Church Calendar Archives - Page 38 of 47

What Joseph Knew

Joe Harby on December 8, 2013

Introduction

Before discussing what Joseph knew, we should perhaps begin by considering what we know about Joseph. Despite the fact that we tend to assume we know very little, we may be surprised to discover how much in fact we do know. This is even more surprising when we consider that in the entire scriptural narrative, Joseph never says a word.

The Text

“And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ” (Matt. 1:16).

Summary of the Text

Matthew gives us an account of the genealogy of Joseph, descended from David, meaning that Christ’s covenantal lineage was Davidic, as well as His physical lineage (through Mary) being also, as is likely, Davidic. The fact that genealogies are given the place they have in Scripture should indicate to us that they are important, and not given to us so that we might have occasion to roll our eyes at all the begats.

What We Know

We know that Joseph’s father was a man named Jacob (Matt. 1:16). We know that Joseph was of the royal Davidic line (Matt. 1:6). Luke makes a point of telling us this (Luke 1:27), just as the angel had called Joseph a son of the house of David. We know that Joseph was a good man, both righteous and merciful (Matt. 1:19). We know that he was a prophet—an angel appeared to him in a dream and gave him a word from God (Matt. 1:20). We know that Joseph was an obedient man—when he woke from sleep, he did just what the angel had commanded him in that dream (Matt. 1:24). When the Lord’s life was in danger, God entrusted the protection of the Messiah to Joseph, sending an angelic warning in a second dream (Matt. 2:13). God led that family through the head of the family. After Herod died, God gave Joseph a third dream (Matt. 2:19). We know that the legal and covenantal lineage of Jesus was reckoned through Joseph, because that is how Jesus came to be born in Bethlehem (Luke 2:4), and the prophet had insisted that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2).

When the shepherds came, they found Joseph together with Mary and Jesus (Luke 2:16). We know that Joseph was diligent to keep the law (Luke 2:27). When Simeon blessed Jesus, Mary and Joseph together marveled at what was said (Luke 2:33). Given what they heard from Simeon and Anna (and from Elizabeth, and from Mary herself), they knew a great deal. And don’t forget the shepherds and the wise men. They knew something huge was up. Remember that Joseph was the second person on earth to believe in the virgin birth, Mary being the first and she almost doesn’t count.

We think we know that Joseph was a carpenter, which he might have been (Matt. 13:55). In the parallel account in Mark (Mark 6:3), Jesus Himself is called a carpenter. The word in both occasions is tekton. The word can refer to a swinger of hammers, but it could also mean builder (as in, contractor), or even architect. In fact, our word architect comes from this word—archon + tekton. We know that whatever business he had, it wasn’t off the ground yet when Jesus was born. The offering they presented at the Temple for Jesus was two turtledoves, the offering available for poor people (Luke 2:24). This also may have had something to do with the “newlywed” adventure they had in Bethlehem, when they couldn’t get a room in an inn.

Joseph lived long enough to be present when Jesus was twelve (Luke 2:43), and we know that he is absent from the narrative after that. At the same time, we may infer from the number of Christ’s siblings that Joseph lived well past the Lord’s twelfth birthday. Jesus was the eldest of at least seven, which normally wouldn’t fit within twelve years (Mark 6:13).

The Namesake

The name Joseph means God will increase, like the Puritan name Increase Mather. It is a name that denotes blessing and abundance. Joseph of the Old Testament sheds some light on Joseph, the husband of Mary. For example, both men shared a name, and both of their fathers shared the name of Jacob (Gen. 30:23-24; Matt. 1:16). Rachel named Joseph Increase because that is what she was looking for—and received in the birth of Benjamin. The one through whom all God’s promises would come to fruition and increase, Mary, was protected and cared for by a man named Increase. Both Josephs had prophetic dreams. Both Josephs were righteous men. Both were connected in some way to a sexual scandal involving false accusation. Both of them were a wonderful combination of integrity and compassion. Both went down into Egypt and were thereby means of saving their respective families. Both were used by God to provide for a starving world.

