When I preached on these verses back in May, we looked at these verses under these three headings. The pagan setting, that was Caesarea Philippi, is where these things took place. A place that was marked by idols and idolatry. We looked at the probing question that Jesus, in the midst of all of this, asked his disciples. First of all, asking the general question of, who do men say that he is? And then turning toward his disciples and then asking them, but who do you say that I am? After a flurry of answers that were given to him. And of course, we have that perfect confession by Peter. Peter spoke up, and Peter spoke those words that ring through the ears of many believers today. And it is our confession as well that you are the Christ, the son of the living God. In verse 17, we saw that Jesus then began to respond to Peter and commended Peter for what he did. But he said to Peter, blessed are you, Simon Barjona. He reminded Peter of a reality regarding what Peter just said. He says, blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because Flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father who is in heaven." So Jesus begins to respond to Peter. He responds by reminding Peter how blessed he is because of the fact that these things were not revealed to Peter by his own intellect. by his own ingenuity, these things were revealed to Peter by God himself. God opened his eyes, gave him the ability to see, to hear, to believe, and then the miracles that were taking place around him, he didn't apprise those things like many who were around him during that time and attributed those things to Satan or even to one of the prophets. No, he came to the right conclusion and concluded this is Messiah. Jesus continues his words to Peter. He begins now on the heels of commending Peter here. Blessing Peter. Now he turns to Peter and he reminds Peter of a promise. So he gives Peter a promise. He says in verse 18, he says, I also say to you that you are Peter and upon this rock, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. Notice Jesus said, I will build my church. This is a promise. He says, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. Now I think it's necessary at this time to consider what he means when he says here, I will build my church. What is it that Jesus is building? This is the first time, by the way, and the one of only two occasions in which the word church appears in the Gospels. We see it here in chapter 16, and again in chapter 18, in the context of church discipline. And he says in those verses in chapter 18, it says, if your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private. If he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses, every fact may be confirmed. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Let me just pause for a moment. and say this, that even though these are the only two occasions in the Gospels in which the word church is mentioned, that does not mean that the church is a parentheses in the plan of God. The church has been a part of the plan of God from all of eternity. This is not a pause in God's plan. He's not now turning to plan B, but God's plan has always been for the church. And I want to emphasize that to you so that we don't go astray in our thinking that just because we don't see those words church in the Old Testament and only twice here in the Gospels that this is just the beginning. No, this is the continuation of what God has been doing in redemptive history from the beginning. Now the word here for church that Jesus uses is the word ecclesia. It is a compound word made up of the preposition ek, which means out, and the verb kaleia, which means to call. And so the word ekklesia means the called out ones. It's a word that's used in secular Greek to simply speak of an assembly that has gathered for some purpose, such as a legislative assembly. The same sentence is infrequently used in the New Testament, where in Acts 19.32, it was used of a riotous mob gathered who were aroused by Demetrius, a silversmith whose business, along with others, had been threatened by Paul's ministry. And so most of the time in the Old Testament and even in the New Testament, or a lot of times in the Old Testament and the New Testament, it was just generally used as a word to describe an assembly of people. So in Acts 19, it's just describing an assembly of a mob there. Now in the Septuagint, which is the Greek translation of the Old Testament, this Greek word was used for almost any type of gathering of people. And the emphasis was really on the idea of the gathering of the people. No matter who was gathered, no matter why they gathered or where they gathered, it was still used to describe an assembly of people. It is not until we get to the New Testament that we see this term come to have its technical meaning of a people who gather specifically for the purpose of instruction and worship. It is used to denote both local churches and what theologians called and call the universal church. The local church, or what we call The visible church is made up of both believers and non-believers. So as we sit in this assembly today, this church gathering right here is made up of both believers and unbelievers. And this is true of any church you gather in, you're gonna find within that context, both believers and you will find unbelievers. This is what we call the local church or the visible church. But then there's what we call the universal church. or the invisible church, that is referred to as the invisible church because we can't see the hearts of the people who are sitting next to us. And in this church, we call it the universal church, it is only made up of true believers. All who are in the universal church have rested their hope fully and completely on the Lord Jesus Christ. They are true believers. They are true believers. Let me say this this morning. A person can be a part of the visible church, but not a part of the universal church. However, a person cannot be a part of the universal church and perpetually not be