Luke 11:1-4 - Lord, Teach Us To Pray

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 10.30 am service, 2000-09-02

Text: Luke 11:1-4

Prayer is one of the most basic necessities in every believer's life. It is our lifeline to God, for it is the important channel of communication that links us with God, who is our life. But just as a child needs to learn about the proper way to communicate with people, we have to learn the proper way to communicate with God. Are you communicating well with God? How many times have you prayed, and then after that you felt, 'I don't think that was the best prayer. I don't think I prayed right. Something important was missing from my prayer. I wish I could learn how to prevail with God in prayer.'

And now while we are in this present time of economic gloom and facing uncertainty about the future, there is an even greater need for us to know how to pray. It is time for us to draw closer to Him at this time, to come boldly unto the throne of grace that we might obtain mercy and find grace to help in this time of need (Hebrew 4:16). To do that we must understand how to pray. You see, prayer is not just a matter of speaking some appropriate-sounding words and phrases to God.There are certain attitudes of our heart we must have when we pray. 

If we are not careful about our attitudes when we pray, our prayers will be made in vain and will avail nothing at all. According to Proverbs 28:9, our prayers can even become an abomination to God. It says, 'He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination.' And according to King David in Psalm 109:7, it is even possible for a person's prayer to become sin! When the Lord Jesus lived among men, one of the things that He took special notice of how people prayed (Matthew 6:5-8). He disliked the long and elaborate hypocritical prayers that were made by some men. He also gave much teaching on the proper way to pray, and at least three of the many parables He told were meant as lessons on prayer. There is no doubt that our Lord wants us not only to pray, but to learn the right and proper manner of praying. 

It is therefore worthwhile for us to learn the proper way to pray from our Lord Jesus, and particularly about the right attitudes one should have in prayer: Can we regard ourselves as being on equal terms with God? Can we relate to Him on the same level, like the way a person puts his arm around the shoulders of a familiar friend and saying, 'Hey, I'm in trouble now. You must help me out of this.' This morning we want to understand that we must have a proper view of our standing before God when we pray. 

In recent years there is an idea, that has become very popular in some circles and churches, that God is just waiting for us to challenge His power when we pray and ask Him to bless us and enlarge our territory. According to this erroneous teaching He has obligated Himself to answer such prayers because He wants to demonstrate all the wonderful things He can do for us when we pray. And all we need to do is to say the right prayer, the prayer that will unlock all His blessings for us. E.g. the Prayer of Jabez, which is found in 1 Chronicles 4:10 'And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.' The name 'Jabez' means 'sorrow' and this reflects the difficult circumstances into which he was born. Hence Jabez is a good example of a man who looked to God for help because of the difficult circumstances he was born into. 

Now, this prayer that he made was popularised by Bruce Wilkinson head of Walk Through the Bible Ministries, in a small book which claims a total of 4 million copies in print, called 'The Prayer of Jabez'. It is is being embraced not only by Evangelicals and Fundamentalists, but also by Catholics, and even non-Christians. 

In the book, Wilkinson turns the simple prayer of Jabez into a formula for obtaining blessing from God. He instructs his readers to pray the prayer of Jabez word-for-word, every day for four weeks, expecting special blessing from God. Wilkinson says: "I challenge you to make the Jabez prayer for blessing part of the daily fabric of your life. To do that, I encourage you to follow unwaveringly the plan outlined here for the next thirty days. By the end of that time, you'll be noticing significant changes in your life, and the prayer will be on its way to becoming a treasured, lifelong habit" There is nothing mentioned in 1 Chronicles 4 that Jabez prayed this prayer repeatedly for 30 days. So this is a man-made.

Wilkinson says the Prayer of Jabez is "a prayer that God always answers" and that "it contains the key to a life of extraordinary favor with God." He mentions thousands of people who are praying the prayer of Jabez and thus are "seeing miracles happen on a regular basis." These are extravagant claims!