Just and Merciful

In the Scriptures, justice and mercy are not at odds with each other. “Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other” (Ps. 85:10).

In Deuteronomy 22:23-24, we are given the death penalty for a betrothed woman who committed adultery. Such commandments were never meant to be applied woodenly, but rather with a firm grasp of the principles involved. For example, consider what the law says about the city limits. Now, under the rule of the Romans, it would not be possible for the Jews to apply such a law. One of the things we see in the New Testament is the use of the ultimate penalty from another government in lieu of the one excluded by an unbelieving government. And thus it is we see Paul requiring excommunication at Corinth, while citing this and four other places that required execution. In the same way, a family could apply disinheritance or divorce. This is something that Joseph is resolved to do.

But we are told something else. We are told that Joseph had a tender heart (Matt. 1:19), and that this was an example of his commitment to justice. Joseph, we are told was a just and righteous man, and because of this, he was resolved to do the right thing, but without humiliating Mary publicly. We know that Jesus grew up in a home that could not have seen Joseph as one of the men with stones in the famous incident of the woman caught in the act of adultery (John 8:7).

What Joseph Knew

We may presume that what Joseph marveled at was part of what he knew. At a bare minimum, Joseph knew that the salvation of Jews and Gentiles both was growing up in his home. “For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel” (Luke 2:29-32).

And here we find our gospel conclusion.

Blessed with Every Blessing (Reformation Sunday 2013)

Joe Harby on October 27, 2013

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Introduction

Ephesians is Paul’s greatest work on the church, the body and bride of Christ. It was John Calvin’s favorite and F.F. Bruce regarded it as ‘the quintessence of Paulinism’ because it ‘in large measure sums up the leading themes of the Pauline letters, and sets forth the cosmic implications of Paul’s ministry to the Gentiles.’ Ephesians bears strong resemblance to Colossians and was likely written at the same time while Paul was in prison in Rome (Acts 28:30) and sent by the hand of Tychicus (Eph. 6:21-22; Col. 4:7-9). While the sufficiency of Christ’s work is central to Colossians, Ephesians is dedicated to Paul’s message that God’s new society, the Church, is a manifestation of the cosmic reconciliation and unity of Christ’s work proclaimed in the gospel. This is why Paul always moves from the indicative to the imperative, rooting what we are called to do in the firm ground of what Christ has already done. The very structure of Ephesians proclaims the God-centeredness of Paul’s theology

The Gift of the Father (vs.1-6)

The Father gives every blessing that belongs to the Spirit in the person of His beloved Son. To speak of the Father as the source of every blessing is to immediately draw attention to the procession and work of the Son and the Spirit. They are the glory of the Father ( John 17:6-10, 20-24). The Father gives every blessing that belongs to the Spirit in the person of His beloved Son. To speak of the Father as the source of every blessing is to immediately draw attention to the procession and work of the Son and the Spirit. They are the glory of the Father ( John 17:6-10, 20-24). The Father’s gift of Himself to His Son and to those who are “in Him” through the gift of the Spirit is His glory. This brings Jesus’ words to his disciples into sharp focus: “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Why is it glorious to give our lives away? Because we bear the image of the One whose glory is to be perfectly generous with His life. Notice how election and predestination are grounded in the Father’s generosity: (vs. 4) He chose us to be holy and blameless, (vs. 5) He predestined us for adoption as sons, and both are to the praise of his glorious grace (vs. 6).

Reconciled by the Son (vs. 7-12)

The purpose of the Father’s gift of every blessing is headed toward an ultimate goal: The summing up of all things in Christ. Not only are redemption and the forgiveness of sins given to us in Christ, but He is the revelation and fulfillment of the Father’s plan to sum up/reconcile all things in Him whether on earth or in heaven. Since our first parents sin in Genesis, death has meant that everything falls apart: Our relationships, our loves, our bodies, our work, and our world. This is what the exile of death means. Yeats captures this futility well: “Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer; / Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, / The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned.” The mystery of his will (vs. 9), which has now been made known to us, is the Father’s kind intention to “sum up” and put right all of the separation, alienation, and exile of our sin. But in order for that to take place, Jesus had to be pulled apart that we might be healed (Is. 53:5). Colossians 1:19-22 brings all of these elements together: “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him.”

