Resolved: Week 3

Again, if you’re visiting us for the very first time or maybe you’re rejoining us after the holidays, thank you for choosing to spend your time with us this morning. We’re in a new series called Resolved where we’re looking at some Biblical ways that we can make 2019 a better year than 2018. We’re leveraging the reality that many of us are thinking: how can this year be better than last year and in what ways do I want to grow as a person and as a follower of Jesus.

You can open your bibles to Matthew 13.

So to sling into that idea of this year being better than last year, I want to start off with the story of a kindergarten teacher up North. It's winter time and she sees a little 5 year old boy that is just really wrestling to get his snow boots on. So she offers to help him and she can understand why he was wrestling because she broke into a sweat wrestling those boots on his feet.

He said they’re on the wrong foot.

So she muffled a whimper and she managed to squeeze those boots off and then wrestle them back on the right foot when he said these are my brother’s boots.

It was all she could do to stifle a scream of “Why didn’t you say so?”

So one more time she pulled those boots off and he said “my momma told me to wear them today.” Ugh. She kept it together.

She wrestled and got those boots back on those feet one more time and said “now, where are your mittens?” He said “I stuffed them inside my boots.”

Here’s the moral of that story: we make life harder than it needs to be when we get things out of order.

So the first of the year is a really good time to remember what should be first. Some of you are already ahead of me. You’re thinking of Matthew 6:33

Matthew 6:33 NIV

33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

where Jesus said seek first God's Kingdom and what God wants. Now some of you are thinking “Preacher, you just used one of those church words. What’s Kingdom?”

Good question. Kingdom is any place where God is in charge. Kingdom is where God’s will gets done. Kingdom is any part of your life where what God wants is what’s happening. Now here’s the thing for us: Most of you are not struggling with putting God in your life in no place. Our struggle is not that God has no place. Our struggle - for most of us - is that there are parts of our lives where God does not have first place. Now, if we’re going to follow Jesus - and that’s the goal of our church. Our mission is to make and grow followers of Jesus - to follow Jesus means we want what God wants first and most. It shapes every choice we make, it shapes every prayer that we pray. We don't pray for what we want, we pray for what God wants. That's what Jesus said in the same chapter in verse 10. “May your kingdom come and what you want be done - here on earth as it is in heaven.”

So this year we’re praying for the kingdom to come, but that doesn't mean it hasn't arrived. What Jesus is saying is “Pray for the Kingdom to come. Pray for what I have started to come to completion.” because Jesus came to bring the Kingdom. We see His favorite sermon theme many times like in Matthew 4:17: Change your hearts and lives. Here comes the Kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 4:17 NIV

17 From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

There are a few things about the Kingdom I want you to learn today. Here's the first:

God's Kingdom is here. It came in Jesus.

Please know God’s kingdom is eternal. When we celebrated the birth of Jesus last month, we were not celebrating the fact that the Kingdom was brought into existence. We were celebrating that God's Kingdom has come within reach. Jesus, by his coming, made it possible for us to be a part of the Kingdom of God. He didn't just come to save us from, he came to save us into.

So Jesus says “now, here's the good news: it is possible now for you to live a life where God is running your life. Which is good news because you don't run your life so hot. We don't make very good sovereigns. But now it’s possible to put first in every part of our lives for what God wants to be first, but you have to do something: You have to change your hearts or some versions say you have to repent.

When we hear repent, we all too often hear stop doing bad stuff. Stop cussing. Stop looking at porn. Stop having so many arguments with your mate. Well, yes, you should do those things. But when Jesus said repent, it wasn’t just stop doing bad stuff, it was to start letting God be first in all of the good stuff in your lives. Let God be first in your job. Let God be first in your marriage. Let God be first in your finances. Let God be first in your sexuality. It doesn’t matter what part of your life it is, let God be first. This is really good news. Surrender your Kingdom. Let go of your Kingdom. And embrace God’s kingdom.

There’s a problem we have with that: Before I’m let go of my Kingdom, I have to know that God’s kingdom is real and sure.

So we’re just going to start early this year in addressing the single question believers get more than any other from people who are struggling to build their faith and struggling to trust God: If God’s Kingdom is here, why is the world so messed up? If God is on the throne and God’s in charge, why is there so much evil in the world?

That is a good question and that is a fair question. And Jesus took it on. He told a parable. It is a really interesting parable. It is the only parable He told where the disciples came back and said Hey, explain that one to us. So I want to read it to you. It’s in Matthew 13 starting in verse 24.

Matthew 13:24–30 NIV

24 Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared. 27 “The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’ 28 “ ‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ 29 “ ‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’ ”

Folks, this is a real problem. Historically, Roman laws prohibited sowing tares together with the wheat of enemies.

