Sermon Notes from 4/10/2011

God's Purpose or Intention for Marriage

Introduction:

From the outset, I want it to be clear that this series of messages is not designed to communicate the church’s stance on divorce and remarriage. Also, it is not my intention to discourage those who are divorced and remarried. I understand that divorce and remarriage is permitted in certain circumstances in the Scripture. However, God's intention was for the permanence of marriage because marriage is to display and typify Christ's relationship to His people, which is binding on the basis of covenant and the finished work of Jesus. This series of messages is designed to take Genesis 2:18-25, along with other texts linked to it, with the purpose of teaching these verses in their context and to communicate God’s Purpose or Intention for marriage and God’s Precept or Instruction for marriage. Also, I know that every marriage, divorce, and remarriage is unique. Therefore, I am not making insensitive and pointed statements.

The chasm between the biblical vision of marriage and the human vision is, and has always been, massive. In Matthew 19 Jesus speaks of God’s intention for marriage (Matthew 19:1-11) and the disciples conclude, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry” (Matt. 19:10). Jesus replied, “Not everyone can receive this saying” (Matt. 19:11a).

Our view of marriage is often equivalent to circumstance-based committed dating. The view we hold of marriage is often mirrored in our relationship to Christ's Church. Likewise, our commitment to Christ's Church is often mirrored in our marriages.

Because marriage was designed to typify and display the Gospel (Ephesians 5:31-32) the following two truths are vital:

a) A casual approach to marriage often leads to a casual approach to Christ's Church.

b) A right view of God's intention for marriage should lead to a whole-hearted devotion to the local church.

God’s Purpose: His Intention (Ephesians 5:31-32)

“Marriage is designed by God to display His glory in a way that no other event or institution can.”

“The ultimate purpose of marriage is to put the covenant relationship of Christ and His Church on display.”

1)   Marriage was instituted by God to Glorify God by:

a)      God instituted marriage to make Himself Knowable by Pointing to Christ. “’Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” (Ephesians 5:31-32).

b)      God instituted marriage to give Man the Earthly Opportunity to Experience and Express the Love Given to Him by God (Ephesians 5:22-33). Marriage and the Sabbath are the only social institutions that predate the fall.

c)      To talk ill of marriage or as a “step down” “the ball and chain” is sinful. We should think about, talk about, and treat marriage as a huge privilege and as precious. To live together before marriage and to support same-sex marriage ultimately distorts the Gospel.

a)      It is God, through covenant  (“hold fast to” – Hosea 2) NOT consummation that joins two into one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no man separate (Mark 10:1-9).

·         When a couple speaks their vows, it is not man or woman or pastor or parent who is the main actor, God is. Marriage is a one-flesh union that God Himself performs. God decreed that man’s solitude is not good (Genesis 2:18); God made a helper suitable for Him (v. 18, 21-22); It was God that was the first Father who gave away a bride (v. 22); It was God who performed the first wedding ceremony (v. 23); It was God who gave the first marriage counsel (vv. 24-25).

·         Marriage is patterned after Christ’s covenant commitment to His Church. “If we are faithless, he remains faithful – for He cannot deny himself” (II Timothy 2:13). Staying married is about keeping covenant. Staying married is not about being in love, it is not based on sex, and is not based on compatibility (2 sinners want their way and are by nature self-serving – this makes you very incompatible).

·         What makes divorce so horrific in God’s eyes (Malachi 2:13-16) is not merely that it involves covenant breaking to the spouse, but that it involves misrepresenting Christ and His covenant. The home is foundational to God’s program of salvation in part because it reflects God’s covenant with Israel and the cradle where the godly seed is brought into being and nurtured. In other words, grace – forgiveness – forbearing – covenant keeping in the home creates the best environment for godly offspring. Christ will never leave His wife. Christ keeps His covenant forever. Marriage is a display of the Gospel. When we are faithless, He is faithful because His commitment and love to us is not contingent on our performance, but His grace. I believe marriage is a display of Christ’s love and grace based on a covenant promise. There are no grounds given for divorce here because God intended marriage to mirror Christ’s covenantal commitment to His Church.

2)      The institution of marriage in Genesis 2 shows that the Church was in the mind of God before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 5:31-32). Genesis 2:18-25 and Ephesians 3:31-32 express the inextricable link between God’s purpose in marriage and God’s purpose for the Church.

a)      Genesis 2:18-25 and Ephesians 3:31-32 express the inextricable link between God’s purpose in marriage and God’s purpose for the Church. Marriage and Christ’s Church are the two primary means through which God makes Himself known. Marriage and Christ’s Church are the two primary places we express our love to God. Marriage and Christ’s Church are the two primary relationships we have that God uses to conform us to the image of Christ (see I Corinthians 7:32-40 – The gift of singleness is a gift to have an undivided mind in serving the Lord): Look at Paul’s exhortation to the Ephesian Elders (Notice the prevalence of evangelism and discipleship in these verses) in Acts 20:18-35 – the emphasis is on verse 28. Unfortunately many of us cherish our marriages and “attend” church or pay no attention whatsoever to Christ’s bride. Likewise, many of us cherish Christ’s bride at the expense of our earthly bride. Neither of these should be so. We must not love anything more than our earthly bride. However, I do not believe Scripture teaches that our priority, love, and commitment to our earthly bride and Christ’s bride (the local church) should be all that disproportionate. In other words, they both hold a unique place of priority in the life of a believer.

