please have your Bibles open at Matthew chapter 14. We're going to look at the first 14 verses together as we go through. Have you ever had hardships in your life because of your Christian conviction? Now I'm sure whether at home, and there are a number of people at home today, and whether you're here, that you have had that, that you have had times where your Christian conviction has had negative consequences. Have you ever lost friends as a result of your difficulties that you might have had in your relationships with them because of taking a biblical stand? Have you ever seeing that as you are willing to witness Christ, have you ever been ridiculed or isolated or even lost a friend in your conviction on the Bible, on your conviction on truth of Scripture, on Christ, and just explaining the Gospel to somebody? And when that happened to you, what held you firmly in place? What held you in place so that you would not give up that conviction, even regardless of the consequences that are happening in front of you? Because if you are confessing Christ, if any of us are actually confessing Christ and living on our biblical convictions, on our Christian convictions, this is going to happen. when we preach Christ or preach the truth of His Word, to speak the truth of His Word to other people, we are going to lose friends, we are going to suffer the consequences of that. Imagine if we didn't though, imagine if we just sounded like everybody else because we didn't want to stand on convictions. We didn't want to show people that we stand on the truth of Christ. Imagine if we didn't want to take that risk. If Christians took no stand on Christian and biblical conviction, it would mean that Christianity would never look any different to the world. There would be no difference in us. There'd be no persecution. There would be no disagreements. There'd be no loss of friends. There would be no awkward moments of silence because you just mentioned the name Jesus. There'd be no disagreements and there would certainly be no martyrs. John the Baptist would have lived to a ripe old age. And a young girl would never have delivered his head on a platter to her mother. Gruesome. As we begin Matthew 14 today, we start in our series that we're calling Confessing Christ. We start by looking at a shocking situation. There's a drunken party. It ends up in the decapitation of the greatest ever Old Testament prophet, John the Baptist. Now I say greatest ever Old Testament prophet, even though John the Baptist is talked about in the New Testament, okay, he really is an Old Testament prophet making the way for Jesus. And so this greatest ever Old Testament prophet loses his head because of his confession of Christ. As I was looking at this passage this week, I was asking myself this question, how does the execution of John the Baptist actually strengthen our conviction in confessing Christ? Because we read this story and we think, if anything, whoa, who wants to lose their head? But as I was looking through it and as I was contemplating, meditating before the Lord, I realized, you know what, it's so much better to be a John the Baptist and lose your head than to be a Herod Antipas and keep it. And that's what we're going to see this morning, but I'm hoping that in seeing that, that we all see this one main thing, and that is that in confessing Christ, the earthly consequences are greatly overshadowed by our eternal King. Let me say that to you again, in confessing Christ, if any of you have had hardship in confessing Christ, those earthly consequences are greatly overshadowed by our eternal King. Now let's think about a bit of the background before we come here because as we go through this we are We are looking at this man, Herod. And by the way, as we go through this this morning, I hope you have a bulletin in front of you, and please open your bulletins and keep them open in front of you, because as we ask questions about this text, I think it's important for us to ask questions to ourself about this text. These are the questions I was asking myself about this text as I was going through it this week, and I hope this meditation is helpful to you as well. So we're just going to go through the narrative of this text and just ask some reflection questions this morning. for us each to think about and I hope you'll think through some of those questions that are in your bulletin. Before we do that let's talk a bit about the person or at least some of the characters here and the main character here is one of the main characters is Herod Antipas and we need to know who this man actually is. Herod the Tetrarch. Herod here is not to be misunderstood with the Herod that you read about in Matthew chapter 2, earlier in Matthew's Gospel, known as Herod the Great. That's a different Herod to the Herod that we're reading about here. It's a different Herod, the Herod that was at the time of Jesus' birth. Herod the Great was the king of Israel and he had rebuilt the temple and many of his own palaces and building projects in Israel and they were buildings of splendour. He was also a Herod who was insanely jealous of power. And if you were a threat to his power, even if you were his own family, you weren't going to live very long. That's how Herod was here. He killed his own family. He killed his own family, but not only that, when wise men came to him, and you know this account, don't you? Wise