Matthew 10:16-33 Fear Less

Is everybody here ready for 2012? Are you ready for it? Okay, I hope so because it's here, okay?

Like right now. I picked up the Gospel of Matthew to go through during the month of December so that we could, you know, around Christmas time be focusing our attention more and more on who

Jesus Christ is, what he came to do, and looking at his life. But then as I was really thinking through things and kind of walking through the passages and the text, the passage just fit today for looking into a new year.

The things that Jesus says, just kind of taking Matthew, the next step. So the next two weeks, rather than going back into Acts, we're gonna take two more weeks in the book of Matthew and just kind of look again closer at this commissioning that Jesus is giving to his followers.

And in the text, Jesus is speaking to his disciples and in the process of sending them out on a local mission, they're going to the area of Galilee, he warns them of persecution.

He tells them how bad things are going to get for them, and then he proceeds to tell them three reasons why they should not fear that persecution.

So as we look at this text and we can consider 2012 and moving forward, we can kind of hear the echoes of Jesus is sending out 12 followers in this text, but he's doing much more than sending out 12 followers, he's giving us some insight into the way that we ought to live this next year.

And so I wanna kind of take the words of Jesus and look at it from that perspective of his sending us out into a new year and thinking that through.

Ultimately, what we see in the text is he's giving a pep talk to his followers, encouraging them forward in boldness and fearlessness towards the world.

Now, is there anybody here who would like to have a bold and fearless 2012? Anybody here who says that would be a good thing,

I would really like that. Well, the fact of the matter is Jesus is not offering a year for us and he is not offering a mission to his 12 followers that is without hardship or without difficulty.

And he's gonna spell that out very clearly. There is hardship in life. How many of you would agree that 2011 has had some hardship for you?

Would you agree with that? How many of you would say that maybe you raised your hand and said it's had some hardship, but you'd still say it's had some really high points too.

Like isn't that what life is? And 2012 is going to happen to us. Did you know that? It's gonna happen one way or the other.

And I mean, we're gonna be standing here a year from now, God willing, and it's going to be another year.

And we're gonna look back and say, what did God do in this year? And we're gonna have another time to think about it and to consider what

God's gonna do in the next year and what he's done for us in the past. But he's not offering a year without hardship.

But listen in to what he does have to offer us in regards to fear and living a life of less fear.

This next year. So even though we know that there might be some hard times ahead, how can we live without fear?

So I want you to open your Bibles to Matthew 10. And we're gonna read verses 16 through 33. So Matthew 10, 16 through 33, that's page 694, 694 in the

Bible that's in the seat back in front of you. We desire for everybody to have a

Bible. And so if you don't own a Bible, please take that one with you that was put in that seat back just for you. Follow along as I read

Matthew 10, 16 through 33. The words of Jesus Christ.

Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. So be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues. And you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake to bear witness before them and the

Gentiles. When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say. For what you are to say will be given to you in that hour.

For it is not you who speak, but the spirit of your father speaking through you. Brother will deliver brother over to death and the father, his child and children will rise against parents and have them put to death.

And you will be hated by all for my namesake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next for truly

I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes. A disciple is not above his teacher nor a servant above his master.

It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master. If they called the master of the house

Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household? So have no fear of them.

So have no fear of them. For nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known.

What I tell you in the dark, say in the light and what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?

And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.

Fear not therefore, you are of more value than many sparrows. So everyone who acknowledges me before men,

I also will acknowledge before my father who is in heaven. But whoever denies me before men,

I also will deny before my father who is in heaven. Let's pray. Right off the bat in our text, if you're remembering where we're at,

Matthew 10, 16 through 33, in case you came in late, that's on page 694 in the

Bible in the seat back in front of you. Right off the bat in verse 16,

Matthew uses one of my favorite words in Greek. Okay, in the Greek, the word is idu, that doesn't matter to you, but it's translated behold.

And the word behold there might even be better in a modern translation to be check this out. And that's what, whenever you see the word behold in the

New Testament, you could substitute in there, check this out, like pay special attention to this.

That's the point of what that means. And so Jesus uses that word right off the bat here and says, check this out.