Genesis 2:18-25 represents the ideal marriage before the fall. It provides the basis for laws against adultery (Exodus 20:14; Hebrews 13:4); it serves as a model for marriage in the church (Matthew 19:3-12); it lays a theological foundation for government in the home and church (I Corinthians 11:3-12; I Timothy 2:9-15); and is a type of the relationship between Christ and His Church (Ephesians 5:22-32) – all of the laws against adultery and laws of government are provided to protect and guide the home, for from the home comes those God calls to Himself (The Church). Therefore – the home is where godly offspring are born and the Church is where the home is trained to do evangelism and discipleship. Individual families and single people make up the family of God, but should never supersede the local church. The church should never supersede the role of the parents. However, the family cannot thrive and stand autonomous from the church. The family is equipped, held accountable, and joined to the larger “body” in the Church.

b)      Christ thought of Himself as the bridegroom coming for His bride (Matthew 9:15; 25:1; John 3:29). “I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ” (II Corinthians 11:2). Christ’s leaving His Father and taking the Church as His bride at the cost of His life, and holding fast to her in a one-spirit union is what marriage should picture. This is why marriage is sacrificial, full of grace, and unconditional.

3)   The only sure foundation for a joyful, Christ-exalting earthly marital union is a joyful, God-exalting heavenly union with Christ. Our dependence upon God, submission to His authority, adherence to His will (the local church – where we are equipped, protected, and encouraged), an enjoyment of Christ is the Biblical foundation for a Christ-exalting, joy-filled marriage.

a)    As you are equipped for ministry, you should be equipped for marriage. Christ served, submitted to the Father’s will, sought the Father’s presence, gave His life, sacrificed self, spent time with His disciples. We learn about Jesus here (local church); we learn how to love others here; we learn how to show God’s grace through the Gospel and how to teach others to love Jesus more obediently here – when we learn to do the work of the ministry (Ephesians 4) we learn how to do the work of marriage. “Since Christ’s new covenant with this church is created by and sustained by blood-bought grace, therefore, human marriages are meant to showcase that new-covenant grace. And the way they showcase it is by resting in the experience of God’s grace and bending it out from a vertical experience with God into a horizontal experience with their spouse. In other words, in marriage you live hour by hour in glad dependence on God’s forgiveness and justification and promised future grace, and you bend it out toward your spouse hour by hour—as an extension of God’s forgiveness and justification and promised help” (Piper).

b)      Immediately when Adam and Eve declared their independence from God, they began acting autonomously in their marriage. “Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another” (I Thessalonians 4:9). Our understanding of God’s love for us will govern our love for one another. “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him (A sovereign act of God’s will; a choice). In this is love, not that we have loved God (we did not deserve it, earn it, or initiate it and were not required to reciprocate to receive it) but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (I John 4:7-12 - italics my comments).

c)       “A profound understanding and fear of God’s wrath is exactly what many marriages need, because without it, the gospel is diluted down to mere human relations and loses its biblical glory. And without it, you will be tempted to think that your wrath—your anger—against your spouse is simply too big to overcome, because you have never really tasted what it is like to see an infinitely greater wrath overcome by grace, namely, God’s wrath against you. This is the vertical reality that must be bent outward horizontally to our spouses if marriage is to display the covenant-making, covenant-keeping grace of God. We see this in Colossians 3:12-13, ‘Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.’ And if you are married to a believer, you can add this: As the Lord counts you righteous in Christ, though you are not in actual behavior or attitude, so count your spouse righteous in Christ, though he is not—though she is not. In other words, Colossians 3 says, take the vertical grace of forgiveness and justification and bend them out horizontally to your spouse. This is what marriage is for, most ultimately—the display of Christ’s covenant-keeping grace” (Piper). “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. To one who strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from one who takes away your cloak do not withhold your tunic either. . . . Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:27-29, 35-36)”– this passage refers to marriage too.

Living Vertically, Then Bending Outward

But the reasons I stress living vertically from the grace of God and then bending out horizontally in forgiveness and justification toward your spouse is 1) because there is going to be conflict based on sin and strangeness (and you won’t be able even to agree with each other about what is simply strange about each other and what is sin); and 2) because the hard, rugged work of enduring and forgiving is what makes it possible for affections to flourish when they seem to have died; and 3) because God gets glory when two very different and very imperfect people forge a life of faithfulness in the furnace of affliction by relying on Christ.

Examples of Staci and I. Examples of how we couldn’t be more opposite, but we also couldn’t be more compatible – not because of our personalities, interests, hobbies, pasts – but because of the Gospel and I John 4.

I am not saying that marriage is a call to endure - only.  Marriage is a call to mirror the Gospel, to know Christ intimately, to show Christ clearly, to experience Christ fully, to serve Christ faithfully.

Only when a wife or husband feels that the other is totally committed—even if he or she doesn’t change—only then can the call for change feel like grace, rather than an ultimatum.

So today I am emphasizing that marriage should not be and, God willing, need not be static—no change, just endurance. Even that is better than divorce in God’s eyes, and has a glory of its own. But it is not the best picture of Christ and the church. Yes, the endurance tells the truth about Christ and the church.

Because marriage was designed to typify and display the Gospel (Ephesians 5:31-32) the following two truths are vital:

a) A casual approach to marriage often leads to a casual approach to Christ's Church.

b) A right view of God's intention for marriage should lead to a whole-hearted devotion to the local church.

Mark 4:26-29 Explained

Growth through God’s Word

And He was saying, "The kingdom of God is like a man who casts seed upon the soil; and he goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts and grows--how, he himself does not know. The soil produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, then the mature grain in the head. But when the crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come."

