Christ Church

State of the Church 2022

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INTRODUCTION

We live in troubled times, certainly, and a regular response that rank-and-file Christians have to this difficulty is found in the lament, “But what can we do?” This year, our annual state of the church message is going to set before you a very local response to a very global and international panic, not to mention the totalitarian “solutions” that are being presented to us. And as it happens, the Scriptures we will bring to bear are Scriptures that are equally pertinent to our local and national situations both.

This is quite striking, because if we zoom out, we see that things have not been so bad in quite some time. But if we zoom in, looking at our community of believers, things have never been so good. What should we do with this?

THE TEXT

“Use hospitality one to another without grudging” (1 Peter 4:9).

“Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (Hebrews 13:2).

“Do all things without murmurings and disputings: That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:14–15)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXTS

The three texts might be described as social exhortations. They have to do with our life together, with our social interactions, and they warn about the kind of sin that disrupts such fellowship. Peter tells us to be hospitable to one another, and he tells us to do this without grumbling or complaining (1 Pet. 4:9). The reason for warning us about this is that hospitality gives rise to occasions where you want to grumble or complain. They didn’t invite you back, or they didn’t wipe their feet, or they didn’t say thank you. Hebrews 13 tells us to show hospitality because we never know who it is we are being kind to (Heb. 13:2). The most inauspicious guest might be an angel—and when it isn’t an angel, it turns out to have been Christ (Matt. 25:40). And then in Philippians, we are warned against grumbles and disputes (temptations which, again, occur often in a community where hospitality is practiced).

But the reason I selected these three particular exhortations has to do with the larger context. Peter says that we are to be hospitable without grumbling, but what was that larger context? He was preparing his readers for persecution. Their faith was to be tried by fire (1 Pet. 1:7). Christ suffered so that we might follow His example (1 Pet. 2:21). They were going to encounter false accusations (1 Pet. 3:16). All this is the run-up to “be hospitable, and no whining.” In Hebrews, we are told to take strangers in—but again, what is the context? These people had undergone great afflictions (Heb. 10:32), had been reviled (Heb. 10:33), and had had their property confiscated (Heb. 10:34). These are the people who are to take strangers in. In Philippians, it is the same. Be blameless, harmless. No murmuring or disputing. But what had Paul said just a moment before? “For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake” (Philippians 1:29).

THE EARLY CHURCH IN ACTS

On the day of Pentecost, three thousand souls were added to the church (Acts 2:41). Later, as the gospel gained strength, there were about five thousand more (Acts 4:4). This process continued, and it started to cause problems. “And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration” (Acts 6:1).

The apostles responded in two ways. The first is that they refused to abandon prayer and the ministry of the Word—as that was the driving engine (Acts 6:4). But second, they made a judicious set of ordinations, setting aside godly deacons to address the problem (Acts 6:3).

All of this was good preparation for what was to come (Acts 8:1).

COMMUNITY, HOSPITALITY, FRIENDS

Because of the cultural disarray in many other places, and because God has been so kind to us here, hundreds of people have moved here. Perhaps you have noticed. All the indications are that hundreds more are on the way. What does this mean? First, it means that there will be multiple opportunities to be hospitable without grumbling. Second, it means that it is quite possible that the trouble we see elsewhere is headed our way. We have no guarantees that it won’t happen, and we do have the assurance of these passages that being kind to strangers is a very good way to prepare. What can I do?

Most of you here don’t know most of you here. In a room filled with strangers, what can I do? We have to understand that God does great collective things by means of doing countless tiny things. No one raindrop feels responsible for the ocean, but each one is. This is how God works.

Koinonia fellowship is a great grace of the Holy Spirit, and we certainly have that blessing here. But do not confuse it with other things. It is not the same thing as friendship, for example. Jesus loved His disciples, and He loved them and protected them all (John 17:12). But He also had Peter, James, and John as friends (Matt. 17:1). And among those three, John was His best friend (John 13:23).

CHRIST IS HERE

At the conclusion of this service, Christ invites you to sit down at His table. This is a glorious kindness. One of the things that it teaches us to do is this—when it comes time for us to set our tables, we should be hungry for opportunities to invite Christ to sit down at our tables. But He travels incognito, remember? You may not recognize Him until He takes the loaf from you, says grace, and breaks the bread (Luke 24:30-31). You might not recognize Him even then. You might not realize any of this until the last day.

