All right, you guys, let's grab this and we'll get started into our study again. I think if things will work out here today, we'll see. I don't want to cut off discussion if there's questions and discussion, but we may get through Article 17 today if we can manage it, which kind of is the last of the section about the works of Christ. And then Article 18 begins with the application of what Christ has done for us and sort of the benefits that accrue to us because of that in salvation, justification, sanctification. There's a whole other segment that runs through the end that's about those kind of theological topics. Article 15 is actually where we're picking up. We'll see if we can do 15, 16, 17 today. Like I said, these are the end of the discussion about the works of Christ last week with Article 13 and 14. We really kind of talked about the resurrection, Jesus' death on the cross and His resurrection. Today, Article 15 picks up with His ascension. So it's sort of working chronologically through these things of Christ. And so in the Christology study handout, it's on page 12, top of the page, Article 15, says that we affirm that Jesus Christ ascended to His heavenly throne at the right hand of God the Father, that He is presently reigning as King, and that He will return visibly in power and glory. We deny that Jesus Christ was mistaken about the timing of His return. So the affirmation statement is about the ascension. After Jesus is crucified, dead buried, right on the third day after His death, He's raised from the dead. And we learn in the book of Acts that He's 49, 50 days after that, to the day of Pentecost, where He's ascended into heaven, where He sits now enthroned. Let's work through the scriptures here about this. Somebody have the study open and want to read that longer passage at the bottom of the page from Acts chapter 1. That sort of gives us the narrative, Luke's history. Caleb, you want to read that down in the footnote down there for us? Thanks. Yeah, Acts 1, 6 through 11. Yeah. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said to them, it is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and on the earth. And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, and said, Men of Galilee, why are you standing and looking into heaven? This Jesus who has taken up for you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw him. Right, so the whole thing's kind of wrapped up in this passage about the narrative that Luke probably learned from Peter and others of the apostles who were there, that they all gathered on the Mount of Olives there and were there when Jesus commissioned them to wait upon the Holy Spirit. I think I said a minute ago that this was 50 days after the resurrection. It's really 40 days, and he tells them to wait. They wait 10 more days until Pentecost. But he, for 40 days, had been resurrected and teaching them, but hadn't yet ascended to the Father. And then when He commissioned them that they're going to be the witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and all Samaria to the ends of the earth, then He was lifted up into the clouds. And then two angels appear and say, you know, it's time to get on with what He told you. He'll be back. The way you saw Him ascend, He'll come back in the same way. And so, that tells us about Him ascending up into heaven and that He'll come back. Clear? So far clear? Crystal clear. Right on. So what's he doing? We'll see it in some of these subsequent scriptures, but somebody want to look up Luke 24, 50? Read those three verses, Paulie, and then we'll skip over to Acts chapter 2 for somebody else to read. Josh, thanks. And then Mikey, will you read Second, 1 Timothy 3.16 after that, so pick and choose a little bit. But Paul in Luke 24, verses 50 to 53, the end of Luke's gospel. And he led them out as far as Bethany, and lifted up his hands, he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple blessing God. So Luke in his gospel sort of fast forwards a little bit after Jesus commissions them and hits the ascension and they were worshiping and then he picks it up in the book of Acts with the second volume of the history to describe the same event with a little more detail. So Luke's providing both of those accounts that were given to him by the eyewitnesses. Good? Josh, you want to read that Acts 2.33? So what is this sort of Peter's commentary about what event? Acts 2 is about the day of Pentecost, right? And the Holy Spirit came upon them. The visual aid of the flames above their head. They begin speaking in different languages. People are understanding it. They're wondering what's going on. We're hearing the wondrous works of God in our own languages. What's happening here? Maybe these guys are drunk. And Peter says, oh no, that's not it. Right? What? Article 16, what verse? It's also in, yeah, yeah. Luke 24, Acts 1, Acts 2. Yeah, no, it's good. Yeah. Well, and we see it there. Peter's pulling the scripture in verses 34 and 35, right? David did not ascend into the heavens, but he himself said, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. Who's the fulfillment of that? Sitting at the right hand of God. Peter says it's Jesus, right? That He's exalted at the right hand of God, having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit. Who's pouring out the Holy Spirit on the disciples, the apostles that day as they're speaking various languages, the wonderful works of God to people who haven't heard it in their language and are startled and shocked by this sign? Who's giving that? When Jesus is up in heaven, what's one of the things He's doing? What's he doing from the right hand of God the Father in heaven? According to