The judgment of the faithful and the unfaithful, Luke 12:35-48

As we come to this passage of scripture today, we must remember that we are entering into the middle portion of an ongoing sermon of Jesus Christ.  Therefore, we must keep in mind the context of this sermon, what has been said so far.  For Christ is building a message, precept upon precept.  And in order to correctly understand what we are looking at today, we must remember what Christ has already been preaching, and consider it in that context.

So what has Christ said so far in His message?  Well, He started out criticizing the Pharisees who He said were hypocrites.  The sin of hypocrisy, you will remember, is thinking that you are hiding your sin while outwardly putting on a religious front.  And the Pharisees were very good at that.  But Jesus says, that which is hidden in the heart, God actually sees.  And one day, God will reveal the hearts of men at the judgment.  He said that we should fear God who has the power to not only take away life, but is able to cast the soul of man into hell.

And this is really the theme of the message up to this point, to show that there is coming a day of reckoning for every man and woman on earth.  He illustrated it with the parable of the rich man, who stored up treasures on earth and thought he was going to be able to live luxuriously for the rest of his life and enjoy himself.  But God called him a fool, and said that that night his soul would be required of him.

But to his disciples, Jesus reiterates that they should not concern themselves with the things of this world such as clothing and food and shelter.  But rather they should be concerned with the things of the kingdom of God.  He teaches them the principle that if they seek first the kingdom of God, then all the earthly things will be added unto them.

So this has been the emphasis of Jesus message up to now, to contrast the life of the citizen of the kingdom who is working for the kingdom and investing in the kingdom with the life of the unconverted person, who is living a self indulgent life for his own interests.  Jesus is speaking primarily to his disciples in saying that God has chosen gladly to give them the kingdom, and so in return they should work for the kingdom, put the kingdom of God first in their lives, and lay up treasure in the kingdom of heaven.

So Jesus continues with this theme in this next section.  He teaches that there will be a day of reckoning for all men and women, and that those that are of the kingdom of God will be rewarded according to their works for the kingdom, but those that are not of the kingdom of God will be judged accordingly.  But Jesus introduces a new concept here in this passage.  He is not just talking about a person dying and going to receive his reward, but He also introduces the principle that He Himself will one day come back and be the judge of all things.  In vs. 40, Jesus says, “You too, be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour that you do not expect.”

So this section introduces the essential doctrine of the second coming of Jesus Christ.  He alluded to it in chapter 9 starting in vs. 25, “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?  For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His glory, and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.”  In chapter 10 and 11, Jesus referred to a day of judgment, but now He is adding more specific information.  He is revealing that He Himself is coming back to bring judgment to the earth.  He makes that clear in the next passage which we will look at next week; in vs.49 He says He came to cast fire upon the earth.  And in vs. 51, He says, “Do you suppose that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division.” Matthew records Him saying at another time virtually the same thing but in a more direct method, “Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” (Matt. 10:34)  He is coming again to divide the sheep from the goats, the righteous from the unrighteous.  To bring reward to the righteous and judgment upon the unrighteous.

Jesus illustrates what I have been saying to you for some time now.  That there is a progressive nature to the gospel, especially in regards to revelation.  There is a principle that as you believe and obey, God will give you more.  And that is borne out by this passage.  But with that revelation comes responsibility.  That is why the principle of faith is always connected to the principle of obedience.

Listen, the gospel is simple enough that a child can accept it and be saved.  That is why Jesus said that one must enter the kingdom as a little child.  A childlike faith is characterized by trusting and obeying. So Jesus invited  children to be brought to Him.  But though the gospel is simple, yet it is also a mystery.  And as a mystery it is understood in a progressive nature as we grow up in Christ and maturity is tied directly to obedience and perseverance.  In other words, there is no such thing as being converted and yet remaining unchanged any more than it is possible for a child to remain a child and never grow up.

Today the church in America is in crisis because the gospel has been dumbed down to the point of some sort of relationship without any sort of responsibility.  But this passage is one of many that illustrate that concept is at odds with the full counsel of God’s word.  I don’t know if any of you are familiar with the working of a plumb line.  In it’s simplest form it is a weight that is tied to a string.  And the string is let down from a height to determine a straight line to reveal if something is true, or straight.

I believe God’s word is the plumb line of truth.  I believe that truth is absolute. God has given us the word of God that we might know the truth and that the truth would set us free.  But we have a responsibility to rightly divide the word of truth as it says in  2Tim. 2:15; “Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”  Why would someone be ashamed?  Because on the day of judgment they will find out that they did not correctly divide the word of truth.  Their lack of scholarship resulted in a flawed doctrine which will make them ashamed at His coming.

And so I am afraid that there are a number of doctrinal issues in which the church today is being deceived.  We looked at that last Wednesday evening in regards to the spiritual warfare that we are engaged in. We were reminded that Satan is the father of lies and a great deceiver, and that his strategy has always been to subvert the truth.   That’s why Eph. 6 tells us that the first piece of armor that we are to put on is the belt of truth.  All the other armor hinges upon the truth.  Our doctrine of grace hinges upon the truth.  Our doctrine concerning the nature of God hinges upon the truth.  Our doctrine of faith hinges upon the truth. All of these things are rendered ineffective if truth is lacking.  Our very salvation is dependent upon the truth.

But truth in the Bible is revealed by being obedient to the Spirit of truth. John 16:13 says, “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.”   And Paul makes it clear that obedience to the truth results in righteousness; Rom. 6:16, “Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin resulting in death, or of obedience resulting in righteousness?”

In other words, there is a plumb line of truth coming down from heaven which is found in the word of God. 2 Peter 1:20 says that truth is not dependent upon personal interpretation but upon divine revelation.  And we must be responsible, faithful workmen in regards to accurately handling the word of God that we might discern the truth and be obedient to it.  I am concerned that the scheme of Satan has always been to twist and subvert the word of God.  Sometimes that is done by the pendulum swinging too far in one direction or the other.  You can err by using some scriptures and to establish a doctrine but at the expense of ignoring other scriptures. And the end result will be a false doctrine.  Just enough error to cause you to go astray.  But a careful examination of the full gospel of Jesus Christ will put things in the correct balance.

Let me give you some examples;  the scriptures teach that God is love, but God is also just.  It teaches that God is merciful, but God is also the faithful and righteous judge.  The gospel offers salvation, but there is also damnation.  There is a heaven, but there is also a hell.  And in practically every doctrine of the faith, you will find this sort of balance.  There is the doctrine of election and predestination, and there is also a doctrine of free will, that whosoever will may come.  They both have to be taken together, and rightly dividing the truth is comparing scripture to scripture and under the guidance of the Holy Spirit bringing all of it together as the truth.

I say all of this because there is a degree of either laziness, or apathy or selfish motivation that has permeated what passes for church doctrine today.  And so many are teaching only a piece of the gospel.  Let me tell you something folks; the gospel starts in Genesis chapter one and continues to Revelation 22.  Churches today are teaching grace without growth, love without responsibility, salvation without sanctification.  And it really gets worse and worse by the decade.  There is very little talk of heaven in most churches today because they want to believe that the best that God has for us is available right here and now.  There is practically nothing taught about judgment today.  Hell is a non-topic.  But in the 18th and 19th centuries of the Great Awakening, most sermons were about either heaven or hell.  Jonathan Edwards best known  message was “Sinners in the hands of an angry God.”  He read his message aloud and half way  through people were sobbing and weeping and prostrating themselves on the floor in repentance and getting right with God.  Today if a pastor read that message from the pulpits of most evangelical churches he would be run out of the church in a heartbeat on the grounds that he was a legalist and uncompassionate.

Today the typical message on a Sunday morning in most churches is often on topics  like “Seven steps to financial freedom.”  A pastor I know personally very well recently kicked off a new series of messages on Sunday mornings at his church on the Daniel Plan.  The Daniel Plan, for those of you that haven’t heard of it, is a diet plan book written by Rick Warren.  And for a certain price you can buy a sermon series from him, complete with diet books and helpful guidelines for healthy living which are suitable for small group meetings.  And if you really want to do it up right, you can incorporate special workouts at the church as well. It’s a big hit.  It’s exactly what the self absorbed modern Christian wants to hear. I think a better title for the book might have been, “How to have your cake and eat it too.” Churches today are doing away with midweek Bible studies and adding exercise classes but 1Tim. 4:8 says that “bodily exercise is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.”

