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Welcome to Unveiled Faces, a Redeemer Presbyterian Church podcast. Please enjoy our feature presentation. So as we've learned in recent weeks, the Apostles' Creed functions in the church as a personal profession of one's own faith. When we recite the creed, we're verbally testifying before God and before man that the words that flow from, for our mouth as we recite this creed, happen to be the very convictions and beliefs that we hold. Last week we've learned that the creed makes at least 17 statements about the person and nature of Jesus. And so far we've dealt with two of those 17 statements. We consider what it means for Him to be Christ, and we consider what it means for Him to be the Son of God. Well, today we're going to tackle the third statement as we consider what it means for Jesus to be our Lord. I believe in Jesus Christ, the Creed says, his only son, our Lord, we confess. So as we consider this statement concerning the Lordship of Jesus, I would like to first turn our attention not to a statement, but to to a question, in fact, to the concept of questions. I would like for you to ponder the question, why do we ask questions? Do we ask questions so that we can learn the answers to those questions? Well, yes, oftentimes we ask questions in order to learn the answers. For example, when I was first a candidate for the office of elder in the Covenant Presbyterian Church, I was asked a lot of questions. The first questions came from my local session. These were personal questions and the elders were obviously asking these questions in order to learn the answers to their questions. Are you a Christian? They asked me. This is one of the first questions you need to ask. Will you please share your testimony with us? Do you have any significant sins of a public nature that we ought to know about? Have you ever been arrested? Have you ever been divorced? What evidence is there that God is calling you to serve as an elder? These are questions and the only way the session or the elders could really have known the answer to those questions is to ask the question. So the reason for asking those questions was to learn the answers. But that's not always the reason we ask questions. Sometimes we ask questions when we already know the answer. For example, Once my local session and my local congregation both voted to approve my candidacy for eldership, the next step was then to submit written responses to a long list of questions that was supplied by our denominations credentials committee. There was a list of 134 questions that I had to supply answers to. Questions like, what are the biblical elements of worship? What is the relationship between faith and baptism? Who are the Puritans and what is their significance? What is the role of women in regards to leadership of the church? Now, do you think that the members of the Credentials Committee asked me who the Puritans were because they really didn't know the answer to that question? Do you think that their intention was for me to educate them about the Puritans? Or do you think that they asked me about the role of women in the leadership of the church because they couldn't come to a decision on their own? They thought that I was the person who would bring a final and definitive answer. No. That was not the reason they asked those questions. They already knew the answers to those questions. They asked the questions in order to see if I knew the answers to those questions. In other words, they asked the questions in order to size me up. to see what I'm made of on the inside. In fact, once I finally had the opportunity to sit before the Credentials Committee for a live examination, some of the questions they asked me were trick questions. They were questions that were worded in such a way that unless I really understood the subject matter at hand, I would be led to give the wrong answer. For example, I was asked, What scriptures would you use to defend your belief that Jesus made atonement for the sins of the entire world? And the answer they were looking for was not necessarily a scripture passage, even though that's what they asked for. What they really wanted to see is if I if I would correct the assumption that Jesus made atonement for every single person in the world. What they wanted to make sure is that I believe that Jesus' atonement was only intended for God's elect. And so in this case the question was not asked in order to learn the answer. Instead the question was asked in order to see if I would fall for the trick. It was asked with the intention of entangling me in my talk. When we consider the broader context of our passage of our text this morning, here in Matthew 22, we see that Jesus was being asked questions for the purpose of entangling him in his talk as well. He was being asked trick questions. Look at verse 15 of Matthew 22. This is just providing the context for what our text is. Jesus had just finished telling the parable of the wedding feast and the Pharisees who had been listening to him wanted to trick him. So it says in verse 15, then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his talk. In other words, they were trying to trick Jesus. So they asked Jesus a trick question, a question that they thought did not have any correct answer. Verse 17, tell us then what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not? The reason that they thought this was a trick question is because Caesar had grown to the proportions