Sunday Sermon: Beware the Leaven of False Teachers (Matthew 16)

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October 4, 2020

Pastor Gabriel Hughes reads Matthew 16 where Jesus warns against believing the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees, that the church may remain pure to the calling and word of Christ. Visit fsbcjc.org for more info about our church!

00:18: You are listening to the teaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas.
00:27: Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast we feature 20 minutes of Bible study through a
00:32: New Testament book. On Thursday is a study in the Old Testament and then we answer questions from the listeners on Friday.
00:39: Each Sunday we are pleased to share our sermon series. Here's Pastor Gabe. Matthew 16 verses 1 through 12, the words of our
00:48: Lord Christ as written down by the Apostle Matthew. And the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and to test
00:56: Him they asked Him to show them a sign from heaven. He answered them,
01:01: When it is evening, you say, it will be fair weather, for the sky is red. And in the morning it will be stormy today, for the sky is red and threatening.
01:10: You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.
01:17: An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.
01:25: So He left them and departed. When the disciples reached the other side, they had forgotten to bring any bread.
01:32: Jesus said to them, Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the
01:37: Sadducees. And they began to discuss among themselves, saying, We brought no bread.
01:45: But Jesus, aware of this, said, O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread?
01:53: Do you not yet perceive? Do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousand, and how many baskets you gathered?
02:02: Or the seven loaves for the four thousand, and how many baskets you gathered? How is it that you fail to understand that I did not speak about bread?
02:13: Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Then they understood that He did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the
02:24: Pharisees and the Sadducees. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank
02:29: You this morning again that we may come to Your Word and we may understand Your statutes that You have laid down for us, and that they are for our good and for Your glory, that we may walk in godliness, putting off the sinfulness of our flesh, that desires worldly things and godless passions, and instead we would desire to be with God and to live in holiness before You.
02:59: May we understand this as it is laid down for us today, that there are many teachers that attempt to lead us astray, that will say something is good that God has called evil.
03:09: May we not be distracted by these lies, enticed by them, but desiring to know
03:17: God and Your truth and to be pleasing and holy sacrifices unto the
03:23: Lord. We read Your Word. We understand Your commandments and seek to do them as worship unto our great
03:30: God and King who has given His Son to redeem us from all lawlessness and purify for Himself a people for His own possession who are zealous for good works.
03:42: Titus 2 .14. We ask that You guide us in Your truth today, prepare our hearts as we come to the
03:49: Lord's table. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray and all God's people said, Amen. Thank you.
03:54: You may be seated. The Pharisees and the Sadducees came. These are the members of the
04:01: Sanhedrin. And we know that the Pharisees were more of the common man and the Sadducees were more of kind of the upper echelon of members of society.
04:11: And we also know that the Pharisees and Sadducees did not get along. These two different sects of the
04:16: Sanhedrin actually believed different things. The Pharisees believed in an afterlife and they believed that their good works would get them to heaven.
04:25: The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. So there was some quarreling among them, but neither one of them were teaching truth to the people of God.
04:33: They both in their own way were false teachers leading the
04:38: Jews astray. And so Jesus is being challenged by the
04:44: Pharisees and the Sadducees with a test. They want Him to show them a sign from heaven.
04:51: Now we know that Jesus has performed many miracles in their midst even up to this point. So what is it that they're asking for in terms of a sign?
04:59: Just right before this, we read about Jesus feeding the 4 ,000. We read about Jesus healing many.
05:06: We read about Jesus even raising the dead and healing the sick.
05:12: All of these miracles have been performed in their midst before we get to here. So what is it that they want to see exactly?
05:19: Do another sign? Notice they're specifically asking for a sign from heaven.
05:25: They want some sort of miraculous fire to come down or something to that degree.
05:31: Whatever it was they were asking for, they wanted something from heaven to come down and prove to everyone that Jesus was who
05:38: He said He was. Now the miracles that had been performed were already proof enough.
05:44: In fact, when John the Baptist's disciples came and asked Jesus, are you the one who is to come or should we be waiting for another?
05:53: They were sent on behalf of John who was in prison to ask Jesus, are you the promised
05:59: Messiah or should we be looking for somebody else? And Jesus' response to them was, go back and tell
06:04: John what you have seen. The proof is in the fulfillment of what the scriptures said about the
06:10: Christ. The blind will see. The lame will walk. The deaf can hear.
