Well, good morning to everyone.
If you would open your Bibles with me to the book of Matthew.
Matthew chapter 12 is where our lesson will be taken from this
morning. Before we begin, let's bow together in prayer. Our great Father, our holy, merciful
Heavenly Father, oh, how we thank you that you have given us yet
one more opportunity to worship you through hearing the preaching
of your word. And Father, I pray you'd bless
us this morning. This is the means that you have
given us to have these classes. And Father, I pray that you'd
bless them. Bless them to your glory. Use these lessons to reveal
to your people more of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. And
Father, use this means that you have given to us to reveal Christ
to the hearts of your people, to cause us to believe in Him,
to rest in him even more fully. Teach us, Father, through your
word. Give us a teachable, a humble and a teachable attitude that
we might learn more of our Lord Jesus Christ. Reveal to us your
glory this morning, we pray. Father, we ask this great blessing. We know it's a great blessing
that we ask for ourselves, not because we deserve it, but because
of your mercy, because of your grace. We ask this great blessing
in the name of and for the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. All right, Matthew chapter
12. I've titled the lesson this morning,
The Lord's Family. Now here the Lord Jesus is talking
to the people. He's teaching them His Word.
He's teaching them some very important things for them to
know of Himself. Can you imagine what a blessed
time that that was right there? The Lord Himself teaching, talking
to the common people. What an opportunity that they
had to hear the incarnate word, preaching, teaching, expounding
unto them the written word. That would have been some blessing,
wouldn't it? To hear the Lord himself. But, you know, we have
this blessed privilege of hearing the gospel preached here every
week, the same way they did. And I hope we never take that
privilege for granted. Now, I know it's not the Lord
personally teaching us, But it is the Lord teaching us, isn't
it? If we're going to learn anything, if God's teaching anything, applying
anything to our heart, it's not the Lord personally teaching
us, but it's the Lord who is teaching us by His Spirit, through
the preaching of His Word, isn't it? And believers need to be
reminded about this, to not take the public worship service for
granted. We need to be warned about that,
because we've had that blessing here for years and years and
years and years. But we need to be warned, don't take it for
granted. Because this is our nature. When the Lord continues
to bless over and over and over again, we tend to take God's
blessings for granted. And it sounds like that's what
happened to the Lord's mother and his brothers and sisters
here. We'll pick up reading in verse 46 of Matthew chapter 12. While he had talked to the people,
behold, his mother and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak
with him. Then one said unto him, Behold,
thy mother and thy brethren stand without desiring to speak with
thee." Now, before we get to the main point of our passage
this morning, there's a few good lessons for us to learn here.
Number one is this. Mary, the Lord's mother, and
his half-siblings, they could have heard the Lord speak any
time that they wanted, pretty much any time they wanted. They
could have talked to him and been alone with him and had time
to converse with him pretty much any time that they wanted. But
here, instead of waiting, they interrupted the worship service.
They interrupted when the Lord himself was teaching, was teaching
the common people. Now, why did they do this? Well,
you know, they must have thought that they were so special that
they could do it. They must have thought that they
are more important than these common people who are listening
to the Lord. So they interrupted him as he taught. Here's a good
reminder for all of us. Don't ever be a distraction to
the public worship service. Christ is preeminent. Christ
is preeminent in all things and especially in the worship service. We need to help everyone look
at Christ and focus on Christ, not on ourselves. Don't get people
thinking about you and what you're doing and what you're not doing.
Don't make yourself the focal point that way. Get out of the
way so people see Christ. So all they have to think about
is the Lord Jesus Christ. Whatever you have to do to make
yourself not the focal point, do that so that Christ is the
focal point. Alright, here's the second thing.
Mary was there with her other children. Now I know that Mary
was a virgin when she gave birth to the Lord Jesus. Man had no
hand in his conception. If that was so, if he were conceived
from human seed, he would have partaken of Adam's sin, but no
human seed, no seed of a human man did not have anything to
do with the birth of our Lord Jesus. Mary was born of a virgin. Our Lord was born of a virgin.