Sealed by the Spirit (vs. 13-14)

The first sign of this cosmic reconciliation is the gift of the Spirit who comes as a seal and a pledge of Christ’s work. In the Greco-Roman world a seal was a mark of ownership that implied a promise of protection. A master would brand his possessions with his seal to protect them from theft. In the OT, God places a sign on his people to distinguish them as His possession and protect them from destruction (Ezek. 9:4-6). In the same way, the Spirit is given to mark us as God’s inheritance (vs. 11) and to give us confidence that nothing can separate us from him (Rom. 8:31-39). At the same time, the Spirit is also a pledge or guarantee of our inheritance. He is the “down payment” who gives us a foretaste of the New Creation (2 Cor. 5:17) and who is the promise that we will obtain full possession of it.

Freedom and the Reformation

The mind-blowing truth of this opening section of Ephesians is that God has chosen us as His inheritance and He has given Himself to us as our inheritance. The freeness of God’s gift by which we are chosen, called, justified, sanctified and glorified (Rom. 8:28-30) is the gift of God Himself. All of it is found in Christ and all of it is a gift of free grace (Eph. 2:8-10). That’s the good news of the Gospel and the heart of the Reformation. Martin Luther beautifully expresses in The Freedom of the Christian Man:

“Christ, that rich and pious husband, takes as a wife a needy and impious harlot, redeeming her from all her evils, and supplying her with all his good things. It is impossible now that her sins should destroy her, since they have been laid upon Christ and swallowed up in Him, and since she has in her husband Christ a righteousness which she may claim as her own, and which she can set up with confidence against all her sins, against death and hell, saying: “If I have sinned, my Christ, in whom I believe, has not sinned; all mine is His, and all His is mine;” as it is written, “My beloved is mine, and I am his. (Cant. ii. 16.) This is what Paul says: “Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ;” victory over sin and death.”

The free and generous work of the three persons of the Trinity is the sole basis for our justification, our sanctification and the certainty of our glorification. It is the ground of our confidence (Heb. 10:19) and our boasting (1 Cor. 1:31), and as Luther noted, our freedom (Gal. 5:13). We must cherish it and defend it against all attacks (Gal. 5:1).

Gospel Presence I: The Resurrection of the World

Joe Harby on March 31, 2013

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Introduction

The resurrection of Jesus was not an odd circumstance in an otherwise unchanged world. This world is not what it used to be because this world is the place where a man once came back from the dead. And when He came back, it was not as a resuscitation, as happened with Lazarus, but as a true resurrection. And as the Bible plainly teaches, when a man comes back from the dead, He pulls the whole dead world after Him. The resurrection was the introduction of an irrevocable principle into a dead world—and there is not a single thing that dead world can do about it except to wait on the approaching life.

The Texts

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled to God. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (2 Cor. 5:17-21).

Summary of the Text

First we are told what happens when a man is in Christ. When a man is in Christ, he becomes a new creature. Everything old passes away, and everything becomes new in and through Him (v. 17). This is what happens to any man who is in Christ, but how extensive is this phenomenon? The answer is global in scope—all things are of God, who has reconciled the Church to Himself (already) and has given to this Church the ministry of reconciliation (for everybody else). So the message is broadening, and it is enormous in scope (v. 18). What is the heart of that ministry of reconciliation? Paul lays it out—God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing the world’s sin to it, and as a result committing the ministry of reconciliation to us (v. 19). As a consequence we are Christ’s ambassadors, as though God Himself were speaking through us (v. 20). We therefore implore everyone—be reconciled to God (v. 20). This is all based on a glorious and unbelievable exchange (v. 21). But even though the transaction is unbelievable, we are called to summon the whole world to believe it.

