Shapshots of Glory

I’m going to read a little bit
of the Bible. I’ve got a bulletin with places for notes. But if you prefer your Bible,
that certainly is fine by me. As you probably already know, naturally adopted by Christ to
portray so many of his parables. We’ve already studied the parable
of the soils. I love that imagery because,
in a sense, that’s kind of where I live a lot of times, especially
in the summers. I love gardening, I love growing
my little trees, and I love the whole difficulty of it. I told somebody a while back,
after growing trees from seed, I’m amazed that there are any
trees, to see how difficult it is. What happens with a seed
is really an amazing thing. It is all timed by the built-in
DNA of the seed itself as to exactly how the germination occurs. And I know that with some of
you, you probably know far more than I do about this, but with
some, depending on the seed coat and depending on the moisture
involved, sometimes it takes a certain period of time to unlock,
if you will, this code for the seed to be awakened from dormancy. Sometimes, some years, I haven’t
been able to do it this year, a little too busy, but some years
you could come to my refrigerator, actually it’s my wife’s refrigerator,
which she has the tendency to remind me during the winter months.
But in the bottom shelf of our refrigerator, during many years,
we have a large bin of dirt rolled up in plastic bags with seed
in them. all for the purpose of waiting
for that right day, three months out of the refrigerator, when
I can sow them in the ground and behold trees burst forth. But over the time what I’ve realized
or learned is that not only is there inherent elements within
the seed themselves that all collaborate and produce a timeline
of when the seed may germinate, there are also great issues related
to whether the seed will ever germinate at all. Of course, the primary one is the
viability of the seed. Is the seed even ever going to
germinate, even if you give it perfect, perfect care? You can keep it in the refrigerator
for three months, put it out in the perfect soil, give it
perfect water, warm weather and good light, and even still, it
will not germinate. The seed is unviable. It’s literally
a dead seed. It has a complete inability to
germinate or sprout. There is also the obvious factors.
that impinge upon whether a seed may germinate. There are the
factors, the simple factors of soil and water and not just soil,
but where in the soil is the seed planted? It took me several
years of planting my garden to realize that some seeds don’t
like to be planted two inches deep. That was my tendency. And for several years without
beets and carrots and other Garden goodies. I finally learned
the lesson that when it says a quarter inch deep it means
a quarter inch deep There are other factors If you’ve ever
tried to grow tomatoes on your kitchen windowsill you’ll relate
to this one there is a a little disease called damping off, that
if you water the plant too long, it gets too much moisture and
it begins to grow this fuzzy growth, white in color on the
outside of the plant stem. It’s actually a virus, mold,
and in essence what it does is attack the plant externally and
kills the plant eventually. One day you come to your beautiful
tomato plants and they’re laying over and that is called damping
off. And so there are all kinds of issues that impinge the growth
of the seed. And even if you get it to a little
seedling, you’re still not finished because you still could face
what is called transplant shock when you take it from the little
seedling tray, put it in the ground and the thing keels over. Well, Jesus is going to take
an image of a seed that is planted And miraculously, as I’ve come
to know, flourishes. This passage we’re perhaps quite
familiar with, and I hope to shed a great deal of light on
it because it’s been misused and abused for centuries. And
I’m not saying I’m the first one to ever uncover the truth,
but I hope to clarify what the passage really means. What Jesus
gives us in this passage essentially is snapshots of glory is what
I’ve called it. Pictures of what the church will
be like. The kingdom of God will be like. Finally. It’s been said that everybody
likes to be on the side that’s winning, right? Wouldn’t you
like to be on a winning team? Jesus’ apostles were no different. They were human. And just like
you and I, they probably saw the events and interpreted them
much the same that we would. They saw a struggling ministry.
They saw a so-called Savior that was taking it on the chin everywhere
He went. Most recently, as we saw last
week, He had literally been maligned for healing a woman on the Sabbath.
And the question very likely came into these apostles’ minds,
even the disciples, the greater number of them. They were likely
doubting. Jesus again and again was having
to build up their faith. And the disciples, seeing Christ
face the difficulties that He was with the Pharisees, these
disciples, no doubt, were waning in their faith. Perhaps even
doubting. They wanted revolutionary changes.