men came to him asking about this new king that was going to be born, and he's insanely jealous of his power, and so in the slaughter of the innocents, he slaughtered baby boys in an attempt to eradicate Jesus as a threat to his own power. Now this, To some, because of the great building programs and everything that he had, he was called Herod the Great, but to others, if you were on the other side of Herod, he was Herod the Despicable. This is not the Herod that we're reading about here, in Herod Antipas, but I go back to that Herod, not to confuse us between the two Herods, but also to understand this, that as you understand Herod the Great, you understand like father, like son. You see, The Herod we're reading about now had much the same moral character as his father. And the kingdom was split up into basically four provinces under Rome. And Herod Antipas was given one of these provinces. He was given the areas of Galilee. So Galilee is the northern area above Judea and Jerusalem, and it's around the west of the Sea of Galilee. And then just under Galilee, just the other side of the Jordan River, is the area of Perea. And he was the governor, basically, he was in charge of those two main areas. Now, John the Baptist was mainly doing his ministry in those areas. Jesus was mainly doing his ministry around Galilee. And so we're gonna learn much more about Herod Antipas as we read through the text in Matthew chapter 14. So let's start with verse one. Verse one, at that time, Herod the tetrarch had heard about the fame of Jesus and he said to his servants, this is John the Baptist. He has been raised from the dead. That is why these miraculous powers are at work in him. So at the basic time of Jesus' ministry that we read about, you know, from 11 through to 13, John's already dead here, okay? He's dead by chapter 14 and Herod was hearing about Jesus and Jesus' ministry. Now I got Robert to read for us from Mark chapter six this morning. and it's a bigger account, okay, there's more details in Mark chapter 6 and if you want to keep your finger in Mark chapter 6 and have a look at some of those extra details, that's a great thing to do, read it during the week. In Mark 6 verse 14, we actually hear that Jesus' name was spreading right throughout the area. The disciples were going out in ministry, they were doing pretty wonderful things in His name, they were confessing Christ and then Jesus himself was preaching, he was doing miracles, the crowds were following him and people were talking about Jesus and there's every indication that through the crowd or through probably the Pharisees that this message, that this account got to Herod. Mark's account says it's not just Herod actually who thought that Jesus was a resurrected John the Baptist, others thought that Jesus was a resurrected John the Baptist. And my guess is probably also the Pharisees. The Pharisees who actually did believe in resurrection, who probably were the ones who were reporting things to Herod. And many scholars believe that's probably how it happened in that day. But the thinking here is this. John the Baptist and Jesus are kind of the same. They're kind of doing the same things, except for the fact that this Jesus is doing miracles and John the Baptist couldn't do miracles. We saw John the Baptist's ministry. He wasn't doing miraculous signs and wonders, but this one is. And so we believe that, you know, the only difference between the two, this has got to be John the Baptist, but maybe he's risen from the dead and from doing that, he's obtained miraculous powers. It was kind of a superstitious understanding of what was happening. And Herod superstitiously accounts for that by worrying, and he's worrying about it, he doesn't want this to happen because John the Baptist makes trouble for him, that John is come back to life. How could anyone mistake John for Jesus? I mean, we think of Jesus, how's anybody gonna mistake John for, look at Jesus, he's so different to everybody, he's so far beyond everybody, yes. And it was acknowledged, you know, there's these miraculous powers, he's not like John the Baptist. But there is so many similarities that we can see between John the Baptist and Jesus. If we go back to the beginning of John the Baptist's ministry, you go back to Matthew chapter three, verse two, we see what John the Baptist was preaching. He was preaching, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand, right? That's what he was preaching. And he was rebuking Pharisees who were coming out and listening to him. They were giving people false hope in their law-keeping and saying, it's okay, you are God's people as long as you're in Abraham's line. And he says, hang on, just because you're in Abraham's line doesn't mean you're a son of God. God can make his sons out of these stones, right? And so he's rebuking Pharisees. He's warning people of the coming judgment, and we know about John, that he was a little peculiar, and he was living a peculiarly holy life. people were following him. Now, if you turn one chapter after Matthew 3 to the beginning of Jesus' ministry in Matthew 4, verse 12, you see what Jesus is preaching. What is Jesus preaching? He's preaching repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Same message. Jesus is rebuking Pharisees, you know that, just read through the gospels. He's warning people of coming judgment. How many times did we get that