Satan's Will Vs. God's Will Matthew 12:43-50

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If you live long enough, you have experienced false advertisement.
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You buy a car, but the car has problems that you are unaware of.
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The owner of the car is left with buyer's remorse. You book a vacation only to find out that it was not the vacation that you were sold.
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A number of years ago, a friend of mine rented a cabin on the north shore of Lake Superior. The cabin was sold as a great place to stay in a pristine location.
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Once they arrived, part of the cabin was still under construction. Sometimes you do not receive what you thought you were getting.
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It's always this way with people as well. People can put on a face, but the question is, who is the person really?
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Sometimes one can be completely different in private than in public. And we all know what high character is.
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It is delightful to be around someone with high character. But what if this high character is really an illusion and not really the case?
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People can have character in a superficial sense. But true character runs deep.
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True character flows from a heart that has a deep love for God. But we can also be fooled by character.
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We may think people have it when they don't. We may think people belong to God when they don't.
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This morning, we are going to see Jesus address this. Some who appear to have character are in fact doing not
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God's will, but the devil's will. While others truly have
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God ruling their lives. So as we continue our sermon series through Matthew this morning, I encourage you to turn in a
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Bible with me to Matthew 12. We'll be looking at verses 43 -50.
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And if you're using one of those red Bibles in the pews, it's on page 972. This sermon is titled,
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Satan's Will vs. God's Will. I'm going to begin by reading the text this morning.
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These are the words of Jesus. When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places, seeking rest, but finds none.
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Then it says, I will return to my house from which I came, and when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order.
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Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there.
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And the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.
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While he was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brother stood outside, asking to speak to him.
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But he replied to the man who told him, Who is my mother and who are my brothers? And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said,
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Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my
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Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.
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Here's our big idea. Do not be fooled by the appearance of righteousness.
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Do not be fooled by the appearance of righteousness. And we're going to see two reasons why in this text.
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But before we jump in, let me give you a little recap of where we were one week ago. We looked at the continued confrontation between Jesus and the
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Jewish leaders. The corrupt Jewish leaders asked Jesus for a sign.
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Now this question was odd since Jesus had already done numerous signs in their presence.
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But according to Jewish tradition, the Messiah was going to be able to do something miraculous from heaven.
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Like an eclipse or stopping the rotation of the earth on a dime.
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So they put Jesus on the spot. But Jesus said no. He told them no, not because he couldn't do it.
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He most certainly could. He told them no because he knew their hardness of heart. He knew that no sign from heaven would change their minds.
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They already had enough information, but their hearts became more and more hardened. Jesus refused to do a sign from heaven, but he did tell them that a sign would be given to them.
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And that is the sign of Jonah. What we learned is there are prophecies in the
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Old Testament that give a picture of the future Messiah and his work. Just as Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of a whale,
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Jesus spent three days and three nights in the earth. Just as Jonah was spit out of the whale on the third day,
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Jesus came out of the tomb on the third day. Just as Nineveh listened to the preaching of the prophet
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Jonah, people needed to listen to the preaching of the greatest prophet, the
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Messiah, Jesus. The sign of Jonah that Jesus spoke of was the
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Gospel. And it is the Gospel. This is the only sign that people need to believe.
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And if you don't believe the revelation given by God, then you won't believe from any other sign that is given to you.
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Now, this leads us to our text this morning. Let's begin by reading verses 43 through 45.
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We already looked at this, but let's look at this again. We're going to zero in on these three verses to start. When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places, seeking rest, but it finds none.
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Then it says, I will return to my house from which I came. And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order.
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Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself. And they enter and dwell there.
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And the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also it will be with this evil generation.
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The first question we need to ask is what is an unclean spirit? And the answer is obvious, right?
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It is a demon. Revelation 12 -4 tells us that very early on in the history of the world, there was this rebellion in heaven where one -third of the angels rebelled against God.
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They are called unclean because they are evil. Anything that is unclean in Scripture is unholy.
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It is sinful. There was also another rebellion, and that came, of course, from humans.
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God graciously has a redemption plan for humans through Jesus Christ. But He does not have one for angels.
