Why We Believe - God's Law is for Today

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If you want to open your Bibles to Isaiah 42, there's so many places that we could go to begin this study.

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And we're going to be going into a lot of Scripture today, but I think especially with the moment that we're in right now, here is hope for the future.

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Here is hope. Isaiah 42, you'll remember as we did our study on why we believe

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Jesus is the Messiah, I talked about the fact that one of the things that must have been difficult, we need to show them some mercy for the first century

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Jews that had the Torah, the Tanakh, they had the writings of the prophets, they had the law of God, the

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Psalms, they had all of that. One of the things that had to be slightly confusing for them is the different facets of the

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Messiah, the different portraits of Mashiach, the Messiah, who was to come.

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You have, of course, all of the illustrations of the Messiah as the suffering servant, as the one who would die for the sins of God's people.

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He would justify the many as he would bear their iniquities. See, the Lord is pleased to crush him.

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You would see all of that, and yet you also have these other prophecies that are extensive and they're all over of Messiah who rules the world, who draws the nations to God, who has dominion, who sits at the right hand of God, putting all of his enemies under his feet.

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You have the promises of the Torah, the law of God, going out to the nations,

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God's standards of justice being upheld. All of that's there. And, of course, that had to be somewhat confusing for them to be thinking,

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OK, this Messiah is going to win the whole world and establish justice in this world. God is concerned with justice.

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And yet here comes this lowly Messiah on a dusty road, this prophet from Nazareth.

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Can any good thing come from Nazareth? Jesus coming humble and lowly on a donkey.

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They had to be thinking, I'm not quite sure how Jesus is going to overthrow the Roman government with so much power when he's just this lowly

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Messiah riding on a donkey. The reason they probably were somewhat confused is the prophecies are clear.

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This Messiah is going to rule the world. He's going to draw the nations to God. He's going to establish justice. And here is one of those prophecies,

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Isaiah 42. This is given today for the people of God here at Apologia for your hope.

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Isaiah 42, verse 1. Hear now the word of the living and the true God. Behold, my servant whom

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I uphold, my chosen in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit upon him.

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He will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice or make it heard in the streets.

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A bruised reed he will not break and a faintly burning wick he will not quench.

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He will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth and the coastlands wait for his law.

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Thus far is the reading of God's holy and inspired word. Let's pray together. Lord, we come before you as your people, humbled before you by the gift of your word.

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This is your special revelation. You have condescended and revealed yourself to us,

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God. We don't deserve what we're holding in our hands right now and we recognize the gift that it is.

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And Lord, in myself, I'm not worthy to be bringing this word to your people. But Lord, we do trust you.

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We cling to the righteousness of Jesus. It's his obedience and his work, his death that brings us to a place where we have peace with you, where we know you, where we're called children of God.

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And I pray, Lord, that you would allow me to get out of the way today as I proclaim your truth to your church.

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We pray that you would guard my mouth and my mind from error, that you would raise up your church boldly with a proclamation of the gospel,

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Lord, in your standards, your truth. Lord, how we love your law. We pray,

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God, that you would use this message to change us, challenge us, and to get us on our feet. Please allow us to be light in the midst of so much darkness.

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Lord, we already know your victory. Your victory at the cross, your victory in your resurrection, your ascension, and your being seated on that promised messianic throne.

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And Lord, we know the promises of your victory in the world. And we do ask, Lord, that you would use us as a means to bring forth that victory.

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In Jesus' name we pray, amen. So, why do we believe that God's law is for today?

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There's ways you could say this. We could talk about why we believe in the abiding validity of the law of God.

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This is an important message because, well, I would say, it wouldn't be such a peculiar sermon during the days of the

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Puritans. If you were talking to the Huguenots or Huguenots, however you want to say it, or the

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Puritans, the pilgrims, and those early people that were founders of this particular nation as it is, talking about the law of God and God's righteous standards and justice wouldn't have been odd.

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It would have been normative. They would have expected and anticipated. If you had a question about how should you run your city, how should you run your communities, what's the righteous response to this evil?

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How should we handle this thing? There wouldn't be any question for, say, the Puritans or the

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Huguenots or those original people who came over here and established communities as to where we go for the answer.

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They knew God has spoken. We're not doing this based upon our own wisdom or understanding.

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We look to the word of God as to what is right, what is just, what is holy and pure and true. But in a day that we live in today, this is a tough message to give because we've been inundated over the last couple of generations with a very peculiar perspective on the law of God, his righteous statutes.

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We've turned the idea of justification through faith alone in Christ alone apart from works of law into an idea that the law is all -encompassing a curse.

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It is just this awful, overbearing thing. There is no real good in it, and aren't we glad that it's over?

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Aren't we glad that Jesus became a curse for us so we can get away from that awful law of God? And I want to say we read it today where Tim read it beautifully,

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Psalm 119. Doesn't the scripture have just a very different perspective than the modern evangelical about the law of God?

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I posted, of course, on Facebook. They come to church. We're going to do the study on why we believe the law of God is relevant today, that it's true today.

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We believe in it today. And somebody said this, and I kid you not, the law is dead.

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The law is dead to the believer in Christ. The law is dead. It's over. And, of course, you can easily just sort of sum up that discussion and end it quickly by saying, are we allowed to have relations with animals under the new covenants?

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There's where people start having a hard time when you ask questions like that. How do we know what's righteous, what's true, and how are we certain of it?

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If we have word from God, we know what the truth is. We know what is righteous, but we're living in a tough time. The state of our nation today is a testimony to the church stepping away.

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It's been said that the culture is the report card of the church. The culture is the report card of the church.

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And so the question we have to ask, I think, ourselves as the church today in a nation that has been so impacted by the gospel of Jesus Christ is this.

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How are we doing, church, with the state of our nation? How are we doing? We had so many believers who sacrificed and preached the gospel.

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We have so many faithful believers behind us. It was never a utopia, of course, because the world is in the process of transformation because his kingdom is expanding like a mustard seed into a large tree and like leaven in a lump of dough.

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But we shouldn't ignore the giants that have come before us and what they laid down and what they testified to and what they preached and proclaimed.

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We have a nation that's been so impacted by the goodness of the gospel and God's just statutes and standards.

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And now our nation has abandoned all of those. And the question must be asked, because we understand how sinners are going to respond to God and his law.

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That's what we do by nature. The question has to be asked, where's the church? Where's our witness?

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Where's our proclamation? And I think we've been gutted as a church because we've told people

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God's law is no longer relevant. His standards of justice and righteousness in society, those don't mean anything anymore under the

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New Testament, under the New Covenant. You see, what we really need to be about as a church is we need to be about escaping from our bodies, leaving our humanity behind and escaping into this gassy existence over there to this higher story of the spiritual.

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That's where life really is. We need to basically get people saved so they can go, quote, to heaven one day.

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Very different, very, very different than the perspective that the prophets give us over and over again about the

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Messiah's kingdom. It is a very much here and now kingdom. It is, of course, a spiritual kingdom, but it impacts this world.