in Matthew 13, right? And he lives a peculiarly holy life. That's hard to say, you try say it, okay? In fact, he's living a perfectly holy life, isn't he? And people are following him. Now, outside of miracles, there are some distinct similarities between the ministry of Jesus and John, aren't there? And John was truly preparing the way for Jesus. But let me say, if you just listen to John, you would know that John is not Jesus. Just listen to John, and John will tell you. John is the one who was saying that the judgment was coming and another was bringing it, and it's not going to be himself, it's going to be the Messiah. He's not the one that's going to bring that, it's another. John said he was a man who was not even worthy to carry the sandals of Jesus. It was John who said, Jesus, I shouldn't be baptizing you, you should be baptizing me. There was no mistake in John's understanding and in what he said, that there's a very big difference between him and Jesus. John clearly knew that there is only one Messiah. but John was preparing the way for the Messiah by living and preaching in expectation of Jesus. John was living out his expectation of the Messiah by being very much like the Messiah. You and I are currently living out in the expectation of the return of Christ by being very much like Christ. that's the first reflection question that I have for you this morning as we look at this. Could Herod mistake you as John for Jesus? Who do you look like? Who could people mistake you for? I know, we're not saying that people are going to walk around and point to us and say, that's Jesus, that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying, are we imitating Christ to the degree that we are reflecting Christ? That's what John was doing. See, yeah, none of us can do miracles, but we can speak and act like Jesus in a way that we are a reflection of our King. And I hope that's who we are. Well, then Matthew fills us in on what actually happened to John. Look at verses three to five. Herod, four, Herod had seized John and bound him and put him in prison for the sake of Herodias, his brother Philip's wife. Because John had been saying to him, it is not lawful for you to have her. And though he wanted to put him to death, he feared the people because they held him to be a prophet. See, Matthew is now giving us the backstory of what happened to John. And so we go back, and I'll remind you again of Matthew chapter three. John was out preaching, and he was baptizing, and he's baptizing Jesus. That's pretty much the last actions of John's ministry that we hear about until we get to Matthew chapter 11. And in Matthew chapter 11, in the first verses of Matthew chapter 11, we already hear that he's already in prison. Between three and 11, Herod's got him and he's in prison. And John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he's really the Messiah. And Matthew says that John was put into jail because he was saying that it was unlawful for Herod to have his brother's wife. Now let's just consider this for a moment and here's what we know about Herod Antipas, his corrupt, greedy man with a lust for power just like his dad. He had power but his brother Philip didn't have power. Now you might say, hang on, Philip was a governor of one of those northern regions too. Yes, this is where it gets a little bit confusing, there's two Philips. There's Philip the Tetrarch who was a governor of a region that was above the region of Herod's. And he's called Philip the Tetrarch. Herod, actually, look at verse one in Matthew chapter 14. Herod is called Herod the Tetrarch, right? A tetrarch means governor of a region. That's simply what it means. And so Herod here is called Herod the Tetrarch. He didn't want to be called Herod the Tetrarch. Herod wanted to be called king. In fact, he went to Caesar because he wanted to be called king. And that was rejected. He had a lust for power and his status was only subdued by the overruling power of Rome. So, the Philip we're talking about here is not Philip the Tetrarch, but this Philip who is still, you know, one of the Herods and living a good life. And Philip, his brother, who didn't seem to get a slice of territory, He had married, Philip had married his niece, Achilleus' daughter, one of the other Herods. And so Philip had married his niece Herodias. And so we have here, look at what we have here in the Herods, right? We have Herod Antipas walking around expecting people to call him king, wanting to have all power, and he has some. He's ruling under the favor of Caesar. He's lusting after his brother's wife. Herodias, who is married to a man who doesn't really have a lot of power, who loves prestige and power, but her husband doesn't have it, but this guy does. To get Herodias, Herod has to get rid of his current wife, who, by the way, happens to be a daughter of an Arabian king, who later comes against him in battle. And Herodias has to divorce Philip to get Herod and grab some of this power. Now if the Herods were alive today, this would be an incredibly highly rated television show, wouldn't it? I was talking to Ryan not long ago and Ryan said it would be called the Herodians, right? Yeah. Quite often back in Australia, you've heard of the show Bold and the Beautiful? Have you heard, some of you heard, it's one of those, you know, American serials, you know, and there's families and they're all, it's just horrible