06:18: The mute can speak. Go back and tell John what you have seen. Because he knew that through this,
06:25: John would understand that Christ is the fulfillment of all these prophecies that had been made about the coming
06:30: Messiah. And these miracles that had been performed in their midst that everybody had seen proved that Jesus was who
06:37: He said He was. The Pharisees and the Sadducees are not satisfied. They want to see actual like wrath of God sign come down from heaven, which is absurd to be asking for that.
06:51: Not realizing that any one of us are deserving of God's judgment. We should praise
06:56: God that it has not yet come upon the earth. That many others would come to know the truth of Christ and His gospel and so be saved.
07:06: But this is what the Pharisees and the Sadducees are desiring to see Jesus called down. Now remember, and we've talked about this even up to this point, not everybody believes that Jesus is the sent
07:18: Messiah. Some believe, as Herod did, that He was a reincarnation of John the Baptist. Even the disciples themselves, when they saw
07:26: Jesus walking on the water, they thought He was a ghost. And here coming up momentarily, even within Matthew chapter 16,
07:33: Jesus is going to ask the disciples, who do people say that I am? And they give various answers of what people are saying about who
07:41: Jesus is. And He puts to them, well, who do you say that I am? So the Pharisees and the
07:46: Sadducees are desiring some sort of a proof that Jesus is, like for example, the answers that the disciples give.
07:54: They say, some of you say that you're Elijah. What did Elijah call down from heaven? Fire to burn up the sacrifice right there in the presence of the priests of Baal.
08:04: So that's what the Pharisees and the Sadducees are asking on that kind of that understanding. Well, we believe He's Elijah.
08:10: So He should be able to bring down fire from heaven. Jesus responds to them in verse 2, when it is evening, you say, it will be fair weather for the sky is red.
08:18: In the morning, it will be stormy today for the sky is red and threatening. You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.
08:27: Now understand that Jesus is not just talking about looking at what's going on in the world and being able to discern and understand what
08:34: God is doing in the midst of these situations. He's talking about looking at what's going on in the world in light of what the scripture says.
08:42: And the Pharisees and the Sadducees should have known better than anybody what time it was, because they had the scriptures and they were the ones who were supposed to be teaching the people of God what
08:54: He said in His word. They should have known better than anybody. Remember that when the wise men came into Jerusalem, we read about this in Matthew chapter 2.
09:05: They said, where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we have seen his star in the east and we have come to worship him.
09:11: Herod had no idea what they were talking about and neither did the rest of Jerusalem. It says that a great concern had come over all of the people of the city because these magi had come asking this question.
09:24: Herod had to consult his own wise men and say, what are they talking about? This star, this one who has been born king of the
09:31: Jews? And they had to go, yeah, well, it does happen to say in our scriptures that a Messiah is coming at this time.
09:38: And in fact, he'll be born in Bethlehem. So they knew, but they weren't teaching it.
09:44: And they should know, all that had been prophesied is coming to fulfillment in our midst.
09:50: We're seeing it in this Jesus of Nazareth, but they didn't believe it.
09:57: You know how to interpret what kind of weather we're going to have today, but you don't even know the signs of the times.
10:06: Verse 4, an evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.
10:15: So he left them and departed. And we know what is meant by this is that as Jonah was in the belly of a big fish for three days and three nights, so Jesus will be in the heart of the earth.
10:24: He'll go on to explain that later on. I've been taking our Bible study class on Thursday night through the book of Revelation.
10:32: We're doing a blitz through Matthew on Sunday morning. We're doing a blitz through Revelation on Thursday evening. I only had a few
10:38: Thursdays left, and we had just finished up the Psalms. And so I said, what's a book that you want to go through? And everybody unanimously settled on Revelation.
10:45: And so we've been knocking this out like four chapters at a time on a Thursday night. And one of the things that I've asked the class is preemptively assuming the question, are we in the end times?
11:00: The answer to that question is, yes, we are. We're not in the end times because I've opened the book of Revelation, and I've cross -referenced it with the evening news.
11:09: That's not why I believe that we're in the end times. We're in the end times because the
11:14: Bible says we're in the end times. John says, you know that in the last days, the antichrist will come.
11:24: And so now many antichrists have come. So we know that it is the last hour.
11:32: And we're in that last hour now. This is the last age before Christ comes.
11:41: And then we enter into his glory and we'll dwell with him forever in his perfect and imperishable kingdom.
