my text this morning. Luke chapter 12, and I want to
begin reading in verse 1, and maybe read down through verse
12. Luke chapter 12, and verse 1. If you have the Pew Bible, you'll
find it on page 1126. In the meantime, when they were
gathered together in an innumerable multitude of people, insomuch
that they trod one upon another, he began to say unto his disciples,
first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which
is hypocrisy. For there is nothing covered
that shall not be revealed, neither hid that shall not be known.
Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard
in the light. and that which ye have spoken
in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops.
And I say unto you, my friends, be not afraid of them that kill
the body, and after that they have no more that they can do.
But I will forewarn you whom you shall fear. Fear him which
after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say
unto you, fear him. Are not five sparrows sold for
two farlings? and not one of them is forgotten
before God. But even the very hairs of your
head are all numbered. Fear not ye therefore, ye are
more valious than many sparrows. Also I say unto you, whosoever
shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of Man also
confess before the angels of God. But he that denieth me before
men shall be denied before the angels of God. And whosoever
shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven
him. But unto him that blasphemeth
against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven. And when they
bring you into the synagogues and into magistrates and powers,
take ye no thought how or what you shall answer or what you
shall say. For the Holy Ghost shall teach
you in the same hour what you ought to say." I want you to
think with me Maybe just a few minutes this morning on the subject
of hypocrisy. Hypocrisy. The Lord deals with
this in our text, and in the 11th chapter He also dealt with
this, and we'll look at that just in a minute. But, here He
said in verse 1, in the meantime, And that was of course in the
context, you'll find this Pharisee had invited the Lord Jesus to
come to dinner with him. And this 12th chapter is either
sometime immediately after that lunch or sometime after the lunch. We're not for sure, but we're
told here in verse 1 that there was an innumerable company of
people gathered to hear the Lord Jesus. He was a very popular
person, wasn't he? People came to him from all over
the regions where he was preaching, not just to be healed. He had
gotten himself a great name and fame, but they come to hear him. He did not speak as the scribes
and the Pharisees. He did not speak as we poor preachers
today often speak, Wayne, in weakness and feebleness. His
words were spoken with power. No man ever spake like this man.
Sometimes when He spoke, boy, He went right to the heart. He
went right to the root of the matter. He dealt with every aspect
of our lives. And when He dealt with it, boy,
He exposed it. He revealed the hidden things
of a person's heart. Oh, He was a preacher. He was
a preacher indeed. When He spoke, He often spoke
words of spirit and life. And sometimes when He spoke,
it was light and it was searching. His words revealed the inmost
being, the secret thoughts, the motives, the hidden things that
nobody knew but Him. He looked beyond what everyone
else saw. He heard beyond what everyone
else heard, and He looked beyond the words that were spoken. He
looked beyond the outward appearances, and He examined and revealed
what the Bible calls the inward part, the hidden part, the heart. David said, You will make me
to know truth in the inward part, in my heart, in my hidden man. Behold, thou desirest truth in
the inward part, in the heart, in the affections is where God
requires and desires truth. And in the secret part, thou
wilt make me to know wisdom. If there is one thing our Lord
Jesus Christ condemned and exposed and warned all against, it's
this thing of hypocrisy. Even His own disciples were told
here in verse 1, He began to say unto them first, Beware of
the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. In other
words, beware of pretending to be something that you're not.
Beware of putting on a front. Beware of making a show. Beware
of speaking words and doing deeds with the intention to deceive
people. When the Lord says, Beware of
the leaven of the Pharisees, He's saying, Beware of their
doctrine. Beware of their teaching. And
you know there's two ways we teach, isn't it? We teach with
our theology, we teach with our limbs, and we teach with our
lives. And their theology was one of
hypocrisy. And their daily lives was one
of hypocrisy. Their whole lives was one of
hypocrisy. They were hypocrites. And the
Lord Jesus told His disciples, Beware of them. Beware of them. My first point
this morning about hypocrisy is this. Hypocrisy is bound to
occur when you and I are more concerned with the deeds of the
body. than we are with the right condition
of the heart. When we're more concerned with
what people think of us than what God knows about us. When
we're more interested in being esteemed of man as opposed to
being approved of God. I want you to look here in the
11th chapter and the Lord Jesus tells us this plainly. This is
the conversation that he had here with the Pharisee. The Lord,
in verse 37, had been invited here to eat with this Pharisee.
