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What we now know as the Apostles Creed descended from an earlier form of the creed, known as the Old Roman Symbol. The beginning of the creed dates from as early as the second century. We do not have any direct evidence that it was penned by any of the apostles, but it is an admirable summary of the apostolic teaching.
We believe that there was a time when the world was not. God spoke, and all of it came into being out of nothing. We believe that there will be a time when the world (as it is now) will cease to be. That will come about in the same way—God will say the word, and it will be done. But it will not go back to nothing. There will be a transformation, a glorification, a completion. And those who are in Christ will dwell with Him forever.
I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the Holy Ghost, and born of the virgin, Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into Hades. On the third day He rose again from the dead, ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence He will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.
“Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead” (Acts 17:31
).
Not only is it appointed to each man once to die (Heb. 9:27), a final day, a last day, is also similarly appointed for the entire world. The world will have a death bed. The world will end on that fixed day, and God the Father Almighty knows when that day will be. Not only will the world end, but just as it is with individual men (“and after this the judgment”), so also it will be with the planet. Jesus will judge the world in righteousness. The world is appointed to end, and Jesus is ordained to judge it.
If any are disposed to challenge this, God has given assurance to all men that this will in fact happen. This assurance (the word in our text is pistis, commonly rendered as faith) was given through the vehicle of Christ’s resurrection. Modern apologetics too often spends its energy trying to prove the resurrection. In Scripture, the resurrection was not the datum to be proved, it was rather the proof of something else. That something else is this phrase in the Creed. Jesus will come again, from the right hand of the Almighty, and He will do so in order to judge the living and the dead.
One quick point before turning to the main theme. You have been taught that many passages traditionally thought to be about the end of the world were actually prophecies about the end of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. What you have been taught about this is called partial preterism. Some of the prophecies in the New Testament were fulfilled in the first century (e.g. Matt. 24:29). But there is another school of thought which holds that all of the New Testament prophecies were about the end of Jerusalem, and that we have no prophecies about the end of the world. This view is called full preterism, and because it denies the Second Coming of Christ, it is heretical.
There are many doctrinal views and variations concerning the Second Coming (as I am sure you know), and the Christian church universal has made only one statement in all her history about eschatology. That solitary statement, made here in the Creed, is that full preterism is wrong.
The Bible teaches that there are two humanities, two races, two ways of being human. One exists in Adam, Adam as he fell into sin. The other is a reestablished humanity, a renewed humanity, created in Christ Jesus, the last Adam. The first humanity was corrupted and turned aside from the way. God could have written the whole thing off as a loss, but in His good pleasure He determined to re-create a new and glorified humanity out of the raw material provided to Him by us—raw material that was hopelessly diseased. Christ was born into this old race (without sin), and lived a perfect and sinless life. He was executed by our rebel leaders in such a way as to pay the debt for our sins, and He was resurrected into new life in such a way as to enable us to participate in Him—to join with Him in that life by faith. If we look away from Adam, and look to the new Adam in faith, we are translated from one race to the other.
Now Scripture speaks of these two ways of being human under many different figures. Here are just a few of them. They are wheat and tares (Matt. 13:30). They are sheep and goats (Matt. 25:33). They are sons of the devil and sons of God (John 8:44; 1:12-13). They are fruitful branches and fruitless branches (John 15:1-2). They are land that bears a harvest and land that grows thistles (Heb. 6:7-8). They are maidens with oil and maidens without (Matt. 25:1-13). They are guests in wedding clothes and guests in sweat pants (Matt. 22:11-14). This basic division is not the same thing as the division between the visible church and the world.
There is another division among men that is irrelevant. Jesus will come to judge the living and the dead both. That is not the fundamental division. Whether you are alive the moment He returns or have been dead for a thousand years will not matter in the slightest. Nor will your position in Christ or out of Christ affect whether your body will be raised. There is a resurrection of both the just and the unjust. Every last man, woman, and child will stand before God in the body.
“And have hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust” (Acts 24:15).
“Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation” (John 5:28–29).
We will all appear before the throne of Christ. This judgment seat (bema) means that our lives will be evaluated, whether we are justified or not.
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are made manifest unto God; and I trust also are made manifest in your consciences” (2 Cor. 5:10–11; cf. Rom. 14:10-12).
It is singular, criterion, not plural. How you will fare in the judgment is not based on criteria. How will we fare? What work must we do to prepare ourselves for that day? There is one work, and only one work that will suffice, and it is to look upon the one who actually did the work.
“Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent” (John 6:29).
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What we now know as the Apostles Creed descended from an earlier form of the creed, known as the Old Roman Symbol. The beginning of the creed dates from as early as the second century. We do not have any direct evidence that it was penned by any of the apostles, but it is an admirable summary of the apostolic teaching.
Introduction
In the creation of Adam as pictured on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, God the Father has a right hand. But the God of the Bible is Spirit, and has no right hand—for He has no body at all. At the same time, with few exceptions (e.g. Acts 7:55), the Scriptures repeatedly tell us that Jesus is seated at the right hand of God. What does this image mean? What are we being instructed to believe?
The Text
I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the Holy Ghost, and born of the virgin, Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended into Hades. On the third day He rose again from the dead, ascended into Heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence He will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.
Summary of the Text
“The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, Until I make thine enemies thy footstool” (Psalm 110:1).
At the culmination of the Ascension, Jesus came before the Ancient of Days in the throne room of God (Dan. 7:13-14). Upon that entry, He was given an absolute and universal dominion over all things. This is where God invited Him to sit at His right hand until the end of human history. This enthronement of Christ is indicative of His faithful completion of all that the Father had given Him to do. The last day of resurrection excepted, the remainder of the great work of redemption was to be done by a Spirit-empowered Church.
“Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him” (1 Cor. 15:24–27).
This session of Christ, His seating at the right Hand of the Father, is a doctrine repeated over and over in the New Testament, and it is the basis for all our labors. The fact that Christ is seated is an indication of His completed work. As our prophet, priest, and king, He has accomplished the work the Father assigned to Him.
Prophet
“Thou wilt shew me the path of life: In thy presence is fulness of joy; At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore” (Ps. 16:11).
Seated as He is by the Father, Jesus teaches and instructs us through His Holy Spirit. We know that this psalm speaks of Christ because the previous verse (v. 10) is quoted in Acts and applied to Jesus (Acts 13:35). Jesus taught His disciples that His Spirit would come to instruct them, and that instruction is part of the prophetic office (John 14:26; Matt. 10:19-20; 1 John 2:27).
“Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear” (Acts 2:33).
Now using the language of the psalm, Jesus is the one who shows us the path of life. He teaches us. He is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25). For those who believe in Him, out of their bellies living water would flow (John 7:38-39), referring to the Spirit. The Way is established because the one who lived it perfectly, and who also taught it perfectly, has now been seated at God’s right hand.
Priest
“Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens” (Heb. 8:1). “But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God” (Heb. 10:12).
Here we are taught that Jesus completed His priestly work. He died on the cross, once for all, and after He ascended into Heaven, at some point He applied the blood of His sacrifice to the heavenly altar (Heb. 1:3; 9:12), also once for all. And then—because our salvation is complete—He sat down. From that position, as a seated priest, He continues to pray for us. “Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us” (Rom. 8:34).
Notice the gospel logic here. Christ died, rose, and was seated at God’s right hand. He prays for us there. So who is he that condemns?
King
“Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him” (1 Pet. 3:22).
We saw earlier that the appearance of Christ before the Ancient of Days resulted in Him being given universal dominion. This position is one of authority and power.
“Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven” (Matt. 26:64; cf. Mk 14 62).
The Great Commission instructs us to bring the nations to obedience. Jesus is Lord. Jesus is the King—the King of kings. We must do as He says.
Prophet, Priest, King
It is hard to cover all the references to this doctrine in just one sermon. There are a number of other passages we don’t have time to address (Mk. 16:19; Acts 2:34; Eph. 1:20; Col. 3:1; Heb. 1:3; 1:13; 12:2). There are many aspects to this, and a multitude of possible applications. But at the end of the day, the charge is this. We are not up and doing because it is all up to us. We stand because Christ is seated.
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God has two ways of destroying His enemies. One is the old school method—the fire coming down out of the sky method. This is the method that leaves a smoking crater. But the other is a far more glorious method, and that is His method of destroying enemies by turning them into friends. That is a far more wonderful destruction indeed. In order to accomplish the former, all He had to do was exercise His power. But to accomplish the latter, His Son had to die.
“The vision of Obadiah. Thus saith the Lord God concerning Edom; We have heard a rumour from the Lord, And an ambassador is sent among the heathen, Arise ye, and let us rise up against her in battle. Behold, I have made thee small among the heathen: Thou art greatly despised. The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee . . .” (Obadiah 1-21).