what happens and it was often in Australia, it was on 5pm before the 6 o'clock news, that's when they would, that's the slot that they would put it in and so all the Australians know, you know, this Bold and the Beautiful and my mum would often have it on waiting for the 6 o'clock news to come on and I'd walk in there and Mum, you're watching Bold and the Beautiful? What are you doing? There's horrible morality and everything in this show. And she would say, Stephen, I'm waiting for the news. Oh, yeah, sure, Mum. Right? Sure. The Harrods make Bold and the Beautiful look like Sesame Street. Matthew says that Harrod arrested John because John had been saying that this marriage is not right. And as a prophet, John would know that it's not right. He just has to look up Leviticus 18, 16. You shall not uncover the nakedness of your brother's wife. It is your brother's nakedness. Don't covet your brother's wife. Now, the Jewish historian actually says that Herod imprisoned John for a little bit of a different reason. He said it was because of political tensions. And so, but I would say it's easy to see how both of those things match together. Because the one thing Herod would always be concerned about, worried about, is an uprising from the Jewish people. So can you imagine? Because the Jews didn't really accept him, they didn't want him as a king. They didn't even see him really as Jewish. This man comes from the ancestry of Samaritans and Edomites. They would have despised him and it wouldn't take much for the Jewish people to react against Herod. So if John had publicly said something about Herod's incest and adultery that could easily have led to public tensions and maybe even cause problems in Herod keeping the peace, that's a concern for Herod because that's his major job under Rome, to keep the peace. It's better to put John in jail. Now I've been pondering this all week, just thinking about this and I've come to a pretty confident conclusion and I want to share it with you and maybe you'll come to this conclusion with me. I don't think John was actually going around on a campaign preaching about the moral problems against Herod. I don't think that was John's main campaign. I don't think he was going around in a political campaign against Herod's morality. In fact, I know that that's not John's message because the Bible tells us what John's message is. In Matthew 3, what was John's message? Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. We get told what John's main concern is. And so he is telling the Jewish people to repent from sin and turn back to their God in expectation of coming judgment. He was preaching for people to be right with God. And we see that same thing in the Old Testament prophets, by the way. Just turn back to prophets like Elijah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, and you see them doing exactly the same thing. They're saying, repent, turn back to your God, look at where you've gone. And in fact, John was even seen as being an Elijah, wasn't he? The Bible tells us that. Jesus says, Elijah has come in John the Baptist. In other words, he is an Elijah-like prophet, preparing the way for Christ. So in warning people to repent in the face of coming judgment, those prophets, Old Testament prophets, would often expose the sin of the people and their leaders. Just read, by the way, through some of those prophets, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, even the history of Elijah, and you'll see that. And they're showing people even explicit sins, you know, the injustice and the immorality that is happening in the people and in its leaders, in its priests and its kings. And he's showing them, the prophets are showing them these things in a way of saying, this is your problem, this is what happens when you turn away from God. Turn back, repent to Him, come to Him for forgiveness of sins. John's preaching much the same way, in an explicit explanation of sin, so there will not be any confusion about their sin before God. I think that's what's probably happening here. I also wonder, by the way, when you read through the Gospels, and you read Jesus often confronting the Pharisees, right? Pharisees are often trying to trap Jesus by asking Him questions that are going to get Him in trouble with Rome or someone else, one of the leaders. And I have every guess that maybe they're doing that to John as well and then going off to Herod and saying, do you know what John said about you, Herod? I could even possibly, that's just a guess, I could see something like that happening too. But here's the point, nobody likes their sin exposed. do they? Just really, honestly, go back this week and read Jeremiah chapter 20, chapter 20 of Jeremiah. Jeremiah, I'm not going to it now, we don't have time, but Jeremiah is preaching what God has told him to preach about the sin of the nation and them to repent and they hate it so much that they want to come and kill Jeremiah. Isn't that exactly what's happening to John here? They wanted to kill Elijah too, isn't that exactly what is happening with John here? And it's only, this is what we need to understand, each one of us, it's only through the sovereign work of God in our hearts that we are humbled to even see our sin and agree that we are sinners and that we need salvation, that we need forgiveness. from God. It's only that humbling in the reality of sin and God's judgment