Welcome to the Cary Baptist Church radio broadcast entitled, Thy Word is Settled in Heaven. Cary Baptist is in Athens, Alabama, not far from Huntsville, south of Nashville. I'm Pastor Ben Donohue. Cary's been in existence for 101 years, started back in 1923, And I'm Brother Ben Donahue. I've been the pastor there at Cary Baptist for about 18 years. Today we continue in the book of Matthew. This is the first book of the New Testament. We're going to pick up in chapter 18. And we're going to begin reading in verse 11. We're going to see Jesus talking about lost sheep. And he's going to be talking to Peter and the apostles about loosing and binding things in heaven. So that's what we have in Matthew chapter 18. I'll begin reading in verse 11. But the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost. How think ye, if a man have a hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray? Doeth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray? And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep than of the ninety and nine which went not astray. Even so, it is not the will of your Father, which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. Moreover, thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established. And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and as a publican. Verily I say unto you, whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again I say to you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my father which is in heaven for where two or three are gathered together in my name there am i in the midst of them. Brethren we're going to end there in verse 20 read about 11 or 12 verses here in Matthew chapter 18 right in the middle of the book of Matthew and We begin with this important statement there in verse 11, for the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost. Men are lost, Christ left heaven to come on a mission to provide for them salvation. Men need saving, and Christ has come to save them. The scripture speaks much about men being saved and living unto God, and Jesus has come for that purpose. Now Jesus is going to talk about a hundred sheep, 99 are in the fold where they should be, and one is lost, one is strayed. And Jesus is going to tell us the importance of finding the one that is strayed. That is his mission, to go out of the way to find the one that is lost. Verse 12, how think ye, if a man have a hundred sheep, and one of them is gone astray, men do go astray. Men that are lost go astray from God. They're far off from God. That's what the Apostle Paul says in the book of Ephesians. Men that were far away have been made nigh or close by the blood of Jesus Christ. So the preposition is men are lost and men have strayed far away from God as sheep have. And it says, doesn't the owner of the sheep, the shepherd, doesn't he leave? Doesn't he go and find the one that is lost? The answer is yes. And Jesus is here, has elsewhere in the Gospels, likening himself to the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd will sacrifice himself to find the lost sheep. It would have been easier to stay with the 99. But that's not the Lord Jesus. He's going to go find the one that has strayed. He's come to seek and to save that which was lost. If he wasn't coming to seek the lost, he would have stayed with the 99. But it says, he goeth into the mountains, and he seeketh that which has gone astray. Here's a picture of Jesus coming to save men that are going astray from God. And if so be that he, the shepherd, find it, verily I say to you that he rejoices more of that sheep than of the ninety and nine which went not astray." Again, Jesus is picturing himself as the good shepherd, and he says the good shepherd will rejoice. Rejoice over the one that he found. This is a picture of Jesus. He's speaking about himself. He leaves the ninety-nine to find the one that has gone astray, and he rejoices when men are saved. It is on his heart to save men. And he emphasizes that in verse 14, even so, it is not the will of your father. What is not the will of the heavenly father? It is not the will of your father, which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish. The little ones are explained earlier in Matthew 18. He says, those little ones that believe in me. And he says, it's not God's will that even one of these shall perish. We have plenty of scripture that teach us that God so loved the world, that Jesus tasted death for every man, that God desires all men to be saved, that Christ is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world. How often does God have to tell us In the scripture, plainly without ambiguity, that not one of these little ones should perish. You see the will of God. He sent his son. Christ will seek and save the one that is lost. He will rejoice when that is found. Salvation brings joy to the heart of God. The Bible says the angels in heaven rejoice over one sinner that repenteth. You see the attitude of heaven about men that have strayed. They rejoice when one is found. Even so, it's not the will of your father, which is in heaven. If you're going to preach a sermon on the will of God for men, you need to preach this verse and the many other verses that says it's not the will of God that anyone should perish. So Jesus says here, not even one of these little ones should perish. Now, verse 15, he's going to change subjects. He's going to talk about a brother. A brother that's at odds with another brother. Let's notice verse 15, moreover, if thy brother, notice thy brother. If your brother in Christ shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone. Step number one, keep it private. Don't involve others. Don't sound it out abroad. Just keep it between him and you. That's the process. Him and Him alone, if He shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. Now, we're gonna stop and say this is the objective and goal of the whole process. If you don't hear anything, hear this. The objective is to gain your brother. Back to yourself. a right relationship with yourself. He may have broken that relationship by offending you, breaking the law against you. Trespass against you is what the Lord says in verse 15. But if you don't get this, you're not gonna get anything. Your purpose is to gain your brother back to yourself. It's not to do anything else. It's not to shame him. It is to gain him to yourself. That's what Jesus says in verse 15. If he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. That's the objective. Don't lose sight of the objective. Many men lose sight of the objective. They go through the process, but they don't have the objective in mind. But if he will not hear thee, remember, you and he alone. then take two or three more, just two or three. That's not really sounding it abroad. That's not really making it known. That's taking two or three that in the mouth of two or three witnesses, every word shall be established. Well, what's that all about? Well, there's two sides to a story. Each man is going to have his side and his evidence and his situation. The two