And verse 38, when the Pharisee realized the Lord hadn't washed
his hands before he eat, he marveled. He marveled. And then the Lord
says to him here in verse 39, He said, How do you Pharisees
make clean the outside of the cup and platter, but your inward
part is full of ravening and wickedness, extortion and wickedness. Ye fools, did not he that which
is without make that also which is within? The Pharisee here
was more concerned with keeping his body clean than he was his
soul. And he said, we recognize and
we confess that God made our bodies. And we want to honor
Him with our bodies and therefore we need to keep our bodies clean.
And what the Lord Jesus is telling them this, He that made the outside,
He that made your bodies, also made your souls. And if He made
both of them, then both of them needs to be cleansed. Both soul
and body. The brothers and sisters, what's
the most critical of these two? The soul is cleansed first, that
which is within the cup, that which is within the heart, and
then the outside will be clean also. In all that we are, and
all that we profess to others to be, and all that we do, all
that we say, if it's to be accepted before God, then the origin of
all that we do must be from that inward being that has been cleansed
by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. The heart is the source
of all that we do, isn't it? Out of the heart become the issues
of life. Everything that the man speaks
through his mouth issues from his heart. The deeds we do comes
from the heart. So if the heart is not cleansed,
then nothing else is clean. And nothing else can be accepted
of God. Because it does not come from
a clean platter or bowl. And this was the Pharisees problem.
They paid tithes of all that they possessed, we're told here
in this passage. Even the herbs. They paid tithes
of all the herbs. But all of it was rejected because
it came from a dirty cup. It came from a dirty platter,
a dirty heart. And our Lord is telling them
here to cleanse first that which is within, and then He said you
can give alms of such things as you have. Such things as you
can afford and it will be accepted because it's coming from a clean
heart. That's what he tells them here
in this passage in verse 41. But rather give alms of such
things as you have. And if it comes from a clean
heart, then all these things will be clean unto you. So that's
the first thing about hypocrisy, isn't it? When we major, upon
the physical. And we set it above, first and
foremost, the heart. The heart first must be cleansed.
And if it's not, then all we do is hypocrisy. We're nothing
but a Pharisee. And secondly, the second thing
we want to see if you're about hypocrisy is this. It's bound
to occur if we don't keep things in their proper perspective.
Look here at what he says in verse 42. But warn to you, Pharisees,
for you pay tithe the mint and rue and all manner of herbs. They did all of that. They were
very careful to do that. But look at this. And they passed
over judgment. They passed over justice. They
passed over truth. And they passed over the love
of God. All of these critical things.
that they should have been most concerned about, but what were
they concerned about? Paying tithes and mint and rue
and cumming and leaves. These poor Pharisees, they would
never miss paying a tithe for anything. All kinds of tithes.
More than God ever required in the Old Testament under the law.
But they had no time to think about what pleases God? What's
true? What's judgment? What about the
love of God? Somebody was telling about Laura
Schlettinger. I don't know if she's still living
or not. She was converted to Judaism,
but she had a radio talk show. And she was a very religious
person converted to Judaism. And someone called in one day
and wanted to know what she thought about the love of God. What do
you think about the love of God? Do you know anything about the
love of God? Do you know what she said? She said, listen, I've
got 600 rules that I have to be concerned about keeping. I
don't have time to concern myself with the love of God. Isn't that
amazing? I'm worried about all of these
other things that I have to do. I'm not concerned with whether
God loves me or not, or whether He loves anybody or not, or whether
I can ever be separated from that love or not. And when we get to the point
where we don't keep things in their proper perspective, we'll
do what the Lord Jesus said. We'll gag at a gnat and we will
swallow a camel. Thirdly, hypocrisy is sure to
occur when we exalt ourselves and we prefer ourselves above
others and when we crave man's esteem. and approval. Look what he says in verse 43.
