“Embracing the Work of God Among Us”
Notes
Transcript
This morning we set out on a new series of messages that we’ll be calling “Marching Onward. Together.” As you may gather from the name of the series, we’ll be engaging with the concept of our congregation being on the move and how we can be on the move together. This series will take us through the end of Luke 11 and right up to the Advent season.
Now, I need to mention briefly where Luke has led us. We’ve seen the missional nature of God in Luke 10. In other words, God is on a mission and it is the greatest mission that will ever be. God’s mission is to redeem and restore everything that is fallen and affected by sin. And it’s no coincidence then, that in transitioning from the concept of the mission of God, Luke opens Luke 11 with Jesus teaching you and I about prayer. I tell you that it’s no coincidence because it’s prayer that serves two purposes concerning our participation in God’s mission. The first purpose of prayer in relationship to God’s mission is that when we practice prayer like Jesus has taught us, our prayer keeps us lined up with the Father in heaven. You can imagine how when we’re on the mission field, which by the way, is anywhere we are whether it’s Kenya or Walmart, we are Christian soldiers who have been dropped behind enemy lines and it’s prayer that serves to make sure we have communication from our Commander. Prayer also serves to fuel our participation in the mission of God. When we’re on that mission field, we need the Lord’s boldness and encouragement and sustaining power to see us be effective in the kingdom cause. And here’s the interesting thing, if we aren’t praying, we aren’t each aligned with the Father and we aren’t powered by the Holy Spirit, and if that’s true, then we have no chance of being unified. The relationship of prayer to mission is of vital importance.
And what we’ll see for the remainder of this chapter is what will serve to be threats to our unity and to the advancement of the kingdom through First Baptist Devine. Don’t hear me wrongly… God’s kingdom will advance. God’s victory is assured. Yet we have a part in whether God sees fit to continue work through us.
I’ve faced leadership challenges of all sorts and I know there are more that await me and no, they haven’t all come just in my time serving you as your pastor. Some have come to me in my work before my call to pastor. They’ve come to me when I’ve coached youth sports. If you’ve ever coached kids, you know that it’s incredibly rewarding but it’s not without its challenges. I’ve coached several youth basketball teams over the years and there are all sorts of personalities on those teams. For example, some kids are really talented and are convinced they’re the only player wearing their uniform. Other kids are playing because their friends are too and they’re looking to have fun. And occasionally, there are kids on the team that aren’t really interested in the sport. They’re unenthusiastic and they’re not really concerned with the game. Sometimes those kids have the basics of the game down, like the idea that the basketball is supposed to go in the hoop, but their lack of enthusiasm and concern for the team has real consequences. When the kids aren’t concerned, there are times that they might grab a rebound on defense and put the ball right back up and score a bucket for the other team. The kid isn’t in line with the coach or the game plan, they’re just out there on the court disinterested and doing whatever they think is best in the moment.
There’s a word for that type of participation level. The word is apathy. Apathetic ball players hurt a team because in actuality, the team would’ve been better off playing a man down than someone wearing the same uniform laying it up for the other team. And I say this to ask, can the life of a follower of Jesus be described as apathetic? Is apathy a threat to First Baptist Devine and our ability to march onward, together? “How could apathy make its way into the congregation here, pastor? So much good has been happening!” Let’s follow along in our text this morning where we’ll see first that one way is to be
Stuck in neutral
Stuck in neutral
Notice with me Luke 11:14 once more.
Now he was casting out a demon that was mute. When the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke, and the people marveled.
Luke brings us to a brisk transition from the scene where the disciples of Jesus have gathered around him to learn what it means to pray to the Father with the word, ‘now.’ We aren’t to be concerned with the amount of time between the teaching on prayer and this scene. All Luke wants us to be concerned with is that in every sense, Jesus is leading the charge at breaking heaven in to earth and giving us a sense of how the kingdom of heaven will look when he brings it fully and lastingly. “When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound and time shall be no more,” every bit of the upside-down nature of creation will be set to rights by Jesus as he brings the kingdom to completion. The demons of hell who resist God do not and will not stand before the Lord’s majesty and might. And in our text, Jesus has encountered one such demon.
This demon has indwelled a man and left him mute. He’s unable to speak. We don’t know where this mute man was. We don’t know how Jesus came to encounter the mute man. But inspired by the Spirit of the Living God, Luke writes to you and I to know the undeniable power of God Incarnate. There is no power of hell that is superior to our God! And as Luke makes plain to you and I, Jesus casts that demon out of the man. Jesus delivered the man from the hand of the evil one. And the man spoke.