The second half of the twentieth century saw an unprecedented interest in principles by which the church grows. When Donald A. McGavran founded the Institute of Church Growth in Eugene, Oregon in 1959, which in 1965 because Fuller Seminary’s School of Church Growth, a movement was born. The ‘Church Growth Movement’ has spawned thousands of articles and books, and has been exceptionally influential. Focusing on measurable results, it has constantly asked the question, what causes the church to grow? What practical steps can be taken to produce growth? What methods and techniques, what strategies and programs are more conducive to the growth of the church?
These are important question and answering them can be fruitful. Every church should constantly be evaluating its ministry and asking if it can’t be doing things more effectively than they are currently being done. But one of the unintended consequences of this movement has been the gradual secularization of church-building. Increasingly the business of growing the church has been understood in increasingly secular ways. The same method by which businesses and institutions grow have been applied to the church. Management and marketing principles have taken on greater and greater importance. Demographic surveys and focus groups have been used to fine tune the method by which the gospel has been presented, and even the message itself. Sometimes in the name of relating to the culture, sometimes in the name of removing what might offend, revolutionary changes have been made in the public ministry of the church, all in the name of growth. The motives have been noble, but many of these changes have been ill-considered. Most important, the line separating what God does and what we do, between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility, has been blurred. At times, it has seemed that the progress of the kingdom has been reduced to a natural process that can be engineered by human agents. The supernatural and spiritual character of the church has been dismissed in the process.
Is the growth of the church fundamentally a work of man or a work of God? If things have gotten seriously confused, we should not be surprised. Most, if not all, of the error in the history of the church, from the ancient Arians and Pelagians, to the modern-day Schleiermacher-inspired liberals, to New England’s Unitarians, has been perpetuated in the name of evangelism. Positive motives do not guarantee biblical results.

Background
The balance we have lost today can be found in Jesus’ Parable of the Growing Seed. The parable is unique to Mark’s Gospel. Its theme is the growth of the kingdom of God. ‘The kingdom of God is like a man who casts seed,’ Jesus says. ‘This is how God works out his purposes,’ R.T. France paraphrases Jesus’ meaning (Mark, Doubleday, 38). The parable’s original design was to equate Jesus’ ministry with the sower, and the temporary hiddenness of the kingdom of God with the seed that lies hidden in the ground. (i.e. the gospel was largely rejected in Jesus’ own day) This same hidden seed offers the certainty of a fruitful harvest at the end.
The expectation then, it seems, was much like it is today. It was widely believed that when the Messiah came He would establish His kingdom instantly, cataclysmically, and universally. Immediately He would vanquish the Romans, claim His throne, and rule the nations with a rod of iron (Ps. 2). In other words, quick, immediate, and extraordinary growth was expected. For many observers it seemed as though nothing were happening. If Messiah has come, where is the kingdom, they wondered? We understand their expectation. We want this kind of growth in God’s kingdom today, and the leaders who can produce it. We admire those who are able to ‘make things happen.’ We want results, and we want them instantly.
Jesus provides the parable to explain that this is not the way it will be in the kingdom of God. New Testament scholar William Lane says,

The parable clarifies the relationship between what was then seen of Jesus within the context of his mission and what may still be expected of him. His work was sowing; only after a certain lapse of time will there be the gathering of the harvest. (169, my emphasis).

The kingdom is sown. Then there is a lapse of time. At the end, it is harvested. In the meantime, the time between the advents, the kingdom grows. How does it grow? In hidden ways. In mysterious ways. It grows even without human agency. It grows quietly. ‘There is a hidden energy at work below the surface, says Donald English (102). It grows by the sovereign initiative of God, says lane (170). We have our part. ‘I planted, Apollo watered, but God caused the growth,’ as the Apostle Paul says (1 Cor 3:6). Christ builds his church (Matthew 16:18).

The Human
What is the human side of the growth of the kingdom of God? Jesus explains:

And He was saying, ‘The kingdom of God is like a man you casts his seed upon the soil.’(Mark 4:26)

First, we are to sow the seed of God’s word.
The ‘man’ of verse 26 can be understood as either Jesus in His lifetime, or Jesus through His servants, after the ascension and before His return. We are to sow the seed. A few verses above in Mark’s account of the Parable of the Sower, the seed is identified as God’s word ( 4:14). That word is received through hearing (v v. 15, 16, 20).
Our responsibility, then, is to ensure that others hear the word. We are to be faithful in our public ministry to read God’s word, preach God’s word, echo God’s word in our prayers, and sing songs that are filled with God’s word. ‘Faith comes by hearing … the word of Christ’ (Rom. 10:17). People are sanctified by the truth of God’s word, Jesus said (John 17:17). Clearly evangelism, outreach and mission are to be filled with God’s word. Beyond this, we are to go out into the highways and byways with the gospel (Matt 22:9) proclaiming Christ from the street corners, in the taverns, and across our kitchen tables.

Second, we are to gather the fruit of God’s kingdom.
We skip to the last verse.

‘But when the crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come’ (Mark 4:29).

When the crop is ripe, it is harvested. The ‘he’ of verse 29 is the same ‘man’ in verse 26, and ‘he of verse 27. Ultimately this person represents Jesus sowing his word, and then at the end of time using his ‘sickle’ to gather his people (cf. Joel 3:13; Rev 14:15). Is is also, in the meantime, His servants acting as His agents in sowing the seed and harvesting the converted into churches. We are to sow the word. Those in whom the word takes root (cf. 4:20) and bears fruit ( 4:28) are then to the gathered into the church. We are responsible to build biblical churches with biblical polity, biblical worship, and biblical doctrine into which believers may be baptized (Matt 28:18ff). We are to gather saints into the churches where they can be nurtured until the day when they are finally and completely harvested (at death) or when Christ returns. The church is responsible for more than just increasing church attendance. We have not fulfilled the Great Commission until believers have been baptized into the church and been taught all that Christ commands (Matt 28:19, 20).
It is readily apparent that the church does not play a secondary role in God’s program. It is God’s preliminary gathering place for his people. He has no other. Christians should not allow the church to develop a secondary role in their programs either. We keep hearing of people who claim to be disciples of Christ, and yet feel no obligation to be involved in a church. They’re busy. Rarely do they come. They show no love for Christ’s church, which itself is problematic. If Christ loves his church, whom He calls his bride, whom He nourishes and cherishes, and for whom He shed His blood, those who love Christ will necessarily love His church as well. God’s plan for believers does not end with the word planted in their hearts. It aims at their being harvested first into the church, and then finally on judgment day into the consummated kingdom of Christ.

