This morning's reading comes from 2 Corinthians 4, verses 4-13. The God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, let light shine out of darkness, made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God's glory displayed in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed. Perplexed, but not in despair. Persecuted, but not abandoned. Struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may also be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. It is written, I believed, therefore I have spoken. Since we have that same spirit of faith, we also believe and therefore speak. All people are like grass and all their beauty is like the flowers of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever. Well, we're in the middle of a short series here called Church. Why? Who? And we're asking some of those questions about the church. What is the church? Who is the church? Why does the church exist? And that's an important question for us as a very young church to ask. What is it that characterizes? the church. As we are about to go into our fourth year of existence here at New City, we sought to answer that question with our core values. Our core values are those pillars upon which we believe the church should be characterized by and which we want New City to be uniquely characterized by. A couple of weeks ago, we looked at our first core value. about what it means to be a biblically faithful church. And last week we started the discussion about what it means that we are a gospel-centric church. And that's what we're looking at this morning. This is part two of that which we started last week. Last week we noted that to be a gospel-centric church means, very simply, that there is a certain piece of news at the nerve center of the Bible and at the nerve center of our lives. We say news because the gospel actually is good news. That's what gospel means. When the Bible talks about the gospel, it's talking about this good news of something that has actually happened in real history, in and through a real person named Jesus Christ, and it was done for us. And so that good news of what he accomplished we've said, in other words, is the distinctive message of the entire scriptures. And secondly, it's the distinctive motivation of our lives, okay? And so that's what it means to be a gospel-centric church, that we see this gospel, this news, to be the distinctive message of the Bible and the distinctive motivation of our lives. And so last week we started to set this up. Last week we covered what it looks like that the gospel is the distinctive message of the Bible. And we just sort of dipped our toes into what it looks like for it to be the distinctive motivation of our everyday lives. And so for the sake of those who weren't here last week, for those who might be visiting this morning or those who had been traveling, we're going to sort of rewind a little bit. And it's very important to me to sort of set the stage of where we were because this imagery that Paul is is writing here in 2 Corinthians and is so important for us to grasp if we're really going to begin to understand how this works out on a practical level, this good news in our everyday lives. And so we're going to sort of backtrack a little bit here, if you'll allow me to do so, to summarize some things from last week. And what we left last week with was we left the place where we were marveling at these pictures that Paul, who wrote 2 Corinthians, these pictures that Paul was holding up. And the first picture was the picture, it goes way back to Genesis 1, where there was darkness over the surface of the deep. That is, God had made the earth, but it was incomplete. There was darkness, there was chaos, it was void of life. And God spoke. And he said, let there be light out of the darkness. And it was, if you could have laid eyes upon it, amazing. An amazing display of his power. Perhaps nothing ever like it has happened in terms of a display of his power until he did what he did in and through Jesus Christ. And that's what Paul is saying here. He's saying an even greater display of God's power has taken place, where this God who said, let light shine out of darkness, has caused light to shine in your heart. And there's been an even greater display. And it's happened in you. And Paul describes what this light is. He says this light is the light of the gospel. And he goes on further to say, that this light is the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Now that's a packed sentence, but we noted last week how important it is to consider Paul didn't just say it's the light of the glory of God, but he says it's the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, which means there's something in the gospel that we come to know about God and about His glory. And so the first thing that's important to see is what is God's glory? We said last week that God's glory is basically the answer to the question of how much God weighs. Kids often ask that question, but we should ask that question too. How much does God weigh? Well, the answer is His glory. When the Bible talks about glory, it talks about that which is heavy. It's weight, and what it means is it's the sum total of all of the excellencies, of the characteristics and the attributes of God. It's his goodness, it's his holiness, it's his power. It's his love, it's his mercy. It's his wrath, it's all of those things together. It's who he is. It's the sum total of his personality and all of those things. That is his glory. We're told that in the gospel, a light is shown that gives us a knowledge of this glory. And I think the knowledge is this, the knowledge is that this glory of God is actually what we were made for as human beings, made in the image of God. We were made to be defined by His glory. We were made to enter into His glory, to enjoy this relationship with this God of glory, to be satisfied in it, to delight in it. But something has changed with the entrance of sin into the world and sin in our lives. And here's what's changed. God's glory, that which was meant to be delightful, That which was meant to be delightful has