a part of the visible church. It is the natural response to the grace of God in the life of every believer that we align ourselves with a local church for worship, mutual edification, and service to the body of Christ. It is absolutely unnatural for there not to be a desire to align ourselves with a church, a Bible preaching, gospel preaching church, When we have the Holy Spirit living within us, indwelt by the Spirit of God, that is unnatural. When this happens, something is wrong. Something is wrong. Now, people make all types of excuses for why they don't go to church. Well, I don't have time to go to church. but we have time for all types of other activities, how come we don't have time to go to church? Those are excuses. Well, my job keeps me from going to church. Change jobs. Get a new job. Seek other employment. Appeal to your employer to loosen the reins on your time so that you are able to come to church on the Lord's day. Well, I can worship by myself. No, you can't. Christ did not die just for you, he died for his church. And the expression of God's church or of worship is usually, when we see it in the word of God, it is usually in the corporate setting. People always say things, well, I can go up to the mountain and I can worship God in his creation. Yes, you can, but that's not what God has called us to. God has called us to local congregations where we worship God together for mutual edification. You can't practice to one another's on the mountaintop with a goat or a ram, okay? You need to be within the body of Christ. Some people say, well, there are hypocrites. That's why I don't go to church. You got hypocrites on your job, you quit your job. You don't stop working because you have hypocrites at your work, do you? No, those are excuses. The natural response to grace is aligning ourselves with the local church where the word of God is preached, where the word of God is preached. Now this word church is never found in the New Testament in reference to either a denomination or a building. And so you'll hear us oftentimes say from the pulpit, when you come to the church building, we use church in that sense as an adjective to describe the building. The building is not the church. The people in here who are saved by grace, who've trusted in Christ for their salvation, who've committed to this local church, that is the church. Then what is the church then? Here's some descriptions of the church that we find in the word of God. The church is called the body of Christ. It's the body of Christ. And I want you to take all that information, I want you to import it when Jesus says, I will build my church. It's called the body of Christ. Romans chapter 12, verse five through six, it says, so we who are many are one body in Christ and individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly. And so in this passage right here, we see both the unity in the church, which is the body, but the diversity in the different parts of the body. And so there's unity in the body of Christ, and then there's also diversity in the body of Christ. And Christ builds this. Christ builds this in the church. There are all these church growth gurus out there who say, well, all we need to do is we need to have certain things in place to bring in the demographics so we can build these multicultural churches in America. Listen, that never works, really. It doesn't really bring in true believers. And we talk about those who are part of that invisible church. It usually brings in a lot of those who are part of the visible church, but not the invisible church. because we bring them in through gimmicks and other means. This is perhaps, when we speak of the body of Christ, perhaps the most popular description of the church. We also refer to the church as the temple of God. The temple of God. We see this in 1 Corinthians 3, 16, it says, do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are. And so the church here is described as a temple, a temple of God. It's a place where, yes, we are individual stones in this temple, but it's a gathering of God's people who are now a part of this temple, who in all these stones come together to create the temple of God. So God not only dwells in each Christian individually, but he also dwells in all Christians corporately, him being the cornerstone, and our Lord is the one who binds the temple together. This speaks here of a place of worship. The place of worship is here when the bodies gather together. Periodically, I'll come here during the week. for various things, to maybe pick up something that I need to pick up from the children's room back here. I'll come make some copies. But when I get here, it's not the church. It's the church building. Because the people of God are not here during that time. I want you to notice what he said here. He says, if any man destroys the temple of God, Listen to the care that God has for his church. He says, if anyone destroys the church of God, what does it say? God will destroy him. Any man, woman, or child who seeks to destroy God's church, God will destroy him. What a warning. What a warning to false teachers. What a warning to those who seek to cause disunity in the church. God will destroy him. That's sobering. That is absolutely sobering to think that if someone would seek to cause disunity, seek to destroy the unity in the body of Christ, that God will destroy them. It's also called, referred to as the Bride of Christ. It's another description of the church. It's that of the bride of Christ. And here we have an emphasis on the love of Christ for his church. Christ loves his church. It's called the flock of God. This emphasizes God's care for his church. He cares for it and tends to it. referred to as the household of God. This speaks of the familial relationship that we have with one another. We call each other brothers and sisters because we are of the household of God. 1 Peter 4, 17 is where it said, for it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God. And so the church is the body of Christ, it is