WWUTT 2448 Faith of a Mustard Seed (Luke 17:5-10)

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Jesus said to his disciples with faith like a mustard seed. You can tell this mulberry tree, uproot yourself, be thrown into the sea and it will be done for you.

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We reference this faith of a mustard seed thing a lot, but what does it mean when we understand the text?

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This is When We Understand The Text, a daily study in the word of Christ for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness.

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Find all our videos and other ministry resources at www .tt .com.

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Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. In our study of the gospel of Luke, we're back to chapter 17, where Jesus has been warning his disciples about temptation, encouraging them in their faith and reminding them to be humble.

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So let me read the section again, verses one through 10. Hear the word of the Lord. And he said to his disciples, temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come.

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It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin.

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Pay attention to yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him. And if he repents, forgive him.

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And if he sins against you seven times in the day and turns to you seven times saying,

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I repent, you must forgive him. The apostles said to the Lord, increase our faith.

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And the Lord said, if you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, be uprooted and planted in the sea and it would obey you.

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Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, come at once and recline at table.

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Will he not rather say to him, prepare supper for me and dress properly and serve me while I eat and drink.

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And afterwards you will eat and drink. Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded?

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So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded say, we are unworthy servants.

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We have only done what was our duty. Yesterday, we looked at that first section where Jesus warns the disciples about sin.

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Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come.

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And he instructs his disciples to look out for each other and even to rebuke a brother if you see that brother walking in sin.

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Some of you may know that I've been teaching a Bible class at a Christian school. And right here at the very beginning of the school year, what

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I've been teaching them about is how to read their Bible. And I've been giving them tools that they can use to properly understand a passage, reading what's around it, looking at it in context, things like that.

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And then we've exercised those rules and those tools. So I've given them various Bible passages and I've said to them, okay, using the tools that I gave you tell me what this passage means.

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One of those passages we looked at was Matthew 7, 1. In fact, before coming into Matthew 7, 1,

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I asked them, let's say you correct somebody on their sin. You see somebody doing something wrong and you say to them, hey, that's wrong.

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You need to repent or you need to apologize to that person for what you did. What are they very likely to throw back at you?

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What Bible verse, if they're not gonna receive your rebuke, what are they gonna say to you in response?

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And the class was very good at replying, judge not. I think some of them had some experience in that before.

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So they said, yeah, they're probably gonna respond by saying judge not. And I said, okay, what verse is that? And a couple of them knew it was

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Matthew 7, 1. So we went to that verse and read around it, read more of the context of the passage to understand that that verse is not telling you not to judge at all, but rather don't judge hypocritically.

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Hypocrisy is really the lesson that Jesus is driving at. When he tells his disciples, judge not lest you be judged for the measure that you use on somebody else, that's the measure that is gonna be used against you.

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But it goes on in that passage to say, if you're trying to remove the splinter out of your brother's eye, when you have a log in your own eye, you're a hypocrite.

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You first need to take the log out of your eye and then take the speck out of your brother's eye.

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So in this way, Jesus is actually instructing his disciples to judge. First take care of the log in your eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

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It's just that we should not be judging hypocritically. So I took them to this passage in Luke 17, knowing that I had recently prepared a lesson in this particular passage for the podcast.

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And I said, let's read this. Somebody read this aloud, and they did. And I said, do you see here how Jesus is directly telling his disciples to rebuke someone who is in sin?

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So does judge not mean that we should never judge? And they all agreed, no.

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So understanding those things in context and seeing that we do have a responsibility to one another, that when we see somebody in sin, to correct them on that.

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Another word that the Bible uses for this is admonish. And that word admonish means to correct with goodwill.

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So we have good intentions when we correct somebody, not to Lord ourselves over them, not to seem holier than thou, but because we care for this brother and sister in the

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Lord, and we want to see them walk in those ways that are pleasing to God, as we all should.

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So the disciples respond to this lesson by saying in verse five, increase our faith.

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And Jesus says to them, if you had faith like a grain of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, be uprooted and planted in the sea and it would obey you.

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Now, you know that you've seen something like this before. It's in Matthew chapter 17, verse 20.

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So a parallel passage. We're in Luke 17 here. You go to Matthew 17 and you see the same thing with faith of a mustard seed, but Jesus says that you'll be able to do something else.

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What is it? You can say to this mountain, be thrown into the sea and it will be done so.

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Here it's a mulberry tree. The likelihood is that where they were sitting is where Jesus would draw his examples from.

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So they're probably in a place where he's referencing a mulberry tree that's right there. In the context of Matthew 17, he's in a place where he can reference a mountain.

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So if you have faith, you could say to this mountain, be thrown into the sea and it will happen.

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Or you can say to this mulberry tree, be uprooted. And this is the response that he gives to the disciples saying, increase our faith.

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Jesus says, you just need faith the size of a grain of a mustard seed.

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Now, what does that mean? We talk about that. We use that a lot. You might've even had a little necklace or a key chain at some point.

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I had this on a key chain once. It was a little silver medallion and it had a mustard seed right in the middle that was kind of encased in plastic or resin or something like that.