The Divine

We speak imprecisely when we speak of God’s part and out part, of human and divine responsibilities. There is a true sense in which everything is God’s doing. Jesus said, “I will build my church’ (Matt 16:18). There are aspects of the church’s growth for which we, as enabled by the Holy Spirit, are responsible, as we’ve just seen. There are also some aspects in which we play no part at all. In particular, this has to do with the growth itself. It is not our responsibility to make the seed of God’s word grow, whether in individuals, or in the church as a whole. Jesus said that the man ‘casts seen upon the ground,’

‘and goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts up and grows – how, he himself does not know. (Mark 4:27).

Look at what Jesus is emphasizing. Realize as we examine Jesus’ words that what he emphasizes we must incorporate in our methods of growing the church.
First, Jesus emphasizes human passivity.
What does the sower do after he sows the seed? He ‘goes to bed.’ He is responsible to sow. The seed is responsible to grow. The sower is not responsible to make the seed grow. While he sleeps, the kingdom of God grows. The sower doesn’t assist it. He doesn’t even understand it. How it grows ‘he himself does not know.’ He can’t help the process, or assist it, or encourage it, or manipulate it because he doesn’t even understand it.! Jesus detaches him completely from the growth of the seed itself. This is not a lesson on farming, we should note. Jesus might have said something about watering and fertilizing and weeding, that is, He might have described those things that one might do to enhance the environment of growth. He omits all that in order to focus attention on the mystery of growth. When I fly to the west coast I have one job; get on the plane. I cannot help the plane or pilot. I don’t understand how it works. I just get myself on board and take a seat. Our role in growing the kingdom is to sow the word and gather the fruit. Growth is not our responsibility. ‘A higher power than (man’s) must do the real work,’ says T.M. Lindsey (110). The sower ‘goes to bed,’ says Jesus, clearly emphasizing human passivity with respect to the growth of the kingdom of God.

Second, Jesus emphasizes divine sovereignty.

“The soil produces crops by itself; first the blade, then the head, then the mature grain in the head.’ (Mark 4:28)

How does the earth produce its crop? ‘By itself,’ Jesus says. Jesus uses the word automate, from which we get our word ‘automatic.’ It is used in Acts 12:10 of a gate opening by itself. The seed grows ‘spontaneously.’ Lane renders it (169). That is, God has constituted His word with inherent properties, so that of its own accord it converts the unbelieving and sanctifies the saints. ‘It possesses its own power to germinate and bear fruit,’ says Sinclair Ferguson (57). ‘The ultimate effect is wholly independent of man’s industry and care, however necessary these may be,’ says Alexander (103). We sow the seed. We do so by preaching the gospel. Then God takes over and empowers that proclaimed word. That gospel itself is the ‘power of God for salvation’ (Rom. 1:16). The word is ‘able to build’ (Acts 20:32). It ‘performs its work’ (1 Thess. 2:13). It causes spiritual rebirth (1 Peter 1:23-25). It is ‘living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword’ (Heb. 4:12). It is not a dead word. It is living and has its own dynamic. Through Jeremiah, God says,

‘Is not My word like fire?’ declares the Lord, ‘and like a hammer which shatters a rock?’ (Jer. 23:29)

God’s word is like a fire that burns and a hammer that shatters. It does not ‘return void’ but accomplishes all that God has for it (Isa. 55:11 KJV). The Scriptures ‘equip’ us for ‘every good work’ (2 Tim 3:16, 17; cf. 1 Thess 1:5; Col 3:6; 1 Pet. 2:2; Eph. 6:1ff). The word goes right on doing its work until the last day, when Christ harvests the fruit of His kingdom.
‘But when the crop permits, he immediately puts in the sickle, because the harvest is come’ (Mark 4:29).

Ministry Today
The emphasis that Jesus is giving to human passivity on the one side, and divine sovereignty (through the words inherent power) on the other, has to mean something for the ministry of the church. The great German Reformer Martin Luther (1483-1546) said of his extraordinary work, ‘I simply taught, preached, and wrote God’s word; otherwise I did nothing.’ Indeed, it was ‘while I slept,’ he said, obviously alluding to this parable, that God reformed His church. ‘I did nothing. The word did it all.’ This old biblical and Reformational perspective, if true, has to affect how we go about ‘doing’ church. We have a finite amount of time, energy, and resources. Upon what are we going to focus or concentrate? Let me elaborate.