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They are doomed forever. What Jesus is doing in these verses is telling an illustration about these unclean spirits, these demons.
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But why does He tell us this illustration in this place? It almost seems kind of out of order. We must understand everything in its context.
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We saw last week that Jesus told the scribes and Pharisees that the Gentile city of Nineveh and the
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Gentile person, the Queen of Sheba, put to shame the rebellious
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Jews of His day. Last week we saw Jesus call them an evil and adulterous generation in verse 39.
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He uses the same phrase in verse 45. So we know that as He tells this illustration,
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He has the scribes and Pharisees and all the Jewish leaders in mind, but not just them, but also any
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Jew that has plunged him or herself into this idolatry, committing spiritual adultery against God.
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What we saw last week is that the Jews were a little different from their forefathers, but really not.
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Their forefathers worshipped the false gods of the nations. They worshipped gods like Baal and Molech, and they set up these metal images to represent these false gods.
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And what God did is He judged them. And He judged them by sending the Assyrians first, and then the
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Babylonians. They pillaged Jerusalem, they pillaged Israel, and took them into captivity.
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After captivity, when Israel was brought back to the land, they put away the metal images that represented these false gods.
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But as I mentioned last week, they replaced these idols with new idols.
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And the new idol was the corrupt, false Jewish system, their religious practices.
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They added laws that God never gave, and it became a works righteousness system.
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This is what men do when they're given religion and they want to do their own thing. And even though they put away the metal images turning from these false gods, they still worshipped a false god.
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They're man -made religion. So they were very much like their forefathers. As Jesus says in verse 45, they were an evil and adulterous generation.
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So what do the corrupt Jewish people in their self -righteous system have to do with this illustration that Jesus is giving about demons?
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What Jesus says about Satan and demons is very interesting. What Jesus explains is that when a demon leaves a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest.
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But as we look at this, you may wonder, why does a demon leave someone in the first place? And what is this rest that it seeks?
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Verse 44 tells us why the demon left. When Jesus mentions house in this illustration, the house is referring to the human body.
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The text that tells us that this house or body that he left became empty, swept, and put in order.
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That's how it describes this body. It became empty because the demon left the body.
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And the reason it left the body is because the body was swept clean and put in order.
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So what does swept mean and what does put in order mean? The demon left because something morally positive happened to the person.
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And this moral change caused the demon to leave.
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It may have been that the demon was cast out or the person it was occupying through sheer will stopped committing the sin that the demon used to have control over one's life.
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Imagine someone who is engulfed in witchcraft and stops practicing it. Or someone is enslaved by alcohol and quits drinking.
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The demon used sins like these to control the person and as long as the person is not committing that sin, the demon becomes frustrated and goes somewhere else to try to find someone else or somewhere else to find rest.
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Looking for another human. This tells us the rest that the demon is seeking in verse 43.
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This is interesting. This demon and all the demons would rather occupy a human, also known as demon possession, than be on the move as a spirit being.
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Just listening to Satan and going to and fro on the earth. There are demons all over the world right now.
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Some roam freely while others occupy the lives of humans. We are given indication that they prefer occupying people from a story we have already seen in Matthew.
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In Matthew 8 verses 28 -34, a man was possessed by a legion of demons. Before Jesus cast them out, they asked him if they could occupy pigs instead of being thrown into the lake of fire in that moment.
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Jesus granted their request and we know how the story goes. The legion of demons possessed about 2 ,000 pigs.
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They ran them down the hill and drowned them. They don't just want to roam.
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They want to occupy something because they cause more damage that way.
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But what they want to control more than anything is not animals. They want to control humans.
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They want to control the only creation created in the image of God.
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We alone are created in God's image. So this is where they spend their time. If they are not possessing and controlling a human life, they feel second class.
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And this is good for us to know. This wicked competition among demons to destroy human lives.
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And Satan is their general, giving them instructions. We need to be reminded of the unseen war.
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The war that's going on around us. The war that's going on in this room right now. God wants you to hear what this passage is saying.
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Satan doesn't want you to hear it, so pay close attention. Demons very much control the lives of unbelievers and they also have some influence over believers.