or three witnesses are to hear both sides. Maybe make a mediation. Maybe game the brother through their mediation. That's why you take two or three brothers not to heap accusation upon accusation. Their job is to be a witness. A witness to what? The testimony of each brother. that the word may be established. So if you have to report this to the church, it's not just you. The two or three witnesses can give both sides of the story. Men in conflict and men at enmity with others will rarely give you both sides of the story equally. They're going to give you their side. But if we have two or three witnesses, Hopefully the two or three witnesses would be able to report back to the church both sides of the story in a reasonable, calm manner. But if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it to the church. Only then, as step three, you've got to go through step one and step two before you go to step three. Only then can you tell it to the church. Not noise it abroad, but tell it only to the church. It's limited. It's limited. The church is limited. And the church will hear the matter. The church will hear the matter from the two or three witnesses. But if he, the one that offended you, neglect to hear the church, that is the wisdom of the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen man and a publican. We're just going to let Jesus tell us it's a three-step process. You go alone. If you don't resolve it, and resolving it is gaining your brother. If you gain your brother, it's resolved. Then take two or three witnesses, and that is all. It's limited. They're going to be able to give an accounting to the church if necessary. If they're not able to mediate the situation, it remains unclosed, so to speak. Unresolved is a better word. then tell it in another limited place, the church only, and if the church expresses their wisdom on the matter, then if he refuses that wisdom, he is to be as a heathen man and a publican. Now again he changes subject, let's notice verse 18. Now we're going to talk about this issue of binding on earth, bound in heaven. Let's listen carefully to verse 18, but I say to you, whatsoever ye, the plural, the church, whatsoever ye, the believers, shall bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven." Now Jesus is speaking this to Peter and the other disciples and apostles. Speaking directly to Peter and the other disciples. Whatever ye shall bind on earth. Remember, the apostles are the representatives and ambassadors of Jesus Christ. They speak in his stead. They have his calling card attached to them. That's the miracle working power. Whatever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. " Well, what does this mean, Brother Donohue? It means that whatever you do to bind and loose shall have already been bound and loosed by the dictates of heaven, by the will of heaven, by the word of God. Not, you're going to go out and do whatever you please and heaven will follow suit. No, that's flipped around. The real thing is heaven. stipulates the terms of men's salvation. Heaven binds things, the way of salvation is given and granted by God and they're going to be speaking that and they're going to speak the word of God. What they speak is going to be bound or loosed by heaven. Heaven loosed in the time of Christ and then later in the time of Peter, loosed the law, the dietary law. It was loosed and no longer binding. Jesus spoke it saying all meats are clean to you and Peter did as well in the book of Acts So there's an example of loosing. It was loosed in heaven Peter resisted at first but the heavenly vision God said to him don't call something common that has been cleansed so heaven loosed the requirement so he's going to change the requirement so that certain meats are no longer forbidden and But it is directed by heaven, not by the apostles. They're following the dictates, the word, and the will of heaven. Verse 19, Jesus is going to turn around and speak again to the saints. Again, I say to you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything they shall ask, ask in prayer. It shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven. We know it's prayer because it's addressed to the Father. So, agree on earth as touching anything that they should ask. We have the privilege of asking. It's our prerogative to ask. It's God's prerogative and sovereign choice to answer how he wants to answer. That's not being changed here, but we can agree on things on earth. That's why we say at our church, we value all prayers, but especially the corporate prayer of the church. When we meet on the Lord's day and we gather together and we have prayer requests that are agreed by the congregation and we pray those publicly in the corporate worship. Now I call those corporate prayers, you could call them church prayers, but they're really the collection of prayers of the church. It's not a single prayer by one person, it's the body of believers praying in our hope and desires that God will hear our prayers, they would be accepted in Jesus and he would do his will through us and through our prayers. Four, where two or three are gathered together, verse 20, together in my name. You gotta be gathered in his name. That happens in the worship service on Sunday. If you wanna gather together in his name, that's where you can meet. Are you meeting in a Bible study? You're gathering in his name? There I am in the midst of them. Now, we've got a really long sermon we won't preach on the church. And one of the treasures of the church is the presence of Christ. And here he is, I am there in the midst of them. He is with his people. He identifies with his people. He inhabits the praises of his people, says the psalmist. And so when we meet, gather in his name for his purposes, I should add that, in a purposeful assembly to honor him, there I am in the midst of them. There's the promise of his presence. Again, that's the church gathered. That's a church working as a corporate body. There I am with you. So brethren, if you want Christ to be with you corporately, you need to be in church on the Lord's day, be endeavoring to do an activity with other believers. And as you gather together, serving or worshiping or praying, we have the promise that he will be with us. That is the treasure of the church. And we know and understand it, believe it, by faith. We don't see Christ among us, but he is here. We have his promise of it. Brethren, we've just read a good part of Matthew chapter 18, and we better close it up here because we're about out of time. Let me remind you, you've been listening to the Cary Baptist Church radio broadcast. Cary Baptist is in Athens, Alabama. I'm Pastor Ben Donohue. Let me thank you for listening. We hope you join us again the next time, and until then, we'll say goodbye. Thank you for joining us on today's broadcast. If you have any questions or want more information about Cary Baptist Church, you can find us on the web at carybc.com. That is C-A-R-E-Y-B-C dot C-O-M. May the Lord richly bless you as you tune in again for Thy Word is Settled in Heaven.