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And then it had the reference to Matthew 17 around it. With faith of a mustard seed, we can move mountains.

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So we make references like this a lot, but what exactly does this mean? Very simply,

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Jesus is saying that the size of your faith is not the issue. It's that you have faith.

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Even with a little bit of faith, the presence of faith, if it's there, can still accomplish incredible things.

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Now, are we to grow in our faith? Certainly. Yes, we all must grow, but it's not something that fluctuates up and down as though the disciples could have requested of the

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Lord here. Make our faith more. Well, that's something that needed to happen for them in the process of their sanctification.

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So Jesus wasn't going to make them immediately mature at this point. They needed to trust the plan of God, look to Christ in all things, grow as they experience life as a

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Christian, keeping their eyes on Jesus. Remember that's the lesson when Jesus was walking out to his disciples on the water and Peter said,

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Lord, let me come out to you. And so he steps out of the boat and he starts walking, but it says when he saw the wind and the waves, he got scared and he began to sink.

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What was Jesus' reply to Peter when that happened? Oh, you of what faith?

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Little faith. Why do you doubt? Now the doubting indicates no faith, that the presence of faith isn't there.

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Now it's not that Peter was suddenly an unbeliever at that point, but he took his eyes off Jesus. He wasn't looking at Christ.

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And we can have those occasions when even in our Christian walk, we may enter into some sort of scenario or circumstance and man, we just feel so helpless.

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If we feel hopeless in the midst of this situation, that we may take our eyes off Christ.

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We might wonder, is God really here with me in the midst of this situation? Or I am suffering so much.

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I just don't see him. I don't know where he is. And we might begin to doubt. And the presence of doubt is going to indicate an absence of faith.

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That does not mean that you've become an unbeliever, but it just means that action or the activity of faith in your life isn't there.

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We need to continually be keeping our eyes on Jesus. So even with the presence of a small amount of faith, great things can be accomplished.

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Now, the Lord ultimately is the one who assigns the measure of faith that we have.

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We read this in Romans 12, three. For by the grace given to me,

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I say to everyone among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.

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So it is good for us to ask the Lord that he would increase our faith, but that's not something that happens momentarily.

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That is something that the Lord is going to do for us as we walk and therefore grow.

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A plant or a small seed rather, doesn't immediately become a big tree. It takes time.

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And so the same is for us as we are growing in this faith, that growth takes some time.

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James even says in James chapter one, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives generously to all without reproach and it will be given to him.

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So Jesus doesn't tell his disciples here in Luke 17 that he's not going to increase their faith.

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He goes, no, no, no, no, no. You don't understand. It's not how faith works, but really gives them the lesson that it's the presence of faith that matters.

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So when you're looking to yourself, believe, trust, right?

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And again, this goes back to the instruction he gave to his disciples a couple of verses earlier in verse three, pay attention to yourselves.

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So what is your responsibility in the midst of any circumstance? Trust God, look to Jesus, keep your eyes on him.

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And with that amount of faith, great things can happen. There will indeed be growth that will happen in the disciples' life.

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But for now, the encouragement to them is to believe, trust, have hope, hold on.

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So we go on from there where Jesus talks about them being servants and reminding them to be humble servants.

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We go on to verse seven. Will any of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, come at once and recline at table?

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Will he not rather say to him, prepare supper for me and dress properly and serve me while I eat and drink and afterward you will eat and drink?

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So what's the point here? The servant is doing his job. The servant is being a servant. And just because he has fulfilled a certain purpose of the day, that doesn't mean he's suddenly done.

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When he comes in from the field, well, now he's got other duties that he needs to attend to. He's got to attend to his master so that his master may eat and drink.

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And then after all of that is taken care of, then the servant can eat and drink. So then

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Jesus says in verse nine, does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded?

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So observe that dynamic that existed in the world at that time between a master and his slave.

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Does a master say to the slave, thank you, whenever the slave does something for him? No, because that's what the slave is supposed to do.

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He's doing his job. Now understand that Jesus is not saying that we have permission to be rude.

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If somebody does something for you, that you shouldn't say thank you to them or something like that.

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Or if you're making your kids do their chores, kids are supposed to do their chores.

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So you're not going to get a thank you from me for that. You're doing the job you're supposed to do. That's probably a lesson they need to learn anyway, but it's still good and polite teaching your children good manners in that sense to tell your child, thank you.

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Thank you for getting that job done. When any of my kids don't get their chores done, they don't get a thank you from me.

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They get told you didn't get your chores done. So there's going to be consequences for that. And here's the penalty that you're going to get today.

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But if they do their chores and they get them done and they do well, I will thank them for that.

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And I will congratulate them for it. In fact, we've heard previously, this was of course the parable of the talents in Matthew chapter 25, but we've heard

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Jesus say to his slaves, to his servants, well done, good and faithful servants.

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Like the master saying, thank you. Not that I needed something and you gave it to me. That's kind of what's implied whenever we say thank you to somebody, but we will hear a congratulations from our master.

