The Parable of the Sower AM Sermon 11/28/10

The Parable of the Sower
There was a family that I got to know decently well in Augusta, GA. This family was different. We ate dinner with them and you could tell the Mother was just a woman of great faith. The Father was an elder in their church. They had one son that was 14 years old and he was just something else. He would stay after practice and ask me if I needed help. He wanted to please his coaches so much and would be a young man that you would feel comfortable to allow your own kids to be around. Michael Cave was a young man of faith and love of Jesus Christ. His faith in Jesus just exuded everything about him. A few days ago we learned that he had caught a virus and died after a week fight. He had a type of anemia that depleted his red blood cell count and the virus caught him at a low point. He was healthy and athletic and vibrant and was cut down in the prime of his life.
The fascinating thing about the family is that during his sickness and eventual death his family shared their faith with doctors and nurses.
When their son was dying they understood that God loved them still, the understood, even though some of us struggled to understand, the family saw their role as bringing the gospel to that hospital.
People look at that and wonder how they do it. Of course they are hurting, of course this Thanksgiving was tough on that family but they had prepared their heart so much for God that they were ready for tough times. They were ready to spread the Gospel. Their hearts were cultivated and waiting for God’s transforming and comforting love.
They were so in-tune with God that He pulled them through and will continue to pull them through.
This morning I want to talk about preparing our heart for God.
I want us to talk about cultivating our heart to make it ready that we can experience the love of God and the word of God.

Mark 4: 21-25
21 And He was saying to them, "A lamp is not brought to be put under a basket, is it, or under a bed ? Is it not brought to be put on the lampstand ? 22 "For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been secret, but that it would come to light. 23 "If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear." 24 And He was saying to them, "Take care what you listen to. By your standard of measure it will be measured to you; and more will be given you besides. 25 "For whoever has, to him more shall be given ; and whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him."

This passage finds its parallel in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5 but in Mark’s Gospel it is found in another context and more than likely this was a similar teaching of Jesus given at another time.
I would propose that this passage finds its best setting Mark’s Gospel between two stories about a person sowing seed in a field.
When we look at this passage in the beginning we see Jesus telling us that a follower of Him must be willing to shine the light of the Gospel before others. This truth that we are given is to be shared and shown.
There are two aspects to this:
1) First we are to open our mouths and share with others what God has done for us.
Last week we talked about the man that had the demons cast out of him called Legion. If you remember Jesus told him to to the pagan people of the Decapolis and share what God had done for him.
That is evangelism in a nut-shell – Telling others the good things that God has done for them in Jesus and their salvation.
2) We shine our light by what we do, and how we carry ourselves.
I had a friend recently tell me that when he met with a lawyer to discuss his case the Lawyer just sat back and said to him that there is just something about you Christians that intrigues me but also makes me want to stand up and fight for you. How we live our lives day to day will cry out what we are all about.

We are the light of the world – you have to be put on a stand and give light to everyone.
This story in Mark is sandwiched between two sower stories. Mark is known from sandwiching stories.
What Mark’s Gospel is full of is a Teaching and then two stories on both sides of this teaching to illustrate this story.
In other words the meat of the sandwich is the teaching and the bread is the stories that illustrate the meat of the teaching.
There is a connection between the sower parable and the Lamp story that is found in the OT. They are connected to one another.
The idea of the Sower and Farming is connected to the Idea of a Lamp.
There is an OT tie in and there is cultural tie in.
Farming in the Middle East-
The average field is about 1 Acre in the Biblical times.
Many times we see the story of Ruth and Boaz as Boaz having 300 acres of land but a big farm would have been 2 acres or more.
Each field belonged to a family and they were divided by marker stones that had been there since the time of the Canaanites.
When they entered the Land of Canaan the Israelites were to keep these boundary markers fixed and not change them.

Deuteronomy 19: 14
"You shall not move your neighbor's boundary mark, which the ancestors have set, in your inheritance which you will inherit in the land that the LORD your God gives you to possess.

God had given them just enough land for each person to have enough to live okay but not extravagant.
God is telling them to keep these ancient boundary markers – About 1 acre tracts of land and don’t go and try to take over your neighbor’s field.
God was so adamant about this that he didn’t even want the widowed or the orphaned to have their land taken away from them

Proverbs 23:10
10 Do not move the ancient boundary Or go into the fields of the fatherless

So I want you to understand as we start to break down this teaching of Jesus in Mark 4 that these fields were fixed with boundary markers and were to be kept the same for generations.
Also, a sense of being content with what you were given was a teaching that the Israelites were having hammered into their thick noggins.
These fields had been divided up in these small portions for thousands of years.
They had just enough to live comfortably if they obeyed God. They were not given too much but just enough.
This land was given to you until your death. There was never a break, you were given this land that was marked by the ancient land mark and was not given away until you died.
You were expected to work this land until you died and gave it to your children or those you left behind.
You worked until you died, there was no retirement in Ancient Israel.
Stone walls would be the boundary markers of your field.
They would allow thorns and thistles to grow up on these boundary stones - These thorns and thistles would act as a barbed wire fence. Close to the fields would be flocks of sheep.
8 months per year the sheep would be in the desert or wilderness but after the wheat harvest to place the flocks were allowed to come in the field.
The farmers and the shepherds would make a deal with each other to allow the flocks to graze in their field after the harvest.
Shepherds would come into the fields between the 1st of July to the month of October.
The boundary markers of the fields also served as paths and walkways between the towns and cities so that people would no walk through the fields. The stone walls would serve as the outline for the walking path.
Imagine Jesus possibly telling this story of the sower in Mark 4 as he watched a sower sow seed in a field.
It is believed that Jesus possibly told His stories and parables as he watched a person do everyday work to illustrate His point or tell a story that people in that town would be familiar with.
In any field of ancient Israel you would have a pathway or roadway that went between the fields to allow one to travel without walking through the crops.
There would be a rocky wall that would outline the field which the Bible refers to the Boundary Marks, and these marks had been there since the Canaanites.
The fields also had thorns in that the farmer allowed to grow up around the rocky boundary to keep the sheep and goats out of the field.
With this picture in mind let us look at this parable that Jesus tells in Mark 4



Mark 4: 2-9
2 And He was teaching them many things in parables, and was saying to them in His teaching, 3 "Listen to this! Behold, the sower went out to sow ; 4 as he was sowing, some seed fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate it up. 5 "Other seed fell on the rocky ground where it did not have much soil ; and immediately it sprang up because it had no depth of soil. 6 "And after the sun had risen, it was scorched ; and because it had no root, it withered away. 7 "Other seed fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked it, and it yielded no crop. 8 "Other seeds fell into the good soil, and as they grew up and increased, they yielded a crop and produced thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold." 9 And He was saying, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."

In this story of Jesus we see the four different types of ground that you would find in any Jewish field.
This is a story that they would really understand and it was something that was an everyday part of their life. These types of soil would make sense to his immediate audience but sometimes we miss the point and actually miss out on some of the meat of this story.
Let’s look at Jesus explanation of this story:

Mark 4: 14-20
14 "The sower sows the word. 15 "These are the ones who are beside the road where the word is sown ; and when they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them. 16 "In a similar way these are the ones on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy ; 17 and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary ; then, when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away. 18 "And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns ; these are the ones who have heard the word, 19 but the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. 20 "And those are the ones on whom seed was sown on the good soil ; and they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold."

The seed falls in all of these types of soil .
The seed fell in four places,
On the Path –
They never even respond to the Word of God – They are so wrapped up this world that they will not even start to receive this word of God.
On the rocks –
They initially receive the word of God but it soon they return right back to where they were before. They totally fall away before any real change or transformation by the Gospel even takes place.
On the thorns –
This is the one that we have to really be concerned about. This is the type of soil that keeps me up at night and is what makes me struggle with this passage.
These are the folks that grow roots, take the word in and start to really change and make a difference. But this life with its pursuit of wealth and things to do tend to distract them.
This type of soil is 21st century American Life - This is exactly the type of issues that Jesus is dealing with.
We are so busy with stuff that we lose sight to what is really important. Church is an afterthought.
If we were to make a checklist –
1) Shopping
2) School Activities
3) Job or place of employment
4) Ball games
5) Hunting, fishing, boating, leisure
And somewhere dead last – way down the list – Church and the Kingdom of God.
This is the one that I struggle with, I am challenged by this passage and I hope you are to because if you are not challenged by this type of soil I would be really worried.
The Good ground is something I want to take a look at for a minute and get to something that we might be missing.
To do this we need to look at the OT passage that is the background to this teaching.
This teaching is found in Jeremiah chapter 4 and it is a passage in which God is calling Israel to repentance before it is too late. He is very close to sending them into a 70 year Babylonian Exile if they don’t heed His warning and he uses some familiar pictures to make His point.
You will see quickly that Jesus’ listeners would have known exactly where Jesus was drawing from.

Jeremiah 4: 3-4
3 For thus says the LORD to the men of Judah and to Jerusalem, "Break up your fallow ground, And do not sow among thorns. 4 "Circumcise yourselves to the LORD And remove the foreskins of your heart, Men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, Or else My wrath will go forth like fire And burn with none to quench it, Because of the evil of your deeds."
BREAK UP THE GROUND - BREAK UP – Hebrew word NEERO
Hebrew word for Break Up – Neeroo
God is telling them that they need to circumcise their heart – you need to break up the unplowed ground of your heart. To the Jew the Heart was symbolized by Soil that was tilled up.
Jeremiah the prophet is telling them to plow up the soil of their heart to prepare it for judgment – to get ready.
How do you become good soil – you have to break up you unplowed ground of your heart, that is how you get your heart ready for God to plant His word.
In Jeremiah’s passage we see a real interesting play on words. The word for Fire, Soil, and Break up are very close to each other in Hebrew,
Fire is Ner
Soil NEER
Break up - NEERO
In the Hebrew there would not be in any vowels in the words so all three of these words would be the same in the Hebrew text.
To break up unplowed ground – in ancient Hebrew culture before they would plow their fields they would have to burn the thorns and thistles away.
In Israel you would take a lamp to your field and burn up the dried thorns and thistles before you sowed your field to expose the ground.
Burn away the thistles and then you take a one handed plow that breaks up the heavy clay and dirt.
Breaking up the unplowed ground meant to burn away and then plow
Go back to Mark – the Lamp is used to illuminate but also to burn away the thorns.
The fire reveals the ground of your heart, the fire burns away the thorns to show what really is there in your heart.