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But I want to make an important point here. Demons cannot possess a
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Christian. 2 Corinthians 6 .14 says, What partnership has righteousness with lawlessness?
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Or what fellowship has light with darkness? And the answer is obvious. None. Darkness and light cannot live in the same place.
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If the Spirit of God resides in a person, then a demon cannot. It's that simple.
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The best way to cast a demon out is to share the Gospel. Once the
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Holy Spirit enters, a demon will never be able to return and cause the havoc he once caused.
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Judas was possessed by Satan and he betrayed Jesus. The other disciples who were true disciples could not be possessed, but like any believer, they could be influenced.
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Their abandonment of Jesus for a short time may have been
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Satan's influence that they eventually overcame with God's help. This cowardice, lack of courage, saying we don't want anything to do with this guy.
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We care more about what the world thinks, so we're going to run from him. But demons dominate the lives of unbelievers.
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Some more than others. And any unbeliever is free reign for one to be possessed.
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This is a frightening reality. We see so much evil in the world and we know why.
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Satan controls the lives of many. He controls the lives of the wicked leaders in our country and in our world right now.
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They are doing his will and it's very obvious. Look at the policies that are put forth. You're thinking, okay, this is the exact opposite of right.
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Well, I wonder why. Who's running the show? And when we think of demon possession, the worst images come to mind.
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Someone foaming from the mouth. A voice coming out of a human. That's not the person's voice.
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The secular world doesn't know what to do with it. They write it off as a psychological issue.
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But all they need to do is read the Bible to find out what is really going on. No medication will help.
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No psychotherapy. But only the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the only remedy that will permanently free one from Satan's complete control.
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This grip that he has on the unbeliever. But even though demon possession happens, demonic control over the life of an unbeliever is more frequently subtle.
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It's subtle because the person looks normal. But Satan rules the life of the unbeliever.
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What Satan and his demons tell the person, the person does. 1 John 5 .19
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says that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. Unbelievers are clenched in his hand and they can't escape, but by the grace of God in Jesus Christ.
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Demons live to control humans and they love to occupy them. They find joy in it.
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This deep control over a human is the rest that they seek. But how is it rest?
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We know from our own experience that evil people get pleasure out of hurting others. It is a twisted pleasure.
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We see this in the political arena all the time. Evil politicians get a twisted pleasure out of making their political enemies pay.
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They wake up in the morning wanting to destroy their enemies and won't be happy until they do.
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Ordinary people do this as well. It is sadly common for a person to want bad things to happen to another.
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People get a twisted pleasure out of this. And Christians can even do this. And if we hope bad things on others and are happy when something bad happens to someone else, we need to confess our sins.
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That's evil. Now, we should want justice when there is evil and there is a satisfaction in it.
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However, we should also grieve that the person ended up in this place in the first place.
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This is how God operates with His justice. In Ezekiel 33 .11, it says that He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but He certainly is satisfied with His justice over the wicked.
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But the twisted pleasure this demon had, he could no longer enjoy.
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Remember, verse 44 says that the human became swept and put in order. There was a cleansing, a moral reformation of some kind, and the person appeared to be on a better path.
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He became clean, as they say. But this was not a deep, lasting reformation.
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A deep, lasting reformation only comes from one place. As one commentator said, the problem with people is not just that they commit sins.
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Their problem is that they are enslaved to sin. What is needed, therefore, is a new power to break in and set people free from sin.
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A power found in and only in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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But the man that Jesus describes in this illustration has not experienced the power of the
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Gospel. The Holy Spirit does not occupy him. So this means that Satan still has control over him in some measure.
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The change in him is only superficial, not deep and lasting. Since there is no real change, the demon can come back at a later time.
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What Jesus is explaining in this illustration is the danger of superficial, moral reform in a person's life.
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We see this in our society. Think of all those self -help books. Think of organizations like Alcoholics Anonymous, which can be used for good, but if we just stop there and don't go to the
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Gospel, there's not going to be deep, true, lasting change. And we should celebrate when one quits drinking, quits smoking, quits pornography, quits gambling, quits impulsive shopping.
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But even if the person never goes back to the harmful sin, Satan still has control over the one who does not have a relationship with Christ.