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Well done. You did a good job, good and faithful slave.

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Now great is your reward. So that's what we want to hear our master say when we enter into glory.

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Jesus is just using an illustration here that the servant has duties that he needs to do. He shouldn't be doing those things, expecting that he's obligating the master to have to give him anything.

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Like the slave is not doing something to receive something from his master. I've done all this, so you're obligated to do this for me.

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No, the obligation is on the slave to do his job because he is his master's property.

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And so we don't do what we do to obligate God to have to give something to us.

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As the apostle Paul said in Acts chapter 17, God does not dwell in places that are built by human hands as though he needed anything, as though man can actually give him something or make for him a place to live.

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In Romans chapter 11, we read, we owe the depth and riches and wisdom and knowledge of God.

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How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways.

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For who has known the mind of the Lord or who has been his counselor or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?

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We've done nothing for God for which he owes us anything. And there are even a lot of Christians out there today that think they do things that obligates

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God to have to give them something because I've done this, this, and this. God has to give me this.

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I made a decision to do this. And so therefore God is bound. He has to do this for me.

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No, our attitude needs to be that we don't deserve anything. And it is

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God by his grace who gives us all things. We become fellow heirs with Christ of the kingdom of God.

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So continue to work as faithful servants until that day when we will hear him say, well done, good and faithful servant.

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So be humble in all of these things we do. And let's not have an attitude of thinking that, you know,

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I just need to accomplish this much. Let me meet this marker in my evangelism walk or something like that.

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And once I get to this point, I know that I've accomplished all that I need to accomplish. I'm pretty good with what

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I have achieved in this life. And then I'm just going to sit back and relax and let somebody else do the work. The apostle

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Paul's attitude was that once he got one job done, he was just going to move right on to the next job. As long as there was breath in his lungs, he was going to go on preaching the gospel.

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Consider what he says in Philippians 3 .12. Not that I have already obtained this. He's talking about the resurrection of the dead.

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That was what he was referring to in the previous verse. Not that I've already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own.

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I press on to make perfection my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.

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Christ who is perfect has made me his own. So I desire perfection as I would desire

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Christ. It's not that we're going to achieve perfection on this side of heaven, but we press on to make it our own. Verse 13, he says, brothers,

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I do not consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,

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I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

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Let those of us who are mature think this way. And if in anything you think otherwise,

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God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

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So what is Paul saying here? If there was anybody who could have said, look at what

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I've accomplished. I've done a lot. Nobody has done more for the kingdom of God up to this point than I've done.

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And I would argue that even since the apostle Paul, nobody has done that much, but he did a great amount for the kingdom of God and the sufferings and the tortures that he endured in doing that.

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At the time that he's writing this letter, he's in prison even. So he went through a lot for the advancement of the gospel.

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And he could say once he gets to prison, or at least he's under house arrest at this time, but once he gets there, he could have said, you know, that was a pretty good run.

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Now here I am in prison, nothing more for me to do. So I hand the baton off to somebody else to take care of it.

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And I'm going to enjoy the rest of my days in my own home. He could have said that.

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And who would have faulted him for it? But that's not what he said. He said, I forget what lies behind.

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Everything that I've accomplished up to this point, praise God, I've got more to do. I'm pressing on to what lies ahead.

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I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

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And let those of us who are mature think this way. This is the same encouragement that Jesus is giving here to his disciples.

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As servants, serve, work, continue to do it. Do it not expecting anything in return.

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Do it not expecting praise. Do it not thinking that you are obligating God to have to give you anything.

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Instead say, this is verse 10, back to Luke 17, verse 10. We are unworthy servants.

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We have only done what was our duty. And that's the humble attitude that they were to have in their walk of faith.

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And my friends, the same goes for us. We need to have these attitudes of humility.

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God owes us nothing. We deserve nothing. What do we deserve?

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Well, because of our sin and our rebellion against God, what we deserve is hell.

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That's what we deserve. But as we read in Romans 5, 8, God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners,

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Christ died for us. He has shown us so much, giving his own son to die on the cross for our sins, rise again from the dead, and whoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life.

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Oh, what great blessings we have received in Christ our Savior. So continue to put your faith and trust in him.

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Continue to serve him. And on that day, when we enter into glory, we will hear our master say, well done, good and faithful servant.

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Now great is your reward. Let's finish there with prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for what we have read here about our faith, the reminder to remain humble and working until that day that we enter into the kingdom of God.

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Let us not become slack or lazy in this work, but what else can we do for the kingdom?

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Who else in our lives can we serve? Can we share the gospel with? Can we lift up in this walk of faith, whatever it might happen to be, even going back to that instruction that Jesus gave earlier, if your brother sins rebuke him, if he repents, forgive him, we need to continue even in that work as we grow together within the body of Christ.

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Let us not grow weary in doing good as said in the book of Galatians, but in the proper season, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

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Lord, continue to sustain us by your hand, guide us by your truth, lead us in paths of righteousness for your namesake.

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It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. This is When We Understand The Text, a daily

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Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, we feature

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New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.