Jeremiah 23:29
"Is not My word like fire ?" declares the LORD, "and like a hammer which shatters a rock ?

The word of God is like a Fire that Consumes and like a hammer that can break up the toughest of soil even rock.
Are you getting your soil ready, are you preparing your heart for the word of God?
Much of this parable and teaching that Jesus teaches is about getting your heart prepared for the Word of God.
How much do you work at your own heart to make it ready for God’s word.
Sometimes we have this picture that some type of great preaching or some miracle is going to rip the barnacles from our heart and make us ready for the word of God but Jesus tells a different story.
The prophet Jeremiah tells a different story.
WE need to burn away the things that are crowding our heart from God’s attention.
WE need to break up the stone that surrounds our heart or the animosity or the hypocrisy that has burned us in the past to be open to Christ all over again.
I have met people that are soured to God because they have been hurt by Christians, they have had personal tragedy and blame God, or maybe they just don’t care about God’s and His word.
My question to all of you this morning is that do you ever feel like you want better?
Do you want to be better? Sometimes I hate the way I act and I want to be better. I want to serve God. I want to be a good Father to my Children, I want to be a good minister.
I want you to join me in letting this lesson challenge us to really consider the breaking up this tough ground of our heart, burn away the distractions and allow God’s Word to plant deep, grow and make us all different people.
Whether you want to believe it or not God is searching for you desparately and wants you to open your heat to His word.
In 1989 there was a terrible Earthquake in Armenia. One of the victims of this viscous earthquake was an elementary school.
A Dad knew his son was in the school and ran across town to search for his son.
His heart sank when he saw the school laying in ruins. He ran and started to dig through the rubble.
The policeman told him that there was no use to try because no one would have survived that type of collapse. The man continued to dig through the rubble calling for Arman his son.
After 12 hours the rescue crews asked him to leave because they feared for his safety but he would not listen.
He worked for 20 – 24 hours and then after 36 hours of pulling away rubble he uncovered his son and his entire class still alive but trapped.
The entire class was saved by this man’s valiant effort. The little boy told his father that he calmed his classmates by telling them that his dad always said that he would never leave him but would always come for him.
In the same way Jesus has done all that He could possibly do to illustrate that He is going to do the same for us. All He has asked us to do is to make our heart’s ready, to be open to His word and accept His love for us.

Baptism and Restoration of Israel

Baptism as Restoration and Promise

A few years ago, an angry man rushed through the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam until he reached Rembrandt's famous painting "Nightwatch." Then he took out a knife and slashed it repeatedly before he could be stopped. A short time later, a distraught, hostile man slipped into St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome with a hammer and began to smash Michelangelo's beautiful sculpture The Pieta. Two cherished works of art were severely damaged. But what did officials do? Throw them out and forget about them? Absolutely not! Using the best experts, who worked with the utmost care and precision, they made every effort to restore the treasures.
By His sovereign grace, God can bring good out of our failures, and even out of our sins. J. Stuart Holden tells of an old Scottish mansion close to where he had his little summer home. The walls of one room were filled with sketches made by distinguished artists. The practice began after a pitcher of soda water was accidentally spilled on a freshly decorated wall and left an unsightly stain. At the time, a noted artist, Lord Landseer, was a guest in the house. One day when the family went out to the moors, he stayed behind. With a few masterful strokes of a piece of charcoal, that ugly spot became the outline of a beautiful waterfall, bordered by trees and wildlife. He turned that disfigured wall into one of his most successful depictions of Highland life.

In the same way God can take something that seems impossible and can put it back together. So many times I have shared with you how broken the situation the world was in when Jesus was born and began His ministry. Israel was broken, dysfunctional, and was not being what she was called to do.
There was a time that many were looking forward to in the time of Jesus and it is a time that we don’t discuss very much in Churches.
The word is RESTORATION – many were reading the OT prophets and were looking forward to a time that God would Restore Israel.

Tonight we will particularly explore this theme of the Restoration of Israel in the Book of Acts and how that relates to our study on Baptism.
God would restore the Davidic Kingdom to Israel.
I would propose to understand many things about the Early Church and their expectations one would have to understand these expectations. One would have to know the template of expectations upon which the Church exploded onto the scene.
The subject that we picked up last week and will continue to talk about tonight is Baptism. I want to propose that the best way to see baptism in the Scripture is connected to the pouring out of the Spirit on the Last Days.
When we say the LAST DAYS the image conjours up to the modern American Armageddon and the end of the Space Time Universe but to a 1st Century Jew it meant something very different.

The Last Days were the days that the God would pour out His Spirit on all flesh as the prophets had foretold. Something great was going to occur in Israel and through Israel.

It goes back to the promise Made to Abraham that all nations would be blessed by the Seed of Abraham.
Father Abraham would have a descendent that would bless all nations.
We have to trace all of these lines of thought and pull them together to get a picture of what Luke is proposing to us in the book of Acts.
The IDEA OF PROMISE - This in the time of the Intertestament Period became known as just the PROMISE
The idea of the KINGDOM OF DAVID – the Davidic Kingdom
The idea of the Restoration of Israel – The reconstituting of the 12 tribes- Israel would be reformed from the dust so to speak – Remember the Assyrians had scattered the 10 Northern Tribes into oblivion and all that was left were the Samaritans.
These three themes were all tied into the hope of the Messiah – The Messiah the Anointed one of Israel would come and bring about those three hopes – PROMISE of ABRAHAM, KINGDOM OF DAVID, and RESTORATION OF ISRAEL.
PROMISE IN ACTS

Acts 3: 24-26
24 "And likewise, all the prophets who have spoken, from Samuel and his successors onward, also announced these days. 25 "It is you who are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with your fathers, saying to Abraham, 'AND IN YOUR SEED ALL THE FAMILIES OF THE EARTH SHALL BE BLESSED.' 26 "For you first, God raised up His Servant and sent Him to bless you by turning every one of you from your wicked ways."

Peter in his sermon in the Temple points out that Jesus is the fulfillment of this Promise made to Abraham.
Paul in his defense before Agrippa sees his ministry tied into this promise made to Abraham. These early Christians were heralds to the world that God was fulfilling this promise made in Jesus.

Acts 26: 6-7
6 "And now I am standing trial for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers ; 7 the promise to which our twelve tribes hope to attain, as they earnestly serve God night and day. And for this hope, O King, I am being accused by Jews.

Paul saw his ministry intimately attached to the idea of the Promise made to Abraham
This same Apostle Paul gives one the best descriptions of this Promise made to Abraham in Galatians 3. Tonight we don’t have time to go through the entire Chapter but we will focus in on one verse that connects the Spirit of God to the Promise made to Abraham and then we will unpack that idea just a bit.
Paul tells us about this connection in

Galatians 3: 13-14
13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us-for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE "- 14 in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

Paul lays out a thick theology here that we need to really take into understand the event of Christian Baptism.
Jesus takes on the Curse of the Cross to open up the Promise made to Abraham and the vehicle of the Promise will be the Holy Spirit.
Lets here Paul right here: Jesus died so that the Spirit can come into the world. The Spirit will bring life and will renew the earth and convict sinners.

Ephesians 1:13
13 In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation -having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise,

Paul here in Ephesians speaks of a seal of the Spirit that is connected to the Promise.
He even calls the Holy Spirit the Spirit of Promise.
To understand how this works its way out in Acts we have to look at what Jesus said in John before he was crucified.

John 16: 7-8
7 "But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away ; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. 8 "And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment ;

It is better Jesus to win the victory of the Cross and be resurrected and ascend into Heaven so that the Spirit of God can come into the world and Heaven and Earth be joined through that Spirit.
The Role of the Spirit will be to unite Man to God- to act as the one that mediates the Grace that Christ won on Calvary. To understand Acts and Baptism we have to understand the Spirit.
What is it that the Spirit will do that should concern us?
Convict the world of sin – Reveal Truth
But something even more,

Romans 8: 7-11
7 because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God ; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, 8 and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. 9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. 10 If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

It is the Spirit that brings Life – but in particular Paul makes it clear in Romans 8 that it will be the Spirit of God that has a role in our bodily resurrection.
The new resurrected body will be powered by God’s Spirit.
So where does this lead us in the discussion of Baptism? We had to lay this ground work to make sense of Acts.
Many Scholars have noted how Luke in the gospel of Luke and in Acts lays out templates to understand his writing. You can tell he has been educated in Greek thinking.
This template is laid out in Acts 1 and will help us understand much of the book.

Acts 1: 6-8
So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel ?" 7 He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority ; 8 but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth."