Mary the virgin. But now listen. She didn't stay
a virgin for the rest of her life. She had many other children
from what we read. You know, the Catholics talk
about the Virgin Mary, Hail Virgin Mary. But she's not a virgin
anymore. She and Joseph had a number of
other children after the Lord Jesus was born. So this shows
us, and there's many other places in Scripture you see the same
lesson taught, Mary has no special place in the kingdom of heaven
that makes her more important than other believers. Without
a doubt, Mary was blessed to be chosen to be the mother of
the Lord. There can't be a question about
that. She is blessed among women, isn't she? But Mary is not closer
to the Lord, and she's not more important than the other members
of the Lord's family. She's not more important than
other believers. And our Lord gently rebukes his earthly family
here, verse 48. But he answered and said unto
them that told him, who is my mother and who are my brethren?
Now this ought to put the thought out of our head forever that
Mary could be our intercessor with the Lord like the Catholics
try to tell us that she is. Mary is on the same plane as
every other believer. Our Lord is no respecter of persons. He saves whom He will, and He
loves them all equally. So don't get caught up in worshiping
Mary or thinking Mary's on some higher spiritual plane than every
other believer because that's idolatry. The Lord says, who
is my mother? Who is my brethren? You know,
it could be that the Lord is asking here, who is it that gave
me life? Who is it that I'm dependent upon? Who is that? Who is it?
Who's dependent upon who here? Mary is just as dependent on
the Lord for life. She's just as dependent on the
Lord for mercy and grace as you and I are. Now read on, verse
49. And he stretched forth his hand
toward his disciples and said, behold, here's my mother and
my brethren. For whosoever shall do the will
of my Father which is in heaven, the same as my brother and sister
and mother. Now the word of God describes
God's church. by several different names to
show us that there are different glorious wonders of the believer's
relationship with God. God's church is called the church,
and the word church means assembly. God has assembled all of his
people together in the Lord Jesus Christ. God has and he is assembling
his people together by calling them out of this world, calling
them together through the preaching of the gospel. The church is
called the elect of God to show us how God chose us. We didn't
choose God. We didn't choose to be in his
body. We didn't choose to be in his church. We didn't choose
to be in his family. We didn't choose God at all.
God chose us. God's church is the elect of
God. God's church is also called the
body of Christ, to show us our union with Christ the head. We
are what we are because of who Christ our head is. We have life
because we're joined. We have union with Christ our
head. Then the church is called the sheepfold, to show us our
dependence, our utter dependence on Christ the Good Shepherd.
We're dependent on Christ to come find us when we're lost,
to put us on his shoulder and carry us all the way back home
to the sheepfold. We're dependent on Christ to
lead us beside the still waters and in the lush green grass of
His Word. We're dependent on Christ the
Good Shepherd. Then God's church is called a
holy nation to show us that we are made holy in Christ. Then the church is called a royal
priesthood to show us that how in Christ we are made kings and
priests unto our God and we can come to God in Christ anytime
we want. You don't have to go to an earthly
man wearing a funny costume. No. If you're a believer, you
go straight to God because in Christ you've been made a king
and a priest unto God. The church is also called the
kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of God. It's called a kingdom
to show us The believers are under the authority of Christ
our Savior. We're under the authority of
Christ our King. So we don't get to pick which
laws to be obedient to. We don't get to pick our own
moral standard. It's not up to us. We don't get
to pick where or when we serve the Lord by serving His people.
We're under the authority of Christ the King. And here's the
difference from earthly kingdoms. God's people like it that way.
We want to be under the rule of Christ our King. We want it
that way. We wouldn't change it if we could.
We love to be under His rule, in the kingdom of God, the kingdom
of heaven. And then here, the church is
referred to as the family of God. The Lord pointed to all
of His disciples who were there listening, those just common
people who were there listening to Him preach, and He said, here's
my family. Here's my family. You look at them, here they are.
my mother, my sisters, and my brethren. Well, how does a person
get to be in the family of God? Well, we're born into the family
of God, aren't we? By the new birth. We're born
into a new birth, into a new family with a new father, with
a new nature. It's a spiritual family. Then
we're adopted into God's family by God's adopting grace. And
the way that we can tell if a person is in the family of God or not,
would you like to know if you're in the family of God? Well, there's
a way to tell. The way we tell if a person is in the family
of God or not is faith. Faith in Christ. Everyone who
is in the family of God believes on the Lord Jesus Christ. Every
one of them. They all believe on Christ. They all believe that
Christ is all it takes to save them. They don't have to add
anything to Christ. They believe He is all. They
believe on and they rely upon the Lord Jesus Christ to do all
of the saving and all of the keeping them saved without any
of their works. Look at the book of John, John
chapter 6. The Savior says here that whosoever should do the
will of my Father which is in heaven, the same as my brother,
the same as my sister, my mother, the same as my family. Well,
believing on Christ is doing the will of God. Doing the will
of God is simply believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. John 6,
verse 38. For I came down from heaven,
not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.