Can I announce to you this morning that there is nothing that will stop the One, True God? Can I announce to you that there is nothing about you that God cannot deliver you from?
You may be riddled by addictions that you believe are unconquerable and yet Jesus Christ can defeat those addictions.
You may believe you’re beyond hope and you may be starting to think that the world will be a better place without you. That is a lie straight from the pit of hell because Jesus Christ doesn’t want you to end your life. He calls people who would follow him into true life and gives them the only hope that stands the test of time and eternity.
And perhaps someone may be struggling with the idea of God delivering them because well, they have latched on to the idea that his grace cannot be really that free and really that abundant. Maybe you’ve bought on to this idea because well, you’ve done some really terrible stuff. But can I just ask you to see that Jesus delivered this man without qualification? Do you see there’s no mention of the man’s “goodness” or “badness” or “deservedness”?
My friends, no matter where you find yourself this morning, whatever your circumstances are weighing you down, whatever lies the evil one is whispering in your ear, would you see that Jesus is in fact hope for the hopeless? That Jesus is rest for the weary? That Jesus is help for the hurting? Jesus will begin the work of fixing what is broken in you because he’s as concerned with mending your brokenness as he is with mending the brokenness of all creation. Would you come to him? Would you admit your fault? Would you make known your need for him to be in charge of your life? Would you follow Jesus with whatever amount of time you have left in this life?
Jesus cast a demon out of this man and he can do even greater things in you. And with every person who is delivered from darkness to light, we are called to respond to the gospel. Responding involves more than simply marveling. With every soul that is delivered from death to life, we are invited to respond in surrender to the glorious gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Do you know what it is to marvel? To marvel is to be filled with wonder or astonishment. God has been so good to give this church opportunity to see him move, hasn’t he? It was early last year that I was in a meeting with our deacons and we were thanking God for the movement of his Spirit here that one of the deacons in attendance looked me straight in the eye and asked me, “What is it that you’re doing?” That question was one born of astonishment and at the same time, it was searching for an explanation to what we’ve seen here. The thing is, and this is true for any church… If we can explain what is happening in a church, then it’s not God’s Spirit who is initiating it.
God has chosen that the kingdom should advance as the Holy Spirit leads the Church to carry and proclaim the gospel to the ends of the earth. By the way, if we are Christians this morning, that’s me and you that God’s chosen to communicate the gospel through. And where the gospel is proclaimed, the kingdom will advance. I’m certain of this because God’s word says so. It may look like a sudden rush like it did on the day of Pentecost where three thousand gave their lives to Christ or it may be a slow chipping away like the seven years that the Baptist missionary William Carey faced before he saw the first person come to Christ in India. The gospel will and must be central to all that we do and when it is, God will give us cause to do more than simply marvel in him…he will call us to respond in greater faithfulness and commitment, to be with him and join him.
My friend, when is the last time you’ve truly embraced the goodness of Jesus? Perhaps that involves you being caught up in astonishment and wonder that God would save you, because his goodness is as true to you today as it was on the day you first met him. We are invited to resist the neutralizing effect of marvelling. We are invited to respond to God’s grace.
Our text will also reveal to us that some
Reject the kingdom
Reject the kingdom
A man is delivered from a demon who had made him mute and many who were at the scene were astonished and filled with wonder. But the sentiment of astonishment and wonder wasn’t unanimous. Notice that there are two different groups that are resisting the advancement of the kingdom here. There first one is found in
But some of them said, “He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons,”
Let’s call this group the deniers. They are deniers because they are denying the work of God in delivering that man, and instead, they’re attributing the man’s deliverance to the work of the devil. So on one hand we have deniers, and on the other we have skeptics introduced to us in
while others, to test him, kept seeking from him a sign from heaven.
These skeptics are people who are saying, “Wow, that’s amazing. Can you do something more significant so we can really believe God is at work here?”
So we have the denier group and we have the skeptic group who have seen a work of God done before their very eyes and each of these groups have concluded that they cannot believe it. We need to be gracious towards these two groups because while we’re not specifically told about who they are, it’s likely that they have been exposed and influenced by the teaching of the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, where discernment is called for. Speaking of discernment, take for instance the caution provided by God in
Deuteronomy 13:1 (ESV)
If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder,
and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’
you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul.