Folks, there is something seriously wrong with the church today in America when this sort of stuff passes for preaching the word of God.  What should be clear from the teaching of Jesus in this passage is that the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of this world are diametrically opposed.  That friendship with the world is enmity with God.  That you are either laying up treasures on earth or you are storing up treasure in heaven.  Jesus preached unapologetically that message.  And He called anyone who focused on this world either a hypocrite or a fool.  There was no middle ground with Jesus.  You were either working for the kingdom of God or you are working for the kingdom of yourself.  Jesus said, where your treasure is, there is your heart also.

So Jesus adds now another dimension to this sermon.  In vs. 35 He says, “Be dressed in readiness, and keep your lamps lit.”  The KJV puts it more literally; “let your loins be girded…”  It comes from Exodus 12, when God told Moses in the instructions concerning the Passover, that they were to eat it standing up with their staff in their hand and their loins girded.  They were to tie their robes up under their belt in order to be able to move fast.  In other words, they were ready to march.  They were ready to go out of the land of Egypt on a moment’s notice.  And that is what Jesus is saying here.  If you are a citizen of the kingdom of heaven, then you are to have that attitude of readiness.  You are ready to leave this world.  You are looking forward to the next world.  This world is not your home.

But since we are looking at Ephesians 6 this week on Wednesday, I can’t help but remind you of the first piece of our spiritual armor that is described in Eph. 6:14,  “Stand firm therefore, HAVING GIRDED YOUR LOINS WITH TRUTH.”  Truth is tied to that idea of readiness, isn’t it?  If you have the plumb line of truth as your foundation, then you will be ready when Jesus comes.

And then He says “keep your lamps lit.”  Now what does that mean?  Well, for one it is a reference to  Psalm 119:105, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”  But it also can refer to a parable Jesus gave in Matt. 25 about the ten virgins.  In the story, Jesus tells of ten virgins who were waiting for the bridegroom.  And five of them were foolish and five were wise.  The foolish ones did not bring enough oil and so their lamps went out.  But the wise virgins had brought extra oil, so when the bridegroom came late, the foolish virgins were without lamps and were left out of the wedding feast.  Whereas the wise virgins refilled their lamps and so had light in their lamps and they were ready when the bride groom came.

Well, what does that all mean?  The most obvious meaning is that we are to be waiting and ready for the appearing of the bridegroom who is Jesus Christ.  But there is another implication in the oil for the lamps.  Without oil, the lamps go out.  Oil is a picture of the Holy Spirit.  So what this is signifying is that there is a need for being constantly filled with the Holy Spirit.  In Ephesians 5 we looked at that principle in vs.18 which says, “And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit.”  It is talking about a constant supply from  the Holy Spirit that comes as a result of being obedient to the Holy Spirit.

The opposite of being filled with the Holy Spirit is to be drunk with wine; out of control, of dissipation which is self indulgence.  But Gal 5:22 tells us what being filled with the Spirit produces:  “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.” Paul is saying that walking by the Spirit is putting to death the deeds of the flesh, it’s passions and it’s desires and having self control.  That’s a Spirit filled life.

And so Jesus is saying that we are to be ready for His return.  That means girding our loins with truth, and keeping our lamps lit by walking in obedience to the Spirit.  Jesus continues in vs. 36; “Be like men who are waiting for their master when he returns from the wedding feast, so that they may immediately open the door to him when he comes and knocks.”   To understand the metaphor Jesus is using here you have to understand the Jewish wedding ceremony of that time period. There were three stages to a Jewish wedding in that day. The first was engagement - a formal agreement made by the fathers. The second was betrothal - the ceremony where mutual promises are made. The third was marriage - approximately one year later when the bridegroom came at an unexpected time for his bride.

So Jesus is referring here to the bridegroom’s friends that were part of the wedding party.  They would have been preparing the house for him to return with his bride.  Jesus is saying that blessed are those men that are waiting and ready for the bridegroom.  These are the faithful men who have been preparing for his arrival.  Now look at what He says He will do when He finds them ready.

Vs. 37, ““Blessed are those slaves whom the master will find on the alert when he comes; truly I say to you, that he will gird himself to serve, and have them recline at the table, and will come up and wait on them.” Here is the principle; those that have been faithful in serving Christ, will one day be invited to His marriage supper in which He will serve them. In Revelation 19 there is a prophecy concerning the marriage supper of the Lamb.  It is a metaphor of the time of celebration and consummation between the Lamb of God and His bride, the church.  But it is also a prophecy concerning the judgment that comes upon the earth.  Following the invitation of the marriage supper of the Lamb in Revelation 19:9,  John writes in vs. 11, “And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself. He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God.” “From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty.”  So those that are ready are invited to the marriage supper, but those that are not are judged by the Word of God.

So even though Jesus has just commended the faithful slaves who were ready when He came, now in an almost contradictory fashion Jesus adds this warning in vs. 39, “But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have allowed his house to be broken into. You too, be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour that you do not expect.”  Allow me to emphasize what Jesus said.   Jesus is coming again at a time you do not expect.  I think far too much attention is given today to trying to figure out all the signs and prophecies concerning the future, and not enough emphasis given concerning our present responsibility to be about the business of the kingdom of God. Jesus doesn’t elaborate on all the details that we like to focus on.  He doesn’t mention a rapture, for instance.  He just says He is coming back and we need to be ready.

Let’s restate vs.39 like this.  If you knew that Jesus was coming back tomorrow at midnight, what would you do during those last 36 hours?  Jesus is basically saying that you need to live like it’s your last hours on earth.  Because it just might be.

This teaching is sort of unnerving for most of us Christians, isn’t it?  We like to think that we don’t have anything to worry about because we are good to go.  To quote Crocodile Dundee, “Me and God be mates.”  We want to believe that we have nothing to worry about because somewhere in our past we walked an isle, or said a sinner’s prayer or had some sort of spiritual experience.  And so we can sympathize with Peter’s question in vs. 41, “Lord, are You addressing this parable to us, or to everyone else as well?”  “Hey Lord, you’re not talking about us are you? Certainly not us.  Right?” Peter wants to know if they are off the hook or not.

Well we can have all kinds of theological debates and try to wriggle out of the following passage in a number of different ways.  But since Jesus didn’t let Peter off the hook, I won’t let you off the hook either.  However, I would challenge you to just consider the plain truth of what Jesus is saying.  If you asked Peter’s question of Jesus that day and this is what He answered you, what would you think?  Let’s just take Jesus’ entire answer at face value for a moment.

Vs. 42-48  is Jesus answer to Peter’s question. “And the Lord said, ‘Who then is the faithful and sensible steward, whom his master will put in charge of his servants, to give them their rations at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But if that slave says in his heart, ‘My master will be a long time in coming,’ and begins to beat the slaves, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk; the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know, and will cut him in pieces, and assign him a place with the unbelievers.  And that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many lashes, but the one who did not know it, and committed deeds worthy of a flogging, will receive but few. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more.”

Well, I don’t imagine that that answer let Peter and the disciples off the hook.  Here is the gist of what Jesus is saying.  If you are a faithful and sensible steward who is found doing what he was commanded to do, then you will be rewarded with good things.  But if you are a foolish steward who is sinful and does what is pleasing to himself then you will receive punishment.

We can slice and dice that statement any number of ways in an effort to get ourselves off the hook so to speak.  But I can suggest how Peter might have answered that himself a few years later because he did so in 1Pet. 4:17, “For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?”  Here is what Jesus’ statement means at the very minimum.  It means that you can’t separate faith and obedience. It means that if you are filled with the Spirit then you will do the works of the Spirit.  It means according to James 2:26 that faith without works is dead.  It means according to Matt. 7:20 that you will know them by their fruits.  Not by their professions, but by their works. Matt. 7:21, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.”  Listen, God isn’t interested in a kingdom of people who only give lip service and then go live like they want.  That was the picture of Gideon’s army.  Those that laid down and lapped the water like a dog could go home.  God didn’t want them in his army.  He would rather have a few that were ready and willing than thousands of self indulgent soldiers in name only.

There is one final aspect to this statement that I want to examine quickly in closing.  It is a warning to me and to you, of this I can assure you unequivocally. Jesus said, “And that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many lashes, but the one who did not know it, and committed deeds worthy of a flogging, will receive but few. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more.”