The subtitle of the book is: 'Breaking Through to the Blessed Life.' The publisher's back-cover reads: 'Do you want to be extravagantly blessed by God? Are you ready to reach for the extraordinary? To ask God for the abundant blessings He longs to give you? Join Bruce Wilkinson to discover how the remarkable prayer of a little-known Bible hero can release God's favor, power, and protection. You'll see how one daily prayer can help you leave the past behind-and break through to the life you were meant to live.' 

Dearly beloved, perhaps you too have read this book and even tried out the programme. But do you know what such teaching on prayer does? It essentially reduces God to becoming merely a means to an end. It turns the sovereign almighty God into a servant that man can use to his own advantage. It makes God serve us, when we should be the ones serving Him. 

We must be discerning and caerful not to fall for this self-exalting and self-centered teaching on prayer! The same thing is being promoted by all the pagan religions where men believe that they can procure for themselves from their gods the prosperity, good fortune and favour they want by flattering their gods and lavishing them with joss sticks, fruits and candles, libations and offerings. These worshippers would gladly make these offerings to the gods which would give them the most impressive package deal in life, and they would readily give up worshipping one god for another if the latter is rumoured to give a better deal. This pragmatic approach to prayer is typical of unbelievers. 

A few weeks ago, I received a strange call in the church office. The caller asked me this question, 'Can you please tell me the name of the god or goddess who can give me the most money?' My reply to him was that it is we who must give ourselves to God rather than expect God to give things to us. I told him that he must come to worship God without any ulterior motive of expecting any gain or blessing from Him in return. The caller was not happy with my reply and put down the phone. 

Dearly beloved, if prayer to us, is a means to get the things we want from God, then we would be treating Him like a mere dispensing machine. And we come to expect that when we just put in the right amount of effort in prayer, we must receive what we want. We use prayer to extract all kinds of material, social and emotional blessings from Him by presumptuous petitioning. Just think of it: How can anyone dare to treat the Almighty sovereign God like this? 

Therefore, dearly beloved, when you come before God in prayer you must be careful how you regard Him. Your prayer would become an abomination to God if you treat Him as a means to an end. Has your praying become like that? Are you praying self-centered prayers? 

As we think about this, it will be good for us to study not the Prayer of Jabez, because that was only meant for Jabez alone to pray, not for anyone else. The Prayer we should study is the one which our Lord Jesus Christ taught His disciples to pray, found in the passage of Scripture which we read awhile ago. When you want to learn how to pray effectively, there is no better person that you can learn from than the Lord Jesus Himself. It is our privilege to ask Jesus now, just as the disciples asked Him before, 'Lord, teach us to pray.' 

Let us turn our Bibles back to Luke 11:2-4 to see how Jesus answered this request from His disciples. He taught them to pray by giving his disciples a model prayer. This prayer has become very well known to us as 'The Lord's Prayer.' This prayer is found twice in the New Testament - here in Luke 11 and also in Matthew 6:5-13. Jesus taught it on two separate occasions. 

Now this prayer is only meant to be a pattern for praying. It is not meant to be just a parroted formula prayer because Jesus Himself did not always use the same prayer when He prayed and even the Lord�s prayer itself is not exactly the same in Luke 11 and Matthew 6. This prayer is rather, a guide or a teaching model which contains the basic elements we should include in prayer. There are many things that we can learn from the Lord's Prayer, but this morning we just want to observe three important principles about prayer in relation to our position before God. The first is found in the fact that the Lord's prayer does not begin with a request for oneself. It begins: 'Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.' This teaches us that: 

I. Prayer must always be focused on God rather than on oneself. 

It is God whom we must seek in prayer. His purposes must be our concern even in our prayers, His exaltation must be our aim when we prayer. His glory must be our aspiration when we pray. And so our first thought in prayer should be nothing else but God Himself. 'Hallowed be Thy name.' Sometimes we approach God's throne with a shopping list or wish list. 