When you come to His house, His identity is known and declared. When He comes to yours, He often comes in the disguise of a nuisance.

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The Knowledge of Good & Evil

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INTRODUCTION

The Lord Jesus was born in this world in order to reestablish mankind. The first mankind in Adam had failed at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and so Jesus was born into this world in order to rebuild the ruin we had created here. Our celebrations at this time of year are dedicated to a remembrance of what He came in order to do. And as we remember, and understand it more fully, that work which He has accomplished is actually advanced in our midst. Most of you have not taken the Christmas tree in your living room down, so remember that in Scripture a tree can be a place of great folly or of great wisdom. Adam disobeyed at a tree, and Jesus obeyed on one.

THE TEXTS

“But the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Gen. 2:17).

“But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil” (Heb. 5:14).

BACKGROUND TO THE TEXTS

We all know that there was one prohibited tree in the Garden of Eden, the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Note that the tree of life was not prohibited (Gen. 2:16), but once sin had entered the world it then went off limits—lest we should eat from it in a rebellious condition and live forever that way, unredeemable (Gen. 3:22, 24). So God in His mercy barred the way to the tree of life, until it was opened up again in and through the gospel (Rev. 2:7). But what about that tree of the knowledge of good and evil? What was it?

So we need to take a moment to consider what that phrase means, and what it does not mean. The two basic alternatives are that it was bad for us to have knowledge of the difference between good and evil, period, or that the prohibition was temporary, and the sin was in grasping for something prematurely.

We should be able to see that it was the latter by how God responds to the situation when our first parents disobeyed. We see that it cannot mean experience of sin. The Lord said, “Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil” (Gen. 3:22). The serpent earlier had promised that this knowledge would make them “as God” (or gods), “knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3:5). Millennia later, the author of Hebrews does not identify this ability to distinguish sin from righteousness as sinful in itself, but rather with maturity, with the capacity to handle “strong meat.”

Too many Christians assume that a pre-fall lack of the knowledge of good and evil was a total blank innocence, with no ethical categories at all. But if this were the case then how would Adam have been able to fall into sin? How would he have known it was evil to eat from the prohibited tree? No, the knowledge of good and evil here has to mean something more than a simple knowledge of the difference between right and wrong.

PREPARATION FOR RULE

God had created mankind to rule over creation and all the creatures (Gen. 1:27-30). In learning how to judge and rule the created order, man really would be like God (Ecc. 12:14). Entering into that rule would have been a transition from immaturity to maturity, and not a transition from moral cluelessness into an ability to tell right from wrong. Kings make judgments. They have to be able to discern right and wrong in the case before them.

Now it is quite true that the Bible often speaks of “good” and “evil” in simple moral categories of individuals learning to love good and hate evil. But when we talk about discernment, we are talking about the ability to tell good from almost good, to discern the difference between white and off-white. Because God created us for rule, He created us for this. And when our first parents ate this forbidden fruit, they were grabbing for that rule prematurely, before God gave it to them as a gift.

WHAT CHILDREN DON’T DO, WHAT KINGS DO

Consider the language of Scripture.

“Moreover your little ones, which ye said should be a prey, and your children, which in that day had no knowledge between good and evil, they shall go in thither . . .” (Dt. 1:39; cf. Jer. 4:22).

This was true of a type of the Messiah, the child born in fulfillment of the promise to Isaiah.

“Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel . . . for before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings” (Is. 7:14-16).

Extreme old age prevents a man from being able to serve as a judge between good and evil, as Barzillai observed:

“I am this day fourscore years old: and can I discern between good and evil . . .?” (2 Sam. 19:35).

And how did Solomon please the Lord when a vision was given to him at Gibeon? Even though he sacrificed in the high places, he did love the Lord (1 Kings 3:3). When the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream and told him to ask for whatever he would have, Solomon’s answer pleased the Lord (1 Kings 3:10). So what did Solomon ask for? He said first that he was “but a little child” (1 Kings 3:7), and so what deficiency did he think needed to be corrected?

“Give therefore thy servant an understanding heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this thy so great a people” (1 Kings 3:10)?

