Amen in Acts chapter 13. I'm
going to start at verse 25 and read through I'll say verse 33
and then we'll begin to pick up where we Have left off last
time. I think I want to pick up in
point number 7 from John to Christ so in Acts 13 verse 25 and as
John fulfilled His course he said whom think ye that I am
I am NOT he and But behold, there comes one after me whose shoes
of his feet I am not worthy to lose. Men and brethren, children
of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you that feareth
God, to you is the word of this salvation sent. For they that
dwell at Jerusalem and their rulers, because they did not
know him, nor yet the voice of the prophets which are read every
Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him. And though
they found no cause of death in him, yet desired they Pilate
that he should be slain. And when they had fulfilled all
that was written of him, they took him down from the tree and
laid him in a sepulcher. But God raised him from the dead.
And he was seen many days of them which came up with him from
Galilee to Jerusalem, who are his witnesses unto the people. And we declare unto you, glad
tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers,
God hath fulfilled the same unto us, their children, in that he
raised up Jesus again, as it is written in the second Psalm,
you are my son, this day have I begotten thee. I'm gonna stop
right here for the reading of the word. For those of you who
are new with us, the context is Jewish, synagogue worship,
which is taking place in the upper regions of Asia Minor,
where the apostles have traveled, Pisidia, Antioch of Pisidia in
Asia Minor, where the apostles have traveled now, sharing the
gospel and exposing their Jewish brethren to the person and work
of Jesus Christ, of which many of them were not aware of. And at this time they are in
the church and the rulers have given them opportunity to speak. And the apostle is representing
those that are with him, and he is now setting forth the historical
facts of the gospel. For those of you who are with
us in our studies, you understand that when history is laid out
according to scripture, technically that theological discipline is
called what? It is called biblical theology.
When history is laid out according to scripture, technically that
discipline is called biblical theology. And so that's what
Paul is doing here as he is recounting the events of Israel from the
days of Abraham. And now he has summed up his
historical recount to the point where he has just set forth before
the children of Israel, the fact that Jesus, is the one whom the
rulers had crucified. And in so doing, they fulfilled
the scriptures. So there's a number of things
for us to grasp in that portion right there. So they are in the
synagogue and the scriptures are the topic. The scriptures
are the topic. But more than that, Jesus is
the topic of the scriptures. And so what we say in terms of
the concept of biblical theology This is something that you might
as well ascertain and acquire in terms of your own knowledge
of how theologians talk. Biblical theology is history
according to whom? Jesus. That's right. That's all
biblical theology is history according to Jesus. When you understand your Bible,
you understand your Bible was written to exalt Christ. And
where you and I do not understand that we cannot actually make
heads or tail out of the history of scripture. There will be portions
in your Bible which will make no sense to you. The book of
Leviticus will make no sense to you. The book of Song of Solomon
will make no real sense to you. And people then will abuse both
books and make them out of something that have nothing to do with
the person and work of Jesus Christ. The book of Numbers will
make no sense to you. If you don't understand that
the book of Numbers is all about the assembling of the people
of God as an army to fight the battles of the Lord in the land
of Canaan, and at the head of that army is the tribe of Judah,
from which comes our Lord Jesus Christ. Biblical theology is
history according to Jesus. And if you don't understand that
your Bible is a bunch of disjointed propositions, historical narratives,
prose, and other things that just don't make sense. Christ
is the glue that puts it all together. I'm sure you've heard
that before, but you definitely wanna nail that down. So this
is what Paul is doing as he's speaking to the brethren. So
we actually were dealing with point number seven, Abraham to
David to Christ at length over the last couple of weeks. That's
our PowerPoint up there. And that was largely because
in the narrative back at verse 22, This is where Paul had begun
to speak to the children of Israel. And when they had removed Saul,
they raised up to them David to be their king, to whom he
gave also testimony and said, I have found David, the son of
Jesse, a man after my own heart, which shall fulfill all my will. Of this man's seed hath God,
according to his promise, raised unto Israel a savior, and his
name is what? Right. So what Paul quickly did
was he opened up talking about Abraham and we affirmed that
a few weeks ago. He quickly moves from Abraham
to whom? David. And from David to whom? Jesus. Right. And so this is where we
were last week underscoring the genealogy of Christ from Abraham. Genealogy Let's see here. This should be
GE genealogy of Abraham to David to Jesus three generations out
of Matthew chapter 1 and under the Abrahamic Covenant We are
dealing with the fathers. This is the patriarchy But once
we get to the Davidic Covenant, we are dealing with what the
monarchy This is what Paul is dealing with now as he addresses
the Son of David whom Jesus is and if we're dealing with the
monarchy Jesus now becomes for us a what a king a King this
is the way Paul is going to set Jesus forth from this point forward
Of this of this man see that is David According to the promise
that's the scriptures. He has raised unto Israel a Savior
named what? alright, and so I said King because
Jesus is God's King coming out of the line of David. Is that
not true? I But he is to be understood by us as a king and a what? A king and a savior. Now that's
going to be critical as again, Paul and his constituents will
be arguing and debating throughout the rest of the book of Acts,
just who Jesus is and what the role of Messiah is in the life
of the church and among the Jewish people. So we've seen that he
is an accounting from Abraham to David, to Christ, We saw the
father-son paradigm, the king-servant covenant model anticipated. And
we said that the final model that the New Testament church
sets down in terms of God's covenant purpose is the model of what?
Husband and wife. That's right. So Christ and the
church takes on the paradigm of a husband-wife model. Israel
took on the paradigm of a king-servant model. The patriarchs took on
the paradigm of the father-son model. the father son model. You and I are in the husband
and wife model. The church is the bride of Christ. Christ is
the husband. It does not mean that he's not
also King and we are not also servants. That's true. He's King
of Kings, Lord of Lords. We are his servants. But it's
true that everyone in the world is his servant. God has made
him Lord of all. All human beings are the servants
of Christ. This is where the prophetic element of biblical
truth comes into play. Why doth the heathen rage? and
the people imagine a vain thing. The rulers have set themselves
against the Lord and against his anointed saying, that's exactly
the world we live in today. Nations hostile against biblical
truth and the proposition that Jesus is Lord. And the church
has to deal with that. But where the church addresses
that antipathy on the part of the world is from a position
of privilege. While we are called to be the
prophetic voice of Christ, we are also the bride of Christ.
Now that's a device and a perspective that God gives to the church
in order for the church to derive a sense of comfort and benefit
and blessing as we identify with Jesus Christ, our husband, because
in the world, you're gonna have tribulation simply because you're
a Christian. So now, Mark this, it's different
for you to perceive or depict yourself as a servant of a king
than for you to depict yourself as the bride of a husband. It's
not to say that the servant king model doesn't have levels of
profound commitment to it because it does. Jesus is a perfect example
of being the servant of his father, Jehovah, and Jehovah is the great
king and Christ is his monarch, as it were, his co-regent monarch.