I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. So be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

That's what he says, speaking to his 12 closest followers. And three weeks ago,

Jesus had looked out on the crowds. He had been doing miracles and doing all kinds of cool stuff.

He looked out on the crowds and he felt compassion for them. He saw them as a flock of sheep without a shepherd, as harassed and torn apart and broken and not whole and not complete as they ought to be.

How many of you can relate to the reality that us as humans and that humanity in general is broken and messed up and in need of a remedy, of a solution, of something to fix us?

And that's what he looked out and he felt compassion towards them and saw them as harassed and helpless. And so then two weeks ago, we saw him gather his 12 in response to that compassion that he felt in his heart.

He gathers his 12, he calls them to go out on a very specific mission to the people that he was looking at and seeing in the region of Galilee and asks them to proclaim the good news.

Sent out his 12 and said, proclaim the good news of the kingdom, that the kingdom of God is here. And remember, whenever we see kingdom, what should we think in our mind?

King, there is a king in a kingdom, right? And so he's saying, the king is here. The king is at hand and he has arrived.

And who is the king? Jesus is the king. Okay, so that's what we saw him doing.

And not only did they go out then and proclaim this message, but they were given the ability to validate that message by showing the signs of the kingdom, by actually doing miracles and amazing things through them.

And he's commissioning them saying, you're gonna go out and you're gonna raise the dead and you're gonna heal the sick and people who have leprosy and cast out demons and do all these miraculous things as a foretaste of the kingdom that is to come.

A kingdom where all of those things are abolished and done away with and there is no more evil and there is no more sickness. There's no more bronchitis or sinus infections or whatever it is that you might be dealing with right now.

So he's given them this commission. And what we see in our text is a continuation of that discussion.

They haven't gone out yet. He's still sending them and he's gonna continue that on and give them more of a commission here.

And he gets right after it by warning the 12 that he is sending them out like sheep in the midst of wolves.

Now, do you remember what does a sheep among wolves look like? Dinner, lamb chops, like sounds good.

So because they're gonna be like sheep among wolves, he encourages them to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

Now, there's all kinds of animals going on in this verse. We're seeing sheep, we're seeing serpents, we're seeing doves.

So think about some of our animal sayings. We use the animal world as illustrations all the time, don't we?

Like if I say sly as a? Sly as a fox. Busy as a? Beaver, some people said beaver, some people said bee,

I don't know. Raise your hand, is it bee? Busy as a bee? Raise your hand, is it busy as a beaver?

Okay, we're split 50 -50, wow. And I think both work. Annoying as a cat.

Oh, oh, sorry. Oh, I think I risked offending half of you.

But that's okay, you're used to being offended because you probably own a cat. So in that time and in that era, innocent as a dove worked.

It was culturally understood. It was acceptable and understood. Innocent as a dove, as cunning or as crafty as a snake, totally understood in that culture, just the way that they viewed the world.

We might not necessarily use those phrases on a routine basis, they would have. And so that worked and that's what Jesus is saying.

Jesus is asking his followers to be wary like a serpent, to be wary, to be attentive, but also to remain innocent.

And how many of you acknowledge that that might be something that would be hard to balance? Okay, I find that in my own life.

It's easy to allow innocence to slide into naivety or blind optimism. Anybody, have you ever met somebody like that?

Everything is good, despite, you know, it's just a flesh wound and they're missing their arm or whatever. And it's just, everything is optimistic and almost kind of a blind naivety towards life, not really recognizing that they're being taken all the time.

But equally, on the opposite end of the spectrum, it's possible to let wariness or cunning or whatever to slide into distrust or cynicism or constantly looking for people to do evil and constantly badgering or pestering others.

You see what I'm saying? Oh, another animal illustration, badgering. There you go. So some of you here, this might be what you take away from this message.

This might be your challenge in 2012, to turn the thinking cap on, get a clue what's going on in the world around you, to be wise in your interactions with the world.

But some of us on the flip side need to stop being judgmental and mean towards other people and learn a little bit of innocence, right?

You see the contrast there? But there's a reason for this balance for the 12.

