Sermon Transcript
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Sun, Jun 02, 2024 10AM • 54:16SUMMARY KEYWORDSpeople, Jesus, judge, scripture, church, sin, Christians, bible, god, context, person, log, good, judging, pearls, chapter, Matthew, Paul, writing, pigs
Good morning.
Welcome. If you're new here among us, my name is Gene I serve here at C3church as your pastor. And I heard a story about four pastors. They're getting together to encourage one another. It's kind of hard to understand what it is to be a pastor. So, you know, find people that you can talk to. So they decided to get together, encourage one another. And one day, one of the pastor says to the other, he says, You know what? We're hearing confessions all the time. People come to us and confess their sins, and we don't really have an outlet for doing that. So why don't we just do that here? Right? We can all trust one another. Were pastors. It's all good. It's Biblical. Right? So James, fine. So he went first, right? So he says, like, this is my problem. This is my sin. If I'm being honest, I lie.
And so sometimes when you know, I'm supposed to be out on a visitation, I'll tell my secretary, I'm out on a visitation, but I'm not. I go to the movies instead.
So no one chimes as well. Yeah, I guess I like to, because, you know, there are people in the church, you know how it is guys. They ask you for things. And sometimes it's really not very important, but they keep pressing down and pressing down. Instead of saying no,
I say I'll pray about it. Oh, that means no, in Pastor world that means no.
Right. So yeah, like, yeah, you know, going to stop that right the line. So the third one, he's like, Well, you know, my problem, maybe it's not that I gamble. I Campbell out, there's this other group of guys that get together with and we play cards, and we bet money on the cards, and sometimes we start smoking cigars, and then I drink too much. It's kind of bad. I got to hang out with you guys more often.
First guy, they'll look at him, Okay, what's your thing?
I really don't want to share it. Like I'm just not comfortable. I don't want to talk about it at all. And they keep pressing and pressing and pressing him. He goes fine. My sin is gossip. I can't keep confidentiality, I can't keep secrets, and I can't wait to get out of here.
We find ourselves continuing in our twisted scriptures. Here's the coffee must be really good this morning. Right?
Okay, so we have this verse of the day problem is I've been talking about in the past, I've given a bunch of different illustrations to help you understand what it's like, you know, so we did the fortune cookie illustrated where, you know, basically, that's how a lot of Christians view scripture, right? It's fed to you, you take it out, and then just apply it to whatever you want. The junk drawer or not that scriptures are junk, but saints, everything your scriptures do. People are a bunch of just disjointed parts, and they don't even know what it belongs to anymore. They're just not even sure what it's for. And so this is what it's like. So I call it a verse of the day problem, because that's the way most Christians are reading the Bible. But a good question came up last week, and someone had asked me, they said, well, when is it okay to use one versus scripture? Is that ever okay? Is that is that an okay thing to any standalone? Yeah, like in the Proverbs especially, you see a lot of standalone verses right? But I want to show something to you. Even like if you send out a daily proverbs Devo to those who want it, you know, and you notice when we do we look at the whole chapter, we don't just look at one verse. And then I draw themes from the whole chapter. And there always are themes you can see. Right? So it's kind of important. I'll show you one area in the Proverbs, just to kind of with this in mind, explain to you where you can kind of go wrong. So proverbs 26, four, don't answer the foolish arguments of fools, or you will become as foolish as they are now. Right? So that's your verse of the day, whatever it is, and so you just think, Okay, what instructions? Well, I won't answer. Fools, like, I'm not going to talk to anyone foolish. Well, what happens if you read one more verse down? Be sure to answer the foolish arguments of fools or they become one. So you see what happens and why isn't their own estimation? Oh, you know what? I mean, there were some more instructions that I should have read that right? Yes. So this year, just if you're confused, if you're new, it's called a paradox. They are seemingly contradictory statements, but when you put them in context. If you read the rest of the proverbs, you get all the way to Ecclesiastes, right? Which is very similar. You kind of reconcile it you, you can kind of contextualize it and reconcile, but the only way to do that is by looking at the full context. That's the only way to do it. So that's why you have to read the Bible like any other book. So just to kind of reiterate that another thing just to note,
the authors of the New Testament, right? Well, they're writing the New Testament, they do quote, scripture, they quote the Old Testament. And so
you got to think of it this way.
There contextualizing these references and by the way, some people say like, I'm going to be a New Testament Christian, right? You can't because one
heard of the New Testament is Old Testament reference, you have to know what's going on. But you'll notice what happened last week.
We looked at Romans eight and says about suffering. And what did Paul do? He quoted back to Psalm 44. But the context was exactly the same. Another thing to remember too, and people kind of play around with this,
you have to remember something, the way we deliver Scripture is very different for the authors of the New Testament, so Right, so they're literally writing the Bible. We're not the Holy Spirit's working in conjunction with these witnesses or apostles and different people to bring us the Bible, the New Testament, right? So they kind of have a little bit of authority there. But even then we see Paul contextualized it. Also, last week, I use a half a verse of Scripture, the end of Romans two, right, but what did I do? I gave you the full context for Romans, that that's why these things take a while. And the full context of the chapter, I let you know, what is going on. So you kind of got the full picture there, right? So as long as we're doing that, it's okay. If it's done, right, it matches the context you can. But again, a good teacher needs to give you the context. So think of it this way. Like movie lines, right? So it kind of gives kind of a deep comparison, but it's kind of like, you know, using these verses that say wrong, it's kind of like taking, you know, a line in a holocaust movie or something like that. And then using it for just something frivolous, right, you know, very distasteful to say the least. Right? So I can kind of propose a couple of things that are funny to help you think about it. Right? So what if you heard of the line? If you build it, he will come?
Right, so good. We got a bunch of old people in here like me.
It's old, like, don't look it up, because you're going to be like, Oh, I'm going to die soon. So. So it's an old movie, right? But if you laughed, what came to mind? Right? You know, the Kevin Costner movie Field of Dreams came up. Now, if you didn't laugh, good for you. You're young. And you don't know that movie. Right? So I would say something like, I'll give you the context, which is kind of funny, which is like ads about this guy in the field. He's building like, a baseball field for these ghost dead baseball players. Like, yeah, it's strange.
But that's the guy. You'd have to give somebody? The context. Right. So do you know his name?
So you got it. Yeah, very good. Now, if you just use the Bible answer's no.
Shoeless Joe, right. So he's from Goodfellas, too, but that has a lot of bad words. So we're not going to quote that.
What have I said, you can't handle the truth. Pretty close. Right? Okay, good.
But you got the picture, right? You're in a courtroom scene is Jack Nicholson. And Tom Cruise, who doesn't eat it's weird. But anyway, he's grilling him and grilling him, right. And he gets him to snap, right. So there's this courtroom scene, but I'd have to explain that too. So it's like this jag and this officer in the military, and he doesn't respect them. And so what's the context there? Well, you know, you can't handle the things I have to handle you, you can't make these hard decisions that I make. You're just some jag attorney. So that's what it is. So you're going to use that in a situation where you know, the person doesn't understand. So if you're a pastor, you can't handle the truth. Right? So like, that's
not quite. So anyway, you get you get what I'm saying. But here's the thing. It's not a movie, what we're quoting here, we really do have to have some respect and reverence for this. And so when people go throwing around the verses like that, it's very, very disrespectful, in my opinion. And just a reminder, right? So this is a twisted scripture series. So we'll go back what because I get asked him like, what's the big deal? And I'm like, okay, then we need to look at this again. So let's put this on the screen, all over the Bible. All right, Old Testament, New Testament, Deuteronomy, four two do not add to or subtract from these commands I'm giving you just obey the commands of your Lord, your God that I'm giving you Proverbs, there you go, 35, every word God proves to be true, he is a shield you all who comes in for protection, do not have to his words or he may rebuke you and expose you as a liar. And there's no other verses and all the Proverbs that say, but sometimes you can't know doesn't exist. We get to Revelation and New Testament, Revelation 2218. I solemnly declare to everyone who hears the words of prophecy written in his book, if anyone has anything to what is written here, God will add to that person the plagues described in this book. And if anyone removes any of the words from this book of prophecy, God will remove that person's chair, the tree of life, and the holy city that are described in this book. Scary, right? So what's the problem with it? Well, I don't want to lose my spot and heaven for one. So yeah, not going to play with that fire. So it's just important. The Bible itself tells us those
So, we're going to go into the Sermon on the Mount again, if you remember last week, who we were talking about, right being the light of the world, and then we turn the page and Jesus clarifies right? So do it in private, right? Don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing what we're going to do today's turn the page again. So, Matthew, chapter seven, we're going to look at the top of seven. Now the seventh one, do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Okay, so this verse here is going to church while you've heard this, so I'm going to call it the repeat offenders life verse, right. So
the repeat offenders lifers, this. Think about it. So what's your lifers Do not judge
that's fine. Like, don't get me started on the whole life. First thing, it's silly. Anyway. Anyway.
So this is used by people to say, don't evaluate me, right? Don't evaluate my actions, you shouldn't be doing that, right? Just stop. It even extends to people saying, well, not even God is just going to judge me, like, nobody's going to judge me at all. There's no judging, like, that's just not allowed. And so they'll kind of use it in that way. So they can do what ever they want. So this is the common, wrong application. So I'm going to show you a picture of what their Bible looks like. So go ahead, we can. That's what their Bible looks like. Alright, so the underlining, no.
