NCC Q42
New City Catechism • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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How is the Word of God to be read and heard?
How is the Word of God to be read and heard?
We had such an amazing trip and enjoyed the beauty of God’s creation and God’s church around the world. But there is something sweet and special to be back here in our local body with our people.
This morning in the service Pastor Mike will share briefly with us about the trip.
What have we been learning the last couple of weeks in here?
Prayer
Does anyone remember with what attitude we should pray?
With love, perseverance, and gratefulness—in humble submission to God’s will.
What should we pray?
The whole Word of God directs us in what we should pray
What is the Lord’s Prayer?
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Well what do all three of these answers have in common?
The Word of God!
The attitude with which we should pray is in humble submission to God’s will (which is revealed in the Word of God)
What we should pray is directed to us in the Word of God
The Lord’s Prayer is found in the Word of God.
So this morning we are going to look at God’s Word and two specific aspects of it.
Q42: How is the Word of God to be read and heard?
A42: With diligence, preparation, and prayer; so that we may accept it with faith and practice it in our lives.
Before we move forward I want to go through something really quick.
What makes the bible such a good book?
Its old, written by men, verified, translated, etc.
What about this book? Its really old (1976) its older than many of your parents. It has lots of good stuff in it. Whats wrong with it? We may jokingly call him the pope but hes not.
What about this book? It has a cool cover, written by an old dead quy. Is this a good book?
What about this one? It has lots of scripture in it—great stuff for everyday living.
Whats the problem with all of these books? Your just getting a taste of the goodness of this book. These are all good resources and in the proper place can be very helpful, but they don’t replace this book.
The problem in our culture is so many people want to suggest this, this and this on how it can improve your life, answer your questions, heal your pain and cure your hurting but don’t dig into this book.
This morning I hope we see a couple reasons why if we are a follower of Christ we are to love and adore this book and most importantly the author of this book.
Imagine with me you lived in a small kingdom. The land is in the middle of a famine but your king has wisely been storing away food for years so that when this time came, you would not starve. However, he only has enough food for his own people.
Soon word reaches that other kingdoms are plotting to steal your kingdom’s food. Your king has stored the food in a secret location outside the city walls, far away. He knows that when the other kingdoms attack, he may be killed so he calls his citizens together in the throne room. Listen carefully, he says, we are about to face a great battle. I don’t know which of us will survive the attack on our city. I am going to tell you where I have hidden our food. Without that food, you will not survive the famine. But it is hidden far away. if you do not listen carefully and follow every word of my directions, you will never find it.
What kind of listeners would those citizens be? Do you think they would be distracted? Would they be thinking of other things? Would they talk to each other while the King was talking?
When someone is telling you something of life and death importance, you will listen attentively. God has spoken to us in His Word and his message of the upmost importance. This is truly life and death—important instructions from the King.
I want you to work with your row of people—you have 5 minutes—write out on your sheet the story line of the bible. Give me a movie preview of what the bible is from start to finish. (like a good movie trailer don’t give away the ending)
1 Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.
God used to speak through his prophets, then he brought us Son and now through the Spirit he has given us this book which is God speaking to us. He has used human writers to write down his divine words so that we may know the truth.
This book is the most important book. Did you know the bible says that Jesus did so many things that all the books in the world could not record them?
25 Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.
But this book right here has everything we need to know about life, death and Godliness. About creation, the fall, redemption and restoration.
This book stands alone—there is a reason we believe in Scripture Alone. No catechism, devotional, commentary, guide, cliffnotes, biography or authobiography can stand compared to the Bible.
And because that is the case, do you think we should prepare and read this book as if it were any other book?
NO!
We need to read and hear this book free from distractions, read to hear and understand what God’s word has to say.
Turn to 2 Timothy 3.
10 You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, 11 my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me. 12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, 13 while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
Paul is encouraging Timothy here and what does he begin with? You have heard about all my teachings, conduct, aim in life, faith, patience, love, steadfastness, persecutions and sufferings in all the places throughout Acts.
I went through all these things and yet the Lord rescued me.
And everyone who desires to live a Godly life will deal with these things—they will be persecuted.
What an encouraging passage.
Timothy—keep doing what your doing. Continue in what you have learned and firmly believe. Knowing from where you learned it—how from your childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings—which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
The scripture is able to make us wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Scripture alone through faith alone in Christ alone.
16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
Have confidence Timothy in the truth. This truth that you have come to believe, have seen in Paul’s life and encountered in God’s Word.
All of the Scripture is God-breathed, fully inspired by God and God alone. This is something that makes Christians unique from Catholics, Muslims and Mormons—we believe that Scripture is from God and God alone and no one else has divine inspiration—the entire canon of scripture is complete right here in there 66 books.
Scripture is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. The bible is God’s means of bringing Christians to maturity.