They were going to be facing persecution. From the Jews specifically, we see that in verse 12.

And Jesus prophetically speaks through this passage. This is like prophecy that he's speaking.

These things are going to come to pass for them, that they would be flogged, it says.

They would be arrested. Were they arrested? We've gone through and we've studied the book of Acts.

Were some of the followers of Jesus Christ arrested? Yes. Were some of them beaten? Yes. So you see what

I mean? This is prophecy. He's like literally in the book of Matthew saying these things are going to happen and then they came to pass.

Now because the verbs shift in verse 18 to the future tense and the scope of the mission is broadened to include

Gentiles. Now we saw at the beginning of his commission to the 12, he's sending them out to Galilee and he said, don't take the road to the

Gentiles. Don't go to the Samaritans. And now we're going to actually see him talk about Gentiles in this passage. What's going on?

It's like Jesus has telescoped out in his discussion to them. So the 12 are sitting there. However you picture it in your mind,

I don't know if you picture him sitting on a rock. I kind of just picture him sitting and them standing and they're talking and having this conversation.

He's teaching them, explaining to them how he's going to send them out. And in that context, he telescopes out and he says, as this whole thing gets the ball rolling and you go out to Galilee, this is going to be a short ministry, but this is going to get bigger than this.

And eventually you are going to go out to the Gentiles and eventually this church and this kingdom is going to expand and get bigger.

And the more it expands, the more persecution is going to come. So he's going to launch into that a little bit. Does that make sense? So you can understand how he's saying, here in Galilee, I told you not to go out to the

Gentiles yet. It's not their time, but when it does go out to the Gentiles, it's going to get dicey and difficult and there's going to be persecution.

So he kind of telescopes that out and starts talking about that. And Jesus foresees a time and proclaims a time when his followers will be dragged before governors, before kings, before Gentile leaders, because they are his followers.

We studied that in the book of Acts and we've seen a lot of that. And they will have a chance to bear witness to these leaders.

And here he gives them a great promise. He says, they need not fear what to say to those in distinguished positions, but the

Holy Spirit will give them words to speak when they come before rulers and authorities. This is not a catch -all statement that you need not ever study the word of God or to study to know him, and he's just going to speak for you.

This is kind of like the, this would be kind of like the lazy pastor's verse right here. I'll just get up and I'll just say whatever comes to my mind rather than study all week and God will just give me what

I need. And that's, what is the specific context that he's saying this in? He's saying when you get arrested and you weren't anticipating that you needed to say something and all of a sudden you have to say something, trust in God.

Trust in him to give you the words to speak and don't be anxious about it. Don't have anxiety over what you need to say at the proper time.

God is going to guide and direct those words when we are pulled into a situation where we are given an opportunity to testify for him.

We need not be anxious about the words we will speak when testifying about him. And I'm convinced that so many are immobilized by fear or the feeling of inadequacy when it comes to speaking to others about Jesus Christ.

Anybody here kind of ever felt that before? That anxiety or that fear or even inadequacy of saying, I don't, what if they ask me a question

I don't know the answer to? You felt that before? Trusting in God to give you the words to say, to speak through you and just letting that go, not being anxious about it.

A side note here on this, I'm not a huge fan of memorized gospel presentations. Now, some of you in this room,

I recognize you probably memorized some kind of a gospel presentation or some kind of evangelism thing and there was a big thing back in the 80s that was just really big called evangelism explosion.

Anybody ever heard of that? There's the four spiritual laws, there's the bridge illustration, there's all kinds of tools out there and I think they're good.

I'm not trying to say that those are horrible but what I'm really for is, I'm a really huge fan of listening to people.

Just listening to them. Hear them out and hear where they're coming from and be a listening ear to them and be a student of the people and the lives that God has put in contact with you and love them and listen to them and when you love them and listen to them, how many of you know that doorways are going to open for you to talk with them about your faith in Jesus Christ?

It's amazing what can happen when you listen to people, you hear their hearts, you hear what's going on inside here and then you have opportunities to share and proclaim and to talk with them.

