Sermon: Unity in the Church

Christian Responsibility to a Local Church

Hey everybody, I'm Pastor Jeff Durbin with Apologia Church. I want to thank you all so much for watching the content right here on Apologia Studios channel. What you're about to watch is a sermon, a message from Apologia Church's worship service.

And again, I want to thank you all so much for watching, for liking, for commenting, for sharing the sermon itself. We truly believe that it's important for the Christian Church to have an engagement in the public square with the Word of God.

So we thank you so much for partnering with us to send this out across the world. I just wanted to say something before you actually watch this and that is that I'm not your pastor. Though I'd love to be I am NOT your pastor, and it's very important as you're watching this.

You know that it's God's design for individual Christians to be part of a local Christian Church under the care of qualified faithful biblical elders. And so as much as we love all of you watching these sermons.

And we're thankful to God that God uses them to bless you to encourage you. I do want to encourage you as a minister of the gospel to get plugged into a local body of believers. Particularly, I think important a reformed church would be would be best.

But we want to encourage you to get plugged into a solid biblical church. Where you can fellowship, where you can worship, where you can serve, where you can be connected. That is vitally important and actually a biblical command.

And so as much as again as we love for your participation, your partnership. And we are so thankful to God that he's using these in your lives. We want to encourage you to get plugged into a local church.

You can though actually partner with Apologia Church as we proclaim the gospel. And provide a defense of the biblical gospel all around the world. You can do that by going to ApologiaStudios .com. You can partner with us by becoming all access when you do you help to make all of this possible and You get all of our tv shows our after shows and Apologia Academy.

All of that and you're a part of all that God is doing with us In the world to proclaim herald the gospel of the kingdom you can partner with us. And I want to say one last word about that. Do make sure that none of your giving and partnership towards Apologia Church interferes with your giving your worship your tithes your offerings to a Local body of believers in your area.

So thank you again so much for watching these and sharing them. God bless you.

Humility and the Danger of Church Division

It is uh, obviously very good to see brother jeff, uh vertical um I walked into the emergency room and he's sitting there on what he's laying there on the on the bed on the gurney they've got all sorts of Needles in him and stuff like that and i'm like You know I didn't know you were so allergic to me.

Because you may not know but he had his first problem The afternoon after I met with him and the elders about becoming a member of this church. And then a few days after I become an elder here there he is again.

So i'm really starting to get a little concerned personally. Um I think i'm sure they're going to be testing him for allergies and things like that and i'm not sure how you test for allergies about a person but um I will offer myself to them if they want to check that type of thing out but it is uh, it is my privilege to fill in and I am aware of the fact that we have Spent a good deal of time already this afternoon.

And so if you're sitting there going Oh, no, if he has a sermon as long as jeff's normal ones uh, we should have brought something along to sleep in but uh, Uh, you don't have to worry about that. I I can see Uh the clock back there and I will be sensitive to that reality.

I also apologize uh, because initially on tuesday when this all went down I'm, like oh, you know, I didn't get through everything on the lord's supper that I intended to so we'll just Go with it.

Um.

But then I said except there is a text I wanted to look at let me let me think about it. So um, we're actually going to be in romans chapter 15 primarily. And we will pick up the next time I have the opportunity of speaking and jeff.

You don't need to rush it wherever you are, please. Um, it's okay. Um next time I have the opportunity of preaching, uh, we will continue with the lord's supper series, but I wanted to talk to Us and I realize we always have lots and lots of visitors and you are welcome.

Thank you for being with us. Uh, we appreciate you being here uh, but I wanted to specifically talk to Apologia. Especially in light of the fact that we were just talking about the opposition that kawai is is presenting to us and the people there and the opposition that we ourselves are facing.

A lot of you aren't aware of the fact that. Uh, even over the past couple of days there have been some fairly well-known people theologians in the reformed community. Accusing us of all sorts of things accusing us of teaching a doctrine called the federal vision.

Which I I I only mention as an illustration, but it does make me chuckle just a little bit. Given that I remember when that movement began. I was one of the first people to speak out against it. I've written a entire book on the doctrine of justification the largest book i've written.

