I'd like to begin today just
with some comments, and then I'll get into the sermon for
the day. But I've been thinking about
a lot of things this week. There's a lot of turbulence in
my industry, a lot of unsurity. Economic outlooks are terrible.
During hard times like that, you have to stop and regroup.
You have to stop and think about what is really meaningful in
life. Otherwise, you can be easily
led astray and just have the feet knocked out from underneath
you. And this week, as I tried to keep my perspective, keep
my sanity, I thought about the church. And that's us. And that's the opening comments
I have today have to do with that, and then we'll get in the
sermon. But just as a thought on that, and I've read this before
from the pulpit, it's Psalm 133, where we're told, Behold, how
good and how comely a thing it is, brethren, to dwell together. It is like to the precious ointment
upon the head that runneth down upon the beard, even unto Aaron's
beard. which went down on the border
of his garments, and as the dew of Hermon which falleth upon
the mountains of Zion, for there the Lord appointed the blessing
and life forever." And that comforted me as I faced some things, looked
through some things through the week because Sunday I'd be here. Certainly God and Christ is present
with us always, but there is great comfort and strength in
coming to the body of Christ and hearing the word preached
and seeing you all and sitting down and fellowshipping around
the table and sharing the good things of life, that being Christ.
And that's a blessing. There's another passage that
I find comfort in, and it's a part, the second part of a verse in
Proverbs 18, 24, and that is, There is a friend nearer than
a brother. Of course, in application, that
friend is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, nearer and dearer
to us than any could ever be. And that's a comfort. And that's
something that I thought about again this week. And then as
I thought about the church and about meeting Christ and meeting
Christ's people here, I remember the passage in Romans 10, verses
11-15, but I focus in this reading particularly on verse 15. And this blesses me,
and there will be some comment to follow on this too. Paul talks
about that those who call upon the name of the Lord shall be
saved. But how will they hear? And then in verse 15, And how
shall they preach except they be sent? As it is written, how
beautiful are the feet of them which bring glad tidings of peace
and bring glad tidings of good things. And as I tried to keep
my perspective, as I thought through things, I remembered
the church. I remembered Sunday after Sunday after Sunday here. Here. I've been here 23 years
now. And I thank God for every Sunday
that I've been here. And I think about those days,
even today, when Brother Bill stood up here and brought us
a message that fed our very souls, preached the Word of God to us,
and presented the truth to us, and is consistent and always
telling us the things we need to hear. And I'm thankful for
that. This verse says, how beautiful
are the feet of them which bring glad tidings of peace and bring
glad tidings of good things. And that's part of the church.
And I am so glad to say that I know from experience that we
have a pastor that does that. That brings us the Word of God
always. And that to me is an encouragement
because any given Sunday we could all go somewhere else and we'd
hear something. We'd hear something. I can't
tell you that it would always be the Word of God, but I have
the confidence that as we come here that we have a man given
to us by God in the position of our pastor that is very diligent,
very serious about the responsibility he's been given. He sees to it
that we are taken care of spiritually, and I'm thankful for that. Brother
Bill, I'm thankful to you for that. And I thought about these things this
week, and it does bring me great comfort to know that regardless
of what all else is going on, I'll be here Sunday morning God
willing. And I'll leave here a better
person for it because I've heard the word of God preached and
I've sat down in fellowship with you all. And I'm thankful for
that. The sermon this morning is somewhat
related to that. My topic is who are God's people? And I've got some scripture here
pull out of various places, and we'll get into these, but I'll
read just one passage to set us in a place. And it comes from
John 1, verses 1-16, but for the reading today I will focus
on verses 10-13. He, and this He being Christ,
was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and yet
the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and his own
people did not receive him. But to all who received him,
who believed in his name, he gave the right to become the
children of God, who were born not of blood, nor of the will
of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God." That will
be my kind of base text. Keep that in mind that the topic
is, who are the people of God? And let me explain where this
comes from. I had a couple of conversations
over the last week and a half that brought some things into
focus for me. Oftentimes, if we're talking
to people, if we'll close our mouths and open our ears, we
might could hear something that we need to hear. We might could
learn something we need to learn. Such was kind of the case. I
was talking to a friend in the parking lot at my office building,