Anybody here ever seen that before? I talk about this all the time but it just seems to be such a big deal in our culture right now but I mean, people coming to your work and just sharing what they did last

Friday night or what was going on and just the mess that's going on in their life or asking you for advice because you're a person who listens to them and those are great opportunities to proclaim

Christ. Great opportunities to be thoughtful about the words that you're gonna say but also trusting

God to give those to you at the same time. But before things get too encouraging here,

Jesus is saying some bad things are gonna happen, some things are gonna get tough, he takes it even deeper so that we get a real significant look at the depth of human persecution that his followers are gonna face.

So look at verse 21. Brother will deliver brother over to death and the father is child and children will rise against parents and have them put to death.

Great. Doesn't that sound exciting? The word deliver by the way, we see that word three times in our entire passage, we see it in verse 17, verse 19 and verse 21.

The word deliver could accurately be translated betray. It's a betrayal word.

So betray them over to the leaders, they will be betrayed by their own household and not just betrayed but turned over for death just like Judas betrayed

Jesus. Jesus says that kind of junk's gonna happen. Doesn't sound good, does it?

Parents turning on their children, children turning on their parents, brothers turning on brothers and turning them in for persecution.

Verse 22 caps it off by saying persecution's gonna come from every angle and the disciples are going to be hated by all, the text says.

Now this is not a statement that they will be ineffective but Jesus uses a literary device called hyperbole.

Has anybody ever heard of hyperbole? It's just exaggeration is another way and exaggeration is maybe a word that doesn't sound right because to say

Jesus used exaggeration. Does exaggeration have a negative connotation in our culture? It does, doesn't it?

Hyperbole is a literary device by which we all acknowledge that it's okay to say. Like an example of hyperbole in our culture is

I'm hungry enough to eat a horse. Well, you liar. How dare you lie to me? You couldn't eat a horse.

I dare you, do it right now. I'll go get a horse, you eat it. Do you see what I'm saying? I mean, that's hyperbole.

Do you ever call somebody a liar because they said I've done this at my job a bazillion times?

No, you haven't. A bazillion isn't even a number. Like, do you know what I'm saying? I mean, we have understood cultural acceptable ways of speaking and exaggerating that are not sinful or wrong or lying to one another.

We get it. Jesus is doing that in this text. So he's using a literary device because all kinds of people will hate the disciples but obviously they're not gonna be thoroughly 100 % ineffective and nobody's gonna listen to their message and everyone in the whole face of the planet is going to hate them.

We know that that's not the case. But I can't help but wonder at the end of verse 22 if Jesus steals a glance at Judas when he says this.

Look at the end of verse 22. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

He kind of looks over at Judas. Why would he? He's talking about them going through this ministry things are gonna get dicey, you're gonna be hated by all, but those who endure till the end will be saved.

Well, who didn't endure till the end? In his audience, he's standing there, he's speaking with 12 people.

One of them is not going to endure till the end, Judas. At a glance, the statement of Jesus can look like salvation is primarily dependent upon our endurance.

Does that make anybody uncomfortable? It looks like, boy, if you hang in there, if you work hard enough, if you go to church enough, if you do enough, and you sustain your spiritual life and you do the right things, then, boy, you might get in at the end.

Does it kind of look like that to you? Anybody kind of a little bit wanting to know what that phrase means?

I think it's important that we dig into these things and we address them directly. We know that's salvation. I challenge you, if you read from Genesis to Revelation, you would get a solid feeling, a solid sense that salvation comes by grace through faith in the work of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on the cross, that we needed that, that that's the only way we come to Jesus.

I mean, the only way that our relationship is healed with God is through Jesus. So we come to him by faith, believing he is the king and asking him to save us, and he saves us.

But the proof that that has truly happened in a life is never that I prayed a prayer one time, or I've got a date written in the front, my parents wrote a date in the front of my

Bible and said when I was seven years old, I prayed a prayer with them. You see that in scripture? Do you ever see that as evidence that you're in with God and everything is gonna be okay?

Or I was at a revival meeting or something and the preacher said, anybody who wants to walk the aisle, come down.

And so I walked an aisle and I raised my hand and I came down and I prayed. Is that ever shown in scripture as evidence that you are a follower of Jesus Christ?