And we see the faithfulness of his servant in Jesus running
through the scriptures. This is my servant in whom I
am well pleased. We are servants and we need to
be able to embrace that too. But the spirit of God is resonant
in the life of the church today to bring us into a greater sense
of relationship to God than merely servants. But it's important
for you and I to be able to adopt the paradigm of being a wife. to a husband who is both God
and the ruler of the universe so that we can derive the blessings
and benefits of being one with him in a world that's hostile
to Christ. So that we take it personally
with regards to how the world views Christ and so that the
sufferings that we experience for acknowledging that we are
his can have a redemptive benefit. If Jesus says, if they have rejected
me, they're gonna reject you. It's one thing for you to suffer
rejection as a servant of a king. It's another thing for you to
suffer rejection as the wife of a husband. This raises the
level of marriage significantly. Now, for those of you who were
with me last week, you know that we could easily veer back into
the marriage paradigm and deal with the crisis of marriage in
the church today and in the world today, right? because that whole
paradigm is being assaulted today too, isn't it? We won't go back
there because I wanna move further into our text, but it's important
for you to know that the things that I'm talking to you about
now are not like incidental pieces of information. These are critical
issues of which I am addressing. The father-son paradigm, that
first paradigm is a critical issue in the world today. If
you and I do not believe that God made the world and all things
in it, and that he did create mankind in his own image and
in his own likeness, and that man bears the image of God, you
won't well fight for true identity of human nature. You will be
inclined to accept the world's view that we can morph ourselves
into anything we want to at any time and simply conveniently
say, I am this, that, or the other. But if you actually believe
in a biblical worldview and you hold to the fact that God made
man and woman, these two binary genders, immutably, unchangeably,
with a larger redemptive and theological purpose and view,
we're going to fight for the biblical worldview, are we not?
And if we don't fight for the biblical worldview, we're going
to be changed into the image of the beast, will we not? And
when once the church has now succumbed to the image of the
beast, the church now no longer represents Christ as a bride,
nor him as a king and us as a servant, and nor God the father as a father
and us as a son in the privileged sense. We have no more purpose
in the world as the church. The church is the redeemed people
of God. Redeemed. Do you guys understand
redemption? The price that was paid to purchase
you back and to make you that which God had originally designed
in the person of Christ. So that redeemed people actually
stand on the other side of the tracks of this world system,
saying to the world, you have a problem and the solution is
Jesus. And should you forbid to submit
to that solution, you will never solve your problem. Does that
make some sense? It's very important to understand
that because We are still working through presently in our church
age, our identity. The devil has constantly assaulted
the church. And as it were distracted it
from a sense of confirmation of its identity. And we are making
ourselves over constantly seeking to try to move the world to the
church. And that's all because we don't
know our identity. Now, when you marry a woman and you marry
a man and you take on that man's last name which is a whole nother
issue in our churches today, you and that person become one.
The battle that you guys are supposed to fight is the battle
of affirming that identity. Your identity is not up for question. It's not up for question. I am
his, he is mine. And the battle then is for us
to affirm that identity and then to affirm the mission subsequent
to that identity. So when we say what model follows,
what is the model that follows after the days in which Christ
is raised from the dead? The husband, wife model, Christ
and the church. And that's how the Bible closes
out. So having dealt with that, let's go to point number seven.
And that's probably point number eight in your PowerPoint. Let's
see the next one. There it is. From John to Christ. Now this
is quite interesting and some things for us to learn by way
of if I had the title, what we're going to be dealing with next
year. In verses 24 through verse 33, it would be under the rubric
of witness, under the rubric of witness. It has to do with
God finally in the fullness of time, sending his son into the
world made of a woman born under the law. As we read in Galatians
chapter four, verses one and following in the fullness of
time, Jesus came into the world. Did he not? When we use the term
fullness of time, we're not talking human time and we're not talking
as it were mere chronology per se. What we are saying is that
God had an appointed time in which he decided to send his
son into the world, didn't he? And even that is rich in his
theological contemplation. Do you know that God created
the heavens and the earth And he allowed humanity to live and
to exist and to function for thousands of years before he
sent his son into the world to begin to solve the sin problem.
We have a whole history of mankind proliferation, proliferating
on the face of the earth and becoming tribes and nations and
wars and conflicts and battles and the division of the nations
in the days of Noah. Now we have countries Massive
in their size to the tune of 8 billion people on planet earth
of all sorts of ethnic groups and history and and Trials and
troubles. Is that right? 2,000 years ago. That's all it was 2,000 years
ago. God finally said okay, it's time
and he sent his son into the world Fascinating because he
allowed the world to exist for what some of us call about 10,000
years particularly of human history 10,000 years, and then he sent
his son into the world 2,000 years ago. But before that, 2,000
years earlier, he set up a representative nation called what? Israel. And
so Israel would be a conduit 2,000 years before Christ to
guard the promises of God until Jesus came. Now you and I are
exactly 2,000 years after that. This is where, from a prophetic
standpoint and an eschatological standpoint, the church is struggling
with, are challenged with the idea of where do we stand? On the one hand, we have the
cross and that took place in what I will call AD 33, have
reasons to argue for that. 2000 years before that BC is
the call to Abraham. And from the cross forward, another
2000 years, guess where we are you and me this is where we are
exactly 2,000 years and we have to ask the question if we've
been in Christ for five minutes if you've been in Christ for
five years if you certainly have been in Christ for 10 years or
more some of us have been in Christ for more than 30 years
and 40 years some of us we have to ask the question where are
we in human history in the scope of Realm of God's purpose we
have to ask that because every generation has a purpose Are
we at the end of the end times of which? Western Christianity
has been so enamored by ever since I came into a knowledge
of the gospel We've been constantly talking about the world ending
the world ending the world ending and it has actually expanded
beyond Christendom There's kind of been this world consciousness
based upon technology, based upon the capacity for self-destruction
with nuclear capabilities that we could destroy the world. And
so we are at this real strange epic in human history. We all
sense around the corner, there's a change coming. We all sense
that, but be careful. Your senses mean very little.
I don't like everybody's got a belly button. So what? So what? Don't don't try to turn that
into some type of prophetic or spiritual litmus test or compass
You know things could settle down and the Lord may not come
for another 2,000 years That's very real now my prophecy buff
brethren don't like it when I say that But the first century AD
was filled with people who swore that Jesus was coming at the
end of the first century And then we had our millennial brethren
who thought that Jesus was coming at the end of the first thousand
years of human history because they bought into a literal, what
we call a millennial period. And so they thought the millennial
reign began at the first century AD and then moved to the end
of the first millennium, first thousand years. And so upon the
end of the first thousand years, they swore that Jesus was coming. And interestingly enough, what
occurred were fantastic signs in the heavens like eclipses
strange and bizarre things. And whenever you and I are on
the harbinger of the bizarre signs and wonders will easily
draw you in, you know, and that's where we are today with a lot
of prophecy buffs. You and I don't know where we are in the spectrum
of God's purpose, but we do know what we're called to be. You
know what that is? Witnesses. We're called to be witnesses
of Christ. And that will bring us into the next category of
our study, a witness of Jesus Christ. That's what we are called
to be. Doesn't matter when Jesus is
coming. He could be coming right now. Our job is to witness to
the glory of God in Christ and to the truth of the scriptures.