And I'm going to show you why. So let's read the rest of it. So let's start at the top Matthew seven, one, do not judge others and you will not be judged, for you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging. The standard use and judging is the standard by which you will be judged. And why worry about a speck in your friends eye when you have a log in your own. I think I think I'm saying to your friend, let me help you get rid of that stuck in your eye when you can't see past the log and your own eye, hypocrite, first get rid of the log in your own eye, then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friends. I know waste. What is holding on people are unholy. Don't throw your pearls to pigs, they will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you. Okay. So what did we see just by reading a little more, you will be judged, right? So there's an interesting dynamic. And it's funny enough, I really didn't think about this until I was preparing the message, I want to share it with you because it's a really great example of again, why you need to look at the context of what the speaker is saying, in this case, Jesus. Right. So the log in the specs
that this is kind of obvious. Most of you guys know this. So basically, he's just it's wild, humorous hyperbole, right? So he's saying, basically, you know, like, that little tiny thing you can barely see in friends, I get the log out of yours. I said something impeding your vision, it's in the way, and you got something to worry about too. Right. So those are the two factors going on there. And most of us understand that. Now, if you've heard the like, you know, don't give to dogs. What is unholy? I think what it literally says in the Greek, right, and don't give, you know, pearls to swine? Well, many of us have used that one. What do you use that for? Well, you use that when it's like someone's stupid, right? Or they're not going to appreciate what you're saying, right? You know, this can be maybe you know, the disciples could use this look, you know, whatever, they don't listen, that's it the bloods not on your hands, keep going, right? So you've heard it in those contracts, like basically. So just think about this for a second, though, because when you frame it, Jesus is doing an incredibly awesome thing here. So, but how many of you have thought, oh, wait, this comes right after the login year? I think, no, we don't really think when we use it, we're just using it right? And we kind of forget where it is, or what's going on. But did you see what, what happened here? What changes right with the objects and the things we're talking about here? Right? So when you when you normally use as I've used it this way, right? You are in a position of knowing better? Right? So you're like, don't waste your time. So if you don't understand like, the pearls are good advice. It's treasure Jesus use this he has a parable, the pearl, right? So it's treasure, it's something very valuable. But in this case, the application would be well what is it you're good advice, right? And I'm putting the good advice in quotes. Because you got to think about what Jesus just said. So it's good advice right? Who are the pigs Well, pigs to Jewish person again, it's like hyperbolic he it's unclean pigs you're not supposed to eat pig right so bacon lovers good things. We're not under the law Moses anymore. So anyway, right. So pigs are it's an unclean, so it's no good he thinking of the worst possible thing, best possible thing maybe right? So that's what it is. And so those are the recipients of your good advice. Think about it again. What did he just tell you about yourself? Get that log out of your eye. He's not framing you out to be a really smart person.
Because you got a hug in your eye and you're criticizing someone with a speck immediate sentence after that, right? Don't waste your pearls on the finger. Don't give to the dogs what is holy
You see how he just described you? Right? So what's going on here is awesome, especially if you're a pastor. And if you're a lawyer, you can detect what Jesus is doing here. he anticipates your thing like your question, right? So when you heard the thing about the log, he anticipates you if you have a log in your eye, you're probably also someone who says, I don't have a log in my eye.
he anticipates that. So what does he do? Right? So Well, if you've got this great advice, don't waste it on stupid people. Anyway.
Beautiful, right, like so it's, of course, he's got he's brilliant, but it's just great. He's pre arguing all this stuff. So that's really the way it's funny. These verses should be contextual. Right? It's like, you're good advice. It don't waste it on these. Because how did he frame the other two people? Right. So who's the pig, the one with this back in his eye? So it's really funny. So anyway, it just made me laugh when I was going through it. So what's the thing here? Look? No, you're not being helpful with your good advice. Again, the log let's go back to the lodge Zip it. Right, however you want to put that. So he talks about effective prayer. So if we keep reading the chapter, I'm going to summarize for you, right, just being persistent in prayer, the Golden Rule, which applies really well here, Matthew 712, like, you know, Do to others, what you want done to you. So love everybody. This is the Bible. This is the law of the prophets. So if you apply that here, what's the context? Right? Don't go around judging everyone, or do you want to be judged? Right? So just comes just a few verses after the narrow that gates you get the warning? Right? The Highway to Hell is broad, but you know, the way to heaven gets narrower, right? So that's kind of oh, you know, and that came right after the judging thing. Remember? Then we see something interesting. Now let's keep in mind, right the gate, narrow gate and all that other stuff going on. Matthew 715. Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep, but they're really ravenous or vicious wolves who can identify them by their fruit that is, by the way they act? Can you pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? A good tree produces fruit. And a bad tree produces bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit of that tree can't produce good fruit. So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. You see what he's insinuating? There? Yes, Joe says you can identify a tree by its fruit. So you can identify people by their actions. So by reading, right, almost the rest of it, we're getting there the rest of the chapter. What do we see? Well, it's clarified. Again, the second time right? About judgment or evaluating things. You're supposed to judge a tree by its fruit. Right? So again, don't judge Well, he's telling you here. Yeah, sometimes you have to write, see judge poetry by what? Exactly? You have a prophet, a teacher? Well, they're judged by their actions. Who is it? You need to judge what they're saying? So some questions, right?
Who should judge? Who should we judge right? And when right so you start thinking about this as an applicant? That's great. We get the point. Jesus can be kind of funny sometimes. But how does this play out in our lives? So honestly, it's different depending on the time the person and the place like and so let's just go through a few of them.
outside the church, let's go outside the church, should we judge people who are not Christians?
Well, in the way Jesus is saying, Judge, like the false teachers or prophets, you discern you evaluate right and so this could be for a lot of things if you go back to the Proverbs right. You know, it's just be careful the company you keep, like we don't want to get in trouble with you know, unbelievers. But as Paul says, right, you don't want to leave the world either, right? You got to get out there, but just be cautious, wise as serpents gentle as doves. So it's more of a knowing and evaluating kind of way than pronouncing judgment on people outside the church. And I'll show you where in Scripture, it kind of clarifies that. So Paul, in First Corinthians, he's dealing with the church in Corinth, which just is no different than our church, but they have correspondence going back and forth. There's like a zero Corinthians that we don't have had written to them. I'm just asking questions in and they're doing things that aren't great. So Paul's, like addressing all these different things. And one of them is sleeping with his stepmother. And it's weird, right? But he is and it's a bad thing. And there's some background going on. We assume that they've kind of really tried to reconcile this get him to stop, you know, like all those things because of what we read in Scripture presumed and they're just not like Paul is just kicking someone out of the church, but that's the conclusion he comes to right. So the conclusion is right gear this guy, because and the reason is, because well, twofold. Really. One he talks about Levin so it's like this little bit of yeast in the door, it's going to pop the dough up, right, so the one bad apple spoils the rest. But in this case, it's going to puff you up, meaning you're prideful, same type of idea. Even the Greek are getting puffed up in practice. So it's spreading. So just get this bad apple out of there. And to fold hopefully, right I'm an animal or Satan, but hopefully it'll teach them a lesson. Hope
Come back, and you'll be saved. Right? That kind of thing. And I like to think he's the guy in Second Corinthians who's forgiven. So that's what's at play here. Right? And then Paul starts talking about how you interact, right? So I didn't mean like in a letter I wrote to you before is what he references. I didn't mean like, don't associate you with even outsiders who are sitting, right, it's the insiders going to watch out for. In that case, otherwise, you'd have to leave the world. That's where he says this, right? So that's all at play here. And he says this first Corinthians 512 Isn't my responsibility to judge outsiders. But it's certainly your responsibility to judge those inside the church were sitting, so he's pressing that on them. He's not there. He's pressing them on them, because they're not doing it. Like he's like, look, you're going to get trifles while you're said, God will judge those on the outside. What scripture say you must remove the evil person from among you. So now you understand the context what's going on? Now?
Why? Why would this be the case? Like what's going on here? Well, think about it for a second, when you're talking about people who are not Christians, they don't know the rules. And so now you're going to apply a whole set of rules that they don't understand. Yes, there's like a general knowledge of like, morality, right, that we have in Romans one again, you know, then God is obvious that he exists. You know, in today's day and age, not so much anymore, like people can just make up. Hey, they did back then too. Right? But they don't know the rules. I haven't read the Bible. So you got to go easy, like so when people are new in church, same type of thing. I'm not going to be like, ah, you know, I could let that will get you there. Like, you don't know the rules yet. So it's like counter to evangelism. What happens when they haven't signed up for this? They don't know the rules, and you start barking all these things at them that they think are okay. What does Romans one also say? Right, they also give approval to those that do these bad things. So they think they're good, right? And so we make no sense at all right? So no sense at all.
So it's better just in general, you know, to just introduce them to Jesus and lovingly, and let the Holy Spirit do what he does better than any of us can do correctly. So you know, just worth mentioning, you know, you see, a lot of Christians doing this, and I've reviewed this before, but you know, they'll go out and they'll decide to pick their favorite sin, right? Apply it to people who just don't agree or don't understand, and then go like, pick it, right? And then pick it places. I'm like,
you know, like, replaced that with please, a downward facing mirror, you know, like, that's what you should have out there. Because what did Jesus just say about the log? Right? Now, and especially in this case, as scripture commands us, we have to be extra careful with those outside the church with these principles, and that says it in your Bible. And so really important now?
Who do we judge inside the church? So we get there pretty quickly with this? Because right, the guy got kicked out, okay. So it's kind of funny, on the picketing, right? Like, if people were really depressed me, so don't do this. Don't do this. If people were oppressed me to pick it, like, Hey, we're going to go pick it someplace. You know, on Saturday, I'm like, good thing. It's my day off. Right. I'll pray about it.
Right now, I believe that all the pastors are like, no.
But
so, you know, like, let's pick it, I feel like yeah, we should, right? Let's pick it. We should all make signs, but I'm going to make the signs for you. And we'll go back to Galatians, five, we'll go back to Galatians. Five, but sexual sin was one of those sins of the flesh that will these people will not enter the kingdom of heaven. And that's what you're going to put on your picket signs, or you're going to how that kind of thing, okay, but there's a whole bunch of other sins in there. Remember them? jealousy, envy, greed, selfish ambition, outbursts of anger. Yep, they're all in there. So here's what we're going to do. So imagine like, the person who was like, we need to pick it'd be like yours is outbursts of anger, you're going to help. So
that's how I'd like the church to pick it. And what we're going to do is we're walk around the church,
you're going to say, we're just going to pick at the church, that's what we're going to do. Because something's wrong right? here first, right? It's like the oxygen mask in the plane, we got to put it on ourselves first.
So, again, like, so the log applies here, too. So in the church,
I'd say just as a blanket. Rule of thumb, all right, if you're not in leadership, and you have not been asked in that position, and you have not been asked to judge someone or talk to someone, they'll just say, in general, there's your business. And there's none of your business, right? So just mind your own business. Just focus on the log, please like it. If you're going to say, you don't have a log, I'm going to tell you then don't waste your pearls on pigs, right? So we all have a lot. We all have something we're dealing with, right? So here's the thing with all that being said, your business, you should discern and observe things right, like so if you're new and you're like, just checking out churches. Great. You know what I mean? But like this, read your Bible and check it against what the person is seeing. Make sure they're right, right. Make sure they use a lot of Scripture. Those are all important things like God do a lot.