In this passage we see the idea of RESTORATION KINGDOM and THE HOLY SPIRIT CONNECTED
They ask Jesus a question that you would expect from a 1st century Jew.
Is this the time that you are restoring the Kingdom – this combines two ideas – RESTORATION and KINGDOM – these are important to understand.
Jesus answer- ties together the idea of the Holy Spirit and the Spirit being poured out which had been prophesied by the prophet Joel and then Jesus lays out the geography of this book.
He lays out that they will be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the remotest parts of the Earth.
Jerusalem – Judea – Samaria- The World
These geographical places mean something – the Gospel will go out in the Land Promised to Abraham but just as prophets like Isaiah had proclaimed – the knowledge of God would go into the world. No longer was the geographical promise made to Abraham restricted to the Land of Israel but now it could go into the entire world.
The Entire world will be filled with the knowledge of the Glory of God.
So what we are witnessing in Baptism is the following:
Israel is being restored and the Kingdom is being re-established, and the promise is being fulfilled.
That is the best way to understand Peter’s sermon in Acts 2. If you read that sermon in light of these expectations it will make so much more sense to you.
As a matter of fact when Peter gets up to preach the 1st Gospel sermon to the men of Israel on Pentecost he cites the expectation of the Restoration of Israel by the prophet Joel.
They accuse the apostles of being drunk but Peter takes his stand and quotes Joel when he says:

Acts 2: 16-21
16 but this is that which hath been spoken through the prophet Joel: 17 And it shall be in the last days, saith God, I will pour forth of My Spirit upon all flesh: And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, And your young men shall see visions, And your old men shall dream dreams: 18 Yea and on My servants and on My handmaidens in those days Will I pour forth of My Spirit; and they shall prophesy. 19 And I will show wonders in the heaven above, And signs on the earth beneath; Blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke: 20 The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the day of the Lord come, That great and notable [day]. 21 And it shall be, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Peter points to the great prophecy of Joel that cites what they are seeing before their eyes as that last great day Restoration of Israel.
What these men were seeing was apocalyptic in the sense that God was going a great act in their site.
He cites all these wonderful acts of the moon to blood and pillars of smoke to prove his point. These are apocalyptic terms that refer to the visitation of Jehovah.
God’s day of visitation has come and he has come to put things back right through the Gospel of His Son Jesus.
If we take Peter’s Sermon and pull out the highlights you will see that he is building a water-tight case for all of Israel’s Hopes being tied into Jesus.
Here was this group of people that had waited for Abraham’s Promise, For the Restoration of the 12 tribes of Israel and the Restoration of the Davidic Kingdom - For the Messiah
And what had they done? They had killed him brutally and on top of that they used the pagan Romans to pull it off. The pagan Roman authorities helped them kill the King of Israel.
Of course Peter tells them that this was all part of the plan but they have a very Jewish response.
Their response is not what head knowledge do we need or facts that we have to memorize. Their Response is WHAT SHALL WE DO?
What do we have to do to make things right? How do we experience the Promise.
Peter tells them-

ACTS 2: 38-39
38 And Peter [said] unto them, Repent ye, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins; and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For to you is the promise, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, [even] as many as the Lord our God shall call unto him

In this passage we see Luke lay out a template for the Promise made to Abraham and the Holy Spirit.
You see the formula if you like that term:
Repent, Baptized, Holy Spirit
This is what he tells them in verse 39 is part of the Promise.
God will now start putting together this plan starting here in Jerusalem and it will spread to Judea, Samaria, and then to the Earth.
Now God will start to make His point clear using water baptism.
1st – It will be the Samaritans.
Remember we talked about how Luke uses Templates to follow but we will see two exceptions that are exceptions for a reason. They are there to show that God is making an exclamation point.
In ACTS 8: 5 we see Phillip go to Samaria to preach the Gospel. Many believed and were baptized. They were baptized in the name of Jesus but did not receive the Holy Spirit.
Now we can look at that and say, I thought that Acts 2:38 promised you would receive the Holy Spirit at water baptism? Why the Exception?
The information is found in the fact that they are Samaritans and outcasts.
It would be hard for Jewish Christians to accept these Samaritans without Apostolic authority.

Acts 8: 14-16
14 Now when the apostles that were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John: 15 who, when they were come down, prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Spirit: 16 for as yet it was fallen upon none of them: only they had been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus

In this passage we see that it takes the laying on of the apostles hands for one to
receive the Holy Spirit for the Samaritans.

This is out of the ordinary.
This is an exception to the rubric laid out in Acts 2:38 but the reason is that God is reclaiming lost territory. God was calling the Samaritans into the Kingdom.
This is a vivid picture to anyone that would want to lock them out of the kingdom and it is two pillar apostles Peter and John that go to Samaria to show that the Church and God has accepted the Samaritans.
We see this same type of change for the ordinary when it comes to the bringing in of the Gentiles to the Church.
In the story of Cornelius we see something happen out of the ordinary so much so that Peter is shocked by what happens.
In the story of Cornelius, Cornelius was a Roman Soldier and was a Gentile. He was a good man that prayed to God and gave alms to the poor. God sent him an angel to tell him to send for the Apostle Peter.
If you remember in the story Peter was having a vision about what is clean and unclean as Cornelius men came to get him. In this story we see a radical change and a shift in the history of the Bible. A turning point because God now includes the Gentiles fully into His family.
In this story Peter is preaching the gospel to Cornelius and we pick up in Acts 10 with the story

Acts 10: 44-48
44 While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Spirit fell on all them that heard the word. 45 And they of the circumcision that believed were amazed, as many as came with Peter, because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit. 46 For they heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God. Then answered Peter, 47 Can any man forbid the water, that these should not be baptized, who have received the Holy Spirit as well as we? 48 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then prayed they him to tarry certain days.

We see another exception to Acts 2:38 – you see the Holy Spirit come upon them before water baptism.
Why would God do this? If you notice the reaction of Peter and the Jewish Christians with him react by allowing these Gentiles to receive water baptism.
God is showing Peter and teaching the Jewish Christians a lesson that He accepts the Gentiles into the Church.
When we put all of the pieces of this puzzle together you start to see that Baptism is much more important than we make it in many Churches.
Last week we looked at how the great events of the OT of the Exodus, Flood, and the Day of Atonement in the Temple were all foreshadowings to the Baptism of Christ.
Tonight, I traced through the idea of the Promise made to Abraham and God’s great project of Restoring Israel are all tied together in the even of baptism.
In Baptism God kicked off the renewal of Israel in Jerusalem with the 3000 obedient Israelites that were baptized, in the Acts 8 we see baptism mark out the Samaritans as acceptable, and in Cornelius God shows the Jewish Church that now the doors of Grace are flung open to the Gentiles.
We see in Paul a summing up of our point when he says in Galatians 3
Earlier I told you that Galatians 3 lays out a thick theology on the Promise made to Abraham and then you will not be shocked to see that he closes out his argument with a talk on baptism at the end of the chapter.

Galatians 3: 26-29
26 For ye are all sons of God, through faith, in Christ Jesus. 27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ. 28 There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one [man] in Christ Jesus. 29 And if ye are Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise.

Man is no longer distinguished by his ethnic background or keeping of the Mosaic law but the badge of acceptance to God is Faith in Jesus.
Faithful people that have been baptized in Jesus are now inheritors of the Promise made to Abraham.
Tonight is a night to go back to reflect on your own baptism and think about what happened on that day.
Think about the seismic shift in Eternity that you were grafted into God’s family and you were accepting a promise made to Abraham a few thousand years ago. A promise that Abraham never got to see but had to look forward in faith is not something you have.
How do we live now knowing this?
Do we live a life that reflects this type of Promise of our future?

Going to the Other Side reflecting God to the Lost AM Sermon 11/21/10

My grandmother would always harp on me about how important it was to not get into trouble at school or in our community. She always reminded me that my Grandfather had worked hard to build up a good name and passed that down to my Dad. It was up to me and my brother to keep up that good name by having a good reputation in the community.
One of the main things that we see in the Bible is the idea of His people reflecting His glory to those around them.
God’s people, the Israelites, would be ambassador’s to the world to show who God is.
IN a past lesson we explored how the geography of Israel was critical in this role. God put the nation of Israel in the most strategic place you put them. Israel was at the crossroads of civilization.
God wanted Israel to be a Kingdom of Priests.
If you remember Israel failed miserably at this task of being a Priest to God.
To understand this call to be priests you must understand the roll of a priest in the ancient world.

PRIESTS
1) A priest was to be set apart – to live holy and separate to God.
2) A priest mediates for other people to God. A priest is one that goes to God on behalf of others.
3) One of the most important rolls is that the priest is to reflect God to the world.

We also need to let it sink in that God called each and every one of the Israelites to this roll. That was his original plan that man would be His priest.
When HE put Adam in the Garden that was one of his rolls that he was to carry out. Adam was to have dominion like a King in a Kingdom.
Adam was also to till and keep the Garden and the Hebrew words used is SHAMAR which is a priestly term used for the Levitical Priesthood.
Adam was supposed to be a King and Priest

Mark 4: 35-4135 On that day, when evening came, He said to them, "Let us go over to the other side." 36 Leaving the crowd, they took Him along with them in the boat, just as He was; and other boats were with Him. 37 And there arose a fierce gale of wind, and the waves were breaking over the boat so much that the boat was already filling up. 38 Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion ; and they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing ?" 39 And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still." And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. 40 And He said to them, "Why are you afraid ? Do you still have no faith ?" 41 They became very much afraid and said to one another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?"
Mark 5: 1-20
1 They came to the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gerasenes. 2 When He got out of the boat, immediately a man from the tombs with an unclean spirit met Him, 3 and he had his dwelling among the tombs. And no one was able to bind him anymore, even with a chain ; 4 because he had often been bound with shackles and chains, and the chains had been torn apart by him and the shackles broken in pieces, and no one was strong enough to subdue him. 5 Constantly, night and day, he was screaming among the tombs and in the mountains, and gashing himself with stones. 6 Seeing Jesus from a distance, he ran up and bowed down before Him; 7 and shouting with a loud voice, he said, "What business do we have with each other, Jesus, Son of the Most High God ? I implore You by God, do not torment me!" 8 For He had been saying to him, "Come out of the man, you unclean spirit !" 9 And He was asking him, "What is your name ?" And he said to Him, "My name is Legion ; for we are many." 10 And he began to implore Him earnestly not to send them out of the country. 11 Now there was a large herd of swine feeding nearby on the mountain. 12 The demons implored Him, saying, "Send us into the swine so that we may enter them." 13 Jesus gave them permission. And coming out, the unclean spirits entered the swine ; and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea, about two thousand of them; and they were drowned in the sea. 14 Their herdsmen ran away and reported it in the city and in the country. And the people came to see what it was that had happened. 15 They came to Jesus and observed the man who had been demon-possessed sitting down, clothed and in his right mind, the very man who had had the "legion "; and they became frightened. 16 Those who had seen it described to them how it had happened to the demon-possessed man, and all about the swine. 17 And they began to implore Him to leave their region. 18 As He was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed was imploring Him that he might accompany Him. 19 And He did not let him, but He said to him, "Go home to your people and report to them what great things the Lord has done for you, and how He had mercy on you." 20 And he went away and began to proclaim in Decapolis what great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed


In Mark 4:35 we see that Jesus tells His disciples lets go on to the other side. Jesus is going to leave his base of operation around the area of Capernaum and go to a strange place.