Heralds or Campaigners?

As we think about the task of evangelism, it is crucial that we get our mission straight in our heads before charging off to fulfill it. Alacrity in obedience is no virtue if you have gotten your task all muddled in your head.

So here is the issue. We are heralds announcing a salvation for the world that has already been accomplished. There are certain things that people in the world must do because it has been accomplished, but one of the things they don’t have to do (and indeed, must not do) is install what has already been installed. Another way of putting this is that we are heralds, not campaigners. We are proclaiming that Jesus has been enthroned; we are not canvassing for votes trying to get Him elected. We are not manning the phone banks on election night. Jesus has been wearing His crown for a long time.

Our message is x has been done, and so we summon you to y. It is not x is desirable, and so we invite you to join us in making x a reality. The gospel is good news; the gospel is not a good platform.

Man in Christ, God in Christ

If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature. We are then told, by implication, that “all things are new,” which is to say, that God has reconciled the world to Himself in Christ, and He was able to do this because God Himself was in Christ. Nothing can be the same. Nothing is the same. We have no authority to consider anything outside of Christ.

The key is to learn how to “implore” those who are not yet in Christ (through faith) in a way that does not drag us into their unbelief. The sun is up, and we implore those hiding in coal cellars to come out and lift their face to the sky. We must never beg them to come out of their coal cellar so that the sun might come up, and so that we might live in this new world.

One other thing must be said in this regard. Note that God is making His appeal through us, and note that it is not supposed to be a lackluster appeal. We implore, plead, beg, beseech non-believers to come to Christ—and we do not do this because we are frail, emotional humans and have run out ahead of the taciturn decrees of God. No, when we plead, God pleads. When we implore, God implores. How can He do that? God was in Christ, remember? God was in Christ, bleeding for the world, and can He not weep for the world? God was in Christ, shedding tears over Jerusalem, and can He not shed tears over a world that He has already purchased? Why will you die, o house of Israel? The world is alive—there is no point in you staying dead.

The Resurrection of the World

What has God done for the world? What has God already done for the world? It says here that He has reconciled the world to Himself. It says, second, that He is not imputing their trespasses to them. And it also says— undergirding this—that we have had the word of reconciliation entrusted to us. But since that word has been given to us, as in a trust, we must take care to be faithful to it.

In Christ, we were raised to life again. In Christ, the Church was raised to life. In Christ, God was reconciling the world to Himself. In Christ, we plead with the world to be reconciled. Now there is no reconciliation apart from resurrection, and this is why we declare that (in principle) the world is a world of resurrection. We are preaching the resurrection of the world in the resurrection of Jesus.

And so this is the glorious pattern of the indicative and the corresponding imperative. You have been reconciled; therefore, be reconciled. This has been done; therefore believe that it has been done.

A Face Like Flint (Palm Sunday 2013)

Joe Harby on March 24, 2013

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Introduction

As believers in the Lord Jesus, we have to learn how to see Him as our substitute in all things, and not just in His death on the cross. Jesus did not just die in our place (although He did do that), He also lived in our place. The sacrifice of Jesus was for us, but so was the obedience of Jesus for us. The blood of Jesus was for us, but so was His courage.

The Texts

“And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51).

“I gave My back to those who struck Me, And My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard; I did not hide My face from shame and spitting. For the Lord God will help Me; Therefore I will not be disgraced; Therefore I have set My face like a flint, and I know that I will not be ashamed” (Is. 50:6-7).