More of the talking. So yes, you should judge in the context. They're just judging, you know, profits, mostly whatever you want to talk. But, you know, people may be leading or speaking. So that's the context and it works there. Judge those people, right, we'll talk about that again in a minute. Sometimes you're going to judge what they're doing, right? And here's the thing though, judging what they're doing. But if you want to go back to that spec, right, you want to go that that spec though that spec, ask yourself some questions. So this is my just my encouragement to you guys. So anytime you start thinking about somebody else's spec and make sure you've identified as a spec compared to your log, as Jesus said, right, like, okay, ask yourself this first, how big is my log? You don't even start asking yourself that? How big of a log? Do I actually have to? Because I'm just giving you a tip, if you're going after everybody else, it probably has impeded your vision, if you
don't go out very well.
Am I really being helpful? Is this a pearl? Am I really being helpful in the situation?
Or, you know, is that Jesus talking to you, they're right about your self righteousness? Is that a problem? Because anything really needs to be said to this person, by you, is it needs to reset? And again, are you in leadership? Is that your role? And your responsibility? Were you invited, right?
Because the church does call people like that. The Church calls people in the leadership, but like, the number one requirement I've had people ask, it's kind of funny, like, you know, how does one like, you know, whatever it is get on the board so I can control you, right? You know, I'm like, they're humble.
Right, disqualified. They're humble. That's the first thing. The other thing is, of course, they love Jesus, right? That's a part of why they're so humble. Like, they concentrate on his logo, which means they're, they're gracious and they're loving. Like, that's what you have to lead with first, right? So why aren't you like, maybe you need to think about that for a minute, right? So
when do you say something? It's very simple, like, if it's harming somebody else, right? So if it's doing harm in the church, it was really like First Corinthians starts out like that, in the first chapter, I got a report from Chloe's household, right? So clearly, there are people telling Paul, what's going on? And that's okay. Right. I can't see everything right. So I got to know. And so if you see some harm being done, of course, tell me though, right, not everybody else in the church around you, because it's called gossip, right? Tell me, of course. But again, before you tell me ask some questions like, Why am I telling the pastor? Like, is there a chance he knows, and perhaps he's applying grace to that situation? And then think maybe he's applying grace to yours, too.
You know, so maybe he's dealing with it and humility, and grace is taking his time. You know, what am I really saying the password, because there's certain things in passwords you're going to hear. Alright, so the first thing I hear is look over there.
Or whatever, you know, is this projection or deflection? Is someone like trying to get the spotlight off them and say, Oh, that person's log, look at that, right?
The other thing? Do you think you're better than them?
No, turn a deal or like, think of it that way? Do you really think you're better than that person?
Careful with that, you're really careful with that.
And sometimes, the pastor hears something like this, like you're not doing your job, right? You need to get more serious about sin. And a good pastor says this, you're right. I'd like to see you in my office.
Careful, so this is not to dissuade anyone from you know, like bringing up serious issues, you get that right, come to you. But please do the evaluation that Jesus says you should be doing right.
So that's what a good pastor will do. He'll take that standard that you're judging, and he will apply it to you, right? That's what's going on. But consider these things. Write
about yourself before making someone else's sin, your primary concern above your own sin. Right, that's what we need to be primarily focused on. Now, this is kind of interesting and worth bringing up.
If it is a sin against you, like directly, right, so this is the other stuff is all minding your own business. I'll get back on that later.
But like, if it's against you, someone like literally actually does sin against you. You are actually commanded not to tell me first. That's surprising to a lot of people. But if you go to Matthew 18, if you've been in church leadership, you've heard this a million times. I go through quick but it's like the Matthew 18 thing. Now in shirts everybody wants to go it's like basically three strikes, you're out. That's like kind of the thing right? But everyone who talks about this applies to
The third strike, we're there, and the conversation already went to them. It wasn't like they don't want to go through Jesus, his whole point in this is forgiveness and reconciliation, right? And Christians don't want to do that. But the first step, like if someone sins against you, the protocol is essentially go to them, right? Don't gossip, go to them face to face, and just try what, for the purpose of winning a brother for the person that, like reconciling is the whole purpose of his teaching here. So we have that if they don't listen, or then you bring in maybe a couple more people right? To beat him up? No, to try to again, reconcile the situation right? So as awake,
reconcile, reconcile, reconcile, you know, then you tell it to the church, right? Wouldn't be maybe that's telling the pastor, right, so third thing and that they don't listen your animal, we're like, I could kick them out of the church, like a sinner or a tax collector, and that's where everybody wants to go, right. But the whole thing is that it's if you read the whole chapter, people don't. The whole thing, the parable of the lost sheep is how it starts, right? And so, you know, the sinners that wander off that one sheep out of the 99 You know, God's going to come after you and get she's going to welcome you back. Right? He's going to go after the sinners, it's about going under. So then you get this teaching and after it Peters like, wow, okay, so he just hears this. And so don't do this. And you have to, how many times do I have to forgive my brother like seven? You know, Jesus, like 490 times, a lot, like all the time always forgive Peter. And then he tells the parable of the unforgiving debtor, right? If you're familiar with that, there's like a servant or a slave and owes the king a lot of money, a myriad of money and your Yabba like, just millions of dollars, with a lot of money. He begs for forgiveness, long story short, so King forgives them, he turns around, goes to another servant, what was it like 10 bucks, barely any money and shakes him down for the chunks and shakes them down for the money when the King finds out about it. Like he throws them in a jail. He's like, I forgave you, but you didn't forgive this other guy, you crazy. So throw him in jail. And Jesus basically saying,
This is how your heavenly Father is going to treat you if you don't forgive other people, throw him in outer darkness where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth, hell.
So this is the way we're supposed to think before we even apply that process that Matthew 18 thing or whatever it is, you want to apply. And seven, the sermon on the mount to it's the way the Lord's Prayer ends. If you remember, right, if you don't forgive others, your heavenly Father will not forgive you. It's really, really important in this context, why are you judging? That's a part of it. You know what I mean? So careful, right? So if this is your footing, for your judging, as a pastor, I'm like, oh, you know, there could be a deeper problem going on here, you know, or you're not forgiving this person for something or whatever. Like, that's scary, right? So your presenting problem is not what I'm thinking about. That's the presenting. I'm trying to get under it. And so that's what's going on here. And this is, we're sternly warned about this. For example, if we go to Colossians. And this is kind of interesting, in light of what we're talking about Colossians 312. Since God chose you, to be the holy people, he loves you with quote, money, you must clothe yourselves, right. So putting on tender hearted mercy. Think about these words. kindness, humility, gentleness, patience. So think about those words mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness,
pay slow to speak. Like,
okay, I get it. This person is doing something wrong, but what does it tell you? All right, mercy. Have mercy on this bird like think, okay, you're great. I get it. This wonderful spot you're in now, but like, the people have mercy over you. Yeah. God, does. Kindness. Be nice. Right? Humility. Who do you think you are? gentle, easy, easy, easy. And patience. Give them time.
God gave you make allowance for each other's faults and forgive anyone. Anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you. So you must forgive others. There it is right. Now, there are those that I'm aware of that will take some scriptures, right. And they'll go back, but still, I've got I've got some pearls, Jean, I get it faster. But I need to help you on some pearl deliveries. Right. So I'm like, I don't even deliver pearls.
Right? Yeah. But is that what you do? You know, it's like, no, not really, you know, so some people still do that. So they hunt for the scriptures, right? To justify that kind of behavior. So you're like, for oil hunting or something like that. I want to share this with you. Right? So some people use these things to try to like bypass the leadership thing like ah, but everyone's called to do this. And so the good place is like the end of James is one but this is another one Galatians six, one, your brothers and sisters. If another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. share each other's burdens and in this way, obey the law of Christ. If you think you're
Do important to help someone, you're only fooling yourself, you're not that important. So then if you keep reading, here we go Galatians, six, four, pay careful attention to your own work. Or then you will get the satisfaction of a job well done. And you won't need to compare yourself to anyone else. We're each responsible for our own conduct. If you feel like you're in kindergarten, you should
write does it sound like that? Like, these are the basics people like really, right? But the Bible is telling you that, Hey, careful, do your work. Okay, give it I'm godly. I'm so godly and I have pearls. Well, if you are godly, you'd be humble. You'd be humble, you'd begin thinking of yourself if you were God, that's how godly people act. Right? No. So pay careful attention to your own workers. mind her own business. Yeah, I mean, if you can help someone great, but then you see all the other stuff. It says about minding your own business, and humility. Okay. Yeah, like you who are godly, who? Maybe he's talking about the leadership.
But then careful, right mind your own business. Right. So this humble and gentle thing I want to take you to First Peter first view to the context of suffering Christians Peters writing to them for encouragement, but in it, first, Peter for 14, if you were insulted, because you bear the name of Christ, you'll be blessed. For the glorious Spirit of God rests upon you. So there's your attitude right there. How are you? You're blessed. If you suffer, however, it must not V for murder, stealing, making trouble or prying into other people's affairs. It's kind of like that Galatians five list, right? Like everyone wants to focus on the sexual sin. Right? That's the real sin, but they don't focus on what the envy the jealousy is outbursts of anger, the selfish ambition that it also says prevents you from entering the kingdom of heaven. Read it. It's crazy. It's a hope that's hyperbole, right? But here we see other lists like that, right? What are people going to be doing? Well, you know, murder, stealing, making trouble, and then they're going to stop right? Or prying into other people's affairs. It's in the same sentence.
It's like murder. You wouldn't think of it that way. But that's what the Bible says. So careful. Be really careful, a seemingly innocent sin. And that's what that is, and a bunch of others that seem more serious, glints. So, First Thessalonians. So again, suffering Jewish, Now Christians, encouraging Paul, savannas, Timothy, encouraging them live in a way that pleases God, we get to chapter four importance of loving each other. And here we go. Here's lessons 411 Make it your goal, to live a quiet life, minding your own business, and working with your hands just as we instructed you before, then people who are not believers will respect the way you live, and you will not need to depend on others. So this goes back to that like evangelism thing, how right? winning them over, right? So being respectful, make your goal to live a quiet life, right? minding your own business.
There you go. Again, and again, as per church instructions, we're more often than not told to mind our own business, unless we've been called into a role of leadership because we mind our own business. So that's how it works. Right? So now, that's how we judge right? So let's look at I mean, you guys feel a little better right now. How we're going to be judged as Christians, starting with me.
James, three, one, do your brothers and sisters not many of you should become teachers in the church? For we who teach will be judged more strictly?
Yes, you need to take the series. Remember those penalties. I talked about the three scriptures I put on the screen the beginning that is on the front of my mind. Every second, I'm preparing a sermon. That's right there. And as it should be. That Scripture scares me. And anyone wants to teach it should we talked about fear the Lord didn't see that message. Go back. It's a serious theme in the Bible. And I have it right. Every teacher should not be frivolously like just throwing this stuff around. This is salvific. Like this is people's salvation depends on this. This is serious stuff. So that's the standpoint there.