Jesus is going to take His disciples to a place that they would not want to go to. This would be about as scandalous as going to the region of the Samaritans. This would be as scandalous as going to the area of Caesarea Philippi.
Consider the Geography of Jesus Ministry and where he would take his disciples.
Remember that I told you before that Israel was called to be a royal priesthood. They did not take this job very serious and they were sent into Exile in Babylon.
They had returned home and Judaism in the time of Jesus – this Judaism during the time of the 2nd Temple had made sure that they kept themselves pure.
They were really strict about what was clean and unclean. They had set up all kinds of rules to keep their purity.

In their quest to not make the same mistake twice they had become legalistic and could care less about the lost sheep of the land of Israel.
They had declared that the Samaritans were unclean, they had declared the pagans were unclean, they had declared that the Hellenistic Jews were unclean.
They had turned their back on these people that were lost and had basically taken the light of God and put it under a bushel.
They were not a light set on a hill.

In the ministry of Jesus we see Him go to these various regions of the outcasts and do some of his most important miracles and teachings there.
Jesus would tell parables about these people like the parable of the lost coin, the lost sheep, and the prodigal son. It would enrage the Jews of his time and puzzle His own disciples.

Jesus had come to show Israel and the world exactly what God looks like and how we are to reflect God.

This also goes back to the time of Genesis when we are told that we are made in the image of God. That means that in worship we reflect God back to God but we are also angled mirrors that reflect God to the Creation.
Man had lost his way and did not know how to reflect God to the world. Jesus who is the VERY IMAGE and BEING OF GOD took on flesh and in His ministry He is showing us exactly what it is like to be a priest of God-To reflect the glory of God to the world.

Now we are getting another lesson in what this looks like by going TO THE OTHER SIDE
The Other Side is the Decapolis, this is what we have talked about before as being the place where the Hellenistic, Greek, pagan Jews and Gentiles lived.
This is also called A FAR COUNTRY in Judaism.
Jesus is going to a place that did not share the values of the Jews, a place that is very pagan, and a Place that His disciples would not have wanted to go to.
As we read the story in Mark 4 and 5 we see a storm come while they are crossing the Sea of Galilee.

The Sea was associated with the Abyss in Judaism and storms were associated with evil, with Chaos, and in particular Satan.
It is amazing that the Disciples reacted like they did to Jesus calming the storm.
They state, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?"
Why would they react this way, Jesus could feed 5000, and raise people form the dead but the disciples did not react the same to those miracles.

Why NOT?Remember that Moses brought Manna from Heaven for the Israelites and Elijah had raised the widow’s son but Jesus had done something that the Psalms said that only Jehovah could do.
The calming of the Sea was a big deal in Judaism. There were two very important passages that the disciples would be very familiar with. Both of these passages referred to the sea and the calming of the seas.

Psalm 89: 8-98 O LORD God of hosts, who is like You, O mighty LORD ? Your faithfulness also surrounds You. 9 You rule the swelling of the sea ; When its waves rise, You still them.
Psalm 107: 24-2924 They have seen the works of the LORD, And His wonders in the deep. 25 For He spoke and raised up a stormy wind, Which lifted up the waves of the sea. 26 They rose up to the heavens, they went down to the depths ; Their soul melted away in their misery. 27 They reeled and staggered like a drunken man, And were at their wits' end. 28 Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, And He brought them out of their distresses. 29 He caused the storm to be still, So that the waves of the sea were hushed.
Jesus shows His identity as God in the Flesh by working the miracle of calming the sea. He goes about proving His identity beyond a question.
Jesus is Jehovah God.

SYMBOLISM of the PASSAGE –
Jesus goes to the OTHER SIDE – NO Swine would have been found in any Israelite village that was faithful to God.
Swine were unclean and they would have been abhorrent to any good Law observing Jew
In this story we run into a man that it is so Demon possessed that the demon is called LEGION.
A ROMAN Legion has about 6000 soldiers so this may not be a literal number that Mark is giving us in this account as a Legion but we are to understand that many demons are possessing this man. In the day of Jesus there was much superstition and belief in the demonic.
There were types of demons and genders of demons. Many believed that every part of the body could be possessed by demons.
What we need to understand is that we are seeing a conflict between Good and Evil. The Kingdom of God is doing battle with the Kingdom of Darkness.
The man is in the Tombs because that is where a demon possessed man is supposed to be. This is where many that are demon possessed are sentenced to live. The tombs in ancient Palestine would be caves hewn out of a rocky hillside with shelves hewn out for the bodies to be laid on.
Tombs and Desert regions would be the places that demon possessed people would live as outcasts from society.
We see that this man sees Jesus and comes to encounter Him and calls Him by His Divine Title. This name that the Demon possessed man uses is the most orthodox name that this demon could use.
Why would this demon use Jesus real name?
“Son of the Most High God”
One answer is that in the process of Exorcism one could get control of the situation by invoking the name of God. Many scholars have looked at this passage and realized that this Demon Possessed man is trying to get one up on Jesus before Jesus takes over the situation.
He is flattering Jesus but at the same time rushes down to meet him and quickly tries to control the situation by invoking the Divine Name.
We see that Jesus is in the driver’s seat because the man has to state his name. In the rite of exorcism in Judaism when the demonic stated their name it showed that the exorcist had taken control of the situation. Jesus came to destroy the works of Satan.
1 John 3:8 tells us- The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.
Earlier in Mark’s Gospel Jesus was accused of casting out demons by the power of Satan and he challenges this belief and refers to something that we see in this passage.

Mark 3:22-2722 The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, "He is possessed by Beelzebul," and "He casts out the demons by the ruler of the demons." 23 And He called them to Himself and began speaking to them in parables, "How can Satan cast out Satan ? 24 "If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. 25 "If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. 26 "If Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but he is finished ! 27 "But no one can enter the strong man's house and plunder his property unless he first binds the strong man, and then he will plunder his house.
We see in the story of the Gerasene Demoniac that they had tried to bind this man with chains but he was so powerful that he broke them.
This man was uncontrollable but now he has come in contact with someone more powerful than he could ever imagine. Now the Creator of the universe has come to his region.
Jesus is the strong man, Jesus will bind Satan and plunder his property.
In the passage before, Jesus was talking about having to bind Satan and plunder His property. This man was the property of Satan but Jesus is taking him back.
Jesus sends the demons into the Swine- 2000 pigs are killed.
In Matthew’s account we see the demon possessed man implore Jesus not to send Him into the Abyss before the appointed time.
The Abyss is the place of the damned souls awaiting Judgment, this demon understood that he was sentenced to eternal damnation and he did not want to go early.
Jesus sends him into the swine and this could be seen as a symbolic act for two reasons.
Near this area of the Gerasenes was a Roman Legion stationed that had on their flag a symbol of a wild pig or swine.
Also the pigs were unclean animals and should not be in the land of Israel in the first place. The destruction of the pigs could show God’s displeasure with having unclean animals in the Land but also make the point that these demons were cast out never to return.
The reaction of the man and the reaction of the people of the city are interesting.
This man wants to be ‘with Jesus’ which is a word used to refer to Jesus inner circle. He wants to be a follower of Jesus. He wants Jesus to take him in as His own.
Jesus commands him to go to his own people.
The city has had their total economy turned upside down and they want Jesus to leave immediately.
There are some points we can take from this story:

1) God is powerful and everywhere the Gospel goes, Satan is being challenged.
We see that He is Jehovah God when he calms the storm.
When people are brought to Christ, we are binding the strong man with the Gospel and we are plundering his property. That was the work of Jesus and that is our work to plunder the property of Satan and take it back for Christ.

2) The Disciples never get out of the boat. If you look at the account of the story Jesus is the only one that gets out of the boat.
They are probably terrified to go to the Decapolis in the first place but now they see this demoniac man and they certainly will not get out the boat when they see him.
It is the apostle Peter that gets out and walks to Jesus in the stormy waters but now they will not even get out of the boat because of where they are.
The reaction of the Disciples is telling in this story.

3) The man makes a big difference. He goes from Demon possessed to an evangelist to the Decapolis. He will go to this pagan region and preach about Jesus.
The next time Jesus returns to the Decapolis he will feed 4000 people.
This man makes such a difference and it is evident in how many people are interested in Jesus ministry from this pagan region when he returns.

4) The people reject Jesus because it costs them something. They care more about economics than about this person that is being healed and brought to wholeness.
They don’t care about this man or the Kingdom of God. They are more worried about the 2000 pigs. It tells you about the value system of people
The Jews on the other side of the lake don’t even care enough about them to come and evangelize them and they care more about the pigs than the man that had the demon cast out of him.

Application for us:In this story we are confronted by different responses to Jesus.
We are called to be priests of God, to reflect God to the world. Now we see the very Image of God, God Himself in action to show us how we are to be,
We cannot become what we were meant to be unless we look to Jesus. Jesus is the model of what real living is all about.
It is Jesus that goes to the place that no one else will go to. Jesus confronts Evil head on and defeats it.
Who are we in this story?
-Are we the person that has been made Whole by Jesus and are now on fire to tell everyone about Him?
-Are we the apostles that are so scared to get out the boat to get to work, or are we just indifferent to the lost of this world that we don’t want to get involved, too busy.
-are we the townspeople that think Jesus is okay just long as He doesn’t upset things. Christianity is cool until it costs me something, demands something of me, don’t upset my comfortable life because of Jesus.

The Master has come to show us what it means to be His priest, his called out, we have to go to the places where other people run from.
We have to enter the fray, we have to get out of the boat, we have to proclaim to those who will listen,
We are called to plunder the possessions of the strong man. The Kingdom is inbreaking and things will never be the same.