11:47: That's all we're waiting for next. And all of the signs point to what
11:52: Jesus said was going to happen in this age. He said it would happen in the midst of his own disciples after he left them, which you read about in Matthew chapters 24 and 25.
12:03: And so we can look about and we can see that many false teachers, many antichrists have arisen attempting to lead astray even the flock of God, if they were able to.
12:13: Jesus warned the disciples of this very thing. And so we know that it is the last hour.
12:22: Jesus warns his disciples that the Pharisees and the Sadducees are among these types of antichrists themselves.
12:34: Verse 4, an evil and adulterous generation asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah.
12:41: And so he left them and departed. My friends, we have that same sign. The sign of Jonah has been given to us.
12:47: Christ died, was buried, and risen again according to the Scriptures. That's what the
12:52: Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 verses 3 and 4. Jesus fulfilled what was said according to the
12:59: Scriptures. And we have gone and we have tested the Scriptures, and we know that what the
13:04: Scriptures said about Christ, Christ has fulfilled and is continuing to fulfill. Therefore, we know by that same sign, the sign of Jonah, he who is buried and risen again, that his word is true and the promises that he has promised to us will come to fulfillment.
13:21: Those signs have been accomplished. They've been witnessed. They've been tested. They're written down in the word of God.
13:27: We have the same sign that has been given to us. And my friends, this sign is enough for us, that Jesus came down from heaven.
13:34: He is the sign from heaven, that he showed himself through the miracles that he performed, the teaching that was in fulfillment to the word, that he died, that he rose again from the grave, showing that he had the power over death itself, and proclaimed that whoever believes in him will not perish, but will have everlasting life.
13:56: And all the promises of God that are given to us in his word are bound up in Christ.
14:01: We receive them because of the sign of Jonah, because he was the one who was buried in the earth for three days and brought himself back to life.
14:12: And so we know that these things have been accomplished through Jesus Christ. He is the sign from heaven.
14:19: We need no other miraculous sign. We need no other revelation of scripture. Canon is closed.
14:26: We don't need this Bible to be added to. Everything that we need to know about God is bound up right here in Jesus Christ, who reveals to us the
14:37: Father. He is the sign from heaven that we need. All is accomplished through Christ.
14:44: The disciples go on with Jesus, verse 5. They go to the other side. They had forgotten to bring any bread.
14:51: So they're hungry. They want a snack. Jesus said to them, watch and beware of the leaven of the
14:58: Pharisees and the Sadducees. So Jesus is taking the disciples' hunger, and he's using it to teach a spiritual lesson.
15:06: He says, beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Here's essentially what
15:12: Jesus is saying here. You're hungry, and you're ready to eat up anything. There is a spiritual hunger that we all have.
15:22: And you may be in this state of just whatever's out there that says to be of God, I'm going to snatch it up, and I'm going to take it, because I need to be nourished.
15:31: I want to be filled up with these things that proclaim to be of Christ. But Jesus says, watch out and beware of the leaven of the
15:41: Pharisees and the Sadducees. Leaven is what you put in bread to make it rise. Now, leaven had a particular significance to Jews, because we know that in the
15:52: Passover, when they were instructed how to make their bread and how to eat their lamb, before the
15:57: Passover of God, who came upon Egypt and struck down all the firstborn, and then
16:02: Pharaoh responds by driving the Jews out of Egypt, and thus God released his people from slavery through these powerful signs and wonders that were done over the land of Egypt.
16:13: The instructions that were given to the Jews is that they not make their bread with any leaven, because then they have to wait for the bread to rise.
16:20: But they needed to have their sandals on and their staff in their hand, and ready to go the moment
16:25: Pharaoh said, get out, I don't want to see your faces anymore, you're set free, go now.
16:31: You need to be ready to go. And everything that we know about what happened in the
16:36: Exodus and how it pertains to our salvation is the same. In Christ Jesus, we're set free from sin and death.
16:43: That was the slavery that we were in according to Titus 3 .3. We were all slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.
16:56: That's who we were before we came to Christ. But God, who is rich in mercy because of the great love with which
17:02: He loved us, didn't leave us dead in our sins and our transgressions. But in Christ Jesus, we've been set free from those things.
17:09: So just as God released the Israelites from slavery and captivity, and they needed to be ready to go at a moment's notice, so we need to do the same when we've been set free from our sin.
17:20: We're not piddling around in that sin anymore. We need to get out. We're now following Christ.
