Sunday, January 5, 2024 AM

Let's go to the

Lord together in prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the day that you have made.

We thank you for this house, this home that we share to gather together on Sunday morning to celebrate the resurrection of our

Lord and Savior, your Son, Jesus Christ. Thank you for providing this place for us.

Thank you for doing all that you've done today and this last week to ensure that this could happen.

And so provide for us, so bless us. Well, thank you for hearing our prayers and thank you for responding to our needs.

What I do pray for my little girl, please help her to feel better. Please help her to turn around and get what she needs.

My wife, as she cares for her, give her peace and wisdom. Thank you for the doctors who are kind and the nurses who are helpful.

And I thank you for this day that you have made. I thank you for the word that you have given.

I thank you for your Spirit whom you have sent so powerfully to indwell us as your new temple.

Thank you for the many graces that you have shared and given to us to bring us into fellowship with you.

And for all these and many other blessings, we give you thanks this morning. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

I invite you to open your Bibles and turn with me to Acts 18, Acts chapter 18. We're going to be reading verses 9 through 23.

Acts chapter 18, verses 9 through 23. As we continue our study of this passage where Paul does stuff for Jesus, and he does that, and he goes to great lengths on long journeys with great risks, personal suffering, expending his life, being poured out as a drink offering.

Because he recognizes that he is bought and paid for.

He's been redeemed, redeemed how Paul loves to proclaim it, redeemed by the blood of the

Lamb. He's been purchased, and thus he is owned by Christ, and thus he serves

Christ and confesses freely happily that he is the bondservant or the slave of Jesus Christ.

And that's why Paul does all this stuff. Now when we look at this passage again,

I want us to think about what kinds of complexities arise that get in the way of us simply doing stuff for Jesus and being happy about it.

What are those things that get in the way, the complexities that seem to trip us up, and how can we find our way back to the simple joy of serving

Jesus in whatever sphere we currently serve? We are reminded from Proverbs 29 .25

that, "...the fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the

Lord shall be safe." Now we're not very familiar with snares these days, but a snare is a wire or a string, a cord that is rapidly tightened around a bird who went for the bait.

And then that bird, or sometimes an animal, tries to escape that snare, and they are in desperate panic mode, and you see them do this.

And when Christians do that in their lives, in their inner person, in their beliefs, in their anxieties, in their emotions, in their positions, in their relationships, when you see them going back and forth, oh, they just can't figure out which way to land, it's a signal that they've been ensnared by something, likely the fear of man.

And throughout the book of Proverbs, that principle of the fear of man being a snare, and yet the trusting in the

Lord makes us safe, that principle and promise is illustrated by many short, pithy cartoons throughout the book of Proverbs, and it is demonstrated in the book of Acts as well.

We have seen that Peter and Paul don't have to fear man. They can trust in the

Lord, even though they're persecuted and imprisoned and defamed, they are still safe from ensnarement, safe in their bond servant to Christ.

And by the way, Stephen and James are also safe, even though they were martyred.

They're safe because Jesus is the resurrection and the life, and having died, they yet live in Christ and will be raised at the last day.

So they're still safe too. The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the

Lord shall be safe. Let's remember that as we read Acts 18, verses 9 through 23.

If you're able, I invite you to stand with me as we read. This is God's holy word. Now, the

Lord spoke to Paul in the night by a vision, Do not be afraid, but speak, and do not keep silent, for I am with you, and no one will attack you to hurt you, for I have many people in this city.

And he continued there a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them. When Galia was proconsul of Achaia, the

Jews with one accord rose up against Paul and brought him to the judgment seat, saying, This fellow persuades men to worship

God contrary to the law. And when Paul was about to open his mouth,

Galio said to the Jews, If it were a matter of wrongdoing or wicked crimes,

O Jews, there would be reason why I should bear with you. But if it is a question of words and names and your own law, look to it yourselves, for I do not want to be a judge of such matters.

And he drove them from the judgment seat. Then all the Greeks took Sosthenes, the ruler of the synagogue, and beat him before the judgment seat.

But Galio took no notice of these things. So Paul still remained a good while.

Then he took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria. And Priscilla and Aquila were with him. He had his hair cut off at Centuria, for he had taken a vow.

And he came to Ephesus and left them there. But he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews. When they asked him to stay a longer time with them, he did not consent, but took leave of them, saying,

I must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem, but I will return again to you, God willing. And he sailed from Ephesus.