Now. most of us didn't grow up on farms. If Jesus had talked about cars or planes or iPhones, we would have understood his metaphors better. But Jesus lived in an agrarian society and everybody he talked to understood this metaphor because the chief food source of their day was bread. That means the chief crop was wheat. And you wanted a good wheat crop. And back in Jesus’s day, there was a plant that grew called a tare. It was a poisonous rye grass. And the problem was that when it came up from the ground, it looked just like wheat. But the more it grew, the more you realized that is a weed. So everybody Jesus talked to had walked by a field of wheat and said “Aw, look at all the tare out there in that wheat field.”

Well, why don't you just rip it up once you see what it is? Here’s the problem: the tare had these really long roots that tangled up with the root of the wheat. So, if you go and pull it up as soon as you know it’s a tare, you’re going to pull up the new wheat also. So everybody knew back then what you have to do if you have tare in your wheat field: you just have to let it all grow up until the wheat matures and the head appears. Then you have to go and you pull it all up. Then you have to separate it. You take all of the wheat and you put it in your barn. You take all of the tares and you put in a bundle, then you set it on fire. That made perfect sense to everyone Jesus is talking to.

Now, what’s the interpretation of that parable? Be careful, because a quick surface interpretation would be “oh, Jesus is clearly talking about hypocrisy in the church. There’s always going to be people in the church who look like Christians and they’re fakers. But we shouldn’t judge them, we should just let him stay in the church, right? Wrong. He is not saying that. In fact, later in Matthew, Jesus said we should confront sin in the church. The church should stand for holiness and for purity.

No, he’s not talking about the problem of hypocrisy, he’s talking about problem of history. Because the biggest barrier to faith is this: how can you believe God is good when you just look on life throughout history and see all the evil and all the bad? If God is in charge, why is there so much wickedness in the world? And so Jesus is going to explain. Look now at verse 36.

Matthew 13:36–43 NIV

36 Then he left the crowd and went into the house. His disciples came to him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.” 37 He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. 38 The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. 40 “As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. 42 They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears, let them hear.

So what did we learn about the Kingdom? Well number one, the Kingdom is here, but number 2 the Kingdom is opposed. The Bible says in Galatians 1 that we live in the present evil age. In Second Corinthians 4, Paul says this evil age has a God and Jesus named him.

OK, if you are going to call yourself a follower of Jesus, then you have to accept his worldview and here is his worldview: There is a real and evil personality, opposed to God and Jesus throughout the gospels named him or called him the devil or called him Satan. So why is there evil in the world? Jesus says God didn’t put it there. God only planted good in this world. Genesis 1 makes it clear: everything that God put in this world is good.

So why is there bad in the world? Jesus says because God is not the only sewer. Somebody else has been sewing in God’s field. An enemy has been sewing tares among the wheat. Well, why doesn’t God stop it? Why doesn’t God just pull up all that evil and get rid of it? Well, He can, and he will.

But here’s what you have to know: God has decided to wait until all of the sons and the daughters of the kingdom are revealed. You’d better be glad he made that decision. Because some of us just 10 years ago, just five years ago, just 1 year ago… Nobody would have looked at some of us and said that’s a child of the kingdom. We would have looked at you and said that is a tare. But God knew. God knew that you were a son or daughter of the kingdom. You just hadn’t matured yet. And so God gave you time.

Now God knows when the time is to send in the angels and God is going to send the angels and Jesus tells us what’s going to happen when they come. Here is a little more of Jesus’s worldview that need to understand: There is a lot of evil in this world. God didn’t put it there. But there is a temporary rebellion that God is allowing against his reign. It’s going on right now, a cosmic conflict. And we’re in the middle of it. 2019 and we’re stuck right in the middle of this world full of evil.

And we have to survive, but not just survive, we have to thrive in the world the way it is now. The world where there are lots of kingdoms all trying to be first instead of God.

So what do we do?

Here are 3 things we remember and 3 things we do. The first thing we remember is that the field belongs to God. So God owns this world and God’s status as owner is never going to be threatened. Remember that. This is God’s world. Number 2: So important. The enemy cannot destroy the good seed. Did you notice that in the parable? All the enemy can do is make the environment more unpleasant. But the enemy cannot do anything to stop or prevent the children of God from growing and maturing and becoming everything they’re supposed to be. So I don’t care how bad it gets in 2019. I don’t care how wicked the world is. Don’t you play that card of “well, I just couldn’t be a mature follower of Jesus because look how bad it is.” Wrong. You’re in God’s field. His DNA has been poured into you through the Holy Spirit. You can be everything this year that God is calling you to be because nothing that is going on around you can stop God’s work inside of you. Somebody say amen to that. Because that is good news!

So, the field belongs to God and the enemy cannot destroy the good seed. Here’s the third thing: the harvest is delayed, but it will not be denied. This present evil age will soon be the past evil age. And when the angels come, everything that God did not put in this world will go. Forgive the pun, but there will be no tares in heaven. So that’s what we remember. Now, here’s what we do.