We keep reading on the other subject. I just want to show you something. James 411. Go and speak evil against each other to your brothers and sisters. If you criticize and judge each other, then you are criticizing and judging God's law. But your job is to obey the law not to judge whether it applies to you. God alone who gives the law is the judge. He alone has the power to save you or destroy you. So what right do you have to judge your neighbor? See it comes up there again, right. So we see it a lot. The log is there a lot. If we go back to the Sermon on the Mount, let's pick up where we left off. Matthew 721 Not at
I want to call it out to me, Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father and heaven will enter. On Judgment Day, Many will say to me, Lord, Lord, we prophesy in your name, we cast out demons in your name, and perform miracles in your name. But I'll reply, I never knew you'll get away from me you break God's laws. So this is very interesting. Right? So doing and you see what he's saying here, like so these people are prophesying, or they're doing all these very like churchy godly things, or get away from me.
What?
Yeah, you're doing all these churchy things, which you're not loving.
So get away from me.
What was Matthew said, What did he just say? What is the what is your Bible? loving others? Hey, you're not doing that. So if you're not doing that, I really don't care about your miracles, your prophecies. And does it sound like church the church? Yes, you sing songs. And this person is great musicians and great singer and this and that. But they're not loving. And Jesus is saying, I don't care. Get away from me. I don't know you. You don't know me clearly.
So it goes back to that and if you want an exercise in this talking about a paradox read all first, John, all five chapters? Right? It's definitely a lot of paradoxical stuff going on in that right. But the point if I had to give it a title if it needed one, right, like if it quacks like a duck, there are a lot of Christians saying there are Christians, but they're not doing Christianity. Just see what happens. Do what I say obey me do it's in there a lot, right? Because what we're not saved by these works, but
their fruit. So the train is fruit. Jesus talks about this more than once Matthew 1233. A tree is identified by its fruit. If a tree is good, it's for will be good. If it's bad, the fruit will be bad. You brood of snakes or vipers, how could evil man like us speak what is good and right? For whatever's in your heart determines what you say, a good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart. and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day. For every idle word you speak. The words you say will either quit or condemn you.
Ouch. Did you see Judgment Day?
Whoa. So you see, our words do matter. So think before you judge write or talk about other people, the standard by which you judge is the standard by which you will be judged. So
in contrary to this in a lot of Christians, it might not be you here, definitely not in this church, for a lot of Christians struggle with the concept of God judging them. They just have like this greasy Grace concept where it's like, okay, I get dumped, and I won't be judged. I'm good. It's difficult for a lot of people, they're like, Well, my save, you're not what's the deal here? Because back to well, if you're saved, you're going to start producing fruit. That's what's going to happen, right? So don't worry about it. You know, but judgment, God judging Christians, it comes up a lot a lot in the New Testament. So Romans, Romans two Romans 14, Second Corinthians five, you go over to Hebrews, it's in there, too. So the concept is, it shouldn't be foreign to those who read the Bible, especially the New Testament, it says it like crazy. So if you go back to First Peter, we see it right. Again, context, Christians are suffering for speed or 117. And remember, that the Heavenly Father to whom you pray, has no favorites, he will judge or reward you, according to what you do. So you must live in fear of him during your time here as temporary residents. So go back to the fear of teaching, you know, why cross that river? It's not there in the Greek, it just says, here. That's it. Here will judge you know, it's a concept two of being like airy aliens here, temporary residence, we're just passing through, right? This isn't the goal here. Like we're passing through onto our heavenly home. And so you see what it does, but your heavenly home? Yeah, concentrate on getting there. Right, concentrate on getting there. Right, focus on yourself getting to heaven right now. Right, but because what you'll be judged, and if you don't believe me, if we keep reading first, Peter 417. And the time has come for judgment, and it must begin with God's household. Judgment begins with us. Peter is writing I'm assuming he's a Christian. And the people he's writing to are Christians, were terrible fate await those who have never obeyed God's good news. And also of the righteous are barely saved. What happens? The godless sinners barely saved? It begins with us. Yes, the Bible says these things.
So what it says it's serious. Alright, so now another concept that you can consider just very quickly
when we talked about it, I believe last week, but anyway, we talked about suffering news two weeks ago, Hebrews 12. Right. So we talked about our heavenly father being a good father and a good father disciplining us, right, that concept. In Greek, it's serious, it's a scourge. It's like how Jesus got whipped same Greek word. Talks about that, but the father is going to do that to you. Right. And if he doesn't, you're
illegitimate, you know, because what good father doesn't discipline their kids, right? So when we see this playing out, said, Hey, a lot, right?
But in that train of thought, if you go to First Corinthians 11, we go back there, it's the Lord's Supper and people are clowning around. They're getting drunk at the heart. So it's kind of weird situation. Right? But bad situation, Paul's rebuking them. Some have died for taking this irreverently, right. It's a very serious thing. First Corinthians 1131. But if we would examine ourselves, in this particular case, that's the problem, but it extends to everyone. If we would examine ourselves at any sin, we will not be judged by God in this way. Yet when we when see what happens here, we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined, so will not be condemned with the rest of the world. So if you took that first verse, there's another one off, right? We're going to be judged by God knows what that says. But when we are judged by God, right, it's for our good, right, so the next verse clarifies. But there's a concept here that all Christians will be judged will be judged will be disciplined by God, but we won't be condemned. You see, we won't be condemned. So if you just go to the line here, right, so yeah, when we're judged by the Lord, we're being disciplined so that we will not be condemned. So you see a difference between judgment, we're going to make some judgments here, God is going to go, Okay, let's look at the report card, you know, see what's going on. Whereas we won't be totally condemned, we're not going to fail, you know, it's completely over. So all Christians will be judged, not condemn. But again, I get I've read Ephesians two, so I get it, right, saved by grace, right. So we can't boast, I totally understand. But if you keep reading, go beyond verse eight to 910, you're going to see something, we're created a new in Christ Jesus, for the purpose of doing good works that God prepared for us before.
So if we are Christians, we are going to be doing good works. Like Jesus says, a tree and the fruit. If we're not, we're not going to be doing good works. So weigh those things. Right. So we might be looking
sometimes within Christianity, right at a bad tree, calling itself a good tree. That makes sense that happens a lot. Right? But even in that case, God will judge it. Right? God will figure that out as you figure it out, to keep yourself safe, especially with teachers, you know who not to listen to. You see back to the don't listen to that person. Keep yourself safe, but condemnations forgotten.
So
the key point, just to kind of wrap it up for us, is to live in such a way
as if Jesus is coming back. Now.
Now, it's like a minute by minute thing, to live in such a way that Jesus is coming back that we just, that's it? I mean, you come back any second, what are you going to do? Right? Not that we should be putting it off or messing around anyway. So Jesus gives a lot of parables. We talked about the sheep and the goats recently, Jesus comes to judge, right. And so there's goats, right? You don't want to be a goat. And what does he say when you're looking at that parable? Well, he's saying like, you know, you don't want to be the ones that look like they're a member of the flock, but we're in, right and they get cast out. The sheep get it. But if you look at the surrounding text, it's all this urgency about being ready to go back to chapter 24. Right after he's talking about like the enzymes, things like that. He talks about like, being ready for a burglar like a homeowner gets ready. Oops, what's the point though? Be ready, right? Be prepared for the thief who's going to come into your house.
Don't be like the unfaithful servant who's like as soon as the master leaves for a while he goes in start partying, getting drunk and beaten the other servants and stuff. Be ready because you come back any second, right? So again, parables don't realize that see, it's all one flow right into chapter 25. Then you get the parable of the sheep and goats, right. It's there. The Parable of the 10 bridesmaids, right? Fiverr full was Fiverr. Wise. What was the point? Why do you say I don't know you? Because they went out to buy the oil. They were prepared. They came back. He didn't know. Be ready. Be ready. Right? The three servants right, again, not about money management. If you've heard that, just stop listening to the person who said, it's not about that. Right. So the talents that he gives to the three different people, right? It's about being ready with your resources. Everything's about be ready. Be ready, be ready. And then right after the servants in that context, you get the sheep and the goats. Right. So it's about these goats who are pretending to be a part of the flock. And what does he say? Right? Get away from me. But here's the thing. It's about what they did or didn't do when I was hungry, thirsty naked homeless, starving, whatever. You whatever you did to the least of these my brothers, you did it to me or didn't right so when you didn't do it to Jesus, get away. How to darkness your goat. You're just pretending to be a part of flock sheep. Well done. Good job, right? Because what when did we ever see you like that? Well, when you did it to the least of these, you did it to me.
Interesting, right? The key factors because what you do says more about what you believe, than anything that comes out of your mouth.
That's just the bottom line. Right? The fruit we produce is evidence of our faith.
That's it. That's what it comes down to.
So just some encouragement as I close today, look,
I just, I just pray that if you're not there yet, I pray for you if you are, and I get it, like the world and the state gets crazy, and we do things, and we have all these outside influences. Just I just pray for your hearts to be strong in him, right? And if you don't, I just pray that you surrender, I focus on the log, surrender yourself to God, ask him to take it from you. Right, and then have that fertile heart, where his word can get in there and work for His purpose to work for his good. And that's, that's my encouragement for you this morning. My prayer for you that we would draw nearer to God, whether we've strayed or that she prostrate away, right, or we've been sitting here or whether we're just not with them at all, and just wondering, like, what is this all about? And so if you're new, and you've never had the gospel presented to you, I'll just share it with you real quick. You know, Jesus, the basics. Jesus died according to Scriptures. First Corinthians 15. For you, for every single person, you're not excluded from that. You're not important in one sense, we just read right? But you're very important to God. You have value in Him, He loves you. He doesn't want to see you stray any longer. He wants you back. Why, so that you can live this life? Peace?
Good fruit in Galatians, five as opposed to the sin, right? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, self control.
Those are all good things to live in. So if you're just tired of the nonsense that you're seeing out there, are you done yet?
I've been done. Are you done yet? But this nonsense that's out there? This is the answer. This is the answer. It's not any of the other things the world tells you to go to. This is the answer for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith. This is the answer. You find it in Jesus alone.
It's like I pray for you, Lord. Thank you for everyone who came here. I was tuning in. Everyone in the sound of my voice. I just want to pray for them. Pray for everyone whether or in you were baptized, just give us encouragement. Just give us that strength. Fill us with your Holy Spirit. For those who haven't believed. Let them feel your love.