17:26: We're set free. We're heading to the promised land in Christ Jesus, our Savior. So this was all symbolic of that was given to us in the
17:35: Old Testament, that we would understand the freedom that we have in Christ Jesus. And so this leaven, when it is put into bread, yeast, that causes it to rise.
17:45: If even a little bit is in the bread, it will cause the bread to rise. If your objective is to make unleavened bread, bread that has not risen, if you get even a little bit of leaven in there, you've ruined the recipe to make unleavened bread.
18:00: Even a little bit will ruin the whole lump. Paul talks about this also when it comes to discipline within the church in 1
18:06: Corinthians 5. He says, don't you know that even a little leaven leavens the whole lump?
18:12: A little bit will leaven the whole lump of bread. So Jesus says to them, using this metaphor of leaven, watch out and beware of the leaven of the
18:23: Pharisees and the Sadducees. Because if you're understanding the bread of the
18:28: Passover, Christ who is our Passover Lamb, if you understand the bread of the Passover to be without leaven, then even a little leaven is going to leaven the whole lump.
18:36: That's a warning that we have throughout the scriptures. It's a metaphor that we have come up regularly throughout the New Testament. They began discussing it among themselves, saying, we brought no bread.
18:46: They think Jesus is literally talking about bread. He's not taking their hunger and using a spiritual lesson.
18:53: They think he's just talking about literal bread. So they're sad that they didn't have any bread. We've disappointed our master because we didn't bring any bread with us.
19:02: And Jesus is... I'm going to be reading into the text. Here's my eisegesis here.
19:08: But Jesus goes, okay. It doesn't say that, but somewhere written in the
19:14: Greek, there's a sigh of exasperation. As they're literally trying to understand what it is that Jesus just said about leaven and Pharisees and Sadducees.
19:25: And Jesus says this, oh, you of little faith. Why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread?
19:33: I didn't even say that. Some of you know that I probably generated some controversy. I didn't probably.
19:38: I did generate some controversy online with a statement that I made this past week. And then retracted by offering an apology.
19:45: Because quite frankly, I simply was not clear in the words that I said. So I take fault and responsibility for that.
19:52: Trying to be too short and too pithy instead of being sensitive to the matter and explaining something that needed more care in teaching than I was willing to give it at the time that I made the statement.
20:04: There were some people that were attributing to me though, many people who were attributing to me, things that I did not say.
20:12: Like Gabe is guilty of saying this. Did you not hear in his apology? He even said this. I didn't say that at all. So they're attributing words to me that I didn't say.
20:20: And Jesus is rebuking his disciples here for the same thing. I didn't tell you that. You of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact you have no bread?
20:28: I didn't bring up the fact that you have no bread. I was taking your hunger and explaining to you that in your spiritual hunger, you may have this desire to eat of the bread of the
20:37: Pharisees and the Sadducees, but what they have to give to you is not good bread. Do you not yet perceive?
20:44: Do you not remember the five loaves for the 5 ,000 and how many baskets you gathered? Or the seven loaves for the 4 ,000 and how many baskets you gathered?
20:52: How is it that you failed to understand that I did not speak about bread? Beware of the leaven of the
20:57: Pharisees and the Sadducees. I'm not talking about literal bread. I'm making a spiritual point, guys.
21:04: Verse 12, then they understood that he did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but to the teaching of the
21:11: Pharisees and the Sadducees. So again there, we have a spiritual desire for that which is of God, but in that spiritual desire, we have a propensity.
21:24: There is a possibility that we could end up consuming something that isn't truly of God.
21:30: It says that it is, but it's not. As it says in 1 John 4, 1, do not believe every spirit as being from God, for there are many false teachers that have gone out to the world, but test the spirits,
21:46: John says. How do we test them? According to the word of God, not everything that claims to be of Christ is truly of Christ, and not everything that claims to be of Christ is even of the
22:01: Christ of the Bible. And so we need to understand our scriptures that we may test the statements that come to us, not just from the worldly teachers of this age.
22:13: There are many teachers who do not worship or honor Christ at all, and yet they're going to tell you that they're speaking some sort of truth in the name of Christ, which isn't going to be true.
22:26: Just recently on CNN, there were a couple of anchors who were arguing back and forth on CNN, and they were making statements about Jesus on CNN that were not true.
22:40: But many people who are ready to absorb just anything that claims to be of Christ are going to listen to such statements and say, well, hey, these guys love
22:49: Jesus. They just want to honor God. That's, of course, what we get from a secular culture.
