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Sunday 04/21/24
Title: To believe IS to Obey
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To believe IS to Obey
So this is our third week of Eastertide. Just as a memory jogger, Eastertide is a Christian tradition which developed sometime after the 1st century.
By the late 1400’s it has largely been seen as that timespan between the resurrection of Jesus and the giving of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost – making it 7 weeks in duration.
We are not submitting to this as an ongoing tradition here at our church. I just felt it was a good direction for us this year.
There is no real formula for how to celebrate it other than remembering the physical death, burial and resurrection of our Lord Jesus.
Last week we learned that the Gospel of the Kingdom of God was as much a focus to Jesus AFTER His resurrection as it was beforehand!
Now as I told you last week, this is terribly important because we are living in a day where people claim that Jesus’ teachings throughout His ministry were all under the law and so have nothing to do with the New Covenant church.
I took you to several scriptures to demonstrate how that is NOT true, the first of which was Luke 16:16. There Luke records that Jesus told His followers that the Law was until John the Baptist, but since that time the Gospel of the Kingdom has been preached.
Then I showed you several passages where it clearly stated that teaching the good news of the kingdom was the focus of Jesus’ ministry and teaching. Luke 4:43 says, “I must proclaim the good news about the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because I was sent for this purpose.”
Jesus also said in Mark 9:1 –
“Then He said to them, “I assure you: There are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the kingdom of God come in power.“
So Jesus was teaching about a kingdom which was coming, but had not yet arrived but which would arrive by the time the Holy Spirit was given in power on the day of Pentecost.
So it is that everything the Apostles taught was centered on the kingdom of God!
Now last week I was going to introduce a few teachings of Jesus which were, of course, about the kingdom of God and begin teaching on what they are saying to us. However due to some good questions asked by you all we turned our Focus to go deeper where we were and therefore never got to Matthew 21.
So with that little review under our belt let’s begin this week by turning with me to Matthew 21
Virtually any teaching regarding the kingdom of God is directly connected to the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus and our participation with Him in the same.
We will see that as we go through some of Jesus’ parables and teachings.
Matthew 21:28-46,
“(28) But what do you think? A man had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘My son, go, work in the vineyard today.’
(29) “He answered, ‘I don’t want to!’ Yet later he changed his mind and went.”
(30) Then the man went to the other and said the same thing. “‘I will, sir,’ he answered. But he didn’t go.”
(31) “Which of the two did his father’s will?”
“The first,” they said.
Jesus said to them, “I assure you: Tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God before you!”
Now notice that the Pharisees were being likened to the son who said he would obey his father and work in the vineyard but then didn’t. Prostitutes and Sinners and tax collectors were compared with those who at first denied the will of their father but then relented and did the work. Notice also that the vineyard represents the kingdom. Now before we go any further who can tell me what about a Vineyard serves as a good example of the kingdom of God?
So the fruit we produce is a representation of the effect of Jesus’s Rule and reign in our lives. Now I want you to notice how Jesus turns his attention from obedience to belief. We are going to place our Focus here today.
“ (32) For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you didn’t believe him.
Tax collectors and prostitutes did believe him, but you, when you saw it, didn’t even change your minds then and believe him.”
I want you to see what Jesus was actually saying. He was saying that belief produces actions. And those actions are in agreement with Jesus being our Lord. So the connection between belief and works is clearly represented here by what Jesus said.
Now to further drive home the point Jesus said this…
(33) “Listen to another parable:
There was a man, a landowner, who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a winepress in it, and built a watchtower. He leased it to tenant farmers and went away.
(34) When the grape harvest drew near, he sent his slaves to the farmers to collect his fruit. (35) But the farmers took his slaves, beat one, killed another, and stoned a third.
(36) Again, he sent other slaves, more than the first group, and they did the same to them.
(37) Finally, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.
(38) “But when the tenant farmers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him and take his inheritance!’ (39) So they seized him and threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
(40) Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those farmers?”
(41) “He will completely destroy those terrible men,” they told Him, “and lease his vineyard to other farmers who will give him his produce at the harvest.”
(42) Jesus said to them,
“Have you never read in the Scriptures: The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This came from the Lord and is wonderful in our eyes?
(43) Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation PRODUCING ITS FRUIT.