actually become dreadful. And we spoke extensively about that last week. But here's the good news. Here's the good news. that what Christ has accomplished is he's opened up the way for us to get back in to God's glory. He's opened the way for us to get back into a relationship with him so that his glory will once again be delightful to us. And it's all because of the gospel. And as we noted again last week, as we sort of stay in rewind mode here and look at how we set this up for this week, We notice why this gospel, this news was so good and why it was so precious to Paul. In fact, he calls it a treasure. This is the next picture that Paul holds up. He says it's a treasure. And it was a treasure. to Paul because it's this treasure of this way that Jesus Christ has opened up the way back in for Paul now to live his life and to be defined by relationship with God, to be defined by who he is in Jesus Christ, acceptable now to enter into God's glory. This now defines Paul and this is now the driving motivation of his life and this was very important for Paul to mention. I think this is why he mentions it to this letter to the church in Corinth, because Paul's identity was the very thing under attack. And we talked about this last week, how it was very well known that Paul had much trouble in his life. It was very well known that Paul had glaring weaknesses in his speech, in his body. And there were people coming into the church saying, how could someone with that much trouble and all of these weaknesses and this suffering that he's facing, how can someone like Paul say that he's God's instrument? How can someone like Paul with all this trouble claim that God is really with him? I don't think God could be for someone like that. How could God really love him? How could God really be with him? Therefore, his message can't be trusted. because God could never be with someone that suffers like Paul. And so this was a very important discussion for Paul to talk about here. What is it that he bases his identity on and his confidence? What's the driving force of his life when these are the kinds of things undermining his ministry and his life and his vocation? Well, Paul says, you know, it's true. And this picture is so fitting. We saw last week, Paul says, it's true. I'm, I'm a jar of clay. I have all kinds of cracks running through my life, all kinds of vulnerabilities and weaknesses. I'm like a jar of clay, left myself with all of my brokenness and cracks. I'd be like any other household item, just easily thrown out, easily discarded. But there's something very unique about this jar of clay. And of course, Paul is speaking of every Christian in this jar of clay. There's a treasure. And therefore, therefore, the defining identity, the worth of this jar of clay, it's not found in all of my brokenness and all of my cracks and weaknesses that you see, but my defining worth is found in the fact that this treasure resides in me. And of course, Paul is speaking of the treasure of the gospel, and so he says this treasure we have in jars of clay. And you see, it was his understanding of this treasure being his treasure, that God had intentionally chosen to place this treasure in this very broken vessel. that was the driving force and the distinctive motivation of Paul's life. And so as we move on, we begin to see how this becomes his distinctive motivation. So as we stay in rewind mode here and look at the third picture that Paul held up for us here to set up for us, how we can really get how this plays out in our everyday life, he takes us to another picture here. And it's a picture of someone who suddenly realizes that from every angle, there's trouble. hotly pressed. He's being pressed in from every side. Hard pressed on every side, he says. And as he looks around, he realizes it's coming from every angle, and so he's perplexed. That is, when that word is used, he doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know what to do. He's a bit paralyzed. That's a picture of this person who then realizes as he surveys the field that These troubles pressing in from every side actually can undo him. There's an intent to harm. I'm persecuted, he says. And then he says, I'm struck down. It's as if there's a choke hold and you're thrown down to the ground by all these things that have pressed in upon you. And you should be destroyed. You should be crushed. You should be dead. But he says, I'm not. I'm not in despair. I'm not crushed. I'm not destroyed. Amazingly. Why? And the answer is, it's because of the all-surpassing power of the Savior who has pledged himself to me. He is my defender. His work on my behalf has done something for me, and it does something presently in this life that is absolutely amazing. And therefore, I'm perplexed. I'm persecuted. I'm struck down, but I'm not destroyed. I'm not crushed. This is what defines my life now. You see, Paul is going on here to discuss in very practical ways what this looks like. And we saw last week, again, how Paul invited us in to take a look at our lives and to look around and to see how this is the case for us. And we looked at this direction and we noticed how, wow, if we really look over here at our places of work, You know, it's not just the difficult people we work with, but it's some of those deeper issues that come to mind in our places of work. We start to realize that we probably could have accomplished more in life, and we start to hear these voices, whether it's from Satan or from ourselves or from other people, why haven't you done more? Why haven't you accomplished more? What's wrong with you? Boy, you should be higher up the ladder by this point. And if you were higher up the ladder, you'd have more money, and so you look at this direction, and we consider our financial situation, and we... realize there's not much there. Or if there is much in our accounts or in your 401k, you realize, as you look down through history, that there's always surprises that come in every generation. And that could happen tomorrow. And boy, I really don't have the security that I should have. And therefore, I'm going to have nothing to pass down to