Woe unto you Pharisees, for you love the uppermost seats in the
synagogue. Bless your heart, I can't get
any of you to move up on the front rope or nothing. I've tried. You're stuck towards the back.
But I'm telling you what, if you had a bunch of Pharisees
come in here, they'd fight for these. They'd be sitting up here.
They'd be wanting to be up here. And that's what the Master said.
You love to take the uppermost seats. And when you go out in
the streets and in the markets, you love for people to say, there
comes old reverend so and so. There comes old rabbi. There
comes our great teacher. They love to be exalted. They
were puffed up in their exaltation. And the Lord Jesus makes this
statement about them here in verse 44. This shows how corrupt
they were, but how hidden they were and how sneaky they were.
What do you scribes and Pharisees and hypocrites? You are like
graves, which appear not. They're not seen. And the men
that walk over them are not aware of them. Now here's what the
Lord Jesus is saying. And we have difficulty understanding
these verses, but they knew well what He was saying. In the Old
Testament under the ceremonial law, if you touched a grave,
You were unclean. You had to go through all this
ceremony and you couldn't even go home until you performed all
this washing until you became ceremonial clean again. That's
why they marked the graves so men wouldn't touch them. The
Lord Jesus said, you fellows are like unmarked graves. You're
so sly and you're so sneaky that men come up to you and they touch
you, they listen to you, and they associate with you, and
when they do, You defile them. You defile everybody that's around
you, everybody that associates with you, everybody that listens
to you. You're just like unmarked graves. That's what you are. Boy, that's cutting, ain't it?
When everybody had such high respect for these Pharisees,
they said, if anybody makes it to heaven, it'll be a Pharisee.
That's the saying of this day. And here the Lord Jesus is cutting
them down and saying, you're nothing but hypocrites. Everything
you're doing is just to be seen of men. It's hypocrisy. It's
hypocrisy. Simon the Saucer became a religious
person, didn't he? We're told that in Acts chapter
8. He was baptized. He joined himself
to the church. He hung out with a preacher.
But he had one critical problem. One critical problem. And here's
what Peter told him. Your heart is not right in the
sight of God. Man! Man! That's bad, isn't it? Your heart
is not right in the sight of God! And if the heart is not
right in the sight of God, all a man does and says and is is
nothing but hypocrisy. The heart must be right in the
sight of God. Simon was cleansing the outside
of the cup, but inside he was bound by iniquity. No wonder
the wise man tells us, my son, give me your heart. Give me your
heart. Give me your heart in faith and
repentance and confession of your sin. Give me your heart. Why? To be cleansed. Give me
your heart in thorough confession to be cleansed. And then let
your eyes observe my ways. If God don't have the heart,
Then He has nothing of ours. Keep your heart with all diligence. Keep your heart guarded. If you
had a treasure, if somebody gave you a treasure that you could
not estimate for its value, its value was untold, how you would
guard that? How you would keep that? How
concerned you would be about that? So here you have a heart
that's been given to you. Keep it! If you've been given
a heart that's right with God, then keep it with all diligence,
for out of it are the issues of life. And that's what the
Lord Jesus is getting ready here to tell even His disciples back
over in chapter 12 and verse 1 of our text. Our Lord began
to say unto His disciples, first of all, First of all, beware
of hypocrisy. Why does He start with His disciples?
That's His people. That's His family. That's His
loved ones, isn't it? That's the ones that He's redeemed
and called and given a new heart. He cares for them. So He instructs
them first. I used to think that when the
Lord rebuked me, and are chasing me, I thought, boy, he's angry
with me. Until I finally see he does this
because he loves me. His disciples first. He said,
beware, my dear disciples, of the leaven of the Pharisees,
which is hypocrisy. He said, hypocrisy is like leaven. It's like yeast. We don't use
that anymore. My mother used to cook with that.