And when he had landed at Caesarea and gone up and greeted the church, he went down to Antioch. After he had spent some time there, he departed and went over the region of Galatia and Phrygia in order, strengthening all the disciples.

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. The fear of man very often is tied together with the fear of death, which is why

Jesus said to not fear man and what they may do to the body. The threat that man poses against man.

Very often those fears are connected, and the fear of man is a snare, but the fear of death is enslavement, the

Bible tells us. Paul is not to fear Galileo. Paul is not to fear the

Jewish uprising there in Corinth. Paul is not to be afraid of man.

Jesus tells him, do not be afraid, do not fear. Paul is not to fear the rioters led by Sosthenes.

He is not to fear the urgent appeals by those in Ephesus who wanted him to break his vow.

He is not to fear the unknown hostiles that may lay in wait for him on his many journeys through Galatia and Phrygia.

As a slave of Jesus, Paul cannot be running around placating other masters.

Now Jesus said concerning the fear of death, no one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other.

You cannot serve God and mammon. You say, wait a second, that's not about the fear of death, that's about wanting to get rich.

Jesus' audience were hoping for enough food for the next day. That's what he's talking about in Matthew 6.

They were afraid about where their food was coming the next day. They're not thinking about getting wealthy, they're thinking about their food for the next day.

They're thinking, what if my clothes don't last me another year, my one set of clothes?

This is what they're concerned about. You say, well, that seems reasonable to be concerned about that and fixated on that and anxious about that.

That seems very reasonable to me. But Jesus says, you can't serve two masters, therefore

I say to you, do not worry about your life. Do you hear that? Do not worry about your life. He wasn't saying, don't worry about your five -year plan to be a billionaire.

He's saying, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on.

He's talking about the fear of death. You cannot serve God and man, and you cannot be the slave of God and the slave to the fear of death.

He says, is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? That's a very good point, Jesus, thank you.

And that's also true of the fear of man, which is so related to the fear of death. And I bring this up because given the context that we're reading and given the importance of Jesus Christ and Him being master, we often load all manner of burdensome expectations and standards upon our days and our deeds until they become endless nights and grueling duties.

But our loyalty, our fealty is not to men's expectations.

When you think serving Christ is a grind and a joyless thing, it's because somehow, some way, the fear of man has slipped in.

Check it, find it. The fear of man is a tornado siren on a bright and sunny Saturday afternoon.

The fear of man is a tornado siren on a bright and sunny Saturday afternoon.

And those who heed it are not virtuous, but vain, quivering in their shelters. To be redeemed, to be saved, is to be owned.

To be saved is to serve. We talked about that last week, it's still the same today. And so 1

Corinthians 7, verse 23 says, you were bought at a price, therefore do not become the slaves of men.

Because of this, therefore this. You were bought at a price, you've been redeemed, you've been saved,

Jesus owns you, therefore do not become slaves of men.

That's what's going to bring all manner of unnecessary complexities to our serving Christ.

Revelation 5 .9 says, they sing a new song saying, these are the elders, the 24 elders who represent all of the redeemed.

They say, you are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals for you were slain and have redeemed us to God, have purchased us to God by your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation.

Let's remember who has bought us, who owns us, who's our Lord, who's our master. And by doing that, we can lay down the millstone of man's approval in our service to Christ.

We can take up the easy yoke and the light burden of serving

Christ, the one who has already suffered and died and been raised for our righteousness.

So the opportunities of service, we've seen that God provided the opportunity for Paul. He provides the opportunity for us.

We can give Him praise for that. Now let's think about the complexities that arise throughout this passage.

We have Paul being accused by the Jews in Corinth before the procouncil,

Galileo, that he is a lawless man. Paul, lawless, that's not good.

1 John tells us that sin is lawlessness. It sounds like Paul is a big sinner.

If he is worshiping God contrary to the law, this is the accusation of the

Jews before Galileo. See it again there in chapter 18 and verse 12.

When Galileo was procouncil of Achaia, the Jews, with one accord, rose up against Paul, brought him to the judgment seat, saying,

This fellow persuades men to worship God contrary to the law. So Paul gets dragged before the governor in court, and the governor is presiding at the judge's seat, and the

Jews in mass, all with one accord, accuse

Paul, saying, He is disrupting our society. He is making us upset.

