Not to preach The Kingdom Community

Introduction

This is our fifth week studying the Book of Matthew. The first week TJ introduced the book to you, then Rico showed us Christ did not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it. Rick then taught us how this fulfillment of the law, the forgiveness of our sins, has given us a great mission to go out prayerfully into the harvest, working to ensure other’s know of the works of Christ. Last week, Rick taught us again what our response to this Kingdom should be.

This leads us to today’s topic, Kingdom community. The people of God are going out and growing His Kingdom, but what are we to do with this community of Believers?

The book of Matthew can be divided up into five sections, and these five sections are the divisions that the pastors of City Church have used to outline our Matthew Sermon series. Each section contains several chapters of stories of Jesus, followed by a discourse where each sections themed is laid out. The stories told in each section tend to work together to better illustrate the discourse. Today’s discourse is found in Chapter 18, but we will look at the different stories throughout chapters 14-17 as well, because they are used by Matthew to drive these major points home.

With that said, we will bring out three important lessons from the passage.

The Kingdom community is Humble.

The Kingdom community is Holy.

The Kingdom community is Healing focussed???? (this is not easy to word)

In each of these, Jesus is talking of a future heavenly kingdom community, but from this, we can also learn the ideal model for our Kingdom church community here on earth today.

So first, let us look at how our community is to be A humble community.

1. A Humble Community (18:1-6)

This chapter starts with a teaching on Humility, and that is fitting because we can’t function in any other aspect of the community until Christ first Humbles our hearts. Let’s read together Matthew 18:1-6

Matthew 18:1–6 ESV

At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.

This is not the first time the disciples came to Jesus wondering about who would be greatest. Two of the disciple’s mom even once came to Jesus asking a similar question. Jesus needed to get their minds in the right place, because although they had sacrificed much, and truly loved their master, they were still stuck on worldly ideas of power, honor, and prestige. They were still caught on being great in the eyes of others, even though who they followed was truly the greatest, yet Humbled Himself in the form of a man to serve and die for others.

So, how did Jesus correct this wrong mindset? He brought over a child from the crowd, and said that this is what I expect you to be. You want to be seen as great, but I want you to be totally helpless and dependent on me as this child is to their parents.

Wednesday night, Whitney and I went to Zach and Sandy’s house, and for those who don’t know them, they just had an adorable baby girl a couple weeks ago. As I held this little one, I couldn’t help but think how incredibly helpless she was. If she was not wrapped in what I said looked like a straight jacket, she would hit herself while sleeping and wake herself up. She was constantly being fed, and cleaned while we were there, because she could do none of these things herself.

We also have a few kids in the service who are a bit older than (insert their baby’s name here). They are not quite as dependent as (insert their baby’s name here), but they are still fully dependent on their parents for survival. ….. possible illustration of Z pouring orange juice on herself….

So what exactly does this illustration Jesus is using teach? He’s saying that we are to not strive to be seen as great and mighty people, that is not why we serve Him. Instead, we are to be like the child, who nobody looks at as being the greatest in the room, because the child is fully dependent on others, just as we are fully commited on Christ, and others in our church community. We must humble ourselves, and recognize that we can’t do any of this on our own.

We are dependent on God for waking up in the morning.

We are dependent on God for the ability to travel to church today.

We are dependent on God for our finances.

We are dependent on God for our relationships.

And most importantly, we are dependent on God for our Salvation.

We see this all through scripture, but I love how Matthew has placed stories in the chapters of this section that so perfectly illustrate this point.

In Matthew 14, Jesus feeds 5,000 people and in Matthew 15, Jesus feeds 4,000 people, both with only a few pieces of food. These people were hungry, and there was no food to be found where they were. They were fully depenedent on Jesus for their food, and it was an impossible task, yet Jesus did it with abundance, so that there was even leftovers.

Let’s read Matthew 15:21-28

Matthew 15:21–28 ESV

And Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon. And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.” But he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him, saying, “Send her away, for she is crying out after us.” He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” And he answered, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” Then Jesus answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

Do you see this? This woman was seen as a lowly nothing by the disciples who wanted to send her way. This woman however knew that whom she was speaking of was great, and worthy of her humbling herself before Him. We could get into this passage for an entire sermon and learn many great things from it, but what I want you to see is that the woman humbled herself before Jesus, and her daughter was healed instantly. If we are to be a part of the Kingdom of heaven, we must go before God with the same humility as this woman, and as the child before their father.

If you notice in our original text, he says that unless you turn and be like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. This is incredibly strong wording. This should have us take a step back, because it’s quite frankly, a scary thing to hear. But it is important for us to hear because salvation comes from a very humbling place. It comes from a place of recognizing that we are dead in our sins, unable to save ourselves. We have no hope of earning God’s favor on our own, we are fully dependent on the work He did on the cross. If we are unable to accept this humbling truth, we are unable to accept salvation.