We pray like this. 'Dear God, I would like to have a good day, travelling mercies, good relationships with everyone I meet, good health, and a good night's rest. Thank you. Amen' Are your prayers like that? If your prayers tend to be like that, then there may be something wrong with your theology. Your theology may be egocentric (or self-centred) rather than theocentric (or God-centred). We should have a God-centred theology, seeing Him as the centre of all things - and if we have this correct theology it will be reflected in the way we pray. God becomes more important to us than our own needs and petitions. And our prayers will begin and end by focusing upon Him. 

Please remember this: God must be always sought for no other reason than the fact that He is God. He is worthy of our highest regard, worthy of our worship, and reverence. And so, when we pray, we ought to be seeking the Giver rather than the things that He gives. Whether He eventually gives and blesses us or not, is not important at all. What really matters most to us is that He is God, and that we earnestly seek Him for who He is, and not for what He does for us, or what He gives to us. Let us seek the Lord primarily because He is God. Then all our prayers will be God-centered and not self-centered.

One example of a person who sought the Lord with such pure motives is the Old Testament patriarch, Job. As you know, Job was severely tested because Satan wanted to prove that Job was seeking God purely for selfish reasons. Satan proposed that as long as God was blessing Job, his ardent devotion to Him would continue, but once God stopped blessing him, that devotion to Him would also stop. In the end, Satan failed to prove this, because in response to the severe trials that came upon him, Job said, 'Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him:' (Job 13:15) 

Dearly beloved, here is a very searching question, to ask yourself, and try to be honest in your answer. If the Lord does not bless you, and does not provide for your needs; if He does not grant you your prayer requests and does not help you in times of trial, will you still trust in Him, will you still seek Him in prayer, will you still honour Him and praise Him? Or will you stop praying because you think that it is an unprofitable and unproductive effort? What if you prayed for relief from your burdens, but instead of getting lighter, your burdens get heavier? What if you prayed for peace, but all that you receive is more trouble? Will you still thank God for answering your prayers? 

If your prayer life tends to slacken whenever your prayers are seemingly not answered, and you are disappointed, doubting God, could this not be an indication that you have been seeking self rather than seeking God in your prayer life? Please be completely honest with yourself in this important matter. What is your real motive for praying? Perhaps you need to ask the Lord to help you to seek Him and Him alone in prayer. And that is why the first petition in the Lord's teaching model of prayer is 'Hallowed be Thy name'. 

As we read on in the Lord's prayer we come now to the second and third petitions and we notice that these still have absolutely nothing to do with self: 'Thy Kingdom come; Thy will be done as in heaven, so in earth.' These teach us the second thing that we need to observe about how to pray: 

II. Prayer must always be submitted to God's will and not to our own wills. 

Not only must prayer have God as its object, prayer must also have the will of God as its chief concern. 1 John 5:14 tells us 'And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask any thing according to His will, He heareth us' We would be very mistaken to think that prayer is all about asking the Lord to do what we wish according to our own will. Here in the Lord's prayer the petition, 'Thy will be done' comes at the head of all the petitions we make for ourselves. This means that every request that comes after it has the implied condition that God wills it. In other words, the thought is: 'Thy will be done in giving us our daily bread.' 'Thy will be done in forgiving us our sins.' 'Thy will be done in leading us not into temptation.' And 'Thy will be done in delivering us from evil.' Everything we ask for in our prayers must be asked with the willingness to submit to the will of the Lord. 

But if you were to listen to the prayers that are being uttered most of the time, will you find submission to the will of God? Very often people actually pray in effect, 'not Thy will, but My will be done!' Instead of submitting to God's will, they impose their wills upon Him. They may even use scripture to justify doing this. They quote Matthew 21:22 out of context which says 'And all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing ye shall receive.' Thinking that this verse provides a scriptural 'blank cheque' for them to claim anything under the sun that they wish from God, they pray for something they want, believing that they would receive it. 

Actually, the word 'believing' in this verse, is not at all to be understood as assuming that the things asked for are already given. This is what some have used this verse to teach and it is not right. Rather, it means believing that God has the full power and authority to grant all that has been asked for. The scriptures are firmly against this practice of imposing our selfish wills on God when we pray. As James wrote in James 4:3 'Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.'