Now, notice that Jesus passes this test because he’s not calling for anyone to go after other gods. The work of Jesus is to reveal the heart of the Father in heaven, the same God whom the Jewish people of Jesus’ day believed they were following and serving. As for signs, let’s keep in mind that we’re now in Luke 11. There have been numerous signs and wonders that have already pointed to the fact that Jesus is the promised Messiah of God. At his baptism, the Father’s voice was audibly heard, Luke 3:22 “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” Jesus has been preaching good news to the poor. Jesus has been setting free those held captive by demons of hell. Jesus has been healing the infirmed like the blind, the leper, the paralyzed, and the sick. We’re not halfway through Luke’s gospel and there’s already enough evidence here to conclude that Jesus is God in the flesh. But for these deniers and these skeptics…they’d made up their minds. “God couldn’t have been involved in setting that mute man free.” I don’t know why, we aren’t told why they see God in the flesh and basically say, “Nah. You can’t be him.” But knowing our human tendency to maintain our comforts and hold on to what we already know, I cannot help but think that these groups resisted the advancement of the kingdom for any other reason than because of what that would mean. And those comforts and things prove to be man-made idols that we chose that are less than God.
In the Book of Joshua, God’s people are beginning to enter the Promised Land and in Joshua 6 God leads them to the well-fortified city of Jericho. Rather than laying siege to the walls, God told Joshua to lead all of Israel to march around the city walls once a day for six straight days. Then God told Joshua to lead Israel to march around the walls on the seventh day and following that, to have the priests blow their trumpets. God said that if they did as he instructed, the walls would fall down flat. The people did what God said and guess what? What God promised to do, he did. Of course, that’s a fairly famous event in the Bible. Maybe you didn’t know the book and chapter where it was located, but you’ve probably heard something about the walls of Jericho collapsing because it’s a great chapter on the faith to be obedient and trust God.
Now, the scene after the fall of the wall is terrible. Everything inside the walls was devoted to destruction as the Lord commanded. But imagine being witness to a great miracle of God like the great wall of Jericho collapsing. I’ve had some “take your shoes off for this is holy ground” type moments in my life. The physical and emotional and spiritual response is an overwhelming flood of joy and peace. No doubt, the Israelites experienced that there at Jericho. And they responded in faithful obedience to what the Lord called them to next.
It may not be that difficult for us to image such a great miracle of God because he has lavished us with witnessing walls being knocked down every week. Every newcomer that comes is a wall God is knocking down where those newcomers were moved by God beyond their apprehension to come to a new place. Every soul God has saved here is a miracle where God has knocked down a wall of resistance to the gospel. Every member that joins the church is a wall of resistance to commitment that God has knocked down. And just like the obligation God’s people had when the wall of Jericho fell, we each have obligations as God’s people when these walls I’ve mentioned fall. No, we’re not going in with sharpened sword at the ready to devote folks to destruction, but as God moves among us to bring newcomers and to save souls and to lead people to join the church, we have an obligation to be a genuine Christian community to and for them. That means welcoming everyone rather than being a cold presence because you tell yourself, “we have people who do greeting.” That means gladly sharing “our pew” and finding somewhere else to sit rather than telling someone to move or worse, just leaving if you cannot have “your spot.” That means actually caring for people that you believe you’ll be spending eternity with by calling them and visiting them and being involved in their lives by mentoring them, rather than saying, “well pastor, isn’t that what we pay you for?” And if I haven’t meddled enough already, I’ll also add that it means opening up our wallets and checkbooks so that we can properly staff for congregational leadership and make better room for everyone.
We all love the grand story of God in Joshua 6 about walls that fall down but how many of us know what follows in Joshua 7? It’s a saddening contrast, if you read it. God’s people had no sooner seen God move in a mighty and miraculous way than they broke faith by clinging to idols, bringing about Israel’s defeat in a battle against another enemy. The advancement of God’s people into the Promised Land was hindered. It wasn’t because God stopped being God, it was because some of the people stopped trusting in God. My brothers and sisters, God is moving. The kingdom is advancing and it is growing. Don’t just take my word for it, test what you have seen and what you have heard by the Scriptures, please. Just be careful to not find yourself in the camp of those stuck in neutral, marveling at their navels or the camp of deniers and skeptics, clinging to the idols of comforts and ultimately finding yourself living an apathetic faith. Marvel in the Lord and his ever faithfulness. Respond to him with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your time and all your talents and all your resources with a joyful obedience. They’re all the Lord’s in the first place.