First, the truth of the parable will lead us to concentrate on proclamation.
It could hardly be more ironic that the biblical content of worship services in the last hundred years, and especially in the last twenty-five, has been drastically reduced. The word-content of public services has been reduced by those whose motive is to grow the church. This is the equivalent of removing gasoline fro the gas tank of cars by those whose motive is to empower automobiles. The unchurched and various seekers are put off by Bible reading and exposition, they say. The answer to this problem for many has been to eliminate them. Sermons are no longer expositions of Scripture, but psychological, financial, career, and familial counseling. Felt needs for improved circumstances in this world are addressed. Little or no Bible is read. Seekers don’t like to sing, they say, so the music ministry has been transformed into performances by professionals that the audience watches. However, the mythical seeker does like the rock/pop genre, so praise bands are ‘in.’ The biblical content of the songs has been reduced because ‘unchurched Charlie’ can’t understand the language of Zion. Seekers are turned off by prayer, so prayer has largely been eliminated. The net biblical content of the church’s public services today has been fatally reduced. What do we call services in which the Bible is not being read, preached, sung or prayed? What can we hope will be the effect of such services in the long run? If we are born again, sanctified, and made wise by God’s word, what will remain of such ministries once their goals of popularity subsides?. Despite the fact that Evangelicalism is America’s largest religion (Business Week, May 23 rd 2005), having a larger share of U.S. population (26%) than Roman Catholicism (22%) or mainline Protestantism (16%), it is far too shallow to sustain itself for long,.The decline of interest in the Bible, knowledge of the Bible, and public use of the Bible spells catastrophe for the church’s future. No, if Jesus’ words mean anything, then know that we much remain faithful to our task to sow God’s word.
One senses a kind of frenetic panic about growth out there in churchland. This panic betrays a lack of confidence in the word as God’s appointed means of growing His church. Again, (for the third time), we remind ourselves of Jesus’ words: ‘I will build my church’ (Matt 16:18). Will He? How? By His word. If we believe that Jesus builds the church through His word, we well sow the word and leave the results of our sowing and harvesting up to God.
Instead, we see today widespread vulnerability to every trick and gimmick that comes down the pike promising a growth that it cannot deliver. I’ve been around long enough to see program after program come across my desk promising ‘success’ in ministry. Most of these novelties transform ministers of the word into managers of people and movements. Shortly after I arrived in Savannah I received a large packet promising eye-popping growth through a field tested telemarketing program. Mobilize your people to telemarket the neighborhood, they urged. One silver bullet after another has followed suit, promising spiritual or numeric growth. Small groups were once the key, then discipleship groups, then a Scripture memory program, then praise choruses (74% of al U.S. churches now use ‘praise and worship’ songs), then the Prayer pf Jabez.’ More recently we’ve had ‘Forty Days of Purpose,’ then ‘the Passion of Christ.’ The latter was touted by one evangelical leader as the greatest evangelistic opportunity in the history of the church. Our response should have been that faith comes by hearing the word of the Christ not by seeing the wounds of Christ. We’ve been told that what we really need is a praise band. The praise team, in one sense, is just the bus ministry of thirty five years ago. Then it was, send out your fleet of yellow buses. This was thought to be the key to the growth so many American churches were desperate to experience. Now it’s the worship team. It’s the latest silver bullet. According to a recent article by Sally Morgenthaler in Fuller Seminary’s Theology, News and Notes (Spring 2005), video clip usage has increased 625% from 1999 to 2004, with 29% of all U.S. churches using video clips at least once per month, and 21% using them once per week (vs. 4% in 1999). At the same time, actual church attendance for any given week in 2003 stood at 18% nationally, and is dropping among evangelicals (from 9.2% to 9%), mainline Protestants (from 3.9% to 3.4%), and Roman Catholics (from 7.3% to 6.2%). Still, hope springs eternal that finally, at last, video clips will grow the church. Or maybe not. The Business Week article cited above describes mega-churches offering food courts, coffee shops, athletic programs, even banking services and auto repair. They’ve taken a page from Walmart’s playbook – put is all under one roof.
Any one of the above-named items considered in isolation and in the right context might not be a concern. But taken together they represent a tendency to grasp at fads, to turn to gimmicks, to jump on the latest growth bandwagon, rather than to trust in God and His gospel. No, God’s word will build the church. How? We don’t know how (v. 27). It is a mystery. It grows ‘by itself’ (v. 28). We don’t need to manipulate the process or distort it.
And we certainly don’t need to change our message because of what a focus group says. This just in: the unchurched don’t like to hear about sin, declarations about right and wrong, warnings about hell, or calls to surrender to Christ. A new flash this isn’t. We are not surprised by this. Again, the business week article cited above also points out that the impact of the new methods on attendance has been negligible or negative: ‘despite the megachurch surge, overall church attendance has remained fairly flat.’ It then adds, ‘And if anything, popular culture has become more vulgar in recent years.’ In other words, for all the gimmicks and fanfare, we are not reaching more people, and those we are reaching are being influenced only superficially. A compromised gospel cannot produce change.

Second, the truth of this parable will lead us to concentrate on gathering and perfecting the church.
The expansion of the mission of the church (in Day Care, athletics, fast-food, auto-repair, banking) inevitably involves the corruption of the mission of the church. The church is not called or qualified to do these other things. They are distractions. They deflect our time and energy from our calling, which, put simply, is worship and witness. They consume our resources on tasks for which they are neither called nor capable. Let the church be the church. The church has a simple assignment: offer to God the public worship that He requires and desires, and bear witness to the world of His grace in Christ Jesus.
A church that believes the gospel will be content to preach and pray, and ‘let the chips fall where they will,’ as the saying goes. We have our responsibility – to faithfully proclaim God’s word - and through the word to gather and perfect the saints. God’s part is to cause the growth. When we sow, we can be sure that God’s efficacious word will grow God’s kingdom, and the harvest will be rich.
When I began my ministry at the Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah on the first Sunday of 1987, I was asked, ‘What are you going to do to make the church grow?’ The question had in mind a description of the various programs that might be implemented to attract attention and bring in the crowds. Attendance was quite low and funds were drying up. Something, anything, needed to be done, quickly, if the church was to survive. Having thoroughly experienced and been convinced of the inherent power of the word by the ministries of John MacArthur in Southern California, and William Still of Aberdeen, Scotland (whose Work of the Pastor is priceless), my answer was, we will preach and we will pray. Of course we also renovated the nursery, replaced the organist, and added another minister. We are not blind to practical concerns. But we never lose sight of that which is central and crucial. We must never lose our sense of perspective and proportion, or allow ourselves to dissipate our energies on lesser endeavors.
Let’s gather the saints. Let’s nurture and perfect the saints. Let’s offer to God the public worship He requires and deserves. And let’s leave it at that. Don’t manipulate the process. Don’t force results. Be patient. Trust God. He has given us more than enough to do.