Just mold us in the vessels just of your mercy, Your Grace, your love as we go out this week
and introduce more people to you I ask these things in Jesus's name.
Morning
Good morning.
Welcome. If you're new here among us, my name is Gene I serve here at C3church as your pastor. And I heard a story about four pastors. They're getting together to encourage one another. It's kind of hard to understand what it is to be a pastor. So, you know, find people that you can talk to. So they decided to get together, encourage one another. And one day, one of the pastor says to the other, he says, You know what? We're hearing confessions all the time. People come to us and confess their sins, and we don't really have an outlet for doing that. So why don't we just do that here? Right? We can all trust one another. Were pastors. It's all good. It's Biblical. Right? So James, fine. So he went first, right? So he says, like, this is my problem. This is my sin. If I'm being honest, I lie.
And so sometimes when you know, I'm supposed to be out on a visitation, I'll tell my secretary, I'm out on a visitation, but I'm not. I go to the movies instead.
So no one chimes as well. Yeah, I guess I like to, because, you know, there are people in the church, you know how it is guys. They ask you for things. And sometimes it's really not very important, but they keep pressing down and pressing down. Instead of saying no,
I say I'll pray about it. Oh, that means no, in Pastor world that means no.
Right. So yeah, like, yeah, you know, going to stop that right the line. So the third one, he's like, Well, you know, my problem, maybe it's not that I gamble. I Campbell out, there's this other group of guys that get together with and we play cards, and we bet money on the cards, and sometimes we start smoking cigars, and then I drink too much. It's kind of bad. I got to hang out with you guys more often.
First guy, they'll look at him, Okay, what's your thing?
I really don't want to share it. Like I'm just not comfortable. I don't want to talk about it at all. And they keep pressing and pressing and pressing him. He goes fine. My sin is gossip. I can't keep confidentiality, I can't keep secrets, and I can't wait to get out of here.
We find ourselves continuing in our twisted scriptures. Here's the coffee must be really good this morning. Right?
Okay, so we have this verse of the day problem is I've been talking about in the past, I've given a bunch of different illustrations to help you understand what it's like, you know, so we did the fortune cookie illustrated where, you know, basically, that's how a lot of Christians view scripture, right? It's fed to you, you take it out, and then just apply it to whatever you want. The junk drawer or not that scriptures are junk, but saints, everything your scriptures do. People are a bunch of just disjointed parts, and they don't even know what it belongs to anymore. They're just not even sure what it's for. And so this is what it's like. So I call it a verse of the day problem, because that's the way most Christians are reading the Bible. But a good question came up last week, and someone had asked me, they said, well, when is it okay to use one versus scripture? Is that ever okay? Is that is that an okay thing to any standalone? Yeah, like in the Proverbs especially, you see a lot of standalone verses right? But I want to show something to you. Even like if you send out a daily proverbs Devo to those who want it, you know, and you notice when we do we look at the whole chapter, we don't just look at one verse. And then I draw themes from the whole chapter. And there always are themes you can see. Right? So it's kind of important. I'll show you one area in the Proverbs, just to kind of with this in mind, explain to you where you can kind of go wrong. So proverbs 26, four, don't answer the foolish arguments of fools, or you will become as foolish as they are now. Right? So that's your verse of the day, whatever it is, and so you just think, Okay, what instructions? Well, I won't answer. Fools, like, I'm not going to talk to anyone foolish. Well, what happens if you read one more verse down? Be sure to answer the foolish arguments of fools or they become one. So you see what happens and why isn't their own estimation? Oh, you know what? I mean, there were some more instructions that I should have read that right? Yes. So this year, just if you're confused, if you're new, it's called a paradox. They are seemingly contradictory statements, but when you put them in context. If you read the rest of the proverbs, you get all the way to Ecclesiastes, right? Which is very similar. You kind of reconcile it you, you can kind of contextualize it and reconcile, but the only way to do that is by looking at the full context. That's the only way to do it. So that's why you have to read the Bible like any other book. So just to kind of reiterate that another thing just to note,
the authors of the New Testament, right? Well, they're writing the New Testament, they do quote, scripture, they quote the Old Testament. And so
you got to think of it this way.
There contextualizing these references and by the way, some people say like, I'm going to be a New Testament Christian, right? You can't because one
heard of the New Testament is Old Testament reference, you have to know what's going on. But you'll notice what happened last week.
We looked at Romans eight and says about suffering. And what did Paul do? He quoted back to Psalm 44. But the context was exactly the same. Another thing to remember too, and people kind of play around with this,
you have to remember something, the way we deliver Scripture is very different for the authors of the New Testament, so Right, so they're literally writing the Bible. We're not the Holy Spirit's working in conjunction with these witnesses or apostles and different people to bring us the Bible, the New Testament, right? So they kind of have a little bit of authority there. But even then we see Paul contextualized it. Also, last week, I use a half a verse of Scripture, the end of Romans two, right, but what did I do? I gave you the full context for Romans, that that's why these things take a while. And the full context of the chapter, I let you know, what is going on. So you kind of got the full picture there, right? So as long as we're doing that, it's okay. If it's done, right, it matches the context you can. But again, a good teacher needs to give you the context. So think of it this way. Like movie lines, right? So it kind of gives kind of a deep comparison, but it's kind of like, you know, using these verses that say wrong, it's kind of like taking, you know, a line in a holocaust movie or something like that. And then using it for just something frivolous, right, you know, very distasteful to say the least. Right? So I can kind of propose a couple of things that are funny to help you think about it. Right? So what if you heard of the line? If you build it, he will come?
Right, so good. We got a bunch of old people in here like me.
It's old, like, don't look it up, because you're going to be like, Oh, I'm going to die soon. So. So it's an old movie, right? But if you laughed, what came to mind? Right? You know, the Kevin Costner movie Field of Dreams came up. Now, if you didn't laugh, good for you. You're young. And you don't know that movie. Right? So I would say something like, I'll give you the context, which is kind of funny, which is like ads about this guy in the field. He's building like, a baseball field for these ghost dead baseball players. Like, yeah, it's strange.
But that's the guy. You'd have to give somebody? The context. Right. So do you know his name?
So you got it. Yeah, very good. Now, if you just use the Bible answer's no.
Shoeless Joe, right. So he's from Goodfellas, too, but that has a lot of bad words. So we're not going to quote that.
What have I said, you can't handle the truth. Pretty close. Right? Okay, good.
But you got the picture, right? You're in a courtroom scene is Jack Nicholson. And Tom Cruise, who doesn't eat it's weird. But anyway, he's grilling him and grilling him, right. And he gets him to snap, right. So there's this courtroom scene, but I'd have to explain that too. So it's like this jag and this officer in the military, and he doesn't respect them. And so what's the context there? Well, you know, you can't handle the things I have to handle you, you can't make these hard decisions that I make. You're just some jag attorney. So that's what it is. So you're going to use that in a situation where you know, the person doesn't understand. So if you're a pastor, you can't handle the truth. Right? So like, that's
not quite. So anyway, you get you get what I'm saying. But here's the thing. It's not a movie, what we're quoting here, we really do have to have some respect and reverence for this. And so when people go throwing around the verses like that, it's very, very disrespectful, in my opinion. And just a reminder, right? So this is a twisted scripture series. So we'll go back what because I get asked him like, what's the big deal? And I'm like, okay, then we need to look at this again. So let's put this on the screen, all over the Bible. All right, Old Testament, New Testament, Deuteronomy, four two do not add to or subtract from these commands I'm giving you just obey the commands of your Lord, your God that I'm giving you Proverbs, there you go, 35, every word God proves to be true, he is a shield you all who comes in for protection, do not have to his words or he may rebuke you and expose you as a liar. And there's no other verses and all the Proverbs that say, but sometimes you can't know doesn't exist. We get to Revelation and New Testament, Revelation 2218. I solemnly declare to everyone who hears the words of prophecy written in his book, if anyone has anything to what is written here, God will add to that person the plagues described in this book. And if anyone removes any of the words from this book of prophecy, God will remove that person's chair, the tree of life, and the holy city that are described in this book. Scary, right? So what's the problem with it? Well, I don't want to lose my spot and heaven for one. So yeah, not going to play with that fire. So it's just important. The Bible itself tells us those
So, we're going to go into the Sermon on the Mount again, if you remember last week, who we were talking about, right being the light of the world, and then we turn the page and Jesus clarifies right? So do it in private, right? Don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing what we're going to do today's turn the page again. So, Matthew, chapter seven, we're going to look at the top of seven. Now the seventh one, do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Okay, so this verse here is going to church while you've heard this, so I'm going to call it the repeat offenders life verse, right. So
the repeat offenders lifers, this. Think about it. So what's your lifers Do not judge
that's fine. Like, don't get me started on the whole life. First thing, it's silly. Anyway. Anyway.
So this is used by people to say, don't evaluate me, right? Don't evaluate my actions, you shouldn't be doing that, right? Just stop. It even extends to people saying, well, not even God is just going to judge me, like, nobody's going to judge me at all. There's no judging, like, that's just not allowed. And so they'll kind of use it in that way. So they can do what ever they want. So this is the common, wrong application. So I'm going to show you a picture of what their Bible looks like. So go ahead, we can. That's what their Bible looks like. Alright, so the underlining, no.