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We must understand that. Many unbelievers enslaved by sin such as these know they have a big problem.
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It is ruling their life. It affects their family life, work life, social life, financial life.
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So this leads some to openly admit this and try to get better.
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But what the Word of God makes clear is that the only true, deep, lasting change comes through Jesus as the
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Spirit gives you a new power to defeat sin. Satan is okay with superficial reform.
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In fact, he prefers it over the deep bondage.
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Interesting, huh? According to this text, that's what it's saying. Do you want to know why? He prefers it because he still has the person in the tight grip of his hand.
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Jesus says this new reform, spiritually speaking, is worse for the person than where he was.
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Why is this? This is so because one who is enslaved to a taboo sin like alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling, excessive hoarding, knows they have a problem.
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And many feel guilt. But they're not willing to give up their idol and follow Christ. But they feel guilt.
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They're somewhat close. Satan and his demons have control over these people's lives.
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But these people are more likely to turn to Christ. There's a big prison ministry.
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I know Mark worked in the prison ministry. A lot of people there come to Christ. And some put on a show,
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I understand that. But there are true, genuine conversions that take place there because they know how guilty they are.
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Some of them do, right? Some of them try to justify it. I know that. But some of them do. But, think about the one who has morally improved their life and looks outwardly good, but this person is further from following God and in fact tighter in the grip of Satan.
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After leaving, the demon does not occupy the person because of this superficial moral reformation.
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And then Jesus says this in verse 45, Then the demon goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there.
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And the last state of that person is worse than the first. So the demon leaves because of superficial reform in the person's life, but realizes no lasting change has taken place.
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The demon did not find a home anywhere else. So what does the demon do? It returns to its former home.
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Its former human that it occupied. And what we learn from Jesus is that the self -righteous person who was once guilt -ridden is fertile ground for a demon to dominate one's life.
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It used to be that one demon ruled this person's life, but now seven more do. We know where Jesus is going with this illustration.
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He compares the Jewish nation to this. The self -righteous were further from God than the drunkards, gluttons, tax collectors, and prostitutes.
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In John 8 .44, Jesus said of the self -righteous Jews, You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires.
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Jesus hung out with the ones who wore sin on their sleeves. That's where He spent a lot of time.
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If Jesus were here, He'd hang out at KJ's. To be honest, He wouldn't want to hang out with the outwardly religious people.
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It's much harder to reach the self -righteous who don't know Christ. The outwardly moral.
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In Luke 5 .32, Jesus said, I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.
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The ones who realize their sin and realize how much they need
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Him. And without Him, they're on their way to hell. So beware of moral reform.
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The person who is outwardly moral but does not have Christ is very much under the control of Satan.
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These are the people that are the hardest to reach because Satan has this person very much under his control.
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He has a tighter grip on them than even the drunkards, the tax collectors, the prostitutes, the gamblers, the people who are enslaved to cigarettes and gambling.
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And this is counterintuitive to how we think. We think the person who has their house swept and put in order is the one who's closer.
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And Jesus is saying, nope. This person is dangerous because they don't realize how much they need
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Christ. They're relying on their own righteousness. And that's dangerous.
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So beware of the religious person who thinks they're good. This is counterintuitive to how we think, but Jesus tells us that right here and the
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Bible always must correct the way we think. Do not be fooled by the appearance of righteousness.
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The first reason why is that the falsely righteous are in the clenched hand of the devil.
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And here's the second reason why we are not to be fooled by the appearance of righteousness. And that is this. This one is more positive.
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Much more positive. The truly righteous are in the clenched hand of Christ.
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Verses 48 -50. Let's look at verses 46 -50.
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While he was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brother stood outside asking to speak to him.
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But he replied to the man who told him, Who is my mother and who are my brothers? And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said,
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Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.
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The illustration about demons that we just saw Jesus explain was heard by a crowd as verse 46 tells us.
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Jesus was inside when he gave the illustration and his biological family is outside.
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And they want to speak to him. We don't know exactly why they wanted to speak to him, but what we know is that what they are going to tell
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Jesus rubs him the wrong way. And we see that from how he minimizes them, his biological family, and lifts up his spiritual family in verses 48 -50.