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I've already given you one testimony to that in Isaiah chapter 42. The Messiah, the servant who will establish justice, he won't grow faint or weary till he has done so, and the coastlands are waiting for his law.

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Is that the eternal state? What are coastlands doing waiting for God's law in the eternal states?

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Just think about it. That's a promise of Messiah's kingdom. That's a promise of the blessing of Jesus bringing his salvation into the world is as people get saved, as their hearts and minds are transformed, as they're indwelt by God's spirit, they now love

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God's law. They long for his law. They long for his righteous statutes.

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They long for justice. They long for victims' rights. They long for love for neighbor.

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They long for God's ways. As Jesus saves people, then we begin the process of teaching them to obey.

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The state of our nation is something to consider. How do we ever get to a place? I watched recently this week,

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I actually watched it. One of the Biden, that wasn't so much of a rally.

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It was more of a gathering of cars. And our former president

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Obama was speaking and sort of doing his thing for Biden, hoping he gets elected.

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And I happened upon a moment in this rally where the former president was talking about billionaires and all the money they're making and essentially saying it's not fair.

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And we need to make sure that we're going after the fact that these billionaires are making all this money and we need to make sure everyone else gets some of that.

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When did he say that? How did we ever get to the place where coveting our neighbor's things was considered virtuous?

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Isn't it amazing? It's become mainline. It's mainstream now. The idea that, hey, they have all this stuff.

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Don't you want their stuff? And everyone goes, yay, give me their stuff. That's righteous. Why? They have something and I want it.

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Give it to me. We've mainlined that. We've mainstreamed that. The idea of coveting what somebody else has and wanting it for ourselves.

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We have whole communities that advocate for such a thing. We should be taking this person's stuff.

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Why? Because it's too much stuff. I like the stuff and I want some of it for my stuff. We say that that's a virtue to take what belongs to other people.

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We turn into a virtue the theft of property. We call it virtuous. If we raise people's taxes, if we take their income, if we take their things, that's a virtuous thing.

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Well, why is it virtuous? Because if we take their things that they've earned and that they have for themselves and we give it to these other people over here, that's very virtuous.

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Well, how will you do it? Through coercion, through force. Well, what happens if they don't give it to you?

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Well, they'll serve time or we'll take more of their stuff by force. We call this virtue, unjust taxation, property tax.

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I was mentioning this week on Apologia Radio. We're in a place now as a nation that if you had told our founders, they would have asked you, have you started shooting yet?

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The idea of property tax. In our country right now, if you buy a house, you buy a home, you don't really own it.

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You can pay it off in cash. And what are you doing? You're paying rent permanently through things called property tax.

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And what is property tax? Well, the land you have, you thought you bought it, you thought you owned it, but actually it's not owned by you.

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It's owned by somebody else. Because if you stop paying that tax, then what happens? They take your stuff.

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They'll take your income. They'll take the home. They'll take your things. There is no ownership of property any longer through things like property tax.

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Does that matter to God? Think about it for a second now. In God's law, God tells his people, do not move the boundary marker of your neighbor.

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What's that mean? Your neighbor has property. Don't you dare enter boundary marker over into their property.

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Why? Because fundamentally, you shall not steal. You should not steal.

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Is it the basis of capitalism? This isn't a sermon preaching Republican anything.

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This is talking about God's law. People own their stuff. That's how God can say, you shall not steal.

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Watch, you should not steal has the assumption, the presupposition in it, that somebody has something that belongs to them and nobody else.

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It's theirs. And God talks about boundary markers. Don't move the boundary marker. Why? Because that property belongs to them.

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How should we view things like property tax or coercive taxation over property when

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God says, don't you dare even mess with their property. It belongs to them. We have things like estate tax today in our country.

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The injustice of estate tax. In God's law, when somebody established wealth, they work their whole lives, they built something up.

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That stuff was supposed to go to the family. It was supposed to go to the firstborn, distributed through the family.

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What's it do? It builds wealth for the next generation. It helps people start new businesses to actually bless their neighbor, to give charitably, to give to others, to flourish because we have somebody who's worked their whole lives, developed stuff, and a righteous person leaves an inheritance for their children.

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And who's it go to? The family. Why? Because it's their stuff. They worked for it. It's their property. You shall not steal.

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And our government today has the injustice of estate tax where you died and then they get you again.

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Not much you can say about it. You're dead. But they say, no, no, no. It used to go to the firstborn, but now the government becomes the firstborn.

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We'll take our piece. It'll belong to us. We have, of course, today, the idea of gay mirage.

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God's law is spurned. We don't want God's law. We don't want his standards of justice. And so what do we have? A nation that creates a fiction over marriage.

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And it says male, male. Sure, we'll call that a marriage. I didn't know if you poured salt into a pot.

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It was called marrying salt. Generally, when you're creating things in a pot, you put different things together.

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And it's called a what? Marriage. Because they're different. You don't marry salt with salt. It's sameness.

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But of course, our nation says, well, male and male, that could be fine. Female, female. And so we have gay mirage.

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Why? Because we hate God's law. We say his rules don't apply. We have gender confusion today.

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Gender confusion. We don't even know if a boy is a boy or a girl is a girl. We have people today who are saying an eight -year -old should be able to make the decision to be castrated, to work their way towards castration.

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Why? Because we hate God's law. The witness of the Christian church is, we say, well, that law doesn't apply anymore.

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God's not concerned with righteousness and justice in this world anymore. What does God want to do?

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He's about the business of getting people out of this world to the spiritual existence elsewhere.

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He's not really concerned with this life and this world. No wonder many Orthodox Jews that know the promises of the

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Messiah's kingdom in the world laugh at the Christian story. Because their perspective from the scriptures is that this

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Messiah is going to do something in this world, in this life. He's going to establish justice and righteousness here in this world.

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We need to talk today about where we're at in terms of the law of our world. Because you see, here's the problem.

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Here's the problem. People are challenged by the idea of Jesus' rule in the world and God's law as the stipulated standards in the world.

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But I want to say that theocracies are inevitable. It's impossible to avoid it.

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Because if you find the source of law in any culture or society, you've found the

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God of the system. What are we saying? When you find the source of law in a culture, you found the

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God of the system. The God of the system is the ultimate. It's the unquestioned. It's the standard from which everything else comes.

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So in a Christian society, what do Christians say when they're asked about the ultimate? How do you know what is right here?

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What do you want to be established here? What's the Christian say? The Christian says, it's right here in this book.

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This is special revelation from the true, the one and only true and living God. This is his revelation.

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This is what is right. This is what is true. This is what is just. The Christian says, this is the ultimate.

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It comes from the ultimate himself. But in today's society, we have a society says, we don't want

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Jesus ruling over this nation. We don't want him as the king and ruler over this nation. And so we need to solve these problems of injustice in our world.

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So what should we do about them? Well, let's ask the question. Can men and men get married? Well, the

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Christian goes to their ultimate source and they say, well, this word says, no, that's not a marriage. That's not how

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God created the world. But we say no to God. So now they go to their ultimate. Well, we have

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Demas as God. Democracy, Demas, the word means people, the people.