Uh, which is in no way, uh friendly toward but in fact very contrary toward federal visionism and yet. That kind of stuff is out there and you would think that christians would always be people who would check their facts.

And uh would would make sure that what's being said is accurate, but guess what? Doesn't work that way and so we often have to deal with really unnecessary opposition when we're trying to we're trying to bring christians together to to to end abortion and to stand firmly for Vitally important things things that are absolutely central to the future of these little children that are running around.

Uh in our midst even even in this day. When we want to stand firm for the fact that god has made Male and female and when he did so he said it is good. So to change that makes it bad. We want to stand up for that we want to bring people together.

We want to be able to explain that we want to be able to see people flourishing in this life and yet in the midst of that we get this kind of opposition for things that are just just seem so often so childish and so disruptive.

But you know what? It's not the first time that we've experienced opposition from outside. And in many ways that kind of opposition tends to drive us closer together with one another. It causes us to be focused upon what's important the real danger and anyone who has Been in ministry for a lengthy period of time knows the real danger.

Is from within. Not so much from without. Oh, yeah, there are forces from without that can Take away places for us to meet and and it would be a little tough right now to meeting in a park someplace at this time.

In in arizona, but you know what? There are people all around the world meeting in parks. And guess what we'd survive some way or another. It's internally That the grave danger really exists. There is nothing that I have ever seen More destructive to the life of a minister of the gospel of jesus christ and to experience a church split.

To experience that kind of tremendous trial and difficulty that comes from within the fellowship itself. And so I want to point our attention to two texts. That I think well, there are many but I just in the time we have I think will be extremely helpful for us.

The Humility of Christ in Philippians 2

And one i'm just going to cover very very briefly because you know it so well. I just want to Point to a particular aspect of it, but it's in paul's epistle to philippians philippians chapter two, you know, it's so well.

It's called the carmen christi. It is the the hymn to christ as to god. I would love to open up this text for you. I think I probably have at some point over the years with you but what I want you to notice is that tremendous text and all that it says about jesus is actually a sermon illustration.

It's a sermon illustration and if you read the first four verses that introduce us to The the song about jesus it's all about how the philippians Need to look at others as more important than themselves.

In fact the key to properly interpreting What's called the carmen christ to the hymn to christ as to god is to recognize that it is an illustration of humility. That jesus is our greatest example. Of humility and what does that mean?

We have equal rights. That's the big thing today. Everyone's got equal rights, right? Well in the church we do not have a hierarchy in the sense of Better christians than other christians. We don't have a priesthood and all the gradations that rome has developed into that over the over the centuries and that kind of thing.

Because the apostles never taught such a thing. They didn't envision such a thing when we come to the lord's table. Later on in just a matter of minutes from now. There is not one line that gets one kind of food and the other line gets a better kind of food or something like that.

There is there is no people who get to go first and other people have to wait. No, there's one table. One set of elements we come before christ as redeemed sinners. There is only one Righteousness that has been imputed to us.

And so there is equality in our standing before god. And so in light of that then what does it mean for us to act in humility of mind? Toward one another within the fellowship of believers. Well, he tells us We are to consider others As more important than ourselves.

We are to look to the things of others rather than just to our own things. So we have equal rights. But we lay them aside. In the service of others that's humility and isn't that what jesus did? This is this is the key to the interpretation.

Of.

Versus five and following because if jesus was just michael the archangel or a great prophet or something along those lines. Then the whole thing wouldn't make any sense because if jesus was less than god If he was a mere creature or even a highly exalted creature, but still a creature.

Then it would not have been humility for him to not try to grasp at equality with god that. Any creature that tries to grasp equality with god is committing blasphemy. That's not humility. So the only way to understand the song as an illustration that fits Is to recognize that that equality he had with the father was something that he didn't hold on to at all costs but He humbled himself and laid that aside in service to us.

He became obedient to the point of death even death on the cross. Therefore god the father highly exalted him and gave him the name which is above every name. You know what the rest of the text says. And so what we have Is paul writing the philippians we get a little bit of a sense.