that verse, one of the things. He's guiding, he's directing the Holy Spirit, right? Exactly what he said he would do in the upper room. That he would send the helper, the comforter, in this case, the sign of the Holy Spirit communicating through them. That's all of this. It kind of combines all of it. Jesus ascends and what's He doing? He's there at the right hand of God. And in 1 Timothy 3.16, Micah. Thanks. Great indeed, we confess in the mystery of godliness. It was manifested in the flesh, vindicated by the Spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed on in the world, It's an interesting synopsis of Jesus' life. And Paul frames it in the context of great is the mystery of godliness. Godliness becoming incarnate and then not just Jesus is born in the flesh, He lives and dies and stuff, but in His death He's vindicated by the Spirit. seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, believed unto the world, where is he now taken up into glory?" That all sort of fits with the affirmation statement. It explains it in a few verses. I don't think there's much in the way of controversy here. If you're going to, you know, if we, if we read the Bible and believe and trust in the incarnation, we believe that Jesus paid for our sins on the cross, that it was, um, it was the, the, the, that penal substitutionary atonement, like we read in a few articles ago and talked about, and then he's raised from the dead in power. If all of that's true, the Ascension isn't that big of a thing to, to swallow, I don't think. And, and many, many agree. Most, most, um, would agree that, This is where Jesus is and what He's doing. He's presently reigning. He's managing all things on behalf of the Father. I don't actually know in the denial statement what the heresy is in particular about Jesus was mistaken about the timing of His return. I think there would be those who would say that there's my guess. My best guess is, is that many of the things that Jesus said indicated that he would be returning during that generation, right? That this generation won't fade away or pass away until all things are accomplished. And I come and they see my return in the clouds. I mean, that didn't happen. And they deny that. And later too, about his, In Article 17, see the denial? It's the denial that His final return of Jesus took place in 70 A.D. They don't. Ligonier doesn't think that either. Nobody really who's Orthodox thinks that. Jesus hasn't returned in His final glory in that way. Um, is he is he restricted from coming and going as he pleases? No, I don't think so. But I think he's mostly sending the Holy Spirit to accomplish many things. How would we discern the difference in our day? We wouldn't. So, you know, he's the one who said that he'd send the Holy Spirit to accomplish all this stuff and that he himself would return bodily one day physically, which hasn't happened yet. But this denial in Article 15 that he's mistaken about his timing is he said I'll be back shortly, but he wasn't. 2,000 years plus and going is, in our timing, not short. But we understand from Peter's letter that in regards to the return of Christ, a day is like 1,000 years, and 1,000 years is like a day. There will be many who mock us and say, where's this supposed return? And we say, well, it's his timing, not ours. And so short to him is different than short to me, evidently. That's all I know. So Caleb? Yes. Obviously, that verse about this generation Yeah. I think that's got to be, which is an interesting thing because it, you know, that verse, depending on what you're discussing about end times prophecies versus the final return of Christ, you know, there's not a tremendous amount of consistency in the use of that verse in some of these other theological interpretations but... Right. No. Right. No, it's not like in his deity, there's stuff that Jesus doesn't know. In his humanity, there's stuff he doesn't know. And he operates in one versus the other nature at times. But right, right. And he's not mistaken. His human nature is not mistaken. Our understanding is flawed at best. So Yeah. So that's kind of the 15th article. It's about the ascension. Where'd Jesus go? What's He doing now? Like I said, I don't think a tremendous amount of controversy, but we can take questions. Is all of that fine? Clear? No. I mean, it refutes the full preterist view, which is Jesus came back in 70 A.D. and we're living in something perfected now. All of this stuff is fulfilled. There's hardly any actual, real full preterists. around and so in some ways you know most of us are partial preterists to some degree or another but a preterist is somebody who thinks that believes that all these prophecies are fulfilled and so yeah that it I think I think that the the timing of his return stuff probably is that but Yeah. So the ascension is then followed by the day of Pentecost in article 16. You see this. We affirm that Jesus Christ poured out his spirit on the day of Pentecost and that in his present session, he is reigning over all things, interceding for his people and building his church of which he is the only head. We deny that Jesus Christ appointed the bishop of Rome as his vicar, or that any person other than Jesus Christ can be the church's head. So we get to the denial thing, which is specifically levied against the Roman Catholics and a few other of the Orthodox churches and stuff to some degree. But the affirmation about what happened is, and we kind of saw this, we'll see it again in some of the Scriptures, that Jesus is ascended into heaven and ten days later on the Day of Pentecost, He pours out His Spirit on His people with the sign of speaking in different languages. What's