(44) [Whoever falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder!]”
(45) When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they knew He was speaking about them. (46) Although they were looking for a way to arrest Him, they feared the crowds, because they regarded Him as a prophet.”
The mistake many make today is that they NOT ONLY blend covenants, they fail to recognize the difference between Covenants and the character of God.
Covenants change, God does not!
Covenants are binding agreements which God has historically entered into with mankind to bring them to the place He wants them to be.
In the past, all of these covenants promised certain blessings due to obedience.
The New Covenant promises the blessing of changing US into the likeness of God due to our surrender to and trust in Jesus’ obedience!
What has NEVER changed in any covenant is the standard for correct living wbich is God HIMSELF!
“I am the Lord God, I change NOT” – the scriptures say.
It is we who were broken, not God!
The net result of all of this is that if God ever said something was intrinsically true – it still is!
If the topic is regarding character or righteousness you cannot say, “well that is of the old covenant so it doesn’t apply to us”. If it was intrinsically wrong it still is – it doesn’t matter if it’s found in the Old Covenant or the New Covenant.
Now there is a reason why teaching this is important.
If we are to die with Christ and rise to new live with Him as the scriptures teach, then we must understand with clarity what New Life in Christ looks like if lived out!
THAT is what makes all of this infinitely important!
And let me just add this – most of this would not be necessary to clarify and teach if it were not for sin and for bad or false teaching.
Most of THIS teaching is to counteract and give the lie to all of the false teaching which is pervasive in the church and culture today!
If we would just love the Lord our God with all that we are, then we would find ourselves living as we should with little need for instruction but only encouragement.
So now, what do I mean when I say intrinsically wrong?
What I mean by that is something which is wrong IN ITSELF.
There were many things that were made wrong under the Old Covenant in order to serve as an example, a type or a shadow pointing to Christ but which were not intrinsically WRONG.
An example would be clean and unclean foods, becoming defiled by body fluids, touching a corpse making you unclean, ritualistic washings and baptisms, the rite of circumcision…etc. All of these were peripheral issues in the Law and Covenant pointing TO a future and spiritual reality.
Things which are intrinsically TRUE are – justice, mercy, love, faithfulness, kindness, purity, meekness, loyalty and devotion. These are inherently and intrinsically true because they are the character of God which is what makes it right!
So it is that under ANY COVENANT – if anyone would draw near to God or have fellowship with Him they must share these character traits in common with Him!
- The tenants of the Old were to perform FOR righteousness.
- The tenants of the New are perform FROM righteousness!
But make no mistake God expects fruit from our union with Him – this is a character issue which will never change regardless of what covenant one is under!
The Pharisees we just read about in Matthew 21 thought that because they were in covenant with God they were safe, but Jesus clearly told them that they were not!
That the same teaching is taught to believers under the New Covenant is found in Ephesians 5:1-12.
This is the passage I promised to read last week but which I never got to. Again it is found in Ephesians 5:1-12…
“(1) Therefore, be imitators of God, as dearly loved children. (2) And walk in love, as the Messiah also loved us and gave Himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God.
(3) But sexual immorality and any impurity or greed should not even be heard of among you, as is proper for saints. (4) And coarse and foolish talking or crude joking are not suitable, but rather giving thanks.
(5) FOR KNOW AND RECOGNIZE THIS: no sexually immoral or impure or greedy person, who is an idolater, has an inheritance in the kingdom of the Messiah and of God.”
That is essentially the same thing Jesus just got done saying to the Pharisees in Matthew chapter 21. Those Pharisees had an outward and superficial appearance of keeping the law but it did not own their hearts and so therefore did not really produce Godly actions. They felt secure due to their religious beliefs but Jesus clearly stated that they were not safe at all.
What we are about to read gives reason for this teaching which I mentioned to you earlier. Most of this teaching would not even be necessary if it weren’t for bad and false teaching which is pervasive in the churches today. They encourage a false sense of security due to what people believe when their lives have not been affected through their belief in the way that they live. Both Jesus and Matthew 21 and Paul here in Ephesians warn that such feelings of safety do solely to believing the right things are both dangerous and unwarranted.