where he was demanding more of the Jews than what was fair and just. If Jesus said, yes, it's lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, then he would have been charged by the Pharisees of endorsing a politically corrupt leader. And if Jesus says, no, it's not lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, then he would have been charged as a political insurrectionist. But Jesus outwitted them. He asked for a coin. He asked them to tell him whose image was on the coin. And then when they acknowledged that Caesar's image was on the coin, Jesus said to them, render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's. And in so doing, Jesus avoided the trap that the Pharisees set. So then the Sadducees decided, well, they will give a triad a trick question for Jesus. Verse 23. The same day, Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, saying, Teacher, Moses said, if a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. Now, there were seven brothers among us. the first one married and died and having no children left by his wife left to his wife to his brother left his wife to his brother so to the second and the third down to the seventh after that all of them the woman dies so in the resurrection therefore of the seven whose wife will she be for they all had her trick question right and once again Jesus saw through the trap and he answered You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven." Today we don't even fully understand this, but nevertheless it was sufficient to answer the question. And so the Sadducees were silenced. Then in verse 34 we read, But when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question. Why? To test him. Asked him a question to test him. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? Now the Jews counted 613 laws according to their count. And so he's testing him. Out of these 613, which is the greatest? And so here in Matthew, This is the third attempt to trick Jesus with a question or to entangle him in his words, as it says in verse 15. But the intellect and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ is so far above the Pharisees and the Sadducees, their trick questions were no challenge for him. And just as Jesus has properly answered the first two trick questions, so now he answers his third trick question. He said to them, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depends all the law and the prophets, Jesus affirmed. So now this brings us up to verse 41 where our text begins. verse 41 we read of Jesus asking the Pharisees a question okay he had already answered three of their trick questions and now it's time for him to ask a trick question of his own and so he sets them up in verse 42 by asking who do you think or what do you think about the Christ whose son is he and when the Pharisees answered that the Messiah, we know that the word Christ means Messiah. And so basically what Jesus is asking is, you know, what do you think about the Messiah? Whose son is he? And the Pharisees answered, the Messiah is the son of David. At this point, Jesus has a confession for them. They've committed themselves to declaring that the Messiah is the son of David. And that's true. There's nothing wrong with that answer. But then Jesus pins them to the wall by directing them to the first verse of Psalm 110, a verse that they undoubtedly knew by heart. I'm sure they could have recited it by heart if Jesus asked them to. And then Jesus says to them, how is it then that David, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit when he pinned Psalm 117 or 110, how is it then that David in the Spirit calls him, the Messiah, Lord? if then David calls him Lord, how is he his son?" Now in order to understand why this is such a confounding question to the Pharisees, we need to know something about Psalm 110. According to verse 43 of our text in Matthew 22, Jesus is affirming that David wrote Psalm 110 while under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. This is a critical point It's a critical part of the point that Jesus is making, because the fact that it's written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit means it's true. There's no denying its veracity. And since the Pharisees already confessed that the Christ or the Messiah is the son of David, it therefore becomes important to note that David is the human author of Psalm 110. Why is this important? Because David, while writing The first verse of Psalm 110 refers to the Messiah as his Lord. His Lord. In other words, David calls, get this, David calls the son of David, Lord. To suggest that a son is the Lord of his own father is a highly inflammatory statement to make, especially when you consider that the Jews were a strict patriarchal society. A father was always understood to have more power, more authority, more dignity, more respect, more status than his son. Remember back in Genesis 37, when Joseph had a dream that the sun and the moon and the eleven stars were bowing down to him. Well, when Joseph told that dream to Jacob, his father, Jacob rebuked him. Jacob reprimanded Joseph, and he said to him, Shall I, your father, indeed bow myself down to the ground before you? This was unthinkable. This was, as I said earlier, this was a very controversial statement of faith. It was unthinkable in the Hebrew culture that a father would bow himself to his own son as Lord. Yet this is exactly what happened, as you know the story, when Jacob and all his family were forced later to purchase grain from Joseph in Egypt. And in that way, we understand Joseph to serve as a shadow or a type of the Messiah who is identified as a son of David, which is now called Lord by David. And this is exactly what's happening in Psalm 110, verse 1. King David, the greatest king of all Israel, declares that the Messiah is his Lord. Jesus, I have no problem with David making this statement because Jesus understands something about the person and nature of the Messiah. Jesus understands that He, the Christ, has two natures. He is both fully man and He is fully God. Jesus understands that in His human nature He is rightfully called the Son of David. But Jesus also understands that in His divine nature He is rightfully called the Lord. of David. Let me repeat that. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke both record the genealogy of Joseph and Mary, demonstrating from an earthly perspective, or should I say a human perspective, that Jesus had the right to claim that he was the son of David. Whether you trace the lineage of Joseph, or whether you trace the lineage of Mary, Jesus' biological mother, or Joseph, Jesus' adoptive father, You trace this lineage and it goes all the way back to David. Both Mary and Joseph were clearly in the lineage of David. Therefore, Jesus' human nature had a legitimate claim to being the son of David, no matter how you compute it. But as we saw last week as well, there is undeniable evidence that Jesus is the son of God. And we learned from last week's text in Hebrews 1 that for Jesus to be the Son of God means that Jesus is divine. The opening verses of the book of Hebrews say that Jesus is the exact imprint of God's nature. Very clear statement pertaining to His divinity. We saw how in Hebrews 1.8 God the Father speaks to Jesus and says, Your throne, O God, is forever. thereby affirming that even God the Father considers Jesus to be divine. And of course, we noticed last week how God the Father commanded the angels to worship Jesus. And we know that worship can only be given to the one who is true God. And so for these and other reasons, we know that Jesus is that Jesus possesses a fully divine nature alongside His fully human nature. And because He is fully God, He is entitled to be called Lord of David. And because He is fully man, He is entitled to be called the Son of David. The Pharisees could see this coming. They understood the implications of what Jesus was driving at when he dropped this atomic bomb of a question upon them. If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son? The brilliance of Jesus' question to the Pharisees is that it forced them to have to deal with the issue, to have to confess that the Messiah is both man and God, both the Son of David and the Lord of David. Yet the hardness of their hearts disallowed them from confessing that Christ is the Lord. You see, the Pharisees in our text were explicitly asked What do you say about the Christ? And in response, they were willing to confess that Christ is a man, but they were unwilling to confess that Christ is Lord. This is rebellion. They had just been shown biblical evidence, Holy Spirit inspired evidence, I remind you, evidence that demonstrates Christ is Lord, and they rejected it. Instead of acknowledging their own errors and receiving the teaching of Jesus as the truth, they rebuild. When faced with the Lordship of Christ, the Pharisees cowardly refuse to answer Jesus's question. Have you ever witnessed people responding to Christ this way? I have. But from my experience, this reaction continues to be one of the most common ways of rebelling against the truth of who Jesus really is. Oh, I'll grant you that he's a good man, people say. He's a good teacher. He was an influential leader. But they are unwilling to call him Lord. Why is that? Why can't so many people bring themselves to acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus? because God has not revealed it to them. That's why. Their eyes are blind to Jesus' true identity because God has chosen not to reveal it to them. Take Peter as an example. In Matthew 16, when Peter properly identified the person and nature of Jesus, Jesus responded to him by saying, Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. So the only reason Peter was able to properly identify Jesus is because God did reveal the identity of Jesus to Peter. The same goes for the Apostle Paul. In Galatians 1.16 Paul writes that the only reason he was able to preach the lordship of Jesus Christ is because it pleased God to reveal Christ to Paul. Had God not revealed Jesus to Paul, then Paul would have continued persecuting the body of Christ and he would have gone on continuing to deny the lordship of Jesus. To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, Jesus said to his disciples. And if you're looking for that one verse that just kind of sums it all up and puts a nice bow on top of the package, is 1 Corinthians 12.3. Therefore, I want you to understand that no one can say Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit. Did you catch that? No one can say Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit. So if God has not given a person the gift of the Holy Spirit, then that person cannot say Jesus is Lord. But you may be asking yourself, Why is this such a big deal? Is it really a big deal if a person is unwilling to acknowledge Jesus as Lord? Well, yes, it is. It's a huge deal. Whether a person acknowledges Jesus as Lord is the difference between heaven and hell. That's a