That’s what the Jews all expected. These followers of Christ, nearly
every one of them Jewish in nature, in background, they all were
expecting this revolutionary Savior, but where was He? Where
were these sweeping changes? Where was this takeover that
they expected? not only of the religious scene,
but of the political scene. And you know what? It’s no different
than today. The same thing goes through our mind. The same doubts
enter in when we see division in churches. We begin to wonder
if the Lord is really in it. We see doctrinal disputes. And
we say, can this all be Christianity? When we face the fall of respected
Christian leaders. When we see compromise and sin
and apostasy from the church, people that we’d walked with
for years. And we see essentially moral ineffectiveness, a failure
of the church to impinge its local community, a failure to
influence. We begin to doubt. We begin to
wonder whether there’s something to this Christianity or whether
we’re just going through the motions. We see a society that
is almost completely indifferent to the church at times, oblivious
to the to the commands of God and to the call of Christ. We
see almost a almost a universal watering down of the gospel in
our nation. We see a constant meddling with
worldly methods in an attempt to accomplish God’s work. And what many have concluded,
or what many begin to question is, is the church dying? The apostles essentially were
asking the same kind of question. Is this thing legitimate? Is
this movement for real? Is this Savior the true Savior? Is this church that Christ had
begun to speak of this kingdom of God? Is it really legitimate?
Can it really survive? Those were the types of questions
that the apostles were asking, and it is that to which Jesus
responds. In Matthew’s Gospel, Matthew
identifies this little teaching that we’re about to read as a
parable, and it is. It’s a parable that brings forth
truth. A simple lesson that lies on
the surface, but deep down carries deep spiritual truth. I want
to give you two snapshots. Look at Luke 13. We pick it up in verse 18, where
Luke records, so he was saying, what the kingdom of God is like,
what is the kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it?
It is like a mustard seed, which a man took and threw into his
own garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the
air nested in its branches. And again, he said, to what shall
I compare the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which a woman
took and hid in three packs of flour until it was all leavened. A lot of unnecessary conclusions,
as I mentioned, over the centuries with regards to this passage.
Some people think that the mustard seed was chosen in this parable,
not only because of its tiny size, we’ll get to the purpose
of the lesson in a moment, but also for its pungent taste. And
they said, you know, I mean, they’re basically likening what
you would put on a hot dog and the reason for which you would
put the stuff on a hot dog. Or perhaps if you get the hot
stuff, dip something in. One described it this way, it’s
heat. And you read this on the face of it and it sounds so plausible. It’s heat. It’s fiery vigor. The fact that only through being
bruised, it gives out its best virtue. Doesn’t it just sound
like good interpretation? The problem is Jesus didn’t use
that. Jesus didn’t use that element of the plant’s product. There are not just a few. came up with that. In fact, that
was the majority view of the whole idea of using mustard in
this illustration was the fact that it produced this tasty condiment. One described it this way, through
the sharp and pungent qualities of the mustard seed illustrates
the fact that Christianity, though small, would prove efficacious
and impressive. In other words, just like putting
hot mustard on your hot dog, you’re going to have that same
kind of impact and influence produced by Christianity. And
that’s interesting. I mean, I like mustard as much
as the next guy, but that’s not the point of Jesus telling this
parable. Not at all. There’s another curious thing.
Some people say that mustard has medicinal qualities. Now,
I have never rubbed it on a sore wound. I have never put it on
sore muscles. I haven’t I’ve never used mustard. It may be that it has medicinal
qualities, but you know what? Jesus didn’t use that element
here either. He didn’t say that mustard I’m using mustard because
it tastes good or because it’s good on wounds at all. There are some that said, taking
those words from the collected gospels, that mustard, a mustard
seed when full grown will be larger than all the other garden
plants. And they take that to mean that Christianity by numerical
count will be larger than all the other world religions combined.
You know what? The parable doesn’t even say
that. And it’s wrong for us to get into that numbers mindset.
In fact, next week we come into the very same context where Jesus
leads right into the broad way and the narrow way. If anything,
it wouldn’t surprise me when the tallies are all tallied up
at the end of the ages, that Christianity is a very small
minority. The true Christians numerically
will be very small. Compared to the rest of the world’s
religions, There are those that saw these
branches, the branches of the tree stretching out from this
little herb that grows into a small tree. They saw that and interpreted
that. And I’ll let you pick or conclude
which religion did this. They conclude that this refers
to the structural organization of the church, a great, well-developed
system of hierarchy. And that’s the sad thing about
parables is there is that element that begs us to interpret it.
The sad thing is that in doing so, so many have abused these
parables. There are some that speak of
the birds. The birds of the air nesting
and nesting in its branches. Now, remember, in the parable
of the soils, the birds were they were gobbling up the seed
is what they were doing. Some people take the birds from
that parable and put the image of the birds on this parable,
and they say that the birds are evil, resident in the church,
that we’re always going to be faced with these difficulties.