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And so what's the ultimate source in a society that says no to Jesus? And they say, we will do it by a vote.

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Who is the standard there? What's the source? Where's the God? The people. They're the

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God. It's their reasoning. It's their voice. It's their law. It's their word. Demas is

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God in our culture and society today. Find the source of law and you've found the

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God of the system, the ultimate, nothing above. This is where it stops.

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You see, this is an important thing for us to study. I think many of us don't know a lot about history and Christians in history and what took place to get to where we're at right now.

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We don't even know about the history of the Covenanters, the Covenanters and what they endured. Think about this for a moment.

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This is not a long study on these historical moments. But if you just think about that group, the

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Covenanters, the Covenanters were destroyed. They were killed. They were starved to death.

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They were to death. They were maimed. They had their heads cut off. They were dragged with their legs broken down a long street.

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And all they had to say to stop the torture was, yes, the king also has authority over the church.

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Think about it. Would you endure having your thumbs broken and crushed and your legs broken and crushed and dragged down a long street, which we walked down this year when we went to Scotland.

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We walked down that street to be brought up to a platform as a public spectacle and then killed in front of everybody.

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Would you be willing to endure all of that for this statement, no king but Christ? No king but Christ.

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They could have escaped all the pain, all the torture by just simply saying, yes, the king has authority over the church, but they died starving, cold, outside deaths to say that there is no king but Christ.

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They understood that there is an ultimate and that's King Jesus. He has the ultimate say.

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There is nothing above him, nothing below him. He is the source. He is the ultimate. He is the standard for justice and righteousness and you are the king and we'll be good servants.

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We will be dedicated, faithful people, but you are not the king over the church. King didn't like that.

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Tyrants generally don't. And so they died to seal that testimony.

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You have examples in history of the Huguenots, my ancestors have recently found out. Durban means city dweller.

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Don't laugh at that. That could sound bad, city dweller. Durban means city dweller and I found out that my ancestors were actually part of the

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Huguenots. They were part of the people who actually escaped the persecution to come over to America. And did you know that the

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Huguenots were here before the pilgrims? Interesting, huh? The Huguenots developed even the doctrine of resistance to tyranny because Jesus is the king.

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And did you know that our founding fathers actually quoted from the Huguenots as they were fighting against the tyranny of King George?

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We have a long history of the Black Robe Regiment in our nation. England referred to the

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War for Independence or the Revolutionary War, they referred to it as the Presbyterian Revolt.

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As the Presbyterian Revolt where Presbyterian pastors wore their black Geneva gowns.

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They preached against the injustices that were going on. They preached the law of God and the gospel.

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Then they took off their robes, they grabbed a rifle and then they went and fought.

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Why? Because they believed that Jesus was supreme. He was the king, his law counted.

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They were indicting England for the injustices that were being perpetrated upon Christians on the basis of God's standards, of God's law.

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We have, of course, the history in our country of, I've mentioned this many times, John Jay, our first Supreme Court justice when they were establishing the case law system that we have today in our

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Supreme Court, when they were establishing that, they quoted directly from the Old Testament law, chapter and verse, when giving case law examples.

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There was no question, where's the source of law in this nation? It's Jesus Christ, it's

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God's law. We've come a very, very long way. And in our own experience as a church this last year, when the government announced that there was a pandemic, when the government announced that churches need to close, that we need to essentially shut down businesses and operations, we need to stop this, stop meeting together, the elders of your church meditated on this issue.

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We prayed about it. We interacted with each other. We challenged one another. We brought up counter arguments.

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But what we put before us was God's word, God's law. And we said,

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God's law says quarantine the sick. God's law says to love our neighbors.

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That means all of them, including those who would lose their livelihoods and their businesses in the midst of this.

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We looked at all the data and we filtered through it because we recognize Romans 13, that the government is

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God's deacon, God's servant. To do what? To punish the wicked and to protect the righteous.

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That's prescriptive, that's their role. So we respect the government because that is their prescriptive duty.

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That's what you're supposed to do. It's not what they always do. But as we examine the decisions that our government was making, we recognized they were inconsistent.

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They were wrong. And we made a decision as elders to say, we will resist the decree of Caesar and we will continue the worship of the people of God unabated.

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And we did that because it is our deep conviction that while we must respect government,

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Jesus is the king and he's the ruler. So where government is consistent with God's law, we will yield happily and submit.

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Where government attempts to subvert God's law, destroy neighbor and subvert the worship of the church, we reject that tyranny and always will.

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The question is this, it's Christ or chaos? It is theonomy or autonomy?

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Theos, namos, two words, God's law. It is God's law or it is man's law, self law.

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There's really only your two categories. It's not a question of whether we're going to work for a society where there's a

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God over the system. It's a question of which God? Who's your ultimate? Where's the ultimate?

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Which God? It is truly in our circumstance, Jesus or Demas, the people.

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Who has the say in our culture and society? Is it Jesus? Is it his voice that is ultimate? Or is it the voice of the

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American people in 2020? Here's the question. Does the Bible teach us to work towards a

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God -ruled world? This is fascinating to me. I always find it so fascinating that we're even having this discussion.

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I really do. I truly think this discussion is fascinating. And again, if we were in the time of the

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Puritans, it wouldn't even be necessary. This would just be sort of like standard stuff. Like, of course, give us something interesting to talk about.

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But here we are in 2020, murder hornets and all. The question,

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I hate that it even has to be asked, but let's answer it. Does the Bible teach us to work towards a

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God -ruled world? Well, there are many places to go to to answer this question, but I think a fundamental one would be one where it kind of gets us all.

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Like, we already have this in our hearts and minds. If you're a Christian, I hope you've read this. We say it all the time in Apology at Church, Matthew 28, 18 through 20.

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It's the Great Commission passage. How could we deny that the ultimate goal is a

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God -ruled world? It's in the Great Commission, brothers and sisters. Jesus says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

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That's past tense. Not will be, not might be, has been given to me.

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This is before the ascension. Jesus is ascending and he says, all the authority in heaven and here.

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Here has been given to me. He says, on that basis, therefore, go make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the

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Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit. And he says, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you.

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Why is there a question whether we're working towards a God -ruled world? The goal of the Great Commission is not simply to get people to make professions of faith, but it is to disciple the nations, to teach them to obey

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Jesus. Is there any question that we're working as Christians for Jesus to rule the nations?

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That's what we're aiming for. You know, I don't even know why we're ashamed to say it. Somebody says, are you saying you want

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Jesus to rule the nation and his law and commands to be the standard? It's like, what Bible are you reading?

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That's the mission of the church, always has been. When the nations teach them to obey

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Jesus, oh, but not the government. Yes, are they part of the nations? Then they got to obey him too.

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Well, I thought they're the ultimate. No, all authority is Jesus. Are you saying Jesus is the king over kings?

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Are you saying that he's Lord over the lords of this earth? Are you saying he's the ruler of the kings of the earth?

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Yeah, that's what we're saying. It's really, it's such an amazing thing. It's like we're afraid to just tell the story as it is.

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Disciple the nations, teach them to obey Jesus. Is there anybody that's not a part of that call?