So then let's follow the paradigm of what it means to be a witness
from John to Christ. Notice what it says in verse
24 and 25. When John had first preached before his coming, before
the coming of Christ, baptism of repentance to all the people
of Israel. And as John fulfilled his course,
he said, whom think ye that I am? I am not he, but behold, there
comes one after me whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to
lose. Verse 24 and 25, Paul has to
insert into the context because John was the forerunner of Jesus
Christ. John was like the morning star
that let everyone know that the sun was about to rise. God has
sent John into the world in terms of ministry in about AD 29. In AD 29, John begins his ministry. And John's ministry is very instructive
to us. And his ministry points to whom? It points to Christ. This is
what it means to be a witness in the true sense. A witness
is one who points to Christ. So John comes on the scene according
to the gospel of John chapter 1 verse 5. Let's look at it.
John 1 5 and listen to the language as we think through how God works
when his when his major plan is about to break out into the
world. In John chapter one, we read
verses one through four concerning the nature of Christ as the Logos
being equal with God the Father and the creator of all things.
And then we read in verse five, and the light shineth in darkness
and the darkness does not comprehend it. This here gives us the sort
of cosmic conflict that is the backdrop to what's about to take
place. Verse six, There was a man sent
from God whose name was what? Right, Yohannes in the Greek.
The same came for a what? So it's important for you to
know that to be sent is to be sent to witness. The same came
as a witness to bear witness of what? The light. Now who is
the light in this context? Jesus. That's right. To bear
witness of the light that all men through him might what? So
if you really wanted to do sort of an exegetical development
of the concept of witnessing, verse seven is a perfect text. Verse seven is a perfect text.
The same came for a witness. That's what believers are. God
sends us into the world to witness. That's Acts chapter one, verse
eight. Ye are my witnesses, tarry ye here until you be endued with
power from on high, and when you are empowered with the Spirit
of God, you will go into all the world and witness. Now watch
this. The same came for witness, to bear witness of whom? The
light, Jesus Christ. Right, so we are not bearing
witness of ourselves, we are bearing witness of Jesus. You
and I are not the light, Christ is the light. And what we do
is bear record to that light. We let men and women know that
Christ is the light of the world. Now, when John uses that metaphor
light, he's also alluding to Christ deity, is he not? First
John chapter one says, God is light. There's no darkness in
him. And this is why in the beginning
of creation, light becomes a major component to the whole process
of dividing the days and the nights and developing the sequence
of God's creative process, right? He calls the light to shine.
And it separated the day from the night. And Jesus here is
called the light. And he's declared to be the light that we witness
of. And our purpose for witnessing
is seen in the last line, that all men through him might what?
This is really interesting. To be a witness is to tell people
about Jesus. We are telling people about Jesus,
not so that they can have their intellectual fancies satisfied,
but that they might believe on God through him. I want you to
notice how the proposition lays out. We are bearing witness of
the light that all men through him through jesus. Jesus becomes
the means By which we believe Who are we to believe in god?
And we are to believe in god through whom jesus So jesus is
the means by which god is revealed to us in a saving way so that
if you are a real witness of jesus You are telling men and
women that jesus is the only way to the father That's right
And this is what John is doing. So our text is laying out for
us the character of John. So under point number eight,
it says a man sent from God. The second thing we need to know
about John is he points to Christ and he never gets in his way.
Do you see that? Is that what your outline says?
He points to Christ and he never gets in his way. One of the things
I learned early on in the gospel ministry, as the Lord was developing
my call to preach and to teach, was the distinction between true
witnesses and false witnesses. So as the Bible says in the book
of Proverbs, a true witness delivers souls, but a false witness speaketh
lies. The Proverbs says a true witness
delivers souls, but a false witness speaketh lies. Now, this is a
very important concept that we are addressing here, because
every Christian professes to be a witness. Is that true? Every Christian is bearing record
in the courtroom of men's conscience that the things that they are
saying are true. This matter of being a Christian is a very
profound, very legal, very, very formal, very technical issue. It's not the kind of emotional
mamby-pamby thing that religion, as it were, fosters on people. When you say that you are a witness
to something, you are saying that you are bearing credible
evidence that the facts about that thing, that person, or that
situation is true. When you say you are a witness
to something, you are ready to stand and swear on the Bible
with your right hand up and oath that the things that you saw
are true. This is what makes the whole
issue of Christianity, a scandal. Because many people really don't
know Jesus who will say they do, but they are not prepared
to actually bear record of him because they don't know him enough
to do so. And so the whole idea of witnessing is a very ominous,
ominous, ominous calling because God now is entrusting you to
tell people about him. Now, so John becomes a forerunner
of that for us. And we know John is described
in the book of Isaiah chapter 40 as the voice crying in the
wilderness, prepare ye, prepare ye the way of the Lord, make
his path straight. This is John being prophesied
by Isaiah some 700 years before John shows up. Now John shows
up and John is preaching for three and a half years before
Jesus comes. A.D. 29 to A.D. 33 is about 23
1/2 years. And that 3 1/2 year period is
something that's summed up in the book of Revelation to underscore
the two witnesses. So John does 3 1/2 years ministry. How many years ministry does
Jesus do? 3 1/2 years. So John does 3 1/2. Jesus does
3 1/2. How many years is that? Seven years. This is the prophetic language
of the book of Daniel. I'm not going to take you there,
but you need to understand that the prophetic language of scripture
is always centered in the person and work of Christ. When people
get caught up in numbers, those numbers are totally irrelevant
if they don't land on the person and work of Christ. So these
Two witnesses John and Jesus are the reason for which the
whole world now turns on the hinge of history and move towards
what we call the period of a D Which is what I know what Domino which
literally means what year of our what Lord? That's right. You and I are in the year of
our Lord that happened in at this point right here. But before
the cross, we had a man named John whose ministry was to point
to Christ. And he did that ministry for
three and a half years. And if you do your ministry right
as a witness of Christ, as you preach, and as you teach, and
as you witness, and as you evangelize, and as you seek to reach men
and women, your job is to never get in the way of Christ. As
you share the word of God, as you seek to evangelize, as you
seek to reach men and women, your job is to never get in the
way of Jesus. Jesus did not call you to eclipse
his glory with your own glory. He did not call you to stand
in his presence and veil and obscure the perfections of who
he is by calling attention to yourself. And this is a tremendous
problem in the church as well. It fascinates me. I study church
history and I deal intimately, even at the present moment while
I'm talking to you, with pastoral ministry. And I, as it were,
I survey the whole of the church through the medium of the internet,
have the capacity to observe church services and observe ministries
and analyze ministries and Ask questions about ministries, the
big popular ministries, small, unassuming ministries. You can
do that now all over the world. You do know that, right? Years
ago, you couldn't know anything about the church down the street,
let alone churches around the world. Today, you can quickly
assess whether a church is a solid biblical-based church or not
right now. You don't even have to go to
that church. If they're up on the web and you can listen to
the sermons of their pastor or preachers, you can know quickly
whether or not they're true witnesses or false witnesses. You can know
very quickly. And so I listen and I observe
and my heart aches for much of the church, not all of it, but
much of the church because the fundamentals are not practiced.
Biblical Christianity is witnessing to Jesus. So he points to Christ
and he never gets in the way. Watch verse 27 in your Bible,
John chapter one, verse 27. Here's what John says when the
Pharisees raised the question. I'm gonna start at verse 25.
They asked him and said unto him, why are you baptizing if
you be not the Christ nor Elijah, neither the prophets? They made
an assumption, didn't they? When they saw John doing his
ministry, that he could not be doing this kind of ministry with
any real valid authority unless he was operating under the authority
of three premises. Either he was the what, Christ?