Silly stuff. One described it this way. He
said it is thought by many that this expression was meant to
denote the corruption which crept into the church of Christ when
it grew into a large body and was favored by the powers of
this world. That isn’t the point of Christ
mentioning birds at all, we’ll see in a moment. Finally, several,
I guess, several last little points, some people have said
of the pair of the paired eleven. that because leaven is so often
in Scripture used as denoting an evil influence, that here
what it’s speaking of is the false believers in the church
that come in and slowly mutate among us. Which is an interesting
conclusion, because Jesus said that this little leavening process
is an illustration of the kingdom of God. And so that what they
must conclude then is that the church is destined for failure. Because leaven takes its toll.
Leaven finishes its job. As we’ll see in a moment. There are some that made gray
hay out of the woman here, the woman putting the the leaven
in the bread. Likening her to the wisdom of
Proverbs, the woman there or Proverbs being likened to a woman
in Proverbs, and you just you begin at the by midweek to sicken
reading of all this ridiculous stuff that gets put on. What were the three pecks of
meal? What did they refer to? Some said it was the three sons
of Noah, which is pretty clear to me. Some said it was three
nationalities, Greeks, Jews and Samaritans. Some says it was
three parts of man, spirit, soul and body. All of those conclusions are
ridiculous. If you just look at the parable,
if you look at the parable, if you look at the context, you
look at the parables as a pair teaching one truth. The truth
lies right on the surface. We don’t need to invent and add
on other little manmade additions or interpretations to this parable.
Christ interprets it for us. I want to give you to just look
at these two images of the church in the world. Jesus points out
that the promised glory and it is promised, even as we prayed
in John chapter seven or read of Christ’s prayer in John 17.
Jesus didn’t pray wistfully and wishfully that God might do something
with the church. Jesus prayed specifically for
the church that it would grow and be unified and multiply and
spread. Jesus wasn’t crossing his fingers
in hope that God might do something. He was praying specifically for
God’s plan in this world. And this passage is no different.
Jesus wants to give us the promised glory of the church. First of
all, it’s seen in the illustration of prolific growth, prolific
growth. Look at verse 18 again. He was
saying, what is the kingdom of God like and what to what shall
I compare it? It is like a mustard seed. The context, if you will remember,
was the healing of this woman that was bent over by some kind
of influence of demonic activity, bent over for 18 years. He heals
her on the Sabbath. And the Jews weren’t real pleased
about it. The woman was ecstatic. But the
crowd, the crowd was rejoicing. They were thankful for what God
had done in their midst. And Jesus uses that enthusiastic
moment to say, you know what, apostles, this is just the beginning. Christianity is going to persevere,
it is going to endure, it is going to endure to the end, and
he’s not talking about numbers, but it is going to be pervasive.
It’s going to grow, it’s going to become a large plant. When he says, so, so he was saying,
verse 18, he points back to that very image, that scene with all
the multitudes rejoicing. And so he was saying. He took
that occasion to lay upon this parable against what Jesus no doubt looked about
and saw He saw the Jews in great numbers. He saw the Romans in
exceedingly great numbers. And over against all those great
numbers of the worshipers of the heathen gods, even the worship
of the Jews themselves, those that believed in Christ were
at this point a very small minority. Jesus wants to tell them, don’t
be Don’t get caught up in the size. These tiny beginnings,
basically, Jesus says, we’re going to grow into something
far greater. It’s going to pervade over time, it’s going to pervade
through the centuries, it’s going to have influence beyond what
you can even imagine. Some people made great issue
over the fact that in Luke, Luke records this man as throwing
the seed. Matthew records it as the man
sowed the seed, forgetting that in those days, often the way
seed was sown was by throwing it. We don’t know what the man’s
intention was, but the bottom line was it was effective. Whether
the man individually took and planted the seed with a set and
specific purpose to plant a mustard seed or whether he brushed off
a mustard plant and casually tossed it aside and the seed
fell into the earth, the bottom line is it germinated. It germinated
and now it becomes to grow. Begins to grow and becomes a
tree. The seed found the soil, the soil germinated the seed
and it grew. What Jesus is pointing out is
that he’s comparing the growth of the kingdom of God to a little
mustard seed. And here is this band. Here’s
this group of people for so long, completely unattached. And here
comes Christ as this little child into the world suddenly. And
announced and only a few recognized it. And in time, there would
be those that would listen to Christ’s teaching and respond,