Number one: we must stay in the field. The great temptation for many Christians in the evil world is to pull away and form little Christian communities and just avoid the world. No, we are put in God’s world. We’re not called to escape his world, we are called to engage his world. Every metaphor Jesus uses for his disciples has us making a difference in the world the way it is, not the way we wish it was. He’s the light and we’re the lamps and everywhere we go, Jesus is shining through us.

There’s a story of Christine Caine and her husband and their daughter who, when they first came to the United States, they went to a Wal-Mart because when you come to America, a Wal-Mart is the first thing you want to see. They told their daughter, you can buy any toy you want. Well, she wanted a flashlight. So they got one, put batteries in it and she turned it on and she said “I can’t see any light”. They said, well honey, you’re in the middle of this big store with all these lights. You’ll have to go where it’s dark. And she said “mama, can we go find some darkness?” And that question kept running through her mind. And it inspired her to start a ministry to rescue girls from sex trafficking. That ministry is A21. You see, the darkness is where God needs us.

S.W.A.T Ministries is another ministry dedicated to going where it’s dark. We’re blessed to have Austin Clapper with S.W.A.T. here today and I’d like for him tell us about his plans for this work.

So, we stay in the field and number 2, we bear good fruit. In this world, the way it is, we mature as followers of Jesus and people see love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and gentleness and self-control. They see what good wheat looks like. They see our good fruit. We don’t respond to evil with evil. We believe that love is stronger than hate. We believe that good conquers evil.

So, we stay in the field, we bear good fruit, and we must believe the harvest is coming. Because it’s easy to be discouraged by bad news and I’m just going to tell you, there’s going to be a bunch of ugly headlines in 2019. But Jesus has given us some good news: The kingdom of God is among us. It really is here right now. In another parable, he compares it to a tiny little mustard seed. It’s so tiny you can barely see it, but don’t misjudge the power of that little seed. It Takes root and it begins to grow and it becomes a powerful force to reckon with. The seed is incredible. The owner is invincible. The harvest is inevitable.

Now, if you are going to follow Jesus, you have to accept his vision of the future. If you don’t, you will struggle in the present to keep God first. But if you believe what Jesus said about the future is true, then in the present you will find the courage and the will to put God first.

So they put him on the cross, they said “that’ll end it. He’s gone.” They put him in a grave and three days later, he came back from the dead and the war was won that day. Now the battle is still going on, but I know who’s winning. And so, let me get blunt. You’re going to struggle this year. You’ll struggle with being seduced by the bluster of all the temporary kingdoms. You’re going to see headlines, you’re going to see posts on Facebook, you’re going to see some stupid tweet, you’re going to get all upset and you’re going to lose sleep and you’re going to be mad and you are worrying yourself to death over temporary kingdoms. Don’t let that happen. Don’t let all of the evil around us keep us from seeing the kingdom of God among us. Harvest is coming. He’s going to send the angels and on that day, only one kingdom will be standing and every knee will bow.

So some of you made it a goal to read through the bible this year and praise God for you. But here’s what’s going to happen – You’re going to get to the book of Revelation and you’re going to get totally confused. So I’m going to help you out. I’m going to tell you the whole book of Revelation in three short sentences. You ready? You have to choose a Kingdom. God’s kingdom wins. Don’t be stupid.

You’re welcome.

You see the first of the year is a good time of the year to remember what should be first. I know where you’re struggling because it’s the same struggle I have. I’m not struggling with being a wicked person. God has a place in my life. My struggle is to let God have first place in every place of my life. So here’s the question:

Where is God’s reign second in my life?

Jesus said you can’t serve two masters. You can’t have two kings, you can’t grow as a disciple with a divided heart. You can’t wear two jerseys. You have to pick one. Here’s the thing about God: he wants no place in your life but first place. It’s not because he’s on an ego trip. God loves you. God loves you, but God cannot lie. If you say to God, in this part of my life I want you to be second, God will say no. Because God would have to lie to himself to say that in any part of your life he only needs to be second. So he wants no place but first place. So we’re going to pray to want what God wants. Everybody bow your head. I’ll finish the prayer and you get to start it. Here’s what I want you to do: I want you to pick just one part of your life where you want God to be first more than he was last year.

So God, give us the courage to fully step into your Kingdom. To believe in its reality, to see its presence. To not allow all that’s going on around us to discourage us. Help us to live in the future tense, so sure of what is to be that in the middle of what is right now, we will shine as lights for Jesus. Us here in Holyoke and Austin in Thailand. And God, we pray that this year, you will give us the joy of seeing more people being revealed as children of the kingdom. Give us the courage to invite, to share our faith, to shine a light, to be part of the only kingdom that will be left standing.

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