Or he was what, Elijah? Because they held both Messiah
and Elijah as the highest order of God sent servants. Either
he's the Christ or Elijah, because this man is doing ministry having
circumvented the approval of the church. They look up and
this dude is doing ministry and thousands of people are coming
to the river Jordan while he preaches the gospel to them and
calls them to repentance and they're saying who gave you the
authority to do this? Are you the Messiah? Are you
Elijah of whom in their sort of pagan syncretism believed
he would rise again or resurrect or take on some new form misinterpreting
the scriptures? We'll talk about that in a moment.
They asked him, are you Christ or Elijah or that other prophet? Again, they're dealing with Deuteronomy
chapter 18, 15, where Moses says, a prophet shall the Lord your
God raise up among yourself. He will come from among your
brethren. He will be just like me. And they failed to understand
that that was a messianic prophecy concerning Jesus. Technically
speaking, the role of prophet, priest, and king are all summed
up in Messiah, is it not? but they were separating those.
They were looking for literal, as it were, resurrection of Elijah.
They were looking for Messiah to come, and then another prophet,
all individual. That's a mess in itself in terms
of people who do not acknowledge the deity of Jesus Christ among
many sects today. You guys do understand that.
That's a mess going on right now in its own right. But here's
what John says. He says over in verse 26, and
John answered and said, I baptize with water, but there standeth
among you one whom you do not what? So then Jesus was already
there, wasn't he? So there's some things for us
to learn by way of application. As ministry goes forth, if that
ministry is authentic and legitimate, Jesus is present, but not all
people know that. So what John is saying is Christ
is among us. Scriptures are being fulfilled
what the prophets have said concerning these latter days the latter
days being the days of Jewish subordination to the Roman Empire
that Messiah would show up John says he's here We just don't
see him and he's not yet to be seen until you and I make our
paths straight What John had been preaching was what he was
ordained to preach by God and what that was the waters of baptism
calling Jewish people to repentance and And this is the other thing
that really ticked off the Jews. Who do you think you are telling
us that we have to be baptized when we be Abraham seed? We know
the creeds, we know the confessions, we know how to sing just as I
am. And I know I'm saved because
the hymn says, Jesus loves me. This I know because the Bible
tells me so. I know he lives because he lives
in my heart. So we're taking all of these traditions and making
them the basis of our salvation, which is a flaw premise. Is it
not? This is exactly what Israel was doing. They're looking at
Jonathan. You do. What authority do you
have to do this? If you're not Moses, if you're
not Jesus, that other prophet or Elijah, you don't have any
authority to do what you're doing. And here's what John says. I'm
doing what I'm doing because God told me to do it. And God's
spirit has endorsed it. And the thousands of people that
are coming to the water are coming to the water because God has
humbled them enough to know that they are not right with God.
He was baptizing the people who had really understood that even
though they were Abraham's physical seed, they were just as lost
and going to hell as the pagan Gentiles who did not know God.
See, this is the thing that was offending them. This dude was
first of all doing ministry without being affirmed by the collegiates
and the scholars at the temple. The second thing that he was
doing was baptizing people, asserting that Judaism had failed to achieve
the goal as a system of bringing people to God. This was an offense
to the leaders. They were offended at John. And
here's what John says in verse 26. 27, he it is whom you do not know
who is coming after me. This same individual is preferred
before me. Old King James language. It simply
means that he is above me. He actually has a more authority
than I do. The one that's coming has more authority than me. He's
above me because he was before me. Whose shoe latches I am not
even worthy to unloose. That means he, John saw himself
in relationship to Jesus as so inept, so low and so humble and
so as it were unqualified to even identify with Christ that
he couldn't even loosen his shoes. Now, ladies and gentlemen, watch
this. This is very important. Why Jesus said that John was
the greatest of all the prophets is inherent in the attitude that
John had. Why Jesus called John the greatest
of the prophets in the gospel of Matthew chapter 11 When Jesus
was defending his cousin from all of the allegations and charges
that were rendered against him, he said, John the Baptist, no
man born of a woman is greater than John. And it wasn't because
John performed miracles, because John didn't perform one miracle.
This is the amazing thing about John's ministry, and this is
going to help you and me in terms of paradigms for gospel ministry. Because the greatest commendation
you and I can receive from Jesus is if you and I are called ministries
of John the Baptist. If Jesus were to say, I liken
you unto John the Baptist, that's the greatest, as it were, a commendation
you could receive. And I'm gonna share with you
why. Because John's ministry perfectly depicts what it means
to totally point people to Jesus. And where ministry is committed
to pointing people to Christ, God is gonna honor that ministry.
And he will never ever honor any other kind of ministry. So
let me kind of give you some insights into the nature of John's
ministry for which Jesus says, he's the greatest of all the
prophets. John was the cousin of our Lord Jesus Christ. The
cousin, flesh and blood. But because John was actually
saved, born again, regenerated by the Holy Ghost in the womb
of his mother, Elizabeth. As John grew in stature and grew
in the knowledge of God and in the things of God, what John
knew was that he was not the Christ. He knew that he was not
Messiah. And therefore he knew that he
was not a sinless man, an impeccable man. He knew that he wasn't divine,
that he wasn't God, that he did not possess, as it were, a state
of righteousness that made him different than any other person
to whom he was speaking. John knew that he was a sinner
saved by grace. This is very important to know.
John knew this. I think sometimes Christians
get beside themselves thinking somehow that they are holier
than someone else intrinsically and personally and characteristically.
And that somehow they have something that gives them an advantage
over other people. Now, when God is working in our
lives in a sanctifying way, and he's really growing us in Christ,
what he teaches you is that you are the worst sinner in the world. You and no one else. And when you begin to get that,
then God can use you. And I'm not talking about the
kind of pious sinner that you get in churches. Oh, I'm a sinner,
I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner. No, I'm talking about
being so bad of a sinner that you don't even tell people, now
I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner. Cause you know, we love to cash
in on all kinds of religious cliches. It sickens me to hear
folks say, I'm a sinner, I'm a sinner, and don't really mean
it. When you really mean it, you don't have to say it. It's
going to be part of your character. To be a real sinner is a person
that knows he must, she must depend upon God fully. And that
the worst thing they could do is steal God's glory at any aspect
of their life, which religion loves to prop glory on you, make
you something that you're not. Religion loves to tell you how
God's mightily using you and how blessed you are and how God's
called you to do this and called you to do that. It's called flattery.
Are you guys hearing me? Religion loves to do it. They
wanna call it bestowing gifts and granting gifts and prophesying
and all. No, no, that's all flattery. Do you know that you and I are
nothing? Have you figured that out yet?
You're nothing. And until you learn that, you
can't be saved. This man is crazy. First Corinthians
chapter one, verse 26 through 30. I'm not going to go there.