on sin that we actually see our need for Christ and coming to the cross and coming for forgiveness from Christ through Him dying in our place and rising from the dead. And so when we preach the gospel, brothers and sisters, and believe me the gospel is not just Jesus loves you and He wants to take you to heaven, the gospel is you are a sinner and under God's condemnation, and you need forgiveness and reconciliation with the God in the universe, which is what God has done for you by supplying the great lamb of sacrifice, Jesus Christ, to die in your place. The perfect sacrifice to rise from the dead. If we don't understand the bad news of sin, we'll never understand the good news and the relief of the gospel, will we? But who wants to hear of their sin exposed? It's tough. It often leads to people being offended. This week, I actually had the pleasure of talking with a young lady, a Christian young lady who lives on a university campus. She told me how difficult it is to just be a Christian on that campus. how difficult it is to just be a Christian, living with other people, and if she even sees a friend hurting as a result of sin in their life and tries to point them to hope in Christ, she often ends up being ostracized because she dared to say that her friends need forgiveness and hope in Jesus. As if something might be wrong with me, how dare you tell me that something is wrong with me? How dare you say that I'm living a sinful, shameful life? How dare you? God must accept me for whatever I want to be and do whatever I want to do, otherwise he's not a God I want to have anything to do with or know about. Look here at what we see with John. And I know many of you, by the way, I know many of you have experienced that, haven't you? Have you experienced some of that too? I certainly have. See, when the gospel exposes sin, you will be persecuted. Maybe not physically, maybe in different ways, but when the gospel exposes sin, you will face opposition and bottom line, and let me tell you, this is just something that we all need to see, your reward is in heaven. Your success is not in that person bowing down in that moment and saying, oh yes, I need Jesus. Of course we want that to happen. But your success, brothers and sisters, is found in your obedience to the gospel no matter what the consequence. That's where your success is. So here's my second question for you today. Why are people having a problem with you? Why are people having a problem with you? Or do people even have a problem with you? Maybe that's a better question for us to ask, isn't it? Are people even having a problem with us? I would suggest to you, if you are not having any opposition in your life, it may be because you are not prepared to speak the truth of the gospel to people. People don't have a problem with us, maybe it's us that is the problem. Do we even have a witness of the Gospel whereby we are even willing to have offence taken against us? Look with me at verse six onwards. Look at this offence that we see in this account. Not only in the jailing of John, but what comes after it. Verse six, but when Herod's birthday came, the daughter of Herodias danced before the company and pleased Herod. So that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she might ask. Prompted by her mother, she said, give me the head of John the Baptist here on a platter. And the king was sorry, but because of his oaths and his guests, he commanded it to be given. He sent and had John the Baptist, John beheaded in the prison. and his head was brought on a platter and given to the girl, and she brought it to her mother." It's a horrible story, isn't it? I told you this was going to be a little gruesome today. It almost looks like Herodias, by the way, in the background, as you read through that, it almost looks like Herodias is plotting in the background, doesn't it, as you read that? And it's in this section that we see a little bit more of Herod's character too, and it's exposed in this way. It's a time where the leaders are around him, and by the way, when it comes to leaders, character matters. And Herod was well known for his extravagant parties. for revelry. And here we get a taste of that. Mark also tells us that the company with Herod were the officials and the military commanders. That's what we get extra information in Mark. This is the who's who of first century Israel all present to celebrate Herod's birthday. But this celebration, it wasn't in any way what a Jewish celebration should be. In fact, there was nothing Jewish about it at all, and Herod, I don't think, really cared about being Jewish. He wanted to be a king like the other nations. And in fact, Jews didn't even celebrate birthdays, really. The big entertainment here for Herod and his guests is his stepdaughter dancing in the middle of them. Now, if you ever see a Jewish celebration and you see Jews dancing, That's not happening. Jews are connecting arms in a big circle. You've seen those pictures of Jews dancing, haven't you, and going around and it's a whole participation in a celebration, like a wedding feast or something like that. That's not the type of dancing that's happening here. In fact, what's happening here is Herod trying to put himself up as a king, much like something like a Persian king. You know, where a girl from the harem would be dancing in provocative ways in front of them and enticing lust, it's a