He's causing problems. We're here to cause trouble for you, O Galileo, and to annoy you, and to make your day a little less bright because this man is doing something that makes us upset.

And we believe that this law is what governs us, and we want you to take care of it. You're supposed to take care of it.

Galileo says, I'm not going to handle that. I'm not going to bother with that. But what about their accusation?

Are they right? Are the Jews correct in saying that Paul is worshiping

God contrary to their law? Is he teaching others to worship

God contrary to the law? Now the law that the

Jews are talking about is, of course, the law given to them by Moses. They're thinking about the instructions, the precepts, the manners that they're supposed to follow, the customs that have been handed down to them from Moses in the first five books of the

Old Testament. This material, the first five books of the Old Testament, is expounded upon by the writings of the poets and the prophets.

You want to know more about what the law has to say? Look at how the poets handle it. Look at how the prophets handle it.

And they're saying that Paul is lawless. He is against the law. He is antinomian.

He is breaking God's law in the manner in which he is worshiping God and telling others to do the same.

It's a pretty serious accusation when you begin to think about it. It's almost as if they're saying that Paul is ditching

Scripture. He's throwing away the Bible and teaching others to do the same.

Very serious accusation. But is he lawless? The truth of the matter is that he is not keeping the feasts according to their prescriptions, and the truth of the matter is he is not offering sacrifices in the temple in the way that they are telling him to do.

The fact of the matter is he's not demanding circumcision of all those who are converting to the faith.

It is true that he is speaking about Jesus of Nazareth as the Christ, the

Son of the living God, and to be worshiped ever as much as God the Father, and he even talks about God the Holy Spirit.

So is he really worshiping one God, or is it three gods?

They would accuse him of the latter. Also, Paul is running around saying that this

Jesus of Nazareth is indeed the Messiah, and that the promises are being fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.

And of course, they wholeheartedly disagree with that because you'll notice that the Romans still occupy the promised land, and all kinds of things that they believe have to be fulfilled have not yet been fulfilled, and so they're saying the messianic hope is still out there and bright, and we should be trusting in God's promises of the

Messiah, and you're saying He's already come in this awful person of Jesus of Nazareth who was condemned and hung upon a cross.

And so they're saying, you are contrary to the promises and the prophets. You are contrary to the poets and the wisdom.

You are contrary to the laws and the precepts of Moses. You are anti -biblical. You are lawless,

Paul. And they want Galileo to punish Paul. But is it true that Paul is against the old covenant law?

No, he was not against the old covenant law. He's not against the Scriptures. This is the same Paul who said that all

Scripture is God -breathed and profitable for doctrine, free proof for correction and training and righteousness, that the man of God may be adequately equipped for every good work.

Paul loved all the Scriptures. He told Timothy, hold on to what you've been taught. Those Scriptures were sufficient to make you wise unto salvation.

Paul is not against the old covenant law. He's not against the Scriptures. He simply is gathering appropriately by the teaching of Christ, by the wisdom of Christ, by the authority of the

Holy Spirit. He is simply gathering up all the signs of Moses, and he's bringing them to their destination in Jesus.

Yes, it's a little disruptive when Paul goes into the synagogue and says, let's start in Genesis.

Or maybe he says, well, let's start in Exodus. And he starts bringing them along on a journey throughout the

Old Testament. He comes up to a sign and he rips it out of the ground, puts it on his shoulder and says, continue with me.

And he walks a little bit further and finds another sign that also points to Christ. He rips that up and he puts it on his shoulder and says, come on, keep up.

And he just keeps on walking through the Old Testament and he rips up every single sign that points to Christ in the

Old Testament, puts it on his shoulder and takes it all the way up and then lays it at the feet of Jesus of Nazareth.

And if they are unbelieving and if they are hard -hearted, they look back and they see a big long line of empty post holes.

What have you done to the road, Paul? What you're supposed to do.

Not just follow the signs to Christ, but once you're at Christ, you're at your destination, you don't need those signs anymore anyway.

You're going to leave them there, you're going to venerate them, you're going to go back and put sacrifices at them, you're going to go back and kiss them, bow down before them.

What are you going to do? They're done. Now notice that Paul has not burned them on his way to Christ.

He's not chopped them down and left them to decay. Treasured them, picked them up, put them on his shoulder, brought them and laid them where they belong at the glorious feet of Christ.

These are good. We should still study them and read them and know them and see them in the light of Jesus.