Or whatever experience you could have in life, some experience with God or, you know, people are really, we're in a culture that's pretty touchy -feely when it comes to spiritual things, would you agree with that?

So I was just sitting in my room one day and I just felt this presence of peace rush over me and I just knew that all is well.

You ever heard that one before? Maybe someone else has said that before, I don't know. The only thing that scripture ever gives, ever gives as evidence for a reconciliation, a correct relationship with God is what?

It is a changed life. That your life is transformed, that it's changed.

We're just saying from the inside out, not some external conformity to trying to meet everybody else's standards and expectations, dressing like them, going to church, giving, doing all these things.

How many of you know we can fake the Christian life? We can fake it from the outside in. And that's the opposite direction that the scriptures talk about.

It's from the inside out. I have a new heart and that changes me. And so, you know, you look at this thing and you say, it's about a changed life.

So I'm convinced and take comfort that those who are saved, if you're here in this room and you are saved, you will endure to the end.

You will, by the power of the Holy Spirit, you will endure to the end if you are his.

If you're saved, you're gonna hang in there. You might ask me, how does that help me now, right?

Like, okay, so the proof is in the pudding and the pudding isn't baked yet and I'm a little bit scared right now, right?

So how do I know that I'm in? Well, there is help for now. Ask yourself if you've seen growth in your life.

Have you seen growth in a desire and a hunger for his word? Have you seen a hunger to know God in deeper ways?

Have you seen transformation and change? Are you moving forward in sanctification in your growth with Christ?

And are you different here at the start of 2012 than you were at the start of 2011?

Has there been anything that God has done in your life and changed you? Can you see any of that?

Some of the things to think about. Do you see the fruit of the spirit growing in you? Fruit like this, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self -control.

Sure, now some of you are sitting here and those things, a couple of those things come natural to you. You're just generally a peaceful person.

Well, yeah, I got that sewn up in there. I'm talking about those areas that you, those areas that you know are your problem.

You struggle with self -control. You struggle with this. Are you seeing God come in and change you from the inside out in regard to those things?

That's hope. If you don't see any change, you prayed some prayer when you were 10 years old or maybe when you were 25 and you, somebody walked you through it and you prayed and you've never seen any change,

I'm telling you, I'm cautioning you, I'm warning you to be concerned. There's a legitimate time for you to be concerned.

And it is, if you have not seen any growth, I am not offering assurance that you're saved.

I'm never going to look somebody in the eye and say, oh, well, okay, you were eight years old and you prayed a prayer with your parents, you're in.

You hear what I'm saying? It's between you and God in recognizing what has he done in your life.

Do you see the Spirit's hand in your life? Do you see him moving in you? I'm not trying to scare people here. I'm just trying to say the reality of it is that if your life hasn't been changed,

I think that's what Jesus is saying by this, those who endure till the end will be saved. Why? Because God has changed them.

You get it? Is that making sense to you guys? So, I'd encourage you, I think that our own salvation,

Jesus talks, or Paul talks about, Russ, totally just, that just totally left.

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Thank you. Somebody knew where I was going. I must have got enough of it out. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, and it is something that we should work out with fear and trembling, something that is a significant, how many of you think that your eternal destiny is a significant issue in your life?

Praise God. Just that you think it's a significant issue in your life, that's an awesome sign.

That's that the Spirit is alive in you. I mean, those who do not have the Spirit working on you probably don't even really care about things like that.

Doesn't even really cross your mind that much. Don't think about it. And now

Jesus is done talking about the future time when the gospel is gonna go out to the Gentiles, and he gets back to the task at hand, the specific ministry of the 12 being sent out to Galilee, and he's back to the towns, talking about the towns that they're gonna go through.

And he says, when they reject you, when those towns reject you and persecute you, flee to the next.

And I think it's interesting just to note this on the side, don't need to get into a lot of detail on this, but notice that it's okay to flee.

Like some people, some followers of Christ think that you need to court persecution, that if you are not being persecuted, that you need to just hang in there and take the worst.

And I know that that just seems like a strange stretch, but I remember when I was in college, I think

I've told this story here before, so I'll make it short, but right around the time that the whole Rodney King thing was going down.