spectacle. And what's more, this isn't just that, this is, her name is Salome. She's his stepdaughter, she's Herodias' daughter. And just look at something with me. Go down to Matthew chapter four, verse 11. Just look at verse 11. The head of John the Baptist was brought to the girl and the girl took that to her mother. The girl. The Greek word used here is a very specific word for girl. Kerasio. It specifically means young girl. Young girl, it's probably, most scholars would say, probably around 12, maybe at the most 14. Now I don't know if you've heard in our time of a very, very concerning television program that is on Netflix called Cuties. I don't know if any of you have heard that, but it has young girls this age dancing in explicitly provocative ways. Now I haven't seen it myself, nor am I going to. And I would warn all of you not to. But this is a first century version of that right here in a king's palace in front of the who's who of Israel. And Herod is not disgusted by this, he's so captivated by this that he says, up to half of my kingdom you can have it. And this young girl is still young enough that she runs to mummy to say, what should I do about this? Mummy says, John the Baptist's head on a platter. Up to half of the kingdom can be given. No, no, no, I just want this man's head on a platter. How much hate do you have to have to ask for that when you have half of the kingdom on the cards? I think the Scriptures here show us something. I think they remind us of something. See, John is the Elijah-like prophet. But I think in John being the Elijah-like prophet, we can see Herod as the Ahab-like king and Herodias as the Jezebel-like wife. Look at what we see here specifically with Herod. He just made a very, very stupid promise. And you know what, when you make a really stupid promise, you should never keep it. You should say no, you should be big enough to say no, that was a very bad promise, I shouldn't have made it. See right now, he risks losing face. He risks losing face with those who's who of Israel who are there at his birthday party. But then again, he risks problems with those who revere John as a prophet in Israel, doesn't he? So he's got two things. But you know what? He dare not be seen as weak in front of the leaders of Israel. And you know what weak men fear most? Being seen as weak. Weak men can't say, I was wrong to promise that. I can't keep it. He should never have kept that promise that he should never have made. So out of fear of man, he does the unthinkable. And the next thing we see is a would-be king giving a severed head to a 12-year-old girl to take to her mother. That's all sorts of wrong. And it shows a complete disregard for God in the killing of a prophet in an attempt to hold the favour of man. And here's my third reflection question this morning. How might the fear of man be influencing us into sin? Because that's what the fear of man does. See, the text shows us this comparison between John and Herod, doesn't it? And I think we should see it. John's willing to uncompromisingly preach Christ. Preaches coming regardless of the consequences. He serves God regardless of the cost. He preaches sin regardless of the opposition. Herod is completely blind to God because of his fear of man. That's what fear of man does, it blinds us to the view of God, brothers and sisters. We cease serving Christ when we elevate man. And in the Gospel of John, we get this incredible example in the Gospel of John, because we see even Jewish leaders who ended up believing in Jesus, but because of the fear of man, they wouldn't confess him. to others. John 12, 42, nevertheless, many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees, they did not confess it so that they would not be put out of the synagogue. In what way is fear of man influencing your life away from the confession of Christ unto a sinful life? Well, there are two more quick observations that I want to have, and these are quick. I want to make them here just in the last couple of verses. Matthew 14, two, 12, sorry. Verse 12 here, and his disciples came and took the body and buried it. And they went and told Jesus. Now we see something of the courage of John's disciples here. And we see something of their ongoing conviction. See, they go as friends and disciples of John to Herod's palace, and they ask for the headless body of John because they wanna bury that. Now that's risky, by the way. That's actually very risky. They're going there and they're saying, hey, we're associating ourselves with this man that you hate so much that you just beheaded. We're associating with him. And we believe what he believes. He has taught us, actually. And if they're John's disciples, they are truly, though, believing what John has taught them. They hope more. in what John has preached to them, the repentance of sin for the forgiveness of sins in God through His incredible sacrifice that they might be truly His people. There's more hope in that, isn't there? Much more hope in that and so they're hoping in what they know is greater than the risk It's a lot like Joseph of Arimathea. We see a lot of similarities between John and Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea, remember what he did when Jesus was crucified? He goes up and asks for Jesus' crucified body to go and bury it, and in that way, what was he doing? He was associating himself with this man that Rome had just