the temple of God, it is the bride of Christ, the flock of God, the household of God. Now import all of that truth and even more than that into the promise of our Savior, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not prevail. Notice in this promise here that this is a two-fold promise. Notice the two-fold promise here, the progression and protection of the church. This first of all, a promise here given to us of progression. We are in election year right now. Everybody knows this right now. If you haven't, I'm not sure where you've been. I don't know if your mailbox is as full of Kamala and Trump stuff as mine is, but it's kind of getting on my nerves about now. But we have all these politicians promising us various things. Safer borders. Lower taxes. They're even, on the other side, promising abortion protection. And they're giving all these promises out to the people. We know how politicians are. They say one thing and then oftentimes, on the other side, they never deliver. Now why is that the case? They don't deliver often because of perhaps two reasons. One, they may not have the moral capacity to keep their promises. Two, they don't have the power to fulfill those promises. Oh, but God does. And Christ has both the moral capacity, because he's not a man that he should lie, nor the son of man that he should change his mind. He says, I will build my church, and he will build his church. And he has the power, because all power has been given to him, all authority in heaven and earth is his. And so the promise that he makes to us, that he will build his church, it will come to pass. And so we have this promise of progression. He says, I will build my church. This is a promise of the success of the gospel. The church will be built, will be the building and making of disciples. He says, I will build my church. The gospel will go forth in power and might and will accomplish all that it has sent forth to accomplish. It will bring in all of God's elect into his fold, will not return void without accomplishing all that God has sent it forth to accomplish. And not just the breadth of God's church, but the depth as well. And that's something we need to be reminded of. Church growth is not just by how many people you have in these seats. It's also by the depth of knowledge, the depth of maturity of the believers that sit in these seats. That's our longing, our desire. We would rather have fewer believers who are deeper in their understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ and who are able to carry out the ministry of God's work in the world than to have hundreds and thousands of people in here who have no interest in the things of God. We're concerned about the death. We trust God to bring in those who have trusted in Christ into this place. So we don't seek to use gimmicks to do that and to bring that about. We seek to be true to the Word of God, preaching the Word of God, preaching the gospel, preaching the unadulterated truth of God's Word. Even when we're stepping on toes, we preach those things unhindered because we know that this is the means that God has given the church to grow the church both wide and deep. Because true believers, let me say this to you, true believers, although we know this message sometimes isn't received by everyone, true believers who love the Lord, who love his church, they will find their way here by God's providence and be fed in this church. You see this, the gospel will have the success. Jesus said, all that the Father gives me, listen to this, all that the Father gives me will come to me. He will come to me. When we preach the gospel, we preach it unashamedly and unafraid because it's not up to us. God is the one who ultimately does the work. We are just faithful to proclaim, to preach, to teach, to instruct using the means that God has given to the church. And we have the promise of protection. He says, I will build my church and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. It's a promise of protection. He uses here the words, the phrase here, the gates of Hades. And there's a lot of, by the way, a lot of ink spilled over these verses here. What is the gates of Hades? Is it the gates of hell? What is it? Is this reference to Satan? Is it a reference to death? I would say yes. It's a reference to Satan. It's a reference to death. And I believe he's saying here that nothing, not even death, that last enemy of us can overpower the church. Not even that, that last enemy. all Satan's arsenal that he might employ to try to dismantle the church, it will not work. And even when he uses that last, his last, we say he throws in everything but the kitchen sink. When he throws in the kitchen sink, spiritually speaking, it will not work. Because even the gates of hell, he's saying it will not prevail. They will not overpower the church. The church will be triumphant. The gospel will be preached, and the gospel will succeed. And so, that is the promise that we have, that Christ will build his church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail. Consider the project now. He says, I will build my church. It's a building project. In Psalm 127, it tells us here that unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it. And so Christ says, I will build my church. Now what does this mean, I will build my church? It means we're going to employ the means that God has given to us. We're going to employ the things that have been lawfully given to us, the means of grace that God has given to us to grow the church, to build the church. And we're not gonna use gimmicks and fads and all the church growth guru plans that lead to naught in the end. As we see from the early 90s, late 90s, all these church growth movements that were taking place, They've come to naught. They've come to naught. Now, this is a building project that is absolutely massive. It is massive. The size of what the scriptures say, of which no man can measure, according to Revelation 7, 9, it says, after these things, I looked, and behold, a great multitude, which