They're still good. He's not giving up on them. He's not getting rid of them. He's bringing them to their right conclusion, their right fulfillment in Christ, very much what

Jesus taught in Matthew 5, verses 17 -20. Paul in Christ is not trying to keep up with the law like these

Judaizers in Corinth. He's fulfilling the law. It's interesting to hear that when we follow

Christ, we don't keep the law, we end up fulfilling the law. All right? Because Jesus is the end of the law under righteousness for everyone who believes, and as we follow

Christ, He fills us with His grace, His Spirit, and we end up fulfilling the law in the way that we love one another, and in fact, it's a righteousness that surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees.

Paul in Christ is fulfilling the law. Paul is not lawless. He's not running around saying, nobody can tell me what to do now.

Christ has come. There's no more law. I can just do whatever. No. Paul was under God's law,

His authority in Christ, who is the new lawgiver. I want to read a passage for you out of 1

Corinthians 9, verses 19 through 23. Listen to the way Paul describes this new situation, and you can understand why the

Jews in Corinth are accusing Paul of being anti -law, but they're incorrect.

They searched the Scriptures because in them they thought they had eternal life. We have the system that gives us eternal life, but it is these that testify of me,

Jesus says, that when the veil is lifted, there is no longer a reading of Moses without Christ.

There is a reading of what Moses has to say about Christ. So 1

Corinthians 9, verses 19 through 23, Paul says, for though I am free from all men, you hear that?

I am not ensnared by the fear of man. You see it? Though I am free from all men,

Galileo has no claim on me, the Jews in Sosthenes has no claim on me, right?

Though I am free from all men, I have made myself a servant to all that I might win the more.

Remember Paul was a slave of Jesus Christ? What was his type of enslavement to Christ?

Oh, he was an apostle, an apostle of the gospel, that he would be preaching the gospel to sinners that they would come to Christ.

And so he says, well, as a slave of Christ, that's what I do, I make myself a servant to all that I might win the more, and to the

Jews, I become as a Jew that I might win Jews. To those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might win those who are under the law, meaning what?

He is going to go to the Jews and he will eat the way that they eat. He will observe the rest days that they have and the rest periods and the feasts and the so forth.

He's going to be around them and he's going to be with them and he's going to recognize what they're doing and he's not going to give unnecessary offense.

I'm not required to do that, I am absolutely free, but I'm going to do this anyway in my freedom to win the more, to win those who are under the law.

To those who are without law, verse 21, as without law. Now, that opens him up to all kinds of accusations, don't you think?

Paul says, well, you know, when I'm around the Jews, those who are under the law, then I live accordingly.

But when I'm around those who are not under the law, I also live as one without law.

Now, what does he mean by that? Because someone could take that and run with it and say, Paul's antinomian, he's against the law, he just does whatever he wants.

No, no, he clarifies, verse 21, not being without law toward God, because God's still in charge, still

Creator, but under law toward Christ, in the Greek it's in -lawed to Christ.

What does he mean by that? Hey, just because the old covenant has been fulfilled and the law has been fulfilled in Jesus Christ, so I no longer live under the law,

I'm not obligated to live according to the law, doesn't mean that I'm free to do whatever

I want. Because Christ is King, He gets to say what I do, and He's the chief and I obey

Him. So he's clarifying that. And verse 21, that I might win those who are without law.

So to the weak I become as weak, that I might win the weak, that I might become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.

Now this I do for the gospel's sake, that I may be partaker of it with you. We have a missionary we support by the name of Mitch Tillman.

He's in Mongolia, and as he's in Mongolia, he eats Mongolian food and he does

Mongolian things. His father was a missionary to Thailand, and the only opportunity he had was to preach the gospel to the lepers.

He had no other open doors, so he went to the lepers, and he went into lepers' homes and sat down at lepers' table and ate lepers' food and preached the gospel to them until God started saving the lepers, until the lepers became their own church and the king had granted special dispensation to the lepers to be

Christians. Why do we do what we do? Not because we're trying to please men and serve men and slave to men, but because we're trying to please

Christ. He's the master, He's the king, and so I'm willing to do this and that. I'm willing to bend, and I'm willing to bow myself down and to be humble before others for the sake of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

That's what Paul is saying. So, Paul is not against the law.

He's not lawless. It's a very strong accusation, but it is not true.