He says…
“(6) Let no one deceive you with empty arguments, for because of these things God’s wrath is coming on the disobedient.”
Now the first thing that any thinking person should say who’s been taught that their beliefs alone are what make them safe is, “I thought the wrath of God was coming upon the world because they didn’t believe in Jesus! So why does Paul hear say it’s because of their actions… their sins?”
Good question!
Someone go back and read that section again. It’s found in verses 1-6.
Why does Paul say that the wrath of God is coming upon the world?
What does Paul call these children of the world? He calls them sons of disobedience!
Now this next part is what is often not taught in churches but isn’t that the most important portion of this passage. It speaks to people’s false sense of security who’s belief is biblically accurate but who’s lives remain unchanged and are identical to that of the world.
“(7) Therefore, do not become their partners.[co-participants with them]
(8) For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light– (9) for THE FRUIT OF THE LIGHT RESULTS IN all goodness, righteousness, and truth– (10) discerning what is pleasing to the Lord.
(11) Don’t participate in the fruitless works of darkness, but instead, expose them. (12) For it is shameful even to mention what is done by them in secret.”
So the teaching here is that if the faith you have does not draw out of your obedience to God and conformity to His character then your faith is no faith at all.
Hebrews 3 uses the words disbelief and disobedience interchangeably – they are essentially the same thing. Now they are not LITERALLY the same thing, but you cannot have one without the other.
James 2:14-26,
“(14) What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith, but does not have works? Can his faith save him?”
Then James offers an example of faith without works – that it is no better than lip service…
“(15) If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, (16) and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,” but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it?
(17) In the same way faith, if it doesn’t have works, is dead by itself. ”
So James is saying that just because you say it doesn’t mean anything.
Anyone can say it!
It only has meaning though when there is follow through in how you act… in what you do!
Anyone can say, “be warmed and filled” but then give the person Nothing by which they can be warmed and filled.
In the same way anybody can say Jesus is Lord but unless they live His Lordship in their life it means nothing!
“ (18) But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.”
Show me your faith without works, and I will show you faith from my works.”
“(19) You believe that God is one; you do well. The demons also believe–and they shudder.
(20) Foolish man! Are you willing to learn that faith without works is useless?”
That is the real question isn’t it? Is the one each of us have to ask ourselves probably several times every day. Am I willing to learn or am I a foolish man?
Then James finishes his teaching on faith always producing works by referencing Abraham with Isaac.
“(21) Wasn’t Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar?
(22) You see that faith was active together with his works, and by works, faith was perfected.
(23) So the Scripture was fulfilled that says, Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him for righteousness, and he was called God’s friend.”
By the way the criteria for being the friend of God has not changed. Jesus told his disciples, “greater love has no one than this than to lay down your life for your friends. You are my friends if you do what I’ve commanded you to do.”
I want you to notice what part of those verses that I just quoted to you are the ones that people remember!
Every time I hear that portion of scripture quoted it only quotes “greater love has no man than this than to lay one’s life down for his friends”.
I almost never hear anyone ever say the rest of that passage which was the very reason why Jesus made the first part of the statement.
Keeping of His Commandments is our laying our lives down for Him. The selfish Gospel of the 21st century reads that verse as Jesus is my friend because He laid down His life for me.
While that does illustrate A truth it’s not THE truth Jesus was making in that Passage.
It was a call for those who claim to be His followers, His disciples – to lay down their life and follow Him in obedience.
When we do this we become the friends of God!
Knowing that there is no gray area… no DMZ in the spirit the opposite would have to be true. Those who do not keep His Commandments are His enemies.
“(24) You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. (25) And in the same way, wasn’t Rahab the prostitute also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by a different route? (26) For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.”
James offers the examples of Abraham with Isaac and Rehab with the spies.
Let’s examine the passage about Abraham in closing to see this man’s faith THROUGH the obedience he offered to God.
Genesis 22:1-19,
“(1) After these things God tested Abraham and said to him,
“Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he answered.
(2) “Take your son,” He said, “your only son Isaac, whom you love, go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”
(3) So early in the morning Abraham got up, saddled his donkey, and took with him two of his young men and his son Isaac.
He split wood for a burnt offering and set out to go to the place God had told him about.
(4) On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.
(5) Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there to worship; then we’ll come back to you.”