pretty big deal. Whether a person acknowledges Jesus as Lord is the difference between eternal salvation and eternal damnation. I think we can all agree this is a pretty big deal. According to Romans 10.9, if a person does not confess with his mouth that Jesus is Lord, then that person has not been saved. But if the person does confess with his mouth that Jesus is Lord, and he believes in his heart that God raised him from the dead, then that person is saved. This is why the Apostles' Creed has included the statement concerning Jesus' Lordship as one of the essential doctrines of the Christian faith. You are not saved if you deny that Jesus is Lord. We hear that term, Lord, so often that I think sometimes it just goes right by us without any real thought or contemplation to its meaning. For example, in Acts 16, when the jailer asked Paul and Silas how he can be saved, they responded, Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your household. When Paul and Silas said to the jailer that he needed to believe in the Lord Jesus, that's a different statement than saying that he needed to believe in Jesus while omitting the title Lord. To believe in Jesus is one thing. Yeah, he's a good man. He's a good teacher. But to believe in the Lord Jesus is an entirely different thing. The latter implies that Jesus God is Lord is your Lord For you to say that Jesus is Lord is to say that Jesus is your sovereign For you to say that Jesus is your Lord is for you to say that Jesus has the authority to tell you what to do with your life For you to say that Jesus is Lord doesn't say that you are enslaved to Jesus as your master Therefore Do not live your life to yourself. Instead, live it to your Lord. When He tells you to be perfect, like His Father in heaven is perfect, then you have a moral obligation to be perfect. When He tells you to not be anxious about your life, then you have a moral obligation to not be anxious about your life. And when He tells you to go forth and make disciples of all nations, then you have a moral obligation to go forth and make disciples of all nations. How is it that Jesus can make all these commands of us? Because He's our Lord. That's why. Because all authority in heaven and earth has been given to Him. That's why. Think of the implications of that statement for just a second. When we read the Great Commission in Matthew 28, We typically blow right by Jesus' claim to authority and we focus upon the work that he's assigned to us, making disciples of all nations. We begin to ask questions like, does that mean that every single one of us is obligated to travel to Africa and go to some remote tribe and put ourselves in danger to become a missionary? Is that what it means to make disciples of all nations? Is it really a command to the universal church or is this just to the apostles and it really doesn't apply to me? Am I fulfilling my obligation to make disciples of all nations if I contribute money to a missionary organization? Is that sufficient in God's eyes? These are the questions we ask, and these are good questions. We need to ask these questions. But we also need to go back to the first statement that Jesus makes at the beginning of the Great Commission. All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to me, Jesus says. So why? Do we make disciples of all nations? Because Jesus said so. And why does it matter what Jesus says? Because all authority in heaven and earth belong to Him. That's why. To possess all authority in heaven and on earth is just another way of claiming to have dominion over heaven and earth. To possess all authority in heaven and earth is just another way of claiming to be the sovereign ruler over heaven and earth. to possess all authority in heaven and earth. It's just another way of claiming to be Lord over heaven and earth. The Lordship of Jesus, therefore, means that everything and everyone in the entire universe is under His control. He is the sovereign ruler over you and I. He has dominion over you and I. He is the Lord over you and I and everything and everyone. Because of God's grace, the elect have been given eyes to see the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Because of God's grace, the elect have been given the faith to embrace Jesus as Lord and to declare from our mouths and to believe in our hearts that God has raised them from the dead. But we need to avoid, this is an important point, we need to avoid the type of language that says, I made Jesus the Lord of my life. So often we hear the Gospel presented in these terms. Repent and submit and make the Lord Jesus, make Jesus the Lord of your life. If God has given you the eyes to see the Lordship of Jesus, then you should already know that He is the Lord of your life, whether you admit it or not. Jesus is the Lord of my life. Jesus is the Lord of your life. And Jesus is the Lord of every single person's life, no matter whether every single person believes it now or not. Consider the atheist. He rejects God. He rejects Jesus. He will tell you to your face that Jesus is not his Lord. Does that matter? In the overall perspective of things? Does that change anything? Is Jesus incapable of exercising his authority over the atheist because the atheist has not made Jesus his Lord? Of course not. Jesus is Lord over the atheist to the same degree that he is Lord over the professing Christian. The only difference between the atheist and the Christian is that one denies that Jesus is Lord and the other affirms it. But in both