The Waters that Divide PM Sermon 11/14/10

Waters that Divide

Baptism was something that united the Early Church but today has brought division to Christianity.
There are many misunderstandings about Baptism and what it means and how you should administer baptism.
This goes back to some of the earliest Christians. A story illustrates this point.
The story is told about the baptism of King Aengus by St. Patrick in the middle of the fifth century. Sometime during the rite, St. Patrick leaned on his sharp-pointed staff and inadvertently stabbed the king's foot. After the baptism was over, St. Patrick looked down at all the blood, realized what he had done, and begged the king's forgiveness. Why did you suffer this pain in silence, the Saint wanted to know.
The king replied, "I thought it was part of the ritual."

Tonight I would like to look back at the origin of the rite of Baptism in particular and Christian Baptism’s roots in the Old Testament.
I think in doing this it will clear up a lot of misconceptions in the world about baptism and people will be able to find some type of unity on this basic doctrine.
To lay out the importance of this, I would say that baptism is a foundational doctrine and teaching.


I. Baptism in Israel
When I was a kid I thought that baptism in the ministry of John the Baptist and in Jesus was a new thing on the world stage.
What I have found out over the years is that baptism was very common in Israel in what is called the 2nd Temple Era.
The Second Temple was the one rebuilt after the return from Exile that was finally completed by Herod the Great. The Second Temple Era goes from 200 BC to 70 AD.
Archaeologists have unearthed over 150 baptisteries near the Temple. These baptisteries were called Miktvah and were made to immerse your body in water. They had steps the descended into the water and steps that lead out the other side. The person would immerse themselves.
In Jerusalem, many houses of influential Jews in the time of Jesus were furnished with Baptisteries. Some Pharisees believed in immersion in water every morning for ritual cleanliness and some immersed themselves in water every night for ritual purity.
On the Day of Atonement the High Priest of Israel was required to be immersed in water before he could enter the Holy Place.
Rabbinic sources show that complete immersion was the requirement.
The Rabbinic rule was that water had to be in contact with every part of your body and the only way that is possible is complete immersion.
So we know that baptism was common in Judaism as well as it was unanimous that baptism meant that a person should be immersed for a baptism to valid.
The very word Baptism comes from a use of meaning complete immersion.
Strabo the Roman Historian uses this word to describe the sinking of ships in a naval battle. This word meant to completely immerse or to dip in a liquid.
One group that was very well known in the time of Christ for baptism and purification is the Essenes. The Essenes believed that one had to be immersed in water to be renewed.
Many people connect the baptism of John the Baptist with this group but there is no conclusive evidence for this.
Another phase of Judaism that required baptism was Jewish proselyte baptism. If one were a Gentile and desired baptism they would have to be immersed in water as well as undergo circumcision. One great Rabbi that was the teacher of the Great Gameliel who was Paul’s teacher taught that Gentile converts had to be baptized because Israel had gone through the Red Sea.
They called this being baptized into Moses. The Jews had been baptized into Moses because they were in the bodies of their ancestors but these Gentiles had to undergo baptism to be a part of Moses.


II. John the Baptist Baptism

John’s call of baptism was not a new thing but there was a new twist.
Baptism in Israel had purely been for ritual outward purity but had never been connected to the condition of one’s heart.
John came as a prophet of Israel’s Restoration.
He came a as fulfillment of Isaiah 40’s prophecy of one crying in the wilderness to make the path straight for the Messiah to come. John comes to warn of the Judgment to come.


Luke 3:2-3
2 in the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John, the son of Zacharias, in the wilderness. 3 And he came into all the district around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins ;


Part of this repentance had John telling the people to bear fruit in accordance with repentance. If you have two tunics share with those in need, if you are a tax collector only take what you have been ordered to take.
Soldiers are not to abuse people by force but we content with your wages.
John’s baptism was connected with inner change and this is something new. This is a baptism just to prepare people for the ministry of Jesus.
The shift though is that now baptism is not just connected with outward cleansing but inward change that is connected to that change.


III. The third aspect of Baptism that I want to look at is something called Typology.
This is a less explored view of baptism but it is fascinating and very much a part of the New Testament.
I would propose that he early church would have understood baptism much more in this light than how people argue or explain baptism today. Let me explain what Typology is. It comes from the Greek word TUPOS which is found in the New Testament.
A TUPOS is a shadowy type of the reality. A great example would be what a footprint in mud would be to the shoe that made the print. The print is not the shoe itself but is the TUPOS or sign that the shoe was there.
The word ANTITUPOS or what we call and ANTITYPE is the reality being signified. The shoe in the example is the ANTITYPE – it is the reality where the print is the TUPOS or Type.
This same language is used to compare Baptism to events of the Old Testament. Tonight I want to look at three types that are found in the Old Testament to Christian Baptism.
The first type that is compared to Baptism in the New Testament is the Flood.


1 Peter 3: 18-21
18 For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit ; 19 in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison, 20 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water. 21 Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you-not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience -through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,


The word in verse 21 that is translated as Corresponding to in the New American Standard Version
The NIV translates this word in verse 21 as Symbolizes
The KJV translates this word as LIKE FIGURE
The Greek word is ANTITUPON
In other words what Peter is saying is the flood is a type of baptism and symbolizes Baptism, Christian Baptism is the reality and is the subject that he is talking about.
How does the flood act as a type to baptism or symbolize baptism.
In the flood you have righteous people being saved by water. The water cleanses away the sin and separates the New Humanity from the Old humanity.
Noah and his family represent God’s new start with humanity and the sinful people are washed away in the water.
In the same way in the waters of baptism sin is washed away.
Now is Peter saying that Baptism is magical and you can just take anyone off the street and say the right words, dunk them and expect them to be saved?
That is definetly NOT what he is saying.
The key word in this passage is the word APPEAL
This word that is used to say that Baptism is an appeal to God for a good conscience can be likened to a Prayer.
Many times I am asked why we don’t have the sinners’ prayer in our churches. I always tell them that we do believe in the sinner’s prayer but we believe the sinner’s prayer is water baptism.
This is exactly what Peter is saying – in Baptism you make your appeal to God.
What better way to say I believe in the Gospel than to reenact the Gospel. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15 that the Gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
In baptism we are declaring or appealing to God that we believe that Jesus died so we therefore repent and put the old person to death, and we too are buried as Jesus was buried, and we are raised up out of the water with the hope of the resurrection.

In Acts 22: 16 we see baptism connected to calling out to God just like this passage in 1 Peter
In Acts 22:16 Ananias says to Paul,

16 'Now why do you delay ? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.'

Baptism is the event that we are separated from sin and Call UPON GOD – CRY OUT TO GOD
Calling on his name could be translated as MAKE AN APPEAL
It means the same as what we looked at before.
Christian Baptism is all about an inward change, a cry to God, and an act of faith that cries out to the world that you believe the Gospel.
For 1800 years of Church history Baptism has always been the proper response to the Gospel call. It wasn’t until the American Great Awakening that people started to separate a person’s profession of faith from baptism.
It wasn’t until the 1800’s that the Sinner’s prayer came into existence. It had always been sufficient for someone to make a public proclamation of faith and be immediately baptized.
This is the same model that we will see in Acts that we will look at next Sunday night.


IV. Baptism linked to the Exodus Event
The second OT type that I wanted to look at tonight was the crossing of the Israelites.
As a matter of fact the Jewish Rabbis as I pointed out earlier said that the reason Gentile converts had to be baptized in water to become a Jew went back to the crossing of the Red Sea.


1 Corinthians 10: 1-5
1 For I do not want you to be unaware, brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea ; 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea ; 3 and all ate the same spiritual food ; 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the rock was Christ. 5 Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased ; for they were laid low in the wilderness. 6 Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we would not crave evil things as they also craved.


In verse 6 of this passage Paul uses the Word EXAMPLES – In other words Israel had these experiences as a type of what is to come.
This Greek word is literally TUPOS or TYPE –
Israel crossing the Red Sea is Type of our baptism into Christ.


Romans 6: 1-6
1 What shall we say then ? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase ? 2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death ? 4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. 5 For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6 knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin ;

We are baptized into Christ – Just as Israel was identified with Moses.
When the crossed the Red Sea there was no turning back. They were ALL IN with Moses and God leading them.
This is what Paul is talking about in Romans. We are baptized into Christ and we are no longer slaves. We have broken the slavery of sin and crucified the old person and have united with Christ in baptism.
So we should see Baptism as a liberating event. An Exodus from Sin and Transforming Experience.


V. The Holy of Holies and the Day of Atonement acts as a type of Christian baptism
You may think this is an odd place to find a connection to Christian baptism and the Holy of Holies but you will see the connection in Hebrews.
In Hebrews 9 we are told that the Holy of Holies is a type or TUPOS of a reality that is in Heaven.
The High Priest of Israel would have to immerse himself in water every year and offer a sacrifice for himself and Israel and sprinkle blood on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant.
Jesus will become the perfect sacrifice and by His blood he will enter the Holy Place of Heaven through that blood.


It is with this in mind we see what the Hebrew writer says about us in Hebrews 10: 19-22
19 Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.


In this passage we see again a connection between bodies washed in water – this is a direct reference to the baptism of the High Priest.
We are the new priesthood in the new covenant. Our baptism allows us to go into the most Holy Place of God with confidence.
This word for the ceremonial baptism of the priesthood is used in Titus 3.


Titus 3: 5-6
5 He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, 6 whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior,


The Washing of Regeneration that Paul uses is a word from the Jewish Scriptures that refers to the Laver in the Temple that was used for these baptisms.
The NIV translates this as Washing of Rebirth
The New Revised Standard actually translates the Greek of this passage the best- water of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.
Water is involved in this Greek word Loutron – you cannot translate this word without water.
This passage is talking about the water of rebirth and it is not a metaphor- to a Jew this word meant H2O water.
So you have Paul using this same term for the High Priestly baptism in reference to Christian baptism.