Have you been given much?  Has Christ not given His precious blood for your salvation?  There can be no greater gift than the gift of our salvation.  There can be no greater gift than the gift of God’s word.  There can be no greater gift than the gift of the Holy Spirit.  And the word of God was given that we might know His will.  The Holy Spirit was given that we might understand His word and have the power to do God’s will. But Jesus says if we know His will and did not get ready or act in accordance to His will, we will receive many lashes.

You know, I have to bear that burden as a preacher. James 3:1 says, “Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment.”  But all of us have to bear that burden to some extent.  Because to some extent we are all teachers.  If not by our words, then by our actions.  Your life is a testimony to what you believe.  You are teaching others by what you do or don’t do.

Listen, don’t get mad at me.  I have to tell you what Jesus says or I will receive greater judgment for my dereliction of duty.  As Jesus said in vs. 48, “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more.”  I would just close with this question, “how are you doing with what God has given you?”  Modern Christians love to claim the gifts, but what is that grace producing?  Are you using your life to further the kingdom?  Or are you using it on your own pleasures and passions?  Are you a faithful and sensible steward that is about the kingdom of God?  Jesus says you are going to be held accountable for what you have been given.  From His simplest commands to His noblest aspirations for us, as we have been entrusted with much we shall be asked of much.  Jesus says one day there will be a judgment and you will be judged by your fruits.  I hope you are ready and unashamed when that day comes.  That you will be found faithful.  That Jesus might say as in Matt. 25:23, “‘Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.'”

Where your treasure is; Luke 12: 21-34

There is a dangerous tendency when coming across a passage of Scripture such as this one, to isolate these verses from it’s context.  It’s dangerous because when you do that, what you end up with is a flawed doctrine.  And a flawed doctrine is one that you cannot fully rely upon.  You can’t fully trust it.  It may sound good, it may seem true from a superficial reading, but when a real crisis hits your life that flawed doctrine isn’t going to hold water and it can cause shipwreck to your faith.

A superficial view of this passage would suggest that Jesus is teaching a sort of Christianized version of the song from the Lion King; “Hakuna Matata.”  Or to put it another way, “don’t worry, be happy.”  Such a flawed theology professes that Jesus is promising an unconditional elimination of worry - that a person doesn’t need to be concerned about finances or worry about needs or even worry about any unfulfilled desires you might have because God loves you and wants to fill your life with blessings. God just wants you to be happy.  That’s His ultimate goal for your life.

It kind of reminds me of this plaque that someone gave me the other day.  It was a quote supposedly taken from a text of Scripture in Matthew 21:22.  It had a nice little frame and this artsy lettering which was well suited for hanging somewhere above the kitchen sink.  It said, “Pray for anything, and if you have faith you will receive it.”  I thanked the person who gave it to me, and then I promptly threw it in the garbage can.  Not only is it a poor translation of the original scripture, but that statement on a plaque over the window  proposes a blanket doctrine devoid of all context, and yet only within the proper context can it be truly understood.  It was never intended to be a cure-all statement akin to rubbing a genie bottle.

We have to avoid the tendency to prescribe to platitudes that are supposedly formed on Scripture, yet cannot be fully understood without considering the framework in which they were given.   For instance, in this passage Jesus is not advocating a carefree, hakuna matata lifestyle, in which God is obligated to work out every wish and desire that I have, irrespective of His will.  As if God’s reason for existence is to serve me and my desires.  No, the fact is that these promises are conditional upon the fulfillment of certain principles of the kingdom of heaven.  IF you are a citizen of the kingdom of heaven, IF you have as your priority the priorities of the kingdom of heaven, IF you are living for the kingdom of heaven, then these things are true.

Notice Jesus is speaking to his disciples. These promises are never intended for all men in general. These promises are only for those who have sacrificed everything for the sake of the kingdom.  These are people that have given up this world, given up their jobs, given up their religion, given up their families, given up their source of wealth or income, to follow Jesus.  Peter acknowledged this in  Matt.  19:27, “Then Peter said to Him, “Behold, we have left everything and followed You; what then will there be for us?”  And Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on His glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for My name’s sake, will receive many times as much, and will inherit eternal life.”

Notice that Jesus isn’t suggesting that He will restore all their fortunes in this life on this earth. But Jesus says that in the regeneration, which is the final part of the kingdom when Christ will sit on His throne and we will be resurrected with a glorified body, THEN they will also sit on thrones.  The fact is, on this earth, all of the apostles ended up losing their lives as a martyr, except for John.  Jesus goes on to say that anyone who gives up his possessions or his family here on earth for the sake of the kingdom of God, will receive many times more and will inherit eternal life.  The promise is simply this; that God offers the blessings of His kingdom for those that are willing to give up the earthly rewards of this life for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.  

That is what Christianity really is, by the way.  There are a lot of people running around claiming to be Christians and yet they have never truly renounced sin, they have never given their lives to be lived solely for Christ.  They essentially just added an outward form of Christianity to their lives.  Kind of like the way somebody might add a life insurance policy to their portfolio.  And I cannot help but wonder if a lot of those people are truly saved, whether they are truly children of God.  Salvation is not necessarily obtained through an emotional experience you had sometime in your past.  That may have been a factor in coming to Christ, but somewhere along the line there needs to be a recognition that salvation is an exchange; not only an exchange of your sins for Christ’s righteousness.  But also an exchange of your priorities for God’s priorities.  An exchange of your goals for Christ’s goals.  An exchange of your desires for God’s desires.  An exchange of your life, for His life lived through you.  Don’t kid yourself, folks, anything less than that is not salvation. Anything less is just religion. It’s just adding a little Jesus like a good luck charm to your life to help you accomplish all that your goals.  But that ain’t salvation.

Salvation means to be transferred from the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of this world, to the kingdom of God.  You once were of the world system, you were captured by the sin of this world and were under the domination of the ruler of this world, Satan.  But when the grace of God appeared, Christ transferred you to the kingdom of God, and that resulted in a change of mind, a change of heart and a change of action. Titus 2:11 says, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession, [who are] zealous for good deeds.”

So when you consider all that Jesus has been saying in our text, it is obvious that the characteristic of a citizen of the kingdom of God is a complete surrender of your will to God’s will.  He started off in vs. 1 by saying that anything less than a transformed heart resulting in a change of behavior is hypocrisy; it’s not really salvation.  It’s just empty religion unless the heart is changed and that transformation will produce a behavior change, or else it’s not real.

Then Jesus says in vs. 2, 3 that God sees the heart.  Nothing is hidden from God; not your thoughts, not your motivations, everything is laid open before the eyes of God.  And then Jesus tells us in vs.5 to fear God! Now that would seem a direct contradiction to the passage we are looking at today.  How do you fear God and not worry at the same time?  Well the answer is that those that are not really a citizen of the kingdom of God should fear God who will cast them into hell one day. But those that are of the kingdom of God don’t need to fear Him, because those that are truly His children do what He wants them to do and He takes care of them.

Jesus then goes on to teach the disciples in vs. 15 that kingdom life is not about accumulating possessions.  That’s the world view, the view of the kingdom of darkness is to say that he who dies with the most toys wins.  That we should just focus on being happy and whatever brings you happiness is ok.  But God doesn’t promise you a perpetual state of happiness as a Christian.  And blessings are not measured by material things.  That view is contrary to Scripture.  But Jesus calls that kind of thinking the plans of a fool, and He says that judgment awaits such a person who thinks and lives a materialistic life.  Jesus says in vs. 21 that rather than being focused on the riches of this world, we need to focus on being rich towards God.

So that’s the context in which these promises are placed.  They are first and foremost for the citizens of the kingdom of God who are living for the kingdom and who have died to the things of this world. They have renounced the world’s view of life, and are living solely for the kingdom of God.  The overarching principle to understanding all of this is found in vs. 31, “But seek His kingdom, and these things will be added to you.”  Matthew adds the phrase, “seek first His kingdom…”  The priority of the kingdom of God in your life is the condition by which all these things are so.

You know, I hate to sound harsh, but for some people we could just stop right here.  There is no sense in going on about all these promises that God has for us if we are still living carnal lives that are only concerned with our needs and our desires.  If your allegiance to God is dependent upon getting what you want in this life, then you might as well just stop right here.  Because that is not Christianity, that is not discipleship and that is not the hallmark of true salvation.  If you love this life more than you desire the next, and you’re not willing to give up this life in exchange for the one that God has for you, then you are fooling yourself.  The promises of God have no place in you.