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Jesus' family is likely afraid for his safety. We see
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Jesus. He doesn't mince words. He doesn't pull punches. He's very frank. He's not willing to call out corruption.
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He's not willing to call out the people who can put him to death. And as this is happening, his family very well may have been concerned about his safety.
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Tone down the rhetoric. You're going to get yourself killed. And we know how the story finishes.
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Jesus is on a mission. His eyes are set on the cross. But his family doesn't care about that.
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They just want him to be safe. Tuck him in at bed at night. Give him milk and cookies.
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Keep him safe. Stay out of the limelight. At this point, his family, with the exception of Mary, who rejoiced at the birth of her son, the
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Messiah, the others were not believers. Not at this point. John 5 -5 tells us that they were not yet believers during his ministry.
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So beware of what unbelievers say to you. So as we realize that his family largely are not believers at this point, what do unbelievers care about?
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What I've already said. They care about earthly things. Not heavenly. They don't care about the age to come.
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But only the here and now. We saw this on full display, by the way, in 2020 and even in 2021 with COVID -19.
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Many in the government and medical community did not see the value of people's soul, their mental health, their spiritual health, but only their physical health.
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The prevailing thought was let's keep people locked, isolated to stop the spread. But what was missing is the fact that long -term isolation can be very damaging to people.
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The amount of depression reported in 2020 is off the charts. Now, there are common -sense health measures that should have been done, and many did those things, which is great.
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But the excessiveness of what was done shows where the priorities are. Physical health is greatly valued, while spiritual health is optional.
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Well, if it helps someone, right? That's okay. People need this. And if they don't have it, they're going to be deprived.
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And bad things are going to happen. In our text,
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Jesus' family wants Him to tone it down so that no physical harm will happen to Him.
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They're not thinking about spiritual health. They're not thinking about the age to come. But this irks
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Jesus. What His family says to Him is like a family member telling someone not to go on the mission field because it's too risky.
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But what about God's will for the person's life? Is that a consideration? Before I came here, we had family members that cared much more about our physical needs being met than the will of God for our family in bringing us to Eureka Baptist.
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There was some risk involved, but we knew God was leading us here.
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And look how God has graciously provided. If you follow
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Him, He will take care of you. And as Jesus is irked by His family members, this gives
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Jesus an opportunity to make a point about who He truly cares about the most.
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He asks the question, who is my family? There were people in His midst who were saved, who were truly
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His disciples as v. 49 calls them. This is not necessarily the twelve who were probably present, but also many others who had believed in Him who were called disciples.
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And what Jesus says in the second half of v. 49 is this, here are My mother and My brothers.
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Then Jesus says in v. 50 how it is that we can tell someone it is truly family, truly spiritual family in Him.
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Where the deepest relationship is, He says, whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is
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My brother and sister and mother. Jesus is very clear here.
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And this would have been offensive to His biological family. But Jesus is not afraid to offend people if He needs to.
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What Jesus wants everyone to know, those listening as He spoke, His biological family, and everyone in this room, what
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He wants everyone to know is that spiritual family must be more important for the
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Christian than biological family who do not belong to God. So it's nice when you get both.
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If you have biological family that are saved, you can have that deep relationship. But what He's saying is that spiritual family is more important than biological family.
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Anyone who does not belong to Christ belongs to Satan. And you cannot have sweet, rich, intimate fellowship with one who lives under the power of the evil one.
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At best, your relationship is superficial. And there still will be some relationship. It's family. You love your family.
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But at best, it can be superficial. But the ones who you should be closest to are those who belong to God's family.
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Those, as verse 50 says, who do the will of the Father. Now in our neck of the woods, family is very tight.
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We have a lot of people related in this church. When I moved here, I couldn't believe how many people were related.
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And new blood was coming into the place when we came here. And this is a good thing.
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But it's important to hear Jesus' words here. If you have unbelieving family, your bond is deeper with your church family than your biological.
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So the question is, are we pursuing relationships with the ones that Jesus says we can go much deeper with?