but it was still a very small minority. Jesus says, from this small beginning,
the very kingdom of God is going to be built. That’s exactly the
point that all three gospel writers make in pointing out the mustard
seed. You see, Luke doesn’t say it. Luke takes it as a given. The
mustard seed was a colloquial expression for something very,
very small. Matthew points it out specifically. Matthew’s Gospel says it this
way. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed which a man took
and sowed in his field. And this is smaller than all
other seeds. But when it is full grown, it
is larger than the garden plants and becomes a tree. Small as a mustard seed, it was
a Jewish expression to indicate a very minute particle. It doesn’t mean literally that
the mustard seed… I mean, science has proven since
then that the mustard seed, as soon as they come up with a magnifying
glass, they’re going to determine that the mustard seed isn’t literally
the smallest seed in the kingdom of plants. It doesn’t make Scripture
untrustworthy. It was held to be, of all the
useful garden plants, it was held to be the smallest of the
seeds. Remember the Lord. When he was
challenging his disciples, Luke 17, if you had faith like a mustard
seed, you mean that pungent, fiery thing that we put on our
hot dogs? Not at all. He’s talking about that little
tiny seed. If you just had a little bit,
a tiny little bit of faith, you would say to this mulberry tree,
be uprooted and be planted in the sea and it would obey you.
It is the smallest. It’s the smallness of the seed
that comes into focus. Look at the size of the tree.
It doesn’t say that it grows into a mighty oak. You know,
if Jesus wanted to say that Christianity is going to grow and overtake
the world, I love what one guy said. He said that a thousand
forests are captivated in one acorn. What he meant to say was
this acorn is planted and it bears a tree and the tree grows
up and it bears acorns and those acorns plant trees. And I mean,
it’s on and on ad infinitum. But Jesus doesn’t say that. The point of the parable is that
from a very tiny beginning, things are going to grow. It’s going
to spread. It’s going to be big, bigger than all the other garden
herbs. Not that it’s the biggest plant that ever existed on Earth. One described the mustard plant,
he said the plant in the east doesn’t rise beyond the height
of one of our small fruit trees. But the exceptional thing is
that a plant like the mustard, which belongs to the garden herb
family, it branches and becomes a veritable tree. That’s what Jesus was pointing
out, that Christianity is going to take root, the church is going
to take root, and when it does, it’s going to become established. The kingdom at that moment may
have seemed insignificant. It may have seemed impossible
to those looking on that it was ever going to become anything
of substance. But it did. The apostles took
the gospel, as you know, the apostle Paul comes onto the scene,
he takes the gospel, the gospel goes not only throughout Asia.
Because even over into what is now Europe spreads from Europe,
eventually, thanks to the Puritan spread to America. From America,
it’s gone. Now, the interesting thing is
in England and America, where at once the gospel, this was
the hotbed. Now it’s waning, but the gospel
is permeating through the rest of the world and growing and
branching out. Jesus said it’s going to happen,
and it did. One Puritan described it this
way. He said the beginnings of the gospel were exceedingly small.
It was a religion which seemed at first so feeble and helpless
and powerless that it could not live. Remember, when they killed
Christ, they thought that they had killed the movement. Its
founder was one who was poor in this world and ended up his
life dying the death of a malefactor on the cross. Its first adherents
were a little company whose number probably did not exceed a thousand
when the Lord Jesus left the world. Its first preachers were
a few fishermen and tax gatherers who were most of them unlearned
and ignorant men. Its first starting point was
a despised corner of the earth called Judea. Its first doctrine
was eminently calculated to call forth the enmity of the natural
heart. Christ crucified was to the Jews
a stumbling block. To the Greeks, foolishness. Its
first movements brought down on its friends persecution from
all quarters. But the progress of the gospel
after the seed was once cast into the earth was great and
steady and continuous. And in spite of persecution,
opposition and violence, Christianity began to spread and increase.
And it hasn’t stopped yet, people. It hasn’t stopped yet. I’m not talking about this specific
church. I’m talking about the church
universal. But don’t look around at the
church and get frustrated and judge God’s work in the world
by what you see. Because the truth is still the
same. Zechariah said, don’t despise the day of small things. And
the work of God in men’s eyes is always going to be seemingly
insignificant. J.C. Ryle said it this way, to
the eye of man, the work may appear too great. The instrument
employed quite unequal to it. In other words, the preaching
of the gospel, this is what’s going to get the work done. Giving
a tract to my friend. Providing my family with a Bible.