Don’t be deceived, Christ is not talking about an easy believism, “name it and claim it” type of Christianity.  That is why back in vs. 11 He says, “When they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not worry about how or what you are to speak in your defense, or what you are to say; for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.”  This isn’t some idle speculation.  This is a promise founded on a prophecy that they would be brought up before trial for what they believed. They would give up their lives for the gospel.

It’s sad that the gospel of Jesus Christ that not only the apostles were martyred for, but thousands upon thousands of men and women through history have died for has been watered down and twisted and perverted to the point that it has been reduced to the prosperity doctrine that it has become today.  In it’s modern dilution, the gospel has neither the power to deliver from sin nor the power to save.  But that is not the true gospel and that is not the gospel of our forefathers in the faith.  Those men and women are described in Hebrews as those that “looked for a city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God.”  “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.”  “But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.”

I recently read the story of such a man of faith as that which I would like to share with you. In a book first printed in 1890, John Ryle describes the death of Rowland Taylor, who was executed in England because he believed that priests could marry and that the bread and wine of communion did not become the actual, literal, body and blood of Jesus.

 On the last day of January 1555, Taylor appeared with two others before the Bishop of Winchester, and was charged with heresy and dividing the church. When they refused to change their minds, they were condemned to death. When condemned, they replied back to the Bishop, "We know that God, the righteous Judge, will require our blood at your hands, and the proudest of all of you shall repent this receiving again of Antichrist, and of the tyranny you now show against the flock of Christ."

On February 4, Taylor was kicked out of the priesthood, and that night, his wife and son were permitted to eat dinner with him. After dinner they left, with much affection and tears. The next day, he was led out to Hadleigh to be executed, so that he would be burned to death in the city where he served as a pastor and in front of his congregation.

When the left the London jail on the morning of February 5, it was still dark. Taylor's wife suspected he might be taken that morning, so she waited with her two daughters outside the jail. When she called out to him, the sheriff allowed her to come with her daughters for one last meeting with her husband. Rowland Taylor took his little daughter Mary up in his arms, while Elizabeth knelt with him and said the Lord's Prayer. They prayed together, then kissed and hugged, and Taylor said to his wife: "Farewell, my dear wife: be of good comfort, for I am quiet in my conscience. God shall raise up a father for my children." He kissed his daughter Mary and said, "God bless you, and make you His servant;" and, kissing Elizabeth, he said, "God bless you. I pray you all stand strong and steadfast to Christ and His Word." As he was led away, his wife called out, "God be with you, dear Rowland: I will, with God's grace, meet you at Hadleigh."

The journey from London to Hadleigh took several days, and all along on the trip, Rowland Taylor was joyful and merry, as if he were going to a banquet or a party. But on February 9, 1555, they came into Hadleigh. When they were still two miles from town, Taylor leapt off his horse and started on foot-but he was walking fast, almost as if he were dancing. The sheriff asked him how he felt, and he said, "Well, God be praised, good master sheriff, never better; for now I know I am almost at home … even at my Father's house... O good Lord, I thank You! I shall yet once before I die, see my flock whom You, Lord, know I have most heartily loved and most truly taught. Good Lord, bless them, and keep them steadfast in Thy Word and truth."

When they came into Hadleigh, they put a hood over his head and came over a bridge. At the foot of the bridge was a poor man with five children, who cried out, "O dear father and good shepherd, Dr. Taylor, God help you, as you have many a time helped me and my poor children." The streets were crowded on both sides with people who wanted to see him; when they saw him being led to death, they cried and wept with all their strength. People cried out, "Ah, good Lord, there goes our good shepherd from us, that so faithfully has taught us, so fatherly has cared for us, and so godly has governed us. O merciful God! What shall we poor scattered lambs do? What shall come of this most wicked world? God Lord, strengthen him and comfort him." Taylor answered back, "I have preached to you God's Word and truth, and am come this day to seal it with my blood."

When they came to the town square, he heard a great multitude and asked where they were. When they told him they were at the place he would be executed, he said "Thank God, I am even at home," and he took the hood from his head. When the people saw his face, there was an outpouring of emotion. They wept and cried out, "God save you, good Dr. Taylor! Jesus Christ strengthen you; the Holy Spirit comfort you," and many other such things. Taylor wanted to speak to the people one last time, but as soon has he opened his mouth, a guard put a spear right up to his open mouth, and made him stop.

He started giving away his clothes-first his boots, then his coat and jacket, till all he had left was his pants and shirt. He then cried out with a loud voice, "Good people, I have taught you nothing but God's Holy Word, and those lessons that I have taken out of God's blessed Book, the Holy Bible; and I am come here today to seal it with my blood." But then one of the guards clubbed him over the head and said, "Is that keeping your promise of silence, you heretic?" So, seeing he could not speak, he knelt down to pray. A poor woman came to kneel beside him and pray, and the guards tried to push her away but she would not go.

When he had prayed, he came to the stake he would be tied to and he kissed it, stepped into a barrel, and stood with his hands folded in prayer and his eyes towards heaven as they tied him to the stake. After some agonizing delays, they finally lit the fire, and Rowland Taylor prayed out loud: "Merciful Father of heaven, for Jesus Christ my Saviour's sake, receive my soul into Your hands." Then he stood perfectly still as the fires arose around him, without crying or moving, until a guard clubbed him on the head and his brains fell out, and his dead corpse fell into the fire. A marker was left that simply said, 1555: Dr. Taylor, in defending that which was good, at this place left his blood.

It is obvious that this man loved the kingdom of heaven more than all this world had to offer.  And though such a story might seem drastic to our 21st century ears, such an attitude is the hallmark of true discipleship.  For those that are willing to bow their knee to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in every facet of their lives, then Christ promises that God will take care of them. They need not worry about earthly things such as food and clothing.  They have a higher calling.  They have been commissioned by God Almighty.  And though they may suffer the loss of all things here on earth, God will reward them.  God the righteous judge will one day set things aright.  This life lasts but a moment.  But eternity lasts forever.  The riches of this world will one day be burned up, but the riches laid up in heaven will  never fade away.  But some of you are clinging to the things of this world, and in so doing precluding the promises of the next.

Jesus says in vs. 22 to those willing to forsake all to follow Him: “For this reason I say to you, do not worry about your life, as to what you will eat; nor for your body, as to what you will put on.  For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing.”  It has taken me almost half my life to come to realize that it is far better to have lived for the Lord and have little, than to live a lifetime without Him but have much. It is far better to burn out for Christ, than to rust away in the world.

Here is the principle; God will take care of His own. “Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap; they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them; how much more valuable you are than the birds!”  David said in  Psalm 37:25, “I have been young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread.”  Now that is a general principle about God’s provision.  And without contradiction listen to how Paul said that is worked out in his life; Phil. 4:12, “I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.”  Paul was sold out for Christ.  He said he considered all the things of this world as rubbish in comparison to knowing Christ.
And so Paul knew he could trust Christ to take care of him.

The citizen of the kingdom of heaven must first come to give his life to God to use as He wills and trust that God values His life and will use it for His glory.  Jesus explains the freedom that comes from having that understanding in vs. 25, “And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span? If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why do you worry about other matters?”

And Jesus illustrates that with an example of the flowers in a field.  Now at first reading this seems to be about clothing.  But I don’t think it’s talking about clothing at all.  I think Jesus is saying to consider how meticulously God created the flowers and how beautiful they are.  They are a picture of our lives which are precious to God.  And yet those flowers are so short lived that they are here today and gone tomorrow.  But how much more value are we than the flowers. Let’s read vs. 28  “But if God so clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, how much more will He clothe you? You men of little faith!”  Isaiah 40 says, “All flesh is grass, and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field.” Our lives are but a fleeting vapor.  We can’t hold onto it.  We can’t add to it.  But if we are citizens of the kingdom, then Jesus promises that our lives will count for something if we give them to God for Him to use.

Jesus continues to contrast the way people of the kingdom of God are as opposed to the kingdom of this world. Vs. 29, “And do not seek what you will eat and what you will drink, and do not keep worrying. For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek; but your Father knows that you need these things.  But seek His kingdom, and these things will be added to you.  Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom.”