and we were going over some things. We weren't talking about anything
religious at all. And the subject of politics came
up, which is common these days, regardless of where you are or
who you are. And in the course of the discussion,
this friend was telling me he was very, very disturbed and
upset about our foreign policy lately, especially our policies
as they pertain to the nation of Israel. And he was saying, we're in a
very, very, very bad place right now in terms of our relationship
to Israel. And we need to really stop and
consider what we're talking about and what we're doing there. And
I said, well, why would that be? Just trying to see where he was
going with this. And he looked me in the eye and he said, well,
of course, Mike, you understand that Israel is God's people. So I said, well, OK, are they? He said, well, of course they
are. It's in the Bible. Parents said, OK. I didn't pursue a more bigger
discussion on that because people get very upset when you start
talking about the nation of Israel. And I didn't feel like fracturing
a friendship or standing in the hot Texas sun any longer. So
we kind of left there and went our ways. The second conversation
I had, which caused me to think a bit, I have another friend
who's taking an online course right now, trying to get some
education. He's taking a course in Christian
worldview, is what the course is called. And he called me up
because he was, in the course of his class, he has to write
an essay explaining something about the pagan people in other
countries? How is it that we can have a
Christian attitude or what should be our Christian attitude towards
people in a dark place that have never heard of Christ and never
have the opportunity to hear of Christ? What about those people
and what is their relationship to God? Well, of course, when
you start coming to a Calvinist position, you have to address
that yourself personally. And then when people find out
what you're where you're going with your own theology, then
that's one of the first things they ask you. And he's got to
write an essay on this, so that subject came up. And these two
conversations were unrelated. They weren't prompted by me in
any way, shape, or form. And yet, they come at a subject,
a question, from two different directions. And that is, who
are God's people? And then built into that whole
discussion again are other discussions about why are they God's people
and who made them God's people. It's a very complicated subject
in time. I mean, we've all been through
this in our thinking. Sometimes it's good to review
and remember these things. I've came to the realization
as I thought about this that the question of who God's people
are is really a pretty important question. There's a lot of people
out here today in the marketplace of ideas, if you will, that call
themselves God's people. They've got a perspective on
it and they, for reasons that they'll say or not say, are God's
people. What made them God's people?
We as Christians should understand who God's people are and why
they are God's people. That's a very, very important
question to ask and a very important answer to find is who are God's
people and why are they God's people? A note here that I want
to make right in the beginning of this whole discussion is that
when I say God's people, I'm talking about broadly or collectively
as a group God's people. There are some dynamics in any
discussion that apply to people collectively or as a And then
there are dynamics that apply to people within that group as
individuals. In this sense, when I'm talking
about God's people, I'm talking about collectively, a body of
people, a large mass of people that we would identify as God's
people. And again, the dynamics in some
instances are the same for the individual and the group, and
in other instances, they're not the same. I need to state that
clearly. When I say God's people, I'm
not talking about individuals. I'm not talking about me. I'm
not talking about any of you individually, but it's the broad
sweep of people that we would identify as God's people. That's
important to the discussion. What we think about God's people,
how we define that body of people will affect, number one, what
we think about who God's people are, their relationship to God,
it will also affect what we think about people who are not God's
people. Two sides of the same coin. You've
got God's people, not God's people. And the scripture clearly recognizes
that there are people that are not God's people. So to define
God's people also somewhat defines not God's people. It's important
that we understand that there are people who are not God's
people. So in the process of all this, that will have to be
discussed as well. A discussion of whose God's definition,
if you will, whose God's people are will also affect what we
think about the nature of that relationship with God. What the
terms of the relationship are. Because every relationship does
have terms, either spoken or unspoken. There are agreements. that we have in dealing with
others that define what is acceptable behavior, what is not acceptable
behavior. So that comes into it. Also an
understanding of what the promises made within that relationship
mean and how they apply. That's important as well. Because
there are, as we read the scripture, there are promises made to God's
people. What do those promises mean?
And how will they apply? How will they be brought to bear?