those with whom I love. And that's embarrassing that I don't have more. It feels very unsafe. It feels very insecure. And then you start to think about your family from this direction. And we noticed how there are all kinds of things that sift us to the core of our identity when it comes to our family. We've had all kinds of opportunities as moms and as dads and as grandparents and brothers and sisters to love people well. We've had all kinds of opportunities as moms and dads to raise up our children and to gain their trust and to set them up for success in life. And we begin to realize all the ways that we failed. We begin to realize all the ways that Boy, we were just so angry. All the ways that we perhaps disciplined them wrongly, all the ways that we perhaps lacked discipline, all the regrets, all the ways that we realized, yeah, something was wrong with me as a mom or as a dad or as a husband or as a wife. You know, my marriage really isn't that great. And then you start to realize, perhaps some of you have always dreamed of that, of having children, of being married. And as you look from this direction, you realize those same questions hit you from a different angle. I'm still single. I don't have anybody. And there's that voice. What's wrong with me? Is it my beauty? Is it my money? And then you start to look over here and you realize maybe everything's not right with my body the way that it should be. In fact, there's sickness and there's disease and then you start to think about the reality of disease and cancer coming into your life. You have so many unfulfilled dreams. You still want to be married in life. What if cancer comes and takes it all away? My life will just be this story of unfulfilled dreams and disappointments. And you start to think about these things. And as you really look around and are honest, you realize you're being pressed in from every direction. And then you look over here at your personal life and you take just even a semi-honest look at the way in which you've lived, and you think about God who's somewhere over here, and you realize that, boy, probably God is even angry at me because I know he's told me to do some things that surely I haven't done. I know I haven't prayed the ways he wanted me to pray, or I haven't read my Bible, I haven't been committed to the church, or given, and all these things, and there's this list of things that cover you, of the disappointments, and you realize, too, that even God is upset, and God is angry. And so we look in all of these directions and we have to ask the question, what do we do? That's the picture Paul is setting up here, still in rewind mode from last week, trying to look at how Paul's going to work these things out, out practically. What do we do? What are our instincts? And the answer is, as we look around at all these things, we do have certain instincts that we have inherited. And what we noticed last week is that these are very clear for us in the Bible. In fact, in very clear picture form, we can go back to the Garden of Eden and see from our first parents what instincts have been passed down to us when we find ourselves in vulnerable and difficult situations, when we look around from every angle and realize things aren't well. Something's wrong with me. People are after me. Circumstances don't look so good. And we see this with Adam and Eve when they realized after they had sinned, all of a sudden they were vulnerable. And they said in their realization, we're naked and we're ashamed And what that means is more than just physical nakedness, but there's this sense that we noticed last week that they're not safe. Much like Paul saying, from every angle, boy, there could be trouble that's coming. And we see what their response was. And it's so good to see this because this so often is our response. First of all, they found fig leaves and they covered themselves with fig leaves. And you say, what in the world would that do? That seems irrational. It is irrational, but we do that as well. We look for ways to cover our shame. We look for ways to cover ourselves so that we can feel this sense of security, perhaps before God or before others, and we do that religiously or irreligiously. We perhaps go to religion to cover ourselves, and we say, boy, I'm really gonna get this right this time. I am really going to improve in my prayer life, and I am really gonna be faithful to church now. And then God's really gonna be happy with me, and we build up these fig leaves of religion or perhaps of philosophy or of science or all kinds of ways that we just try to put cover around ourselves to make ourselves feel some sense of safety. But then secondly, we see Adam and Eve just run and hide. And that's often an inherited instinct as well when there's trouble coming from different angles. We just bury our heads and we hide and we say, I don't want to deal with this. I don't want to deal with God. I don't want to deal with these issues in my marriage. I don't want to deal with these issues in my family. I don't want to deal with these issues in my heart. I just want to hide it. I want to deny it. I want to run from it. And we see that in our first parents. They ran and they hid and then we see something else they do actually. Next, they simply, they play the blame game. They find other people to blame or they make excuses. When God came to them and he said, Adam, Eve, did you do that which I told you not to do? And Adam's response in one sense is comical as he starts to play these games with God because Adam says, well, he doesn't answer the question right away. He says, you know, this woman that, by the way, God, that you gave me, who brought this fruit to me from the tree that you had told us not to eat from, you know, who basically sort of, you know, forced this fruit down my throat. You know, if you're talking about that woman, if you're talking about that fruit, this situation that you put me in that was absolutely impossible for me to do what you wanted me to do, if that's what you're asking, yeah, sure, maybe I didn't do exactly what you wanted, but I was in an impossible situation. There was no way I could