I'm gonna let you read it for yourself. God only saves nothings. That's all he saves. All God
saves is nothings. And this is why John is saying,
I can't even loosen this man's shoes. Now he's doing that over
the knowledge that he is the man's cousin, that he is six
months older than Jesus, and that Mary and Elizabeth are close
family members. And if John wanted to swill with
pride at being the cousin of the Messiah, he could have cashed
in on that significantly. But see, grace had humbled him
in such a way that God could use him. And by the way, that's
the only way God really truly uses a person. where grace comes
in and humbles you enough to know that you better not even
contemplate for a moment still in God's glory. Cause that'll
make you a liar and false witnesses tell lies. I'm getting back to
the witnessing. I'm actually developing the concept
of witness from a psychological standpoint. You guys do recognize
that. So what John has done is told the rulers, not only, Is
it not me? But he's coming after me here
shortly and he's preferred before me. And I like what John just
did at the first line that you're reading. He's coming after me.
Do you know that God did not tell John when Jesus was coming?
God did not tell John when Jesus was coming until God said to
John, look, there he is. That requires the humility of
obedience for God to tell you he's coming, but not tell you
when he's coming. requires obedience. You got to
be able to trust God, isn't that right? Because we love to cash
in on how soon Jesus is coming. I mean, Hal Lindsay has made
tons of money and all these other cats revising what, you know,
these books and people are buying them over and over again because
they think we're getting closer and closer and closer and they
want to cash in and they're making millions of dollars left behind
series. Do you know how many times he
had to revise that book? Left behind. Do you understand? I was 18 years old when God called
me by his grace and they were marking out the 10 common market
in the United Nations. That thing has turned around
25 times since the Lord called me. Got to revise the book. But
do you know what? Every time they revise the book,
other people buy it. There's a second born every day in the Christian church. It's
sad. Listen to what John says in verse
28. These things were done at Beth
Barra, beyond Jordan, where John was baptizing. Then we read in
verse 29, the next day, John sees Jesus coming unto him. Do
you see it? The next day, John sees Jesus coming to him and
said, behold, the lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the
world. Go back to our PowerPoint. I
want you to see that pattern. And I want to press that home
in your heart of what it means to be a true witness to Jesus. The next day John sees Jesus
coming unto him saying, behold, the Lamb of God, which takes
away the sin of the world. Watch this. What does it mean
to be a witness? It means to be a man or a woman
or a people sent from God. What does it mean to be a witness?
It means that we point to Christ and we never get in his way.
We never get in his way. What John does in verse 31 is
what God has called all believers. Can y'all see this? See what
I'm doing? This does not take a degree. PhD and MDiv. It doesn't even actually take
a high school diploma to do this. You can actually do this in the
third grade. You can do this in kindergarten. You know what
I'm doing? I'm pointing. And guess what I'm doing? I'm
pointing away from myself. Now, from a true witness of God,
I'm pointing to something so that your eyes are to depart
from me and fix itself on that other thing. And where the ministry
of the church is not pointing people in another direction,
it's lying. You guys understand that? It's
lying. The cause of Christians is to
point to Christ. Here's the ethic. It's in John
chapter three, verse 29 through 31. Here's the ethic. I want
you to see the ethic and see if you can cause these things
to sink down deep into your soul. Here's another wonderful sort
of characteristic of John for which Jesus says, he's the greatest
of all the prophets. So I'm gonna start at John chapter
three, verse 26. But once again, the rulers are
coming to John because John still, he got thousands of people coming
to him, folks. I'm just saying thousands. I
mean, he got disciples, he got ministry going on, it's massive.
And he never went to the temple. Never. Isn't that wild? And watch this. He was a Levite. Isn't that crazy? I'm trying
to show you the antithesis, this juxtaposition over against his
Jewish heritage and his calling as a witness to Jesus, how he
never reached over into his Jewish heritage to try to win points
with the religious system of his day. He was a Levitical priest. His daddy was, he was next in
line. He could have taken up the order.
He could have served in the temple. He could have made it to high
priest. He could have done a number of politically strategic things
that religious folk do in order to be known and seen. Rather
than go to the temple, John goes to the wilderness. Rather than go to the temple,
God, John goes to the wilderness where he meets God. Can God be found in the wilderness? Read your Bible, the biblical
narrative makes it very clear that it's so. Did Jesus find
God in the wilderness? Sure he did. There's a time to
depart from the people so that you can hear from God in order
that you might know that you're actually hearing from God. John's
whole preparation and ministry was born in the wilderness. And
when he came into Judah and to Palestine and started preaching
and teaching, he never went to the temple, although he had a
right in the temple. But the reason he didn't go to the temple
was because the church was corrupt. The father's disfavor was on
the church at that time. The disfavor. John was an omen
to the church. The rulers didn't know what to
do with this dude. He got on a leather girdle, dressed in
a cashmere outfit. It's kind of rough. Cashmere
with a leather strap, big old leather strap. long stringy hair,
um, you know, and eating well, honey and locusts. Some of y'all
might like that today. I understand that our diets are
changing, but you know, they thought he was crazy, bizarre,
couple cards short of a full debt, one pin missing, you know,
all of this stuff that they do. And he was actually smack dab
in the middle of the will of God. He knew more about God than
any of the rulers and his ministry was filled with power He was
serious about God's word And he was serious about pointing
men to Christ But more than pointing them to Christ Preparing them
for Christ It's one thing to point a person to Christ. It's
another thing to prepare them for his coming And that's what
John did. Not only did he say he's coming,
he's saying, get clean, get clean, get clean, enter into the water.
Now, if you want Jesus, you're going to have to come to him
on your knees. If you want the king, you got the bow and kiss
the sun. Psalm two says, and that's the
only way we can come to Jesus today. I tell people all the
time, you're never going to meet God standing up. God does not
need you. You guys understand that God
doesn't need you. He doesn't need me. God was perfectly
content. with his own self before he created
anything. He didn't make this universe
out of personal necessity. He made it in order to glorify
himself. And at the pinnacle of his glory, he created you
and me. We have to always be careful not to turn things upside
down and turn this into a humanistic man-centered gospel. God does
not need us. We need him. Do you understand
that? This is very important. Otherwise we will prostitute
the gospel. for our own means. So John doesn't go to the temple,
though he was one of the religious leaders by heritage. John's ministry
is outside the temple. He never circumcised. He baptized.
He was telling the whole nation, you're just as lost as the Gentiles.
You got to come in through the door of repentance and faith. They were presuming upon their
circumcision and their church history and their tradition and
being Abraham. See, watch this though. They came unto John,
said unto him, Rabbi, he that is with thee beyond Jordan, to
whom thou bearest witness, behold, the same is baptizing and all
men are coming to him. So this is interesting because
now here they come starting trouble between John and Jesus. You guys see that? So we can
say actually the devil is behind this. You do understand that,
right? So the goal of the devil is to create unbiblical division. Do you understand that? Let me
see if I can help you. We still got a few minutes here.