He doing there? It's interesting phrase it for a phrase that in his present session. They don't want to use a word like Dispensation that historical theologians would have used because they don't want to be accused of being dispensational But in the present dispensation what's what session mean session means dispensation and the way he's currently running the meeting is Right? What's he doing right now? What's he been doing since the day he ascended into heaven, at least since the day of Pentecost? Well, he's presently reigning as king. We don't have any dispute with that whatsoever. Right? His kingdom's not, in my thought, his kingdom's not fully manifested on the earth yet, but he's nonetheless reigning as king. He's interceding for his people. We love that. Right? What's he doing? He always lives to intercede. He's always the mediator between us and God, the Father. He's building His church. He's preparing a place for us. Yeah. Yeah. Plus what? Yeah, He's adding people to the church, right? Generation after generation. Different times, He does it at different rates and different places, but He's nonetheless, He's the one who's building the church. And so, the church is In my view, it's an interesting statement for our Presbyterian friends at Ligonier to make comment about, in that they believe that they're building the church by baptizing babies, right? They're adding to the membership. God's not doing that. They miss this point. It's one of the fatal flaws in the idea of infant baptism. is that they think they're actually adding members to the church by sprinkling water on people, but that they don't actually believe that the Holy Spirit's being imparted to them. So there's sort of like this weird theology that occupies the space of infant baptism. But I only just mention it because, you know, every now and then we see the inconsistencies in some of these statements with other doctrines that they hold. You know, we try to be perfect in our doctrine, and it's okay for us because we're not famous, so we can be right about everything, right? That's a joke. That's a joke. Anyway, all right, so the Bible verses, the one that they printed there is from Ephesians 1.22 at the bottom, footnote 16, and he put all things under his feet and gave him his head over all things to the church. This is one of Paul's repetitious, supreme sort of statements about Christ and what he's doing. There's a repetition to say that all things are under his feet, that he's the head over all things, and most especially over the church. And so we see that there's sort of a double statement. Everything's under his feet, which means he's the head over all things. He's the authority over everything. He's the ruling and reigning king. Nothing's happening that's outside of his governance, and especially so in the church. Make sense? That's after he's ascended. Jesus no longer, although still in the previous statements, the previous affirmation statements, Jesus is still fully human, but he no longer operates in a separated human deity sort of manner. It's united in a way that he's one and it's not sometimes where he is now, he's operating in the space of being only a man. this sort of stuff makes that clear, even though they didn't make the statement. So Acts 2.33, we read this verse a minute ago, but therefore, being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he's poured out this thing that you yourselves are seeing and hearing. Again, Jesus is pouring out his Spirit on the day of Pentecost. That's the The clearest verse about that in the affirmation is, He's pouring out the Holy Spirit on that day. And the effect was seen and heard by witnesses. Caleb. That's all right. I got Jesus on the brain. That's good. Yeah, last verse. Yeah. Is there a time where all things were not under suggestion? So, most interpret this that when it says that He's now ascended and He's been given all authority, it implies that He didn't have all authority before. And the only thing that makes sense, you're either stuck with two choices, I think, ultimately. One is that He was not God before, and He became God somehow after His ascension. That can't be true based on what the Scripture teaches us. What's that? Yeah, it's a heresy, and it just simply can't be true with all the rest of the evidence of the scripture. The other option is that it's making reference to the time that he, in Philippians 2, you know, surrendered, sort of, he didn't divest himself of his deity, but he didn't count equality with God a thing to be held on to, right? He sort of surrendered the use of his God faculties during his incarnation he's operating as a man and then after he's ascended all of that stuff is restored to him perhaps with even a greater if it were possible to have a greater authority because of what he's accomplished and earned on behalf of his people maybe that I mean, the new titles, I don't know that there's a new title. I mean, in the New Testament, he's given the ultimate absolute of being the Lord of Lords and that kind of stuff. But I couldn't tell you for sure without looking it up if that's actually a title that comes out of the Old Testament, too. Head of the Church is a new title. because the church is arguably established with the inauguration of the new covenant, which is somewhere maybe at the last supper or at the resurrection or somewhere in there in that two, three day period. It's surrounding that about when is the new covenant actually inaugurated. Some would argue not until the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit's poured out in a way that's a new covenant. um, you know, reception by all believers somewhere in that couple weeks, couple months