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With the only ones where you can have deep, sweet, intimate fellowship?
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It is with true Christians where true family is.
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Where God is your Father and we are brothers and sisters in Christ.
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This people, this family, is eternal. Think about that.
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There's people you've never met all over the world, all over the country who are Christians. And in heaven someday, you're going to be great friends.
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You're going to be family. And you haven't even met them yet. But you're going to have this deep, intimate, sweet, eternal friendship because of Jesus Christ.
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Those who do God's will are in Jesus' family and God has a grip so tight on His people that it cannot be loosened.
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In the previous point, we saw people who aren't in His family. They're in the devil's family doing the devil's will.
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But here we see His family who do the Father's will. And Jesus has a tight grip on these people.
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Jesus says this about His brothers and sisters in John 10. Verses 27 -28, He says,
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My sheep hear My voice. I know them and they follow Me. I give them eternal life and they will never perish.
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And no one will snatch them out of My hand. Isn't that wonderful?
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This tight grip that Jesus has on you as a
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Christian. Think about your parents as you're growing up. Your child is falling and your parent grabs your hand and nothing would ever remove that grip from the parent to the child's hand.
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I had an occasion like that a couple weeks ago. Isaiah, before we put the nets on the new playground,
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Isaiah was walking across the bridge and I caused the problem because we were playing a game and I reached for him and I kind of bumped him and he was falling off.
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You know, a two -year -old falling off, that's kind of a serious thing. And I reached out and I grabbed him and I was just holding him and there were people with us and eventually they had to grab him.
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But I wasn't going to let him go. There was no way I was going to. So I caused the problem and by God's grace,
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I was able to help him. Thankfully, there's nets there now. But my point is, the grip is tight.
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Satan can never open that hand. And think about how wonderful this is. No one can snatch a child of God out of Christ's hand.
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Not Satan, not the world, not even you. And I think that's the biggest threat of all.
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The Come Thou Home song, prone to wander. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love.
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Isn't that true? But if you're His, it's not going to happen. One day, my family was out at Gordie and Barb's house and Gordie, a number of years ago, built a cabin for Barb where she does a lot of her writing.
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And I remember we walked out there and she had a sign on the wall that said,
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I'll spoil the ending. It ends good. That's pretty much what it says. And I've ever seen that thinking, okay, that's how it ends for the believer.
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Think of the war we're in with our own flesh, with Satan. But if you're
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His, the grip will never be loosened. He will always have you. It'll end good.
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It'll end in heaven. Again, the truth is sweet. His tight grip remains forever for His family.
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So do not be fooled by the appearance of righteousness. We've seen two reasons why in this text.
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The first reason why is that the falsely righteous, the ones who do the devil's will, even if it looks good, but are not following God, they are in the clenched hand of the devil.
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The second why we are not to be fooled by the appearance of righteousness is that the truly righteous are in the clenched hand of Christ.
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We need to be able to discern true righteousness from false righteousness in our own lives and in the lives of others.
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Discern the spirits. So hear these words, Eureka Baptist. May we all truly follow
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Him. May we all recognize apparent righteousness, which is really demonic, from true righteousness, which is godly.
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Now next Sunday, we are going to look at one of the most fascinating parables that Jesus gives.
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And you know what? As I say this, this is two weeks from today. Two weeks from today, we're going to see the parable of the sower, the four seeds, where every person is one of these four seeds.
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So that'll be very interesting to look at. Next Sunday, we have the anniversary, of course, and it'll be a different sermon for that celebration.
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But at this time, let's bow our heads in prayer. Father in Heaven, I thank
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You that You've shown us the true way of righteousness that only comes through Jesus Christ through the indwelling power of the
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Holy Spirit. And may this power, Lord, be clearly seen in our lives at this church.
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Lord, we want to see wonderful things happen in our homes, in our community, and this is going to happen through the
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Spirit's work in each of our lives. And so, we pray for that. Help us to be able to discern true righteousness from false righteousness.
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Thank You, Lord, for saving everyone here who knows Jesus Christ as their
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Lord, Savior, and Treasure. Delivering us from the grip of the devil to the clenched hand of Jesus Christ.