“(6) Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac.
In his hand he took the fire and the sacrificial knife, and the two of them walked on together.
(7) Then Isaac spoke to his father Abraham and said, “My father.”
And he replied, “Here I am, my son.”
Isaac said, “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
(8) Abraham answered, “God Himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”
Then the two of them walked on together.
(9) When they arrived at the place that God had told him about, Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood. He bound his son Isaac and placed him on the altar, on top of the wood.
(10) Then Abraham reached out and took the knife to slaughter his son.
(11) But the Angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!”
He replied, “Here I am.”
(12) Then He said, “Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son from Me.”
(13) Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in the thicket.
So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son.
(14) And Abraham named that place The LORD Will Provide, so today it is said:
“It will be provided on the LORD’s mountain.”
(15) Then the Angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven (16) and said, “By Myself I have sworn, says the LORD: Because you have done this thing and have not withheld your only son, (17) I will indeed bless you and make your offspring as numerous as the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. Your offspring will possess the gates of their enemies. (18) And all the nations of the earth will be blessed by your offspring because you have OBEYED My command.”
When the New Testament writer of Hebrews describes these actions of obedience he calls it an example of FAITH!
Hebrews 11:1-3; 17-19,
“(1) Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen. (2) For by it our ancestors were approved.
(3) By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen has been made from things that are not visible.”
“(17) By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac. He had received the promises, yet he was ready to offer up his only son.
(18) God had told him, “Through Isaac descendants will carry on your name,” (19) and he reasoned that God could even raise him from the dead, and in a sense he received him back from there.”
So Abraham believed God and that belief manifested itself in prompt and willing obedience to Him in all things… even in something that seemed to contradict what God had already said.
God had told Abraham that through Isaac the promise seed would come but now God is telling him to kill Isaac the very Vessel through whom that promise was going to be accomplished.
How does Abraham reconcile these two things?
Well he might have reconciled them through any number of means but for Abraham the choice was to believe that the same God Who gave Isaac to him in the first place, could also restore him to his side by raising him back up from the dead – even from the ashes – in order to keep His stated promise.
Notice how strong was Abraham’s faith. He had come to know God and as a result trust in Him, His goodness and His power. So when called to his mark for obedience, Abraham did not flinch.
His trust in the God he had come to know, drew out of him obedience.
Let me suggest to you that this was no simple feat.
Even though we have it on the authority of scripture that Abraham believed that God would just raise Isaac back up from the ashes, God Himself knew that Isaac was to Abraham his only true son and was the son of his love. The son and embodiment of all of his Delight.
Even if you knew God was going to raise your loved one up from the dead – tell me how easy would it be to take the knife and slit their throat and set their body on fire?
This was a test of Allegiance.
It was God asking Abraham what Jesus asked of Peter after his denial.
Peter do you love me more than these?
For Abraham it was, “Abraham do you love me more than your son, you’re only son, the son of your great deep and abiding Love?” This is what it means to love the Lord your God with all that you are!
This is why Jesus said, “If you do not love me more than father, mother, sister, brother, wife, husband, children or friends you are not worthy of Me.”
I hope that what you’re seeing through these passages is that our faith is not superficial. It is not a simple salve we rub on life’s problems or on our future eternity but is a devotion called out of our hearts through a commitment of love and allegiance to our God, and our king Who we adore and worship and as a result we live for.
If you will indulge me in a lengthy quote, I can more quickly illustrate the truth we’ve learned today even in Abraham from the words of A.W. Tozer in his book The Pursuit of God, Chapter “The blessedness of possessing nothing.”
In it he makes some assumptions, but they only serve to further illustrate the truth of living our faith.
A.W. Tozer’s The Pursuit of God…
Abraham was old when Isaac was born, old enough indeed to have been his grandfather, and the child became at once the delight and idol of his heart. From that moment when he first stooped to take the tiny form awkwardly in his arms he was an eager love slave of his son.
God went out of His way to comment on the strength of this affection. And it is not hard to understand.
The baby represented everything sacred to his father’s heart: the promises of God, the covenants, the hopes of the years and the long messianic dream.
As he watched him grow from babyhood to young manhood the heart of the old man was knit closer and closer with the life of his son, till at last the relationship bordered upon the perilous.