Do you remember that? And there were all kinds of riots and different things going on. I was a college student in South Carolina, and everything was going down in downtown

Columbia. We went down there to kind of talk with people and just kind of see what was going on. And there were two street preachers that were down there, and they were standing by this pub, like three feet away from where people were eating.

Of course, there was glass there. And they are shouting and screaming hellfire and brimstone on everybody. And this place was electric.

I mean, obviously it was like kind of tense and stuff was going on, and the intersection was shut down, and there were helicopters flying over, and they thought there's just gonna be a riot in Columbia.

It's pretty crazy. And these two street preachers kept being asked by the proprietor of the pub to kept coming out and saying, dude, you're disrupting my people inside.

Can you go across the street? It's okay, you can go over there, but you're disrupting the people that are trying to eat right in here.

Well, what did they do? Shouted all the louder. And so then I actually had a chance, the cops came, were asking people questions, trying to figure things out, and they were gonna arrest these two guys, and they ended up arresting them for disturbing the peace, which there was no peace, but they're gonna arrest them.

So I actually had a chance to talk with them while they were getting ready to be booked. And I asked this one guy, I was like, what's the, why don't you just go across the street?

He's like, we're suffering for Jesus. Or you could have just, if your message was that important, you could have just went across the street, couldn't you?

Do you see what I'm saying? Some people out there would actually think you have to court persecution. I'm guessing that there's nobody in the room here who's doing that.

So that was kind of a weird side note. Verse 23, Jesus says, don't worry, because you have plenty of towns to get to in Galilee, and I'm gonna catch up and come to you before any of that is done.

Now this is, I admit that I recognize that this is a controversial passage. And I agree that it's confusing if you think that Jesus is talking about his grand and awesome second coming here in verse 23.

He says, when they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the

Son of Man comes. So some people see the word, a name for Jesus, Son of Man, and they see the word come, and they're like, oh, the second coming.

Well, if you're interpreting this as the second coming, you're going to be confused. I don't believe that that's what Jesus is talking about here about his second coming.

He's saying, you 12 are not gonna get through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

Well, how can he have a second coming if he hasn't even died and went to heaven and raised from the dead and all that stuff?

Would that be confusing if you interpreted that as the second coming? Very confusing. What do you mean,

Jesus, we're not gonna get through? What is that all about? I don't see it that way. I think in context, the most simple and sensible interpretation is that Jesus is literally saying, get a move on, don't dawdle,

I'm sending you out, sending you 12 out to Galilee. If a town rejects you, go to the next, because you know what, you're not gonna blanket, you're not gonna hit every single town in Galilee before I catch up with you.

I'm gonna be hanging back here in Capernaum, and stay here, but I'm gonna catch up with you guys, and when I do, we're gonna go on and do some other things.

So hit these towns and hit them hard and go one right after another. Does that make sense? Do you see how that's different than interpreting this as the second coming?

And that's not just me, there's some other scholars that would, some scholars who would agree with that.

So he's really talking about, you know, a literal physical coming to them after a period of time while they're out doing this mission.

Everybody get that, does that make sense? Okay. He goes on to make some real common sense statements that just seem obvious in verse 24, just real sensible things.

A disciple isn't better than his teacher, and a servant is not above his master. Like, right, okay?

I got that, Jesus, even I can understand this one. Go on, you know. Well, Jesus says, if they call me

Beelzebul, a nickname for Satan, and I'm master of the household, how much more will they malign my children?

And two things here. To follow Jesus is to come under his headship, and actually to be included in his family.

I mean, I think that's a cool thing. That's what it means to be saved, is to enter into the family of Jesus Christ.

But there's also a little bit of a catch to that, because the world hated him and crucified him, right?

So how much more does that put us in line with him and for his persecution?

The world doesn't like him, and therefore the world doesn't care much for his family either. The name

Beelzebul is a favorite thing that the Jews like to do with names. They like to change letters just to make them mean something different, and actually, they're playing with a nickname for Satan.

So there's a nickname for Satan, Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies, and that in itself is a nickname, and then they mess with the nickname and make it something different.