have done what you wanted me to do. And so, you know, in subtle ways we play these games where we sort of just let God know that really what he said and really what he expects isn't realistic. And so we, you know, give God some advice and wisdom and we sort of carve out for ourselves the kind of expectations for our life and perhaps our living and our morality that we think we should have and we get it just at the place where we really like it and we can feel safe. And that's the game that Adam and Eve played. And in more and more sophisticated ways, we noticed that we continue, we continue to play these games as well. And as we continue in rewind mode here, we shared the story. I shared the story. of my five-year-old daughter Anna and it's a lot easier to tell stories about her than it is about me because she's five years old and she's not in here and I don't want to tell you all the ways that I do some of these things and so it was easier to come up with a story from Anna to try to illustrate the ways in which we go on with our lives in very similar ways but very sophisticated. And I, to sum it up, told a story of Anna who at dinner a couple of weeks ago we were eating and there were some Legos laying around the table and what I didn't mention last week is the reason I had told Anna there with these Legos Which I probably should have picked up, but they're just so much a part of our life. We just left them there I told Anna, who I noticed was sort of looking and playing with these Legos, Anna, don't put these Legos in your mouth and don't put them up your nose. Now the reason I told her that was because we've actually had to take her to the emergency room before for stuffing peas up her nose and they were so far up we couldn't get them out and so we had to take her to the hospital and so this looked like another one of those situations and so we got to talking and all of a sudden we looked over and Anna was just going to town on her nose and she was picking her nose and she was, you know, sort of covering herself up And I said, Anna, what's wrong? And she said, Daddy, I'm just picking my nose. There's just a booger up there. And, you know, so I try to help Anna and she won't let me. And I said, Anna, let me help you. And she got up and she sort of walked away. She said, no, I don't need your help. And then obviously it was clear that something was wrong, and so we called Anna over and pulled her hands down, and sure enough, there was a pea-sized Lego shining right there up her nostril that we couldn't quite get out. And so the question came to Anna, Anna, why did you do what we asked you not to do? And her first response was the fact that we didn't ask her not to do that. And we clearly asked her to do that. But she says, you didn't ask me to do that. And of course, in her mind, she was thinking, Dad, you didn't tell me not to put it up, you know, this nostril. And you didn't tell me specifically not this Lego. So she was playing these games in her heart, right? And so when we finally persuaded her that we did ask her not to do that, she went on to say that it really wasn't her fault because the Lego fell up her nose. Well, then we spent a little time in Lego surgery and we finally got the Lego out of her nose. But the point to illustrate is the ways in which most of us go on in very functional ways. We've become more sophisticated. We've become more sophisticated at playing some of those games of covering up so we can feel safe or playing some of those games. And if you notice in that story, you know, There's a little bit of Pharisee and there's a little bit of, you know, prodigal. And Jesus spoke to the Pharisees and he spoke about the story of the prodigal son. And if you remember what Jesus said to the Pharisees, it was interesting, the Pharisees didn't have Legos up their nose, but Jesus said you did have planks of wood in your eye. but they just thought it was dust, and they thought it was no problem, and the Pharisees went on, and they had Legos up their nose, you might say, but they continued to say, it's fine, I don't need your help, all is well, no Legos here, no planks of wood here, and Jesus referred to them as whitewashed tombs, because on the outside, they were covered nicely, whitewashed, everything looked fine, but on the inside, on the inside, all kinds of trouble and deadness and sin, You know? And then with the prodigal, of course, Jesus told the story of the prodigal who went out for his own pleasure and went out with his wealth and spent all that he had on his own pleasure. And then, of course, his resources ran dry. And, you know, in that illustration with my daughter, you can see a little bit of that prodigal, you know? You tell me not to put Legos up my nose? But it's so fun. It's so fun. It feels so good to put Legos up my nose. And so I do that. And then of course we turn into the Pharisee where we say, I'm fine. There's no problem here. No Legos here. And we go on with life and we do this, you know. more and more, and for a short while, you see, it works, and that's why we're so addicted to it, because it works to be a Pharisee at times, and it works to be a prodigal at times. It works for us, but, however, you see, over time, the Pharisee builds up so many layers of cover, and the prodigal ends up seeing his resources all dried up and all worn out and no longer satisfying, that the prodigal and the Pharisee end up in the same place. And the place where they end up is with a life that's very shallow. And they end up with a heart that's fearful. And they end up with a heart and a life that's fake. that's angry with God and with other people. And you see this fakeness and this shallow life and this anger and this fear and this territorial spirit, you know, all this stuff that bubbles to the surface is just that. It's these things that bubble to the surface that point to something much deeper that's going on. And that thing that's much deeper that's going on, and this is what we were set up for last week, is there is a heart that is captivated by a certain glory, but it is not the glory of the gospel in the face of Jesus Christ. We've exchanged that