There is a book out called “Fearless”, the biography of Adam Brown.  He was a former drug addict who was saved while going to Teen Challenge.  After graduating from college, he joined the Navy to become a member of Seal Team 6.  And one day he paid the ultimate sacrifice by drawing enemy fire to himself in order to save his comrades.  But just before he died he sent a letter to his wife and children which said in part, “I’m not afraid of anything that might happen to me on this earth because I know, no matter what, nothing can take my spirit from me.”  He knew he had eternal life, he knew that he had an inheritance awaiting him in the kingdom of God and so he didn’t fear losing his life here on earth for the sake of a higher calling.

I don’t think that we fully appreciate the nature of this inheritance we have in the kingdom of God.  We have been given the right to be joint heirs with Christ! Listen to  Rom. 8:16, “The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”  I’m afraid that we commonly swap the treasures of heaven for the baubles of this world much like Esau traded his birthright for a cup of stew.  We rightly condemn Esau for making such a dumb trade, but we commonly trade the glory of heaven for the garbage of this world and think nothing of it.

Christ gives one more set of characteristics of those that are children of the kingdom. Vs. 33 “Sell your possessions and give to charity; make yourselves money belts which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near nor moth destroys.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Having no fear, having no worries results in the freedom to give yourself totally and completely to the Lord.  So that rather than accumulating possessions as the rich fool did, the citizen of the kingdom gives his possessions away.  Rather than storing up treasures on earth, the citizen of the kingdom makes a money belt that doesn’t wear out because it’s resource is in heaven.  If God owns the cattle on a thousand hills, the wealth in every mine, then because He is our Father then they are mine as well.  That gives me the freedom to give without my right hand knowing what my life hand is doing, because God my Father has endless resources.

But if my treasures is wrapped up in things of this earth, in my possessions, in the fulfillment of my agenda, my desires, my will, then that shows that my heart is still unregenerate.  My heart never has really been transformed.  If I am afraid to live fully and unreservedly for the kingdom of God, then that shows that I have a heart that is still trapped in the kingdom of darkness.  Or at the very least, I show that I have allowed the enemy to take back territory that was claimed for the kingdom of God.

Listen, if we claim to be a child of the King, a citizen of the kingdom of God, then we should act like it.  We should live fearlessly, fully throwing ourselves into the work of the kingdom and not allow ourselves to get caught up again in the worries of this world. 2Pet. 2:20, “For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.”

I am going to close with a warning from Hebrews 12, starting in vs. 15. “See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled; that there be no immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal. For you know that even afterwards, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance, though he sought for it with tears.  For you have not come to a mountain that can be touched and to a blazing fire, and to darkness and gloom and whirlwind, and to the blast of a trumpet and the sound of words which sound was such that those who heard begged that no further word be spoken to them.  For they could not bear the command, “IF EVEN A BEAST TOUCHES THE MOUNTAIN, IT WILL BE STONED.” And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, “I AM FULL OF FEAR and trembling.” But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which speaks better than the blood of Abel.  See to it that you do not refuse Him who is speaking. For if those did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape who turn away from Him who warns from heaven.  And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, “YET ONCE MORE I WILL SHAKE NOT ONLY THE EARTH, BUT ALSO THE HEAVEN.” This expression, “Yet once more,” denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.  Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire.”

The fruit of hypocrisy, Luke 12: 13-21

The other night my wife and daughter and I were watching an old movie called “It could happen to you.”  It was the story of a guy who did not have the money for a tip at a restaurant and so he told the waitress that if he won the lottery he would give her half of what he won.  So as Hollywood would have it,  that night he finds out he did in fact win the lottery and he ends up having  this great debate with his wife who was not quite so honorable as he was about whether or not to honor the commitment he made to the waitress to split the lottery winnings with her.

Now I don’t want to spoil the movie for you if you haven’t seen it.  And by no means in telling this story should you infer that I endorse playing the lottery.  But I say all that to say that the movie prompted a discussion in my family about what we would do if we won a lot of money  like the man did in the movie. It’s kind of fun to fantasize about what you would do with a couple of million dollars, isn’t it?  I mean, I had it all figured out; how much I would spend on a new car, what new surfing gear I would buy, how much I’d use to pay off bills, how much to invest, the whole works.

And then a couple of days later I started studying for this message.  And I realized that I wasn’t much better than the rich man in Jesus’ parable.   Never once when I played that fantasy scenario of winning the lottery in my mind did I think how I would invest any of that money in the kingdom of heaven. It never crossed my mind to think of spending it on anyone other than myself.  I would hope that in real life I would consider what purpose the Lord would have for that money and that I would use at least a percentage of it for the kingdom.  So I have to say at the outset that on a personal level I was convicted by this parable.

Now what Christ is teaching here in this parable is not so much a diatribe against riches, or against making a lot of money, but what Christ is illustrating is that a man’s heart is revealed by his actions.  This section of scripture is actually a continuation of what we have been looking at for the last couple of weeks.  We first looked at the end of chapter 11 at the nature of hypocrisy, then last week we saw the crisis, the cure and the curse of hypocrisy, and now today we are looking at the fruit of hypocrisy.  The principle that what is in the heart comes out  in our actions.  That is the fruit of hypocrisy that we are examining today in light of the word.

As we look back in the text we see that Jesus was teaching concerning hypocrisy that there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed.  And then, seemingly out of nowhere and completely unrelated to the message, some random guy in the crowd calls out that he wants Jesus to intervene in a family dispute about his inheritance.  And many commentators and students of the Bible scratch their heads and wonder what does this have to do with what Jesus is preaching about?  But when you consider how Jesus uses this as an opportunity to illustrate the principle of hypocrisy, then it becomes clear why Luke includes this interruption here.

So in vs. 13, this random guy yells out to Jesus as He was preaching, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.”  Seems totally unrelated to what was going on, doesn’t it?  But Jesus turns this into an opportunity to teach the truth.  Vs. 14, “But He said to him, “Man, who appointed Me a judge or arbitrator over you?”  Now an arbitrator was a type of judge that settled civil disputes.  And this would have been a position provided through the government or even possibly through the synagogue to judge civil affairs, matters of property, and boundary lines and so forth.  And even a certain portion of the Levitical law was given to arbitrate in civil matters, because the people of God were designed to operate under a theocracy, and the priests and rabbis and synagogue officials would implement that function of arbitrator in the Jewish community.

But Jesus doesn’t want to get sidelined by that sort of petty legal wrangling.  Jesus said to Nicodemus in  John 3:17 that “God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.”  See, it’s not that Jesus didn’t care about the man’s petty problems.  But His purpose in coming to earth was not to settle property disputes but to save men’s hearts.  Jesus knew that when the heart is right with God, then a right heart will produce right actions.  The way to bring peace on the earth was not for Him to set up a throne in Jerusalem and start hearing court cases in an effort to help people to start getting along, but the way to bring peace on the earth is to convict men of their sinful nature, have them repent and be saved, and then their new heart will produce works of righteousness. Eph. 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”

So Jesus is concerned with the heart of man.  God told Samuel that man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.  And so this whole teaching then comes out of His earlier teaching about hypocrisy and sin being likened to leaven, which produces fermentation in the loaf of bread and how that corruption becomes evident by the bread rising.  In other words, what is in the heart is revealed in one’s actions.  And so following up on that message, Jesus is going to use this man’s question to segue into another manifestation of hypocrisy which is the sin of greed.

So first Jesus gives the principle. Look at vs. 15, “Then He said to them, “Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.”    Notice first of all that this principle starts off with a warning, “Beware, be on your guard…”  Basically the same thing He said earlier in regards to hypocrisy in vs. 12.  “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.” Beware of hypocrisy, beware of greed.  Both are indicators of a corrupt spiritual nature. Both are the fruit of an evil heart.

So be on your guard, beware every form of greed, for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.  The point Jesus is making is very critical, especially with the modern prosperity view of Christianity that is so prevalent today.  The point is this, that abundance isn’t evidence of an abundant life.  Or to put it another way, earthly blessings don’t necessarily produce a godly life.  Or simply, abundant life is defined as much more than the sum total of your possessions.  But I will tell you what a godly life does produce -  a godly life produces blessings to others.  A godly life gives as God gives, loves as God loves, is faithful as God is faithful. A godly life is not measured by possessions, but by godly fruit.

