Psalm 95 - "They shall not enter My rest"

Psalm 95 1Oh come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. 2Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms. 3For the Lord is the great God, And the great King above all gods. 4In His hand are the deep places of the earth; The heights of the hills are His also. 5The sea is His, for He made it; And His hands formed the dry land. 6Oh come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. 7For He is our God, And we are the people of His pasture, And the sheep of His hand. Today, if you will hear His voice: 8“Do not harden your hearts, as in the rebellion, As in the day of trial in the wilderness, 9When your fathers tested Me; They tried Me, though they saw My work. 10For forty years I was grieved with that generation, And said, ‘It is a people who go astray in their hearts, And they do not know My ways.’ 11So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ ” NKJV

”So I swore in My wrath, ‘They shall not enter My rest.’. The psalm ends sort of abruptly doesn’t it? I have to admit that when I printed the text out to prepare for my Wednesday night study I thought my software had dropped a couple of verses. I flipped through my bible and sure enough verse 11 is the last verse. I really expected there to be some words of hope for the righteous if they choose to follow God, some exhortation reminding us of the rewards to come if we follow God. I wasn’t expecting “They shall not enter My rest – The End”.

Why is that? Why did I expect the assurance of the reward? David spent the first ten verses exhorting me to follow God. Look at the breakdown:

Verse 1 – Our salvation is secure through God.
Verse 2 – We are to approach God with a spirit of thanksgiving
Verse 3 – God is above all
Verse 4-5 – God is in control of creation
Verse 6 – We are to approach God with a sense of humility
Verse 7 – God watches over us and protects us.

How much more exhortation do I need? As if that weren’t enough, David reminds me what happens to the rebellious in verses 8-11. The rebellious generation died in the wilderness. They never entered the promised land.

I’m glad that the psalm ended abruptly, I need to be shaken sometimes. I need to be reminded that serving God is reward enough. I need to be reminded that the salvation provided by God is better than anything that this world has to offer. I need to be reminded that the consequence of my choice to be rebellious is unrest.

I do not want to go astray in my heart…
I want to know His way…
I want to enter into His rest…

Pray that I learn to be content simply in Christ and I’ll do the same for you.

Grace and peace to you all.

Matthew 23:13-33 Part Three (Corruption and Perversion – vs 15-22)

Matthew 23:15-22 15“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. 16“Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.’ 17“Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? 18“And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.’ 19“Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift? 20“Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it. 21“He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it. 22“And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it.

The next two curses go hand in hand – corruption and perversion. If you remember from the last post we were discussing how the Scribes and Pharisees were keeping people from the kingdom by their actions. They were corrupting and perverting the purpose that God had given to Abraham, to be a blessing to the world.

They had lost their focus, instead of focusing on the bringing the world to the Lord they were instead focused on their own comfort and their own prosperity.

First let’s talk about the corruption described in verse 15.

Jesus begins with you travel land and sea to win one proselyte. What’s a proselyte? A proselyte is an outsider who has come into a religion. Shouldn’t Jesus be commending them for their efforts, after all they traveled land and sea to bring the Gentiles in? Their motives were not as pure as we might think. Look at this section pulled from the MacArthur commentary:

There were two kinds of proselytes in the synagogues. One was called “a proselyte of the gate,” a Gentile who only attended the services. He now worshipped the true God, but he had not committed himself to full ritualistic and legalistic Judaism. Such proselytes are referred to in the book of Acts as a person who was devout, as “God-fearing”, or as a “worshiper of God”.

The other kind was referred to as “a proselyte of righteousness,” so called because he became as religiously Jewish as a Gentile could become. The participated in all the ceremonies, rituals, and feasts; they observed all the cleansing and other rites, both biblical and traditional; and if males, they were circumcised. Those converts were even given Jewish names in order to separate them as much as possible from their pagan past. Contrary to their popular appellation, however, they became anything but righteous. Like the scribes and Pharisees who instructed them, the became paragons of self-righteousness The MacArthur New Testament Commentary: Matthew 16-23… John MacArthur

How do you think one of the “proselytes of righteousness” carried himself? What do you think that he had to go through to become and accepted as a Gentile? Now this is just preacher’s imagination but I would imagine that the things that he had to endure to be admitted into “the club” would have made college hazing or our time look tame.