glory for a lie. And so when these things bubble to the surface, it's evidence that underneath there's a heart that's actually captivated by another glory, a fading glory, a fake glory. It's a heart that's captivated, you see, by trying to manage all of the pleasures and the treasures and the beauty and the bodies and all these kinds of things. It's trying to manage all of these things in a way that will lead to a better identity for myself, more happiness. And if these things go well, then it's a good day. If these things go bad, it's a bad day. And it's this roller coaster of life trying to manage all these things. And it's the heart that's captivated. And when you're driving down the road, or when you're alone, or when you're taking a walk, typically we're dreaming and we're thinking about the things that captivate our hearts. And what we think about and what we're oftentimes captivated by is the dreaming and the scheming of how we can climb that ladder better, man. How we can maneuver and how we can position ourselves to be in a better place, or how we can make up for these regrets that I have over here. Man, how? How I can get to that place where I really have that financial security? And our hearts are captivated by that. And we're captivated by people and looking to people who will affirm us and accept us. and we're perhaps consumed with the unfinished tasks or lists or the unfulfilled dreams in our life. Perhaps we're captivated by the glory of a person that we really just want to like us. And our hearts are captivated by that glory and that's what excites us and that's what we're thinking about. It's that person or perhaps it's It's the guy who is just captivated by the thought of regaining his youth or perhaps it's the woman captivated by regaining her glory or wishing she had a husband who would be a better husband who would really like her and at least show it sometimes and all these things that captivate our hearts. Or perhaps it's the fading glory of someone whose greatest excitement is to go home to a computer screen where there's, you know, a favorite porn site where there's at least somebody even if it's imaginative, who will look at them and say, I love you, I accept you. And there's at least that fading exhilaration of affirmation. Now that's a general list. I don't know what that looks like for you, but you can certainly personalize what is it that has captivated your heart? What glories is it? that you look to, that consume your heart. And I think the question that we're posing as we talk about what does it look like that the gospel is the distinctive motivation of our life, What we're really asking is, is there an alternative to what I just described? Is there an alternative to that shallow life where just anger and anxiety bubbles to the surface because underneath all we know is the fading glories of the things of this world? Is there an alternative to that? Well, I hope to say yes. The answer is yes. We're talking about how the gospel is the alternative. You see, what I just described is a picture of where at the nerve center of our lives and the driving motivation of our life, you know what it is? It's myself and it's my little kingdoms and it's how I can sort of try to build an identity and gain a sense of worth by all these things. And that's at the nerve center of our hearts. That's the driving motivation of our lives, but the alternative to that fading glory is to get the good news of Jesus Christ and the reality of it and the weight of it and a deeper grasp of it into the nerve center of our hearts, that it might be the driving motivation of our lives. And so the answer is yes, there is an alternative. There is an alternative. And the first step, I would say, to perhaps experiencing a gospel-centric life it's actually to turn to all of these different angles where there was all of this trouble and perhaps all of these failures and these things that have sifted you to the core and that have made you see the cracks in your life and have made you see the weaknesses and the brokenness and all the ways that you actually have failed people and the ways that you failed God. And the first step, you know what? It's saying, it's true. I'm not going to cover it up anymore with these fig leaves. I'm not going to run and hide. I'm actually going to admit for the first time, Yeah, I'm a jar of clay. I'm pretty broken. I have failed God and I have sinned against him. I have let my spouse down. I have let my children down. And it's coming to that place of deep honesty where we can say, it's true. It's true. And then it's looking to the face of Jesus Christ, as Paul put it, and saying, though I'm a clay jar, this treasure dwells in me, and what that means is that even though it's true that I have sinned and I have failed, God loves me. My sins have been forgiven. God has assured me of these things, and it's God who accepts me. And this God who affirms me and he loves me, I mean the living God, the God who made all of these other things that I've spent my whole life seeking affirmation from, all of these other things that I've looked to to build my worth onto my identity, the God who made all of these things is the God who says, I love you. You are mine. You are my precious possession. You have an irreversible citizenship in my eternal kingdom when I will restore all things as my child. And though that's not yet here yet in its perfection, it's true of you now. And so when you live life now in this world, you've got to know that these things are what are true of you. This kind of security, this worth is what you've been wrapped in. It's what I've said about you. It's what I've declared about you. And you know, perhaps it's that you've started to come here to New City, and you come to church, and the only reason you've come to church in the past is because you felt like it was something you had to do, at least. You know, if I'm not gonna make God totally angry with me, at least I better go to church. And so you come to church, and you know, maybe it's just never been real, or maybe it used to be real, but maybe you're in a season in your life where, you know, it