Some division is good. Don't ever think that all division
is bad. Some division is good. Some separation
is not only good, but essential. Some separation is critical to
your salvation. It is not good for you to embrace
false doctrine. It is not appropriate for you
to hold to error false teaching that can send you to hell if
People are imbibing are holding to a false teaching that is heretical
and damnable It is in your best interest to separate from them
The Bible is very clear separate yourself from those who pervert
the truth He has clearly plainly told us in the Bible that we
are to come out of Babylon Touch not the unclean thing. I'll be
your God. You'll be my people. So there is a separation essential
to our allegiance to Jesus. This idea of loving everybody
indiscriminately is from the devil. Be sure of it. You can't love one person sincerely
if you love everybody the same. I love Jesus and I love everybody
else. Well, you can't love Jesus. I know that's kind of weird,
but think about this ladies. If your husband comes home and
as he's getting ready to go bed, he kisses you on the cheek and
say, honey, I love you. Just like I love all the other
ladies in the world. I love all y'all. I love all
y'all. I love everybody. I'm not going
to segue into that heretical doctrine to develop it. But God
does not love everybody. And as soon as you learn that,
the better. God does not love everybody. Once you grasp that,
then you can appreciate the fact that he has chosen in his sovereign
prerogative and inscrutable judgment to love you. It's true. It's just true. Does God love the devil? Fallen
demons, those creatures that are damnably hostile to God,
would God love them? Does God love Pharaoh? Would
God love Balaam? Are Judas Iscariot? Would he love those people who
have risen up And as it were, just put their fist in God's
face and say, to hell with you, God, we're going to do our own
thing. Right. And for those of you who think
God loves people that are in hell. What kind of love is that? What kind of love is that? So
right now I'm retrieving people who are listening to me from
a gooey love that has absolutely no principles under it whatsoever
and no basis in reality. It is not scriptural, so it's
not theologically sound, and it's not experienced by any human
being. You know how we go around talking
about we love everybody? I don't, but I mean, lots of
people do. Stay with me. The moment you say you love everybody,
I'm telling you right now, you are a liar. You are a liar. You don't love everyone. And
you don't love everyone equally. Now you may love somebody. You
may even love a lot of people. But you don't love all eight
billion of us. Please. So it's very important for us
to understand Christian doctrine because God would have you to
sanctify his love. He would have you to sanctify
his love. Do you understand that? That you would guard his love
and protect his love and not mar his love and not prostitute
his love. Now, any soul on planet earth
that wants God's love may have it, but not everybody wants it. And
because they don't, they won't have it. Are you guys hearing
me? This is the way you communicate
biblical love. God is love and his love is wrapped
up in the person of his son, right? And the person that would
believe on Jesus will have God's love. Is that true? If you don't
believe on Jesus, will you have God's love? Right. So we've talked
about this before. Love is not unconditional. That's a fallacy theologically.
That's a fallacy experientially. Is that true? Honey, I love you. And then you
kick her upside her head. and dogger and do whatever you
want to. And you expect her to love you
back. Watch this unconditionally. Isn't that right? Wouldn't that
be crazy? So I know I'm challenging some
of your categories right now because you've been duped by
this soft, mushy terminology that even our more prominent
theologians use. Unconditional love. Sounds so
good. But love by nature is conditional. inherent by nature is conditional. You're not going to always just
misuse love. Is that true? Love endures and
suffers long, but love is not going to always be trodden underfoot.
So it's very important for us to comprehend that. They came
to Jesus and said to him, he was said unto him, Rabbi, he
that was with thee beyond the Jordan to whom you bear record,
the same baptizes and all men are coming to him. These rulers
now were seeking to get John to be divided from Jesus and
watch the nature and character of John's love towards Jesus
in verse 29. Are you there? And he says this,
sorry, verse 28. Nope, we gotta start at verse
27. I'm jumping way down, verse 27. John answered and said, a
man can receive nothing except to be given to him, where? From
heaven. What an interesting insight to
what Some people were thinking was a dilemma John ministry had
grown and had almost reached its peak when Jesus came Jesus
now is becoming popular and his ministry is growing and Jesus's
disciples are doing what baptizing Some folks are looking at John
ministry looking at Jesus. Whoa Jesus is catching up to
you John Seeking to build a wedge between the two These are the
scandals that go on in the church. Do you know that? especially
when the church is given to the idol of growth in numbers. Where pastors are jealous because
the church down the street has more members than their church.
And now we're striving for numbers. Look at the way John exhibited
his love for Christ. He says, a man can receive nothing
except in what? Be given him from heaven. Isn't
that a gracious answer? John was saying, I'm not jealous
over the master getting all the attention. He's supposed to. He's worthy of it. Isn't that
powerful? Diffused their attempt at creating
jealousy in John. Now, here's the other phraseology
that's critical to the issue of Christ. And by the way, you
know what? I learned something about this many, many years ago,
too. in ministry. If you're doing ministry, if
you guys are teachers, if any of you are pastors in here and
you are even just witnesses and you enjoy witnessing, when God
uses you, when God uses you, enjoy the momentary satisfaction
that comes with him using you. Enjoy it and hurry up and get
over it. This is important. Watch this.
This is important because if you get addicted, to the feeling
of being used, now your motive for service is you and not God. Are you hearing me? If you get
addicted to the feeling of being used, now your motive for ministry
is you and not God. Now it's narcissistic. Now it's selfish. This is important
because here's what God will do for you and me. Even did it
with Jesus. I love it. There's nothing that
God calls you and me to do That he hasn't done first And he's
done it in the most impeccable way. So if you've been a Christian
a while and God has used you You know that the winds change
seasonally according to the will of God use the analogy You may
have a season where God is allowing you to open your mouth and share
the gospel with people, and you are a blessing to people, and
you can guide them to truth, and you can help them out of
troubles, and you can even see some, I mean, some outrageous
things, supernatural things occur. In my ministry, it has. And I'm
amazed at how God will use me to be a blessing to people on
so many levels. And then I'll go through a season
where no one's paying me any attention, not even my children. Not even my grandchildren. When your grandchildren aren't
paying you any attention, you're back to square one again. You
know what that is? A sinner. A hopeless, helpless
sinner. Remember Jesse, you are nothing
but a sinner. And when I choose to breathe
through you, or manifest my glory, or take you as a receptacle to
pour life into other people, and I decide to set you down
for a minute, that's my sovereign right. And my job is to be happy
still being in the family. Yours too. What John was able
to do was graciously demonstrate that the most important thing
is that Christ is exalted, whether it's through me or somebody down
the street. Are you guys following that?
Watch it now. He says, as a rule, a man can
receive nothing except to be given to him from heaven. So
he's acknowledging God's what? Sovereignty, right? It's not
about manipulation. It's not about, you know, Madison
Avenue techniques for church growth. It's not about how much
effort you put in. All of that is phony when it
comes to real ministry, actually authentically working. Look at
the next verse. Here it is. Watch this. He says,
you yourself bear witness that I said, I'm not the Christ. but
that I am sent before him." So John is giving these people the
reason for which the trend of attention now is going towards
Christ and not him. He said, "'Cause I'm not Christ."
He's the one that deserves all the attention. The next verse,
here it is. This is beautiful. Now this is
gonna help some of you budding teachers, budding elders, budding
pastors. Get this. This is why Jesus said
that John was the greatest of all prophets. I want you to get
this now. I'm going to make some application with this and then
I'll open the microphone for questions and we'll take up our
study next week. This is very important because
the area in which the devil works to discredit the ministry of
the gospel most prominently and most significantly is in the
realm of leadership. It's in the realm of leadership
that the devil works to invalidate and to corrupt and to make non-effective
the cause of the gospel. If the devil can get the leader's
heads twisted, if he can distort their understanding and twist
and corrupt their motive, he has the people already. Because
as the leaders are, so are the people. This is a rule all the
way through scripture. Pastor, can you demonstrate that?