no one could count. It's a massive building project. It's not just a massive building project. It's such that it's a multicultural and multi-ethnic building project. He goes on to say, and this building project will include men from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues standing before the throne and before the lamb clothed in white robes and palm branches were in their hands. And they cry out with a loud voice saying, salvation to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb. And in Revelation 5, 9 it says, and they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the book and to break its seals for you were slain and purchased for God with your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. See, we don't, Jesus doesn't need any gimmicks to bring in people from diverse backgrounds. They don't need DEI hires to bring in the right people, does he? No, we have where the word of God preached, Christ died for a people, and in that death, he secured salvation for men from every tribe, tongue, nation, and people. So there will be a glorious time, a massive project that will be multi-ethnic, be contrived of living stones that are together and that are a part of this colossal structure, spiritually speaking, this temple that God is building, according to 1 Peter 2. We are those stones that are part of that edifice, spiritually speaking, that will be built and that is being built even now. That's the project. It's a colossal, massive, multi-ethnic project. Consider with me now the proprietor. The proprietor. He says, I will build my church. I will build my church. Notice that Jesus names himself as the proprietor of the church. He says, I will build, and he names it as my church. What is a proprietor? A proprietor is a person who has the exclusive right or title to something, an owner as of real property. Christ owns the church. The church belongs to Jesus. It does not belong to any man or group of men. We frequently say things like this. Oh, that's John MacArthur's church. Oh, that's Paul Washer's church. No, it's Christ's church. It's Christ's church. In John MacArthur, Paul Washer only servants who serve in Christ's church. The church doesn't belong to any quorum. It doesn't belong to any man, any group of men. It doesn't belong to any theological seminary. It belongs to Christ. The church belongs to Christ. because Christ died for the church. He purchased the church with his own blood. We see this in Ephesians 5, 25, it says, husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her. Christ loved his church and he gave himself up for her. By the way, this is one of the verses that convinced me of particular redemption or limited atonement. It says here, Christ died for who? His church. The church. Who is the church? The saved ones. The ones who have trusted completely and fully in the work of Christ. Now this was along with other verses, but I would say largely this verse right here convinced me of particular redemption right here. Christ died for who? For the church. For a specific people, he laid down his life for them. So the church belongs to Jesus. Christ purchased the church with his own blood. And he is the head of this church. As the proprietor of this church, he heads the church, according to Colossians 118. It says, he is also head of the body, the church, and he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he himself will come to have first place in everything. He heads his church. He leads the church. He is the one who inaugurated the church. by his own blood. And he claims the church as his own. He says, it is Christ's church. The church was a love gift from the father to the son. God the father gave to God the son a people for his own possession. Again, back to John chapter six, verse 37, it says, all that the father gives me, all that the father gives me will come to me. and the one who comes to me, I will certainly not cast out. And he says in John 17, he says, I ask on their behalf. I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom you have given me, for they are yours. Christ died for his church. The church is his own, it's his own possession. Now the question arises, and when he speaks here in verse 18, he says, I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. Now again, much ink has been spilled over these verses here. Now there are at least Three prevailing views that dominate the arguments surrounding the meaning of these verses. Now, some questions arise when we read those verses there, that verse there. It says, I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. So the question becomes in the mind, what is the rock that this promise is built upon? Is this rock referring to the apostle Peter? If it is, in what sense is it referring to Peter? And does it matter? Does it matter what we believe about these things? And I would say absolutely. Because as I said before, there are at least three prevailing views of this portion right here. So the first view is what we call the Roman Catholic view. This comes from, by the way, this comes from Vatican I. In the First Vatican Council, the Catholic Church infallibly declared in Matthew 16, 18, it was to Simon alone that Jesus called the rock. The council continued, and it was to Peter alone that Jesus confided the jurisdiction of supreme pastor and ruler of his whole fold. This is what we call the establishing of the pope or the papacy. As for this interpretation of Matthew 16-18, the Council infallibly declares that it has always been understood by the Catholic Church and that the Church always affirmed that Peter, in preference to the rest of the apostles, taken singly or collectively, was endowed by Christ with a true and proper primacy of jurisdiction. They're just saying that Peter was chosen by God to be the first pope. We speak here of that word primacy there. That means he was endowed to be the first pope. He was made what's called the vicar of Christ. That means Christ's representative on the earth. And that that can be then, by the way, passed