Conclusion:
From looking at the OT types we can draw a few conclusions:
1) Baptism is about separating sin from man. We are leaving the sinful way behind and becoming a new humanity In Christ.
Just as in Noah mankind got a new start, we are getting a new start in Christ with our baptism.
2) Baptism is a petition to God, If you like a prayer of faith to God.
3) Baptism is an Exodus event in which you leave the slavery of sin behind, it is about Freedom in Christ
4) Baptism is an event that purifies us by the shed blood of Christ that we can now go into the most Holy Place of God.

A Kingdom Call AM Sermon 11/14/10

NT Wright tells the story of Americans visiting the British Parliament for the first time. The American tourists were in the House of Lords and one of the British members of Parliament came by them with all his regalia and was all dressed up for the formal meeting of the House of Lords. He happened to see one of his friends down the hallway and his friend’s name happened to be Neil Martin. He wanted to get Neil’s attention and he yelled out down the hallway – NEIL !! with that the American tourists knelt down before him because they thought that was what they were supposed to do. Something between the two cultures that are very close in proximity – America and Great Britain- was lost. They were confused.
The same can be said of our gospels many times. We have read these stories to the point that they have lost their zest and original meaning. We have shaped them into our own image instead of allowing God to shape us by these stories.
The Bible is a book to be read as one that shapes and molds our lives. This is a book that should challenge us every time we read it.
Another true story was told of a public school teacher that decided one Christmas holiday to read to her students about the Nativity story of Christ.
Many of the students in this school came from a background in which they had never attended Church and were from a multicultural background.
The students were captivated by the story of Jesus and hung on every word that the teacher told them about Jesus.
When she was finished one of the students spoke up with something very peculiar and asked his teacher why the baby in the story was given a ‘swear’ or ‘curse word’ for the baby. To some people in our day and age the name Jesus Christ is merely a curse word.
As a matter of fact many Christians have no idea that Christ is not Jesus surname. Many people act as if Mary and Joseph were Mary and Joseph Christ and Jesus just took their last name. The name Christ is not a last name but a title of Jewish royalty.
It is literally Christos in Greek which is a translation of the Hebrew word Messiah.
Literally it means Jesus Messiah.
This morning I want to take a big panoramic view of a theme that is shot all through the Gospels but it is one of the misunderstood and least talked about theme and that is the Kingdom of God or as Matthew’s gospel puts it the Kingdom of Heaven.
This problem of grappling with much of the Gospels goes way back in Church history and I want paint for you a very simplistic picture as to what happened over the history of Christianity that lead to this situation.
If you go back to the time right after the Apostles you will find a church Militant that is fighting for the faith. The Apostolic Church was a church that is on fire for the Gospel but also under persecution. The Church is on the bottom side of power and under fire by the Romans.
About 300 years after Christ was crucified a Roman Emperor came to Power that claimed to be a Christian. His name was Constantine and Constantine was a very powerful man.
Constantine also issued a law called the Edict of Toleration which made Christianity legal under Roman Law.
Contrary to popular belief, Constantine did NOT make Christianity the official religion of Rome but just made it legal to be a Christian. It wasn’t until Emperor Theodotian that Christianity would become the official religion of Rome.
Under Constantine the Church come out of hiding and become a vocal part of Roman society and with that brought debates.
Most of those debates centered around the Divinity of Jesus and the Trinity. The church for one of the first times was on the brink of being ripped apart by various heresies and false teaching.
Because of this threat to sound doctrine on the Divinity of Christ and the Trinity a council was called of all Church leaders at the time. The model that they looked to was Acts 15 and the Council of Jerusalem but a critical element was missing and that was the living voice of the Apostles. They felt that the Scripture or the writings of those Apostles would have replace the living voice of the Apostles and they took Scripture and said, “What does the Bible teach about the Trinity?” and from that they formulated what we call the Nicene Creed.
Many churches around the world recite the Nicene Creed in all of their worship services.

Originally the Nicene Creed was just going to be a statement about the essentials of Christianity over and against the Heretics.
The problem that arose in the years after the Creed and through the Middle Ages was that the Creed became the teaching rubric of the Church.
In other words, whether intended or not, the Creed formed the direction of most Christian instruction and many people became ignorant of many of the teachings in the Gospel about what Jesus was all about.
The Creed focused on the Divinity of Christ, the Trinity, Baptism for the remission of sins, the Church as being one and holy, Jesus resurrection from the dead, and Jesus Second coming.

All of those I think, or hope we would be in hearty agreement with but a problem arises when one just focuses on the Incarnation of Christ in flesh and His birth then it short circuits straight to His Death, Resurrection, and Ascension into Heaven.
That is super important and without the resurrection all of this discussion would be moot but we forget something really important.
The teaching of Jesus about His KINGDOM gives meaning and impetus to His death, burial and resurrection.
Because the Church focused on just the birth of Jesus and His Passion things like the Crusades were possible.
People had forgotten the radical Kingdom call of Christ.
Because of ignorance of the Kingdom one could have corrupt state Churches that would lead people like our Founding Fathers to revolt and set up a government separate from the Church.
People had forgotten that all governments had merely borrowed their power from God and Christ’s Kingdom super cedes all other Kingdoms.
One of the goals of the Protestant Reformation was to reclaim a lost heritage of reading the Bible afresh and grappling with these issues.
What in turn happened was controversies that were fought within the Protestant Movement about matters of how one is justified by faith. This will lead to more creeds and confessions of faith to prove fidelity to truth.
Things like the Westminster Confession of faith came about because of these controversies and once again Biblical study focused mostly on what the Creeds and Confessions stated and once again Jesus radical Kingdom call was neglected at our own peril.
Two men in the Restoration Movement in the United States of America set out to make the idea of God’s Kingdom a major part of their teaching and they felt, and rightfully so, that this teaching had been neglected by Churches.
David Lipscomb and James Harding, the schools Lipscomb in Nashville and Harding in Search, Ark are named for them, were two men that emphasized God’s Kingdom Movement in the Ministry of Jesus.
This morning I want to point out to you some important places in the Gospel that give us some insight into that Kingdom as well as our response to that Kingdom Movement.
I think there has never been a better time for the Restoration Movement to go back to our Kingdom movement roots more than now.
We live in a time when Churches that claim ties with the Restoration Movement are turning to emphasizing parties, pop Bible studies that draw spiritual lessons from Andy Griffith, and basic spiritual fluff.
What has been left behind is the rigor of hard Bible study, Discipleship, and a vigorous evangelistic outreach that marked our Movement from the beginning.
Instead of transforming the religious landscape of America we have become complacent in our own skin and allowed the American Pop culture to infiltrate and water down the Gospel.

1) First misconception – People have a hard time understanding that God’s Kingdom could begin in the Ministry of Christ and still have a future fulfillment in the Second Coming.
There are two extremes when it comes to God’s Kingdom coming in the Church and looking totally to the future.
Some say , If God’s Kingdom came in the ministry of Jesus and the teaching of the Apostles then why do we still see a world upside down?
There are two ways to understand this
In the world that Jesus lived in there was already terminology being used that specified what was happening at the present time and what was to come.
In the Inter-testament period the terms arose ‘THIS AGE’ and the ‘AGE TO COME”
We find Jesus use this terminology in His sermons. We see this terminology about the Present and Future in Mark 10

Mark 10: 28-3028 Peter began to say to Him, "Behold, we have left everything and followed You." 29 Jesus said, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms, for My sake and for the gospel's sake, 30 but that he will receive a hundred times as much now in the present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and farms, along with persecutions ; and in the age to come, eternal life.

Jesus tells Peter that those the give up for the Kingdom will receive an entire new family identity in which Jubilee fellowship will occur when the Church will take care of each other and will be FAMILY and you will receive Eternal Life in the AGE TO COME – or what we would call the SECOND COMING

In the teaching of Christ you could have the KINGDOM COME in the Present AGE but not be totally realized until the Second Coming.
This tension is called the NOW and NOT YET concept or realized ESCHATOLOGY

Mark 1: 14-1514 Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, 15 and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand ; repent and believe in the gospel."

This passage is direct fulfillment to Daniel Chapter 9. In Daniel 9 there is a timeline given for the Time be Fulfilled for the Kingdom of God coming and the Messiah. Messianic expectations were high in time of Jesus because of this prophecy in Daniel 9. In Daniel 9 the prophet prophesied about a 70 week period which was interpreted to be 490 years.
This time period had the Messiah coming in the time of Jesus. People were at a fever pitch because of this.
They knew that the time was nigh for God to set up His kingdom.

In Matthew 4: 23 we see the healing ministry of Jesus connected to the coming of the Kingdom and the preaching of the Kingdom.
Healings, teaching, and casting out of the demonic were all equated with Jesus Kingdom activity.

In other words, when the power of God’s kingdom came to this Earth things started to happen like the blind receiving sight, the lame walking, the demon possessed being freed. All of this is connected to Jesus Kingdom activity.
Now, we may look at this and say if Christ came into our world to set up God’s Kingdom why does it seem that things are not a ton better. The world is still upside down and is flying in the wrong direction.
The answer is that we must see the Kingdom through Jewish eyes. They had no problem with the Kingdom being inaugurated with a look forward to a more fulfilled sense of the Kingdom.
Let me give you an example of how this worked in the time of Jesus.
100 years after Christ a man came along named Bar Kochba. Bar Kochba was endorsed by the leading Rabbi of the day named Akiba. He was hailed as the Messiah the Christ.
He lead a revolt against the Romans. This is just 30 years after the Jewish Temple had already been destroyed by the Romans.
Bar Kochba raises an army and takes on Rome and wants to rebuild the Temple on the Temple Mount.
Here is the important point. On the first year of the rebellion Bar Kochba has coins minted with the year 1 on it. He had reset the clock because he felt he was the Messiah. This rebellion lasted 3 years so there were three coins minted for the years 1, 2, and 3 under Bar Kochba. Each one of these coins had a picture of the Temple on it that laid in ruins.
If you went up to one of Bar Kochba’s followers and said, Has Bar Kochba ushered in the Kingdom of Heaven? They would have emphatically said YES!
But do you think that meant that they could go back to the fields and work and act like life goes on? Do you think they looked and said you know what the Temple is ruins and the Romans are strong so we better wait until God comes and does something miraculous?
NO, they understood that the Kingdom, in their minds, was inaugurated and it was time to fight.
That is the same idea of the Kingdom that Christ set up.
It was inaugurated in 27 AD with His Ministry, death, burial, and resurrection and things have changed. It is time to go to work and bring about this Kingdom proclamation and godly rule.
But at the same time it is okay to look forward and long for a greater realization of that kingdom when Christ returns.