crucified, that the Jews had just crucified. And here's the fourth question. Are you too convinced that hope in Christ is worth the risk? Are you also convinced that hope in Christ is worth the risk? Lastly, and I think this is significant and this is where we'll kind of finish. Notice what the disciples of John did. They went and told Jesus. That's what we see, they just went and told Jesus. Imagine for a moment if the big message of John had been Herod is immoral. That's the only big message that he was going around. That's his main message. Herod is immoral. He's a bad leader. We need to get rid of this man. He's a tyrant. If you cross him, he's going to kill you. Imagine if that's the big takeaway from them. Yeah, look what they did to John the Baptist. It's true. He is like this. We need to go out and tell everybody. There's no need for them to go to Jesus if that's the main message. They can just go straight out to everybody else and just cry out about the immorality of Herod and its effect on the culture. There's no reason for them to go back to Jesus. But that is not John's message, and it is not what persuaded them. John the Baptist was always aware of his own job, and that was to prepare the way for Jesus. And so when John was in prison and contemplating in circumstances, he didn't tell his disciples to go out and tell the Jewish people of the injustice of an innocent man being put in jail by an immoral tyrant. That wasn't the message. He sent his disciples to Jesus, hey, did we get it right? Are you really the Messiah? Look where John's focus is. His focus was on preparing the way for Christ. He wanted to make sure that was right. He wanted to make sure he had the right mission. Was I right about this mission? Is this correct? So now, what do John's disciples do? There's just so much to see in just these few little words. They go and tell Jesus. They go to Jesus. That just tells you focus, doesn't it? It's not focus of anything else. It's focus on Christ. They go to Jesus. They go to the Messiah. He is now their focus. They do exactly what John would want them to do. And let's just look at one more thing. Look at verse 13. It's not in the bulletins, but in verse 13, upon hearing this, what was Jesus' response? It says, Jesus withdrew. Jesus withdrew. He didn't create an uproar about the injustice of wicked Herod. What would that do but get him put in prison? What's so much more important to Jesus? Going to the cross to die for our sins. It's so much more important to Jesus to pay the debt for our sin by going to the cross and being a sacrifice that none of us could be, to rise from the dead so that every single person who will put their trust in him can receive forgiveness of sins and eternal life. See, John's focus was Jesus, and Jesus' focus was the cross. That is our hope. That's the hope of the world, brothers and sisters. The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. That's our main thrust, that's our main message. Whenever I see Jesus, you read through the Gospels, you'll see it multiple times. Jesus withdrew, Jesus withdrew, Jesus withdrew. That's not cowardice. He's withdrawing to do something incredibly courageous, to die for the sins of everyone who will put their faith in Him. Every time I see those words, Jesus withdrew, you know what's in my heart? Thankfulness. Gratitude. You know why? Because Jesus is never going to get distracted by the manipulations of this world, whether it's cultural, whether it's political, whether it's material or anything else. Whenever Jesus is withdrawing, he is doing so because absolutely nothing can be allowed to get in the way of him going to the cross for you and me. That's what's happening here. That's the mission of Christ. That's the message of John. And so the last question that I just simply want to ask you today is what is your mission and message? What is your mission and message? If people would describe, just think about this for a moment, just in your general language, what you normally talk about with people, where you are and what they could say, hey, this person, they're really driven by this. If people describe your priority of speech and actions, Is the gospel of Christ a part of that description? A prominent part. Is the mission of Christ your flavour? What is it, brothers and sisters, that allows you to stand strong in the face of a world that opposes you? A world that hates you for even suggesting that someone might have sin in their life and need forgiveness? world that despises you because you declare that there is only one way of salvation and that is only through Jesus Christ and His work on the cross. What will it take for us to be willing to lose our job for the sake of Christ, to go to jail face physical abuse or even death. What will it take for you and I to stand without wavering? On that day, let me tell you, it's not gonna be because we're just fighting for a better morality. It's not going to be because we even want a better environment for our family. It's going to be because our eternal debt has been paid by our precious Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ. That's what keeps us strong. There's more in Him than there is ever in this world. So in confessing Christ, the earthly consequences are greatly overshadowed by our eternal King. So let's make sure our courage is in Christ, through Christ and because of Christ. Okay, let's pray.