How well will they be fulfilled? Another thing that will have
to be understood in light of the relationship of God's people
is expectations in the relationship. And that ties in as well with
the promises. Because we do have expectations
as Christians as to what the relationship will mean to us.
where it will take us, how it will build us, what it will do
for us. And none of that is unreasonable.
All of that is just part of a relationship. And Christianity is indeed a
relationship with God through Jesus Christ. So these things
need to be understood. There are also an understanding
that we have to come to about how much of the relationship
is physical, in terms of the relationship with God, and how
much of it is spiritual. That's an important consideration
as well because you have heard the preaching across the board.
Some people who can make the argument that the relationship
with God, God's people to God is completely spiritual and there's
no application in the flesh. It's all spiritual. And then
on the other end, you've got people who have turned Christianity
in particular into nothing but a physical relationship where
we just basically petition God and get what we want. So built
into the whole idea is that there's a relationship with God and God's
people have expectations. Some are spiritual, some are
physical. And how does that all fit together? So that's all part
of the discussion. And, you know, as you stop and
think about it, just to say that somebody is a person within the
nation of God or a people within a relationship to God is a simple
statement but a loaded statement. Now, built into the understanding
from the very beginning is that there is a God. That goes without saying. You
can't have a relationship with somebody who doesn't exist. The
truth is, and I think we know this, and human history certainly
demonstrates this, that most of the entire world believes
in a god or gods. The true atheist, the person
who has no belief in any god at all, is rare. It is built into us as we were
created by God, now marred by sin, but nonetheless created
by God, that we have an innate belief in God. Now where we go with our sinful
nature is another question, but most of mankind across the world
at any place at any time has a belief in God and they develop
the idea of some kind of relationship Of course, you get into some
of the dark pagan countries, and their god lives in a volcano
and spews wrath constantly, also lava. So, you know, humans in
depravity have gone far places with a belief in God, but it
is somewhat understood that there is a god, or gods. Second to that is, of course,
if there is a god, then he has a people. And we have seen this
throughout human history, too, is that everybody who professes
a belief in a god, some kind of god or god, claims to be his
people. You look in the Old Testament
and the people that Israel confronted in their travelings, every one
of them had their own god, tribal gods. When Jacob went to Laban's
house for a wife, And when he left, finally had
enough and packed his stuff and his family and left, his wife
cleaned out the cabinet of all the gods. And I say that, not
that I want to dwell on it, except to say that everybody had gods. Laban had a closet full of gods. And he assumed he was a people
to some of those gods, or he wouldn't have had them. He felt
the ones that he had were the right ones. But people believe
in a God, and they believe themselves to be the people of that God. And that's pretty universal.
Now, it's probably not in most instances the correct God, and
they're not the people of the true and living God, but they
do believe that there is a God and they are a people of God. The discussion that we have has
to be centered around Christianity. We are Christians and we understand
God through Jesus Christ and we know Christ to be the truth.
So that's where our discussion has to be. But these days, these
days the discussion when you start talking about Christianity
tends to get muddy because now we're talking about Judeo-Christianity. And Even beyond that now, we're
talking about the Abrahamic covenant. And there are people that will
tell you that the people of God, the people of God, are Jews,
Christians, and Islamics. There are people that will tell
you that. They'll cite this Abrahamic tradition. It's all the same
God. The people of God are Jews, Christians,
and Muslims. I'm going to tell you that. Now I mention that because those
are actually the influences that we need to discuss and focus
on. The influence of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Those are the ones that are pertinent
to this discussion because very few people will claim any lineage
to Buddhism or animal sacrifice in Africa or anything like that.