2) AFTER the Realization that Christ has inaugurated something new in the Kingdom of God in our time, what should our response be?
Isaiah the prophet had a vision of what perfect peace is all about.
He is looking forward to a time when God’s Kingdom will be fully realized in the New Jerusalem.

Isaiah 32: 16-2016 Then justice will dwell in the wilderness And righteousness will abide in the fertile field. 17 And the work of righteousness will be peace, And the service of righteousness, quietness and confidence forever . 18 Then my people will live in a peaceful habitation, And in secure dwellings and in undisturbed resting places ; 19 And it will hail when the forest comes down, And the city will be utterly laid low. 20 How blessed will you be, you who sow beside all waters, Who let out freely the ox and the donkey.

Isaiah is speaking of a time of God’s peace or SHALOM when every thing will be made right. A time when you can live in your home peacefully and you will not have to worry about war. You can sow your field beside waters without worrying about seasonal flooding. This is a picture of perfect peace that only God can bring back to this world.
We are now living in the Tension of the in Between. We are living in the Kingdom awaiting its final fulfillment.
So how do we live?
We are strangers first of all, this world should seem weird and out of joint for us. It should anguish us at times what this world is like sometimes. Kingdom living sees that this is not our ultimate home that we are citizens of another place.
The other day we were watching Sports Center on ESPN and they were broadcasting from a German base where our American soldiers are stationed and you could see a girl in the background with a big sign that said ROLL TIDE! I thought I hear you sister, you may be in Germany but your heart is in Alabama.
That is how we are to feel about God’s Kingdom. We are firmly planted on this earth, on Terra Firma, but our hearts, minds, and all are in the Heavenly courts. The Hebrew writers lays out this vision of what Kingdom living is all about.

Hebrews 11: 13-1613 All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. 14 For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own. 15 And indeed if they had been thinking of that country from which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God ; for He has prepared a city for them.
The Hebrew writer paints for us the picture of what it is all about. The Hebrew writer uses the heroes of faith of old as our example. Particularly people like Abraham that was called to leave his home country to go to a new land. He never looked back but expected God to lead him.
They saw their identity as something new. In the same way we are strangers or aliens in this world.

Paul tells us that our citizenship has changed.
In Philippians 3:20 Paul tells us that our citizenship is in Heaven and not here in this earth.
The Christians of Paul’s world found themselves in a peculiar position. They had been kicked out of the synagogues of the Jews and they could no longer go the Gymnasium of the Romans.
They really were strangers in a weird place. They had become sojourners in this world awaiting a better city to be revealed.
We are citizens of Heaven here to bring that Heavenly rule to our world.
What would it look like if we were to bring Heaven’s rule to this earth?
What would happen if Christians started to see themselves more as Heaven’s citizens and less at home in our own culture.
Many historians say that in the Restoration Movement that at some part of the mid part of the 20th century the Church got real secure and comfortable in modern American culture and less Kingdom minded.
In other words compromise was made with the world and there was a loss of reading the Bible with a Kingdom mindset, praying with a Kingdom mindset, and evangelism that had a sense of urgency about it.
Peter reminds the Christians living in this corrupt time and it do well to hear him again from this perspective:

1 Peter 2: 11-1211 Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. 12 Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.
Peter uses the word in Greek for Aliens and Strangers that could also be translated as refugees or foreigners.
We are literally in foreign territory.
Something that moves me is the testimony of man named Justin Martyr. Justin lived in the generation after the apostles and was a pagan convert who eventually was killed for the faith.
Justin wrote and made these points:
I formerly rejoiced in uncleanness of life but now I live in chastity
I formerly made the pursuit of wealth as my only ambition but now we bring all of our possessions into a common stock to take care of anyone in need.
We once hated one another, killed one another, would not eat with one of another race but now we pray for our enemies and try to win over those that hate us without just cause.
Justin Martyr lays out what it was like in the early Church when one came into contact with God’s Kingdom.
This was not in the time of the Apostles but just one generation later. These folks still had a fervor for the Lord that would make them totally change their lives.

As we consider this lesson, let us think about some points=
1) Are our lives ordered in such a way that people recognize as distinct from the world? Do we act just like others around us or are we different?
2) Are we constantly trying to bring God’s just rule and wisdom to every situation?
3) Are we ready to put God’s Kingdom first in everything? Will our actions show it?

In the years 1014-1035 there ruled over England a Danish king named Canute.
King Canute tired of hearing his retainers flatter him with extravagant praises of his greatness, power and invincibility. He ordered his chair to be set down on the seashore, where he commanded the waves not to come in and wet him.
No matter how forcefully he ordered the tide not to come in, however, his order was not obeyed. He wanted to prove a point to his subjects that he was not the greatest power of all.
Soon the waves lapped around his chair. One historian tells us that, therefore, he never wore his crown again, but hung it on a statue of the crucified Christ.
This is a fitting example of what the Kingdom should mean to us.
All things are subject to the Kingship of Christ.
If there is anything in our lives that we have not made Jesus the ruler over we need to really reconsider what we are doing.
Today let us pledge anew to make Christ and His Kingdom first in everything we do. From the way we talk, the movies we watch, how we spend our money, to the company we keep – Christ needs to rule ALL.

For God So loved the World Mimosa AM 11/7/10

John 3: 16
16 "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

I know when we hear these words we sometimes seem almost callous to the unbelievable statement made in this passage.
Sometimes we need to call a timeout and get back to some basics. Last week we looked at the basics of the atonement of Christ on the cross. We looked at how He was our substitute and because of that we can take on righteousness and that is our only hope.
Today I want to talk about For God So Loved the World.
HOW MUCH is what we will discuss.
How Much did God love the world? We need to be reminded just how much and we must go back to a very ancient character named Abraham to understand.
Abraham was a simple man that God called. Abraham was a man of the desert and a man that was simple by the world’s standards.
Abraham was a man that lived in harsh conditions and understood exactly what it meant to live each moment to depend on God for help. Abraham would be the father of the Jewish people.
God would call Abraham and make a covenant with him. In our passage this morning we will focus on a very important chapter in Genesis 15. The chapter shaped the very argument that Paul developed in the book of Romans when he set out to display his argument of Justification by faith. We start this passage with Abraham having God visit him in his home. Abraham is living in a tent in the wilderness when God visits him.

Genesis 15: 1-17
1 After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, "Do not fear, Abram, I am a shield to you; Your reward shall be very great." 2 Abram said, "O Lord GOD, what will You give me, since I am childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus ?" 3 And Abram said, "Since You have given no offspring to me, one born in my house is my heir." 4 Then behold, the word of the LORD came to him, saying, "This man will not be your heir ; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir." 5 And He took him outside and said, "Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be." 6 Then he believed in the LORD ; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness. 7 And He said to him, "I am the LORD who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess it." 8 He said, "O Lord GOD, how may I know that I will possess it?" 9 So He said to him, "Bring Me a three year old heifer, and a three year old female goat, and a three year old ram, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon." 10 Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, and laid each half opposite the other ; but he did not cut the birds. 11 The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away. 12 Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram ; and behold, terror and great darkness fell upon him. 13 God said to Abram, "Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years. 14 "But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out with many possessions. 15 "As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace ; you will be buried at a good old age. 16 "Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete." 17 It came about when the sun had set, that it was very dark, and behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between these pieces.


Things that come out at you from the passage:
1) The courage or Hutzpah of Abraham-
Imagine if God came to visit you and told you that He would be your Shield. God tells Abraham that He will be Abraham’s shield.
Imagine if God came to your home and started off to tell you that He is your shield. I could imagine that I would be in total terror first of all and then probably speechless but Abraham doesn’t have a problem asking God a question.
The Jewish people called this hutzpah and today hutzpah is seen in a negative connotation but in ancient Israel this word comes from the root for the Jewish word for faith.
This is the type of faith that holds on for dear life and will not quit. It is the type of faith that Jesus talks about in His parables when he talks about how persistent we should be in our prayer life. A type of faith that never gives up.
This is the type of faith that Abraham has. He reminds God that God had made him a prior promise. God had promised Abraham decendents and through those decendents they would one day bless the entire world. Abraham at this moment reminds God about this promise.
That takes guts but it seems that God always honors this type of persistence. We see Abraham display this when he prays to God for Sodom and Gomorrah.
Abraham wants to know, where are the children that you promised me and then God paints for him a beautiful picture- He takes him outside the tent and shows Abraham the stars of the skies and says this is how many decendents you are going to have.
This is true in the literal fleshly sense of the Jews but also his children through faith the Church.
In verse 6 it tell us that Abraham believed in God and was reckoned to him as righteousness.
What type of belief that Abraham have? He had a type of faith that would drive him to almost sacrifice his only son that God finally gave him.
He was a man that had a persistent faith and if we want to be true to Scripture that is the type of saving faith that Bible speaks of. Faith is of the type that you believe so much that it changes your life. Saving faith causes one to reorder their life and priorities. Saving faith would drive someone like Abraham to leave his own homeland and wander in a strange place because God told him to do it.
That is the example of faith that Paul gives us in Romans and the Hebrew writer gives us.
This very passage of Genesis 15 forms much of the backbone of the Apostle Paul’s argument in Romans. We read in Romans 4 one the great doctrines that sets Christianity apart from all other religions.
Islam and other world religions all have some form of works righteousness. They all have a sense that as a human being we can somehow merit our salvation.
1st of all this makes no sense when you consider that the Creator is all holy, and all powerful. We have rebelled against his just and wise rule and fallen into sin. We are hopeless on our own.
Romans 4:1-8
1 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found ? 2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. 3 For what does the Scripture say ? "ABRAHAM BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS CREDITED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS." 4 Now to the one who works, his wage is not credited as a favor, but as what is due. 5 But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness, 6 just as David also speaks of the blessing on the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works : 7 "BLESSED ARE THOSE WHOSE LAWLESS DEEDS HAVE BEEN FORGIVEN, AND WHOSE SINS HAVE BEEN COVERED. 8 "BLESSED IS THE MAN WHOSE SIN THE LORD WILL NOT TAKE INTO ACCOUNT."
Paul is addressing a heresy in the Early Church that was espoused by the Ebionites and the Judaizing teachers.
They were telling the new Gentile converts that they had to practice the works of the Law to be just before God.
In other words you had to be baptized into Christ but also circumcised, observe Kosher diet food laws, as well as observe the Jewish Holy Days to be saved.
They had hijacked the great teaching of the OT and the prophets. The prophets had foretold of a time God would keep His promise and the Gentiles would be grafted into the family of God.
God would save all men by His grace. As a matter of fact the doctrine of God’s grace is found all through the OT.
These false teachers were now perverting that doctrine of grace.
Paul takes them back in time to Abraham to the passage of Genesis 15 and lets them know that it was by FAITH and TRUSTING GOD that Abraham was saved.
Abraham was saved by GRACE and not by WORKS.
It would be the work of God that would save man, NOT our works. We cannot pull ourselves up by the moral bootstraps.
How would God save Abraham by GRACE?
How would Abraham be saved by faith and not works?
To clear this up we need to go back to Genesis 15 and talk about a subject that makes sense of most of the Bible and also the doctrine of Paul.
That SUBJECT IS THE COVENANT, IN PARTICULAR THE COVENANT THAT WAS MADE WITH ABRAHAM AND GOD’S COVENANT FAITHFULNESS.