A sister from our church once shared at our Tuesday prayer meeting about a boy who asked her: 'When I am playing a computer game, can I ask God to help me to get to the next level?' A football fan may perhaps ask a similar question: 'When I watch the world cup series, can I pray that God will make my favourite team win the game?' And they might even try to justify it like this: 'Will this not glorify the Lord, when I can tell people that He answered my prayer: I prayed that He would make my team win the game, and my team really won the game - praise God!'

If this is the way you think, I have got news for you: This will not glorify God. It will only make people think that God can be used to make our dreams and wishes come true like a divine fairy godmother, and that it is to your advantage to get Him to be on your side. But how can we, who are mere creatures made by God, dictate to God what He should do? How can we, who are sinners saved by grace, issue orders to God and make Him work for us as if He is a waiter or office boy? 

So it is absurd that anyone should not pray in submission to God's will. Let us take great care not to be found guilty of this sinful attitude in prayer. Let our prayers always be made with the condition 'Not my will, o Lord but Thine be done.' We move on now to the last thing we want to observe today concerning the way we should regard ourselves in prayer, which is that: 

III. Prayer should be seen as our Privilege, and not our Right 

Prayer is a high privilege that God grants to every believer, where the great sovereign God of the universe condescends to listen and consider the insignificant pleas of mere mortal creatures like us. Like salvation, this privilege comes to us by God's grace alone. When we understand prayer as a privilege given to us, we can see that God does not owe us any answer to our prayers. It is, after all, His prerogative whether or not He wants to give attention to our prayer. 

This being the case, we should never think of prayer as our entitlement to make claims from God. When we come before God in prayer we have no entitlements at all to claim or to make demands from Him. We cannot say to God, 'If You don't answer my prayer I will not worship you and serve you.' 

Let us consider the petitions found in the Lord's prayer: 'Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.' (Luke 11:3,4) The tone in each of these petitions is more of pleading, begging, and asking. The verbs 'give', 'forgive', 'lead us not' and 'deliver' in this prayer are not demands at all. 

We know this by simply comparing the structure of these petitions with similar prayers of petition found in the Old Testament. In the Hebrew language there is a certain letter of the alphabet which when added to command, softens its force to that of a plea. This letter is called the Cohortative He and it is used in prayers of petition, like those made by Daniel, Ezra, Nehemiah, David and others. Thus the petition to God to forgive, could be translated 'please forgive us our sins' instead of just 'forgive us our sins.' The rest of the petitions could likewise be translated with the word 'please' before each of them. 

We can safely say therefore, that the petitions found in the Lord's prayer were meant to be pleas to God rather than commands. This is important for us to note. When we come before God we should never command, demand, or even claim; our attitude with regard to our requests should be one of pleading; pleading for things which are not ours to claim at all' 

Pleading on no other ground than God's mercy and grace alone; pleading with complete trust in God to deal with us in whatever way He wills. You know, those of us who are parents teach our children to say 'Please,' in order to teach them the proper attitude they should have towards us. And if a child does not say please but demanded things and said, 'I want' or 'Give me' we would remind them to ask politely. Please remember this. Sometimes we take for granted that God must be listening to our prayers and that He must grant them.

We forget that when we stand before the Almighty God, we are treading on holy ground, where angels fear to tread, and instead of pleading, the tone in which we make our requests becomes one of telling God what to do or even demanding Him to do them. Let us remember that prayer is really pleading before God in humble submission to His will. 

In Genesis 18 there is an account of how Abraham prayed before God to be merciful to the righteous minority who lived in the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah when He destroys the two cities. Gen 18:27 'And Abraham answered and said, Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes; And he said unto him, Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak: Peradventure there shall thirty be found there.' 

It is my hope that all of us will be careful from now on about how we pray. Let us not take too much upon ourself and end up making presumptuous prayers which are displeasing to God. Let us remember these three things about prayer; Firstly prayer must always focused on God rather than on oneself, Secondly, prayer must be submitted to God's will rather than to our own wills, Thirdly, prayer must be seen as our privilege and not as our right before God. May the Lord help each one of us to treasure the great privilege that we have, of being granted an audience with the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. That is what prayer is all about.