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Everybody. It's why when the early missionaries went to the Hawaiian kingdom in the 19th century, they converted the

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Hawaiian islands to Christ. And within 20 years, within 20 years, those missionaries knew what they were doing.

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They were winning the Hawaiians to Jesus and the Hawaiian constitution in 20 years of missionary work said no law of the

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Hawaiian kingdom will be at variance with the law of Jehovah God. They knew what they were doing in the

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Hawaiian kingdom. Those missionaries knew the goal. Let's win them to Christ and teach them to obey

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Jesus. Is there any question what our goal is? Someone says, Jeff, are you working for a theocracy? Have you been listening?

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Yes, I'm working for Jesus to be the one who's obeyed up and down and all around in the culture.

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I'm trying to win this world to Jesus and bring the nations to Jesus so they obey him. Are we ashamed to say that?

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Shame on us for being ashamed to say that. He's the ruler. He's the king. Only this king, we don't win people to his side through bullets and bombs.

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We win with the gospel, calling people to repentance and faith. And when they trust him, they love his law and they long for it.

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Matthew 28, 18 through 20. By the way, don't forget this. This is so, so important. Don't forget that when

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Jesus says that, it's so crazy. We always, we think of a big picture of things and we forget about like moments of context, like where they were at, what was going on.

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He just died, just rose again. He's appearing to people. And now he's telling them he has all authority in heaven and on earth.

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They're on this like dusty road in, you know, it's like unknown part of the world with these very confused disciples, like only a couple of them.

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And he has the audacity to say that I am the final authority in the entire world.

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And they were like, I think Caesar might have something to say about that. I think he's down the road a bit and he might have something to say about the fact that you're the boss.

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But that's what Jesus said. That's the sum and substance of our message. He has all authority. And in terms of what does the

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Bible teach us about to work towards in terms of a God ruled world, I'm gonna point you to Romans one.

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Let's go ahead and do it. I want you to see it with your own eyes. Go to Romans chapter one. Romans chapter one.

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As the apostle Paul is explaining the gospel, I want you to see how the apostle

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Paul sets up his explanation of the gospel.

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In Romans one, verse one, he says, Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the

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Holy Scriptures concerning his son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the son of God in power according to the spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead,

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Jesus Christ, our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.

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That's the goal, to bring about the obedience of faith or the obedience that comes from faith. Some people have argued for that translation, that structure there.

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But the point is to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations. That's how he starts this.

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We're aiming for all the nations to obey Jesus.

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And he ends this, Romans 16, go there. So you see how he ends with the same words.

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Romans 16. So his opening words and his departing words are essentially the same.

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Romans 16, verse 25. Now to him who's able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal

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God. Here it is. The command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith.

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That's the goal. Starts the gospel, ends the gospel explanation with that's the goal.

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The command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith. Among what? Among all the nations.

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That's the goal of the Christian faith. Yes, we're trying to take over the world with God's gospel of peace.

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Amen. Are you afraid to say it? Someone's like, these guys are dangerous to try and take over the world. Yeah, I thought you knew.

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We've been here for a long time. 2 ,000 years Christians have been doing this and yep, that's what we're trying to do.

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Have everyone know Jesus and obey Jesus. This, by the way, sounds very familiar to the

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Jewish mind when Paul as a Jewish rabbi knowing Jesus is starting his gospel with bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations.

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The command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith sounds a lot like Genesis 49, 10.

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First book of the Bible. What were they hopeful for? This one is coming and to him shall be the obedience of the nations.

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To him shall be the obedience of the nations. That's the goal. The Messiah rules the world, wins the world with his salvation and brings about his standards of justice and righteousness.

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How does the Bible see Jesus? Revelation 1. Go to Revelation. Not revelations.

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Revelation 1. What's it say about Jesus? How does the Bible see Jesus post -resurrection and ascension?

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This is very important in our day when you have so many people vying for power and trying to pull it away from Jesus and his rule and authority.

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Here's how the apostles saw and the inspired scripture sees the

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Lord Jesus and his rule. Revelation 1, 4 through 6.

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John, to the seven churches that are in Asia, grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come and from the seven spirits who are before his throne and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead and the ruler of kings on earth.

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John says this in Patmos. I believe in exile, Nero sent him there.

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Nero's killing Christians. He's in exile in Patmos with this revelation and he has the audacity to say, yeah,

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Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth. Wow, he's in Patmos sent into exile, right? But that's the message of the

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Bible. Jesus is the ruler of the kings of the earth. To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priest to his

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God and father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever, amen.

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Jesus, the ruler of the kings of the earth in the first century, to him shall be dominion.

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Sound kind of familiar? Oh yeah, that's what the Bible said about the Messiah. If we were singing our

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Psalms in synagogue, we would know about Psalm 72. He shall have dominion from sea to sea, from the river to the ends of the earth.

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Desert tribes are gonna lick the dust and bow down to him, this Jesus. And it's this

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Jesus that's gonna have dominion. Of course, you can go to 1 Timothy 6, 13 through 16, all the descriptions there of Jesus as the sovereign, as the king of kings and lord of lords.

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And I want you to stop here and pause for a moment. Here's where you come back. Please listen to this, very, very important. We, I've often said, have turned this into a pithy slogan and something you just put on posters and T -shirts and hats and it almost has no meaning in our culture and society and it shouldn't be the case.

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When we say Jesus today is king of kings and lord of lords, do we mean it?

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Do we even mean it? Because here's the thing we have to ask ourselves. Do we as a church have the right in our culture and society to go to our legislators and the rulers in government and say to them, no, this is unjust.

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You must obey Jesus. We've turned Christian witness into, well, let's do it with neutrality.

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Let's take the backdoor approach, right? We don't want to call this murder because that offends people, even though God would define it as murder, image of God, unjust taking of human life.

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We don't want to say murder and we certainly don't want to say that the legislator has to obey Jesus. Well, how's that working out for you with 65 million dead babies?

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How's it working out for you? Your neutrality. Jesus says, whoever's not with me is against me.

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When we've gone to our legislators over the last year in the state of Arizona, we've been gracious. We have been humble.

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We have pled with them and we have not compromised by the grace of God. We have said that's an image bearer of God.

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This is murder. You need to call it murder. You need to criminalize it and not regulate it because God demands that of you.

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You must obey Jesus. I'm saying that to Mormons, Catholics, Christians, atheists.

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I'm telling sheriffs, criminalize it because you have to obey Jesus. And they're like, you know, I think you're right about that.

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I think I need to do that. Isn't it amazing? What faithfulness will get you?

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We need to stop compromising. Now let's talk about the law of God here. We talk about the law of God.

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I'm gonna say that the law of God in scripture is a constituent element of the new covenant.

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The law of God was promised to be a constituent element of the new covenant. Now don't get this wrong.

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Nobody has ever been justified by the law. Not in the Old Testament, not in the

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New Testament. How was Abraham justified? Genesis 15, six, Abraham believed

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God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Nobody has ever, ever been justified through the law.