It was then that God stepped in to save both father and son from the consequences of an uncleansed love.
“Take now thy son,” said God to Abraham, “thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.”
The sacred writer spares us a close-up of the agony that night on the slopes near Beersheba, but respectful imagination may view in awe the bent form and convulsive wrestling alone under the stars.
If only the man himself might have been allowed to die. That would have been easier a thousand times, for he was old now, and to die would have been no great ordeal for one who had walked so long with God. Besides, it would have been a last sweet pleasure to let his dimming vision rest upon the figure of his stalwart son who would live to carry on the Abrahamic line and fulfill in himself the promises of God made long before in Ur of the Chaldees.
How should he slay the lad!
Even if he could get the consent of his wounded and protesting heart, how could he reconcile the act with the promise, “In Isaac shall thy seed be called”?
This was Abraham’s trial by fire, and he did not fail in the crucible. While the stars still shone like sharp white points above the tent where the sleeping Isaac lay, and long before the gray dawn had begun to lighten the east, the old saint had made up his mind. He would offer his son as God had directed him to do, and then trust God to raise him from the dead. This, says the writer to the Hebrews, was the solution his aching heart found sometime in the dark night, and he rose “early in the morning” to carry out the plan. It is beautiful to see that, while he erred as to God’s method, he had correctly sensed the secret of His great heart. And the solution accords well with the New Testament Scripture, “Whosoever will lose for my sake shall find it.”
God let the suffering old man go through with it up to the point where He knew there would be no retreat, and then forbade him to lay a hand upon the boy.
To the wondering patriarch He now says in effect, “It’s all right, Abraham. I never intended that you should actually slay the lad. I only wanted to remove him from the temple of your heart that I might reign unchallenged there. I wanted to correct the perversion that existed in your love. Now you may have the boy, sound and well. Take him and go back to your tent. Now I know that you fear God, seeing that you have not withheld your son, you only son, from Me.”
The old man of God stood there on the mount strong and pure and grand, a man marked out by the Lord for special treatment, a friend and favorite of the Most High.
Now he was a man wholly surrendered, a man utterly obedient, a man who possessed nothing.
He had concentrated his all in the person of his dear son, and God had taken it from him.
I have said that Abraham possessed nothing. Yet was not this poor man rich?
Everything he had owned before was his still to enjoy: sheep, camels, herds, and goods of every sort. He had also his wife and his friends, and best of all he had his son Isaac safe by his side. He had everything, but he possessed nothing.
There is the spiritual secret.
There is the sweet theology of the heart which can be learned only in the school of renunciation. The books on systematic theology overlook this, but the wise will understand.
After that bitter and blessed experience I think the words “my” and “mine” never had again the same meaning for Abraham. The sense of possession which they connote was gone from his heart. Things had been cast out forever. They had now become external to the man. His inner heart was free from them.
The world said, “Abraham is rich,” but the aged patriarch only smiled. He could not explain it to them, but he knew that he owned nothing, that his real treasures were inward and eternal.
The Christian who is alive enough to know himself even slightly will recognize the symptoms of this possession malady, and will grieve to find them in his own heart.
If the longing after God is strong enough within him he will want to do something about the matter.
Now, what should he do?
First of all he should put away all defense and make no attempt to excuse himself either in his own eyes or before the Lord.
Let us never forget that such a truth as this cannot be learned by rote as one would learn the facts of physical science. They must be experienced before we can really know them. We must in our hearts live through Abraham’s harsh and bitter experiences if we would know the blessedness which follows them.
The ancient curse will not go out painlessly; the tough old miser within us will not lie down and die obedient to our command.
If we would indeed know God in growing intimacy we must go this way of renunciation. And if we are set upon the pursuit of God He will sooner or later bring us to this test.
Abraham’s testing was, at the time, not known to him as such, yet if he had taken some course other than the one he did, the whole history of the Old Testament would have been different. God would have found His man, no doubt, but the loss to Abraham would have been tragic beyond the telling.
So we will be brought one by one to the testing place, and we may never know when we are there. At that testing place there will be no dozen possible choices for us; just one and an alternative, but our whole future will be conditioned by the choice we make.
Blessings!
Tri