In some of the things he says I mean he doesn't have any major words of correction of the church of philippi. I mean this church in comparison to corinth is doing really well. They really are there you don't have to name that.

I mean It's sort of sad that some of the new testament epistles paul has to name by name. How would you like to be one of those folks that paul had to call out and say and by the way ladies? Uh, you all have been sort of uh going at each other and you need to love one another.

And now it's in scripture for everyone to read forever. Isn't that wonderful? So you do have an advantage that you were not necessarily in the primitive church but Philippians, there's really not any major correction, but there might be some somewhat of a underlying theme.

That paul addresses here and saying look. You want to know the best way to keep harmony in the fellowship of believers? Don't worry about being seen. Do not worry. About being called out from the pulpit for that wonderful job.

You did last week. In humility.

Serve.

Others when you have a fellowship filled with those kinds of saints. You're going to have one of the smoothest running fellowships ever and almost any time. That you start seeing problems it's because someone has come along and said i'm not getting my due recognition.

Many years ago, I was a member of a very very large church. We had 20 ,000 Members, don't worry. We can never find more than 7 ,000 of them at any one given sunday, but they were on the roll someplace.

And that means there was a big music ministry huge music ministry. 250 voice choir. Full orchestra. It was beautiful. I mean you they could belt it out. I mean I remember they sang a version of he's alive and man.

I just had goosebumps. It was awesome. It's wonderful. But guess where the majority of problems in the church came from? The music ministry. Now I ran sound god bless you guys up there. It is the most thankless job on the planet.

It really is. If you do it perfectly, right? No one ever says a word to you. But if it all goes wrong, everybody turns around looks right up there. Even if you didn't have anything to do with it. I could tell you many stories.

Trust me. But the thing about all the guys that ran sound was we knew the soloists really well. And we knew which ones were always going. Could I have more me in the foldbacks, please? I want to hear more of me and we're up there going.

We don't want to hear more of you. Not showing up. Okay. How's that? Okay, fine. We didn't touch anything, but it made it look like we did, you know. We almost wanted to have shirts made up that said more me we just sort of give them to certain people, you know and Seriously the the the focus that some of these people had upon when they got to sing solos.

Was a little scary. And it created so much strife and so much division. Totally in contradiction to what you see in philippians chapter 2 and when you see a One of the one of the things that. That I really appreciated a number of years ago obviously, I was at a different church a number of years ago and.

But I was an elder there and and one of the questions that we had as elders that I thought was a good thing to give consideration to. Was we was asked the question do we see? A growth in grace and maturity amongst our people.

Or do they pretty much are they pretty much where they were a year ago? We can all ask ourselves that type of a question. What about that? Are we constantly having to correct this and correct that and correct this and correct that or is there a desire on the part?

Of everyone we want to walk as jesus would have us to walk. We don't want to be distracting from what we as a people are doing. We Want to be servants of christ wherever he places us. That's a sign of maturity.

And that means there are sometimes One of the elders is going to walk right by you after a service and not even see you. The mature person immediately goes wow, I wonder if something's going on. I wonder if they're it looks like they've got something that they really are Weighing heavy on them.

Maybe they just got worried about something the immature person's like. Well, did you see that? I mean, I want to tell the pastor about that evangelistic thing I did this week and i'm just I think i'm gonna start visiting other churches.

You don't think that doesn't happen? Sadly, it does all the time Paul tells the church at philippi one of the greatest Mechanisms god has given us Is if we are seeking to live in humility of mind before him.

We will serve others and as he tells the colossians It's christ that you serve don't be a man pleaser. Don't worry about what people see you doing. Because no matter what you're doing christ is always observing and if you're serving him, what more do you need?

What more is there? That is the most important thing. And so keep that in mind as we turn back to the the passage that really caught my attention this week and that's in romans chapter 15. Romans chapter 15.

Beginning in verse 4. The apostle is wrapping up.

His.