hasn't been real, and you've really struggled, and it's been, or at least felt a bit more fictitious to you, and you come to church, and you hear this about what Christ has done, And you know, you begin to get a little excited because you begin to realize, this isn't fictitious. You get a little bit excited and you realize, this news, I mean, this is real. And this was for me. And so then you start to think, I actually I want some more of this. I want to be reminded of this more." And so no longer do you come to church because you have to, but you're actually excited to come to church and to hear in our songs and to hear in our sermons this stuff that God has said about you and this stuff that God has done for you in Jesus Christ. You actually could use some good news, and so you get excited to come to church to hear this good news, and it becomes more real to you. and you hear it in the sermons, and then you realize, I don't just have to hear these sermons preached on Sundays, I actually can begin to preach some of these truths to myself. And so when you go out on Monday, or Tuesday, or Wednesday, or Thursday, you begin to start to sort of talk to yourself a little bit, and you start to preach to your own heart some of these truths that we speak of here on Sundays. And as you do that, you say, wow, this is really exciting. This is actually who I am every day of the week. And you say, I want to drink this in some more. And then you start to think about, well, what a gift God has given me in commanding me to pray. He didn't do that as something I needed to check off my list, but I have the opportunity to go to God 24 hours a day and pray to Him and shed tears to Him and give fears to Him and give praises to Him and to talk with Him and to interact with Him and to fellowship with Him all the time. I can go. I can pray to Him. I want to pray more. I've always sort of prayed because I felt like I had to, but I want to pray. And then you begin to think about the Bible and you realize, boy, I've always sort of read the Bible like it was homework from some angry teacher that I had to do, but now when I open this up, I realize that here is contained the amazing promises that God gave, but it's for me, and I want to drink it in, and I want more of it. And so you begin to tear into your Bible, not because you have to, you see, but because you want to. At the nerve center of your life, there's this good news that you're just so thirsty and so hungry for because it's now what defines you. And now you begin to see the joy that's in this relationship you have with God, that you're entering into the glory of God. When you go to him in prayer and enter into his word, and then you read the Bible, you begin to see there are certain commands here. commands like you need to throw off everything that hinders and you need to throw off the sin in your life that so easily entangles you. And you know, now as you realize what Christ has done for you and how he has secured you in his love in a way that no one can ever snatch you away from, the fact that he has justified you and he has covered you, you begin to realize, I don't just want to deal with my sin because I feel like I have to make God happy. He's already well pleased with me, but now I want to. I belong to this kingdom. This is now who I am. I want to live for Him. It's my desire to obey Him. It's my desire to throw off this sin. And so all of a sudden, do you see what's happening underneath? Even some of these disciplines, like dealing with sin and reading your Bible and praying, do you see what's happening? underneath the motivations now have been distinctively transformed from something you have to do for God so that he might smile at you to all of a sudden now underneath that there's a relationship and you see what he's done for you and you're so thirsty for him and you're so thirsty to remember his promises to you. It's the desire of your heart. It's the desire of your heart to run in his paths and and to seek him as a deer pants for water, the scriptures say. So you see, there's this new distinctive motivation. And then, you know what you begin to realize? As we talk about what this distinctive motivation of the gospel looks like in our lives, what we begin to realize is our eyes are open to how This is what's true in every area of my life. I mean, this is who I am. This is my identity. I now am defined by the fact that I've been made acceptable to this glorious God. I stand in His grace. I live in His glory. I'm His. He loves me. He's for me. And now all of life is defined by this, and it's now our driving motivation in every area of my life. And I think about, actually, the Garden of Eden, after Adam and Eve went through the things that we discussed earlier, and after their sin, I would have loved to have heard Jesus sitting down with his disciples, perhaps late at night, teaching through the Old Testament at this part in Genesis chapter three, where after these things took place, Adam and Eve did their hiding, they did their covering, You know what? God gave a promise. And he gave a promise of victory. And actually, theologians refer to that as the first gospel when it was announced that God would crush the evil one who had tempted them. But you know what else God did? God covered them with animal skins, which suggests there perhaps was the first sacrifice. And it was this beautiful act of God saying, your leaves don't work, you're running and hiding, it doesn't work, but let me cover you. And I would have loved to have heard Jesus teach on that, and perhaps Jesus would have said, you know, this is what you get when you receive me. You get what this covering pointed forward to. You get, what you receive is the treasure of God defining your worth and defining who you are. And it says, you're clothed in the very righteousness of Jesus Christ. And I would have loved to heard Jesus teach on this and to talk about how wonderful and exciting that was, but you know, I imagine Jesus teaching his disciples through Genesis 3 at that point. And you know, coming to the point where God clothed Adam and Eve, I imagine Jesus saying, you know, at