Our participation in God’s advancement of his kingdom will be met by enough resistance by those forces who believe they can defeat Jesus. Don’t find yourself clothed in Jesus’ righteousness and scoring baskets for the other team. We can avoid that temptation and we can be renewed as we set our eyes fresh upon Jesus. As we each
Embrace the King of Heaven and Earth
Embrace the King of Heaven and Earth
Jesus responds to those two groups who are challenging the miraculous work of freeing that mute man with some basic logic. Remember, one of those groups said that it wasn’t God’s power at work through him, but by the hand of Satan that Jesus was casting the demon out of the man. Now, no one who is witness to this doubts that the demon that has been cast out is a demon of hell. And Jesus is saying that it wouldn’t make sense for Satan to act against his own demon because Luke 11:17 “Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and a divided household falls.”
I hope it’s clear that if one team or one nation or one kingdom is working against itself, it’s to that team’s or that nation’s, that kingdom’s, or that church’s ruin.
And Jesus goes on to say, Luke 11:20 “But if it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” The deniers and the skeptics are confronted with the reality that it wouldn’t make sense for Satan to be at war with his own cause and therefore, Jesus must be operating within the power of God as his kingdom advances. Jesus tells us about the strength of Satan in Luke 11:21, but notice what Jesus says in Luke 11:22 “but when one stronger than he attacks him and overcomes him, he takes away his armor in which he trusted and divides his spoil.” Jesus is that stronger man.
In the face of what might be our doubts and our skepticism and our preferences and our lack of interest, I take great joy in announcing that Jesus has won the victory! He has defeated all those who stand against God’s kingdom. He has defeated sin and death! How’d he accomplish that? A cross. A cross, you wonder? Yes, God in the Person of Jesus Christ has established his rule and reign and has defeated every evil force by going to and going through the embarrassment of the cross. The Apostle Paul knew that when he was preaching about the cross of Jesus to the Corinthian people…they just thought the whole thing was foolish. God adds to himself humanity and is executed and God wins? Yes, that’s precisely it. Because what looks like the worst defeat is the greatest victory. Because everything about this world as we know it as actually needing to be turned right-side up. For as much as we think the way life works to be correct, it’s wrong.
When we have our doubts or our skepticism or what have you, rather than succumb to that stuff, we must train ourselves to look to and embrace King Jesus again. He is the stronger man. He has dismantled all those who oppose God. He is leading the kingdom’s advance and he’s calling us to join in and embrace it.
So what does this have to do with a bunch of Baptist believers in Devine, Texas? We need to each search our hearts and check if we are doing everything we can to support the work of God among this church. We need to confess and repent of those areas where we may be intentionally or unknowingly working against it. I’ve been a pastor for nearly five years and I’ve come to recognize that at times, as members of a church, we enjoy the right of having the final say on things. You know what I’m talking about right? Something has changed or is new and it’s news to any one of us and so our response is, “Who said that could happen?” And deep-down, that comes from the fact that you didn’t say it could. But being a member of a church is more than clinging to the right of having the final say…being a member involves a commit to joining in on God’s active work among us. And the consequence of the church not doing that is that it may find us as those that Jesus talks about scattering into the wind. I’m not talking about anyone’s salvation, but I am talking about whether the Holy Spirit finds us useful or not.
Jesus is at the forefront of all that happens here and by his grace, Jesus has been doing some mighty things lately. He’s been working some miracles in lives and in this church. Jesus isn’t going to be stopped. But will we do what is necessary in response?
Imagine with me for a moment what it would look like if we did. If we become a congregation who truly disciples well, inviting every soul the Lord brings into our family of faith to drink deeply from the well of living water. Imagine if we became a congregation that cared for one another really well…like the caring and love that Jesus has for each of us…that we lived that out with one another where everyone knew they were cared for and remembered. Imagine if we became a congregation who so cared for this community so well that no one in Devine could imagine the city continuing if First Baptist were gone. We can be that if we each commit to responding with obedience to the work of God that has gone on among us already. But there’s also a shadow side to this… We can choose not to, with varying commitment levels and divided interests and if the church survives to the next generation, the halls of the church will be filled by baby Christians walking blindly, seeking bottles to suck milk from.
If we are to embrace the work of God happening among us, we’ve got to ask ourselves some self-reflection questions:
How interested am I in FBC’s present and future?
Do I care more about those who God has and will add to our church family than myself?
Does anything excite me more than seeing people come to faith in Jesus and seeing people grow in the Lord?
Jesus isn’t going to be stopped. Are we with him or against him?