Really fully involved fully laid out gospel. Which he sends the church at rome knowing that Rome is the center of the empire and that means if you have a sound Church there the gospel is going to go out into the entire Roman empire and that's exactly what took place.

And so you've had the theology the deep theology and now you've beginning in Chapter 12 you have the application just like you have in hebrews where there's that transitionary part part. And here in chapter 15 beginning verse 4.

Well back up. Uh, let's go ahead and begin at verse 1 now we who are strong Ought to bear the weaknesses of those who are weak or do not have strength. And not just please ourselves. Sound familiar. We should not seeking be seeking simply to please ourselves.

This is pretty much the same thing he was saying the philippians but here in another context. We are to bear one another's burdens. If you have the physical strength the spiritual strength. You ought to bear the weaknesses of those who do not have those types of blessings.

Sometimes they're there just simply so that you can serve christ in that way. And not just please ourselves because the tendency Is to use god's gifts. He has given to us to please ourselves. That's the american way.

It is the american way it is not the christian way. And we must keep that in mind let each of us please His neighbor. For his good to his edification. Wow, we can spend a lot of time on how you can do that.

But the point is the mindset is external. It's looking outward from ourselves. To how we can serve those around us it's amazing when you want to be serving someone. How insensitive you are. To any offense they might give you.

You hear me if your heart is truly set upon serving others. You are not going to be that hyper sensitive person that's always looking for a reason to be offended. This again is where we we stand in absolute opposition to the mindset of our age.

That tells you to be constantly looking out for number one and therefore to be offended at.

Everything.

When I look at how people communicate with one another in social media today I am reminded and I remember this day. And when you're my age and you remember this stuff this far back. It's a good thing.

It's it makes you very happy. Really really does. But I remember I was out in the front yard. 301 St. Mark's Road.

Uh.

Chiremonstown, Pennsylvania. What was that? Someone from Chiremonstown here. Oh, okay. All right. Well, whatever.

And.

I was five or six years old probably about six. And one of the friends I was playing with I don't remember what they did hit me with a stick called me a name. I don't know what it was but my natural instinct.

Was to run and tell my mommy because I had been offended. Because that's how little kids are. And all of a sudden I remember I remember which direction I was facing I remember what the trees looked like when all of a sudden it struck me.

Yeah, but I'm having too much fun. Why do I need to care? It doesn't really matter. I'm just gonna keep playing. Wow, there's a big step toward maturity. And I don't know about you. But it seems that that level of maturity that I achieved at age six is now illegal on university campuses in America.

It is I decided I didn't need a safe space. It was more fun to play. What has happened? It's astonishing and that should. That level of maturity should be really basic within the church. Don't please yourself.

Please the neighbor. For his good for his edification. Build him up. Sometimes that's costly to you. But build up your neighbor that's the command of christ. For even christ did not please himself. Here it is again.

Here it is. Again. This is this is really the the same section from philippians 2 transferred over in other words to.

Uh.

Romans 15 for even christ not pleased himself, but as it is written The reproaches of those who reproached you fell upon me.

He took.

The reproaches that were ours and they fell upon him. Many times my muslim friends when we have debates Will attack the biblical presentation of the crucifixion. And they will do so by saying Why was jesus so afraid?

Why was he sweating drops of blood? Why was he praying that god would take this away? Obviously he didn't want to die. He was afraid of death. This couldn't be a true prophet of god and they go on and on and on and on.

And that's when you get the wonderful opportunity being able to explain to them. The reason that jesus said let this cup pass from me, but not my will but yours be done. The reason he sweats as it were drops of blood is not because of his death.

It is because the fact that he was made to be sin in our place the holy Sinless son of god the weight of the sin of all of god's people.

Of all.

Generations laid upon him. He made him who knew no sin. To be sin in our behalf that we might be made the righteousness of god in him the great exchange. That is what it was all about. That's what he's saying here.

The reproaches of those who reproached you fell upon me. He took what we deserved. And there again is the illustration. He didn't have to do that, but he did. That's humility. That's serving others. For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction that through perseverance and the encouragement of the scriptures.