period nonetheless. And so he becomes something because of the establishment of a new entity under a new covenant. He then, you know, sort of picks up a new title, but it's not like his function is much different. Well, the temptation of the devil, Satan, in those days when Jesus is ready to begin his ministry, he's in the wilderness. I think the best understanding of what the devil's actually tempting him with is he really does have, the devil still to this day does have a power over the nations. They are not necessarily consciously serving him, but they are. basically under his control as the Lord allows it, as God the Father allows it. And I think that the best interpretation of that is that Satan is really offering to Jesus, if you just bow your knee to me, I won't push it, you won't have to go to the cross, you won't have to earn all of this, you won't have to pay for these people, I'll just let them go. But for Jesus to do that, it requires him to bow his knee to Satan, which he would, you know, didn't do, would never do. Never never actually that but it's only a real temptation if Jesus in his humanity is actually Doesn't possess that authority and he might actually want to do that He might actually want the devil to sort of surrender, but it seems to be sort of like a trick question But for that to be an actual temptation there has to theoretically There has to be a real potential for him to do something wrong there, I guess. But that's all just, you know, logic and reason as best as possible. There's nothing really that teaches us much about that directly in the Scripture, so it's inference, I think. But I think it's a good inference. It makes sense. So, yeah. Alright? So, in the ascension, Jesus goes. He's pouring out the Holy Spirit. Let's see. We've got a few more Scriptures. Somebody want to look up 1 Corinthians 11? 3-5 to read that. Christopher, thank you. Ephesians 4 and Ephesians 5. Somebody can read two verses in two different chapters? Mikey, thanks. And Colossians 1.18? Anybody? Anybody? Polly, thanks. All right. 1 Corinthians 11. Thanks, Chris. It's 3 through 5. What's all of that pointing to, supposed to point to? What are we supposed to be concerned about in the passage? the symbolism of the reality that Christ is the head, right? Christ is the head. And there's this authority structure that we understand about the family, about husbands and wives and things like that, right? So the authority of every woman is her husband, and every husband is Christ the man, the head of the wife, and the head of Christ is God. Who's in between? Who's in between the man, the husband, and Christ? This is the point, huh? Yeah, the Pope, right? The priest, the pastor, right? None of those. None of those whatsoever. And so there is no other authority in the context of the family other than Christ, who's the head of the husband. Is it wise for husbands to listen to pastors with wise counsel? Probably. with the qualification of with wise counsel from the scripture, but like the actual authority structure is this. That's one aspect of it about Christ is reigning over all things. He's reigning over families. He's the only head, not only of the church, but the only head of the family too. This is not quoted here. They didn't pull out another sphere of our society, which is the civil government. But he's the head over the government according to Romans 13, right? He has that place. And also over the church. That's the point of Ephesians 4. Ephesians 4.15. "...rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, This is the context of the church. See v. 12, "...equipping the saints for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ, so that we're no longer children tossed to and fro by every winded doctrine, by human cunning. Rather, we're supposed to speak the truth in love and grow up in every way unto Him who's the head unto Christ." That body. He's the head. He's the head of the church. Also clear in Ephesians 5.23. So who's in between Christ and the church? Nobody. If it's Christ to the church, that's it. There's no intermediary. There's no mediator like Mary. There's no head of the church like a pope or others. Not between the church itself. The governing elders of the church and the people of the church and Christ himself. Colossians 118 So the clear statement that he's the head of the church, he's the first, he's the preeminent one, he's the first who's been resurrected. One day, the eternal state that the universal church will exist in, the glorified state that we'll all join with one another in, Christ is the head of that, just like he's the Christ of the individual local congregation now. And so those are those statements that support the affirmation that he's in this current time reigning over all things, interceding for his people, building his church. He's the only head. So we deny this, right, that Christ has appointed a bishop of Rome as his vicar, his representative, his emissary, the one who would rule in his place. The Roman Catholic doctrine is real developed, we'll say, about the place of the Pope and who he is. And he's this, you know, handed down from the descendancy of Peter, not necessarily genealogically, but in an unbroken line of authority, right? That Peter's the one on whom Jesus said he would build his church. Well, they mistakenly interpret that, that Peter's going to build the church. Instead of on Peter who you know is one of the foundations of the Apostles like Paul wrote in Ephesians 5 or 4 that he's one of the Apostles that is the creation of the sort of the foundation of the church on whom Christ is building. Christ is the one building. It's not that Christ has gone away and left somebody