have the dough spread out. She'd take a little bit of leaven
or yeast and she'd sprinkle it around and cover it up and work
it in the dough. We don't do that anymore. Some
of you ladies know what it is though. Leaven. It begins with
so small amount and it's hidden. And it's covered. And it begins
to work by a process that's slow. It works so slowly, its influence
and effects are so difficult to observe. It gradually rises
and increases and spreads until it's thoroughly worked its way
through the whole loaf. Like leaven, hypocrisy puffs
up. It swells people up in high opinions
of themselves. They begin to detect and condemn
the moat that's in the eyes of others while they have a beam
in their own eyes. They see and try to correct the
faults they discern in others, and yet they see no faults in
themselves. They detect sin in others, but
they never see any in themselves. They'll justify their own sin
in their life while condemning the good deeds of others. Boy, hypocrisy, hypocrisy. And
you know what happens? Like leaven that's cooked in
bread, if hypocrisy is allowed to bake in the heart, It's one
of the most difficult things in the world for a man to rid
himself of. Beware of the leaven of hypocrisy. One way to guard against this
leaven of hypocrisy is to discern it in its first influences, in
its first rise. That's why we're told to keep
our heart. Keep our heart. Study your heart. Keep an eye
on your heart. Know what's going on there. Know
what God's doing there. And then when hypocrisy first
begins to writhe, you can notice it. You can notice it. I wrote
a letter to a friend of mine the other day, and I signed it,
Bruce, the old hypocrite. And he wrote me back and he said,
not very many people will admit that. But you know, isn't that
the first remedy to diagnose the problem? When we first see
the rise of hypocrisy in our own heart, isn't that the first
thing that we do is notice it and confess it to Him, not to
man, but to confess it to Him that hates it, but has promised
to forgive it and to cleanse us from it? Why does He tell
His disciples, beware of hypocrisy? He knew. He knew that it was
going to have an effect upon them just like it had on everybody
else. And they was going to have to
catch it in time and discern it in time before it swept through
the whole heart and shamed them, brought shame on the church and
reproach upon the living God. Notice our Lord here in our text. In verses 2 and 3, He begins
to give us some helps to avoid or maybe to beat us off from
hypocrisy. Look in verses 2 and 3 of chapter
12. Here's some things that will
help us. When He says, Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees,
which is hypocrisy, look here what He tells them then. For
there is nothing covered which shall not be revealed. Neither
hid, which shall not be made known." There's nothing covered,
but it's going to be uncovered. There's nothing hid, but everybody's
going to know about it. That's a good aid to heal us
of hypocrisy. That's some good medicine to
think about this. What is hypocrisy? It's a cover-up,
isn't it? It's a cover-up. It's a pretense. What's going to happen? Someday
the cover is going to be removed. And it's all going to be exposed. I remember one time here, I remember
there was a couple sitting right here and I was preaching in Acts
chapter 5 about Ananias and Sapphires lying to the Holy Spirit. I remember
when they sold the land and they come in and said, we got so much
money out of it, but they lied. And Peter said, you've lied to
the Holy Spirit. And I was preaching all that.
And I made the statement, aren't you glad that Peter's not here
preaching instead of me? Because he had exposed something
in your life. And boy, this one fellow, as
soon as I got finished, he took out of here. He took out of here. And I started asking the lady
sitting with us, I said, what happened to him? Where did he
go? She said, I don't know. I don't know. And I went home. And I had his dad's phone number
and I called his dad and I said, I said, your son left out today
and nobody knows where he is. And I said, what happened to
him? He said, don't you know what happened to him? I said, no.
He said, well, let me tell you. He's living with that woman.
He's moved in with that woman. And what you said went to his
heart and it scared him to death. He thought he had it hid. And I was talking to her sometime
later, and she said, yeah, I've seen him one more time. He came
by and got on his clothes and took off, and I haven't seen
him since. Scared him to death. See, hypocrisy is a covering. And it's either going to be revealed
in this life, or it will be in the life to come. Nothing is
hid that's not going to be uncovered. Nothing is concealed and kept
in secret that will not be exposed and known somewhere, either in
this life or in the life to come. The old prophet talked about
the day when God shall judge the secrets of men, didn't he?
The secrets of men. No sense in keeping secrets.