Further, Paul, right after he's accused of being lawless, as you begin reading in verses 18 -21, all of a sudden,

Paul now looks like a legalist. Did you see that? First he's lawless, now he looks like he's a legalist, verse 18.

So, Paul still remained a good while, then he took leave of the brethren and sailed for Syria, and Priscilla and Aquila were with him.

He had his hair cut off at Centuria, for he had taken a vow. Okay, Paul, wow, that's kind of extreme.

How very Old Testament of you, it sounds like one of the Old Testament prophets, cutting off your hair, taking a vow.

Verse 19, he came to Ephesus and left them there, and he himself entered the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews.

Okay, first, you take a vow and cut off your hair, now you're just hanging out in the synagogue with the

Jews some more. And then verse 21, or verse 20, when they asked him to stay longer with him, he did not consent, but took leave of them, saying,

I must by all means keep this coming feast in Jerusalem. Oh, now you're keeping feast,

Paul. Well, which is it? Is Paul lawless or is he a legalist? See, all of a sudden, he sounds incredibly

Jewish after being accused of not being Jewish enough out of the frying pan into the fire.

He can't win for losing, can he? But what is he doing there except what we just read about in 1

Corinthians 9? He's heading back to Jerusalem. He's going to be preaching the gospel there to the

Jews, and he's going to be around Jewish Christians. And so, truly, Paul is not lawless or a legalist.

He is the Lord's. He belongs to the Lord. And wherever the

Lord leads him to go, that's where he's going to go, and the people to whom he's supposed to preach, he's going to preach to them, and he's going to do so in the way that is the most pleasing to Christ and the most serving to those to whom he preaches.

Why would he do that? Why is Paul doing all of this stuff for Jesus?

For you were bought at a price, therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are

God's. Why do we do stuff for Jesus? Why would we humble ourselves?

Why would we go to such trouble? Why would we risk ourselves? Why would we suffer?

Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the

Father through Him, in the name of the Lord Jesus. Remember who's the master? Him being

Lord is what makes sense of whatever you do in word or deed. Why is it all of that?

Why is it all of our words and all of our deeds? Why is it whatever we do in word or deed, do it in the name of Jesus?

Because He's the Lord. He owns everything. He owns us completely.

And this is where, and this is how, the complexities of our opportunities to serve are made simple.

It can seem complex on first and second meditation, how to serve

Christ in different spheres. How do I serve Christ in my family? How do

I serve Christ in the church? How do I serve Christ in the world at large? So many different complexities that we could ponder, but how many of them simply go back to a fear of man, a high concern about whether or not someone's going to be happy with me at the end of the day based on how

I speak and how I perform? And when you begin to bring in several different concerns,

I have 10 people I'm thinking about in any given day about, I'm worried about whether they're going to be happy with me at the end of the day.

Have I said the things that are peaceable to them? Have I done the things that they like and they're fine with me about?

You know how exhausting that is? It's a snare.

But what if there was only one person that we were concerned about in any given day?

How would he think about my attitude and my speech and my deeds and what

I'm spending my time doing? And so if I just had one Lord, one Master, how freeing that is, how simple it is, and how

He always leads us to love one another so I don't have to worry about the condition of my personal relationships, because if I'm thinking about serving

Him, then that's going to fall into place. If my personal relationships are going to work a whole lot better, aren't they, then

I'm serving Christ because He's going to lead me to love others and thus fulfill the law. There's a simplicity to that.

All authority belongs to Christ. His throne is above all. We're never anywhere where it's not His turf.

We're always on His turf. So Jesus was in the court of the Gentiles. Galileo was sitting there on his judgment seat, and he proves to be an unjust, capricious kind of governor.

He only cared about what he wanted to care about. He didn't care about very much, and he didn't care about Jewish laws being broken or Jewish lawyers being beaten.

In fact, given the context, Claudius had just expelled the Jews from Rome for causing such a ruckus, and so Jews were very low on the priority list for Jewish governors at the moment.

And so here he has a miniature riot going on, just like in Rome. They all got kicked out because they wouldn't be quiet about Christus.

Here they are again, upset about Paul preaching Christus, and Galileo says, well, I know what Claudius did.

Why don't you all just go away? And when Sosthenes gets beat, he's like, well, he probably deserved it. Jesus told

Paul, don't be afraid. Paul's in the court of the Gentiles. Can Paul, does

Paul have the right to expect that he can stand there in the court of the Gentiles and not be afraid? Yes, because it's owned by Christ.