in charge in his place like that. I think we're not confused about that, but anybody confused about that? I guess I should ask instead of assume. Caleb, you're confused about that? Okay, good. I was talking about this, that Christ is the head of the church, so there's no other head in the church. I was talking about the church Catholic. In local churches, there is an authority structure that is created between the Irish and the Catholics in the head, but instead of being like monarchs, they're more like presidents. They're given certain authorities, but really they're the first citizen. They're in a sense, you know, in using Jesus's sort of explanation of he's the shepherd of the sheep. And pastor, that word itself is sort of related to being a shepherd. But it's not that I, you know, the elder of a church would be shepherd instead of Christ. We would refer something like an under shepherd, somebody who is representing. And The shepherd of the church is subject to the same discipline of the church that everybody else would be. And so, you know, those who rule well, how would you define ruling well? Somebody who's doing it according to the scripture, teaching and preaching and leading and guiding the local church in that way. Well, they deserve some amount of honor amongst the people. It's not a thing that they're supposed to lord over anybody. They're not supposed to talk about it like I'm the master and you're the servants or anything like that. That's very much the difference between, you know, a New Testament church pastor, elder, bishop, preacher, whatever you want to call them, right? In that way that the shepherd of the sheep is way different than the vicar of Christ who the first thing you must do is kiss the ring. And then after that, bow the knee and, you know, any pastor, preacher, pastor, elder, bishop, presbyter, whatever, anybody who would do that in any way is, according to the New Testament, basically disqualified from the office because of that. And so just the act of receiving adoration is enough to be disqualified from the post. And so, you know, watch any of the pageantry that goes along with the new pope. You can see why he should be out. And so, unfortunately, he'll have many souls to answer for that he's not done right with, as have centuries of popes before him. sort of like the president being the first citizen. Obviously, the pastor, the eldership does not derive the limited authority that they have from the exact governance from God. In a sense, I'm a little bit more congregational in my interpretation of the church, in that I think that it's not so much a pastor is imposed upon a church as a church recognizes a pastor as being called. And so in that sense, there is this bottom-up thing about that. In my view, it's not, we don't really think that, I don't really believe that pastors are put in place by, you know, Abundantly qualified folks like it is in that sense. It is like a president I mean he's elected from amongst the people and stuff like that and so and he's subject to all the same laws and rules and things And so he's not he's not being installed over the top by some monarchial succession plan or something like that. And so Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, yeah recognized as having been set apart by god that's a that's a mysterious sort of a spiritual mystery of of the church and it is she it is supposed to be that way but who's recognizing whether god's placed a calling on a man or not is it i don't think it's really supposed to be him i feel like i'm should be the authority and therefore god must have appointed me and i feel the calling or something so i'm going to go to seminary and become a professional guy or something i don't think that that's really the way we see it in the scripture and so Yeah. But Christ is involved in all of that. That's the point of the article, right? Christ is guiding and leading those things. It sometimes comes across in that, you know, how do we know that He's calling? It doesn't usually come from a voice in heaven, but there's these things that we look for according to the Scripture to see if a man's qualified for an eldership or something like that. So it all fits into that article. Which leads into Article 17, like I said, which is kind of the final article about the work of Christ, specific to what has He done or what is He doing. This is what will He do, right? Article 17, we affirm that Jesus Christ will come again in glory to judge all people and will finally vanquish all His enemies, destroy death, and usher in the new heaven and the new earth, in which He will reign in righteousness. We deny that the final return of Christ, Jesus Christ, took place in A.D. 70, and that His coming and its attendant events are to be viewed as symbolic. to try to deal with that last statement, because they don't actually believe that in full. But nonetheless, Jesus is coming again. This is his promise before his death, burial, and resurrection. It's his promise after his resurrection. It continues to be his promise now that he's ascended into heaven and he's managing all things, right? He's coming back. And so in Acts 10.42 printed at the bottom of the page. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that He's the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. What's one of the things Jesus is going to do when He returns? He's going to be the judge of the living and the dead. That's really quite clear in the Scripture that Jesus is returning, and one of the things He's coming back for is to judge. I'm going to read all of the Scriptures there. There's only five passages or verses, John 12, 48. Somebody want to read John 12, 48? Paul. John 14, 3. Do you want to read John 14, 3? Caleb Acts 7, 7. Acts 17, 31. Virginia, thanks. And 2 Timothy 4, verses 1 and 8. Andrew, thanks. All right, so John 12, 48. I already forgot. Paul, was that you? Thanks. The Word I have spoken, Jesus says, will judge him on the last day. Jesus is going to judge, and what's He going to use as the standard of judgment? The stuff that He taught. His commandments. What He expected from people. So it's clear that Jesus is the judge. He's using His own teaching as the standard. Chapter 14, verse 3. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me, that you also may be where I am. Yeah, so this is one of the things Jesus is doing currently, right? He's preparing a place for us. What that means is, you know, I think it means that He's preparing a place for us. Exactly how that looks or architecture and construction, I'm not sure, but He's going to come again. That's His statement that He wants us to understand. He's going away, but He's coming back. What's He coming back for? Yeah, for us to take you, to take you to be where I am. He's going to this place, he's preparing, he's gonna take us there, whatever that is. He's gonna come back and as we know from clearer statements at the last two chapters of Revelation, he's gonna usher in a new heaven and a new earth. That's the affirmation statement at the top of the page, right? So he's preparing that place and he'll bring us to be with him there. after the judgment. So these sort of follow in order. Acts 7.7. So this is Stephen preaching about the old covenant, but this verse can be definitely something that's a promise made in prophecy that applies in multiple different ways, right? It's a near far sort of prophecy. The nearness had been fulfilled that when the people of Israel were serving God, they were worshiping Him, and He was their God, and He was blessing them. But the ultimate fulfillment of something like that is in the end, when Jesus Christ returns and judges the nations. And those who serve God truly, they will forever worship Him in the place of His designation. And so, that's applied in that way out of this verse, if that makes sense. Acts 17.31. Virginia, thanks. So, who is this judge guy going to be according to this? There's a day that God has set on the calendar when somebody is going to be judging the world. Who's that? The man he's appointed. Who's that? What's his name? His name is Jesus, right? Jesus the Christ will be the one who judges everybody on that day. How do we know it's going to be him? God promised and what else? God raised him from the dead. And then being raised from the dead, he's ascended into heaven where he sits at the right hand of God, managing and ruling all things until he returns to do what? Judge. Judge the whole world. When he's going to vanquish all his enemies, like the article 17 affirmation says, he's going to get rid of all his enemies, destroy death. He's going to defeat the devil finally, throw him into the lake of fire forever. Right? All of that. All of that's going to be done when Christ comes back. Does that mean he's being defeated now? That he's not in control now? That he's not reigning and ruling now? No, but, oh, it will be different after he returns. I think we have to see that. 2 Timothy chapter 4. I've lost track. Oh, Andrew, thanks. I charge you in the presence of God and of Jesus, Christ Jesus, who is the judge of the living and the dead, by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word, be ready in season and out of season, prove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to soothe their own passions. And we'll turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the righteous judge will reward me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved me up to this day. Thanks, Andrew, thanks. So Paul's convinced of this, right? And he's charging Timothy in the presence of God. When you preach, preach this, Jesus is the judge of the living and the dead. He's going to come back to judge. When he appears and his kingdom appears with him, preach it this way. He's coming back and he's coming back to judge. And so, you know, you need to, you need to get right with the Lord. Timothy's supposed to reprove, rebuke, exhort, be patient, but teach all of these things. And then Paul knows this for himself. There's laid up for me a crown of righteousness, verse 8, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing. The subject of the judgment is kind of twofold at that great white throne judgment. For the goats, those who are lost, the unbelievers, it's the judgment of eternal condemnation. For the believers, for the righteous in Christ, it'll be this. It'll be the judgment of rewards. Who did a good job? Who did the best? Who did the least? Who utilized what God gave them? And Paul's anticipating that. It's all the same. Who's the judge in both cases? Christ Himself. Jesus is the judge. And so, when He comes back, this is what He's going to be about doing. And so we see that in the article 17 again, that He'll come again. He's going to come in glory. It says like on the clouds. Everybody will see Him. Right? And it'll be apparent evidently as these things are coming that he's coming to judge. And it'll be all people, right? It'll be the righteous in Christ, the dead in Christ. It'll be the souls of the unrighteous. The sea will give them up. The graves will give up all of them. Everybody's going to be raised to this judgment where Jesus will finally get rid of all of his enemies, defeat all the enemies, vanquish them all when he comes back. He's going to destroy death and usher in that new heavens and the new earth, where those of us who are in Christ will