down in what we call the succession of popes. And this is why you see every few years, or decades or so, we see a new pope come on the scene. It's because that authority that Peter had has been passed down from pope to pope until it now reaches the pope that is currently head of the Catholic Church. They go on to say, Those who say that this primacy was not conferred immediately and directly on blessed Peter himself, but rather on the church, and that it was through the church that it was transmitted to him in his capacity as her minister, are declared anathema by the council. That means cursed of God. So if anyone declares anything apart from that, that Peter is not the first pope, and now the first in a long succession of popes, that he is to be cursed of God, he's anathema. And so here's the summing up of those things from Vatican I right here. The church always understood what Vatican I taught on this particular issue. So they knew what they were saying. It's not like they changed course midway through, that they understood what they were saying. Vatican I teaches that only Simon was called the Rock, not anyone or anything else. So they say this is solely for Peter right here. Vatican I also teaches that Peter was given primacy of jurisdiction. This is why the Roman Church has jurisdiction over all others. That means that they call it the Catholic Church and it exercises authority over all other churches. And in fact, if you're not a part of the Catholic Church, according to Rome, truly Rome, you're not a true Christian. You're not really, they wouldn't say saved, but you're not a true Christian. Fourthly, And lastly, Vatican I further teaches that it is anathema to say that Peter attained to primacy through the church or that primacy belongs to the church itself. In other words, that the authority that we see down in verse 19 of that binding and loosing and saying that that belonged to, not to Peter, but to the church, they would say that anyone who believes that is anathema. They are anathema. And so that is the Vatican's view, that's Rome's view of Matthew 16, 18. Then we have the traditional view. And this view states that the rock that is spoken of here was either Peter's confession or Jesus Christ himself. And that's the traditional view. Then there's a view that says that, yes, when this was spoken of here, when Jesus said these words, that Jesus was speaking to Peter. And I would probably fall on this last one right here, in my understanding of these things, that he was talking to Peter. I think the verses here that follow that, verse 19, betrays us that he was talking to Peter. He was talking directly to Peter. Now, I don't believe that he's talking to Peter as the Pope, of course, much less than the Pope. I do believe that Peter was I would say chief among the equals. He was chief among equals as far as the church of, as far as the apostles were concerned. You can see this in many different ways. You know, Peter is very frequently first in the list of the listing of the apostles. Also, I would say that Peter was a particularly unique vessel employed by God in the building and the establishment of the early church. And I think that's what we have here in these verses here, is that Peter was a unique vessel. a unique vessel used by God, employed by God in the building and establishment of the early church. And so when he says here, upon this rock, he's talking about what Peter did in various places where we see, actually, this is what's happening in the New Testament church. Peter is there in the establishment, in the building of the church of Jesus Christ. Now, we understand that Christ is the chief cornerstone, but I believe that we could say that that Peter was very prominent there. So for example, we see in Acts chapter two, Peter preaches at Pentecost. Peter preaches at Pentecost. And what happens at Pentecost? 3,000 people are saved, and they're what? They're added to the church. We have 3,000 people saved, added to the church. This is an example here where Peter is given that role of preaching and proclaiming the gospel. and then being used by God in a very unique and particular way. We also have in Acts chapter four, if you will turn there with me, Acts chapter four, Peter's again preaching. This is the second message that he preaches that's recorded in the book of Acts. In the beginning, verse one, it says, and as they were speaking to the people, the priest and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to them, being greatly disturbed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. And they laid hands on them and put them in jail until the next day, for it was already evening. Verse four, but many of those who had heard the message believed, and a number of the men who came A number of men came to be about 5,000. And so there were more people added to the church through the preaching of the apostle Peter. Look in verse chapter eight, Acts chapter eight now. Acts chapter eight, 14. It says, now when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For he had not yet fallen upon any of them, They had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they began laying their hands on them, and they were receiving the Holy Spirit. And finally, we have in chapter 10, Acts chapter 10, again, Peter is there again, preaching to Cornelius. He's preaching to Cornelius. Cornelius had prayed that God would send someone to them, and what does he do? Peter's there, and he preaches Christ to Cornelius and his family, and they are saved. So I think we can say that Peter had a very prominent role in the establishment of the church. Now again, I don't go so far by any means. He was a pope, but he was a very unique vessel in the establishment of the early church. And so when he says here, upon this rock, I will build my church. I think that would be very consistent with what we have in the New Testament church here, in an early New Testament church, that Peter was used uniquely by God, very uniquely. We don't see John in here preaching like that. We don't