2) The Covenant Sealed in this passage
In this passage we see something a bit odd in the sealing of the covenant with Abraham.
There is something else at work in this passage that ties most of the entire Bible together and that is the idea of the Covenant. A covenant is not a contract.
A contract is something in exchange for goods and services but a covenant brings a change in relationship.
The best way to understand covenants in our time is Marriage or Adoption. This is more of an exchanging of lives.
There were two types of covenants in the ancient world. One covenant was made between those that were equal and in that type of covenant the terms were set by both parties.
The other type of covenant was one between a greater party and lesser party. The covenants in the Bible are of this type. God is the one that sets the conditions of the covenant. There is only one side that sets the blessings and curses and that is God.
God is the sovereign over the entire process of the covenant.
We witness something in Genesis 15 that would have been common in the making of covenants and it would be a blood affair.
Animals would be split in half from head to tail and their two portions would be split apart and blood path would be made between the animals. The ones that were making the covenant would walk through the blood trail and when they did this it was a very serious and solemn event.
When you walked through the blood path you were saying, if I don’t keep my end of the covenant this is what should be done to me. If I don’t keep my end up I should be slaughtered in blood.
Notice the 5 animals sacrificed in Genesis 15. They are the same five animals that will make up the sacrificial system of the Temple.
This is a foreshadowing to the Temple worship and Abraham did not even know it. This is long before the Temple stood.
God has promised Abraham in this covenant a decendent that will become a nation, Land, and a World Wide Blessing.
We will learn from other portions of Scripture that Abraham and his desencedents would be required to be totally faithful to God. They are to be perfectly obedient.
Do you think that Abraham can hold up his end of the bargain??
Do we doubt that God would be totally faithful to the covenant? But Abraham would not be able to be faithful totally. He is human and flawed.
As a matter of fact as soon as Abraham set foot on that blood path between those animal carcasses he would be a dead man.
God knew in his foreknowledge that Abraham could not be totally faithful. God knew that those that would come after Abraham would not be faithful either. So God does something extraordinary in this passage.
Notice in Genesis 15:12 that darkness and Terror fell upon Abraham.
Abraham knew full well how covenants worked and I could imagine that he knew this is serious business. He was about to go into covenant with the living God.
Then we witness something strange in verse 17 we see two things: we see a SMOKING OVEN or some translations call it a SMOKING POT and also a flaming torch.
The Smoking pot was used in the ancient world to gather up hot coals at night so that you start a fire the next morning.
What is important to note that anytime we see smoke or fire in the OT it always symbolizes God’s presence. In the Temple his Shekinah glory is like smoke. The pillar of fire and smoke and the fire and smoke at Sinai all represent God’s presence.
The Smoking pot and torch represent God.
What we need to pause and notice is that Abraham never crosses between the blood path.
Notice that God passes twice through this blood path. God passes through as the smoking pot and then as the flaming torch.
What is God saying, I will keep my end of the bargain and your end of the bargain.
In essence God is saying I will be faithful to my Promise and I will pay the price for your disobedience to this covenant. Remember that if you violated the covenant you could be punished by the shedding of your blood.
At that moment Jesus Christ was sentenced to death because there would be no way that man would be able to keep up his end of the bargain. At that moment God would keep the covenant and pay the price for man’s disobedience.
Now fast forward to the days of the Temple in Israel. God told Israel that every day no matter what they would offer two sacrifices.
The two sacrifices were one at 9 am and the other at 3pm. They were one sacrifice at midmorning and the other midafternoon.
They would offer this sacrifice whether rain or shine, holiday, Sabbath, no matter what this perpetual sacrifice would be made.
The same types of animals that God sealed the covenant with Abraham would be offered in the Temple every day. The priests of the Temple knew these sacrifices could not cleanse them of their sin.
They were a stop gap. Every time an animal was slain at 9am and 3pm the blood would be thrown against the altar they would be reminded of the covenant made with God.
In essence they would be saying to God, Please remember our covenant and that we can’t do this own our own.
Somehow all of this was starting to be tied up with the expectations of the Messiah by the time of Jesus. Somehow the Messiah would fulfill the promises made to Abraham and bring shalom or peace back to Israel.
The Messiah would bring peace between God and Israel.
Now take your mind some 1800 years after Abraham and look just outside the city walls of Israel.
You will see a road going out of the city on the Feast of Passover. The feast of Passover was a feast that celebrated deliverance and reminded Israel of God’s promises.
On this particular day you see three men on Roman crosses. They are nailed to these crosses in agony and gasping to breath and writhing in pain.
We read the sign of the man in the middle and it says He is the King of the Jews.
The text of the Gospels tells us that Jesus was crucified at 9 am. 9 am would be the time of the first sacrifice of the Temple. At 9 am the priests would be throwing blood against the base of the altar.
They would throw the blood on the base of the altar crying out to God to remember the covenant. Just a few yards away the perfect Lamb of God Jesus would be spilling His blood.
God who sent the torch and flaming torch through the blood path was now spilling His own blood because we were hopeless. We could not be perfect we could are totally dependent on God.
Something interesting would happen in the Temple every day at 3pm. At 3pm the priest of God would stand near an hour glass or possibly a sundial and would signal to another priest. Right at 3pm he would blow a trumpet and all of Jerusalem would fall silent. They claim that everyone would stop and grow silent realizing the 3pm sacrifice was occurring.
At 3 pm the throat of a lamb would be cut and its blood would be spilled.
AT 3pm on this Friday of this particular Passover we read that Jesus cries out at this very hour IT IS FINISHED!!
Jesus has finished the task. God has been faithful to the Covenant. God has been faithful to the covenant, upheld our end of the covenant, and then paid the penalty for our disobedience to the covenant.
Now we come back to that original question.
How much does God love the world?
For God so loved the World – He loved the world so much that he was the sacrificial victim. He was the one the bore the brunt of the blood covenant.
If that doesn’t grab your attention and make you take a hard look at Jesus something is wrong with you.
God is calling you. God is calling you to have a faith like Abraham.
Grace is too much to ignore. It is all about Grace, you cannot ignore it.
There is nothing we can do to save ourselves. We can’t work our way for salvation. It is God’s gift, he has borne the brunt and paid the price, we just have to accept this sacrifice in faith.
We just have to have that type of faith that Abraham had that would say Yes to God so much that you would follow Him anywhere he leads you.
I will have a faith that is persistent because He loves me this much.
Our response:
-Before Grace was made evident in Christ there was a sense of foreboding fear and trembling.
Remember in Genesis 15 when night came and the covenant was about to be sealed a sense of fear fell over Abraham.
Moses when he came to Mount Sinai he was full of fear and trembling.
Hebrews 12:21 it tell us that Moses was fearful of God’s presence.
Paul talks about this concept of fear before God.
Philippians 2: 12-13
12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling ; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

Why does Paul tell us that we are to work out our salvation in fear. Paul is not saying to go out and do a bunch of good works and live in fear because God may zap us. He is laying out a doctrine that is so unbelievable.
It is exactly what we have been talking about this morning. God is at work. He is the one working in us.
It is God’s work in our lives – the Holy and Living God that created the entire universe is working in our lives to save us.
What Jesus did on the cross has opened the way for this and now the doors to God’s courts have been opened.
Of Course we are to walk right into God’s presence but never loose light of how revolutionary and how awesome it is all about when God is working in us through Christ’s work on the Cross.
This morning let us consider exactly what John 3:16 tells us.
Think about what has been accomplished on the cross.
Consider how wonderful God’s grace really is.
Hebrews 10 reminds us that under the Law of Moses one could fall under the judgment on the witness of two or more witnesses but how much more will be the punishment be for those that reject what Jesus did.
From God’s perspective, think How much more could He display his love for humanity?
When someone rejects Christ imagine what will happen to those people. God has thrown out the ultimate life line and told them all that he asks in response is a compelling Faith.
Trust in him and hold on to him for Dear life. Hebrews 10 verse 31 is one of the most scary verses in the Bible.
It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
God wants to save us from our sin, he loves us and has shown us through Jesus.