Luke 01:26-38 - Mary and Joseph: Parents of Christ

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 8am & 10.45 am service, 2012-12-16

Text: Luke 1:26-38; Matthew 1:18-25

Since the time when the New Testament was written, many strange myths and legends have emerged about Mary and Joseph. The problem with all of them is that they have absolutely no biblical basis at all. There are only myths and legends, and we have no reason to believe them. The Bible is our only reliable source of information about this couple. And what the Bible says about them makes them very much like any couple today who plan to marry and have children.

Like any good husband-to-be, Joseph loved Mary and prepared himself well for the day when she would become his wife and they can start a family. Like all good wives-to-be, Mary looked forward to the day when she would present herself as a chaste virgin bride to her husband, ready to become a good wife and mother. Like any couple, Joseph and Mary probably expected their plans for marriage and family life to proceed normally, following all the Jewish traditions and customs of their day, and seeking God’s blessing upon all that they planned. But unknown to them, God had higher plans for their marriage and family life – Plans to use them to restore the royal line of David to reign over Israel; plans to fulfill the OT prophecies concerning the promised Messiah; and most of all, plans to bring God’s only begotten Son into the world, to save sinners from sin and eternal death!

Let us try to imagine what this couple might have experienced as God’s plans for them unfold. Joseph was a carpenter who lived with his parents in a village called Nazareth. Since it was a close-knit rural community, every family in Nazareth would have known each other quite well. Through this, Joseph got to know a young maiden named Mary. One day Joseph asked his parents about the possibility of having Mary as his wife. As typical Jewish parents, they discussed it among themselves, considering Mary’s ancestry, and family background. They could hardly fault her background because it was very much like their own – both families were descendants of King David. So they probably approved Joseph’s choice with much enthusiasm.

Joseph’s father then visited Mary’s parents and told them about his son’s interest in their daughter. Mary’s parents were probably keen to have such a fine young man as their son-in-law, confident that he would take good care of their precious child. So they called her in to break the news to her. When Mary heard that Joseph had asked for her hand in marriage, she may have recalled those times when she accompanied her dad to buy some new furniture for their home, and she was impressed by this hard-working carpenter who was known to be a just and kind man. And so Mary heartily agreed to the proposal, and the two fathers then proceeded to formalize the marriage covenant.

On the appointed date, Joseph was brought before Mary. They took their vows and sealed the marriage covenant by tasting a cup of wine together. Then their parents uttered a formal benediction over them. This little ceremony meant that Mary and Joseph were not just engaged but legally married, though they were not to live together yet until Joseph had built and furnished their marital home, and a wedding feast for all the villagers was held there. In those days married couples had to wait up even to one year before they could live together as husband and wife. In the meantime, it was their duty to keep themselves sexually pure until their wedding day. If either Mary or Joseph was unfaithful to each other before their wedding day, it would be deemed as the sin of adultery, and it was punishable by death (Deuteronomy 22:23,24).

But since Joseph knew Mary to be a virtuous woman who had been brought up well in the knowledge of God, he was fully assured that she would be faithful to him. But things began to happen. Shortly after their betrothal, Mary left Nazareth to visit Elizabeth, an elderly relative of hers. She was absent for about three months. After she returned to Nazareth, Joseph probably came to see her at once, since he had missed her for three months.

Perhaps this was what happened then: Mary said to him, “Joseph, I have something very important to tell you. I am pregnant.” “You’re what?” said Joseph. “I am pregnant. But it is not what you think, Joseph – I have not been unfaithful to you. Three months ago, God sent an angel to tell me that I will conceive and bring forth a son who shall be named Jesus. I asked the angel, ‘How can this happen since I am a virgin?’ and he said that the Holy Spirit will work a great miracle inside me. Then, to help me believe his word, he told me that my childless cousin Elizabeth has conceived a son in her old age and was already six months pregnant. That’s why I went away to see her – I had to verify that what the angel said is true. And indeed it was true – Elizabeth has just given birth to a son named John. It’s a real miracle! And now the Holy Spirit has done a miracle in me, and that’s why I am pregnant. Joseph, I know how shocked you must be by this news. I am sorry I did not tell you about this earlier, as I was not sure how you would take this news. But I hope you will not be angry with me.”