that point, God didn't tell Adam and Eve to go run and hide in a cave and just like totally stay away from all the trouble and all the temptation in this world. Not to go run in a cave and just to wait, you know, until they can go to heaven one day. Now you're clothed, but just play it safe. But no, what is it that we see now with Adam and Eve? Well, what was true of them is actually true for us. You know what God said? Go live. Go live your life. Go and marry. Go and make children. Go and work. Go and make music. Go and do art. Go and build culture. Go and build cities. Go live. That's what I made you for. That's what I made this world for. So that it would be a theater where my glory would cover this earth and my image bearers would enjoy it. They would work it. They would build in it. So go live now. It was clear that with the curse, there's thorns and thistles, there's sweat on our brows, there's all kinds of difficulties and pains as we go forth. But the commission was still to go live. And as we go live and as we go work, what we're to do with this newfound identity, what we're to do is actually go forth to show God off. with our lives and with our work and to show off the glories of his kingdom so that the world will say, wow, that's the one who made us. Wow, that's how creative he is. Wow, that's beautiful. And we're to go forth. to live and to work, where to go forth as plumbers and painters and programmers and preachers and policemen and pianists, to go forth with our work and to realize that we actually have unique gifts and a unique place in life. And God has given us these things for a very particular purpose. And the reason God has given us these gifts in these unique places in life, perhaps vocationally, is, as we just said, to show him off and to show off the glories of his kingdom. And this is a lot more exciting. See, this is a lot more exciting and it's a lot more secure. than before when we went out to work, as we described earlier, looking for work to be the place where we can be defined in our identity and in our worth. It's a lot more exciting and it's a lot more safe to go forth now knowing that our identity is in Jesus Christ and God has called us to this, to go forth with work. Now we have completely new motivations. Now we have these distinctive motivations that are driven by the gospel. You see, before, when you go forth as a painter or a programmer or a police officer or a pianist, when you go to work, what so often is the motivation underneath is It's building up our lives and it's building our little kingdom so that someone, so that somebody through your work or through what you do will say, wow, you are really somebody. Wow, you are really special. And it's to build up these little kingdoms so that we can, you know, get enough money to make our lives secure perhaps and to get to this place where we feel like we're somebody, where we feel like we are so safe and so our successes make us. But when we lose those, and when there's defeats and setbacks, it breaks us. It's devastating, it's crushing. But when you begin to realize your worth in Christ, and your identity in him, driven by a gospel motivation, when this news is at the nerve center of your heart, and you're driven by that, it's so much more exciting. It's so much more exciting and safe because, you see, there's a greater kingdom that we're living for. And now we have, now we have the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. And part of that knowledge is realizing all of these other things that we've lived for, it's a fading glory. It's a fading glory. It's an empty glory. It's a lie. But now, because of Jesus Christ, I am somebody. I am safe. I have an unfading treasure through which I can live. And so if you're a pianist and you can pretend whatever your place of work is, you go to your piano, you go to your piano and you play and you begin to play your piano and underneath as you play so wonderfully, you know, there's actually praise in your heart and there's actually the ability when you go to work to actually worship God and say, wow, Lord, you've given me this place and you've given me this little domain in life to make something of and you've given me these, you know, unique gifts and you actually work really hard and there's blood and there's sweat and there's tears as you try to master your craft. And so we work hard. I mean, we sweat and we give it all we have because this is something God has given us to show Him off. And you know what? We even suffer in our work. And so when you come over here, you see with gospel motivation, it doesn't mean you back off. It doesn't mean you become, you know, lazy. It doesn't mean you don't work. Actually, it might even make us better workers. And so we even suffer to give our, so that in some way that perhaps might not even be measurable, we're giving life to somebody. We're enhancing God's reputation in his world through our works and in some way we're showing the first fruits of the realities of that kingdom that is to come through the beauty of your music or of your pipe playing or whatever might be the case. And your successes, you see, they don't make you. You know who you are in Christ apart from how well you do here. And your failures, they don't break you. And the same, of course, is true when it comes to our family life or our relationships. And as you look at your marriage or your family, do you want to work hard? Do you want to be the best mom you can be or the best dad you can be? Absolutely. Absolutely. It's not for your image or for your worth, but it's for the Lord and it's so that you might give life. And so we suffer in those ways, but our failures don't break us and our successes don't make us. And in your singleness, you know, you're able to say with your worth in Jesus Christ, you're able to say, yeah, you know what? I am, I'm a jar of clay. But you begin to realize how precious you are as one who possesses the gospel. And you recognize that there's, thousands upon thousands of people who would be richly blessed to have you as a spouse, but God, who oversees all things in His wisdom, has ways that are higher than