They're going to be revealed. Paul talked about the day when
God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. God shall
bring every work into judgment with every secret thing, whether
it be good or bad. Hypocrisy. A cover-up. A cover-up. Cover up the fig leaves. That's
the worst way to cover anything up is. But the fig leaves are
going to be tore away and everything is going to be seen. You know
this helps me. I think it's because I see such
hypocrisy in myself. It's just natural for your pastor
to be a hypocrite. So this helps me to quit covering
things up and to be honest, no matter how hard it hurts, because
it's going to be exposed anyway. Have you ever had anything, have
you ever had God to expose something you didn't? Well, I have. I thought I had it here. And
man, God exposed it. And you talk about breaking my
heart and making me weep and cry. And he says something else here
in verse 3 of our text. Therefore whatsoever ye have
spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light, and that which
ye have spoken in the ear and closed it shall be proclaimed
upon the house top. The parallel passage of this
is in In Matthew chapter 11 or 10, 27, I think it explains this
better. Here's what the Lord says in
the parallel passage. What I tell you in darkness,
that speak you in light. And what you hear in the ear,
that preach you upon the housetop. So what He was saying here, what
I teach you from My Word, what I teach you in your private studies,
when just Me, My Spirit and you are alone, Don't you be afraid
to preach that. Don't you be afraid to teach
that. When I whisper something in your ear, then you go preach
it out in the streets and on the housetop. Don't be afraid
of that. There's two times when we want
to withhold the truth from people. Two temptations preachers face,
especially of withholding the truth from people. One is when
they want to court the favor of man. When they want to please
man, they withhold the truth. Oh, if I say that. Oh, if I say
that. I'm gone. I see their faces.
I see their faces. I see how quiet they get. Just
mentioning the Word, I see how quiet they get. I had a lady
friend, mine and Joe's, and they went to a church not far from
us. I was talking to her one time
about elections. She asked me about it, and I
told her. I showed it in the Scriptures to her. God has chosen
us in Christ before the foundation of the world. I said, don't your
pastor preach that? She said, I've never heard it
before. I said, ask him why he don't preach it. Ask him if he
knows anything about it. And you come and tell me, would
you? And so I saw her a while after that, and she said, well,
I asked my pastor. I showed him in the Bible what
you showed me, and I asked him if he believed that. And he said,
well, yeah, I believe that. And I said, well, pastor, why don't
you preach it? And he said, well, it would confuse some people.
It would confuse some people. Some people know more than God
knows, don't they? Some people are so wise. Preachers
can get something. They're wiser than God. They
could counsel God if he would listen to them. I can't preach what God said
to preach. They confuse somebody. No, you're not worried about
people being confused. You're worried about people frowning
at you. You're worried about when people go out that door
back there, they give you a little flimsy handshake and don't smile
at you. You're worried about people leaving
you and not giving you their money and a raise. That's what
you're concerned about. Hypocrisy. Courting man's favor
will make you withhold the truth from him. And secondly, the fear
of man. The fear of man. Oh, be careful,
the Lord Jesus, of what I teach you. I'm not giving you this
to hide within your own heart. And I'm telling you, before you
say it, the world's going to hate you for it. The world's
going to persecute you for this gospel. Father, I've given them
the Word, and the world has hated them. There's not much hatred
aimed at us anymore. We're pretty much secure from
suffering. I wonder if we owe our security
sometimes to our unfaithfulness, brothers and sisters. I think
if we were more faithful to preach and teach what the Lord says
in His Word, I think more would be hating us and despising us. Oh, I've noticed this in myself.
I've noticed this in myself. Courting man's favor. Wanting
man to think highly of me. and fear in man. Peter got caught
up in this, didn't he? He denied the Lord because he
feared that little maid. This warning is very needful. Here in verse 4 and verse 5 of
my text. Look here what he says, several
things here quickly. And I say unto you, my friends,
be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that they
have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom
you shall fear. Fear him which after he hath
killed hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, fear
him. Be not afraid of man." If you can live your life without
the fear of man, then you've pretty much dispelled hypocrisy. Because that's one of the things
that breeds it, is the fear of man. Be not afraid of him. Be not afraid of man. You know
when we fear man, we forget the Lord. We never fear man until
we first forget the Lord. And that's why we fear man. What
is man? Doesn't the Bible ask that? What
is man? Who is man that we should esteem
him over God and fear him above God? Who were those rich men
and powerful men who opposed these poor disciples? Some of
them were kings. Some of them were high priests.