But these days we will try and make that leap between Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam. And I will tell you right up
front that I have real problems with that. So this is pointed,
very pointed discussion. I have personally little tolerance
for that argument that we're all worshiping the same God and
we come from the Abrahamic tradition. I will tell you right now as
we discuss this, in identifying who are the people of God, I'll
put it right before you right now that I throw the Islamics
out. That's not politically correct
these days and after 9-11 we seem to be trying so hard to
include Islamics in discussion of kindness and As I read the
scripture and as I have read through the Quran and the Hadith
myself, I find that Islam has nothing to teach Christianity. And I will tell you right now
that I personally think that Islam
has nothing to do with Christianity, and it's not even a part of my
discussion, so the primary influences or question to do with the people
of God doesn't even include Islam when I say that. Their view of
Christ is that he is a lesser prophet, he was not the son of
God, and he was not crucified. They do not believe that Jesus
Christ was crucified. They say that's a mythology that
was created that he himself was not crucified and that if he
wasn't crucified, of course, he wasn't resurrected and he
did not bear our sin. They don't have Christ in their
theology. They have Jesus the man as a
prophet and not even the greatest prophet. So Islam is out of my
view here, but I do mention it because it is in the view of
many. The primary question of who God's people are when we're
talking within the realm of Christianity is, do we include the Jews? That's the question. That's what
we're talking about ultimately. And I do realize, and I hope
nobody misunderstands me as I say this, because most people these
days, when you start mentioning the Jews in this way, their hands
go up and they say, you're anti-Semitic. You're anti-Semitic. I am not. The Jews are a people. And you know what? The Jews need
Christ. We talked this morning. Brother
Bill preached to us this morning. And the message from Acts. And
he talked about Paul and the synagogues and what have you.
Paul was a Jew. And Paul recognized his own people
needed Christ. So Paul understood that the Jews
were a people. I understand that. They need
Christ. There is no salvation outside of Christ. But the common
thinking today is that there's the church and we're God's people. But then there are the Jews and
they are God's people. This comes primarily from dispensational
theology, dispensational end times theology, which started
really coming into focus in the early 1800s and then was brought
into a very clear focus primarily with the publication of the Schofield
Bible in 1905, which was a commentary Bible. It brought dispensational
theology, end times theology, into clear focus. And the dispensationalists
do have a special place for the Jews. They are a salvation unto
themselves. There are some dispensationalists
that go so far as to say that the Jews as a people do not need
to accept Christ to be saved. They are saved. And they draw that from Romans,
in some of Paul's writing there, they take some verses, which
I think are taken out of context, and build the case that the Jews
as a people are saved. That's a big influence in our
thinking today, and when we start talking about who are the people
of God, It doesn't take long before that floats to the top,
that the Jews are God's chosen people. And this is furthered and has
been furthered because it fits hand in glove with something
that was going on in the Jewish world in the 1800s, coming to
a focus in the late 1800s, and that is what was called Zionism. The Jews throughout Eastern Europe,
which was primarily controlled by Russia in those days, and
then throughout the Russian Empire, were being persecuted by the
Tsarist government. They had what were called pogroms,
and the Tsarist troops would come in and kill or run out of
town all the Jews. They had decided that the cause
of their problems in their empire was because of the Jews. They
needed a scapegoat. The czarist government was out
of control. But it's always easier to blame
someone else than it is to look in the mirror and say, I did
it. So they blamed the Jews. And
the Jews felt very put upon, and they should have. And developed within Europe was
this idea of Zionism. That the Jews should gather up
and develop, go to their own homeland. That tied in very well with the
dispensational Christian thinking that was coming up at the time.
That the Jews were a special people within the scripture.
And it fit hand in glove. And with the end of World War
I, the British had taken charge of most of the Middle East, and
they put together what was called the Balfour Declaration, which
laid the ground and set the route in the Middle East for a Jewish
homeland to be the nation of Israel. And that came out of Zionism
as a political movement and Christian dispensational thinking. Of course,
that came to fruition in 1948 after World War II. And ever
since then, we hear on the TV, the radio, in books that God's
chosen people have moved back to their holy land their nation. That's the time marker. And now
we're clicking towards Armageddon. Because God's people have come
back together, because God's people now live in their kingdom
once again. It begs the question again, who
are God's people and why are they God's people? And again,
I understand when you when you talk this way, some take this
and they don't hear the full message. They hear something
and they say this is anti-Semitic. You are against the Jews. And
no, that's that's not what I'm saying. That's not what I'm saying
at all. But the Scripture does define
for us who are God's people. And we as Christians of all people
should understand who God's people are. We read the passage in John
earlier that told us who God's people were. All who receive
Him, that being in Christ. That's Christ. All who receive
Him who believe in His name. That's the people of God. Clearly. Simply. No questions asked. That's the people of God. It
is not being born of any blood, any lineage. It's not. My parentage has nothing to do
with my position as a child of God, as a citizen of the heavenly
Jerusalem. It has nothing to do with that.