How much compassion and mercy is he going to show to those that are around him? Isn’t he going to push those around him at least as hard as he was pushed? Twice the son of hell Jesus calls them. The students had passed their teachers in their ability to keep people out of the kingdom. They had corrupted the original beautiful intent of God to bring the entire world into the kingdom into something petty and ugly that kept men out. No wonder the Savior’s heart is breaking

Next lets talk about the perversion Jesus describes in verses 16 to 22. These verses all deal with how the scribes and Pharisees dealt with their vows toward God.

In the Sermon on the mount Jesus condemned all swearing of vows. We are instructed to tell the truth at all times because we are godly people. The examples of vows made to God in the Old Testament are usually related to praise and thankfulness, not to insure that the truth was being told or that a service would be rendered. Part of being holy and set apart for God is the fact that our word is good.

The leaders living at the time of Christ however were not concerned with praise. They had perverted the Old Testament examples given to us in the Psalms of keeping vows to God into something used to ease their own conscience or to offer themselves a way out.

They had set up a whole chain of how to get out of a vow. Swearing on the temple was not the same as swearing on the gold in the temple, if you swore on the gold you had to keep that. Swearing on the altar was not the same as swearing on the sacrifice, if you swore on the sacrifice you had to keep that. Do you see the flaw in the logic here?

Who does the temple belong to? God
Who does the gold belong to? God
Who does the altar belong to? God
Who does the sacrifice belong to? God

Jesus is reminding them that the vows that they make are all made to God. There is no getting out of them just to cover your lie… Fast-forward to Acts ch 5 and Ananias and Sapphira.

Ananias and Sapphira had decided to sell a piece of land and that they were going to give the money to the church afterwards. For whatever reason after the sale they decided to keep some of the money for themselves and lied about the amount that they had sold the land for. What happens? God strikes them dead. Did God strike them dead because their offering was less? No, He struck them dead because they lied about it. They did not honor God in their actions.

Jesus reminds us of this fact in verse 20. When they were swearing on the temple they were in essence swearing by God’s holy name. When they broke their vow they brought dishonor to God.

Perversion and corruption are two very dangerous enemies of the church today. When God’s word becomes uncomfortable we have a tendency to twist into something more palatable. When our service to Him becomes too uncomfortable we will justify our disobedience.

Let us learn from the examples of the scribes and Pharisees. Let us seek to bring people into the kingdom but let’s not make them legalistic. Let us win them into the kingdom by showing them compassion, grace and mercy. Ask God to break you today if you have a spirit of self-righteousness. Remind yourself that you did not save yourself and it is God’s amazing grace that has brought you in.

Also let us take some time to examine our service to Him. Are we fulfilling all of our vows to the Lord? Are we truthful at all times? Are we seeking to bring honor to Jesus’ name? Ask God to break your heart in this area as well if the need is there.

Let us not keep people out of the kingdom by our example.

Grace and Peace to you all…

Matthew 23:13-33 Part Two (Blocking the Door - vs 13)

Matthew 23:13 13“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.

Why does Jesus pronounce this woe first? I believe it is because in it is the root of all of the other woes. The only way that man can be saved is if he responds to the gospel of Christ and our purpose is to point people toward the kingdom and its King. In everything that we do, isn’t He supposed to be the focus? Isn’t bringing people into the kingdom job #1? Look closely, He first points out that the religious leaders are not part of the kingdom, and if that weren’t bad enough, they are keeping other people out because of their actions.