And I'm going to show you why. So let's read the rest of it. So let's start at the top Matthew seven, one, do not judge others and you will not be judged, for you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging. The standard use and judging is the standard by which you will be judged. And why worry about a speck in your friends eye when you have a log in your own. I think I think I'm saying to your friend, let me help you get rid of that stuck in your eye when you can't see past the log and your own eye, hypocrite, first get rid of the log in your own eye, then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friends. I know waste. What is holding on people are unholy. Don't throw your pearls to pigs, they will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you. Okay. So what did we see just by reading a little more, you will be judged, right? So there's an interesting dynamic. And it's funny enough, I really didn't think about this until I was preparing the message, I want to share it with you because it's a really great example of again, why you need to look at the context of what the speaker is saying, in this case, Jesus. Right. So the log in the specs
that this is kind of obvious. Most of you guys know this. So basically, he's just it's wild, humorous hyperbole, right? So he's saying, basically, you know, like, that little tiny thing you can barely see in friends, I get the log out of yours. I said something impeding your vision, it's in the way, and you got something to worry about too. Right. So those are the two factors going on there. And most of us understand that. Now, if you've heard the like, you know, don't give to dogs. What is unholy? I think what it literally says in the Greek, right, and don't give, you know, pearls to swine? Well, many of us have used that one. What do you use that for? Well, you use that when it's like someone's stupid, right? Or they're not going to appreciate what you're saying, right? You know, this can be maybe you know, the disciples could use this look, you know, whatever, they don't listen, that's it the bloods not on your hands, keep going, right? So you've heard it in those contracts, like basically. So just think about this for a second, though, because when you frame it, Jesus is doing an incredibly awesome thing here. So, but how many of you have thought, oh, wait, this comes right after the login year? I think, no, we don't really think when we use it, we're just using it right? And we kind of forget where it is, or what's going on. But did you see what, what happened here? What changes right with the objects and the things we're talking about here? Right? So when you when you normally use as I've used it this way, right? You are in a position of knowing better? Right? So you're like, don't waste your time. So if you don't understand like, the pearls are good advice. It's treasure Jesus use this he has a parable, the pearl, right? So it's treasure, it's something very valuable. But in this case, the application would be well what is it you're good advice, right? And I'm putting the good advice in quotes. Because you got to think about what Jesus just said. So it's good advice right? Who are the pigs Well, pigs to Jewish person again, it's like hyperbolic he it's unclean pigs you're not supposed to eat pig right so bacon lovers good things. We're not under the law Moses anymore. So anyway, right. So pigs are it's an unclean, so it's no good he thinking of the worst possible thing, best possible thing maybe right? So that's what it is. And so those are the recipients of your good advice. Think about it again. What did he just tell you about yourself? Get that log out of your eye. He's not framing you out to be a really smart person.
Because you got a hug in your eye and you're criticizing someone with a speck immediate sentence after that, right? Don't waste your pearls on the finger. Don't give to the dogs what is holy
You see how he just described you? Right? So what's going on here is awesome, especially if you're a pastor. And if you're a lawyer, you can detect what Jesus is doing here. he anticipates your thing like your question, right? So when you heard the thing about the log, he anticipates you if you have a log in your eye, you're probably also someone who says, I don't have a log in my eye.
he anticipates that. So what does he do? Right? So Well, if you've got this great advice, don't waste it on stupid people. Anyway.
Beautiful, right, like so it's, of course, he's got he's brilliant, but it's just great. He's pre arguing all this stuff. So that's really the way it's funny. These verses should be contextual. Right? It's like, you're good advice. It don't waste it on these. Because how did he frame the other two people? Right. So who's the pig, the one with this back in his eye? So it's really funny. So anyway, it just made me laugh when I was going through it. So what's the thing here? Look? No, you're not being helpful with your good advice. Again, the log let's go back to the lodge Zip it. Right, however you want to put that. So he talks about effective prayer. So if we keep reading the chapter, I'm going to summarize for you, right, just being persistent in prayer, the Golden Rule, which applies really well here, Matthew 712, like, you know, Do to others, what you want done to you. So love everybody. This is the Bible. This is the law of the prophets. So if you apply that here, what's the context? Right? Don't go around judging everyone, or do you want to be judged? Right? So just comes just a few verses after the narrow that gates you get the warning? Right? The Highway to Hell is broad, but you know, the way to heaven gets narrower, right? So that's kind of oh, you know, and that came right after the judging thing. Remember? Then we see something interesting. Now let's keep in mind, right the gate, narrow gate and all that other stuff going on. Matthew 715. Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep, but they're really ravenous or vicious wolves who can identify them by their fruit that is, by the way they act? Can you pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? A good tree produces fruit. And a bad tree produces bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit of that tree can't produce good fruit. So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. You see what he's insinuating? There? Yes, Joe says you can identify a tree by its fruit. So you can identify people by their actions. So by reading, right, almost the rest of it, we're getting there the rest of the chapter. What do we see? Well, it's clarified. Again, the second time right? About judgment or evaluating things. You're supposed to judge a tree by its fruit. Right? So again, don't judge Well, he's telling you here. Yeah, sometimes you have to write, see judge poetry by what? Exactly? You have a prophet, a teacher? Well, they're judged by their actions. Who is it? You need to judge what they're saying? So some questions, right?
Who should judge? Who should we judge right? And when right so you start thinking about this as an applicant? That's great. We get the point. Jesus can be kind of funny sometimes. But how does this play out in our lives? So honestly, it's different depending on the time the person and the place like and so let's just go through a few of them.
outside the church, let's go outside the church, should we judge people who are not Christians?
Well, in the way Jesus is saying, Judge, like the false teachers or prophets, you discern you evaluate right and so this could be for a lot of things if you go back to the Proverbs right. You know, it's just be careful the company you keep, like we don't want to get in trouble with you know, unbelievers. But as Paul says, right, you don't want to leave the world either, right? You got to get out there, but just be cautious, wise as serpents gentle as doves. So it's more of a knowing and evaluating kind of way than pronouncing judgment on people outside the church. And I'll show you where in Scripture, it kind of clarifies that. So Paul, in First Corinthians, he's dealing with the church in Corinth, which just is no different than our church, but they have correspondence going back and forth. There's like a zero Corinthians that we don't have had written to them. I'm just asking questions in and they're doing things that aren't great. So Paul's, like addressing all these different things. And one of them is sleeping with his stepmother. And it's weird, right? But he is and it's a bad thing. And there's some background going on. We assume that they've kind of really tried to reconcile this get him to stop, you know, like all those things because of what we read in Scripture presumed and they're just not like Paul is just kicking someone out of the church, but that's the conclusion he comes to right. So the conclusion is right gear this guy, because and the reason is, because well, twofold. Really. One he talks about Levin so it's like this little bit of yeast in the door, it's going to pop the dough up, right, so the one bad apple spoils the rest. But in this case, it's going to puff you up, meaning you're prideful, same type of idea. Even the Greek are getting puffed up in practice. So it's spreading. So just get this bad apple out of there. And to fold hopefully, right I'm an animal or Satan, but hopefully it'll teach them a lesson. Hope
Come back, and you'll be saved. Right? That kind of thing. And I like to think he's the guy in Second Corinthians who's forgiven. So that's what's at play here. Right? And then Paul starts talking about how you interact, right? So I didn't mean like in a letter I wrote to you before is what he references. I didn't mean like, don't associate you with even outsiders who are sitting, right, it's the insiders going to watch out for. In that case, otherwise, you'd have to leave the world. That's where he says this, right? So that's all at play here. And he says this first Corinthians 512 Isn't my responsibility to judge outsiders. But it's certainly your responsibility to judge those inside the church were sitting, so he's pressing that on them. He's not there. He's pressing them on them, because they're not doing it. Like he's like, look, you're going to get trifles while you're said, God will judge those on the outside. What scripture say you must remove the evil person from among you. So now you understand the context what's going on? Now?
Why? Why would this be the case? Like what's going on here? Well, think about it for a second, when you're talking about people who are not Christians, they don't know the rules. And so now you're going to apply a whole set of rules that they don't understand. Yes, there's like a general knowledge of like, morality, right, that we have in Romans one again, you know, then God is obvious that he exists. You know, in today's day and age, not so much anymore, like people can just make up. Hey, they did back then too. Right? But they don't know the rules. I haven't read the Bible. So you got to go easy, like so when people are new in church, same type of thing. I'm not going to be like, ah, you know, I could let that will get you there. Like, you don't know the rules yet. So it's like counter to evangelism. What happens when they haven't signed up for this? They don't know the rules, and you start barking all these things at them that they think are okay. What does Romans one also say? Right, they also give approval to those that do these bad things. So they think they're good, right? And so we make no sense at all right? So no sense at all.
So it's better just in general, you know, to just introduce them to Jesus and lovingly, and let the Holy Spirit do what he does better than any of us can do correctly. So you know, just worth mentioning, you know, you see, a lot of Christians doing this, and I've reviewed this before, but you know, they'll go out and they'll decide to pick their favorite sin, right? Apply it to people who just don't agree or don't understand, and then go like, pick it, right? And then pick it places. I'm like,
you know, like, replaced that with please, a downward facing mirror, you know, like, that's what you should have out there. Because what did Jesus just say about the log? Right? Now, and especially in this case, as scripture commands us, we have to be extra careful with those outside the church with these principles, and that says it in your Bible. And so really important now?
Who do we judge inside the church? So we get there pretty quickly with this? Because right, the guy got kicked out, okay. So it's kind of funny, on the picketing, right? Like, if people were really depressed me, so don't do this. Don't do this. If people were oppressed me to pick it, like, Hey, we're going to go pick it someplace. You know, on Saturday, I'm like, good thing. It's my day off. Right. I'll pray about it.
Right now, I believe that all the pastors are like, no.
But
so, you know, like, let's pick it, I feel like yeah, we should, right? Let's pick it. We should all make signs, but I'm going to make the signs for you. And we'll go back to Galatians, five, we'll go back to Galatians. Five, but sexual sin was one of those sins of the flesh that will these people will not enter the kingdom of heaven. And that's what you're going to put on your picket signs, or you're going to how that kind of thing, okay, but there's a whole bunch of other sins in there. Remember them? jealousy, envy, greed, selfish ambition, outbursts of anger. Yep, they're all in there. So here's what we're going to do. So imagine like, the person who was like, we need to pick it'd be like yours is outbursts of anger, you're going to help. So
that's how I'd like the church to pick it. And what we're going to do is we're walk around the church,
you're going to say, we're just going to pick at the church, that's what we're going to do. Because something's wrong right? here first, right? It's like the oxygen mask in the plane, we got to put it on ourselves first.
So, again, like, so the log applies here, too. So in the church,
I'd say just as a blanket. Rule of thumb, all right, if you're not in leadership, and you have not been asked in that position, and you have not been asked to judge someone or talk to someone, they'll just say, in general, there's your business. And there's none of your business, right? So just mind your own business. Just focus on the log, please like it. If you're going to say, you don't have a log, I'm going to tell you then don't waste your pearls on pigs, right? So we all have a lot. We all have something we're dealing with, right? So here's the thing with all that being said, your business, you should discern and observe things right, like so if you're new and you're like, just checking out churches. Great. You know what I mean? But like this, read your Bible and check it against what the person is seeing. Make sure they're right, right. Make sure they use a lot of Scripture. Those are all important things like God do a lot.
More of the talking. So yes, you should judge in the context. They're just judging, you know, profits, mostly whatever you want to talk. But, you know, people may be leading or speaking. So that's the context and it works there. Judge those people, right, we'll talk about that again in a minute. Sometimes you're going to judge what they're doing, right? And here's the thing though, judging what they're doing. But if you want to go back to that spec, right, you want to go that that spec though that spec, ask yourself some questions. So this is my just my encouragement to you guys. So anytime you start thinking about somebody else's spec and make sure you've identified as a spec compared to your log, as Jesus said, right, like, okay, ask yourself this first, how big is my log? You don't even start asking yourself that? How big of a log? Do I actually have to? Because I'm just giving you a tip, if you're going after everybody else, it probably has impeded your vision, if you
don't go out very well.
