Jesus' True Family, Part 1
Matthew: The King and His Kingdom • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 41:05
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· 19 viewsExclusion from the family of God in unbelief results in unclean spirits taking up residence, filling their lives, and spiraling from bad to worse.
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Adoration
Adoration
1 Praise the Lord! Praise, O servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord!
2 Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore!
3 From the rising of the sun to its setting, the name of the Lord is to be praised!
Confession
Confession
12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.
13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving
3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence,
4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.
Message
Message
43 “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none.
44 Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order.
45 Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”
46 While he was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brothers stood outside, asking to speak to him.
48 But he replied to the man who told him, “Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?”
49 And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers!
50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”
It is a common phenomenon in ministry.
People will live a grossly immoral life.
They will hit rock bottom.
Then they will desire to turn their lives around.
But after a time of cleaned up lives, they will begin to stray from the faith.
Then after a time you’ll run into them and their lives will be in shambles.
Even worse than it was at the start.
Exclusion from the family of God in unbelief results in unclean spirits taking up residence, filling their lives, and spiraling from bad to worse.
Exclusion from the family of God in unbelief results in unclean spirits taking up residence, filling their lives, and spiraling from bad to worse.
How are we to think of something like this?
To understand our text today, we need to jump ahead to observe a question that Jesus asks.
His family came think that He is out of His mind (Mark 3:21) to stop Him.
Mary and his brothers tried to pressure Him to stop this madness.
And Jesus asks…
“Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?”
This is a pivotal question because it will either include or exclude people.
It will either bring you in or send you away.
Jesus has already told us that…
30 Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.
Neutrality is gone.
But Jesus gives a standard by how a person knows if they are in the family of God or not.
49 And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers!
50 For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.”
It’s not about blood relations.
It’s not about ethnic lines.
It’s not about status or privilege.
It will be those who by faith alone trust in Jesus alone and are inhabited by the Holy Spirit that they live in obedience to the Father’s will.
What about those who are outside Jesus’ family?
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family
In Matthew 12:43, Jesus returns to the subject of demon possession that He already addressed in Matthew 12:22-32.
The “strong man” has dominion over the world and keeps it captive to do his will.
That is until Jesus the Stronger man comes and binds the “strong man.”
Jesus has comes to bind the “strong mans” grasp on the world by loosening the strangle hold he has on individuals.
Those individual’s will be plundered from Satan’s strangle hold.
BUT, what happens to the evil spirits after they have been driven out?
This is a critical question because remember that Jesus just cast a demon out of the man standing next to Him.
So the logical question is, where’s the demon now?
43 “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none.
Jesus describes the unclean spirit as truly leaving the person that it once captured.
This is not merely for show or a formalism.
The “unclean spirit” departs from the person that has been loosed life.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits only leave temporarily.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits only leave temporarily.
43 “When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none.
Jesus says that the unclean spirits when they are expelled continue to journey.
They could be compared to that of water.
Water always flows to it’s lowest point.
It desires equilibrium.
Jesus has upended the pools of settled water.
The same way water finds equilibrium at it’s lowest point, unclean spirits find equilibrium in those who indulge the flesh.
Application – More than a Quick Moral Cleanup
Pretend with me that it became immediately illegal for anyone to commit the sin of drunkenness or some openly debauched sin and the consequence would be the death penalty.
Men would fear loosing their lives and so reform their lives to accord with the law.
Would it immediately be because there has been a revival?
No!
But has change truly come to these individuals?
Yes and no.
Yes, they are different.
But if the law was released, the same men would fall back immediately into those sins or worse.
We can approach sin the same way.
“Stop drinking!”
“Stop smoking!”
“Just stop it!”
But has real change come?
Application – Discipleship with Others
This truth is critical that we grasp when walking with others.
Sometimes people will receive the truth quickly.
They will receive it with joy even.
They will seemingly expel every “unclean spirit” from their lives.
20 As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy,
21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away.
It’s not that we should be skeptical when people remove the unclean spirits from their lives.
We need to take a que from the hardworking farmer and wait for the plant to bear fruit.
What about those who seem to have been freed from the captivity of the evil one, but return to a life of sin?
44 Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits claim ownership of “the home.”
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits claim ownership of “the home.”
The unclean spirits still refer to the “house” or the person’s life from whom they came.
The “house” is where the unclean spirit took up residence.
Notice that the unclean spirit still refers to this as “my house.”
The unclean spirit may have been temporarily evicted, but the deed of the property still remains in the possession of the unclean spirit.
An unbeliever is still one with the deed of the property in the hand of the unclean spirit.
The unclean spirit still refers to the person as “my house.”
“Where sin predominates and rules in the heart, there the Devil has possession; that heart is Satan’s throne where he reigns and sways the scepter.” –Benjamin Keach
Judas – When he was to betray the Lord Jesus.
3 Then Satan entered into Judas called Iscariot, who was of the number of the twelve.
Ananias – When he greedily withheld money that he lied to have given to the church.
3 But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of the land?
Those who walk in the course of this world, follow the prince of the power of the air.
2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—
3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
In a strange sense we can confess that all those who are still under the power and domain of Satan are possessed by the Devil.
It’s not as though every unbeliever is possessed of the devil.