see Paul here at the beginning like that. We see Peter there, a special agent of God, flawed as he may be. Okay, remember, if we continue to read in Matthew chapter 16, he rebukes Jesus because he says, you're not gonna die and be crucified. No, that's not gonna happen to you. And God says to him, get behind me, Satan. Remember, he forsook Jesus three times. So we know Peter's a flawed man, but God used him mightily in the establishing of the early church of Jesus Christ. Now we understand, of course, Jesus is the cheap cornerstone. We sing hymns like this, the church's one foundation is Jesus Christ, her Lord. That's what we believe. Now, just quickly, turn with me to Ephesians chapter two, As Peter was that special agent, but these things were passed along as Peter preached and taught the word of God. God used him as he wrote and the apostles wrote. The church is built upon those things right there. We have to understand that. Now, Jesus is the ultimate builder and Jesus is the chief cornerstone, but we have to understand that God used flawed men to build the church. We see this in chapter two. beginning in verse 19, it says, so then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God's household, having been built on the foundation of what? The apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone. See, I don't think this is, this is not saying that this is all about Peter. No, this is about Jesus. But the apostles, Peter himself in particular, was uniquely used by God as that foundational piece in preaching and proclaiming Christ in the establishment of the church. Let me finish with a couple of points of application. In less than two weeks, we might be having a new president. I doubt it. But we might. We might. And we don't know what's coming. We heard promises of preserving the church and the church being allowed to worship freely. They're telling us those things. We've heard a lot of things through the course of the last several years about potentially the liberties being taken away from us. We don't know. But what we do know, this is a certitude right here, what we do know is that no matter what happens after November the 5th, Christ will build his church. and the gates of Hades, even if God employs governmental officials as his agents of destruction to suppress the church, it will not work. Because the church will reign, we will be victorious in these things. As we even read, we sung that last hymn about the church militant rising up, preaching the gospel, taking land from the enemy. Yes, we're gonna do that. We're taking territory, spiritually speaking, spiritually taking territory, the lost being brought into the fold of God. Yes, that will happen. You may be in prison, but the gospel's not in prison. The gospel will continue to go forth and spread and flourish and run and bring forth true believers. So no matter what happens, After, on or after November the 5th, Christ will build his church and the gates of Hades will not prevail. Secondly, God uses flawed human beings to build the church. He doesn't use perfect human beings. He uses submitted, consecrated, not perfect, human beings to build his church. It's a good reminder to us is that we all have our flaws, spiritually speaking, and we need to work on those things. We need to grow in godliness. But God uses us in all of our difficulty and all of our messiness. God uses us to build his church and we need to be about building God's church. Are you concerned? Let me ask you this question. Are you concerned with building God's church? Does it bother you? Does it trouble you? The thought of Christ's church not being built. Do you participate in the building up of Christ's church? Are you engaging, are you using your spiritual gifts for that purpose? How has God gifted you spiritually? And then are you using those gifts to build up the body of Christ? See, some of you have teaching gifts that God can use to build up the body of Christ. But perhaps there are things in your life that are not, where you're not walking with the Lord and you can, you come to those passages in James chapter three, you can't with a clear conscience do those things. Deal with your sin and be used of God in his church. Are you being lazy? Are you neglecting those gifts and putting those gifts on the shelf when God wants to use those gifts for the building up of his church? Some of you have been endowed with great wealth and liberality of heart. Are you using those things for God's glory to build up the church? That's another way in which God uses the church of God to build the church. It needs funding. Are we doing those things? Are we giving liberally out of what God has given to us? You see, it's multifaceted, and God has given to us and granted to us many gifts in the church, and we need to employ those gifts. We are all living stones in the temple of God. Are you using your stone supporting the church, encouraging the church, edifying the church, building up the church for the glory of God. Let us go to the Lord in prayer. Father, thank you for this time and thank you for your word. Thank you for the instruction from Matthew's gospel. I pray, Lord, that you'd be pleased to use these things, that we would be those who give ourselves to your kingdom, to building up your church, that we would not simply waste our abilities, the gifts you have given to us on ourselves and for our own glory, but that we would use them for your glory. Father, I pray that we would see this as your church, not ours, and that we would see that we are stewards of your church, and we are to employ those gifts that you have given to us for the glory of your name. Father, we need your grace and your help in these things, and so we pray, God, that you'd be pleased to use the things that you have put in us, spiritually speaking, that we might glorify you and live our lives in such a way that in every aspect of our lives, whether we eat or drink, and whatever we do, Lord, it would be to the glory of your name. And this we ask in Christ's name and for his sake, amen.