Do you remember how the Scribes and Pharisees responded to John the Baptist? Look with me at Matthew 3:

7But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8“Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, 9“and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. 10“And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 11“I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12“His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

John’s message was repentance and the leaders wanted nothing of it. They simply wanted to be seen with the crowds so that the people would not lose respect for them. They were not interested in repentance, they were not interested in bringing people into the kingdom. They were only interested in their own comfort and how they were perceived.

Yet another example on the reaction of the leaders to Jesus after He had performed a miracle, this from John 9:

13They brought him who formerly was blind to the Pharisees. 14Now it was a Sabbath when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. 15Then the Pharisees also asked him again how he had received his sight. He said to them, “He put clay on my eyes, and I washed, and I see.” 16Therefore some of the Pharisees said, “This Man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath.” Others said, “How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?” And there was a division among them.

You’re kidding me right? A blind man can now see and the reaction isn’t “Praise God for his power and mercy” or “Praise God for his healing, this man who could not see can now see.”? Instead they are upset because this miracle was performed on the Sabbath.

They were not interested in the expansion of the kingdom. All they saw were the masses responding to an uneducated teacher from the backwater town of Nazareth. They did not like the fact that His message was one of repentance and holiness. They did not like the fact that people were flocking to Jesus in droves. Instead of joining the crowd in worship the Scribes and Pharisees were trying to discredit Him. They were accusing Him and His works of being from the devil instead of from the Father.

They did not want people to respond to the God Jesus was describing. They did not want people to respond to a God that is all about mercy and grace and forgiveness. Why? Because it takes everything away from them doesn’t it? When you tell people that their salvation is not about their own righteousness what does that do to the self righteous person? It suddenly takes away all of your value doesn’t it. When the message is that there is hope and peace and it is available to all who believe what does that do to the person who has spent his own life working for heaven? It takes it all away…

They did not want God on His terms, they wanted God on theirs. They were so consumed with their own righteousness that they were willing to stand in the way of others that may come into the kingdom. That is what makes Jesus cry out in anguish, their own selfishness is not only keeping them out of the kingdom but it is leading others away.

Fast-forward some two thousand years. Are we leading people into the kingdom? Is that the bent of our life or are we standing in the way? The world does not need us – the world needs a Savior. Let us never forget that our purpose is to spread the gospel so that mankind can be saved.

I’ll close today with lyrics from the song What This World Needs by Casting Crowns. Grace and peace to you all…

What this world needs is not another one hit wonder with an axe to grind
Another two bit politician peddling lies
Another three ring circus society
What this world needs is not another sign waving super saint that’s better than you
Another ear pleasing candy man afraid of the truth
Another prophet in an Armani suit
What this world needs is a Savior who will rescue
A Spirit who will lead
A Father who will love them in their time of need
A Savior who will rescue
A Spirit who will lead
A Father who will love
That’s what this world needs
What this world needs is for us to care more about the inside than the outside
Have we become so blind that we can’t see
God’s gotta change her heart before He changes her shirt
What this world needs is for us to stop hiding behind our relevance
Blending in so well that people can’t see the difference
And it’s the difference that sets the world free
Jesus is our Savior, that’s what this world needs
Father’s arms around you, that’s what this world needs
That’s what this world needs

Matthew 23:13-33 Part One – Introduction

Today starts a series of posts based on a sermon I gave on February 22nd. Again I would like to thank Cecelia for transcribing my ramblings and for the initial edit. I hope you find these edifying – Jeff

Matthew 23:13-33 13“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. 14“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation. 15“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves. 16“Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.’ 17“Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? 18“And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.’ 19“Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift? 20“Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it. 21“He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it. 22“And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it. 23“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. 24“Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel! 25“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. 26“Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also. 27“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. 28“Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. 29“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, 30“and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’ 31“Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32“Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. 33“Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell?

What is the purpose of the Church? That should be an easy question but it seems as if we struggle in today’s world with the answer.