See the type of life Jesus is talking about is not a quality of life defined by possessions, or how much you make, or what you have achieved in social stature or worldly fame, but the Greek word used for life is zoe, which means real life, the fullness of life designed for man by the Creator.   Jesus said in John 10:10 “I came that they may have life, and have it more abundantly.”  Same word, zoe, talking about the fullness of everlasting life, and yet so many people today want to take this to mean the exact opposite of what Jesus is talking about.  They want to use this verse to claim that God is promising prosperity in earthly possessions and wealth.  We have somehow gotten the wrong view of Christianity here in America.  It’s a view that God loves Christians in America more than Christians in China, or Russia, or Africa.  And as an extension of that love we are somehow guaranteed a lifestyle that is light years away from what the other parts of the body around the world would dare to even dream of.  Even those of us that live at the poverty level in America are wealthy by the  standards of most Christians in those countries.

Christians today too often equate prosperity with blessing.  Such a mindset indicates that we have fallen for the seduction of the world.  Our minds have been conformed to the world rather than being transformed into the image of Christ.  But Jesus is saying here that abundant life is not found in possessions.  It’s not found in wealth.  An abundant life is found in a transformed heart.  And to illustrate that He gives them a parable.

Vs. 16, “And He told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man was very productive.”  In other words, a rich man made a lot of money from his farmland.  The Bible says that God causes it to rain on the just and the unjust, on the righteous and the unrighteous.  Romans 2:4 says that God does this so that His kindness will draw men to repentance.  God doesn’t always strike down the ungodly.  God in His sovereign wisdom rains His mercy on both the good and the evil.  His purpose is to show Himself good and to cause men to give thanks to Him.  But gratefulness doesn’t come from the heart of this rich man.  He doesn’t see the hand of God in the land producing a bountiful crop.  He doesn’t see the hand of God in the sunshine or the rain.  But in his arrogance, he sees this all as just the rightful return on his own labor.  You know, I have heard of a lot of rich men that claimed to be self made men.  But I have yet to truly meet one.  No one is self made. God made you.  God gives gifts to men of life, of breath, of health, of the earth and of peace on the earth. And yet very few so called self made men ever thank God for that.

So this rich man won the lottery so to speak.  He got considerably more wealthy from this very productive season.  And in vs. 17 Jesus tells us what the man decided to do with this windfall.  “And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?’ Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.”  Do you see what’s striking about that? There are eight I's and four my's in two verses. That gives us some insight into his heart.  His heart is not spiritual but carnal, and so what he thinks of when he gets this great harvest is himself.  He has no thoughts for others, no thought for the synagogue or the temple, no thoughts of God, but only thoughts for himself.  It’s his money and he will use it for his pleasure and enjoyment.  It’s the natural outpouring of an unregenerate heart.  It’s all self indulgence, self fulfillment and selfish ambition.

See, Jesus is illustrating that what’s in the heart comes out of the mouth, what’s in a man’s heart comes out in their actions or in this case, his heart is revealed by his bank account.  See, Jesus isn’t speaking against the guy making a lot of money, but He is showing that how the man acts in response to money reveals his heart.  I’ve heard it said  before that you can tell a lot about a man by his checkbook.  And I believe you can tell a lot about a man’s faith by his checkbook as well.

 A person who is first of all God’s steward will use his resources for God’s purposes.  I try my best not to talk  very much about money from this pulpit.  I neglect teaching about giving very often to our church’s detriment.  But please understand something.  Jesus is using money here as an illustration only because it has universal application.  He could just as easily be talking about time, or commitment, or responsibility, or faithfulness, or even being a witness.  There are many things that we are commanded to do in the New Testament.  Giving is just one of them.  But money happens to be something that pertains to all of us to one degree or another.

But don’t forget that all of this is coming under the heading of hypocrisy.  See, the flip side of this is that if you are God’s child, if you have a heart for God then that should result in a desire to give back to the Lord.  But the hypocrite claims  some sort of self righteousness, but their lack of fruit, their lack of consistency, their lack of commitment, their lack of generosity prove otherwise.  When  people ask me about their responsibility to tithe, I tell them that tithing is an Old Testament commandment.  We aren’t under that requirement the same way that the Jews were.  But please understand something.  If grace provides more than the law ever could, then shouldn’t being under grace produce more than the law did?  Of course it should.  So being under grace then do you give more or less than the law required? Is grace a license to sin or an impetus to give?  The Bible says that we are not to give under compulsion anymore; that is we’re not under the requirement of the law to tithe.  But it says that God loves a cheerful giver. So then if we give cheerfully, not under compulsion, but under grace, do we give less then than the law required or do we give more?  If you are under the greater law of grace, then is your giving greater or less than the law?  The Biblical principle is that grace doesn’t provide less than the law, grace provides more.

So when people ask me about giving I say you are not under the law of tithing.  The law required 10%.  But you are under grace.  And grace isn’t 10%.  Grace is 100%.  Grace says Jesus paid all your debt that the law could never pay so that He might be Lord of all.  Lord of all of you, all of your resources, all of your energies, all of your affection, all of your service, all of your commitment, all of your faithfulness.  All the law is summarized in two laws;  You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind and all your strength. That’s 100%.  And then you are to love your neighbor as yourself.  That’s 110%.  Going the extra mile.

Listen, when Jesus commended the poor widow that dropped in two half pennies in the box at the temple He said she gave more than all the hypocrites who had come before her giving ten percent because she gave all that she had to live on.  She gave 100%. That was commendable to God.  I’m sure that she willingly gave 100% because she knew the chorus that I used to sing in Sunday School growing up as a boy,  “that He owns the cattle on a thousand hills, the wealth in every mine.  He owns the rivers and the rocks and rills, the sun and stars that shine.  Wonderful riches more than tongue can tell, He is My Father so their mine as well.”

But back in vs.19 the rich man says, ‘And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come; take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”’  The rich man thought he had a pretty good investment strategy.  He had a lot of money in the bank, he had all his needs for the future under control, and he planned on living out his life to a ripe old age enjoying his life, enjoying all that his money could provide.  Jesus presents a picture here of  a life that is characterized by sensuality.  Ease, luxury, taking time off, eating, drinking, and having a good time.  That’s what he thought life was all about.  Money, possessions, vacations, dining out, partying, living the good life.

But Jesus refers to  him in vs. 20 as a fool.  “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your soul is required of you; and now who will own what you have prepared?’ Jesus said in Mark 8:36, “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul? “For what will a man give in exchange for his soul?”  That’s the $10000 question; what will a man give in exchange for his soul?  The answer is simple;  his life.  If you want to save your soul, you must give up your life.  That is what Jesus said in vs. 35, “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.” That is why He calls us to take up our cross and follow Him.  Dying to self, results in life.

The rich fool didn’t die to self.  His life was all about getting more, enjoying more, building more, buying more.  He may even have practiced an external religion, he may even have had all his doctrine and scriptures down pat, but his heart was unregenerate, and his actions revealed his heart’s condition.  You know, there are some so called Christians out there that are like that.  They claim the doctrines of Christianity, but their lives produce very little to convict them of it.  In fact their lives declare something different than they profess is in their hearts.  But what is in the heart eventually comes out.  That is why Jesus said in Matthew 7 that you shall know those that are truly His disciples by their fruits.

God said to the rich fool that this very night he was going to die and someone else would use all that he had acquired.  The Bible says that is appointed unto man once to die and after that the judgment.  That means that all of us are going to die, some sooner and some later.  But we all are going to die.  There is going to be a day of reckoning for all of us. Isaiah 2:12 says, “For the LORD of hosts will have a day of reckoning against everyone who is proud and lofty and against everyone who is lifted up, that he may be abased.”

That’s why Jesus finishes this parable by saying in vs. 21, ““So is the man who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”  Just as there was a day of reckoning for the rich fool, there will come a day when all men’s works are judged. Romans 2:6 says that God will bring about the day of judgment, and He “WILL RENDER TO EACH PERSON ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS: to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, [they will receive] eternal life; but to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness,[they will receive] wrath and indignation. There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good.”

Jesus said in Matthew 6:19, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Listen, the rich fool revealed the nature of his selfish heart by what he did with his treasure.  He laid up his treasure on earth, he put it in barns, and then even bigger barns so he could live a life of self indulgence and pleasure.  He thought of himself only and his needs, his desires.  There was no love for God in his heart.  There was no love for his neighbor in his heart.  And that selfishness of his heart became manifested by his actions.

The sin of hypocrisy is also manifested by our actions.  When we hold onto our rights, our time, our energies, our money and don’t use them for the kingdom of God then we reveal that our hearts are not right with God.  You’re either backslidden or you aren’t saved.  But that kind of selfish heart is not the result of righteousness.