Third, the truth of this parable will lead us to pray
We will ask God to do that hidden work of grace that only he can do. We will sow the word and then call upon God to do the supernatural work of regenerating and sanctifying sinners. Let’s put it this way: if we think that we can change human hearts and grow the kingdom, then let’s go ahead and do whatever it takes to produce results. Let’s rework the message and make it winsome to unbelievers. Let’s redesign our services to make them attractive to seekers. Let’s take what is ‘foolishness’ to the unbeliever and make it to him seem wise (1 Cor 1:18-25). But if it is God’s work to convert and transform, then we better be less ambitious. Let’s concentrate on sowing, gathering and praying for God to make his simple, ordinary means effectual. This, after all, is exactly how the Apostles prayed. They did their work and then prayed that God would enlighten the heart, that love, knowledge, and discernment would grow, that worthy walking and fruit bearing would result (Eph. 1:16-23; Phil 1:9-11; Col. 1:9-12).

J.C. Ryle (1816-1900), that wise old saint, once Bishop of Liverpool, summarizes the lesson of this parable admirably. It ‘supplies and admirable antidote to overcarefulness and despondency,’ he says. ‘Our principle work is to sow the seed. That done, we may wait with faith and patience for the result’ (75).

The Church: The greatest mission field in America

The greatest danger in the church today is not some societal immorality “out there” but in our misapprehension of the gospel. Because so many have not heard a clear gospel, the church itself is one of the greatest mission fields. I fear that a significant percentage of evangelicalism is now not much better off theologically than the semi-Pelagianism of the Roman Catholic Church at the time of the Reformation: Recovering the gospel for Christians and non-Christians, therefore, must be our top priority. The gospel teaches that we are much worse off than many of us are willing to hear so we are tempted to subtly change the gospel that will, in some way, appeal to our self-righteousness.
Consider that as Christians whenever we become angry, covetous, and proud or break any of God’s commands it is because, at that moment, we fear and worship something else more than we do God. As an example: a woman grows in bitterness toward her husband who is not spending enough time with his young boy. She fears that her son will grow up receiving bad influences and go down the wrong road. She follows Christ but says the one thing she would not endure is if her son went down a bad path in life. If something like this happened, she might lose her faith in God. While it is right to have good intentions for our children, this woman is letting her son become an idol that replaces the true God. This person cannot be helped with mere psychological counseling. Her real problem is a "worship disorder". She must see that her justification comes from Christ and that He alone can fill that gap she has been filling with false gods.
The work of God in the Christian is to grow them in grace by the ongoing process of eliminating these gospel replacements. He does this by shining his light in the dark corners of our hearts, in places we hardly knew were dens of iniquity. Painful though it may be at the time, he does this for our good and our eternal felicity. Sin arises in our hearts when we replace fear of God with the fear of some created thing. In their book How People Change, Timothy Lane and Paul David Tripp write,

“While external conditions can be very influential in our lives and should not be ignored, the Bible says that they are only the occasion for sin, not the cause. Difficulties in life do not cause sin. Our background, relationships, situation, and physical condition only provide the opportunity for the thoughts, words, and actions to reveal whatever is already in our hearts. Our hearts are the ultimate cause of our responses, and where the true spiritual battle is fought … [while] we must never minimize our suffering - ours or anyone else’s … we must make the important distinction between the occasion for sin and the ultimate cause of sin. This will determine what you think the solution to the problem will be …The bible says that my real problem is not psychological (low self-esteem or unmet needs), social (bad relationships and influences), historical (my past), or physiological (my body). They are significant influences, but my real problem is spiritual (my straying heart and my need for Christ). I have replaced Christ with something else, and as a consequence, my hearts is hopeless and powerless. Its responses reflect its bondage to whatever it is serving instead of Christ. Ultimately my real problem is a worship disorder.”

It is when we set our hopes on something other than God to add meaning, hope and justification to our life that we fall into sin. So our growth in Christ is essentially the ongoing removal of deeply buried idols. Christ has redeemed us, is redeeming us and one day will consummate our redemption. Idols often begin as good things in an of themselves like work, leisure, marriage and children but become sin when we make them the highest good in our lives. According to Paul in the Epistle to the Romans it is when we take these good things of creation and let them take the place of God (Rom 1:23). Sinfulness is the inevitable result. Good things like respect, material goods and family become the object of worship and so we conclude that the true God cannot help and we must be in control. When our desires are not met we will use sinful ways to meet them … and understanding this opens up the opportunity to apply the gospel to every situation. Consider this; both hardship and blessings both help us to see the idols of our heart, our God replacements. Our responses to hardship and blessing show what we most value and give weight to. Our sin revels what we fear. But union and identity with Christ will override whatever struggle you may be going through at the moment. We are not merely to follow Christ’s example, which by itself would lead only to despair, but we must daily come to Him for the mercy and grace if we are to become like him.
“He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.” (1 Thessalonians 5:24)

Would You Willingly Sin?

 

Were it made known to us, that if we ever voluntarily committed any particular act of sin, we should be damned without any remedy or escape, should we not exceedingly dread the commission of such? Should we not be very watchful and careful to stand at the greatest distance from that sin; and from everything that might expose us to it; and that has any tendency to stir up our lusts, or to betray us to such an act of sin? Let us then consider, that though the next voluntary act of known sin shall not necessarily and unavoidably issue in certain damnation, yet it will certainly deserve it. We shall thereby really deserve to be cast off, without any remedy or hope. And it can only be owing to free grace, that it will not certainly and remedilessly be followed with such a punishment. And shall we be guilty of such a vile abuse of God’s mercy to us, as to take encouragement from it, the more boldly to expose ourselves to sin?