So Beelzebub means Lord of the Flies. Beelzebul means Lord of the Dung. So they're taking it a step further, and they're calling

Jesus Lord of the Dung. I would not wanna be in those shoes on Judgment Day.

That's the pet name that the religious leaders gave for Jesus Christ. Would you say that Jesus has painted a fairly bleak picture of the situation and the persecution of his family?

Kind of a little bit of a downer? I think so. How many of you had signed up for that in 2012? Like you're ready to sign up for that?

Arrests, beatings, hatred from all kinds of people, family members turning on one another. There's a sign -up list over on the

Welcome Center if you wanna go sign up for that kind of lifestyle. I'm just kidding, it's not really, you can go look, there's not one there.

But now comes the punch. Okay, so he's got, does it sound like the deck is stacked against his followers?

This is what he's gonna say. Here comes the turn. Because life is gonna happen to us in 2012.

None of us knows where we're gonna be at this time next year. So listen carefully how Jesus wants us to live this next year, regardless of what hardships or joys we face.

He says, have no fear. Have no fear.

Like what? Wait a minute. He just basically painted a picture of everything that could go bad for me this next year.

Like let's see, I could be beaten by the police. I could lose all social standing by being formally rejected by every leader in Matawan.

People could be taking out campaigns against our church. My own family could turn on me.

And I could be despised by all. How many of you would enter this next year with a little bit of fear if you knew that any one of those things was going to be reality for you?

One, thank you for your hand. And he says, have no fear of them.

Have no fear of these things. Them, in verse 26, are those who are persecuting.

And he's gonna give three reasons to not fear. He says, first of all, there is a judgment that is coming.

As bad as people can treat you, there's a coming judgment where all things are gonna be brought to light. Things that are hidden will be made known.

And Jesus Christ himself will judge in righteousness. Nothing, nothing is going to remain hidden.

So Jesus calls for a bold proclamation. It is not enough just merely to avoid fear, but we should take up boldness.

If the disciples faced this persecution and their call was to boldness, how much more bold should we be when we face little to no persecution for sharing our faith with others?

What's the worst that's gonna happen to us? These guys were facing death and all kinds of massive issues if they shared and proclaimed boldly.

He says, proclaim the truth in the light that they hear in the darkness. Shout from the rooftops that which was whispered to them.

See the transition? That which was whispered is to be proclaimed boldly from the rooftops.

Second thing, so there's a judgment that's coming, but the second thing, don't fear those who can only kill the body.

This is kind of funny. I thought that death was a big deal, right?

That's a Jesus. That's not the way he looks at it. I love in the end how utterly nonchalant

Jesus really is about death. In the end, he sees it as a movement, like a geographical movement from one place to another, not as an ultimate end.

The more we love the world, the worse death appears. But the more we trust and love

God, the more death snaps into perspective for us. Ever thought about that? I'm convinced that death is a big deal because we love the world too much, right?

Putting that in perspective. But we're commanded in this passage to have some reverent fear. So I didn't title this message

Fearless 2012. I entitled it Fearless 2012.

Because I would love for the result of this to be that we fear fewer things, but we fear one thing that is right to fear.

We narrow down the scope of what we fear in 2012 to the one thing that we should fear.

Have a reverent fear. Don't fear those who can only destroy the body, but fear the one who can destroy both body and soul.

Namely, who is that? God. God is the one who controls our destiny.

Now, there's been some controversy over this passage, and without getting into all the nuances of it, I, along with most biblical scholars, don't interpret the word destroy as annihilation.

But some have interpreted that word as annihilation. Other passages are clear that hell is a horrible place of eternal torment.

I don't like that. But destroy need not mean cease to exist.

Like the body that is destroyed doesn't cease to exist. And Jerusalem, which was destroyed in 70

AD, didn't cease to exist. Destroy is not a pleasant word, but it does not always mean cease to exist.

Does that make sense? If you want to debate or discuss that with me, we can talk more about it later. I think

I could probably spend an entire message talking about that one verse and kind of dealing with that, and some people have written whole books talking about it.