How would you have reacted to this, if you were Joseph? Here you are, counting the days to your wedding, looking forward to a life of wedded bliss and to raising up your own kids. Suddenly your beloved informs you that she is pregnant and you know that you are not the child’s father. What a crushing blow this is! Morever, she had been absent for three months – could it be that she had met someone else and had been unfaithful to you during that time? Could it be that everything she said about the angel visiting her and the Holy Spirit working a miracle in her is nothing but a story she fabricated to protect herself from accusations of infidelity? Perhaps all this was just too much for Joseph to take, and he left without saying a word.

He went home to decide what to do now. What thoughts do you think went through Joseph’s mind? “Should I proceed with the wedding or should I just call it off? What will everyone in Nazareth say when they notice that Mary is pregnant? Can I tell them that she has not been unfaithful and that child she is carrying is mine? Wouldn’t that be lying? Wouldn’t it be displeasing to God for me to condone the sin of adultery and live a lie? According to the Law that God gave to our forefathers, this sin is worthy of death and no exception should be made. But how can I bear to see my dearly beloved Mary stand before the Town council and be condemned to death? How can I bear to cast the first stone at her?”

As Joseph struggled with all these thoughts late into the night, he finally came to a decision – He will call off the wedding. But since he was legally married to her, this would mean giving her a writ of divorce and having to pay a fine for backing out of the marriage contract. And Joseph resolved in his heart that he would not accuse Mary of being unfaithful to him. He did not want to bring her before the authorities. This shows how much he cared for her as he did not wish to see her suffer. He was willing to suffer the loss of his own hopes for a happy marriage, and allow Mary to depart and live in peace. But Joseph was still troubled by what she had said about the angel’s visit to her and the Holy Spirit’s miracle causing her to conceive. She had said this with such deep conviction. “Could it be that this is really true?”

With such thoughts troubling his mind, Joseph fell asleep. While he slept, the answer came from God in the form of a dream where he was told to proceed with the wedding, because the child that Mary was bearing was really conceived by a miracle of the Holy Spirit, and when He is born, Joseph must give Him the name,Jesus. Joseph woke up, feeling greatly relieved – God has spoken to him! And he was now very glad to know four things – Firstly, Mary had not been unfaithful to him. Secondly, she had been truthful to him. Thirdly, they could be happily married after all. And fourthly, the Lord God of Israel had given them the honour to become the parents of Jesus, the One who will save His people from their sins!

Can you imagine how immensely relieved Mary must have been when Joseph told her about his dream? Can you imagine how they both must have been so thankful to God to be made the parents of such a special son? And so the wedding was held as planned, and Joseph and Mary now looked forward to the birth of Jesus. Like all expectant parents today, they would have got their home ready for the baby’s arrival. Perhaps Joseph used his carpentry skills to make a special little crib with extra-soft bedding material for Jesus to lie on. But once again, things did not turn out they way they expected. Because of a decree by the Roman emperor, Mary and Joseph had to travel all the way south to Bethlehem to be registered, and the birth contractions started soon after they arrived there. Oh dear! This is terrible. What are they going to do now?

They went to the local inn, but it was full – No room available at all! In the end Mary’s baby was delivered in an awful place: A dirty, smelly stable for animals – a real kandang kerbau, nothing like the nice maternity hospital that is a few blocks away from our church. And for a crib to place the newborn in, they had to make do with an animals’ feeding trough! I am sure it must have been tough for these young parents to endure all this. And some time later, after Joseph was able to move his wife and the baby Jesus to a decent house in Bethlehem, they had to pack their bags and run for their lives. Why? Because King Herod’s men were on their way to Bethlehem to seek the child and kill him. They had to run to a place far enough to be safe from Herod’s reach. Where would that be? Egypt!