GROWING UP IN JESUS

We are called to understand the world so that we might grow up into a maturity that is capable of ruling the world. The verb to speak a proverb is a word that also means to rule. The wisdom of Scripture is wisdom that is geared to dominion. The author of Hebrews knows and understands the creation mandate. He quotes Ps. 8, and says that we do not yet see everything subject to mankind—but we do see Jesus (Heb, 2:9). The world to come is not subject to angels, but to mankind (Heb. 2:5ff). Mankind in Christ is therefore being fitted for godly rule (Heb. 5:14). Because we grabbed the forbidden fruit out of order, we have needed to be retro-fitted for it, but this is what is happening.

So in the child Jesus, given to us at Christmas, our response should be the same as that of the wise men. We look at a little child and we see a king. And all around you, you should see princes.

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Christmas for the Blind: A State of the Church Message

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INTRODUCTION

This is something of a Christmas message and end of the year State of the Church sermon all wrapped into one. But the point is that I want to meditate on the covenant curses that are raining down on us in the form of Covid-statist tyranny, the sexual promiscuity and perversion jihad, on top of abortion insanity, fiscal madness, and political imbecility. Christians find themselves caught in the middle of family and culture turmoil. What are we to do? The central thing we must do is recognize all of it as judicial blindness from the Lord. He had done this.

THE TEXT

“According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins” (2 Pet. 1:4-9).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

By His power, God has given to His people everything that they need for life and godliness through the knowledge of Christ, at all times and in all places (1:3). Having escaped the corruption of the world, Christians are to grow in holiness and godliness through God’s great and precious promises (1:4). The broad outline of that growth is listed in seven additional steps added to faith in those promises (1:5-7). With those eight virtues abounding in Christians, they cannot be barren or unfruitful in the knowledge of Jesus (1:8). But a Christian who lacks these things is blind, near-sighted, and has forgotten that he has been forgiven (1:9).

TWO DIFFERENT KINDS OF JUDICIAL BLINDNESS

We know from elsewhere in the Bible, that unbelievers have a certain kind of spiritual blindness: 2 Cor. 4:3-4: “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” Likewise in Ephesians 4:18, speaking of the Gentiles, “Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart.” That is one kind of judicial blindness. But here in 2 Peter 1, we have a different kind of blindness described, what we might call a covenantal judicial blindness. Peter is describing believers who have not progressed as far as they should have as blind and forgetful (2 Pet. 1:9). Jesus calls the church of Laodicea to repent of a similar blindness: “Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked… anoint thine eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke, and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent” (Rev. 3:17-19).

COVENANT BLINDNESS & CALAMITY

This same covenantal blindness is described in the Old Testament: “If thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God… all these curses shall come upon thee… The Lord shall smite thee with madness, and blindness, and astonishment of heart: and thou shalt grope at noonday, as the blind gropeth in darkness…” (Dt. 28:15, 28). Likewise, in Isaiah’s commission: “Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed… But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return…” (Is. 6:10, 13). So when God’s covenant people disobey and break covenant, God sends covenant curses and spiritual blindness on them for the purpose of dividing the faithful from the unfaithful: some are proven to be complete unbelievers who die in their blindness, but there are some who struck with some blindness in order to chastise them, and call them to repentance (e.g. Rev. 3:17-19, Jn. 12:37-43).

CONCLUSIONS & APPLICATIONS

While America is fast joining the post-Christian nations of the West, there is another sense in which covenanted nations do not have the luxury of forgetting their Christian past. They may forget their Christian past, but their Christian past cannot forget them. Or to be more precise, God does not forget covenants made and broken. And we have manifestly fallen under covenantal curses. We have murdered our own children, and while we have not yet stooped to eating them, we most certainly have experimented on them and used their bodies for sorcery (what we call “medical research”) (Dt. 28:53-58). We have been chased by tiny minorities of sexual madmen (Dt. 28:25, 32:30), and we have been struck with terror and diseases (Dt. 32:25, 28:59-61).

But it is perilously easy to make light of our sins in the church because they do not seem as bad as the pagans, but that is not at all the same thing as holiness, as godliness and virtue (2 Pet. 1:5-7). It’s said that in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king, but listen to what it says: “he that lacketh these things is blind” (2 Pet. 1:9). Do you lack any virtue, any temperance, any patience, any brotherly kindness or charity? Those “little sins” of anger, lust, envy, selfishness – they are blindness and near-sightedness. And like the church of Laodicea, we are tempted to make light of them because of how fabulously well-off we are: “knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind…?” We think we know what joy is because we have high speed internet, Instagram, and food on demand. But that isn’t joy. Joy is serving the Lord with gladness of heart for all the abundance of things (Dt. 28:47). Joy is holiness.