Am I really being helpful? Is this a pearl? Am I really being helpful in the situation?
Or, you know, is that Jesus talking to you, they're right about your self righteousness? Is that a problem? Because anything really needs to be said to this person, by you, is it needs to reset? And again, are you in leadership? Is that your role? And your responsibility? Were you invited, right?
Because the church does call people like that. The Church calls people in the leadership, but like, the number one requirement I've had people ask, it's kind of funny, like, you know, how does one like, you know, whatever it is get on the board so I can control you, right? You know, I'm like, they're humble.
Right, disqualified. They're humble. That's the first thing. The other thing is, of course, they love Jesus, right? That's a part of why they're so humble. Like, they concentrate on his logo, which means they're, they're gracious and they're loving. Like, that's what you have to lead with first, right? So why aren't you like, maybe you need to think about that for a minute, right? So
when do you say something? It's very simple, like, if it's harming somebody else, right? So if it's doing harm in the church, it was really like First Corinthians starts out like that, in the first chapter, I got a report from Chloe's household, right? So clearly, there are people telling Paul, what's going on? And that's okay. Right. I can't see everything right. So I got to know. And so if you see some harm being done, of course, tell me though, right, not everybody else in the church around you, because it's called gossip, right? Tell me, of course. But again, before you tell me ask some questions like, Why am I telling the pastor? Like, is there a chance he knows, and perhaps he's applying grace to that situation? And then think maybe he's applying grace to yours, too.
You know, so maybe he's dealing with it and humility, and grace is taking his time. You know, what am I really saying the password, because there's certain things in passwords you're going to hear. Alright, so the first thing I hear is look over there.
Or whatever, you know, is this projection or deflection? Is someone like trying to get the spotlight off them and say, Oh, that person's log, look at that, right?
The other thing? Do you think you're better than them?
No, turn a deal or like, think of it that way? Do you really think you're better than that person?
Careful with that, you're really careful with that.
And sometimes, the pastor hears something like this, like you're not doing your job, right? You need to get more serious about sin. And a good pastor says this, you're right. I'd like to see you in my office.
Careful, so this is not to dissuade anyone from you know, like bringing up serious issues, you get that right, come to you. But please do the evaluation that Jesus says you should be doing right.
So that's what a good pastor will do. He'll take that standard that you're judging, and he will apply it to you, right? That's what's going on. But consider these things. Write
about yourself before making someone else's sin, your primary concern above your own sin. Right, that's what we need to be primarily focused on. Now, this is kind of interesting and worth bringing up.
If it is a sin against you, like directly, right, so this is the other stuff is all minding your own business. I'll get back on that later.
But like, if it's against you, someone like literally actually does sin against you. You are actually commanded not to tell me first. That's surprising to a lot of people. But if you go to Matthew 18, if you've been in church leadership, you've heard this a million times. I go through quick but it's like the Matthew 18 thing. Now in shirts everybody wants to go it's like basically three strikes, you're out. That's like kind of the thing right? But everyone who talks about this applies to
The third strike, we're there, and the conversation already went to them. It wasn't like they don't want to go through Jesus, his whole point in this is forgiveness and reconciliation, right? And Christians don't want to do that. But the first step, like if someone sins against you, the protocol is essentially go to them, right? Don't gossip, go to them face to face, and just try what, for the purpose of winning a brother for the person that, like reconciling is the whole purpose of his teaching here. So we have that if they don't listen, or then you bring in maybe a couple more people right? To beat him up? No, to try to again, reconcile the situation right? So as awake,
reconcile, reconcile, reconcile, you know, then you tell it to the church, right? Wouldn't be maybe that's telling the pastor, right, so third thing and that they don't listen your animal, we're like, I could kick them out of the church, like a sinner or a tax collector, and that's where everybody wants to go, right. But the whole thing is that it's if you read the whole chapter, people don't. The whole thing, the parable of the lost sheep is how it starts, right? And so, you know, the sinners that wander off that one sheep out of the 99 You know, God's going to come after you and get she's going to welcome you back. Right? He's going to go after the sinners, it's about going under. So then you get this teaching and after it Peters like, wow, okay, so he just hears this. And so don't do this. And you have to, how many times do I have to forgive my brother like seven? You know, Jesus, like 490 times, a lot, like all the time always forgive Peter. And then he tells the parable of the unforgiving debtor, right? If you're familiar with that, there's like a servant or a slave and owes the king a lot of money, a myriad of money and your Yabba like, just millions of dollars, with a lot of money. He begs for forgiveness, long story short, so King forgives them, he turns around, goes to another servant, what was it like 10 bucks, barely any money and shakes him down for the chunks and shakes them down for the money when the King finds out about it. Like he throws them in a jail. He's like, I forgave you, but you didn't forgive this other guy, you crazy. So throw him in jail. And Jesus basically saying,
This is how your heavenly Father is going to treat you if you don't forgive other people, throw him in outer darkness where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth, hell.
So this is the way we're supposed to think before we even apply that process that Matthew 18 thing or whatever it is, you want to apply. And seven, the sermon on the mount to it's the way the Lord's Prayer ends. If you remember, right, if you don't forgive others, your heavenly Father will not forgive you. It's really, really important in this context, why are you judging? That's a part of it. You know what I mean? So careful, right? So if this is your footing, for your judging, as a pastor, I'm like, oh, you know, there could be a deeper problem going on here, you know, or you're not forgiving this person for something or whatever. Like, that's scary, right? So your presenting problem is not what I'm thinking about. That's the presenting. I'm trying to get under it. And so that's what's going on here. And this is, we're sternly warned about this. For example, if we go to Colossians. And this is kind of interesting, in light of what we're talking about Colossians 312. Since God chose you, to be the holy people, he loves you with quote, money, you must clothe yourselves, right. So putting on tender hearted mercy. Think about these words. kindness, humility, gentleness, patience. So think about those words mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness,
pay slow to speak. Like,
okay, I get it. This person is doing something wrong, but what does it tell you? All right, mercy. Have mercy on this bird like think, okay, you're great. I get it. This wonderful spot you're in now, but like, the people have mercy over you. Yeah. God, does. Kindness. Be nice. Right? Humility. Who do you think you are? gentle, easy, easy, easy. And patience. Give them time.
God gave you make allowance for each other's faults and forgive anyone. Anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you. So you must forgive others. There it is right. Now, there are those that I'm aware of that will take some scriptures, right. And they'll go back, but still, I've got I've got some pearls, Jean, I get it faster. But I need to help you on some pearl deliveries. Right. So I'm like, I don't even deliver pearls.
Right? Yeah. But is that what you do? You know, it's like, no, not really, you know, so some people still do that. So they hunt for the scriptures, right? To justify that kind of behavior. So you're like, for oil hunting or something like that. I want to share this with you. Right? So some people use these things to try to like bypass the leadership thing like ah, but everyone's called to do this. And so the good place is like the end of James is one but this is another one Galatians six, one, your brothers and sisters. If another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. share each other's burdens and in this way, obey the law of Christ. If you think you're
Do important to help someone, you're only fooling yourself, you're not that important. So then if you keep reading, here we go Galatians, six, four, pay careful attention to your own work. Or then you will get the satisfaction of a job well done. And you won't need to compare yourself to anyone else. We're each responsible for our own conduct. If you feel like you're in kindergarten, you should
write does it sound like that? Like, these are the basics people like really, right? But the Bible is telling you that, Hey, careful, do your work. Okay, give it I'm godly. I'm so godly and I have pearls. Well, if you are godly, you'd be humble. You'd be humble, you'd begin thinking of yourself if you were God, that's how godly people act. Right? No. So pay careful attention to your own workers. mind her own business. Yeah, I mean, if you can help someone great, but then you see all the other stuff. It says about minding your own business, and humility. Okay. Yeah, like you who are godly, who? Maybe he's talking about the leadership.
But then careful, right mind your own business. Right. So this humble and gentle thing I want to take you to First Peter first view to the context of suffering Christians Peters writing to them for encouragement, but in it, first, Peter for 14, if you were insulted, because you bear the name of Christ, you'll be blessed. For the glorious Spirit of God rests upon you. So there's your attitude right there. How are you? You're blessed. If you suffer, however, it must not V for murder, stealing, making trouble or prying into other people's affairs. It's kind of like that Galatians five list, right? Like everyone wants to focus on the sexual sin. Right? That's the real sin, but they don't focus on what the envy the jealousy is outbursts of anger, the selfish ambition that it also says prevents you from entering the kingdom of heaven. Read it. It's crazy. It's a hope that's hyperbole, right? But here we see other lists like that, right? What are people going to be doing? Well, you know, murder, stealing, making trouble, and then they're going to stop right? Or prying into other people's affairs. It's in the same sentence.
It's like murder. You wouldn't think of it that way. But that's what the Bible says. So careful. Be really careful, a seemingly innocent sin. And that's what that is, and a bunch of others that seem more serious, glints. So, First Thessalonians. So again, suffering Jewish, Now Christians, encouraging Paul, savannas, Timothy, encouraging them live in a way that pleases God, we get to chapter four importance of loving each other. And here we go. Here's lessons 411 Make it your goal, to live a quiet life, minding your own business, and working with your hands just as we instructed you before, then people who are not believers will respect the way you live, and you will not need to depend on others. So this goes back to that like evangelism thing, how right? winning them over, right? So being respectful, make your goal to live a quiet life, right? minding your own business.
There you go. Again, and again, as per church instructions, we're more often than not told to mind our own business, unless we've been called into a role of leadership because we mind our own business. So that's how it works. Right? So now, that's how we judge right? So let's look at I mean, you guys feel a little better right now. How we're going to be judged as Christians, starting with me.
James, three, one, do your brothers and sisters not many of you should become teachers in the church? For we who teach will be judged more strictly?
Yes, you need to take the series. Remember those penalties. I talked about the three scriptures I put on the screen the beginning that is on the front of my mind. Every second, I'm preparing a sermon. That's right there. And as it should be. That Scripture scares me. And anyone wants to teach it should we talked about fear the Lord didn't see that message. Go back. It's a serious theme in the Bible. And I have it right. Every teacher should not be frivolously like just throwing this stuff around. This is salvific. Like this is people's salvation depends on this. This is serious stuff. So that's the standpoint there.