The most likely setting for this book is after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. and before Babylon’s campaign against Edom in 553 B.C. Edom was a mountainous region, due south of the Dead Sea. Just to get you oriented, this was the era when Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha) was born in Nepal, King Croesus ruled in Lydia, and when the temple of Artemis was built in Ephesus. The Edomites were descended from Esau, and godliness was not unknown among them (e.g. Job). But in this instance, they had rejoiced in an ungodly way during Judah’s Babylonian crisis, and Obadiah pronounces a judgment upon them as a consequence. At the same time, this prophecy extends far beyond the immediate fulfillment.
The small book begins with a “vision” concerning Edom (v. 1). Armies are already gathering against her. As they had held Judah in contempt, so they were going to be held in contempt (v. 2). They were a small nation, misled by their pride and apparently invulnerable mountain fortresses (vv. 3-4). Who will bring Edom down? God will. Ordinary thieves would usually leave something behind—but not here, not now. Esau will be stripped bare (vv. 5- 6). Just as Edom betrayed Judah, so also will Edom’s allies betray them (v. 7). Just as they “cut off ” Judah’s refugees (v. 14), so also will they be cut off (vv. 8-9). Mount Esau is a way of referring to Edom, and Teman was a chief city of theirs, named after Esau’s grandson (Gen. 36:9-11). They failed to help their brother Jacob in the day of violence (hamas), and will be judged for this sin of omission (vv. 10-11). Failing to intervene led them into even worse sin—gloating, rejoicing, boasting, looting, and even capturing and turning over refugees (vv. 12-14). The day of the Lord, the day of recompense, was upon them (v. 15). To drink sin is to drink wrath, and destruction is the result (v. 16). But deliverance will come to Zion, and everything will be restored (v. 17). The house of Jacob will be on fire, and the house of Esau will be fields of stubble (v. 18), with predictable results. People from all over will possess Edom (vv. 19-20). Deliverance will come, and Zion will judge Edom, and the kingdom will be the Lord’s (v. 21).
The Bible teaches us—comparing passage to passage—that you all are part of the fulfillment of Obadiah’s prophecy. In Obadiah 18-20, the prophet quotes Amos 9:11-12. And the prophet Joel quotes Obadiah 17 inJoel
2:28-32. The phrases in question are these: “that they may possess the remnant of Edom” and “in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord has said.”
This is significant because that very section of Amos is quoted by James, the Lord’s brother, at the Council of Jerusalem, referring to the inclusion of the Gentiles through the gospel (Acts 15:12-21). And the relevant passage in Joel is quoted by Peter on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:16), with the claim that it was all fulfilled on that day. So though neither James nor Peter mention Obadiah by name, they do tell us what he is talking about by direct implication.
In what day will Mt. Zion rule over Edom? What day will that be? It will be the day the Tabernacle of David is reestablished. And what will be the day of escape for those in Jerusalem? It will be the day of Pentecost. Where are you from? “I am from northern Idaho.” And what are you doing here at Christ Church today? “I am possessing Mt. Esau” (vv. 19-20).
This is the sin of delighting in the misfortune of others with a vindictive spirit. Take care. Remember the deadly progress of malice in vv. 12-14. It is a small step from rejoicing when someone falls to kicking them as long as they are down. God hates it, and the sin of Edom in this regard was quite striking. It is rebuked in Ps. 137:7 and again in Lamentations 4:21. Remember this perverse tendency of the human heart—once you have wronged someone significantly like this, you might never be able to forgive them.
Be angry and sin not. Do not rejoice over your enemy’s failure, even if he is your lawful enemy (Prov. 24:17-18). Indignation, even at its best, is like manna—it will rot overnight. Remember that Judah deserved her destruction (as Jeremiah was telling them), but Edom added an ungodly amen. Do not be like those who do not know what spirit they are of (Luke 9:55). But the way to avoid this sin is not to search out some sort of room temperature tepidity.
John Chrysostom once said something striking about the apostle Peter. “Peter was a man made all of fire, walking among stubble.”This is the image that we have at the end of Obadiah.The house of Jacob (that’s you) will be a fire and a flame (v. 18), and the house of Esau (the unbelieving world) will be fields of dry stubble. God’s people are called to be a fiery people—fire came down upon our heads at Pentecost (Acts 2), and fire comes out of the mouths of the two witnesses (Rev. 11:5). Our spirits are supposed to be on the boil (Rom. 12:11). We are a fiery people in a combustible world. This is not surprising, for our God is a consuming fire, and we are in Him (Heb. 12:29).