Summary of the Text

As we consider this text, and the courage of the Lord Jesus, there are four events we should keep in mind together. The first occurred earlier in this chapter (Luke 9:31), when the Lord was transfigured and met with Moses and Elijah. One of the things they discussed on that mountain was the “exodus” that Jesus was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. The second event is this one—the Lord, when it was time for Him to be “received up,” set His face steadfastly in the direction of Jerusalem, which was to be the place of His passion. The third event is His triumphal entry to Jerusalem, the event that we are marking on the church calendar today (John 12:13). The fourth event was His agonized prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane (Mark 14:32). The Lord knew what the Scriptures had prophesied, He knew the Father’s will, He had set His face already to do that will, and He was willing to go. Our passage from Isaiah concerns the suffering servant, who is the Lord Jesus. He knew the abuse He would receive from the authorities in Jerusalem. His face would be abused—beard plucked out. But He refused to hide His face, and in His courage He set His face like flint in order to pay the price for your salvation and mine.

A True Man

The Lord Jesus had a sense of His calling from the time He was twelve (at least). This was confirmed to Him at His baptism, when God spoke from Heaven, and the Spirit descended upon Him like a dove. But remember that we confess that He was not only fully God but also a true man. Indeed, He was the true man. This meant that He felt and fully experienced the gradual approach of a day of dread. He knew what was coming, but when it was a week away instead of years away the burden was much greater. The Lord Jesus required courage, which He displayed, and the Lord Jesus had to carry the burden, which He did.

He spoke with Elijah and Moses about the great exodus He would accomplish. He resolved to do it, setting His face toward the cross at Jerusalem. He empathized with the rejoicing at His triumphal entry—He supported it and did not think it out of place. Incidentally, it always bears repeating that we have no biblical basis for supposing that the crowd with the palms and the crowd crying out crucify Him! were the same crowds. This was not about the fickleness of the masses.

Active Obedience

Christ is everything to us. He lived His entire life as a public person, as the last and final Adam. Everything He did was for us and to us, and God imputes to us all of His obedience, and not just His obedience of suffering on the cross. Theologians distinguish this by calling one His passive obedience (His suffering obedience on the cross) and His active obedience (His entire life of faithfulness to God). All of this is imputed to us, credited to us.

It was not just necessary for the people of God to pay for their sins. It was equally necessary for them to fulfill the vocation that God assigned to us. This is why Jesus identified with us from the first moment of His ministry (in His baptism). This is why He fasted forty days in the wilderness (remember forty years in the wilderness?). This is why He was tempted there. Who else was tempted there? This is why He invaded Canaan as the greater Joshua, and undertook a great warfare there, expelling demons. Christ is Israel, and Christ is Israel, finally doing it right. Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.

When Courage is Called For

Let us bring this down to particulars. Every Christian is called to take up the cross daily (Luke 9:23). But this is not a solitary cross (although it will often feel solitary enough). It is not solitary because Jesus invites us to take up the cross in order to follow Him with it. He promises, in the next breath, that whoever loses his life for the sake of Christ will save it (Luke 9:24).

If we are believers, we are in Christ. If we are in Christ, then our crosses are within His cross. We are never alone in what God has apportioned to us. If we are called upon to show courage, then our courage is located where it must be located—inside His courage.

Courage is needed when you don’t think you can do the work anymore. Courage is required when the pain continues to go on and on, and you don’t know what to do with it, or where to put it. Courage is required in the face of uncertainty—perhaps you are threatened by a diagnosed illness, or financial troubles. Courage is required when your reputation is threatened by those who would slander you—not because your work is deficient, or because you have been dishonest in any way, but because you identify with Jesus Christ. Now identifying with Jesus does bring this kind of hostility. But identifying with Him also brings a great and glorious blessing. Why is that? Because His courage is given as a gift to you. The one who gives you this blessing of high-heartedness is the one who set His face like flint in order to go to Jerusalem to purchase you out of the slave market of sin.

State of the Church 2013

Joe Harby on January 13, 2013

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Introduction

Near the beginning of every calendar year, it has been our custom for some years now to have a message that addresses the “state of the church.” Sometimes we have addressed the state of the national church, and sometimes of this local congregation. It all varies . . . depending on the state of the church.