Today parents with babies can easily travel from Bethlehem to Egypt in the comfort of an air-conditioned coach. I have travelled on that road to Egypt in such a coach when I visited Israel years ago. I remember that when I looked out the bus window I saw nothing but hot dry desert for most of the journey, and I was glad not to be out there. But that was where Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus had to travel on their way to Egypt. How stressful it must have been for them to make such a difficult trip which they hardly had time to prepare for!

And their difficulties did not end there. Some time after they had settled down in Egypt, King Herod died. Then Joseph was told in a dream to bring the family back to Israel. But when they arrived in the southern part of Israel, hoping to rest in Judea from their long trip out of Egypt, they had to leave immediately and travel all the way north to where they came from. All this uprooting and change of travel plans would have added a lot of stress to these young parents. But finally they arrived at Nazareth and things became more settled now as they were back in their home sweet home. What can we learn from this whole account of Mary and Joseph? I would like to draw two main lessons from it: Lessons on the kind of people that God uses to accomplish His divine purposes in this world.

I. God Uses Ordinary People

Mary and Joseph were not super-spiritual heroes or sinless saints. They had not gone through any special training programme to prepare them for their roles, not had they gone through a selection process. They were just ordinary people like us – people who were going through the usual stages of life: Acquiring the skills to make an honest living, taking on new responsibilities of marriage and of parenthood, and coping with various trials and difficulties of life. Like many of us, they had limited financial resources. Although Joseph was a carpenter, he didn’t own an Ikea factory. In fact, he was so poor that when he and Mary came to the Temple in Jerusalem to dedicate the baby Jesus, he could not afford to make an offering a sheep or goat. He had to make do with a pair of doves or pigeons. Such exceptions were allowed only for the poor to present as offerings.

Like most of us, Mary and Joseph made occasional mistakes. Sometimes when we travel overseas we assume that we had taken everything we needed to take. And then to our horror we discover later on that we left something important behind. Well, Mary and Joseph made such a mistake too. When they were traveling home from Jerusalem, they wrongly assumed that their 12-year old boy Jesus was somewhere in their group. After traveling for a whole day they realized that He was missing. This led to a frantic search all over Jerusalem until they found Him in the Temple of God, which was like home to Him.

Like all of us, Mary and Joseph were sinners. How do we know that? After all, the Bible does not record any of their personal sins. But we do see Mary admitting her need for salvation when she spoke to her cousin, Elizabeth, in Luke 1:46,47 – “My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.”Why would she call God her Saviour unless she herself needed salvation from sin? We see the same thing with Joseph. God’s angel told him that Jesus will save His people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). Surely Joseph would be very glad to know that the child He was to take care of would save sinners like him from their sins.

The lesson we need to learn from Mary and Joseph is this: God used ordinary people to accomplish His purposes: People who went through the same kind of changes we go through in life, people who made the same kind of mistakes we make, and people who were sinners just like us. The point is: If God could use them, He can also use us. May this lesson encourage us all to trust God to use us to accomplish His purposes. No one should every think that he or she cannot be used by God. Who knows what God can do through you?

While God uses ordinary people, not all ordinary people are used by God. Why? Because there is one important quality that makes us usable, and that is Obedience to God. This brings us to the other lesson that we can learn from Mary and Joseph:

II. God Uses Obedient People

Obedience was very evident in both Mary and Joseph. When Mary was told that she was going to conceive and have a son, her response to the Lord’s message was nothing but unqualified obedience. All that she said was, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.” (Luke 1:38)

But such obedience does not come naturally. And so it is good to find out, ‘What made Mary so ready to obey God?’ There are two clues that help to provide an answer. The first is found in the song of praise which Mary uttered to her cousin in Luke 1:46-55 – “My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name. And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation. He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away. He hath holpen his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy; As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever.”