Nothing. It has nothing to do with any
choice I made. I did not wake up one morning
and say, I'm going to be One of the people were God. We understand
from the Scripture, as God has taught us, that none of us had
the ability to make that decision anyway. It is not even remotely
realistic to think that we were going to wake up one day and
say, I'm going to be a child of God today. I've seen it. I understand. I'm going to be
a child of God. None of us did that on our own. None of us. Citizenship in heaven was decided
not by me, not by my lineage, but by God. God Himself has defined
who are the people of God. Now, Israel had a place as the people
of God, as a marker, as a type, as a shadow. There is no question
about that. Read the Old Testament. It is
the history of God's people. No question about that. But throughout,
God also told them that there is a day coming when the greater
light will shine. And there's coming a day when
a people that once were identified as my people will no longer be
my people and a people that were not my people, a people that
were far off will be my people. These are things to think about.
Can we say that the Jews are God's people? Can we look
to the nation of Israel and say that is God's chosen nation? Can we make that claim? People will tell you, well, you
know, our country is doomed if we turn our back on the nation
of Israel, because of course, if we forsake Abraham's seed,
we're cursed. We're cursed. Is that what all that means in
the scripture? I think not. And today is just food for thought
to get us thinking about who God's people are and why they're
God's people. And I understand, and I understood
as I started to think about this, that this wasn't one sermon. Couldn't be. Where we need to
go next, and we don't have time to do it now, certainly, is to
go into the book of Galatians, Paul's letter to the Galatians,
and read there in chapter 3, I believe it is, and go into
that passage in depth where Paul explains the blessings that would
come to the world through Abraham's seed. And there I think Paul
really addresses this whole issue of who God's people are and why
they're God's people. And I think it's very good that
we go through that again sometime and look at it, pick it apart
and see what Paul is saying. Because Paul, believe me, if
any man apart from Christ dealt with this particular issue, it
was Paul. Because he wrestled with the
Jews daily. And at that time, as Paul wrestled
with the Jews, the temple stood in Israel. The temple stood on
a hill in Jerusalem. And yet Paul said to them, as
they looked at the temple, he said, it's not the temple, it's
Christ. Paul addressed this issue in
a day and a time when it was fiery. when it was violent. And we know it was violent because
the Jews killed Christ. We know it was violent because
Stephen was stoned to death. We know it was violent because
many were cast out of the synagogues and left without provision. And
yet Paul addressed this very issue. Who are God's people and
why are they God's people? And again, next time, whenever
that may be, we'll look at Galatians 3 and go through that. And I
think it will answer these questions about who are God's people and
why they're God's people. Who the seed of Abraham are and
how that actually applies. And again, all of this comes
from a few discussions. And I know you've had these discussions
with people. Or you've heard these discussions
with people. Particularly when you talk about the nation of
Israel, that's God's people. There's no question about it.
The nation of Israel, that nation over in the Middle East, established
in 1948, that is God's people. Well, we'll talk about it more
later, but today, food for thought. And I hope it has been meaningful.
I hope that it's made you think a little bit. These discussions
can be insightful sometimes. They may wake you up, you know,
as you talk to people and you hear things that may wake you
up a little bit, cause you to remember some things, and that's
always good for us. That's always good for us. I'll
end on that, and kind of like the old cliffhanger in cereal,
you know, we'll get back to it later. Where will we go then?
But I'm thankful for the opportunity, and as I said earlier, and I
hope If the second part of all this didn't spur you, I hope
the first part did, because I must say, and I am blessed every day,
and the truth is that I thank God every day for this church,
and this time I mean us. I'm thankful that we have the
pastor we do, who has lingered long with us and taught us well.
and brought us to a greater understanding of Jesus Christ and a sweet fellowship
centered here around Jesus Christ. And that is a blessing, brothers
and sisters.