Bikini? Good thoughts from a mom...

Good thoughts from a blog post I read today:

Recently the media has been all over a well-known retailer who introduced a spring swimwear line featuring a girl’s padded bikini, with sizing options of 7 and up. Amid the uproar over the past several days, the retailer has back-pedaled, now saying it believes the bikini is best “suited” for girls 12 and up.

 I’m still not happy.

 Certainly, almost everyone can agree that a padded bikini for 7-year-old girls is ridiculous, unhealthy, and perverted, but what makes it okay for 12-year-olds?

Beliefs. Are boobs really that great? Well, in our culture, yeah, it appears so. Pornography, by God’s definition, is everywhere: movies, advertisements, websites, and television; all resting on an unrestrained fascination with that part of the female anatomy. From padded bras to plastic surgery, the belief exists that when it comes to women’s breasts, “the bigger the better.” But what about in my family? And what about in my own mind and heart? As a mom, I don’t want my nineteen-year-old daughter to think her worth and value rests on her figure. And I didn’t want that happening when she was 12, either. Is a padded top necessary for your 12-year-old? And for that matter, is a bikini necessary? When it comes to our Christian families, the answer is no to both.

 Behavior. If you don’t think a bikini changes the behavior and atmosphere of a group setting, then it’s been a while since you’ve been to youth group. One youth pastor I know, who manages a group of several hundred kids, told me, “Moms think their daughters look cute. But that’s not what the boys are thinking. In fact, if those same moms knew what the boys were thinking, they wouldn’t think it was cute at all.” Into our sexually-charged culture comes a girl who brings pornography to life with her two-piece.

• What was avoided becomes available.
• What was hidden becomes familiar.
• What was taboo (Is it okay with you for your daughter to run around in her bra and panties?) becomes acceptable.

When girls who are fearfully and wonderfully made begin to believe that they are just anatomy, when they are provoked to enhance fresh tween skin with make-up and glitter and their barely budding bodies with built-in padding, I call it identity theft. And I think what we choose to put on our bodies (or what we decline to put on) results primarily from what we choose to put in our minds. Are you feeding your daughter with a steady diet of God’s Word? Are you yourself feasting daily at His table, so that what overflows from your heart pours directly into hers? Are you teaching her to feed herself? Or are you letting the culture do it for you? The culture will gladly take over your parenting gig. Fight it every step of the way—even if it starts with a bikini, it will most certainly not end there.

God's Instruction for Marriage Sermon Notes 4/3/11

God’s Precept: His Instruction for Marriage (Genesis 2:18-24)

The man and the woman are created in God’s image to rule the earth for God; the man is created first and

is given ultimate responsibility for the marriage relationship, while the woman is placed alongside the man as his “suitable helper.” Just as an earthly king sets up his statues around the kingdom to declare his dominion and rule, so God placed His image in man and set him to rule as His representative. They, in their distinct roles (complementarian), are to rule the earth together, as one unit, as God’s representatives.

 

Genesis 2:18 – Against the sevenfold statement “God saw that it was very good,” the divine observation (for the first time) that man’s situation was not good and complete should draw our attention. The reason God instituted marriage (other than to shadow Christ and His Church) was for the purpose of companionship.

Elsewhere helper/help usually refers to divine assistance, but is used in three prophetic passages of military aid (Isaiah 30:5; Ezekiel 12:14; Hosea 13:9). To help someone does not imply that the helper is stronger than the helped; simply that the latter’s strength is inadequate by itself (Joshua 1:14; 10:4; 10:6; I Chronicles 12:17, 19, 21, 22). The help looked for is not just assistance in his daily work or in the procreation of children, but the mutual support and companionship another person provides.

Genesis 2:19-20 – Despite God’s identification of man’s need, there is a delay in his provision: contrast the instantaneous fulfillment of the divine Word in chapter one. This hold-up creates suspense. It allows us to feel man’s loneliness. All the animals are brought before him, and we see him looking at each on in the hope it would make a suitable companion for man (Gordon Wenham). “Helper” entails his inadequacy, not her inferiority, for elsewhere the term is used of God and the Holy Spirit. Also, it should be noted that man does not find His significance or satisfaction in work (naming the animals), but in the companionship of His wife.***

Genesis 2:21-22 – Something was taken from Adam in order that he might embrace with greater benevolence a part of himself.  Just as Adam laid down his life, so did Christ. Just as something was taken from Adam to make Eve – we were given life as Christ imparted His life to us.

Genesis 2:23 – in verse 23 we see man’s first poem.

Notice three points in God’s Precept or Instruction for Marriage:

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother or “Leave.”

In the Hebrew, the word means to “leave behind” or “depart from.”

This does not mean a mere geographical move. This is leaving one authority, not the abandonment of your parents/relatives (Deuteronomy 4:9; I Timothy 5:8).

In marriage we must distinguish between permanent and temporary relationships.

The call to leave is a call to make your marriage relationship your primary human relationship – this is where your first priority and privilege is found. Your wife did not marry your friends, softball, your work, four walls and five kids, video games, etc. Your spouse married you to find companionship from you.

You should not be dependent upon your parents financially, emotionally (going “home” in the midst of conflict), or authoritatively.

And hold fast to his wife or “Cleave.”

Cleave means to stick or to weld together. This phrase suggests both passion, difficulty, and permanence. God uses terms with Israel like “forsake” and “stick or cleave” (Deuteronomy 10:20; 11:22; 13:5).

Marriage is based on a covenant NOT circumstances (love, sex, handicap, finances).

“So you will be delivered from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words, who forsakes the companion of her youth, and forgets the covenant of her God” (Proverbs 2:16-17). Read Malachi 2:13-16 with an emphasis on verse 14 (your wife by covenant). Give an example of Jay and Jenna’s wedding and how something Holy, Eternal, and Sacred was happening there when the vows were being said.

“Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another” (I Thessalonians 4:9). Our understanding of God’s love for us will govern our love for one another. “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through Him (A sovereign act of God’s will; a choice). In this is love, not that we have loved God (we did not deserve it, earn it, or initiate it and were not required to reciprocate to receive it) but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (I John 4:7-12 - italics my comments).

Therefore love is not feeling, but choice

Love is not convenience or feeling-driven, but obedience to God and choice-driven.

Not about compatibility, but about covenant.

And they shall become one flesh or “Weave.”

They become related to one another as brother and sister. The laws in Leviticus 18 and 20, and possibly Deut. 24:1-4 illustrate the application of this kinship-of-spouses principle to the situation following divorce or the death of one of the parties.

Marriage is to share the same goals, motives, mission, and commitment to growth. This is why only believers are to marry believers (I Corinthians 7).

Why discuss the role of husbands in marriage?

The Man’s Ultimate Responsibility for the Marriage and the Wife’s Role as His “Suitable Helper.”

The apostle Paul’s comments on Genesis 1–3 repeatedly root the man’s primary responsibility in the family (as well as in the church) in the fact that he was created first. Not only does Paul draw attention to the fact that the man was created first, but he also notes that it is not the man who was made for the woman, but the woman for the man (1 Cor. 11:9; cf. Gen. 2:18, 20) and from the man (1 Cor. 11:8, 12; cf. Gen. 2:22). Moreover, the man was the one who received the divine command (Gen. 2:16-17), was presented with the woman (2:22), and named the woman with a name derived from his own (2:23; cf. 3:20), which also implies his authority.

God’s creation of Eve demonstrates that God’s plan for Adam’s marriage,

as well as for all subsequent marriages, involves a monogamous

heterosexual relationship. God only made one “suitable helper” for Adam, and she was female. What is more, it was God who perceived Adam’s aloneness and hence created the woman. The biblical text gives no indication that Adam himself was even conscious of being alone or discontent in his singleness. Rather, God is shown to take the initiative

in fashioning a compatible human companion for the man. For this reason it can truly be said that marriage is God’s idea and that it was God who made the woman of his own sovereign will as a “suitable helper” for the man (Gen. 2:18, 20) - (Kostenberger).

How Does This Work with Husbands:

It is important to understand individual roles in marriage because if Satan can destroy the home and distort God’s intention for marriage – he destroys our view of the Gospel.

Leaving, cleaving, and weaving happens when the husband becomes a learner, lover, and leader.

The husband is to LEARN his wife (1Peter 3:7). Before you can lead and love, you must learn. “I just cannot understand women” might be true, but to say that about your wife is unbiblical. We must be understanding of her concerns, needs, fears, spiritual well-being.

A command, not a suggestion.

A command that takes time daily.

A command that takes study.

A command to treat her as fragile

A command that affects your spiritual life. Things cannot be “bad” with your wife and simultaneously “good” with God.

The husband is to LOVE his wife (Ephesians 5:25-33). You lead by loving by learning.

Remember the Biblical definition of love in I John 4? Love is a choice or act of the will where the other person is not deserving or expected to reciprocate.

Husbands are to love first (I John 4:19), most quantitatively (John 15:13), sacrificially (Ephesians 5:25; John 3:16).

We love not by what we say or intend, but what we do. “Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth” (I John 3:18).

Do you serve your spouse so they will serve you? We should love in spite of reciprocation and without the motive to be served in return. Look at the rejection Christ faced by His own people and those He called friends (John 1:11; John 15:15). 

The husband is to LEAD his wife (Genesis 1:26; 2:18-25; Ephesians 5:23; Matthew 20:25-28).

The order of creation and the pattern for Christ’s Church establishes the husband’s role as leader (I Timothy 2:13; Ephesians 5:22-33).

God declared the husband to be the leader (Ephesians 5:23).

Leadership is about authority expressed through servitude (READ Matthew 20:25-28).

The greatest example to husbands is Jesus. The greatest example of leadership is Jesus. There is a difference between being a Pharaoh and a Shepherd (proud/humble; no accountability/seeks accountability; makes decisions without counsel/seeks counsel; wants to be served/looks for opportunities to serve; selfish motives/motive to please God).

APPLICATION QUESTIONS:

Sit down together. Pray together.

1)    Share with your spouse what you appreciate about him/her

2)    Share with your spouse how God has used him/her in your life

3)    Share with your spouse an area where you feel unappreciated or criticized by him/her

4)    If you could change three things about me that you believe would make me more Christ-like, what would they be?

5)    Do I have annoying mannerisms or irritating idiosyncrasies that you would like to see me change?

6)    On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate our marriage?

7)    What would it take to make our marriage a ten?

8)    If we could go on a date and we could do anything you desired, what would we do. Could I call Brian and Staci or Kemp and Linda to ask them to keep our children while we go on this date in the next month?

9)    Do you have any needs or desires that you believe I ought to be meeting or fulfilling better than I do? What are they?

10) How could I better serve you around the home?

11) Are there habitual sin patterns you see in my behavior, communication, and desires that I am blind to?

12) Is there an area I can help you grow?

13) Will you remind me to pray with you every day (dinner doesn’t count)?

WILL YOU GUYS COMMIT TO LEARNING ONE ANOTHER??? MANY OF YOU PARENTS SHOULD GO ON THIS DATE AND ASK SIMILAR QUESTIONS OF YOUR CHILDREN. You might be surprised what you children perceive you to be, but will not speak because you are not humble enough to listen?? Just a thought J

I will be asking around this week and next to see if you all have followed through with applying what you heard today. Love you all – Pastor Brian

Get Away From This Mentality by Going to the Gospel