Matthew chapter seven, Luke chapter 12. Here's what Jesus said just
to help you get the CD. Listen to it 10 times. A lot
of principles I'm sharing tonight. A lot of good principles. Jesus
says a good tree cannot produce bad fruit. Did you get that? A good tree cannot produce bad
fruit and a bad tree cannot produce good fruit. Now I want you to
follow the parable because Christians are called to think, not feel,
think. Think. He says that the nature
of a tree produces the fruit according to its nature. That's
how God made everything. And when things operate according
to their nature, we get to see the truth of the thing. If things
now can start acting and functioning contrary to nature, you and I
can be deceived, manipulated, confused, as is what's going
on in our gender issue right now. You guys following the logic? Jesus says, let the tree either
be good or bad. And what that's, What he's teaching
there is that in your estimation of truth, don't you allow your
brain to be twisted by a philosophy or a system of truth that allows
you to interpret something contrary to nature. Don't buy into an
ideology that says, well, it does look like bad fruit, but
I think inside actually he has a good heart. I'm trying to find
a way to, I think he actually has a good heart. See, you're deceiving yourself.
And Jesus said he wasn't here to actually affirm lies and to
trap you by bad reasoning. He was here to teach you how
to see a thing for what it is. When he says, let it bear good
fruit or bad fruit. Let's not be in the ambiguous
world of not knowing what we're seeing. This is how people end
up dying in false churches. Dying in churches that are not
teaching the truth. and they're constantly justifying
the bad fruit that's going on in the church when it starts
at the pulpit. Now, if you're doing that, you
yourself are in trouble. We learned this a couple of weeks
ago, 2 Thessalonians 2, verse 9 through 11. Remember, because
they did not receive the love of the truth that they might
be saved, God gave them over to a what? Strong delusion. that
they should believe a lot. So the reason why people stay
in false churches under false teaching with bad fruit is not
because they don't see the bad fruit. It's because they rationalize
it. They rationalize it rather than
dealing with the hard fact that this person is wrong. The Bible
says this and they're doing that. Now what am I to do with them
doing that and the Bible saying this? Let the tree be seen by
its fruit. And then respond accordingly.
Are y'all following that logic? This is the reason why you have
such difficulty with talking to your professed Christian friends
about Bible truth. Because they're not willing to
accept what the Bible plainly teaches. They're still governed
by flawed principles of discernment based upon sort of serpe interpretations
of love and non-discerning and don't be critical and don't be
judgmental, right? Don't judge. You better judge. You better judge. You better
make sure you're under the truth. The goal of the devil is to deceive
you. So getting back to my point with John, Why did Jesus say
that John was the greatest of all the prophets? Because John
was operating out of an ethic that he was blessed with in the
depths of his heart. Do you know what that ethic was?
Love. Love. L-O-V-E F-O-R G-O-D L-O-V-E
F-O-R G-O-D The foundation of his ministry
was rooted in love for God. Are you following me? Stay with
me for a few more minutes. And that's the only way you can serve
God. You cannot serve God if you don't love God. Because if
you don't love God, you won't stand for the truth. Are you
hearing me? When the love of God is shed
abroad in your heart, he graces you to stand for the truth, even
if it hurts you. Because your love for God allows
you to retain the principle that it's not about me. It's about
God. You guys following that? This
is important. This is why when we talk about
he that hath the Son hath life, it's not some abstract bizarre
concept of life. We're talking about the ethic
that God has always talked about from the beginning. This is the
whole of the commandments. Love the Lord your God with all
your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.
Isn't that what the scriptures say? On these hang all the law and the
prophets. Is that true? And what Paul said
is we can sum up the whole of the keeping of God's commandment
in one word. What is it? We can sum up the whole of keeping
God's commandments in one word. What is it? We can sum up the
whole of the keeping of God's commandment in one word. Let
me hear it. It's a hundred people in here. How many? That's right. That's right. What is love going
to do? Love is going to be the plum line that helps you actually
discern the thing for what it is and prioritize your response
so that you don't lie on God and lie on yourself. I'm helping
you whether you like it or not. I'm helping you. It's very important
to get this and where people depart from the truth. We know
what's missing is love. Jesus said in the John chapter
8 to the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the Pharisees hated Jesus. How
do you hate the epitome of love? How do you hate the epitome of
love? Other than the fact that love
is absent from your own heart, right? Jesus said, I know that
you hate me. And here's the reason why, because
you do not have the love of God in you. That's John chapter 8.
If the love of God were in you, you would love me. Isn't that
what he said? Now watch John. Watch John. Here's
what John does. This is powerful. This is for the leaders too.
Because when you see scandals going on in the church, What
I'm dealing with you right now, this principle of love as a foundational
ethic for how we respond in giving God the glory in everything that
we do. When there is sin dominating the congregation, it's because
that ethic is gone. Do you understand that? That
ethic is gone. How do you sin against your wife?
How do you sin against your husband? How do you sin against the bride
of Christ? The ethic of love must be gone.
Is that true? You can't love God and sin against
God's body. That's true. Watch John. This is why Jesus said, John's
my man. This is my man. John gonna show
you, this is the way I can back up and actually disappear and
let Jesus get all the glory. In fact, God's gonna give me
enough grace for them to cut my head off for the glory of God. Here's the ethic, are you ready?
He that hath the bride, going back to our last paradigm, are
we there? You are smart people, is the bridegroom. Who's the
bridegroom? Who's the bridegroom? Who is
John pointing to even again, even in the midst of this controversial
debate that's trying to trick John into being jealous with
Jesus, what is John doing? He's pointing to Christ, is he
not? He first acknowledges the sovereignty
of God. A man can receive nothing except
to be given to him from God. So I don't have to grasp after
glory. I don't have to try to claim fame for myself. I don't
have to marshal all the people into a building to make me important. If God wants me to have converts
and save folks, he'll bring them to me or give me the capacity
to influence them so that I'm not stealing sheep and goats
from other churches. He that hath the bridegroom,
he that hath the bride is the bridegroom. Now watch this. But
the friend of the bridegroom, watch this, withstandeth and
listens to him. That's the friend of the bridegroom.
Who is that? Who's he talking about? Himself. What did John just call himself?
I'm the friend of the bridegroom. I'm not here to hurt the bridegroom.
I'm not going to impede the bridegroom. I'm not going to hinder the bridegroom.
I'm not going to obscure the bridegroom. I'm not trying to
marry the bride. I'm not trying to take advantage
of the bride. Every time pastors rip off the
church, they are corrupting the bride and showing themselves
being the enemy of the bridegroom. Every time they deceive the church,
every time they corrupt the church or abuse the church, every time
pastors sleep with members in the church, every time elders
sleep with members in the church, every time deacons get into illicit
affairs in the church, it is very clear that they are assaulting
the bride of the bridegroom. Are you guys hearing me? In no
way can they be called the friend of the bridegroom. It can't be
done. Can't be done. This is how the
eldership in the church stays pure. This is how the pastor
in the church stays pure. This is how God blesses his ministry
by keeping him in a John the Baptist position. I am nothing. Christ is everything. I must
decrease. He must increase. I'm his friend. I'm not his enemy. I'm not trying
to steal his woman. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? My job is to point to him. I wish I had 10 arms. That's how much I love God. I
want people to get to Christ as soon as possible. Are you
guys hearing me? Very important. Very important.
And I'll close it right here. He that hath the bride is the
bridegroom, but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth
and heareth him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's what?