But where sin dominates and rules over the person, the Devil is in control.
This means when we turn on the news and see some awful event, it’s a person filled with an unclean spirit.
Even if they weren’t an “evil person” before hand.
Even if they were trying to clean their lives up.
We should understand them as being homes for any number of unclean spirits.
And this isn’t something mere education can fix.
This isn’t something a government program can fix.
“What is a reformed life without a changed heart?” —Benjamin Keach
“Casting off gross acts of sin will not avail you anything, without the breaking of evil habits, and being renewed in the spirit of your mind. Though you seem to be godly to men, yet God knows your hearts, and how they stand affected to him and to true real godliness.
A form of religion will never save you; and though you may have got some ground against Satan, and he seems to have left you, or is gone out, yet take heed he does not return again with greater strength, and get you into stronger bonds now, than he had before.” —Benjamin Keach
Notice the progression of what happens…
44 Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits fill the house to the brim.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits fill the house to the brim.
The unclean spirit comes back to the person that it was cast out of, and finds the vessel “empty, swept and put in order.”
Instead of finding the vessel filled with something else, it is spick and span.
People are much different than unclean spirits.
If unclean spirits are like water.
Then people are much closer to the pipes that carry the water.
People have the ability to filled with any manner of evil.
They are designed to give glory to God and exalt Him.
But they are also capable of great evil if filled with an unholy entity.
The unclean spirits don’t find the pipes filled with something so that they cannot enter.
They find the pipes empty, cleaned, and prepared for water.
Unlike water pipes that can form a vacuum and stop the flow, when a person’s life is empty, anything can rush in and take over.
45 Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”
The unclean spirits are not solitary.
They are herd minded.
They group together and Jesus describes them as coming back into the vessel that the first dominated.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits go from bad to worse.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits go from bad to worse.
As Proverbs tells us,
11 Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool who repeats his folly.
But Jesus amps it up and says that the state of the person will go on from bad to worse.
Application for Unbelievers
Often this kind of ramping up of sin is easy to spot.
For instance you will often hear secular people say something like,
“All I want to do is be a good person and love each other!”
“Can’t we all just get along!”
And its almost within the next breathe we will hear them say,
“We need to get rid of this person out of society.”
Well what happened with “getting along”?
Where did that go?
It went where Jesus describes the sins of the unclean spirit.
They attempted to tidy up the bones inside the casket to make it more appealing.
At the same time we see an even worse spirit come and take it’s place.
Application for More “Respectable Sins”
Jerry Bridges wrote a book entitled “Respectable Sins”, and its an oxymoron.
There are no such thing as respectable sins.
But what can begin to happen is a person can get so excited that they are saved by grace.
Maybe their drug addiction falls away from them and they find victory in that area.
But it can look even more insidious.
Instead of dealing with a drug addiction, which is awful.
They begin to be proud that they’re not like all those other drug dealers.
‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
Jesus applies this especially to the Jews of His generation.
He says that they will go on from bad to worse.
45 Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. So also will it be with this evil generation.”
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits are characteristic of every unbelieving generation.
Apart from Adoption into God’s Family…unclean spirits are characteristic of every unbelieving generation.
Think about how the Jews fulfilled this.
They accuse Jesus here of being in league with the devil.
But eventually it will lead them all the way to hanging Jesus on a cross.
That escalated quickly!
From accusing Him of being an enemy all the way to take up pitchforks and seeking to destroy Him.
Think about it this way…
Jesus goes to the temple and cleanses it by driving the money changers from it.
14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there.
15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables.
16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, “Take these things away; do not make my Father’s house a house of trade.”
Jesus cleanses “the house” or the temple physically.
But does this lead to greater righteousness?
Not a chance.
This generation will be especially guilty of the sin that Jesus describes here because they reject Him.
Remember what we said that humans are like pipes, the thing is they all need filled with something.
We have no ability to be merely an empty vessel.
Every vessel will be filled.
What will it be filled with though?
“What would things look like if Satan really took control of a city?”
“Over half a century ago, Presbyterian minister Donald Grey Barnhouse offered his own scenario in his weekly sermon that was also broadcast nationwide on CBS radio. Barnhouse speculated that if Satan took over Philadelphia (the city where Barnhouse pastored), all of the bars would be closed, pornography banished, and pristine streets would be filled with tidy pedestrians who smiled at each other. There would be no swearing. The children would say "Yes, sir" and "No, ma'am," and the churches would be full every Sunday...where Christ was not preached.”
Included only through Adoption into God’s Family… (Matthew 12:46-50)
Included only through Adoption into God’s Family… (Matthew 12:46-50)
And Jesus here is looking forward to the day when the Father and the Son will send forth the Holy Spirit to fill all of His followers.
9 You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
Unbelievers do not have the regenerating Spirit of God in their lives and thus are outside of Christ.
Unbelievers are filled with any manner of unclean spirits.
But ultimately they are NOT filled with the Holy Spirit.
10 But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
11 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.
15 For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
Exclusion from the family of God in unbelief results in unclean spirits taking up residence, filling their lives, and spiraling from bad to worse.
Exclusion from the family of God in unbelief results in unclean spirits taking up residence, filling their lives, and spiraling from bad to worse.
Benediction
Benediction