Is it for companionship? Hopefully you attend a church where everyone is friendly. A place where we come together as a congregation because we are accepted there, warts and all. We can find companionship in the body of Christ that we cannot find anywhere else. Companionship is a good thing, but is that our purpose?

Is it benevolence? Hopefully you attend a church that ministers to others, a place of prayer and compassion. A place that is not afraid to dig into its treasury when someone is struggling financially. A place that is not afraid to dig into any of the resources that it has to come alongside someone that is struggling. Benevolence is a good thing but is that our purpose?

How about worship? Is our purpose worship? Is our point of being part of the church simply so that we can praise God and sing His praises? Hopefully you belong to a church where you talk about how wonderful He is, a place where praise and thanksgiving come together and lift everyone up to the glory of the Son. I hope that you belong to a place where God is praised by the reading and teaching of His word. Worship is a wonderful thing but is that our purpose?

Would it surprise you if I told you that the answer to the above questions is “no”? All of these things are things the church is supposed to do and if a church isn’t doing them that probably is an evidence that they have some problems that they need to address. All of these things are good and fitting but they are not our purpose. The church exists for one reason and one reason only - to save souls. Look with me at the last words from Jesus in Matthew 28:

18And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20“teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.

Its pretty clear from that passage what our purpose is. Go and gather the world together under the banner of Christ. The purpose of the church is to save souls.

If we are simply an organization that offers companionship, benevolence and well being than we are no different than any other organization that man has created. We have been called to something much higher than any of these things, we have been called to be the proclaimers of the gospel of God. The purpose of the church is to go out and tell men and women that there is hope, to let them know that they do not have to be lost in their sins.

The purpose of the church is to go and remind people that there is sin, that there is a heaven to gain and a hell to spurn. We are also to remember that anything that we do in the church that waters the gospel message down or hides it in any form is a sin. Anything that we do that just simply adds burdens to people with no talk of grace and mercy is a sin. Anything that we do that does not bring people closer to God is a sin. The purpose of the church is to save souls, the same purpose it has had since the beginning.

God called Abraham and told him that through him He would bless the entire world didn’t He? The temple was built with an area for the Gentiles to worship. God has always wanted all of mankind to respond to Him in faith; to look to Him for their meaning, to look to Him for their security, and to look to Him for their salvation.

The leaders in Jesus’ day had sorrowfully forgotten their mission - to tell people about God. we are going to be talking over the next couple of days about the purpose of the church, about how the Scribes and Pharisees (and perhaps ourselves) have lost their first love.

But before we begin in earnest, some definitions are in order.

The first word is hypocrite. Jesus uses that term several times in our passage to describe the leaders of the church. The word comes comes from a Greek word that originally meant actor. An actor portrays something that he isn’t. He learns lines and he’s very believable on stage, and the more believable he is in his role the more accolades he gets. Nine times out of ten he’s nothing like the character he portrays and that concept is the one that Jesus drives home. The idea of pretended goodness instead of actually being good.

The other word is woe. It comes from the Greek word ouai (Oo-ah’-ee ) and my commentary tells me that it is a word that describes the feeling it’s sound portrays. It sound as if you are suffering some kind of inward pain when the word is pronounced. It portrays the sound of anguish. When it’s used in New Testament writings it’s always used to talk about this idea of sorrow mingled with the idea of judgment. It’s a cry of anger and a cry of pain and when we keep that thought in mind it brings these passages home all the more. As you read these verses you hear the anguish and the anger that God had toward those that stood in His name and the way that they had forgotten their purpose. You can hear the Savior crying out to His people because they had fallen so far from Him.

We’ll start in earnest in our next post. Until then read these passages and reflect upon the purpose of the church.

Grace and peace to you all

Annie Armstrong Week of Prayer - Willie and Ozzie Jacobs

Today please pray for Willie and Ozzie Jacobs (click on their picture to read about them).

If you'd like to read more about the North American Missions Emphasis please click on the logo below...