And this is the Father's will. Now, you want to do the Father's
will? This is the Father's will which has sent me. That of all
which he hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise
it up again at the last day. And this is the will of him that
sent me, that everyone would seeeth the Son, and believeth
on him, may have everlasting life. and I'll raise him up at
the last day." This is the Father's will that we believe on His Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ. So everyone who's in the family
of God, they believe the Lord Jesus Christ because God's given
them faith in Christ to believe Him. Now, every believer is a
child of God. Every believer is in the family
of God with all the rights and all the privileges of children.
Here's the main point that I want us to get this morning. It's
the great blessing of being in the family of God. To have the
Lord look at you and say, here is my brother, my sisters, and
my mother. What an unspeakable blessing
it is to be in the family of God. If the Lord will show us
this this morning, the blessing, the great privilege of being
in the family of God, our hearts are going to be comforted. And
we're going to be encouraged to continue, to continue pressing
on, to continue serving God by serving His people. and by loving
his people. And number one, just like every
other family, the family of God all goes by the same name. Now
what a blessing that is to not to have to bear Adam's worthless
name anymore. Now we bear the glorious name
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here is the reason that believers
are called Christians, because they believe Christ. They follow
him. They're in his family. We who believe bear the name
of Christ. no longer bearing the worthless
name of Adam. Jeremiah led us in on this great, great blessing.
He told us that the Lord's name, this one who's coming, the Savior
who's coming, his name is Jehovah Sidkenu, the Lord our righteousness. And then later on, 10 chapters
later, Jeremiah told us this is the name wherewith she shall
be called. This is the name wherewith the
bride of Christ shall be called. Jehovah Sidkenu, the very same
name as Christ our Savior. This is the name wherewith she
shall be called the Lord, our righteousness. That's the exact
same name as our Savior, because the family of God all has the
same name. Believers bear the same name
as Christ our bridegroom, because we're married to Him. We're in
the same family. Families have the same name. All right, number
two, families have the same nature. There's a family resemblance
in families because we have the same DNA. Someone recently saw
Dan Morgan and his father out taking a walk and they said,
oh, I love to see a father and a son taking a walk together.
Well, they knew that was a father and a son because Dan and his
father look so much alike. There's a family resemblance.
Well, by God's regenerating grace, believers have a family resemblance. We've been made partakers of
the divine nature. We've been made partakers of
the nature of our God and our Father. There's been a new nature
that's been born in us, and a new birth, and that nature bears
a family resemblance in every believer, no matter where you
find them. We truly are blood family. That's right, believers
are blood family. The blood of Christ. All bought
with the blood of Christ. All having His nature in us.
Been made partakers of His nature. Then thirdly, families have the
same Father. God's family is the same way.
Look in John chapter 20. John chapter 20. Families all have the same Father. They come from the same place.
Now this is after our Lord has risen from the tomb. And Mary
is there looking for Him and she can't find Him. She thought
that they'd stolen His body. In John 20 verse 16, Jesus saith
unto her, And she turned herself, and now she saw him. Now she
recognized him. And she saith unto him, Rabboni,
which is to say, Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch me
not, for I am not yet ascended to my Father. He's not saying
you can't touch me or hug me. What he's saying is you don't
have to cling to me. I'm not going anywhere just yet.
I'm not ascended yet to my Father. But go to my brethren and say
unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, to my God, and
you're God. Here the Savior is telling us
that His Father is our Father. If God is our Father, we're part
of His family. We're all part of that same family.
Now, if God is your Father, all is well. You reckon He's going
to take care of you? That He's going to provide for
you? That He's going to teach you? That He's going to direct you?