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It is always been through faith and through faith alone. That is a testimony of the scriptures through and through.

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However, the Bible does teach that the law of God is a constituent element of the new covenant blessing to the world.

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I'll point you to two spaces, Jeremiah 31, 31 and Ezekiel 36, 25 through 27.

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In Jeremiah, you guys can go there, 31, 31.

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Easy to remember that one, right? It's the easiest one to memorize. Jeremiah 31, 31. Here's what's promised.

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Now I want you to consider real fast as you get to Jeremiah 31, think of yourselves under the hearing of this message in Jeremiah's day.

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You are a Jew long before the time of Christ and what do you have? You have some of the prophets at this point.

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You have Moses. You have the law of God, the Pentateuch. You have that, but more is coming and Jesus hasn't arrived yet in the incarnation.

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And so what do you have? Torah, the law of God. And in Jeremiah 31, 31, it says this.

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Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I'll make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when

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I took them by the hands to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the

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Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord. I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts and I will be their

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God and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother saying, know the

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Lord, for they shall all know me. From the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more.

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First of all, hashtag that post mill. All of them will know me from the least of them to the greatest of them.

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That's just a side note. Just had to point it out. Next, I'll point to the fact that he says, I will put my law within them.

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So much for the law having no meaning under the new covenants. What's it say God's going to do?

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Which law did they know? The law, the known law, God's law.

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Only difference now is in the Old Testament, what did you have? You had the law written on stone tablets outside the people of God.

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And in the new covenant, God by his spirit is going to put that law within them.

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Now they're going to have the spirit wrought power to obey that law when before they were just in the flesh and that's on stone tablets exerting pressure from the outside and down.

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And now God says, I'll put that law, the law within you and cause you to observe my statutes.

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The new covenant is better, yes, but a constituent element of the new covenant is the blessing of the law of God within the people of God.

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So much for the law being dead to the new covenant believer. Ezekiel 36, 25 to 27, you can read that later.

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God promises that in the new covenant, he's going to do something amazing. He's going to sprinkle clean water on you and cleanse you from all your idols.

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He says he's going to remove a heart of stone and give a heart of flesh. And then he says he's going to put his spirit within his people and cause them to observe his statutes.

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Now think again, Ezekiel's day, which statutes is God referring to?

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The known statutes, the known revealed law of God. God says in the new covenant, I'll put my spirit within you and I'll cause you to observe my statutes.

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The law of God is a constituent element of the blessings, the promises of blessing in the new covenants.

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But here's the really cool stuff and I would love to do this all day, but this is a standalone message and I will not go as long as James went last week.

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Just kidding. The law, I really will. Yeah, okay. The law is a constituent element of the kingdom of the

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Messiah in the world. Or I can say the blessings of the rule of the Messiah in the world.

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And so just two places, we already did one of them today, but that book I told you about that gives you so many different perspectives of Messiah.

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You have suffering servant and yet victorious king. Go to Isaiah chapter two. Isaiah chapter two.

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Oh, so much in Isaiah. So much about this victory. It just, again, we can't spend all day on this, but just in terms of like what they were expecting.

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Context always very important. Amen. Yes. Isaiah chapter one, brutal.

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I mean, if you haven't read it, read it and take it to heart. It will work you over.

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You've got to read it and consider what God is saying there. Isaiah chapter one, God tells his people, his covenant people, that he doesn't want them to bother with their prayers and their worship.

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He says that he's weary of bearing them. He says their hands are full of blood and he tells them to seek justice, correct oppression.

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He says, bring justice to the fatherless and God tells them they have to correct all this oppression and injustice or he doesn't want their worship.

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He says, you're filled with injustice. He says, I want you to cease, turn away from it, correct the oppression and the injustice.

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And he says, come now, let us reason together, says the Lord, though your sins are as scarlet, they be white as snow.

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It's in the context of the fact that they have injustice all around them, all around them and God says, don't even bother with your worship while you are sitting in the midst of all this injustice and then

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Isaiah two. So that's the background of Isaiah one. Now Isaiah two, here's the promise.

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The word that Isaiah, the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, it should come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the

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Lord should be established as the highest of the mountains. Beautiful poetic language here.

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And shall be lifted above the hills and all the nation shall flow to it and many people shall come and say, come, let us go up to the mountain of the

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Lord to the house of the God of Jacob that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths for out of Zion shall go the what?

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Law. Law. Isn't it interesting that one of the promises of Messiah's kingdom is as he is drawing the nations up to God's mountain, beautiful imagery there because water doesn't flow up.

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So God's drawing the nations up to his mountain and what is the promise as a part of the

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Messiah's kingdom is that these nations are coming to God and they're saying what to God?

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They're saying that teach us your ways and it says out of Zion. That's that center place of the people of God.

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It says out of Zion shall go what? The law. Who wrote this?

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Isaiah. What law is he referring to? The known law, the revealed will of God and law of God.

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So much for the law of God being dead to the Christian. It's a constituent element of the promise of the blessing of God in the world.

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Of course, I read Isaiah 42 at the beginning. I won't read it again. That's the promise that this Messiah who's coming is going to establish justice in the earth and here's what we need to grapple with, guys.

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Here's the important stuff we gotta think about because all of us have to start asking the questions like, well, what part of the law and how's that look?

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I thought the law is a curse and the answer is yes, it depends on how you're referring to it.

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It's a curse to those who can't accomplish it, who violated, of course, who were in the flesh rebelling against God but Jesus became a curse for us, took that.

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It doesn't mean the law itself is not good, is not true, is not righteous, is not just.

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We need to ask this question and it's fundamental. Please hear me on this. If you've checked out, check back in for this one.

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Deuteronomy chapter four, how does God view the law that he gave?

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Does he view it like the modern evangelical? The modern evangelical talks about God's law in terms of oppression.

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That awful Old Testament law. Aren't we glad that that's no longer around sort of a thing?

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And of course, there are elements to the law. We would say in terms of it being a curse, not being able to accomplish it, you'd say, praise

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God for Jesus and I'm not under the curse, I'm not condemned. Christ accomplished it all but how does

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God talk about his law? In Deuteronomy chapter four, in verse five,

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God says this. See, I have taught you statutes and rules as the Lord my

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God commanded me that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. Keep them and do them for that will be your wisdom and your understanding and the sight of the peoples who when they hear all these statutes will say, surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.

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For what great nation is there that has a God so near to it as the Lord our God is to us whenever we call upon his name and what great nation is there that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?

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Does that sound like the law is just a curse, just oppressive? God's saying, actually, this law that you have that I've given to you, this law that protects property, that protects life and neighbor, this law that upholds victim's rights, this law that has at its basis love for neighbor as the foundation, this law was supposed to be something that the surrounding pagan nations looked at and went, what?

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Whoa, that's liberty, that's freedom, that's justice, that's righteousness, that's wise, that's wise.

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You know, people talk about criminal justice reform today. I want to say, guys, there's a, there's kind of a book, there's kind of a book that talks about how you're supposed to handle these things.

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He goes, it's not fair, this guy got caught with this and he did 15 years in jail. Yeah, yeah, that's abusive damage bearers of God.