cases, Jesus is still the Lord. There will come a day, Isaiah tells us, that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Today, those of us who are in the church have bowed our knees to the Lordship of Christ because of the grace that God has shown us. For no other reason. It's because of His grace. In the future, those who have not been given this grace will bow their knees as well. But they will bow their knees because of the wrath that has come upon them. Yet, in both cases, Jesus is Lord. We do not make him our Lord any more than the atheist prevents him from being Lord. In fact, he is Lord apart from anybody's consent or disagreement. So remove from your speech any language that would suggest that you have the ability to make Jesus your Lord. Instead, if you feel compelled to speak on the subject, I encourage you to use words like acknowledge Jesus as your Lord or recognize Jesus as your Lord. And as I said a few minutes ago, to acknowledge Jesus as your Lord, the Lord of your life, is to bow the knee to Him. It is to serve Him and His desires instead of serving yourself and your own desires. It means that you owe everything to Him that's in your possession right now. This is why the Apostle Paul refers to himself as a doulos of Christ Jesus, a slave of Christ Jesus. A doulos is a bondservant. On the scale of servitude, the doulos is the lowest form of servant. Underneath the house servant or the hired man, quite literally, to be a doulos means one who gives himself up to the will of another. One who gives himself up to the will of another. Properly understood. for Paul to call himself a doulos of Christ is to say that Paul has completely given himself up to the will of Jesus Christ. But don't think that Paul is in the unique or special category of Christianity. You and I, according to 1 Corinthians 7.22, are also called to be a doulos of Jesus Christ. We have been bought with a price. Paul writes to the Corinthians, Therefore, be not doloit to men, but doloit to Christ. Be not slaves to men and man's desires, but slaves to Christ and His desires. That's what it means for Jesus to be Lord of your life. Are you willing to live as His doulos? Are you willing to live as His slave? Are you willing to spend every hour and every minute and every second of every day doing His will instead of your own? This is our calling as Christians who affirm the Lordship of Jesus Christ. When we recite the Apostles' Creed and we utter the words, Our Lord, we are acknowledging His complete sovereignty over us. And we are acknowledging our complete submission to His will. There's a heretical teaching that has been circulating within the Christian church ever since the first century. Like all heresies, they go in cycles. And once the corporate church has focused enough attention and effort at identifying and suppressing the heresy with the Word of God, it goes into hiding for a century or two. And then it comes back under a different name, different circumstances. But it's typically the same heresies that come up and over again. Today, there's an ongoing dispute within the church, which goes by the name of the Lordship Salvation Controversy. Have you heard about it? The Lordship Salvation Controversy. It's been big for the past 15 or 20 years. I don't have a whole lot of time to explain it, but given everything that I've already covered today, I don't think it requires a whole lot of explanation. Basically, the controversy is this. There are people who say that you can be saved but not be in submission to Jesus as your Lord. They say you can be saved but not be in submission to Jesus as your Lord. That is to say there are people who put forth this heresy that you can be saved and yet still refuse to bow the knee to Jesus as your Lord. Such a person they refer to as a carnal Christian. Proponents of this heresy define a carnal Christian as a person who has made the decision to accept the atoning work of Jesus Christ yet they have not yet decided to follow him to do as he says. Now that term carnal Christian can gain some traction if you read through Romans 6, because Paul talks about the flesh and carnality and so forth. And so you might, if you were reading through Romans 6 and then Romans 7, you might read this and say, oh, maybe they have something, you know, an argument here, because Paul makes reference of a carnal Christian too. Paul's talking about a different type of carnality. Paul is not talking about those who refuse to acknowledge the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. So don't make that mistake if you study this controversy and get into the semantics of the game. These carnal Christians, as they're described to be, continue to live a life which is devoted entirely to pleasing themselves and to doing their own will, making themselves lord over their own lives. I was going to bring you an image. Frequently I'll use the projector to display things. I didn't want to do it because I would be actually using an image to display heresy, and I didn't want that sticking in the young, impressionable minds of our congregation. So I will describe to you under the understanding that this is heresy. What the image is, and it's used on many college campuses in their Christian evangelism material, is that of three chairs. And then you have in one chair, you have a man sitting on the chair, and the chair represents a throne. And you have the man sitting on the throne make himself Lord of his life. And his decision is not to serve, or has not been to