Well, of course He is. If God is our Father, all is
well. Alright, here's the fourth thing.
Families love each other. Now, Christ our Savior, He loves
all of His children the same. He loves them all with the same
infinite, immeasurable love. Christ's love for His family
is a pure, mighty love which passes all human understanding.
And it's that love, His love for His family, His love for
His bride, His love for those people that the Father gave Him
to save, that love caused Him to lay down His life for His
children, just like you do for yours. You'd gladly lay down
your life for your children, wouldn't you? Our Savior did
the same thing because of love. He laid down His life to redeem
His family from their sin. But here's the difference between
our Savior's love and our love. His love means a whole lot more.
Oh, we might be willing to lay down our life for our child,
and whether or not that would save their life, I don't know.
But when Christ laid down His life, He purchased the eternal
redemption of all of his people. And families love each other.
The Savior loved his people with that kind of love. And in return,
because he first loved us, we love him. And we also love them
that are begotten by him. We love that family of God. There's
a love one for another. Fifthly, families have communion
together. Families just like to sit and
talk together. Well, Christ's family is the
same way. God's family has communion with our Savior every time the
gospel is preached to us. This is how God communes. How
he talks with his people is through the preaching of his word. If
you want to commune with the Father, you want to read his
letter to you, read the word, and then come to the worship
service and hear it expounded to you. That's how God's family
has communion with each other. Then, sixthly, families correspond
with each other. You have families who live in
different areas of the country. They used to write letters. Now
they text, but they still correspond with each other through writing,
through the written word on a paper or through the written word on
a text. They correspond with each other. They want to talk
to one another. They keep in touch with one another. Well, Almighty
God corresponds with his family through his word, through the
preaching. of His Word. What a blessing
it is for us to have the Word of God. This is how God communicates
Himself to sinful men and women. This is how God corresponds to
His family through His written Word. Then seventh, families
gather around the table together. Now we love that, don't we? Just
gather around the table with our family. And you know for
the family, especially when your children are grown, they're out
of the They never have to have a special invitation to come
back home. They never have to have a special invitation to
come sit at our table. They're always welcome because
they're children. And we love to gather around
that table together. We know that's what God's family
does, isn't it? God's family gathers around His table, the
Lord's table, where we remember Christ our Savior. We gather
around the table, the family, the family dinner table, every
time the gospel is preached, where we have a feast, Fat things
on the leaves. Families gather around the table
together. Then eighth, families protect each other. If families
have each other's backs, they watch out for each other. Well,
God's family is the same way. God's family is fully protected
by God our Father and Christ our big brother. If Christ is
our big brother, we don't have to worry about a single bully
out there on the block, do we? They'll make a lot of noise,
but the Lord will take care of them. If God is our Father, we
don't have to worry about anything going on in this world, because
our Father owns it all, and He's in control of it all. Families
protect each other. Our father and our big brother
see to it. Their families protect them. The ninth, families provide
for each other. We'd never let anybody in our
family go without if we could help them, would we? No, we wouldn't,
because families provide for each other. Well, God's family
is the same way. God provides for his family. He provides for us absolutely
everything that we need. God provides for all the spiritual
needs of his children. He provides for our needs by
being everything that we need. Christ has made unto us wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Christ has made
unto us personally to be everything that we need. That's how God
provides for His family. Everything God requires of His
people, He's provided for them in the person of the Lord Jesus
Christ. That's how God provides for His family. If you're in
God's family, you're well provided for, aren't you? Not lacking
a thing. Not lacking anything. And then
our Father will provide for His people in this life, too. God
will provide for our needs. Now, He's not going to provide
for all of your wants. but He'll provide for all of our needs.
And knowing that that's so, knowing that our Father will provide
for our needs, that does not make God's people lazy or fatalistic. Or it sure shouldn't, because
if it does, that's a doctrinal error. Knowing that God will
provide does not make God's people lazy. Oh, make some hard workers. The Lord will provide for our
earthly needs. But you go to work. And you work
as hard as you possibly can. You do as good a job as you possibly
can. You don't talk back to that boss.