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Did you know there's a book that talks about that, how you're supposed to handle that? Do you know that there's actually revelation from God that tells you how to actually deal with these sins and crimes and culture and society in such a way that you love the victim and you allow the person who's committed the crime to come back whole to society and not be treated like an animal in a cage?

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Do you know there's a way to uphold people's dignity and their value as human beings if they sin or commit a crime and culture and society?

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But God's law establishes justice or it could say, well, what do you think we should do with someone that steals? Well, cut off their hand, maim them for life so they can never work again.

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Is that just? Would God's law allow for something like that in terms of theft? God's law says what?

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You steal, what happens? You pay it back. And there's different standards for if you steal from somebody who used something for a business versus just a person who has, you're stealing their television.

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God says restoration, make the victim whole again. God's law is concerned with justice.

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Now, that's how God uses law as wisdom, as a way for the nations to look into the people of Israel and say, this

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God is wise. These statutes are righteous and good.

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You see, other nations were to see these laws and want to come into Israel to live in a place where there was liberty, where there was protection of victims, where there was justice and where there was righteousness.

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God actually talks about his law in a way that is very different than the modern evangelical. But we need to talk about this in terms of God's own nature or his character.

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This is fundamental because everybody could say, that's how God talked about his law and his concern for justice. But is

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God concerned with it any longer? And I want to point us to the immutability of God. What's that mean?

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It's a big fancy theological term that means this, God does not change.

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It's one of the glorious truths of the Christian world, dear brothers and sisters. It's not the kind of testimony you'll get from Latter -day

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Saints. Their God changes. He was once a man who became a God one day. And you and I are on our way to hopefully become little gods and gods like him over our own planets one day.

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This God grew and changed and learned. The God of the Bible is all knowing and eternal.

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There's none before and none after. And he says, I am the Lord. I do not change. So if God tells us that he commands his people to uphold justice, to protect the fatherless, to correct oppression.

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When God tells his people, I don't want your worship. If your hands are filled with blood and you have injustice all around you and you do nothing about it.

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The question is, has God changed? Has he changed? The Bible teaches that God does not change through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

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We have atonement and forgiveness, but God's concern for justice and righteousness in this world have not changed because he says,

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I'm the Lord. I do not change. God is still concerned with justice today.

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And I want to just say this. If you want to see God's perspective on his law, his rules, his statutes, read

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Psalm 119. It'll take you a minute. The question we have to ask is this.

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I'll just do it briefly. What was Jesus' view of the law? Go to Matthew chapter 5.

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Matthew chapter 5, 17 through 19. This is, of course, in Jesus' most famous sermon.

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It's the most famous sermon in the history of the world. The Sermon on the Mount. When Jesus says first that the meek shall inherit the earth and he pronounces the blessings on the peacemakers and all the rest that you know, he says after telling us that we're the salt of the earth, that we're the light of the world, he says in 5 .17,

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do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

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For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot shall pass from the law until all is accomplished.

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Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.

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But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. So Jesus' perspective on the law was he was not coming to take it apart, to take it down, to undo it.

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Jesus talks about the fact that he wants them to not even think, not even to start to think that he's come to abolish the law or the prophets.

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So Jesus' perspective of the law of God, he didn't come to destroy it. He came to fulfill it.

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And of course, we need to ask the question, what does it mean to fulfill? How did he fulfill it? And we'll try to do some of that here. But the next question

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I want to ask is this, what do we see after the resurrection and ascension of Jesus? Because that's key, right?

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Jesus has died for sin. Jesus has risen again. Jesus has ascended. So what do we see in the inspired writings of the apostles in terms of what was their posture towards God's law?

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How did they relate to God's law after Jesus had ascended? So new covenant is in force.

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Everything's accomplished. It is finished. We have to ask the question, how do the inspired apostles relate to God's law?

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Well, what do we see? We see throughout the New Testament, this principle, the assumption of continuity, unless we have divine revelation of a change.

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What do you see in a New Testament? The assumption of continuity, unless there is divine revelation of a change, a change in the administration or how something's supposed to be done.

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And what do we see? I'll give you some examples. You want to write them down. These are very, very important. It's not an exhaustive list, but it's some things in terms of things about timing.

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Jesus died. Jesus rose. Jesus ascended. He's now seated. And the apostles are writing now divine revelation.

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First point, judicial law. First Timothy 5, 19.

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Judicial law. What's this mean? Did you know that in the case law stuff of the

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Old Testament, the law of God, there is law regarding how you are to receive accusations or how somebody should actually go to trial.

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And the law of God, and Paul quotes this to Timothy, is received no accusation against an elder unless it's on the basis of what?

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Two to three witnesses. God's law said there had to be two to three independent lines of witness, evidence and testimony to bring charges against somebody.

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That was so we do not penalize or punish people who are innocent. So what's

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Paul saying here? This is, by the way, let's take a step out of this for a second in terms of thinking of the overarching big stuff and think about it in your own lives.

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Moms and dads, teach your kids this. Teach your kids this. You assume the innocence of every single person you cross paths with.

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You assume the innocence of everybody unless you have evidence to the contrary.

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Everybody has the assumption of innocence. And by the way, does that sound familiar to you? Innocent before what?

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You guys can thank the Christian worldview and the law of God for that one. Innocent until proven guilty.

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That didn't come from atheist societies, brothers and sisters. That came from Jesus. So on the behalf of Christians everywhere, you're welcome, atheists.

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Innocent until proven guilty is no accusation received unless it's on the basis of two to three witnesses.

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Now watch. Here the apostle Paul is post cross, post resurrection, post ascension, new covenants in force.

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And he's quoting from God's standards in the court to say you're to receive no accusation against an elder unless it's in the base of two to three witnesses.

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That applies, by the way, not just to elders, but to everybody. You are assumed innocent until there is proof of guilt.

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Thank God for that blessing. But we should note that's from God's judicial law. And that's after the ascension.

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Next, the assumption of continuity unless we have divine revelation of a change is seen in 1

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Timothy 5, 18, where the apostle Paul quotes an animal husbandry law and applies the general equity of it, the principle to that day.

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Give an example. You are not to muzzle the ox while it treads the grain. Paul quotes that and assumes it's continuity.

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He doesn't say, now, Timothy, we all know that the law is dead. It's dead to Christians.

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It's over with. It's defunct and over. But I'm going to bring this neat little animal husbandry law over right here because isn't this cute?

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He says, like you're supposed to know, you're not to muzzle the ox while it treads the grain.

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And most of you are like, well, I don't have many oxes, so I don't know how that applies to me. It does apply to you in terms of who you have working for you.

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If somebody works for you, you pay them. And by the way, Christians, we got to get this one right.

01:00:03

We're supposed to be the best at hospitality and giving things away. Christians are always looking for handouts from other

01:00:09

Christians. Stop, stop. If a Christian does good work for you, pay them better than anybody.

01:00:16

Pay them well. We're always looking for a hookup, right? You got a Christian, you're like, hey, can you paint my house for me or fix my car for me?