He's the king. Paul doesn't have to be afraid in the court of Galileo. Jesus Christ is in charge.

Proverbs 21, verse 1 says, the king's heart is in the hand of the

Lord. Like rivers of water, he turns it wherever he wishes. So why be afraid of the king when he's just water in God's hands?

Jesus is also in the synagogue of the Jew. What is Paul doing there in the synagogue? What gives

Paul the right, every single time he goes to a new city, first place he's off to, well,

I'm off to the synagogue. First thing he does, I'm going to go preach in the synagogue.

It's a Sabbath day. Oh, boy. We're going to go read from Isaiah. This is going to be good.

What right does he have to go into a synagogue and tell them, this synagogue no longer has any right to exist?

That's strong, isn't it? What right does he have to walk into a synagogue and say, this synagogue, by the word of God, by the authority of God, should no longer exist.

In fact, all of you should rejoice that your Messiah has come, and we ought to have a church right here.

We should be done with synagogue. It should be church time now. Jesus has come. And if they don't believe

Him at first, then He starts walking them through Genesis and Exodus and Vinicius, grabbing all the signs, taking them to Jesus.

Moses testified of Christ. That's what Jesus said. He spoke about me. The prophets testified of Christ.

Jesus told that to His apostles, opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. The writings testify of Christ.

He is the sum and substance of all the wisdom and knowledge of God. All of those are treasured up in Him.

The Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of David, the Son of God, He was being declared every

Saturday, every Sabbath in the synagogues. Men would stand up and read from the Old Testament, and they would be reading about Christ and reading about Christ and reading about Christ and the veil over their faces the whole time.

But when God, by His grace, lifts that veil and the glory of Christ and the face of Jesus Christ shines forth, then it becomes absolutely clear what all that's about.

It is truly a challenge, but I want you to think about the way in which the fear of man and the fear of the

Lord truly are counterproductive. They can't coexist peacefully.

They just don't get along. If you fear man, then you are going to refrain from the gut punch of Christianity, which is there's only one

Savior, Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life, and no man comes to the Father except through Him.

There's one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, and how will they believe unless they hear, and how will they hear without a preacher?

The gospel must be proclaimed for people to be saved, and that is the exclusive claims of the

Scriptures. That's the gut punch of Christianity. But if you fear man, then you'll be afraid to amen that, to agree with that, to echo that, to bring that forward in your conversations and relationships and evangelism and apologetics.

You know, it's pretty strong to say

Islam has no right to exist. I didn't say Muslims and people in Arabs and Indonesians have no right to exist.

We all live by God's grace anyway. But I'm saying the false religion of Islam has no right to exist.

It's a perversion of the Scriptures. Mormonism has no right to exist.

Those who identify as Mormons are made in God's image, and I hope that God saves them. But that false religion of Mormonism has no right to exist.

It's a perversion of the Scriptures. The same goes with any perversion of the

Bible, including rabbinical Judaism. It is a loving thing to say to somebody who identifies himself as a religious

Jew today. It's a loving thing to say that you ought to stop being that and turn to Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of the

Scriptures. It's a loving thing to say. It is a most hateful thing to say, well, you do you.

Jacob, I have loved. Esau, I have hated. Have you ever read Genesis chapter 36? The entire tale of Esau in a chapter, and do you know who's not mentioned one time?

God. Jacob, I have loved. How many times did

God hound Jacob? The hound of heaven would not leave Jacob alone. Even wrestled him. Would not leave

Jacob alone. Pursued him, bothered him, annoyed him, challenged him, humbled him.

He loved Jacob. Esau, he said, I hated, meaning God didn't have anything to do with him.

You do you, Esau. It is loving for us as Christians to look at the various world religions and cults and so on and so forth and say, you know what?

What you believe in makes no sense and has no right to exist, but I think you're made in God's image, and Jesus Christ suffered and died upon the cross, and I want to talk to you about God's Son.

That's a very loving thing to do, and those exclusionary claims of Jesus Christ and the

Scriptures, although they hit very hard in our pluralistic, man -fearing society, they are very loving.

That kind of clarity and that kind of simplicity is very loving and very appropriate.

So Jesus is in the court of the Gentiles, and He's also in the synagogue of the Jew, and He is in the assemblies of the churches.

He is building His church. We see Paul traveling around from Corinth to Ephesus, Caesarea, Jerusalem, Antioch, Galatia, Phrygia.