Because righteousness results in right acting.  Righteousness results in storing up treasures in heaven by our deeds here on earth.  And those treasures God will keep and one day reward us for.  But don’t be deceived, where your treasure is, there is your heart.  You want to know the condition of your heart?  Then find out where your treasure is.  Examine what you spend all your time, money and energies on.  Examine your bank account and see where you spend all your money.  Examine your faithfulness and see where you spend all your time.  The proof is not in your profession of your lips, the proof as they say is in the pudding.  Is your heart producing right actions? True Christianity is not all hyper spiritual or theoretical, but it is lived out in the natural realm, it is lived out by producing the fruit of righteousness.  The fruit of grace is that it gives.  The fruit of love is that it loves.  The fruit of righteousness is that it is righteous.  The fruit of faith is that it is faithful.  But the fruit of hypocrisy is greediness. And greed is the fruit of an unrepentant heart.

The crisis, the cure and the curse of hypocrisy, Luke 12:1-12

Last Sunday we looked at the end of chapter 11 and the nature of hypocrisy.  Today we are continuing in that theme starting in chapter 12 and we will be looking at the crisis, the cure and the curse of hypocrisy.

Last time we discussed Jesus statement in 11:39 in which Jesus basically describes the nature of hypocrisy or the definition of hypocrisy as one who cleans the outside, but on the inside they are full of corruption.  I went on to say that the original Greek word for hypocrite referred to an actor in theater, who performed an act on stage for the applause of men.

But I would like to broaden that definition of a hypocrite this week, if I may.  Because I think while that defines a hypocrite in the major sense of the word, it is somewhat limiting.  I like the definition of Martin Lloyd Jones who said hypocrisy is not just someone who is pretending to be something he is not, but it is someone who wants the best of both worlds.  They want to be able to enjoy the pleasures of this world while guaranteeing them the safety of the next.  It is the man who wants to do the minimum necessary to guarantee their safety in regards to the next world.

So therefore, a hypocrite is not only someone who deceives others, but he is someone who deceives himself.  He believes that he is righteous, and as a result he is self satisfied with his present condition.  He sees no need for confession of sin, because he is well content with who he is and what he is doing.  He has deceived himself in regards to his righteousness, and he is content to stay in that condition. This is the crisis of hypocrisy; that the hypocrite has deceived themselves by what is ultimately a form of false religion.

I believe there are three factors that contribute to hypocrisy. The first is a lack of honesty. The hypocrite is not honest with himself nor does he judge the scriptures with integrity. Jer. 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”  He is not willing to open his whole heart to the truth, that God may search him and try him.  David cried out to God in  Psalm 139:23, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”  But the hypocrite protects himself against the truth.  And when the truth touches on his pet concern that he wants to protect, he turns away from the truth or twists the truth for his purposes.  God desires truth in the inward parts. David said,  “If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear me.”

The second factor that contributes to hypocrisy is lack of understanding.  The hypocrite may use religious phrases but he doesn’t understand the meaning of the phrases.  For example; he may say he has confessed Jesus Christ and believes in Him, but he doesn’t understand what it means to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.  It means nothing less than the whole of Christian doctrine.  He uses the phrase but he doesn’t really work out what it means to believe in the LORD Jesus Christ.  Jesus illustrated that in great detail in the Sermon on the Mount when He said you think you say you haven’t committed murder, but actually he who hates his brother is guilty of murder. Jesus goes beyond the letter of the law, and explains the intent of the law of  spirit of the Law.  The hypocrite tends to misinterpret the scripture because they don’t fully understand the things that they are professing.  He has never worked out the conclusions of his own professions.

The third contributing factor of hypocrisy is lack of application; a failure to apply the whole truth to the whole of one’s life.  They may know something on an intellectual level, but they have not applied it on a practical level.  There is a great dichotomy  between what they confess to be with what they appear to be.

Now these three contributing factors produce three types of hypocrites; intellectual, emotional and the practical.  Each are guilty of hypocrisy and yet each denounce the other.  There is the intellectual hypocrite who is  content with an intellectual system or doctrinal system in his mind but does not live it out.  And there is a hypocrite who is characterized by emotions.  He is not necessarily concerned about doctrine, but he has had an experience, or he feels a certain way at certain times.  He doesn’t care much beyond his feelings.  But he persuades himself he is alright because of  his emotional reactions.  And then there is the practical hypocrite: he is not interested in doctrine or emotion, but takes pride in his moral accomplishments.

In every case though they stopped the gospel at a point where they wanted it to stop in order to keep that sin that they were comfortable with, twisting the scriptures to their advantage. They have a form of godliness but they have denied the power of the gospel to transform them.  Because they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God in all it’s fullness as it is revealed in the scripture.  Paul says in 2 Tim. 3:2 that these hypocrites will be characterized by being “lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these. For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith.

This self deception which is hypocrisy is what Jesus is warning against here in chapter 12.  He says to the disciples – note that.  Not to the Pharisees or to those that were not interested in His gospel, but Jesus speaks this warning to those who were His disciples.  “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”

Just a word about leaven by the way.  Leaven is always pictured in the Bible as a form of sin.  That is why the bread eaten at the Passover meal was to be unleavened bread.  Leaven is a lump of dough that is taken from an old loaf of bread and stored until you are ready to make a fresh loaf.  The lump that is stored has already been fermented by yeast.  And that is what is referred to as leaven.  So when they wanted to make a fresh loaf of bread they would take the old lump of leaven and put it, or hide it in the new loaf.  That leaven would then began a process of fermentation.  It would start a corruption process within the new loaf that causes it to emit gases and the bread starts to rise.

Jesus uses this to illustrate the nature of sin and it’s effect on person which produces hypocrisy.  It is self righteousness covering up sin that is unconfessed, that is hidden, and begins a process which eventually causes corruption in the entire body. Paul says in Gal. 5 that a “little leaven leavens the whole lump.”

So Jesus elaborates on that principle of hiding sin in vs. 2. “But there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.”  See, you can have two loaves of dough lying on the kitchen counter.  Someone hides a piece of leaven in one loaf and not the other and for a while they will continue to look the same.  But sooner or later the truth will be revealed.  The leaven will cause the one loaf to rise while the other does not.  This is what Jesus is so brilliantly  illustrating.  Those that hide their sin may appear on the outside as righteous, but sooner or later their sin will begin to manifest itself.  Unconfessed sin is like leaven that starts to spread and corrupt all the body and the hypocrite will eventually become apparent when their actions fail to measure up with their profession.  Sin starts off small and the hypocrite thinks they have concealed it, but it soon corrupts the entire person.

See, God sees the heart, not just the outward appearance.  1 Cor. 4:5 Paul said that the “Lord will bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men’s hearts.”  God sees the heart.  And He will judge the heart by His standard of righteousness  which is not altered by our conceptions of what we think is proper but by His unchanging nature as revealed in His law.  That is what Jesus is saying in vs. 3, ““Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops.” Jesus is saying that one day God will reveal all hypocrisy.  Now that is the crisis of hypocrisy, it is a sinful condition that permeates a person subtly, gradually, but eventually completely corrupts and Jesus warns his disciples to beware this destructive influence of unconfessed sin.

Now then, let’s consider the cure for hypocrisy.  How do we avoid this sinful condition? What can we do to stay away from it? Well Jesus is going to reveal three principles that will keep you from hypocrisy. They sound simple, but like the illustration I gave earlier of the lack of understanding, the real import of these three principles can easily be missed because of the familiarity of the phrases.  But there are three principles to ensure you don’t get caught up in hypocrisy; one; honor God, two; honor Jesus Christ, and three; honor the Holy Spirit. As I said, that sounds simple, but let’s look at what is involved.

Look at vs. 5, "Fear the one who after He has killed has authority to cast into hell." This is where it starts. God must be honored. God must be feared. Prov. 9:10 says
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.”  But hypocrites don't really fear God, they fear men. And they live their lives to please men, they live their lives in an outward show of self righteousness for men’s approval aren’t concerned about righteousness on the inside which is invisible. Jesus said stop fearing men and start fearing God.  Stop worrying about what people think and start worrying about what God thinks.