embrace Christ's atonement. And so this first chair with the man sitting on it represents unsaved man. And then on the other side of the page, you have a chair with Christ sitting on it. And that represents the person who is a Christian who has accepted the Lordship of Jesus Christ. And of course, he's saved and his eternal security, his eternal salvation is secure. But then in the middle, connected to this one in the same circle as this one, you have a chair with a man sitting on it. He has accepted Christ as his savior, but he has yet to accept Christ as his Lord. And that's what they define as a carnal Christian. Let me assure you, based upon the testimony of God's holy and inspired scriptures, there is no such thing as that type of carnal Christian. In the sense that these people are using the term carnal Christian, there is no such thing. There is no such person who is saved, yet has not bowed the knee to the Lord Jesus Christ. According to so many other scriptures that I've already recited or that are linked to the ones I've cited, the outward evidence of a person's salvation is the fact that they have bowed the knee to the Lord Jesus Christ. Those who think that they're saved but have not bowed the knee to Jesus are the ones that Jesus will someday address, away from me, you workers of iniquity, I never knew you. And they will say to Him, but didn't we do such and such in Your name? Didn't we do that and this in Your name? And He will say, I never knew you. We might surprise you. is the list of names of people who have stacked up on the wrong side of the Lordship Salvation controversy. Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusades for Christ, has been one of the leading proponents of this heresy concerning the carnal Christian. So has Charles Ryrie, the dispensational author of the commentary notes to the popular Ryrie Study Bible. Chuck Swindle, Charles Stanley, Norman Geisler are all men who have aligned themselves on the wrong side of the Lordship Salvation Controversy. Now, the reason I'm dropping these names is not to slander these men or to drag their reputation through the mud. My job is to do the job of a pastor. And a pastor's job is to look over the flock and to expose heresy where it exists and to call these men out on the carpet. My job as a pastor is to alert you to false teachings so that you can guard yourselves against them and guard your impressionable ones against such teachers. Do you have loved ones in college? Then warn them about this heretical aspect of campus crusades for Christ. Do you have loved ones who watch TV ministers? Then warn them about the false teachings of Charles Stanley and Chuck Swindoll. That doesn't mean that these guys are wrong in everything they say, but when it comes to this lordship controversy, they are on the wrong side. We can glean a lot of good information from them but we must be careful when they espouse heresy and that's what they're doing when they speak of the Lordship of Jesus. Are you reading the commentary notes of a wriry study Bible and throw that thing away and get yourself a good study Bible. Remember what Paul says to the Romans. If you confess that Jesus is Lord and you believe that God raised Him from the dead, then you will be saved. What if you remove just one of those two qualifications? Is it possible to confess Jesus is Lord but not believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead and still be saved? No. Nor can you deny that Jesus is the Lord of your life. and still be saved. According to Paul, both the confession of Jesus as Lord and the belief that God raised him from the dead is the outward fruit of an inward salvation. When I began this sermon, I asked you to consider why we ask questions. Well, now it's my turn to ask you a question. And this is not going to be a trick question. Who's the Lord of your life? I'm not asking this question in order that I can learn the answer. I already know the answer. I know that Jesus is the Lord of your life. But do you, do you know the answer? That's why I asked the question. I asked the question for the same reason Jesus asked it of the Pharisees. He wanted them to deal, to have to come head to head with the issue, to have to make a decision to embrace or to reject. Unfortunately, the Pharisees rejected when they were faced with that decision. And it's my prayer that you would accept it. So I ask the question because it forces you to confess with your mouth that either Jesus is the Lord of your life Or you or something else is the Lord of your life. So think carefully before you answer the question. Who is the Lord of your life? This has been a presentation of Redeemer Presbyterian Church. For more resources and information, please stop by our website at visitredeemer.org. All material here within, unless otherwise noted. Copyright, Redeemer Presbyterian Church, Elk Grove, California. Music furnished by Nathan Clark George. Available at nathanclarkgeorge.com Would you bow your heads with me as we lift our voices to our great God? We'll read from Psalm 18. I love you, O Lord, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God and my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies. Lord, we only have this ability because of the great work of Jesus Christ upon the cross and your perfect and wonderful plan that you had for salvation when you sent your son, your firstborn, to die for the elect, Lord, to give life to those who did not acknowledge you, who did not desire to be with you, who only