Transition

So we know that the Kingdom community is made of people who have humbled themselves before God in our salvation, as well as in all aspects of our lives.

We are fully dependent on God for being made righteous, but that does not mean we simply do nothing. Once God has saved us, once we go from dead to sin to alive in Christ, we go the rest of our lives dependent on God for what we call sanctification(Shen1 Sheng4 hua4 神圣化）

This leads us to the next description of the Kingdom community, it is a Holy Community.

2. A Holy Community ( 18:7-11)

Matthew 18:7–11 ESV

“Woe to the world for temptations to sin! For it is necessary that temptations come, but woe to the one by whom the temptation comes! And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire. “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.

We have seen multiple times by multiple preachers during this series that sin is a serious thing. Sadly, sin is so prevalent in the world, and even our lives that even as Christians, we often miss the magnitude and seriousness of sin. The Bible talks very serious about sin, and therefore as a church we must see that a Holy Community understands the seriousness of sin and the need to resist temptation, because we know that it will come.

A. A Holy community works to resist the temptation of the individual.

The primary tone of this passage is communal, and we will get to that in a second, but there is also a responsibility of the individual here I want to first address. In taking sin serious, Jesus tells us that it would be better to cut off a hand or a foot than to continue into sin. This is some pretty serious and scarry wording is it not? Do you see now how important it is for us to take sin serious?

I have even heard people say things like “I’m already a Christian, so I am forgiven even if I do these sinful things.” I am always shocked when I hear these things because the apostle Paul directly spoke against such attitudes in Romans 6:1-2

Romans 6:1–2 ESV

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?

So are we taking sin serious city church? This is a question we have to ask. Is City church a church that takes sin as serious as the Bible takes it? Is Hutong going to be a church that takes sin as serious as the Bible takes it. Are YOU going to take sin as serious as the Bible takes it.

Now, I do need to stop here and say a couple disclaimers.

We must be careful that in striving to live Holy and righteous lives, that we do not fall into the sin of self-righteousness as we see the pharisees did in Matthew 15:1-20. They became so concerned with looking righteous that they became prideful and fell even deeper into sin. Again, this is where we must remain a Humble Community.

The language in verses 7-11 should be taken as hyperbole language. ( put definition on the screen). The point is not to mutilate your body, because cutting off a hand is not going to fix a problem of the heart. The point is to use hyperbolic language to make a point on how serious we should take the resisting temptation of sin.

Application: What areas of your life do you need to take drastic measures to resist sin?

A no override filter on all of your devices.

A trusted accountability partner to ask you how you are doing in a specific area of temptaion every day.

A trusted brother or sister who you daily/weekly confess your sins to.

Get rid of all the alcohol in your home if you struggle with over drinking.

Distancing yourself fully from those who lead you back into the sins you are tempted by.

?????

I encourage you today and this week to discuss with your family or small group ways that you could help resist temptations.

Transition

But to go back to what I said before, the overall tone is not a tone just for the individual, but rather it has the community as a whole in mind as well, which leads us to A Holy community works to resist the temptation of others.

B. A Holy community works to resist the temptation of others.

We know that temptation will come. We know that even Jesus was tempted, so how much more will Satan tempt us who he knows are weak? But as much as we know that this temptation will come, it should never come from those who are also in the Kingdom community. Jesus says woe to those by whom the temptation comes, meaning those who are tempting others into sin.

This should be a chilling statement to us today. We have discussed much on how serious sin is, so how much more serious must it be if we tempt others into sin?

We are responsible for how we help each other in our spiritual growth. We are all struggling with various sins, but are we actively trying to help those we are discipling, and our brothers and sisters close to us in the church stay clear from these temptations? Are we so focussed on our own lives that we don’t even consider how our actions may tempt those around us?

Or have you gotten so caught up in your sin and have not been fighting it with the help of those in the community that you end up dragging those very people into your sin? Woe to us who fall into this trap. If this is you today, I pray that you see the severity of the situation and repent to God first, and then to those you have led into sin second. Seek out reconciliation as we will discuss in the last point.

Maybe it is more subtle than that. Maybe you are doing something that is perfectly acceptable, just as Paul said eating meat offered to idols was perfectly ok, but for those younger Christians around you seeing you do these things, they become confused and start to go against their conscious, which is sin. The example of this that always comes to my mind because of the culture where I grew up, is alcohol. There is nothing in scripture that prohibits drinking alcohol as long as one does

3. A Healing Community (18:12-20)

Matthew 18:12–20 ESV

What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray. So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”