The Text

“Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matt. 16:24-26)

Summary of the Text

The fundamental call to discipleship is one at a time. Jesus says that if any man wants to follow Him, he must deny himself (v. 24). He must take up his cross, and follow Christ. A cross fits one at a time—it is not an instrument of mass execution. Jesus then teaches that if we are clingy with our own lives, then we will lose what we are clinging to. But if we lose it for the sake of Christ, then we will gain what we have given up (v. 25). What is the point, what is the profit, in gaining anything if we lose our own soul in the transaction? What would be a good price to put on your own soul (v. 26)? Jesus teaches us to value our own soul over anything else we might gain or accomplish.

The Individual and Individualism

We go to Heaven or to Hell by ones. The Lord Jesus was the one who established the importance of the individual, over against every secular collective. A man or a woman will live forever, in a way that corporations and empires will not. But if we live forever in glory, we will do so as part of the Body of Christ, and we will find ourselves in union with Him, and with all the rest of the redeemed. We are all members of one body. But we are not melted down in some sort of cosmic unity—the more Christ is formed in each of us, the more like ourselves we will become.

A Holy Sanctuary

Pascal once said that “men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.” This has often and unfortunately been the case in the building of sanctuaries. Holy places have often been assembled with unholy hands. I say this because it now seems possible, Lord willing (Jas. 4:15), that we will allowed to begin construction on a sanctuary for worship in this calendar year. We have architects working on the initial drawings now. But when we are done, we don’t want a sanctuary that is holier than all the people who built it.

A Thought Experiment

We want to build, but we want to build with gold and silver, and with costly stones—and not with wood, hay, and stubble (1 Cor. 3:12). But we are talking about materials from God’s supply houses, not from ours. What does He call gold and silver? What does He call stubble?

It all lies in the adverbs. How we build is going to govern how we occupy, and whether God receives it. If we build in a spirit of love and mutual submission, and a meteorite destroys the whole thing before the first service, we are still that much ahead of the game. This is because building the external building is just a device that God is using for building us—we are the true Temple. We are the living stones, and we ought never to privilege the dead stones over the living ones.

And if we build a glorious building for future tourists and sightseers in Moscow to ooh and ahh over, and to comment on how majestic our spiritual vision must have been, but we did it while quarreling, fussing, and complaining, then we were trashing the real sanctuary for the sake of our picture of it. This is like a man yelling at his wife for damaging a precious picture he had of her.

Many of you have been on glorious tours of glorious churches, both here and in Europe. Don’t be the guy who carves his last scrollwork—soli Deo Gloria, or something equally lofty—and then dies and goes to the devil. What does it profit a man, Jesus asks, if he crafted something as glorious as the Rose Window at Chartes, but loses his own soul?

A Generation on the Move

Since this congregation was first planted in 1975, it has met in many locations. We have met in East City Park, St. Augustine’s Catholic Church, the Hawthorne Village common room, the American Legion cabin, a garage, Greene’s body and paint shop (both locations), the Paradise Hills Church of God, Moscow High School, the Logos auditorium, and now the Logos field house. I will say this—you all are good sports. During the body and paint shop days, I remember joking once that we were the only church I knew of where you could come to worship, find a Rainier beer truck in the sanctuary, and not think anything of it.

But all this was preparation time, not “get lazy” time. God intended the time in the wilderness as a time to shape and mold Israel. Those forty years had a point for them, and they have had a similar point for us. This means I would deliver a charge to the generation following us—my children’s generation, and those coming up after them. You must be like the men who served with Joshua, and who kept Israel faithful as long as they lived (Judges 2:7). You must teach your children to do the same (2 Tim. 2:2). You must not be like the odious woman who finally gets married and is insufferable as a result (Prov. 30:23).

Never Forget the Lord

When you come into a land full of good things, take special care not to forget the Lord (Dt. 6:12). And if your response is something like “oh, we could never do that,” you have already started to do it. The one who thinks he stands is the one who needs to take heed lest he fall (1 Cor. 10:12). The Old Testament was given as something that New Testament saints constantly need.