be rewarded into it and begin the whole thing with a kind of like a wedding feast, I hear something like that. So be good days and a lot of them. And so, and they say that right, he'll reign in righteousness over everything. Nothing will be, there won't be any competition. He doesn't allow that once he returns the way he does now. In the denial, they deny, we covered this a little bit, that the final return of Christ, they say, did not take place in AD 70. That's more of this full preterist idea that Jesus has already come back, because he said he'd be back shortly, so it had to be that. you know, we don't see it, there's no effect of it, there's no righteousness around us, that's not how the nations are operating, there's none of that going on now. It's kind of, in my view, one of the more silly heresies that you could imagine, to think that that's what it is. They agree, they say that's a full thing that they deny, incomplete and total. And they say this, this is an interesting statement that I'm not going to try to pick on too much, but They claim to deny that his coming and the attendant events that surround and precede and lead up to and are around his second coming, they deny that those are to be viewed as symbolic. They at least should be honest and say in part, right? Because they do most certainly believe that many of those things are symbolic. They're not literalists in the book of Revelation. They're not literalists until about chapter 20 somewhere. But in order for them to make the denial statement, it definitely affirms this, that the logic of it all is if his return is real, the attendant events are real too. That if his return is literal, it would only make sense that all of the attendant events that precede and surround his second coming would also be literal. This is a point that we make, right? Which of the prophecies of anywhere in the Old Testament about the first coming of Christ proved to be symbolic? Like where he would be born, how he would be born, how he was conceived. that He would reign and rule, that He would die and be killed for sin, that He would be raised from the dead, that He would reign in heaven. All of that stuff's literal. Why would we ever expect anything different? And so it's an interesting denial statement in my theological view, but I'll just leave it at that since I get the podium. I get to spout my thing for a second. Any other last thoughts of the last things? Last thoughts of the last things? Chris? Well, I was just going to say it's pretty cool that even though there's a lot of these articles we looked at today that would get me into trouble, you know, because of my Preterist kind of leanings, it's cool that it's not necessarily related to things like the atonement and the gospel. Yeah. So we can sit here Yeah, I think that's a super important thing that I'm glad you added that, you know, these basics of the faith that define Christian, Christian doctrine, Christianity, like, yeah, we can agree about these things. And, you know, the some of the details and the implications of some stuff we can disagree about. But I mean, we don't disagree in any way that Christ is still coming back, that he's currently a king, you know. And so that is good. We can bicker about minor things, but we're not talking about a different religion in any way. And so the glory really is to Christ and that's where, you know, I should want to keep it in these things. And so if you just kind of, this is one of the things that I love, why I love the statement, even though there may be things that I generally disagree about in principle or, you know, in application or in interpretation. If you go back through them and virtually every one of the affirmation statements is all about Jesus, right? Who's the one that we should be glorifying? Who's the one that we're interested in? Who is he? What has he done? What's he going to do? We all agree about the broad brushstrokes of that, which really makes it a unified Christian religion despite the fact that there's things like denominations and factions and stuff. It's not really It's not really that we're like the Shiites and the Sunnis where we want to cut each other's heads off because we disagree about, you know, who the descendant of Muhammad is. So, yeah, praise the Lord. It's an evidence about the Lord's grace in all of it. So that gets us through these articles. It hits us a good time. It's kind of what I wanted to accomplish today, because Article 18, next week, the Lord willing, we'll talk about, now it sort of shifts gears, you see, in Article 18, that we affirm that those who believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved. and what that means, and that begins to work on what does this mean for us, and what's our response to these truths intended to be, and what benefits can we get from these things. So that'll sort of round out the rest of the articles, I think, if I remember right. So that's the plan. Last thoughts or questions? I so much appreciate the last comment, Chris, so praise the Lord. Thanks. All right, Lord, I thank you for the time together this morning. Thank you for gathering us around your word and giving us your spirit to lead us to worship Lord Jesus Christ. I pray that we would do that in spirit and in truth. Even today as we're together, I thank you for the opportunity to gather, to worship you and to try to bring glory to you Lord I pray that you would in fact be glorified before our eyes today and that you would be with us and help us give us a greater sense of the unity that comes from your spirit and that spirit of adoption by which we know your love and pray that you give that to us more and more today in Jesus name amen.