There he goes again, the bondservant of Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, and he's out there strengthening the churches, and that's a look at Jesus Christ building

His church, building the new covenant temple, quarrying those living stones from the nations.

Now consider the priority of service. I would hate for us to think of service to Jesus Christ as something very toilsome and burdensome, filled with condemnation and always failing to measure up, and then say, now be all about that.

Remember Jesus' description of serving Him. "'Come unto Me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.'"

Remember what kind of master we have in Jesus Christ. Remember that He is all our righteousness. Remember His grace.

Remember His compassion. Remember His power and trust in Him. He is the perfect and good master.

Now with that in mind, listen to Colossians 3, verses 22 -24.

Now this is instructions of Paul to the Christians who are gathering every Sunday at Colossae.

They're gathering together, households are coming together, and so he has instructions to everybody in the household.

He gives instructions to husbands and wives, to parents and children. He also gives instructions to slave owners and to slaves.

Colossians 3, verses 22 -24. Bondservants, again, that's just the English gloss for the

Hebrew word doulos, which means slaves. Slaves, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh.

Obey in what way? Not with eye service as men -pleasers. You know how it is when the boss comes back to the job, everyone jumps up and starts looking busy.

Not with eye service as men -pleasers, but in sincerity of heart, fearing God. And whatever you do, do it heartily as to the

Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you'll receive the reward of the inheritance for you serve the

Lord Christ. Now those are legitimate, down -to -earth, practical applications for various Christians who are living as slaves in the

Roman Empire and yet came to Jesus. And then they're owned, legally owned, by slave owners, by their masters in that context, and then, hey, you know what?

Here's how you live as a Christian slave, for the glory of God. But think about that.

If this is true in the lesser, surely it's true in the greater. If this is how earthly slaves are to serve earthly masters, and given the context of what

Paul writes, shouldn't this be true of how we serve the Lord? Isn't that what it says? Whatever you do, do it heartily as to the

Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance for you serve the

Lord Christ. Can we remember that? A reminder to slaves that we do stuff for Jesus. So we serve

Christ in faith, let's believe His promises, entrust yourself to your master's wisdom and power.

How often do we fall short, hold ourselves up, restrain ourselves, stop, just not going to have enough wisdom to go that direction, don't have enough strength to go that direction, just not going to have enough, not going to have enough.

Are we going to trust that our master, who has called us into obedience, that He will also provide the opportunity for us to obey and learn and grow?

Do we trust our master to provide for us? Or do we say, he's kind of a stingy master, he's kind of a stingy master, and he lets me down, so I'm not going to continue in obedience.

Serve Christ in hope. Related to that is serve Christ in hope. Lean on His goodness. Do we expect our master to be successful?

If we could put ourselves in the frame of mind of a slave in the first century that Paul writes to in Colossians and so on, and part of an estate, part of a household, and you know, if your master fails, if his crops fail, if his business goes away, what happens to you?

Welcome to being a beggar, or he'll sell you off to a bad master or something. So you want your master to be successful, especially if he's a good master.

And if we have the best master of all, Jesus Christ, do we expect that he's going to succeed?

Or do we expect that he's going to make a miserable failure of this world which he has inherited? I think he's going to be massively successful, and I think he is being successful.

Also, not only faith and hope, but also love. Serve Christ in love. Let us remember, each one of us remember,

I am not the only slave my master owns. I might be special in some ways, but I'm not special in that way.

All these other fellow slaves that Jesus Christ died on the cross for, shed

His blood for, suffered under the wrath of God for, but was raised the third day to bring them righteousness that He reigns over and that He loves, that He will never lose, says, not a single one of His flock,

I should embrace all those fellow slaves. When you look at each other, when we look at each other,

Jesus Christ shed His blood for him. Jesus Christ shed His blood for her.

Yes, of course, I will love that person. Yes, of course, I will embrace that person. Yes, of course,

I will forgive that person. Yes, of course, I will serve that person. In that way, we make our service to Christ a priority in faith and hope and in love.

Let's close in prayer. Father, we thank you for the time you've given us in your Word. I thank you for the stories that you preserve for us, for our reflection, our meditation.

Thank you that we do not have a lawlessness in Christ, but we have

His perfect authority and we have His righteousness and we have His direction. I thank you that we have such a good

Master in Jesus Christ, and I pray that you would help us to be joyful servants.