Some of them were rulers of the synagogue. Who are they now? Who are they now? Go find them. Go find them. Some of their ashes,
they're gone. Their breath was in their nostrils. Don't fear man, is what the Master
is telling us. Look over here, hold my text,
and look over here in Isaiah chapter 51. I wanted to quote
this to you, but look over here and read this. If you and I can
get this in our hearts and live in the faith of this, you talk
about dispelling the fear of man from our hearts? It would help us so greatly.
Look what he says in Isaiah chapter 51, and look in verse 12 and
verse 13. You find it on page 808 in the
Old Testament. Verse 12. I, even I am he that
comforteth you, who art thou that thou shouldest be afraid
of a man that shall die? And the Son of man which shall
be made as grass. And forgetteth the Lord thy Maker
that stretcheth forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the
earth, and has feared continually every day because of the fury
of the oppressor, as if he were ready to destroy. And where is
the fury of the oppressor?" You know what fear sometimes
is? It's something we think is going to happen. Most of the fears that we agonize
over is not what we're presently going through. It's over what
we think is going to happen. What's going to happen tomorrow
about my job? What's these people going to do tomorrow and next
week? What about this and what about
that? And we worry ourselves sick about that, don't we? And
we fear about it. And what's that an evidence of?
We've forgotten our Lord that made the heavens and the earth.
that laid the foundations of this world. Oh, the Lord said,
don't fear man who is so limited. He is so limited. Yes, he can hurt you if God permits. He can curse you. He can burden
you. He can even kill your body. But that's all he can do. And
God has to allow him to do that. If a man could touch you and
do you any real harm, then that would be one thing. You'd have
reason to fear him. But if man kills you, that's
all he can do. And what harm has he done you?
What real harm has man done you if he kills your body? Has he
done you any harm? He's done you a favor. He's done
you a favor. He sent your soul to rest in
the bosom of your Heavenly Father. That's a favor, is it not? If a man cannot touch your soul,
he can do you no real harm. Think about that. They kill the
body and that's all they can do. That's the first thing. Notice what the Lord Jesus tells
us about God here. Back over in our text again.
Notice what He tells us about God. I will forewarn you in verse
5 whom you shall fear. Fear Him who after He hath killed
hath power to cast into hell. Yea, I say unto you, fear Him.
I'll forewarn you whom you should fear. Fear Him who is not a man. Fear Him who is not limited in
His power. This is what helped poor Moses
to forsake Egypt. Not fearing the wrath of the
King. He endured as seeing Him who is invisible. He looked at
that King and He said, I can see Him. I see all the power
that He has. And He is so limited. And I know
what wrath He can incur upon a man. But I look and see an
invisible God, I see an invisible Lord who is not limited in anything. And that's the way we endear,
isn't it? That's the way we dispel the fear which will make hypocrites
of us. Oh, pity those who deny Jesus
Christ because they fear what man can do unto them. Pity them. because they incur
the wrath of God, who can do much more. He can destroy the
soul as well as the body. Something else we notice here
in my text, in verse four, I want you to
notice this, how He addresses these people. And He's still
speaking to His disciples, I say unto you, my friends, Christ
was instructing His disciples against hypocrisy and He called
them His friends. Isn't that wonderful? This is
not someone who is threatening us with damnation. This is not
someone who is waiting for us to fall so He can condemn us. This is someone who is giving
advice to us, friends. The Son of God is our friend. The Lord of glory is our friend. A friend that sticketh closer
than a brother. A friend who loveth at all times. A friend who will never leave
you or forsake you. And listen to this. This friend
gave his life for your life. Greater love hath no man than
this friend for your soul, that he has laid down his life for
you. He reminds them of God's unlimited
power, the body and the soul. And in verse 6 and 7, he reminds
them, the Lord Jesus reminds them and us of God's unlimited
care for His own. Unlimited power, now unlimited
care. Look what he says in verse 6
and 7. Are not five sparrows sold for two farlands? And not
one of them is forgotten before God? But even the very hairs
of your head are all numbered. Fear not ye therefore, ye are
more valued than many sparrows. And he takes this up, this same
subject up, over in the last part of this chapter. Look here
in verse 24. Look what it says in verse 24.