We might have hope so Here in the context of saying isn't it great? That these words were written for us so long ago so that we might have this constant encouragement. Every generation of believers will have this constant encouragement.

To recognize what christ did in our behalf and therefore to have an idea of how we should serve one another the scriptures provide to us. Those examples and there are many examples that you could point to at that particular point in time.

And then paul does something this is really where I wanted to get to is verses five through seven because Paul does this in a number of different places. A number of different places in the middle of normally a very practical exhortation to the people of god.

Paul will break out into a prayer into a doxology. Into a recognition of the grandeur of god but here. It's a prayer like you have in colossians where he prays for the christians at colosseum. There's a there's a great book that arthur w pink wrote many years ago.

Specifically studying the prayers of paul and it is deep. It's really good stuff. If you are looking for something to read and there certainly isn't much to be watching on television anymore. So I would highly recommend it to you.

Here you have one of the prayers of the apostle and he says.

May.

The god.

Who.

Now it literally says the god of perseverance and encouragement. And technically you could understand that is Either describing god or something that god is the source of but it's pretty obvious That what he's saying is the god who is the source of encouragement the god who is the source of perseverance and patience and steadfastness.

We're not to look to anyone else as the source Of our perseverance our holding on. We pray to that god. And he says may the god who grants who gives perseverance and encouragement Give to you something and this is my prayer.

For us.

Because it's in the plural give to you plural the congregation. The church there at rome. And here's literally what it says. To think the same thing to be of the same mind. In fact, it's interesting. It's the very same term that he uses over philippians, too.

And he says have the same mind among yourselves, which is in christ. Jesus same term here. To amongst yourselves think in the same way. According to christ jesus.

Now what does that mean.

We're all different. God created us in different ways and in different fashions. He's given us different gifts different interests. And so how are we supposed to think the same thing. We can't think same thoughts.

You've got a different job than i've got and you've got different kids and different experiences. How can we think the same thing? Well, I think it's laid out for you right there. According to christ jesus He is the standard.

He is the one who is to give form to the unity Of thought that is to exist amongst us. We need to be on the same page. That's a nice Niv ish translation.

Okay.

We need to be on the same page. When you have a fellowship where everyone is focused upon what they can get out. Of being there at church. And everyone's going different directions. That is the recipe for disaster.

Disaster. But when you have a fellowship and folks this can only happen. This can only happen by the gifting of the spirit of god.

When.

You have a fellowship Where everyone is pulling the same rope. Going the same direction. Serving Edifying lifting up others Rather than just themselves. When there is a unity of belief and faith. When there is a Agreement as to what is key and central in the christian faith.

There you have a fellowship that is not only blessed of god, but a fellowship that god can use to accomplish great things. When we think Of what we believe. When we think of the message of the triune god.

Who jesus christ is god in human flesh? We are looking for the appearing of our great god and savior jesus christ. Titus 2 13. Our god and savior jesus christ. Second peter 1 1. Thomas answered and said to him my lord and my god when we have that common Confession can you imagine a church if you didn't have that common confession?

Can you imagine how any group of people could have unity and harmony in pulling the same direction. When the people over on this side you guys get to be the orthodox today the people on this side believe That jesus christ was truly the incarnate one and then sorry guys the people over here Are going well, no, you know, that's a little extreme.

Don't you think I mean? Maybe an exalted angel or just a great moral teacher. How could how could you ever? Bring those people together to accomplish anything.

Maybe impossible.

Common faith one gospel when jeff was talking about Justification and righteousness and the gospel a few moments ago I leaned over to zach and said doesn't sound very federal visionist to me. And he said that's because it's not.

Because we don't believe in that because we understand what the gospel is. We understand What faith is we understand election and predestination and we understand justification imputed righteousness of christ.

We've been teaching that all along. But can you imagine if we had differences? And you had the orthodox people over here i'm going to try to be fair here. You have the orthodox people over here who are trusting solely in the imputed righteousness of jesus christ.

And you got these people over here and you sort of look like you might be this way. But you got these people over here that are just really trying and striving to do certain things to be pleasing to god.