When someone becomes saved, the Holy Spirit comes to live in them. And when you read the bible, the Holy Spirit guides them and applies it to their life. When you read the bible as a follower of Christ, you are hearing God’s Word.
Teaching- divine instruction or doctrinal content of both OT and NT (what is necessary for life and Godliness)
Reproof- rebuke for wrong behavior or wrong belief
Correction- the restoration of something to its proper condition
Training in righteousness- positive training in godly behavior, not merely rebuke and correction of wrong behavior
The bible is inspired by God to help us in all of these areas. Through teaching we are given instruction or doctrine of how to life. The entire bible has instruction for us.
Through reproof we are rebuked for our wrong thinkings by the word of God and oftentimes dear brothers and sisters who use the bible to help show us our error.
Through correction we are restored to the proper condition—when we have veered off the path we are corrected in the right direction.
Through training we learn the truth and what we are called to do—through things such as sunday schools, camps, retreats, wednesday nights, and sunday sermons.
The bible is unlike any other book in the world. We must treat it different than any other book. It isn’t something we just have on our phone we can open up when we are bored or in trouble. Its not something to help fill time.
There is nothing wrong with that—but the bible is so much more. And we should approach the bible differently.
Prayerful
We should open up the word of God with a prayerful spirit—thanking God for giving it to us, for speaking to us, for his Holy Spirit applying it to us. Asking God to allow it to teach, reprove, correct and train us.
2. Reverent
The Holy Bible is different. And we must remember that it is God who speaks through Scripture. The God who created the world with the sound of his voice. He put the water in the seas and sand on the beaches and the rock to form the mountains. He counts the stars in the sky and give source of light to the sun, he counts the number of hairs on your head.
He banished Adam & Eve from the garden, promised Abraham, delivered Jospeh, brought Moses & Joshua through the wilderness, used Samuel & the prophets, took Elijah home, protected David, saved Daniel and Jonah from death, destroyed Sodam and Gomorra.
He made the blind man see, the lame walk, the mute talk, the deaf hear. He walked on water, he calmed the storm, the feed 5,000 with just a couple fish and a loaf of bread. In one hour he stopped the bleeding of a women simply by her touching his robe and he raised a 12 year old girl from the dead. He told Lazarus to come out of the tomb and he himself came out of the tomb.
He built his church across the world despite resistence of persecution from the cities in China to the jungles in central America to the deserts of the middle east. Christians have been boiled in oil, beheaded, burned to the stake. They have been beaten, shipwrecked, imprisoned, humiliated and outcast.
The God that did all those things is speaking through the Scriptures.
When was the last time you thought about that. The same God that did all those things is speaking to you through his word. And we approach it as if it is an obligation or a requirement. Like we are trying to get another sticker to impress our teacher or turn in our bookmark for our free pizza hut pizza.
The Bible is powerful and worthy of our reverence.
12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
That God is speaking to you—we must approach it with reverence.
3. Humble
This flows right from the last one. But this God who did all those things and is speaking to you and to me, we should be humble as we approach.
God use this work to work in me and to sanctify me.
13 Who has measured the Spirit of the Lord, or what man shows him his counsel?
I have nothing to bring to Him but have everything to learn from Him.
We should be rejoicing that God even wants to change and mature his people. He doesnt have to, but he wants to.
27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church,
Christ wants to present his bride, the church, in splendor, without spot or wrinkle. So that we can be holy and without blemish. and he does this through the word of God.
Paul tells us in Titus:
14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.
Christ died for us so that he could purify for himself a people, zealous for good works.
We are called to live to a higher standard.
1 I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. 2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Well how do we transform our minds? By reading this book and not only reading it but coming to it in prayer, with reverence and with humility and seeking to learn from it.
Before we close I have a couple questions I want to work through together.
What should we do if we don’t understand the Bible?
Pray—ask the Holy Spirit to give us understanding.
Seek counsel from Christians—specifically our leaders and parents.
Look to good, Godly, people to read (typically old dead guys)
Can I admit that I find the Bible boring?
Is baseball or soccer boring? Why do you think its boring? Why do you not think its boring? As you understand it more, the less boring it gets. Actually it gets to a point where it is really exciting. If you think its boring its probably because you don’t properly understand it or the scope of it.
Before we close I want to add one thing. A word of warning and maybe correction. Don’t idolaize this book. I know that may sound to go against everything I talked about this morning. But you can easily fall into a trap of worshiping this book and everything about it. You can memorize it and listen to it and study it and take pride in your bookmarks and notes and highlights—and miss the point. The point is not to worship this book. The point is to worship the author and perfecter of our faith, the author of this book—God.
So many Christians make it their life goal to be about this book and not about the God of this book. Biblical knowledge will not get you into heaven. Faith alone in Christ alone through grace alone via scripture alone to the glory of God alone.
In Uganda I was reminded by Shannon, and if you have ever heard him speak you have heard this that there is a king, and his way is best.
And his way is revealed in this book.
Let’s pray.