Consider the lilies. For they neither sow nor reap.
They don't have storehouses nor barns. And God feedeth them. How much more are you better
than fowls? And then he goes down in verse
27. Look at this. Consider the lilies, how they
grow. They toil not, they spend not,
yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed
like one of these. And then he applies this. If
God so clothed the grass, which today is in the field and tomorrow
is cast into the oven, how much more will he clothe you, O ye
of little faith? What should we fear when we look
at all nature? since our God is controlling
all nature. No wonder he says here in verse
30, For all these things do the nations of the world seek after,
and your Father knoweth that you have need of these things. Our Father. These are minute
creatures, aren't they? The sparrows, We've seen, when
Wayne feeds the birds, we see the little birds flying around,
coming and going. Little minute creatures. They
have to watch because some bigger creature will kill them. And
the hairs of our head, what is that? The hairs of your head. I don't have many left, but you
can't count them. I've still got some that you can't count.
Ravens, the grass. minute things. God manages them
in their motion and limits them and restrains
them and determines them by His own pleasure. How much more then the big things? If He controls and manages the
little minute things, How much more the greater things as the
sun and the moon and the weather and the oceans. Who makes the
sun to rise? Who brings the snow out of his
treasure? Who says that a small rain be
thou on the earth? Who plants his footsteps in the
sea? Who rides upon the storm? God
has put His bridle in the mouth of this universe. And He has
the reins. And He controls all the motions
of everything. Isn't that competent? Why do
you fear? Lord, I tell you why we fear.
We forget you. We forget our Sovereign Lord,
don't we? Something else that dispels our
fears and beats us off of hypocrisy. This unlimited God, this caring
God, is our Father. He is our Father. You are more
valued than many sparrows. You're God's child. Anybody touch
you, they touch the apple of His eye. Get something right
in the center of your eye sometimes and see how uncomfortable that
is. That's God's children. He said, you touch one of mine,
you've touched the apple of my eye. And I'm uncomfortable with
that. That's what He said. You better
not do that. Our Lord first calls us friends.
I say unto you, my friend. Now He's calling us His children.
In another place, He calls Himself our husband. In another place,
our Redeemer. Fear not. For thou shalt not
be ashamed, neither be thou confounded, for thou shalt not be put to
shame, for thy maker is thy husband." I hope my wife is not afraid
of me. I hope she does not live and
torment me. She has been around me when I have had butcher knives.
She has been around me when I have been shooting the pistol. But she has never been tormented.
of me. Why? I'm her husband. I'm her
husband. There's wives who are tormented
with their wretched, sorry, low-down husbands. I think sometimes if
I was some wives, and I know one, if I was her, and I called
him to sleep, I'd get me one of them big black iron skillets,
and he would wake up in the emergency room. That's where you'd come
to yourself, out in the emergency room, with a big ol' huge knot
right on Top of his head. But you ladies who have a good
husband, they're security to you. You love them, don't you?
They provide for you. The Lord said, I'm your husband.
I'm your husband. I'm your Redeemer, the Holy One
of Israel. I'm your Father. I'm your Father. We don't dwell enough on this,
brothers and sisters, I'm telling you. This is one of the reasons
we get so comfortless sometimes and so prayerless. We don't think
enough on God being our Father. Our tender, merciful, forgiven,
everlasting Father. You've not received the spirit
of bondage again to fear. You've received the spirit of
adoption whereby you cry, Father, Father. If you don't have any
words to say, go before His throne and lay there and groan it out.
Father, my Father, my Father. He loves to hear that. And He'll
never have that relationship to change. I don't care what
you've done, what you've fallen into. That relationship will
never change. My Father. He's my Father. What should I
allow fear or anything to drive me into being a hypocrite? Behold, God is my salvation.
I will trust. I will trust and not be afraid. I'll trust Him. I'll trust my
Redeemer. I'll trust His mercy. I'll trust
His grace. I'll trust His blood. I'll trust
His promises. I will trust and not be afraid. And he asks in verse 32, look
what he says in verse 32, and I'm almost finished. I'm almost
finished. He says in verse 32, look what
he says. Fear not, little flock. This is a good thing to dispel
our fears. For it is your Father's good
pleasure to give you the kingdom. Does the Father do His pleasure?