The only way out of this mess is if Jesus gives us eyes to see. “And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind. And some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also? Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth” (Jn. 9:39-41).

Are you blind? Is our land full of the blind? Christ was born so that the blind might see.

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Through the Blood of His Cross (A Chalcedon Christmas #4)

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INTRODUCTION

In the fourth century, the Council of Nicea settled the question of the Lord’s deity, and consequently became the touchstone that enables us to address various Trinitarian heresies. A Trinitarian heresy has to do with the unity of the Godhead, and the tri-personal nature of God’s existence, and all without reference to the creation. What is God like in Himself? In the fifth century, the Council of Chalcedon addressed the relationship of the human and divine in Jesus of Nazareth, a question that arose as a result of the Incarnation. Errors on this question are usually called Christological heresies.

THE TEXT

“And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell; And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven” (Col. 1:18–20).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

We have seen that the apostles held two very distinct conceptions of the Lord Jesus. On the one hand, they recognized His full humanity. We saw Him, John says, and we touched Him (1 John 1:1). At the same time, they also speak easily and readily of Christ as a cosmic Lord, as in our text this morning. And moreover they speak of Him as one integrated personality.

Our Lord Jesus is the head of the whole body, the church (v. 18), and He is the arche of all creation (v. 18). He is the integration point of all things, which is the word underneath “beginning.” He is the firstborn from among the dead, and this privileged position makes it plain that He is to have the preeminence (v. 18). All the fullness of all things dwells in Him, and this was the pleasure of the Father (v. 19). Everything in this fragmented creation order was shattered and broken, and Christ’s mission was to make peace for all of it, reconciling all of it to Himself (v. 20). But this soaring rhetoric comes down to earth with a crash when we see that it is to be accomplished through the “blood of His cross.” This was blood that was shed, remember, because of the collapse of Pontius Pilate in the face of a mob.

THE NUB

This is the heart of what Chalcedon is testifying to.

“our Lord Jesus Christ, at once complete in Godhead and complete in manhood, truly God and truly man . . . not as parted or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son and Only-begotten God the Word, Lord Jesus Christ.”

Remember that we are simply stating what Scripture requires us to state, and is not an attempt to “do the math.” This confession is admittedly miraculous, and this means that you won’t be able to get your mind fully around it. You can get your mind around the fact that we confess two distinct natures united in one person, without any muddling of them.

A QUICK RUN DOWN OF SOME HERESIES

Heresies often arise as the result of people trying to make all the pieces fit together within the tiny confines of their own minds. Some people have an itch to make it all make sense to them, and the result is tiny (and tinny) dogmas.

Ebionism holds that Jesus was the Messiah, but just an ordinary man, with Joseph and Mary as his parents. The Ebionites were Jewish Christians in the early years of the church. People who want to say that “Jesus was a great moral teacher” represent a modern form of this.

Docetism holds that Jesus was completely divine, and that His humanity was only an apparition. The word comes from the Greek verb dokein, which means “to seem.”

Adoptionism holds that Jesus was fully human, and was “adopted” as the Son of God at a point in time, whether at his baptism or at his resurrection.

Apollinarianism taught that the Word (a perfect divine nature) took on a human body in Jesus, replacing his human soul and mind. Thus Jesus was God inside and man outside.

Nestorianism is the view that denies the unity of the person of Christ, suggesting that there were two natures, two persons going on, loosely joined. In the interests of fairness, it should be mentioned that there are good arguments suggesting that Nestorius himself was not a Nestorian.

THROUGH THE BLOOD OF HIS CROSS

And so here is our confession, here is our faith. We are Christians, which means that our lives center on the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. If we get Chalcedon wrong, we are corrupting the doctrine of His person. And if we do that, then we empty the cross of its dynamic power.

The cross has the ability to fascinate all men, and to draw them to God, precisely because of the identity of the one who died there. Unless Jesus were a man, He could not die. He could not shed His blood for us unless He had blood. Unless Jesus were God, His death would not have the ultimate salvific meaning that it does. And so it is that we acknowledge that Jesus of Nazareth, fully God and fully man, died on the cross for the sins of the world.