You just do what that boss tells you to do. That's honoring to
our Savior. And work hard. Work hard knowing
this. It's not your hard work that's
providing. It's your Father which is providing. He is providing
for us. And if you don't work and you
just say, oh, well, the Lord provides so I'm not going to
work, don't be surprised and you go hungry. And it won't be your
fault. It won't be God's fault for not providing. It'll be your
fault for not eating or for not working. Isn't that right? Our
Father provides for His people. He provides everything that we
need spiritually. And He provides for His people
in this life too. And if that makes you fatalistic
and lazy and say, you know, whatever will be, will be, you have the
wrong attitude. God's family is provided for
by our Father. The intent families have an inheritance.
Now that inheritance, it might not be worth much to the world.
I mean, most people don't have a whole lot of money to pass
down to their children as inheritance, do they? It might not be worth
a lot of money, but boy, it sure could have a lot of sentimental
value to a family, couldn't it? That's an inheritance that we
pass down to our children. Well, God's family has an inheritance.
Believers are made joint heirs with Christ. So God's family
has an inheritance from our Father. and it's precious. It's more
valuable than human language can explain. Every believer is a joint heir
with Christ and they have this unspeakably rich inheritance. Peter described the inheritance
of God's family. He said it's incorruptible. You're
not going to lose it because it rotted away. Peter said God's
family has an inheritance. It's undefiled. It's perfect. It has no sin. You can't lose
it because of our sin. Then Peter said, this inheritance,
it fadeth not away. It'll never lose its value. It'll never go out of style.
It fadeth not away. And Peter said, our inheritance
is reserved in heaven for you. No thief can break through and
steal it. It's reserved in heaven for you who believe. Oh, what
an inheritance we have, being joint heirs with Christ. We have
an inheritance. Then lastly, families like to
get together for family reunions. Families just enjoy coming back
home and being together. Well, God's family is the same
way. One day soon, the Lord is coming back to gather his family
all together in one eternal family reunion, where we're all together
eternally worshiping Christ our Savior. Now, God has a family. Scripture says that the Lord
is not ashamed to call them his brethren. God has a family. And
if you're in that family, you shouldn't be ashamed to call
your brethren, brother neither. Believers should be as concerned
about loving and taking care of our spiritual family as we
do our earthly family. You should never break down a
doctrinal disagreement upon family lines. It should always be based
upon the truth of the Word of God. We should never choose earthly
family over spiritual family. We should never choose that over
the family of God, over the worship of God. We should never choose
our earthly family over the truth of God, the truth of the gospel
of God. Never should we do that. Now,
we shouldn't do that. But oftentimes, unfortunately,
we do, don't we? Sometimes God's family on earth
does a pretty good job of it, but often we do not do a very
good job of that. Now, I would encourage you, don't let that
be true of you. I would encourage you who believe to love and care
for your family in Christ, your spiritual family, every bit as
much as you do your family after the flesh. That's what the Lord
is teaching you. Who is your real family? What's
the Lord teaching you? Those who do the will of the
Father. That's your real family. And remember this. Eternity is
coming soon. Right soon, eternity is coming.
And in glory, there's not going to be these earthly families.
There's not going to be any marriages. There's not going to be any separate
family unions. There's units. There's going
to be one family. There's going to be one marriage. There's going
to be one bridegroom and one bride. We'll all be married to
Christ. We'll all be in one family. Now, you know that's so in eternity,
don't you? You know that's so in glory. Then we ought to start
acting like it now. Why wait till the end? We ought
to start acting like it now. But when we don't do a very good
job of doing that for each other, we ought to start acting like
that now. But when we don't, we don't do a very good job of
it, don't take care of one another like we should, just remember
this, the Lord does. The Lord does. The Lord is faithful
to love, to provide for, and to protect his family. The blessing
of our heart is not how well we act towards one another, how
good of a brother or sister that we are. The blessing for our
heart is the Lord, our heavenly Father, our big brother. He is
unchangingly, eternally faithful to his family. He will never
leave or forsake his family. He will never quit loving his
family. He will never quit taking care of and providing for his
family, ever. And aren't we thankful? Aren't
we thankful? What a blessing to be in the
family of God. What a blessing. to have Almighty
God be our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, the
Savior of sinners, to be our big brother. Oh, what a blessing
to be in the Lord's faith. All right. Until next time, I
pray that the Lord will keep you and watch over you.