Does God have a will and pleasure? Does He do it? He works all things,
doesn't He? After the counsel of His own
will. Then here's His good pleasure to give you the kingdom. The kingdom is secure for you.
I don't know what's between you and the kingdom, but I know this
much, that kingdom is reserved for all those who love God, Wayne.
Those who are the called according to His purpose. I think sometimes when we have
this nagging fear that, well, maybe it's not mine. Maybe I
ain't going to make it. Maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm not. That's when we're apt to yield
to fear and yield to hypocrisy, being a hypocrite. When we live
in the faith of this and the assurance of this, that God in
His great mercy and faithfulness, as wonderful as it is, has reserved
this kingdom for me, then, my goodness, I can be faithful.
I can endure and not give in to this slavish fear and hypocrisy. If the kingdom is mine, what
does it matter about everything else? Two more things quickly. Verses
8 and 9 of our text. Also I say unto you, whosoever
shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of Man confess
before the angels of God. In the parallel passage of this
over Matthew chapter 10, it says he will confess before the Father.
Revelation 2 says he'll confess before the Father and His angels.
Doesn't this help us? We don't have to be afraid. Don't
have to let fear rule us and make us hypocrites. We have somebody
in heaven to represent us. Your name is being confessed
in heaven. Isn't that wonderful? Before
the Father. Father, look at my hands. Father, behold my side. That's one that I purchased.
That's one I bought at a great price. He's mine. Oh, and justice
says he sinned. And Christ says, look at my hands.
And justice says, I forgive. I forgive. Oh, to have my name
confessed before the Father. Isn't that wonderful? And before angels. I'll confess
you before angels. Those who confess me upon the
earth, those who deny me, those who are ashamed of me, I'm not
going to confess them. I'll be ashamed of them. But
those who confess me before men, I'll confess before these holy
angels, my holy heavenly creatures that are mighty and glorious
and they do my bidding and obey my commands. I'm going to tell
them, you watch over old Wayne, he's mine. You minister to Larry
Baker, he's mine. Don't you let anything hurt Greg,
he's mine. I bought him. Boy, when they
get a commandment like that, you talk about running to protect.
They're ministering spirits and Christ is their mind. And lastly, when they bring you
into the synagogues and to magistrates and powers, and boy they did,
and they whipped them and killed some of them, take no thought
how of what you shall answer. Don't sit around and think, boy,
how am I going to get out of this? What am I going to say? Come up with all these connivance,
these schemes, how I can, you know, twist things around to
get out of this mess I've gotten myself into. Paul Martin Luther,
when they told him, said, ask him, are you going to recant?
Remember that? He's standing there before that great council,
and boy, everybody was in there, and they said, Luther, are you
going to recant? Are you going to deny Christ?
Or not? He said, let me think about it.
Whenever He said, I need a day to think about it. That's tough,
ain't it? That's tough. But you know, when He came back
in the next day, He had a renewed strength. And what was it? The Holy Spirit. Just like Christ
said in our text. It's not you that speak. It's
not your strength in which you stand. It's the Holy Spirit strengthening
your inner man, giving you grace that you never heard of, never
thought of. I was reading about one of the
martyrs, bless his heart, and he got so afraid. And the next
day they were going to take him and burn him. They didn't have
the stake and everything up there. And they gave him one more day
to think about recanting. And they gave him a candle in
his room. And he thought, boy, tomorrow
I'm going to burn or deny Christ. And he said, I wonder how bad
that's going to hurt. And he stuck his finger to the fire
to see how bad it's going to hurt. And he said, oh! He said,
if I can't take this, what am I going to do when my body's
on fire? But he said, I can't deny my Lord. And the next day
he went. They tied him and set his body
on fire. And he sang while he burned. Why? We have an unseen help. We have a strength this world
knows nothing about, and we know so little about, the blessed
Holy Spirit. So there's some things to dispel
our fears and our hypocrisies, and I hope they've been a help
and a blessing to you.