But the point stands either way in the text. There's only one worthy of fear, the one who holds our eternal destiny in his hands.

So, with the notion of fearing him, I want to add this. Is anybody here glad that Jesus has made a way for us to be adopted into his family?

That we need not fear him any longer because he has made the way through the cross of Christ, that we are his family, we're with him.

The third thing about living fear, fearing less, this 2012.

You see, Jesus even follows up those very grave words with encouragement in verse 29. He says, even two sparrows, which were sold for meat.

Now, have you ever seen a sparrow? Not a significantly large bird. Two sold for a penny, you'd get a snack out of them.

They were actually eaten in that time and in that place. And he says, even those are cared for by God.

God is in charge of their destiny. He knows each of us so intimately. The text says that the number of our hairs on our head, the hairs on our head are numbered.

He knows how many, and apparently, some of us require a little more attention from God than others, right?

Yeah. But the third and final reason to live fearlessly is that God is in charge.

He's in charge and he cares for us. We won't die without outside of his plan. Nothing will come to us that takes

God by surprise. He knows everything about us. He follows the lives of the sparrows.

And you, each and every one of you, is more valuable than a sparrow. And so here comes the final plea for boldness from Jesus in the face of significant persecution.

Jesus reminds his 12 that he is the one who determines their eternal destiny.

He says, if they acknowledge their allegiance to Jesus before people, he will acknowledge them before his father in heaven.

But whoever denies Jesus before men, he will deny before his father. And what I believe that he has in mind here is not an event of denial like Peter.

Anybody else's mind turned there pretty quick? Like if you deny Jesus, you're out? And didn't he do it three times?

He almost kind of seemed to make a habit of denying Jesus. So what's the scoop here? I believe that it's not,

Jesus not referring to a one -time denial like Peter did, but an ongoing embarrassment of Jesus that never relents.

A follower of Jesus that never publicly professes Christ because they're embarrassed, and never professes him as Lord and Savior is not with Christ.

We see in one of the letters to the Corinthians, if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is

Lord and that God raised him from the dead, we will be saved. So there's some very heavy themes in this text, but don't miss the forest for the trees.

The big picture here is a call to a bold life. Bold in what way, you might ask?

What does boldness mean? I don't walk with you every day, I don't know what it's like in your neighborhood,

I don't know what it's like at your workplace, but I think you can begin to think of some ways that you might be more bold.

And boldness is not just strictly proclaiming the truth of Christ, although that's an area that I'm convinced we all need to be more bold about in telling others the story, telling others about Jesus Christ.

But boldness is also in regard to dealing decisively with sin that we see in our lives.

Dealing decisively with what we see as our downfalls and our habits and the things that we fall into.

Boldly, taking bold steps to yield to Christ. Taking bold steps to walk with his spirit.

And I'm convinced that if you were to just pray this simple prayer as we come to communion, Jesus, show me the areas that you want to change me in 2012, he will let you know, he'll let you know.

Now, don't pray it if you're not ready, because there might be some things, I've been blindsided, I've been thinking, boy,

I've got this, I've got this in my life and it's square and it's feeling good and I've got that taken care of,

God, thanks for helping me, sew that up. And then boom, he's like, okay, well, you ready for what's next?

Boom, pride or anger or whatever. And it's like, oh, yeah, you're right, that's ugly.

And he's faithful, he's faithful to let us know what he wants us to be working on and what he wants to be working on in our lives.

I encourage you to pray that, to really consider that. What does he want to do different in you in 2012? Now, ask yourself this, what's holding you back from being more bold?

We know persecution in any really damaging way is unlikely for proclaiming Christ in our culture.

So let's make 2012 a year of fearing less of this world. Let's make 2012 the year when we realize that we have been sent into the world to be as wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

And the one who knows every hair on your head will be guiding you, giving you words to say and Jesus himself will be the one who commends you to his father on that final day.

And won't that be an awesome day? Anybody looking forward to that day of commendation? When we hear Jesus say to his father, this one is mine.

He or she gave their allegiance to me. They're mine, well done.

I look forward to that. So let's live for that commendation in 2012. Let's live with boldness for our