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In this parable, the Lord Jesus teaches us not to despise the day of small beginnings (Zech. 4:10). We see a disproportionate result from the tiniest of garden seeds—an herbal plant that can grow to twice a man’s height. When this happens, it is not an instance of things going terribly wrong—the seed is the kingdom.
“Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof” (Matt. 13:31-32).
Jesus put forward a third parable in this series of seven, and this parable and the following one about the leaven are found in between the telling of the wheat and darnel and the interpretation of it. Jesus says here that the kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed (v. 31). A man (unidentified) takes the seed and plants it in his field (v. 31). Mark’s version of this parable says that the seed was sown “in the earth” (Mark 4:30-32), and Luke’s version says that the man sowed the seed in “his garden” (Luke 13:18-19). The Lord says that the seed is the smallest of the seeds and yet results in a plant that is the greatest of all the herbs—treelike. The result of this phenomenal growth is that the birds of the air come and take up residence in the branches (v. 32).
Remember that Jesus gave us an answer key with the parable of the sower so that we would know how to handle all of them. But what use is an answer key if you don’t use it? The sower is clearly Jesus. And since the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, it is clear that the mustard plant is that same kingdom grown to a remarkable size, especially considering its insignificant beginning. The previous parable was meant to teach us not to be thrown by the presence of evil in the kingdom, and we see the same thing here. The birds of the air represented the devil in the first parable, and there is no reason to change anything here. The kingdom grows to a size that allows for evil to take up residence. But just as darnel is not wheat, so also birds are not mustard branches.
Jesus teaches us here that in His kingdom the effects are disproportionate to the causes. The cause is a small seed, and the result is a large plant. Don’t think with simplistic carnal categories. The Lord Jesus elsewhere adds another detail, which is that seeds are not just small in comparison to the plant, they are also dead (John 12:24). There is a sharp contrast with regard to size, and also a sharp contrast with regard to death and resurrection.
Jesus set the pattern in the way He established the kingdom in His death and resurrection. He is the seed . . . and He is the resurrection and the life. He died, and the whole world is quickened as a result. But He did not just die —He also died and rose to set the pace for all who would come after Him. This is how it is done. Take up your cross daily, and come follow Him.
This is why the Reformation was the glorious event that it was. It was this because at the time it was nothing of the kind. Think of it this way—every society lionizes its dead troublemakers and its living conformists. Which prophets have memorials built in their honor? Why, the dead ones! At the time of the Reformation, the Reformers did not walk to their churches, or their meetings, or their homes, past great big statues of themselves. They were not there yet. At the time, they were being hunted. Prices were on their heads. Luther describes the Christian as a solitary bird, sitting on the rooftop and warbling his little song. Nothing great was ever accomplished by a reasonable man. Part of this unreasonableness is that he expects greatness to arise out of insignificance, out of his insignificance. “How do you know you will conquer the world? How will you manage to fill Jerusalem with your doctrine?” “That is easy—I know we can do it because we are nobody.” Faith is what overcomes the world, and faith can fit in a mustard seed.
The number of commentators who do not want Jesus to have told this parable (and the next one, about the leaven) is quite striking. We are like the handlers of a political candidate who uttered some gaffe in front of the microphones, and our job is to go into the spin room in order to “fix it.”This parable of small beginnings and enormous results sounds a little bit too much like Constantine did a good thing. And we then set up shop to argue that Constantine did a terrible thing, and our argument in favor of this idea is that birds came and nested in the branches of the mustard plant. But . . . isn’t that what Jesus said would happen? How is this an argument for not planting the mustard seed in the first place?
In the world the Lord is talking about, when things go wrong, that means we are right on schedule. Someone has once wisely observed that the kingdom of God proceeds from triumph to triumph, with all of them cleverly disguised as disasters. Begin with the greatest of them—the crucifixion. Chesterton once put it this way: “Christendom has had a series of revolutions and in each one of them Christianity has died. Christianity has died many times and risen again; for it had a god who knew the way out of the grave.”
Jesus is the Lord of history, and we are not. What is the job of the seed? It is to go in the ground and die, expecting great things to result from it. But if we are too busy to do that, if we are re-explaining the parables, or keeping children away from Jesus because He is a busy man, or otherwise making ourselves useful, we are being too busy to think like seed.
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