01:00:24

Like, listen, if the brother or sister says, no, I am not getting paid. I'm doing this to bless you and to love you. I just want to give to you.

01:00:30

That's fine. But a lot of times Christians go, all right, here's the yellow pages. It used to be a thing called yellow pages.

01:00:37

Let me look for all the businesses and people. Now, let me go to my church directory and see if there's any guy

01:00:42

I can get to do this for free for me, right? We abuse others. What's the principle in God's law?

01:00:48

Don't muzzle the ox while it treads the grain. What's that mean? Well, in Paul's days saying, you should pay these ministers who are laboring for you.

01:00:57

They're giving their lives for you. Make sure they're not going to starve. And then he says, don't muzzle the ox while it treads the grain.

01:01:04

Well, that principle, the general equity is applied in the new covenant. Someone says, how much of the law actually applies?

01:01:11

Well, the general equity of animal husbandry laws even applies according to the apostle Paul. Another one, and this one, kids, listen up.

01:01:19

The apostle Paul, post cross, post resurrection, post ascension, says in Ephesians chapter six, verse one, to the children who apparently were in the congregation.

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He says, children, obey your parents in the Lord. Honor your father and your mother.

01:01:36

It's the first commandment with a what? Promise. Now, wait a tick.

01:01:43

That's the 10 commandments. And I'm pretty sure that Jesus put that law to death, right?

01:01:51

Paul just quotes it just like they're supposed to know. You know, that commandment, the 10 commandments, kids, honor your father and your mother.

01:01:58

First commandment with a promise. He just quotes it like assumption of continuity. Next, death penalty.

01:02:05

We wouldn't want the death penalty in a Christian society. Well, the apostle Paul in Acts 25, 11, there's a moment where actually we have insight to what the inspired apostle believed about the death penalty in the new covenant after the cross, after the resurrection, after the ascension.

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While he's on trial, he says this, if I've done anything worthy of death,

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I don't object to dying. Which says that he believed that there were things worthy of death.

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And he says, if I've done anything that's worthy of death, I don't object to dying.

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Acts 25, 11. Next, how about feasts and proper celebration? Just go to 1

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Corinthians 5, verse 8. As an example of the apostle Paul telling believers under the new covenant, you are to practice this in its meant way, what it was pointing to.

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Rather than removing from your house the leaven, like before in the ritual that was supposed to give them a dress rehearsal, a ritual of practice to symbolize what they were doing to clean their house.

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He says, you're to remove the leaven of malice from your lives. So watch, that law still has meaning, but it's done in the new covenant way.

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We're Christians with the spirit of God within us. We don't need to go around our houses removing leaven from our houses.

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Who has leaven in their house anyways? Wait, we do, yeah. Actually, a bunch of bread -making homeschool moms do, yeah.

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No, I love it. I'm not making fun of your bread. I'm saying keep giving it to me. Don't stop.

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But we don't have that problem. We also don't have to do the ritual because it's the new covenant now. We remove now malice and wickedness from us.

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It meant something. But can I point something out to all of us in terms of new covenant law and all the rest?

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Yes, there are changes. It's a new administration. Of course, there's changes. But can I point something out?

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We still have a temple. We still have a priest.

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And we still have a relevant sacrifice. Think about that. The reason you're not guilty is because you have a priest who's advocating for you before God.

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The reason you're not guilty is because there is a sacrifice that God demands for the breaking of his law that is still relevant today.

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It's a once -for -all sacrifice. But don't ever forget, brothers and sisters, there's still a temple, still a priest, and still a relevant sacrifice.

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God's law has abiding validity. It doesn't mean it's all done in the same way. Someone says, you mean the whole law gets dropped down?

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No. Like, for example, the muzzle of the ox thing. We take the general equity of the principle and we apply it today because the principle is abiding.

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Or there are other laws that are actually good and righteous laws. Like, for example, and this is a popular one.

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It's one of my favorites. Most of you know this already. And they were to put a parapet around the roofs of their houses. It was a rail to protect people from falling off because you spend a lot of time on the roofs then to cool off at night.

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And so God says, put a parapet around the roof of your house. Why? The principle is preservation of life.

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You protect life on your property. You protect that life on your property. Now, today, we wouldn't leave here after the service and say,

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Pastor Jeff says God's law has abiding validity. Let's go to Home Depot and build a rail around the house. There'd be no point.

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But you could say, hey, that principle still applies today. So I should put a railing or protection around pools to protect kids from falling in.

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I should put a railing around deep wells and property. I should do what I can if I have this electrical wire sticking out near my doorway.

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So if a friend comes in, hey, you know, like I should do what I can to preserve human life because God's law commands that we preserve human life.

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Now, consider this, justification by faith alone. How are we justified? Through faith alone, apart from works of law.

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If anybody tries to get justified on the basis of any law of God, Christ has become of no effect to you,

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Paul says in Galatians chapter five. You've fallen from grace. Salvation's by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, that law will justify nobody.

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If you go the route of law, you will be condemned, anathema.

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However, in that same chapter, Romans chapter three, when the apostle

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Paul is talking about nobody is justified on the basis of law or the works of the law, go see this.

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In Romans chapter three, the apostle Paul says in the same discussion, when he says we are justified by grace as a gift, verse 24, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, when he says in verse 28, for we hold that one is justified by faith apart from the works of the law.

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He then says in verse 31, do we then overthrow the law by this faith?

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By no means, on the contrary, we uphold the law. We establish the law.

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Christianity is not antinomianism. It is not lawlessness. It is not autonomy.

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We're saved now so we can live according to our own dictates, our own statutes, our own rules. Christianity says

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God saved me. He changed my heart. He changed my mind. He indwells me.

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And so now I love his law. Now I love his statutes. Now I uphold this revelation of God.

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I establish it. Okay, final points here. And I really mean that.

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Everyone laughs about that. That was a very devious laugh.

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Did you hear that? Okay. Okay, answering questions here real fast. Does the law come with a curse?

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Yep. People who receive that law, who are in the flesh, who fall short, we're told that there'd be blessings and curses of the covenant

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God made with the nation of Israel. There'd be blessings and there'd be curses. That's right.

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Old covenant administration, very specific administration. We're not arguing for that administration to be dropped on the world today.

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It's a new covenant. Jesus is the king. Jesus is the priest. All that's transformed and changed.

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Of course, the law has a aspect to it that is a curse. You are under the curse to fulfill all of it if that's the route you're going in terms of how to be right with God.

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However, Jesus became a curse for us. Jesus became a curse for us.

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Those of us who have violated God's law, violated His stipulated standards, Jesus took the penalty and the curse on our behalf and we are reconciled to God through what

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Jesus did. However, please hear me on this. It is vital. It is not a curse.

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It is not evil. It is not oppressive to say, you shall not sleep with your neighbor's wife.

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That is righteous. That is good. And that is from the mouth of God. It is not a curse to say in society today that you shall respect your neighbor's property.

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It is not a curse to say that today God demands that we preserve human life.

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It is not a curse to say as God says, you shall not rape. It is not a curse to say that victim's rights should be protected.