Sharing my faith with my coworker. This is what’s going to transform
this world. I’ll tell you something, when
I first first went to California to go to seminary, I’ll never
forget driving in on the 10 freeway. And here I am, you know, three
years in the faith, fresh out of college, purposing to go to
seminary. And I’m driving in and basically
about the time you hit the California border, you hit this sea of humanity,
five lines, five lanes wide and nothing but houses and buildings
and businesses all the way from the desert, all the way to the
heart of Los Angeles. And I’m driving in and I’m thinking,
what am I doing here? What do I think I’m going to
do? How do I how do I really think I’m going to impact this
world? And I’ll never forget. driving
out five years later. I had a good brother, one of
our college people with us driving with me to Colorado and by God’s
grace and by God’s grace alone, he had allowed me to have an
impact, not of entire Los Angeles community. Although he’s enabled
me to have a part in building into people’s lives, some are
who are now aspiring to ministry and in ministry and some of whom
are are becoming elders of churches and bearing families and raising
up kids. God will use us. And I’ll never
forget driving out the Ten Freeway, remembering that, recalling that
hopeless feeling. The work may appear too great.
But let us never give way to such thoughts, Ryle goes on,
when the line of duty is plain, we should not begin to count
numbers and confer with flesh and blood. We should believe
that one man with the living seed of God’s truth on his side,
like Luther or Knox, may turn a nation upside down. Do you
really believe that? Do you really believe that God
could use you in that kind of capacity? Who knows who you are
going to introduce to Christ that maybe they would become
this nation’s Luther or Knox? Ryle concludes by saying, if
God is with him, none can stand against him. Do we believe this? It’s the very reason Jesus told
that parable. There’s a second illustration.
Not only is the promised glory of the church seen in the illustration
of prolific growth, but secondly, in the illustration of a permeating
influence. And here he uses the simple illustration
of leaven and bread. Look at verse 20. Again, he said,
to what shall I compare the kingdom of God? It is like leaven, which
a woman took and hid in three packs of flour until it was all
leavened. Now, in our modern language,
essentially what is going on here is yeast and yeast. Once
it’s inserted into this lump of flour and water, this dough,
it begins to permeate the yeast and essentially the chemical
reaction continues until it’s concluded. And once the dough
is completely leavened and the dough has risen, it’s done. When
we I don’t know what happened. I spoke to Mary about this last
week. I don’t know what ever happened to Amish friendship
bread. Maybe there aren’t any Amish in our community, but this
stuff is it’s kind of a church thing to do because, you know,
Martha brings this bread to church one day and she cuts it in portions.
She gives each person a portion and each person puts it in more
stuff and and then they portion it out at the end of the week
and they give it to somebody and it just keeps going like
that. That’s what leaven does. It just keeps on leavening and
leavening and leavening until it’s done. It’s good bread. We should meet
some Amish. The problem is that, as I mentioned
before, many people have taken this to say, well, leaven, you
know, leaven in Scripture, that’s an indicator of evil. And that
means that evil is in the church and we’re never going to get
rid of evil. We might as well learn to live with evil because
it’s here to stay. Jesus said it. Not in this parable. It’s true
that in Scripture it is used of corruption, it is used of
evil influences. that can be pervasive. Luke chapter
12. We just looked at it. Under these
circumstances, after so many thousands of people had been
gathered that they were stepping on one another, He began saying
to His disciples, first of all, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. People, He wasn’t talking about
bread. He wasn’t talking about literal
leaven. What He was talking is using
that euphemistically of evil influence. But that’s not what
he means here. The whole thing points back to
the institution of the Passover meal when they were directed
to eat unleavened bread, and there is where the illustration
came from. God created the illustration, but God isn’t locked into using
that same thing the same way every time. The unleavened bread
was to be an image of keeping oneself unstained by the influence
of the cultures around them. To use the same way by the Apostle
Paul in First Corinthians. First Corinthians five, your
boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little
leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? That still, the fact
that the Apostle Paul uses that illustration still doesn’t lock
us in to using these words the same way in this place. It doesn’t
always have to be used in a negative sense. There are a lot of images in
Scripture that are used in a multiplicity of ways. Think of the lion. In
1 Peter, it’s used of Satan. Just a few books later in the
book of Revelation, it’s used of the lion of the tribe of Judah.