And he's just glad Jesus is in the house. He glad Jesus is getting
all the glory. This my joy. Therefore, this
is crazy. They thought he was jealous.
His heart was full of joy. Amazing, amazing, true pastor. What this, what is this all about?
This is all about witnessing. It's all about witnessing. This
is all about the ethic and attitude and motive of witnessing to Jesus.
When you have this kind of ethic, attitude and motive, God can
use you to witness the other people because you're not in
it for your own glory. Any questions? Emotionalism. Yeah. Your Bible is clear. Your motive
for God has to be he holds highest position in everything. That's
first. It's just priority. It's very
practical. You guys, this is not supernatural
because God holds highest priority. What we want to be able to do
is obey him. For God, that's what love is.
If we get past that simple, simple concept, we're going to get into
very vague and opaque dimensions. If you love me, keep my commandment. You guys follow that? That is
really where that is. The next question. Apostate Yeah,
no great question and these are things we should be talking about
frequently because the enemy comes into every local church
Where the gospel is attempted to be preached? Like the enemy
comes into every family. I want you to know that Please
if you if you're gonna do this thing called Christianity, you
better be ready for a fight. I You might as well stop being
a Christian now live like hell and then meet God at the judgment
because you're in a warfare as a Christian This is you're not
in a vacuums. You're not in Disneyland Christianity
is a battle for the glory of God in the church in the home
in the family You guys follow that the devil wants to destroy
particularly the church and the family because his goal is to
destroy the image of God represented in the male female paradigm.
And the church is the only institution that's ordained to reinforce
that paradigm. Are you hearing me? Only the
church is to be the authority to reinforce the paradigm of
the biblical concept of male female. And so the church has
all of the resources for restoration and recovery and growth and affirmation
of identity in Christ, which restores the biblical paradigm
where the world is breaking it down. And when the leaders are
blinded to the infiltration of the devil because their priorities
are wrong, it is wholly appropriate for a prophet to rise up and
say to the leadership first, I've been watching and I have
the credible, tangible evidence that we are in error. And you
share it with the leadership. And when once the leadership
neglects that, you go and share it with responsible men in the
church who may have some sway with the leadership. And when
once those responsible men reject or abrogate their privilege and
right to go to the leadership and say, hey, we got problems.
These teachings are not appropriate. And they too capitulate to the
leadership. Then we know that Christ has
left the leadership. Your job is to leave that church. And you're leaving that church
under those orders will leave in the conscience of the members
of that church, a recognition that you weren't there to devastate
the church. But you aren't there now because
the church is in trouble. As Isaiah chapter 57 verse 1
says, when the righteous perish, it is because they are taken
away from the evil that is about to come. And when God draws good
men and good women out of corrupting churches, it's because he's removing
them from a judgment that he's bringing on that church. When
good sheep depart from churches, it's a problem for that church.
Do you understand that? Next question. Are we done with
our questions? All right, no more questions.
Let's close for the night. Father, thank you for the, you had a
question? Come on, you gotta raise your hand, man. Come on, these people
ready to go to sleep. I have a question. My name is
Joseph. Can't hear it. Put it to your mouth. It says here that what happened
to John the Baptist when he was in prison and he sent his disciples
to Jesus and to ask him, are you the one or are we waiting
for another? And there's also a passage here
that says, he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater. He who is least in the kingdom
of heaven is greater than him. So you need those two questions
answered? Yeah. Okay. And these are classical
questions. How can John be so eminent and
so powerful and so effective in ministry? And then here he
is in prison, raising the question, are you the one? Well, I'll answer
it two ways. On a practical level, we have
our ups and our downs. Do we? Are you a real Christian? Now, if you're a phony Christian,
you ain't got to pay me no attention. But if you're a real Christian,
some days you just wonder if any of this thing is true. Can I get a real Christian in
the house? I love this. I love these kinds
of questions because I love coming right at it. Because Christians
will act like, you know, they always believe. No, you don't.
No, you don't. No, you don't. You got a million
questions. You just scared to ask them. Here's the other one. When trials
are heavy, They crush us. And our faith dissipates to such
a level that we cannot remember the visible, tangible, concrete
works of the Lord that met us in times past, wherein we were
so bold and so clear about the hand of God, because we are frail
creatures. You guys hearing me? So Jesus
sent back to John to tell him, remember cousin, what the scripture
say? I'm the only one doing this brother.
No one is doing these things but me. You got me, right? In other words, when you and
I are weak in faith, what faithful men and women are gonna do is
point you back to the word of God and show you that the Jesus
of the Bible, you can trust. when things are really, really
bad. John the Baptist was about to die for telling the truth. The go-go girls in the church,
remember? Phillip's wife, the dancing and
partying and everything. John said, hey, we don't have
no go-go girls in the church. And she got upset and she said
to Herod, I want his head, remember that? She partying and dancing
all in front of the king. Somebody got mad at me years
ago for saying that. I don't believe in go-go girls
in the church. How are you gonna see Jesus with the go-go girls
going on? Right, right? Y'all know what
I'm talking about. Y'all know what I'm talking about,
right? The go-go girls. Be careful. God made us as men. Can I get some real men in the
house? Hands up, hands up. So we gonna
praise Jesus, praise Jesus. We ain't praising no Jesus. We
checking out the body size and everything else. I'm just being
honest for the men, cause they not gonna be honest. I'll just
be honest for the men. That's why when we started grace, no,
no go, go girls, no go, sorry. You can go praise dance somewhere
else. We love you. No praise dancing
in the church. John the Baptist told Herod,
His brothers, hey, you all jacked up, dude. You're supposed to
be a Jew. You're supposed to know the law. You married your brother
Philip's wife. That's what got him killed for
telling the truth. You got that? Telling the truth.
He had another spirit. He that is least in the kingdom
is greater than he. Jesus was talking about himself.
Jesus is the least in the kingdom. John was said to be the greatest.
Remember, Jesus said, John is the greatest in the kingdom.
And when he gave that, that parable of the least over the greatest,
what Jesus was saying, I am the least because everyone in the
kingdom hates me. And they view me as nothing.
And yet I'm the greatest. Do you see that? It's important
for you to understand that crystal central hermeneutic is going
to land all the glory on Christ. And that's what we call a kinetic
principle. The kenosis doctrine is this. If you humble yourself,
you'll be what? And Jesus emptied himself and
became nothing, right? And because of that, the father
highly exalted him and gave him a name above every name, right?
So Jesus was able to own being the least. Didn't Paul own that
term? Didn't Paul say, I'm the least
of all the saints, but God had mercy on me. This is what I meant
about true humility. If you and I are not willing
to own being the least, God's not going to use us because it's
not after Christ. One more question. We're out
of here. Did anybody else have a question? Okay, let's pray Let's pray father.
Thank you for this time. Thank you for this class too.
Thank you for our brothers and sisters Thank you for the hard
things that we have to face and raise the question Do we actually
know what we're saying when we say what we're saying and does
it square with your word Especially in these days when so much is
being said in terms of biblical ideas concepts and notions Help
us to study your word help us to grasp ideas and concepts and
ask the question Is this really a biblical concept or no? So
that we might walk in the truth, love the truth, live the truth,
and share the truth for your glory. We pray in Jesus name,
amen.