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It is not a curse to say that we need to protect the innocent from false accusations.

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God's law is good. These statutes are wise and holy and true and good and they are abiding.

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They have validity today. Somebody could ask this question, the holiness code though.

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What about all this? This is where I always love it. It always comes down to this, right? Every time you can read

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Psalm 119, all of your righteous rules endure forever. You could show Paul quoting from the judicial code and animal husbandry and all the rest and everyone just neglects all of it.

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They don't answer it. And they just say, so no bacon, right?

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So no bacon? What about the different mixed fibers? And what about all these weird holiness codes thing?

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What about all the ceremonial uncleanness, all that stuff? Brothers and sisters, we have revelation from God that tells you what those laws were pointing to and how they are no longer done in that way under the new covenant.

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You know why? I'm not under that anymore. I don't need that. I got the spirit of God that teaches me to be separated from the world.

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I don't need to do the ritual with the clothing to teach me not to mix things together against syncretism.

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I don't need to have all those divides with food that were teaching me to keep myself unstained and pure and away from those things.

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Why? Because I have Jesus now. All those rituals and all those dress rehearsals are done because we have the better, the new covenants and we get to eat bacon.

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But if you wanna go see the revelation from God about how those things are to be viewed, just read Ephesians chapter two.

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Just read Ephesians chapter two in terms of how are we to view the holiness code under the new covenants.

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We have word from God, revelation from God that tells us how you're to view those particular aspects of the law.

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Now, I wanna land on this one. Pastor James encouraged me to land on this one. When we think about our mission in the world today,

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I started with this. Jesus is the ruler of the world. He's the King of kings and Lord of lords.

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Do you agree? He's the ruler of the kings of the earth today. Do you believe he has all authority in heaven and on earth today, brothers and sisters?

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Yes. The mission of the gospel is not to get people to make just personal professions of faith and to have

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Bible studies in basements. The mission of the gospel is to win the nations to God and to teach them to obey

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Jesus. Now, you know that we believe at Apologia that Jesus is going to have dominion and he will have victory over the world.

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We believe that he's seated at the right hand of the Father right now in a position of power and authority and he's putting every enemy under his feet.

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And Paul says, 1 Corinthians 15, he must reign until every enemy is subdued, put under his feet, and then death will be defeated.

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First, every enemy and then death. You know that we believe in the victory of the gospel. However, believing that Jesus is gonna win the entire world before he comes back for the final resurrection, does not mean that every nation that was once professing faith in Jesus is gonna make it.

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There are historical judgments in history. There are historical judgments in history.

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God does not change. Let me give you an example of this just in Scripture so you can see it.

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I can do this over and over again, but I just want you to see at least these references. Go to Leviticus.

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Some of you guys are like, where's that? Leviticus 18.

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Just look at this example in Scripture of when God gives his law, how he refers to the surrounding nations and his dealing with them in the midst of his giving his law to his people.

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Leviticus 18, 20. God says this, and you shall not lie sexually with your neighbor's wife and so make yourself unclean with her.

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You shall not give any of your children to offer them to Moloch and so profane the name of your

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God. I am the Lord. God's against child sacrifice. His heart hasn't changed on that.

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God is still against child sacrifice. He says, you shall not lie with a male as with a woman.

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It is an abomination. And you shall not lie with any animal and so make yourself unclean with it.

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Neither shall any woman give herself to an animal to lie with it. It is perversion. Do not make yourselves unclean by any of these things.

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For by all these, the nations I am driving out before you have become unclean.

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And the land became unclean so that I punished its iniquity and the land vomited out its inhabitants.

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But you shall keep my statutes and my rules and do none of these abominations. So here's an example in scripture where God has a standard of sexual ethics when it comes to animals, neighbors, men with men, women with women.

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He says, here is my law. This is an abomination. This is a perversion. And he says that he's judging, hear this, he's judging the surrounding nations and he is uprooting them and putting them out of existence and out of their land on the basis of his law and his standards.

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He gives his law to his people and he actually still holds the pagan nations surrounding

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Israel guilty for violating his standard and his laws.

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There are historical judgments. You can read another example of this in Leviticus 20, 22 through 23.

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I'll let you read that later. Here's my point in terms of our call as missionaries to our world.

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We're called to bring the gospel of the kingdom, the call of repentance and faith and salvation as a gift of God through the grace of God and Jesus.

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We're called to tell the whole world that and call the world to believe in Jesus. But when we have a nation that we're sitting in today that sacrifices their own children by the metric ton, millions and millions of children sacrificed to false gods.

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When we have a nation that does perversions as God defines them, we should expect,

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I believe, historical judgments apart from revival, reformation and repentance. It's amazing.

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Somebody will say to me, you believe, Jeff, that God's going to be victorious with the gospel and the kingdom? But look at America today.

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I'm going to say, don't forget where we started. It was only a couple of confused disciples and today we have more professing

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Christians on this earth than any time in history. But there are historical judgments. There's no promise that America is going to be here as we know it today.

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And I do believe that where we are as a nation in terms of our blessing and flourishing will be based upon trust in Christ and obedience to God's law.

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God has already said when he gave his law to his people that he's driving out these pagan nations for their wickedness and he's uprooting them.

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There's no cause to believe that God has changed in terms of how he deals with nations and their wickedness.

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So my hope in terms of our witness as a church is that we would speak the gospel boldly and with humility to the culture around us that we would do what

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Jesus says to do and be salt and light to the world around us.

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That we would invest in it. That we would not love our lives more than Jesus and his gospel.

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That we would sacrifice ourselves in the way that our forebearers did for the sake of the gospel and our descendants.

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That we would look at the culture around us right now and we'd stop asking questions like, how did this get so wicked?

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And start saying, how did I let this get so wicked? Why haven't I been faithful? Why haven't we been faithful?

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I hope that this message challenges us to be bold in our proclamation of the kingship of Jesus Christ in the world.

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You know, that whole concept of no king but Christ can also just be a pithy slogan.

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The real challenge is putting legs on that truth in the culture around us by actually saying to the world, there is no salvation other than through faith in Jesus Christ and through his work and his work alone.

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And there will be no justice and peace in society apart from obedience to Jesus. None. My hope is that we would actually be brave enough, and this is my final word to say to the powers that be, you need to do what is just and righteous.

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Here it is, because God says. We're so afraid to say that today.

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God says. Yep, that's my basis. I can defend that, by the way, philosophically, rationally.

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We could take the legs off of atheism and all the materialism and their attempts to have a moral standard apart from God, but we need to be willing to say, these are

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God's standards. You shall not, God says. And we need to live lives of missionary, risky sacrifice for the cause of the gospel of the kingdom.

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Let's pray. Father, I pray that you'd bless us as a church with our witness in the world, our courage.

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Grant to us love and humility and peaceableness, but also grant to us the strength to be godly

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Christian troublemakers. To go into the world with your gospel of peace saturated with love, compassion, and grace, but also with a boldness that your word is true.

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Your law is good. Your righteous statutes are just. Please, God, give us the grace as a church to leave a legacy for the gospel.