Annie Armstrong Week of Prayer - Paul and Elizabeth Biswas

Today please pray for Paul and Elizabeth Biswas (click on their picture to read about them).

If you'd like to read more about the North American Missions Emphasis please click on the logo below...

Matthew 23:1-12 Part Six (Verses 10-12 Submission)

Matthew 23:8-12 8“But you, do not be called ‘Rabbi’; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren. 9“Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. 10“And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ. 11“But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. 12“And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

We’ve spent most of our time talking about how not to serve Christ, now lets spend some time talking about what we should be doing. Read the above passages, focusing on verse 12. Our goal as followers of Christ should never to be elevated.

He says “do not be called ‘Rabbi’”. The Scribes and Pharisees were all about the titles. A (s)cribe by definition is merely someone who diligently and reverently copies God’s word, however a (S)cribe is someone to be looked up to because they interpret and preserve the law, they are God’s pens on earth. A righteous and God fearing Jew is merely someone who is following the great Jehovah, however a Pharisee is one who is above the law. They are God’s examples to man on earth and they are to be respected and honored because of their standing with God. Do you see the difference between that mindset and what Jesus is saying in these verses? Jesus says don’t look for the title of “Teacher” because anything you learn is from Christ.

He is to be the model for us. He is to be the example for us. God took on human flesh and walked among us to become the perfect sacrifice for our sins. In His time here on earth He also gave us the example of how to live our lives. Everything He did He did to glorify the Father. His actions were motivated by His love for the unredeemed. He lived the perfect life of submission finally submitting Himself to death on the cross. Everything we do should be interpreted with Christ as the model.

Don’t want to seek to be elevated because we are all equal in Christ and we all submit to the same God. Look at Romans 1:16:

16For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek.

We all have the same salvation, we all come to Him the same way. There is nothing special about any of us other than the fact that God loves us. Look at Galatians 3:26-28

26For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

We are all one in Christ. There is none of us that is more important than another.

Jesus tells us in these verses not to seek any title; Rabbi, Teacher, Father or anything else that man may dream up. We serve God, He is our Father – not someone given a title by man. We serve God, He is our Teacher – not someone given a position by man.

God is to receive all of the glory, never us. Anything that elevates us above God is sin. Any title that we revere above Christ is an idol and it must be cast away from us. Let us give the glory where glory is due. Let God have all the titles. Let Him be the holy one, let Him be reverenced, let Him be called Father and Teacher. Don’t seek that for yourself.

Jesus tells us if we want to be great we must be willing to accept lowly service, look at verses 11 and 12. ”He who is greatest among you shall be your servant.” Our perfect example of that is Jesus on the night of the last supper. Do you remember what He did before dinner? He washed everyone’s feet. God Himself took on the role of servant didn’t He? The biggest picture of Christ humbling Himself for others has to be the cross. Did Jesus have to die on the cross for Himself? No. That He did for us...

He allowed Himself to be betrayed, He allowed Himself to be captured, He allowed Himself to be beaten, He allowed Himself to be spat on and He allowed Himself to be nailed to a tree. Why did He do all that? Because we needed Him to…

He knew that we could not save ourselves. He took upon that role of servant and fulfilled a duty that we could cannot because He loves us more than we can imagine.
Let us follow His example in the way that we serve. Let us seek to be exalted in the next kingdom and not this one. Let us humble ourselves before one another remembering that when we serve each other we are serving Him. There is no task no menial for us to perform.

Look closely at verse 12 and the choice it offers. We can choose to be honored in this life but we will ultimately be humbled if that is the case. We can choose to be humbled in this life and be ultimately lifted up in the next. Let the only words of praise that we seek be "Well done my good and faithful servant". Let us serve Christ first and seek only His approval.

Let us not forget His example to us on the cross. Let us serve Him and others out of love never forgetting that is was God’s grace and mercy that brought us to the place in which we now stand.

Grace and peace to you all…