We keep reading on the other subject. I just want to show you something. James 411. Go and speak evil against each other to your brothers and sisters. If you criticize and judge each other, then you are criticizing and judging God's law. But your job is to obey the law not to judge whether it applies to you. God alone who gives the law is the judge. He alone has the power to save you or destroy you. So what right do you have to judge your neighbor? See it comes up there again, right. So we see it a lot. The log is there a lot. If we go back to the Sermon on the Mount, let's pick up where we left off. Matthew 721 Not at
I want to call it out to me, Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father and heaven will enter. On Judgment Day, Many will say to me, Lord, Lord, we prophesy in your name, we cast out demons in your name, and perform miracles in your name. But I'll reply, I never knew you'll get away from me you break God's laws. So this is very interesting. Right? So doing and you see what he's saying here, like so these people are prophesying, or they're doing all these very like churchy godly things, or get away from me.
What?
Yeah, you're doing all these churchy things, which you're not loving.
So get away from me.
What was Matthew said, What did he just say? What is the what is your Bible? loving others? Hey, you're not doing that. So if you're not doing that, I really don't care about your miracles, your prophecies. And does it sound like church the church? Yes, you sing songs. And this person is great musicians and great singer and this and that. But they're not loving. And Jesus is saying, I don't care. Get away from me. I don't know you. You don't know me clearly.
So it goes back to that and if you want an exercise in this talking about a paradox read all first, John, all five chapters? Right? It's definitely a lot of paradoxical stuff going on in that right. But the point if I had to give it a title if it needed one, right, like if it quacks like a duck, there are a lot of Christians saying there are Christians, but they're not doing Christianity. Just see what happens. Do what I say obey me do it's in there a lot, right? Because what we're not saved by these works, but
their fruit. So the train is fruit. Jesus talks about this more than once Matthew 1233. A tree is identified by its fruit. If a tree is good, it's for will be good. If it's bad, the fruit will be bad. You brood of snakes or vipers, how could evil man like us speak what is good and right? For whatever's in your heart determines what you say, a good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart. and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day. For every idle word you speak. The words you say will either quit or condemn you.
Ouch. Did you see Judgment Day?
Whoa. So you see, our words do matter. So think before you judge write or talk about other people, the standard by which you judge is the standard by which you will be judged. So
in contrary to this in a lot of Christians, it might not be you here, definitely not in this church, for a lot of Christians struggle with the concept of God judging them. They just have like this greasy Grace concept where it's like, okay, I get dumped, and I won't be judged. I'm good. It's difficult for a lot of people, they're like, Well, my save, you're not what's the deal here? Because back to well, if you're saved, you're going to start producing fruit. That's what's going to happen, right? So don't worry about it. You know, but judgment, God judging Christians, it comes up a lot a lot in the New Testament. So Romans, Romans two Romans 14, Second Corinthians five, you go over to Hebrews, it's in there, too. So the concept is, it shouldn't be foreign to those who read the Bible, especially the New Testament, it says it like crazy. So if you go back to First Peter, we see it right. Again, context, Christians are suffering for speed or 117. And remember, that the Heavenly Father to whom you pray, has no favorites, he will judge or reward you, according to what you do. So you must live in fear of him during your time here as temporary residents. So go back to the fear of teaching, you know, why cross that river? It's not there in the Greek, it just says, here. That's it. Here will judge you know, it's a concept two of being like airy aliens here, temporary residence, we're just passing through, right? This isn't the goal here. Like we're passing through onto our heavenly home. And so you see what it does, but your heavenly home? Yeah, concentrate on getting there. Right, concentrate on getting there. Right, focus on yourself getting to heaven right now. Right, but because what you'll be judged, and if you don't believe me, if we keep reading first, Peter 417. And the time has come for judgment, and it must begin with God's household. Judgment begins with us. Peter is writing I'm assuming he's a Christian. And the people he's writing to are Christians, were terrible fate await those who have never obeyed God's good news. And also of the righteous are barely saved. What happens? The godless sinners barely saved? It begins with us. Yes, the Bible says these things.
So what it says it's serious. Alright, so now another concept that you can consider just very quickly
when we talked about it, I believe last week, but anyway, we talked about suffering news two weeks ago, Hebrews 12. Right. So we talked about our heavenly father being a good father and a good father disciplining us, right, that concept. In Greek, it's serious, it's a scourge. It's like how Jesus got whipped same Greek word. Talks about that, but the father is going to do that to you. Right. And if he doesn't, you're
illegitimate, you know, because what good father doesn't discipline their kids, right? So when we see this playing out, said, Hey, a lot, right?
But in that train of thought, if you go to First Corinthians 11, we go back there, it's the Lord's Supper and people are clowning around. They're getting drunk at the heart. So it's kind of weird situation. Right? But bad situation, Paul's rebuking them. Some have died for taking this irreverently, right. It's a very serious thing. First Corinthians 1131. But if we would examine ourselves, in this particular case, that's the problem, but it extends to everyone. If we would examine ourselves at any sin, we will not be judged by God in this way. Yet when we when see what happens here, we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined, so will not be condemned with the rest of the world. So if you took that first verse, there's another one off, right? We're going to be judged by God knows what that says. But when we are judged by God, right, it's for our good, right, so the next verse clarifies. But there's a concept here that all Christians will be judged will be judged will be disciplined by God, but we won't be condemned. You see, we won't be condemned. So if you just go to the line here, right, so yeah, when we're judged by the Lord, we're being disciplined so that we will not be condemned. So you see a difference between judgment, we're going to make some judgments here, God is going to go, Okay, let's look at the report card, you know, see what's going on. Whereas we won't be totally condemned, we're not going to fail, you know, it's completely over. So all Christians will be judged, not condemn. But again, I get I've read Ephesians two, so I get it, right, saved by grace, right. So we can't boast, I totally understand. But if you keep reading, go beyond verse eight to 910, you're going to see something, we're created a new in Christ Jesus, for the purpose of doing good works that God prepared for us before.
So if we are Christians, we are going to be doing good works. Like Jesus says, a tree and the fruit. If we're not, we're not going to be doing good works. So weigh those things. Right. So we might be looking
sometimes within Christianity, right at a bad tree, calling itself a good tree. That makes sense that happens a lot. Right? But even in that case, God will judge it. Right? God will figure that out as you figure it out, to keep yourself safe, especially with teachers, you know who not to listen to. You see back to the don't listen to that person. Keep yourself safe, but condemnations forgotten.
So
the key point, just to kind of wrap it up for us, is to live in such a way
as if Jesus is coming back. Now.
Now, it's like a minute by minute thing, to live in such a way that Jesus is coming back that we just, that's it? I mean, you come back any second, what are you going to do? Right? Not that we should be putting it off or messing around anyway. So Jesus gives a lot of parables. We talked about the sheep and the goats recently, Jesus comes to judge, right. And so there's goats, right? You don't want to be a goat. And what does he say when you're looking at that parable? Well, he's saying like, you know, you don't want to be the ones that look like they're a member of the flock, but we're in, right and they get cast out. The sheep get it. But if you look at the surrounding text, it's all this urgency about being ready to go back to chapter 24. Right after he's talking about like the enzymes, things like that. He talks about like, being ready for a burglar like a homeowner gets ready. Oops, what's the point though? Be ready, right? Be prepared for the thief who's going to come into your house.
Don't be like the unfaithful servant who's like as soon as the master leaves for a while he goes in start partying, getting drunk and beaten the other servants and stuff. Be ready because you come back any second, right? So again, parables don't realize that see, it's all one flow right into chapter 25. Then you get the parable of the sheep and goats, right. It's there. The Parable of the 10 bridesmaids, right? Fiverr full was Fiverr. Wise. What was the point? Why do you say I don't know you? Because they went out to buy the oil. They were prepared. They came back. He didn't know. Be ready. Be ready. Right? The three servants right, again, not about money management. If you've heard that, just stop listening to the person who said, it's not about that. Right. So the talents that he gives to the three different people, right? It's about being ready with your resources. Everything's about be ready. Be ready, be ready. And then right after the servants in that context, you get the sheep and the goats. Right. So it's about these goats who are pretending to be a part of the flock. And what does he say? Right? Get away from me. But here's the thing. It's about what they did or didn't do when I was hungry, thirsty naked homeless, starving, whatever. You whatever you did to the least of these my brothers, you did it to me or didn't right so when you didn't do it to Jesus, get away. How to darkness your goat. You're just pretending to be a part of flock sheep. Well done. Good job, right? Because what when did we ever see you like that? Well, when you did it to the least of these, you did it to me.
Interesting, right? The key factors because what you do says more about what you believe, than anything that comes out of your mouth.
That's just the bottom line. Right? The fruit we produce is evidence of our faith.
That's it. That's what it comes down to.
So just some encouragement as I close today, look,
I just, I just pray that if you're not there yet, I pray for you if you are, and I get it, like the world and the state gets crazy, and we do things, and we have all these outside influences. Just I just pray for your hearts to be strong in him, right? And if you don't, I just pray that you surrender, I focus on the log, surrender yourself to God, ask him to take it from you. Right, and then have that fertile heart, where his word can get in there and work for His purpose to work for his good. And that's, that's my encouragement for you this morning. My prayer for you that we would draw nearer to God, whether we've strayed or that she prostrate away, right, or we've been sitting here or whether we're just not with them at all, and just wondering, like, what is this all about? And so if you're new, and you've never had the gospel presented to you, I'll just share it with you real quick. You know, Jesus, the basics. Jesus died according to Scriptures. First Corinthians 15. For you, for every single person, you're not excluded from that. You're not important in one sense, we just read right? But you're very important to God. You have value in Him, He loves you. He doesn't want to see you stray any longer. He wants you back. Why, so that you can live this life? Peace?
Good fruit in Galatians, five as opposed to the sin, right? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, self control.
Those are all good things to live in. So if you're just tired of the nonsense that you're seeing out there, are you done yet?
I've been done. Are you done yet? But this nonsense that's out there? This is the answer. This is the answer. It's not any of the other things the world tells you to go to. This is the answer for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith. This is the answer. You find it in Jesus alone.
It's like I pray for you, Lord. Thank you for everyone who came here. I was tuning in. Everyone in the sound of my voice. I just want to pray for them. Pray for everyone whether or in you were baptized, just give us encouragement. Just give us that strength. Fill us with your Holy Spirit. For those who haven't believed. Let them feel your love.
Just mold us in the vessels just of your mercy, Your Grace, your love as we go out this week
and introduce more people to you I ask these things in Jesus's name.
Morning