We need to fear God because one day He will reveal the inward thoughts and motives of our hearts.  In vs. 2, 3 Jesus says God will one day reveal everything we have said, everything we have done.  And we need to fear God because though men have the power to kill the body as Jesus says in vs.4 and 5, God not only has the power to kill the body but also the power to cast your soul into hell.  That’s good evidence by the way for those that don’t want to believe in a literal hell.  They just want to believe that the grave is all there is to death.  If it was, then Jesus wouldn’t make that distinction, would He? He makes a distinction between physical death and hell. And thirdly, we should fear God because He knows everything about us. Vs.6 “Are not five sparrows sold for two cents? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.”

Notice that Jesus starts by saying “fear God” and then ends by saying “do not fear.” The point being that God knows those that are His.  He knows the heart of man, the thoughts of man, even down to the smallest details of our lives.  And in that all compassing knowledge obviously God knows those that are His.  Those that truly fear God have nothing to fear because they are His offspring.  And it’s evident they are His offspring because they exhibit the characteristics of their Father. But those that are of their father the devil do the works of the devil.  So their hypocrisy is evident.

The second principle of curing hypocrisy is to honor the Son.  The way to honor God is by honoring the Son.  Jesus Christ is the manifestation of God.  There is no other way to the Father except by Him.  So in order to honor God you must honor Christ. John 5:23“He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.”

How then do we honor Christ? The answer is in vs. 8; ““And I say to you, everyone who confesses Me before men, the Son of Man will confess him also before the angels of God; but he who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God.”  What is meant then to confess Jesus?  Is it just to admit that Jesus existed?  No, I would submit that it is far more than just recognition of a historical Jesus.  It is a confession that Jesus Christ is Lord and all the doctrinal truth related to that fact. Romans 10:9 says “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”  It means confessing that Jesus Christ has become your Lord, and has a place of Sovereignty over all of your life.  Remember the sin of hypocrisy is hidden sin.  Confessing Christ as Lord is confessing your sin, giving over all of your life to Him to be used for His purposes.  There is a difference between calling Jesus the King of Kings and giving Him all the keys to your kingdom, inviting Him to live in all rooms of your heart.

In Matthew 7:21 Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.”  So it’s not just a confession with their lips, for those people confessed Him with their lips saying “Lord, Lord.”  But it’s the confession of transformed lives that do the will of the Father in heaven.  Jesus said in Luke 9:23 “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” So we die to our desires and live after God’s desires which is what we see Jesus doing.  We are to be like Jesus was, doing the will of the Father.  Dying to self. Living for God.  These aren’t just churchy phrases without meaning.  This is the reality of confessing Jesus Christ as Lord. And this is the basis for our salvation.  If we truly confess Jesus Christ as our Lord, then Jesus will confess us as His in heaven.  But if we deny that Lordship of Jesus Christ and do our will, then He will not confess us in heaven.   Salvation is not just saying a prayer a certain way or walking down an aisle or having some experience that you think might have been spiritual.  Those things might contribute to your coming to Christ, but please understand the truth of salvation; it’s not just Jesus dying on the cross for your sins, it’s taking up your cross and following Him. It’s not adding Jesus to your life, it’s losing  your life that you might live for Him.  It’s not having Jesus come along and grant your dreams and fulfill your ambitions, it is saying no to your dreams and your ambitions and yes to His sovereignty and to His will.  And for those who are willing to confess that, God is willing to grant you the righteousness of Jesus Christ in exchange for your sins.

Thirdly, the cure for hypocrisy is honoring the Holy Spirit. You can't know Christ without the work of the Spirit. It's the Spirit that shows us Christ. It's Christ that shows us the Father. The way to Christ is through the work of the Spirit. The way to the Father is through the work of the Son.  Just as Jesus revealed the Father, the Holy Spirit reveals the Son. We honor the Spirit as the one whose revelation concerning God and Christ has been made known to us. No one comes to God except through Christ. No one comes to Christ except through the Spirit because you can't come to Christ unless you know the truth about Him and you can't know the truth about Him unless you believe the revelation of the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit that tells us about Christ. It is Christ who points us to the Father. To say it again, God is revealed in Christ and Christ is revealed by the Holy Spirit.

Romans 10:17 says, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by  the Word of Christ," Who is the author of the Word of Christ? Who is the author of the New Testament? Who is the author of the Old Testament?  The Holy Spirit.  Peter says "Holy men of God were moved by the Spirit,"  It is the Spirit that has authored the Word. He is the revealer of Christ’s gospel.

The Spirit is the one who gives life, it says in 2 Corinthians 3:6. The Spirit is the one who regenerates, Jesus told Nicodemus in John 3. John 16 says it is the Spirit who convicts the world of sin, righteousness and judgment. And the Spirit does that not in some mystical experience but He does that through Scripture. It is the reading of the Word of God authored by the Spirit that brings the sinner to the reality of his own sinfulness, because it is the Scripture that reveals the Law of God. And measured against that Law, you know you're a sinner and that's how you become convicted of sin and righteousness and the judgment that's revealed in Scripture. You wouldn't know what sin was without the Law. You wouldn't know what righteousness was without the Law. You wouldn't know what judgment was unless God had laid down the punishment for the violation of that Law. So the Spirit brings conviction through the Word. He brings regeneration through exposure to and belief in the Word. And He brings, of course, new life through the Word.

Now look at vs. 10, “And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him.”  To blaspheme simply means to reject Christ.  Everyone who is unconverted has blasphemed Christ.  They have rejected Christ and chosen to ignore the sacrifice that He made for their sins.  They refuse to confess their sins, to repent of their sins.  They don’t think that they need what He has to offer.  And that is blasphemy.  At one time, all of us were blasphemers.  But thank God we that have confessed Jesus as our Sovereign Lord and Savior are granted forgiveness.  But He who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit it will not be forgiven Him.  This verse has caused a lot of people a lot of confusion.  But it should not be confusing to you in light of what we have been teaching.  Blasphemy simply means that they have rejected the conviction of the Holy Spirit. They have rejected the revelation of the Holy Spirit as revealed through His word. If you reject His conviction through His revelation, you can't be saved because there's no other way to come to the truth.

Jesus said in John 15:26, “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.” How does that work?  Well, Jesus was actually conceived by the Holy Spirit we saw that in the beginning of Luke. And at His baptism, according to Luke 3:22, the Spirit of God descended upon Him. And as He began His ministry, you remember back in the fourth chapter of Luke when Jesus began His ministry, it says He went into the wilderness to be tempted but He was full of the Holy Spirit. And when the temptation was over, Luke 4:14, Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. And then He began to announce who He was in the synagogue at Nazareth and He said, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He's anointed Me." And He went through His whole life operating not only in submission to the will of the Father, but in the power of the Spirit.  The Holy Spirit testifying that Jesus was Lord through the works that He did in Christ. And then after Jesus ascended into heaven, the Holy Spirit brought back to the minds of the Apostles all the things that Jesus had taught which were then written down for us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

So here is the curse of the unpardonable sin, it is that of rejecting the testimony of the Holy Spirit through the word of God and His conviction in your heart. Look at Hebrews 10:26, For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE ADVERSARIES.
Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.” And again, “THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE.” It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” Rejecting the promptings of the Holy Spirit, rejecting the conviction of the Holy Spirit is the sin of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit and the final curse that is associated with that is the judgment of God.  You rejected His Gift? Then you are left under the curse.

For those who do honor the Spirit, there's a wonderful promise in the final statement, verse 11 and 12, "When they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not become anxious about how or what you should speak in your defense, or what you should say for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say." Here's a wonderful thing about honoring the Holy Spirit. If you will believe the testimony of the Holy Spirit concerning Christ’s gospel you will have the Spirit as your permanent teacher throughout all your life here on this earth. If you will believe the testimony of the Spirit of God to the truth of Christ, if you will embrace the gospel and believe in what the Spirit has revealed concerning Jesus Christ, the promise is that the Spirit of God will come to take a residence in you and be there even to the severest time when you will be literally have your life on the line and the Spirit of God will sustain you even at that hour.  The Holy Spirit will empower you to do God’s will.  That is yet another  ministry of the Holy Spirit.  He equips us to do the will of God.

How do you avoid the destructive corruption of hypocrisy? How do you come to the full knowledge of the truth? By believing and honoring God as holy, sovereign judge, by honoring the Son as holy, sovereign Lord and Savior and by honoring the Holy Spirit as holy, sovereign revealer of truth. You cannot come to Christ but by the Spirit's testimony as revealed in the full counsel of God’s word. And you cannot come to God but by Christ as Sovereign Lord of all your life and action.