22:56: We're going to get wrong understandings of who Jesus is. They look at Jesus as no different than Gandhi. But then we're also going to have those persons who are going to stand in the pulpit and claim to be of God, and not really be of God either.
23:10: Jesus has already warned us in Matthew chapter 7, beware of those who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
23:21: There are many Christians who are going to come to us looking like they're part of the flock, but inwardly they're ravenous wolves.
23:28: If I may expound upon Jesus' statement a little bit more, there are even going to be those who will come to you that look like shepherds, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
23:43: Beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. This is particularly something for this church to keep in mind, and our pastor search committee, and others as you are looking for the next pastor who's going to fill this pulpit.
23:58: Beware those who are going to claim they are of Christ, but they really have not the right qualifications to stand and lead the people of God according to the word of God.
24:08: And it's not to say of that person that they may not even be a Christian at all. That's not necessarily the judgment, but they're not qualified to be a teacher.
24:18: And if they're not qualified to be a teacher, then they will even inadvertently. It may not be that they're some deceiver in that they have
24:26: Satan inside of them somehow, and their plan is to get in here and infiltrate the pulpit and lead everybody into sin.
24:32: That may not be their desire at all. They're just mistaken. And they think they know what they are proclaiming is of Christ when really the fact of the matter is they don't truly know him to the degree that a teacher needs to know
24:48: God and desire to walk in his way so that they may lead the people of God in that way as well. Therefore, you put that man in error, and he is going to lead the rest of the congregation in error as well.
25:00: Martin Lloyd -Jones once said that we need to stop thinking about false teachers as being these men who are deceptively just kind of scheming.
25:08: They're just like, I'm going to tell people this, but I'm really going to come in and I'm going to do this other thing. He said the heretics throughout the ages were well -intentioned men.
25:18: They thought they were doing the best thing for people. I don't want you to be deceived by this.
25:24: What I want you to know is this. And then the this that they bring, the truth that they claim is truth is actually contrary to the
25:29: Word of God. They were well -meaning individuals, but they were led astray. They were deceived by Satan, which is one of the reasons why
25:37: Paul says to us in 2 Corinthians 10 and in Ephesians chapter 6 that our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces of darkness.
25:47: A person can be led astray and not realize that they are deceived and therefore deceiving.
25:54: So you must be discerning to see who is truly walking in the truth and proclaiming that truth and who is deceived and being deceived.
26:06: This is what Paul warned Timothy about, is that those who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while the ignorant and unstable will go on deceiving and being deceived.
26:20: Jesus warns His disciples to beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the
26:25: Sadducees. My friends, He warns us of the same. We've had this warning in Matthew already up to this point, and we're being warned yet again that as we desire to feed on the
26:36: Word of God, which Jesus has even prophetically demonstrated in the breaking up of loaves and fish to feed 5 ,000 people.
26:47: How many baskets did you gather left over, Jesus said to the disciples? Anybody remember how many baskets they gathered?
26:53: Twelve, right. Symbolic of the people of God, that's what that number represents.
26:59: Twelve tribes of Israel, twelve apostles. The bread was pointing to the people of God being fed by the
27:07: Word of God. He says, remember the 4 ,000 that were fed, taking a few loaves and feeding 4 ,000 people.
27:14: He's done this miracle twice in their midst. There is a true Word that comes from God that feeds the multitudes.
27:23: But beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees that poisons the bread and leads the people astray.
27:35: Verses 13 on through 20, Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, and He asked
27:41: His disciples, who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, some say John the
27:46: Baptist, others say Elijah, others Jeremiah, one of the prophets.
27:53: And we've seen this in the story up to this point. We've seen various people saying different things about Jesus, but not really knowing that He is the
28:00: Son of God. And He said to them, but who do you say that I am? And Peter's the one that replies, you are the
28:08: Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, blessed are you,
28:14: Simon Bar -Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.
28:20: This is a spiritual truth that has been given by the Spirit to a spiritual people.
28:28: And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
28:36: I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
28:45: Then He strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that He was the Christ. Now, this is the passage that the entire
28:53: Roman Catholic Church is built upon. They set up their pope based on this particular passage, because Peter represents the first pope, and then there's been a successive line of popes ever since, and it's upon the pope that the church is built, according to the
29:07: Catholic Church that reads this passage. That's not what it was that Jesus was saying here. Jesus is the one that defines the church.