your ways, and He has plans that are better than your plans for this season of your life. And in your singleness, you're able to go to the Lord Jesus Christ in prayer, and you're able to fellowship with Him, who was single as well, by the way, and you're able to experience the glory of His fellowship in these times of suffering and discontentment and struggles in your life, perhaps, of singleness. And you might even recognize that He's preparing you for something that you simply have no idea. Perhaps He's preparing you for what it really looks like to build your life on the foundation of your worth in Him because God knows how marriage only magnifies the insecurities and the discontentments that we have in our single lives. But whatever the case, you recognize that God is working all things for the good for you. He's for you. He's pleased with you. He loves you. He cherishes you as His child. And in our health, or in our sickness, in our wealth, or in our poverty, do you see in all these things, we have a completely new motivation. We have a distinctively different driving force that you can only have if you're a Christian. Let me tell you something. You don't have to be a Christian to read your Bible and to pray and to work hard and to be a good mom or to be a good husband. You don't have to be, you can have, you can do all those things and not be a Christian. You can come to church faithfully and not be a Christian, but you can't, you cannot go out into the world with these distinctive motivations. of this joy that bubbles over for the honor of Jesus Christ and for His kingdom, and more excited about His kingdom than you are about your little kingdom, and more excited about your relationship with Him than you are about any other relationship, and recognizing that you're worth an identity, it's in him. And these things don't make you and these things don't break you. You see, only with the gospel can you go forth with that distinctive motivation. Only with the gospel can you say what Paul says in verses 10 through 12. when he says we always carry around in our body the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. We who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake only with the gospel. Can you say that? Do you see what Paul's saying? He's saying, you know, I went to Corinth to work. That was my workplace. That was my vocation. And man, I was hammered. My identity was sifted to the core. I was attacked. I was questioned. I was undermined. All those things. And it should have crushed me. I should have quit. I should have just said, you know, forget you guys. I tried to give you some good news. You don't want it? Fine. I'm out. But do you see what Paul says? When I went, and by the way, I'm going to continue to go, it's like carrying death on my shoulders. I'm carrying the death of Jesus around in my body. And what he means by that is this picture to say, man, I'm suffering, and it feels like I'm carrying death on my shoulders, but here's what I know, and here's why I can rejoice, that through my carrying death, I'm doing the very thing that Jesus did. Jesus, every day of his life, from every direction, had to carry death on his shoulders, but through that, people received life. And through that, life was given. And because I've suffered for you and carried death on my shoulders to you, church and Corinth, you've received the gospel and there's life among you. And that's why I'm convinced that I'll continue for the rest of my life to carry around in my body the death of Jesus so that life might go forth from me. And we can say that as well at our workplace and in our houses and our homes and in our families. You know, as a mom, or as a husband, or as a single person, you can say, you know what, it's a joy, as my Lord Jesus did, to carry death on my shoulders. To carry this, trusting, trusting that through that, the life of the gospel will go forth in ways that I don't know and I can't measure, but I trust that life will go forth. And that's why Paul ends here this section with a quote from the Psalms when he says, it is written, I believe therefore I've spoken. You know what he's doing there? He's quoting Psalm 116. And interestingly enough, it was a Psalm where the Psalmist David was entangled by the cords of death from every direction. There was trouble. And he began to recount these troubles that were coming at him. And it was sifting him to the core and it was sifting him in his identity. But then he remembered. He remembered what it is he believes. He remembered the promise of God. He remembered who he really was because of the promise of God. And therefore he spoke of his confidence in God who loved him. He was able to speak of his confidence in the goodness of the Lord as it's displayed in his life. And that's why Paul says, Therefore, we too believe, and therefore we speak. And what he's saying is, we have an even greater promise that's been revealed in Jesus Christ. And when we go back again and again and again, and we preach to ourselves the lie that we've been living with all of these fading glories that we've lived for, that we've sought after, that we've built our identity on, when we begin to see the lie in that, when we remember and we believe the gospel, God really loves me, he's really for me, and I will never be taken away. And he's given me the privilege of serving for his kingdom, this great kingdom, and of bringing other people into it as the gospel goes forth from my life and from our church. And you know what? Therefore, then we speak of our confidence in him. and we can carry death on our shoulders so that life might go forth from us. You can only say that individually. We can only say that as a church, that we will carry death on our shoulders so that the gospel might go forth and that life might go forth to people. We can only say that if the good news of Jesus Christ is at the nerve center of the life of our church and at the nerve center of our very lives. the good news of Christ as the distinctive motivation of our lives. We can only say it when that's the case. And I think it is the case that we believe and therefore we speak.