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, the just shall live by faith” (Romans 1:16–17)

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The Person & Work of Christ (A Chalcedon Christmas #3)

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INTRODUCTION

At the beginning of Hebrews 3, we are told that Jesus Christ is the Apostle and High Priest of our confession. As an apostle, sent from the Father, He represents God to us. As a high priest, designated to come before God on our behalf, He represents us to God. Consequently, the bridge between God and man is a bridge that can be traveled in both directions—from God to man, and from man to God. But in order to be the high priest, He also had to serve as the sacrifice, and this meant that He had to be a spotless sacrifice. This also is addressed by the author of Hebrews.

THE TEXT

“Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:14–16).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Because Christ was given to us, we have a great high priest. Because He is our high priest, He travels away from us, in order represent us in the heavens. In the heavens, He sprinkles His own blood on the altar (Heb. 9:12), and in the heavens He also intercedes for you (Rom. 8:34), praying for you by name.

We are instructed to hold fast our profession precisely because we have a high priest in the heavens, and this high priest knows exactly what it is like down here. The original word here is sympatheo—we have a high priest who is sympathetic with us in our infirmities. He was tempted in all the same basic areas we are tempted, and yet without sin. His ability to sympathize with us is not despite His perfection, but rather is the result of His perfection.

His throne is a throne of grace, not a throne of recrimination or accusation. It is a throne of grace. So, we are told, when you are in need of grace (unmerited favor) or mercy (demerited favor), or both, you are supposed to come to his throne boldly.

All of this is reflected wonderfully in the Definition of Chalcedon, which says that Christ was “like us in all respects, apart from sin.”

TRUE TEMPTATION?

Some people are prone to rely on their own wits instead of the plain instruction of Scripture, and so they reason something like this. “If it was not possible for Christ to sin, then in what way was His temptation a true temptation?” And because we share some of the frailties of the objector, this kind of thing sometimes make sense to us.

Let us answer it with another illustration. Were Christ’s bones breakable? And the answer to that question is both yes and no. They were breakable in that they were made of the same breakable substance as our bones are. His bones were not unbreakable; they were not made out of titanium. But because Scripture cannot be broken (John 10:35), because the Word of God is unbreakable, His bones were not going to be broken (Ex. 12:46; Num. 9:12; Ps. 34:20; 1 Cor. 5:7; John 19:36).

So Christ’s human nature was peccable (capable of sin), but the promises of God concerning Him were impeccable, which meant that God’s Word was going to be fulfilled in Christ, and that Christ would see the desire of His soul and be satisfied (Is. 53:11). The Christ will prevail through all of His temptations and trials, and He will praise His Father in the great congregation (Ps. 22:25).

TRUE SYMPATHY?

We can only come before this throne of grace boldly if we are sure of our reception, and if we are also sure that the one who receives us warmly is actually capable of helping us. “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). We must believe that He is there, and we must also believe that He is both willing and able to help us. “And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean” (Matthew 8:2). And Christ said yes.

Suppose that temptation is the wind, and that sinning consists of blowing right over. Suppose also that all of we assigned the task of walking 10 miles in winds that were up to one hundred miles per hour. To make this an illustration with nice round numbers, suppose that 100 of us were told to walk this distance in this wind. Ninety of us blew over the moment we stepped outside, nine of us blew over after three yards—true saints, all nine of them, and one of us (Jesus) walked the entire distance. Now which of the 100 can be considered a wind expert? Who knows the most about it?

When you sympathize with a fellow right next to you, who blew over the same moment you did, your sympathy is weak and pathetic compared to the true sympathy that Christ has for you and for him. His sympathy is the stronger for His strength. His strength does not render Him a weak high priest. How could it?

COMPLETE MAN, COMPLETE OFFICER

We have considered the person and work of Christ. The person of Christ was the result of the great miracle that was wrought by the Holy Spirit nine months prior to Bethlehem (Luke 1:35). And because He was the complete and perfect man, He also perfectly fulfilled the calling of His various offices (prophet, priest, and king). Only a perfect man can be a perfect prophet (Dt. 18:15). Only a perfect man can be a perfect high priest (Heb. 4: 14-16). Only a perfect man can be a perfect king (Rev. 19:16).

And precisely because Christ has entered into His inheritance, it is possible for us to enter into ours—because all that He has and is belongs to us by grace. “For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

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