29:14: He's the one that calls the church, and we as the church are not the ones who have authority over the
29:21: Scriptures to say what is Scripture and what is not. Rather, the Scripture has authority over us, and it's the
29:27: Word of God that defines the people of God, not the people of God defining the Word of God. We know who we are called out from the world to follow
29:35: Christ and be a kingdom of people even on this earth because of who Jesus has said that we are, not because of what we have said about His Word.
29:44: The Roman Catholic Church claims authority over this Word. This Word has authority over all.
29:51: As Jesus will say, coming up in Matthew 28, 18, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to whom?
30:01: Jesus Christ. Not to the church. We are under submission of Christ, and we know what
30:10: Christ has said because His Word tells us, and His Word is the Bible. Genesis 1 to Revelation 22 is all the
30:18: Word of Christ. He is the one who spoke in the beginning, let there be light, and there was.
30:24: He is the one who proclaimed the gospel that we may know the truth and be set free. It is by the
30:31: Word of Christ that we are the people of Christ. And notice what Jesus says about the church.
30:37: He asks His disciples, who do you say that I am? Peter is the one that replies, you are the Christ, the
30:43: Son of the living God. Jesus answered him, blessed are you, Simon Bar -Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my
30:49: Father who is in heaven. And my friends, I say this to you, just as it is the Spirit of God that revealed to Peter this truth, so it is the
30:56: Spirit of God that has revealed this truth to you. You know the Father, you know the
31:04: Son, and you know the Holy Spirit because it's been revealed to you by the
31:10: Spirit of God. Go and read 1 John 5 on this later. I don't have all the time in this sermon to go through that.
31:17: But it talks about there how the Spirit is the one who testifies to the truth of God. We have evidences that we can go through.
31:24: We can look at the scriptures. We can test it according to history and archaeology and other claims in antiquity.
31:32: And we can come and affirm and whatever it is that the Bible says is certainly true. It's been affirmed even by outside sources.
31:38: But we don't need the outside sources to know that it's true because the Spirit is the one who testifies to the truth.
31:45: So you know that Jesus is the Christ because it's been revealed to you by the
31:50: Father who is in heaven. As we read previously in Matthew chapter 11, no one knows the
31:56: Son except the Father. And no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the
32:01: Son chooses to reveal Him. So we have come to know the Christ by God who has revealed this to us.
32:11: And what does Jesus say about the church? I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock... Peter, which means rock.
32:17: He is Simon bar Jonah. Simon the son of Jonah is what that means. His father's name was
32:23: Jonah. I tell you that you are Peter, which is a new name that means rock, and on this rock
32:29: I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Was Jesus talking about Peter, or was
32:36: Jesus talking about a truth claim upon which he was going to build his church? Now, he was specifically talking about Peter because as we have it stated in the book of Ephesians and elsewhere...
32:51: Peter even talks about this, in fact, in 1 Peter chapter 2. The church is built on a foundation of the apostles and prophets.
32:59: Christ is the cornerstone. So indeed, the testimony that Peter would give as an apostle of Jesus Christ would be upon which the church would be built.
33:08: But as he's saying, on this rock I will build my church, indeed Peter is among those disciples who are going to be laying that foundation for the building up of the church.
33:18: We still are under the authority of the apostles and prophets even today every time we read the word of God, to whom
33:26: God's word was given. The prophets gave us the Old Testament. The apostles gave us the New Testament.
33:32: And as we're under the authority of that word, so they are the ones who have laid down the foundation of this church, which we are, the ecclesia, the calling out of persons from this world to be a holy nation unto
33:44: God, following him, as it says in 1 Peter chapter 2 verses 9 and 10.
33:49: We are a holy nation, a royal priesthood, a people for his own possession, that we may walk according to the excellencies of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.
34:03: Once we were not a people, but now we are God's people. That's what the scripture says about those who are his church.
34:11: And notice that it says, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
34:19: This does not mean, my friends, that hell is advancing upon the church. Gates don't advance.
34:26: I don't know if you've ever noticed that before, but gates don't go out and conquer. A gate of a kingdom does not expand out into another kingdom to conquer that kingdom.
34:35: Rather, you have an army from one kingdom that goes against the gates of another kingdom. Gates are there to guard.
34:42: They are not there to advance. Hell is not advancing against the church. What Jesus is saying here is that the church is advancing against hell.