desired this nature of their sin within their hearts. Lord, praise you, Jesus, for the great work that you did on the cross. And thank you for the Holy Spirit, Father, that indwells us, whom enriches us, saves us, opens our eyes and brings us before the throne with the prayers that we commit to you. Lord, I pray for the Mitchells, the Burns, the Shavers, as well as Olivia Ward, that they would have safe travels to their destinations, as well as those who are on their way home. We ask you that they would enjoy their time together with one another's family and each other. And I just thank you that you give us opportunity to travel and to be in your great creation and to see things that you have created with your spoken word that we may not see here and where we live. You are a mighty God that gives great attention to creativity that we are given grace to enjoy because of your great works. Lord, you have told us that we can come to you with our requests and that you will hear them. So we bring the requests and we continue to pray for the health of Carol Palster as well as April Shuler and Sandy Shaver and Heidi Witten. We know that you have them in your thoughts and your heart, Lord, before them and that your will is a perfect will and what you desire for each one of their lives. You have already ordained, Lord, and we know that you are a perfect God who desires to be glorified by his people. So we ask that each one of these would glorify you in all that they do and how they respond to their illness and how they respond to your will in their illness. We praise you for the VanderDusen's finding a home. We ask that everything would close and escrow perfectly tomorrow and that there would be no last minute difficulties. We thank you for finding them the perfect home that you have deemed for them. And I personally thank you for moving them close to us. We thank you also, Lord, for the continued prayers for Nancy Douglas, and we ask that you would just help her in her battle with her cancer, comfort her as she struggles with it, and we ask that it would be your will that you would bring her relief and victory in this cancer fight that she is struggling with. And I lift up our dig groups, that as we meet this week, That is, Paul encouraged the Thessalonians that the Holy Spirit would lead them, would change their hearts, would slowly sanctify them in all that they would do. I ask that the Holy Spirit would lead us in our dig groups, that he would be with us in word and in wisdom, and that we would just dig through our book and we would find the truth that you have put there before us. And Lord, even though many of us have read these verses many times, we know that you have told us in 2 Timothy 3.16 that your word is God-breathed. It has life. So even though we have read these words before, let the life come alive to us as we study this, and let us be convicted by the Holy Spirit to find new truths in which you have taught the Thessalonians 2,000 years ago. I also want to lift up the elders of CVP and RPC and TCC as they meet on October 25th and 26th for an elders retreat as they discuss the vision and the plans for our three churches for the next year. I ask that you would bring them wisdom, that there would be discernment, and that they would be thoughtful to each and every member of the body, as I know they already are. Lord, I thank you for all the elders that we have that you have placed in all of these churches. Mr. Langley, Mr. Vanderdusen, Mr. Walker, as well as Mr. Hine. And we thank you for their commitment to our bodies. And we thank you for their families who have also given time through their fathers and husbands to just put their heart out and to shepherd their flock. I also think of Todd Adams and his family who are now Back in Quebec, I asked that you would be with Mr. Adams as he continues to minister to the locals there, as well as to the islands that they, for so many years, lived on and weathered both physical and spiritual harsh conditions. Now, there are people on this island that are asking for the Adams to come back. They desire to hear more of the Word of God. Praise to you, Jesus, for that desire. I ask that you would just continue the work of the Holy Spirit on the islands and that they would desire more, more Jesus and less of them. And Lord, I ask for the Philippines, as we prayed for this morning, a population that has barely anybody there who proclaims Jesus with their mouth. And we ask that you would work mightily in this country That you would bring the gospel to them and the difficulties of the the various languages is almost 200 different languages But Lord you are a mighty God you are the creator of these languages you can battle through this you can work through this You can bring the gospel to each and every one of these people in the island So we pray for the Philippines today, and we ask that your word would be proclaimed and that Jesus would be heard the true and living God and of our world. And as we come to the time where we thank you for what you have blessed us with financially, I ask that our hearts would be giving hearts, that we would freely give back to you what you have given to us, because all that we have, remember, comes from you, the true and living King. Amen.
Jesus Christ... Our Lord
Série Apostles' Creed
Identifiant du sermon | 25141646562 |
Durée | 52:42 |
Date | |
Catégorie | Service du dimanche |
Texte biblique | Matthieu 22:41-46 |
Langue | anglais |
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