And and hoping that at the end you'll have done enough. You're not going to have unity. You're not going to be going the same direction. But to have the same mind also means that we have to recognize.

What the key and central defining important things in this life really are to have that same mindset. That's the indication of a unified people. That's one of the reasons. We love to sing. We love to see the baptisms we love to do the lord's supper.

This church has got a lot of things going on all the time. But what is the central core? What is absolutely? Central. What we're doing right now. The ministry of the word of god and that's what brings us all together.

The rest of the week the world's trying to get us going this direction and get us going that direction. But when we open the word of god when we allow the word of god to speak. We're brought back together again, it's like the the sheep the shepherd.

By his word brings us together gives us direction once again. And focuses upon the real issues the important things. That we have been called to proclaim the lordship of christ in all aspects of life.

That's our calling. So we need to have that same mindset. Be of the same mind with one another. According to christ jesus he has to be the standard of all things. And that's why he has to be god in flesh.

He has to be the one in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. If he's anything less He could not function in the way. The new testament describes him as functioning. And so this is paul's prayer because he knows that when you have a church focused in this way God can use that people.

In order that so when that happens.

With.

With one accord with one goal with you're going one direction. With that unity that results. You may with one voice Glorify the god and father of our lord jesus christ. Oh we talk about Glory to god. It's almost a thing in our society, you know, the the preacher is on tv glory to god.

How do you actually bring glory to god? We as a people can bring glory to god when with one voice in one accord. We his people. Point to the true god and what he has done in the gospel. When the church Speaks with many voices and focuses upon many different things.

The world does not hear what it's supposed to hear. But when god blesses his people with that unity that is to be theirs. With one voice we glorify the god and father of our lord. Jesus christ. Now, let me just very quickly sometimes.

We're all involved in apologetics around here. And sometimes you hear that phraseology and it it trips people up. Why would paul say? Anything other than just simply the father of our lord jesus christ.

Remember, there's a this is a parallel passage to philippians chapter 2. How did philippians 2 end? Every knee is going to bow. Every tongue is going to confess what? That jesus christ is kurios lord what's next to the glory of god the father.

There is a perfectly balanced trinitarian recognition. That the father sends the son there is a distinct there's a distinction between them. And yet even confessing jesus as lord drawing from the prophet isaiah identifying him as yahweh.

Jesus does not desire glorification. Apart from the father as some separate deity. This is all what john 5 was all about instead. When you glorify jesus as lord. You're glorifying god the father and yes as the incarnate man.

Where'd my thing here go?

What's uh?

What's that say there again down there?

Where'd it go?

Oh great i'm missing one page of it. Lovely. Oh, here it is. He says he drops it on the floor and it flies all the way down there. All right. There you go. What are the what are the words some of you have already memorized.

I was looking out there became man. And so was and continues to be god and man in two natures and one person forever. Did you know that the catechism question would be relevant to our exegesis this morning?

How is it relevant real simple? How could jesus be god and have a god? You'll be asked that question you'll be asked that question. If i'm preaching up here and jeff durbin's preaching up here our people are going to know how to answer that question.

That's what I loved about The I will always know it as the beard video. Did you all see it on facebook when the jehovah's witnesses came to zach's house a couple months ago? And we've got this this awesome.

Like it was planned video. Of zach in in relief shadow relief on the wall. Is this like it's like this beard is just eating this jehovah's witness. It was just really. It was awesome. I love that. It was so great.

And what did you hear zach explaining how jesus christ is the god man? Jesus. If he if if if the second person of trinity entered into human flesh ask yourself a simple question. Would he have been an atheist?

Think about how silly that is. If he was truly man, then what is any true man going to do? He's going to worship god. That could be an atheist. Well, how can that be because the son is someone other than the father?

And if he becomes flesh doesn't cease to be god, but he's been in communion with his father for all of eternity. He's going to continue that communion and as a man that communion is going to be.

Worship.

So in john chapter 20 in the same text where it says My lord and my god of jesus only a few verses earlier in that jesus talked about ascending to my god into your god. It better say that. Or we have contradiction in the bible.