34:53: And the gates of hell will not be able to stop that which
34:59: God has commissioned the church to go out and do with the spreading of the gospel of God to the world.
35:07: And whenever we preach the gospel and people come to faith and believe, as it says in the book of Jude, we are snatching them out of the fire.
35:18: They who are doomed to destruction because of the sin and rebellion that they have committed against God. But we who have come to believe the gospel and have now been armed with the gospel, as it says in Ephesians 6, the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.
35:35: We advance against the gates of hell. And we rescue people out of the flames that they would not perish under the judgment of God, but they would have everlasting life by faith in Jesus.
35:48: That has been accomplished in this church for 65 years. And there are churches before this one that have been doing that for centuries.
35:58: Ever since Christ commissioned his disciples to go out and share the gospel, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the
36:07: Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. Ever since Christ commanded, commissioned the church to go out and do this, it has been accomplished in the world.
36:20: So, my friends, what Jesus proclaimed here 2 ,000 years ago to his disciples sitting around him is continuing to be accomplished to this very day and will until Christ returns.
36:34: Our president is currently sick, and he's sick with a virus that we know has claimed over 200 ,000 lives.
36:44: We pray for his recovery, but what if he doesn't recover? What if our president dies?
36:51: Well, we have systems that are set in place in the United States as to who assumes power then after that point.
36:56: But there will nevertheless be a grave concern in our nation that we don't have a leader. And there are other people in the world that may even want to take advantage of this nation because our leader has died.
37:05: What will happen then? My friends, take heart. Christ is still on his throne.
37:12: He still reigns. And that which he had decreed is still being accomplished in the world.
37:19: Even when rulers die. Let's say, God forbid, that the
37:26: Marxists win in the election coming up in a month. And our entire system of government shifts, and everything that we have known to be freedoms for us here in this nation get turned over to a leftist perspective who just trashes the
37:40: Constitution and takes us in a direction where we lose all of the rights that have been afforded to us by the
37:45: Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and other such documents that have secured our freedoms as a nation.
37:52: What if that happens? My friends, take heart. Christ is still on his throne.
38:00: The majority of people in the history of the world for the last 2 ,000 years have lived under tyrants.
38:06: It may happen again, even in the United States. But we do not lose heart because Christ reigns.
38:15: This is in not any way me standing before you saying that you don't have a responsibility to go out and vote. I believe that you should.
38:22: But whatever the result of that may be, whether it's an honest result or dishonesty was done that swayed the decision of the election, we do not lose the confidence that we have in Christ, who reigns now, who is coming back again.
38:42: He will judge the living and the dead. And it's in the knowledge of this that we have taken hold of the gospel of Christ.
38:51: We have come to faith and believe. And we desire that others would believe in this gospel message as well so that they would not perish by the death of the body and then by the judgment of the soul before the throne of God.
39:06: But we know that we have fellowship with God and everlasting life with him in a place where there will be no more evil.
39:13: There will be no more tyranny. There will be not even the threat of your freedoms being taken away because whoever is set free in Christ is free indeed.
39:26: He has declared it. He secures it. And it is promised. We have it in Christ.
39:33: You have it now. And then our faith becomes sight forever in glory with God when we will dwell in that perfect and perishable kingdom with him.
39:42: For now we toil, we struggle. We will face persecution.
39:49: We will face tribulation. But Jesus said to his disciples, take heart,
39:54: I have overcome the world. Verse 21, From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and the scribes and be killed and on the third day be raised.
40:08: And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him and say, Look at this. This is the guy who just aced the test a few verses before.
40:17: Who do you say that I am? You are the Christ, the son of the living God. Blessed are you, Simon Barjona.
40:24: And now when Jesus says that he's going to go and suffer many things because that's what the scriptures prophesied about him.
40:30: This is what he came to accomplish. This was even foreordained by the predestined plan of God as Peter will later go on to preach in Acts chapter 2 but we're not to that Peter yet.
40:45: Right now Peter takes Jesus aside and he begins to rebuke him saying, Far be it from you, Lord, no, to go to Jerusalem and suffer and die.
40:53: This shall never happen to you. But Jesus turned to him and said to Peter, Get behind me,
40:59: Satan. You do really good on Sunday school tests, but you're not doing so great right now.
41:06: You are a hindrance to me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.
41:13: Remember what I said earlier from Martin Lloyd -Jones that the heretics are not people who are like scheming behind the scenes and then they come out and present one thing, but in the meantime, they're like these liars and they're attempting to lead you in this alternate scheme that they have that's going to tear down the church, okay?