When you speak of the serpent in Genesis, it is of Satan in
Exodus, it becomes a good thing spoken of in the Gospel of John,
just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. Even so, must
the son of man be lifted up? What about the goat? The goat
in Matthew 25 is an indicator of unrepentant sinners. But that
same image in the Old Testament was a good sacrifice, which he
would bring for sin. Levin was constantly or rather
regularly used in Scripture as a metaphor for evil influence.
But the Lord didn’t use it in this, in this, he wasn’t bound
to use it in this sense, in this parable. What he says is that the kingdom,
it’s almost going to come in unnoticed. You don’t see the
leaven once you mix it into the bread. You don’t see the chemical
process taking place. But if you leave the room and
come back 20 minutes later, you begin to see the effects of it.
And that’s exactly what he says is going to happen. It’s going
to have a permeating influence in society. This little band
of men going from town to town, hardly noticed. Proclaiming a
message that most people wouldn’t listen to. Is in time going to
save and transform the world, not every person. But it’s going to do what Jesus
said. It’s going to bring forth this
glorified kingdom. It is going to produce the church
as God would have it. That was the message that Christ
wanted to give the apostles. I love the way one pastor said
it. He said, how does leaven conquer
the meal? By the influence of the small
piece of leaven on the particles nearest to it and those particles
upon others that are nearest to them until it is all leavened. You know what he does? He takes
a sermon within a sermon. He says that kingdom in which
the will of God is acknowledged until it becomes supreme is to
spread from soul to soul until all are brought within his sovereignty.
It spreads from Christ to the twelve, from the twelve to the
infant church and so on until the whole mass is reached and
transformed. People don’t misunderstand. He’s
not saying that every person is going to be saved. Each Christian
soul is to be a missionary. We are to be leaven is what he’s
saying. We are to rub the particles next
to us. We are to have that pervasive
influence. Our lives are supposed to count
for something. He says this, this implies that
the Christian must live in the world for the leaven cannot work
without contact. Human life must be touched at
all points in order that this at its work, its play, its relaxation,
its religion, its politics, its business, its science, its arts
may be raised and warmed by the penetrating action of Christ.
He is no true Christian who either shuns society for fear of contamination
or when he goes into society, leaves his Christianity behind
him. In other words, he says that
if you are a Christian, you are leaven and you are to function
as leaven. We are this next week to be as
so many lumps of Amish friendship bread. This little group of disciples
may have been despised. Their beginning may have been
extremely small, insignificant. from the world standpoint, destined
for failure. But you know what? That is God’s
way. Think in your mind’s eye as we course through the pages
of biblical history, little Israel spoken of as being almost insignificant
time after time. Little Joseph, Jacob, little
David versus Goliath, Gideon with his troops winnowed and
thinned. Jesus says, you little band of
people are going to be the very seed. You’re going to have that
leavening action on this world. And what starts out as a small,
insignificant thing can even be testified to on the date of
your newspaper this morning, right? The 2005 years ago, something
so drastic took place that it changed the way that we recorded
time. The church has survived to this
day through countless persecutions, through almost impossible odds.
At times, almost every piece of literature we had was burned
along with those that carried the documents and still it advanced. It seems like the hotter the
fires got, the more Christianity spread. What he’s talking about, what
Christ is promoting here is perpetuation, not a complete and universal
takeover. But he does say that you and
I will have and should have influence in this world. MacArthur said it this way. He
said, no matter how beleaguered and persecuted, martyred and
rejected, maligned, poor or ignoble the true church may seem, the
Lord will not abandon His chosen ones. When the people of God
seem weakest, look again. Jesus is still building His church. The original plan is still in
operation. Modern times are no threat to
his sovereign purposes. The circumstances of our troubled
world do not alter his design. And no matter how corrupt and
worldly the visible church has been or may become, Jesus Christ
is still building his church. Are we going to build it with
him? Let’s pray. Gracious God, Thank you for your
encouragement through your word, not only to your apostles, but
to us. Lord, we know that we look around us, we think of our
own tiny little church and think, what can we do? But Father, individually
and collectively, by your grace, indeed, if God is with us, who
can be against us? Grant us your grace, Father,
to stand boldly for the gospel, to proclaim Christ to our friends
and neighbors, not for the sake of Providence Bible Church, but
for the sake of your church, the kingdom of God that you are
building. Be glorified in it, Father, for your glory in Jesus’
name. Amen. For the sake of time, we
will wrap up with that. Let’s go ahead and stand and
we’ll part in prayer. Trying to think of a more effective
way of departing sometimes because of the hard break.