41:29: The heretics were always well -intentioned men. Peter right here is being a heretic and he has really good intentions.
41:40: He does not want to see his master suffer and die. Far be it from you,
41:46: Lord, to go and die. If I were in the place of Jesus, I'm not, and praise be to everybody that I'm not in that place.
41:55: But if I were there, I would have responded to Peter. Peter, did you not hear what I just said? I'm going to rise on the third day, man.
42:02: Did your ears stop working after I got to the part where I said I'm going to suffer and die? I said I'm coming back to life.
42:07: But Peter, with really good intentions, really bad doctrine, said, far be it from you,
42:17: Lord, if Peter would have had his way in that moment, none of us would be saved. And so Jesus, we know that God is love, right?
42:28: Amen? God is love. 1 John 4, Jesus says in love to Peter and in love for us, get behind me,
42:43: Satan. You are a hindrance to me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.
42:54: So our mind should go back to, beware the leaven of the
43:00: Pharisees and the Sadducees. Our mind goes back to, beware those who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
43:11: There are those who are well -intentioned men who are going to teach you things that appeal to your flesh, but the way of their doctrine is death and not life.
43:22: Peter needed to be rebuked here, out of love for Peter's soul and out of love for ours as well.
43:33: Jesus said he taught exactly what was going to happen and Peter rejected it.
43:40: At least in this moment, praise be to God, he was convicted of this sin and he was certainly turned around, certainly came to know the truth and believed and proclaimed the truth.
43:52: And we're sitting here today because Peter proclaimed the truth. But Peter had set his mind on the things of man and not the things of God.
44:00: May we be careful of this, not to be driven by the passions of our flesh, by emotion and other such things, but we fix ourselves upon Christ and we listen to his word.
44:12: Peter's ears stopped working at one point there. I'm going to suffer many things. No, but I'm coming back again.
44:20: May we desire to know the whole counsel of God and leave no part of it out, not just the parts we like, not just the parts that shock us, but everything that is proclaimed in his word.
44:33: Let's finish up chapter 16. Jesus told his disciples, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.
44:41: And again, this is right on the cusp of Peter speaking from his flesh rather than speaking according to the word of God.
44:49: Deny himself, take up a cross and follow after me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
44:58: For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?
45:06: For the son of man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his father, and he will repay each person according to what he has done.
45:14: Truly I say to you, there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the son of man coming in his kingdom.
45:21: What was Jesus talking about there? The transfiguration, which we read about next week in Matthew chapter 17.
45:28: But in the meantime, we bring this to a close here with Jesus charging his disciples and saying the same to us.
45:35: If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up a cross and follow me.
45:41: Die to yourself, die to your own sins and passions and pleasures and worldliness and desire to live in the godliness and righteousness of Jesus Christ, our
45:52: Lord. Jesus, who left his throne in heaven, who took on flesh and dwelt among us, who lived a perfect life for us, who died for us, who was buried, rose again, conquering death itself so that whoever believes in him will have everlasting life.
46:11: And our sins will be forgiven and we will receive the righteousness of Christ and walk in that righteousness.
46:18: This body that was broken for us and the blood that was spilled for the forgiveness of sins. We remember this sacrifice as we come to this table this morning and partake of the body and the blood that were given for us.
46:44: What a fellowship, what a joy divine, leaning on the everlasting arms.
46:57: What a blessedness, what a peace divine, leaning on the everlasting arms.
47:09: Leaning, leaning, safe and secure.
47:20: Leaning, leaning, leaning on the arms from day to day.
47:52: Leaning on the everlasting arms.
48:02: Leaning, leaning, leaning on the arms from day to day.
48:22: What have I to dread? What have I to fear?
48:29: Leaning on the everlasting arms.
48:35: I have blessed peace with my
48:40: Lord so near, Leaning on the everlasting arms.
48:48: Lear, Jesus, Lear, Jesus, Safe and secure from all alarms.
49:01: Lear, Jesus, Lear, Jesus, Leaning on the everlasting arms.
49:16: Thank you for listening to our weekly sermon presented by First Southern Baptist Church of Junction City, Kansas.
49:22: For more information about our church, visit fsbcjc .org.
49:28: On behalf of our church family, my name is Becky, inviting you to join us again this week, Growing Together in Christ…when we understand the text.