This song of praise was not composed by a theologian, but by a young Jewish maiden of Nazareth! It reveals the intimate knowledge that Mary had of God and His Word. In it she mentions three great attributes of God – His might (v.49), His holiness (v.49) and His mercy (v.50) It also shows that Mary had a deep confidence in God to fulfill His covenant promises to Israel despite all the power, might and riches that Israel’s oppressors might have. How did an ordinary young maiden like Mary have such spiritual insight about God and such deep confidence in His covenant promises? I believe that she must have received it through the time that she spent learning the Scriptures well.

The other clue to why Mary was so obedient to God is found in two verses: The first is Luke 2:19 – “But Marykept all these things, and pondered them in her heart.” The things which Mary kept here, refers to the events that took place when Jesus was born, particularly the shepherds coming from the fields to see Him that night and relating how angels had told them that Christ was born in Bethlehem. The other verse is found in Luke 2:51 – “…but his mother kept all these sayings in her heart.” The sayings here refer to certain things that Jesus spoke which reveal His true identity as the Son of God (e.g. “…wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?”)

These verses tell us something really good about Mary – She made the effort to retain every significant word and experience she received in her heart, and she gave much thought to them. This is a good habit for us to develop – Whenever you receive lessons from God’s Word through a sermon, a Bible lesson or a devotional reading you must make an effort to retain them in your heart, and take time to reflect on them.

Please don’t treat these precious gems from God the same way you would treat any other piece of information – allowing it to have only a very superficial impact on you. They must get deep into your heart and make a permanent impression on your soul. When your heart is well-primed with God’s Word that has been received, retained and reflected upon, then it will become a lot easier for you to respond with obedience the way that Mary did.

How about Joseph? His obedience was very consistent. Every time he received instructions from God, he obeyed. When he was told to take Mary as his wife, Joseph did it without delay (Matthew 1:24). When he was told to take Mary and the child and flee to Egypt, Joseph obeyed immediately (Matthew 2:13,14). When he was told to bring them back to Israel, Joseph did so obediently (Matthew 2:20,21). And when he was told not take them to Judea because Herod’s wicked son had become its ruler, Joseph immediately changed course and headed for Galilee.

One lesson this teaches us, is that God leads us only one step at a time. He does not reveal the entire path He has planned for you, but only the next step that you should take. Though you cannot see where the path will eventually bring you, you must trust God and obey His instructions without question and without delay. Will you obey God with the same consistent, unquestioning and immediate obedience that Joseph had? We notice that in Joseph’s case, God’s leading came entirely through dreams. Today we should not expect to be led by supernatural means like dreams, visions or angelic messengers. Why? It is because God has given us His complete written Word and the Holy Spirit. These are sufficient for us to discern the direction He wants us to take.

Those of us who are husbands and fathers must take note of this. The Bible gives us clear instructions that husbands are to exercise loving leadership to their wife (Ephesians 5:23-25), and fathers are responsible to bring up their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4). Fathers are also responsible to protect their family and provide for their needs – not just material needs, but spiritual, social and emotional needs as well (1 Timothy 5:8; Psalm 68:5). If you are a husband or a father, God wants you to obey these instructions consistently, like Joseph did.

I want you to observe that every instruction that Joseph received from God pertained to the role he played as the husband of Mary and as the foster father of Jesus. Firstly, he was told to take Mary as his wife. By doing this, he became fully responsible to provide all the love and leadership that she needed. That’s a husband’s job. And because Joseph was a good husband, his wife was able to be a good mother to the holy child.

Secondly, Joseph was instructed by God to name that child, ‘Jesus.’ By doing this, he assumed the prerogatives of a foster father to Jesus, responsible to raise him up lovingly as his son, ensuring that he develops all the skills He needs for living, and obtains all the training He needs in the Law of God. That’s a father’s job.

Thirdly, when Joseph was told by God to bring the family to Egypt and then back to Israel later on, his obedience became the means by which his wife and son were protected from all harm and danger. And that is the job of a husband and father.

We conclude this message on Mary and Joseph with this thought: God has not given us the role of bringing Jesus into the world and bringing Him up to adulthood. That role was given only to Mary and Joseph as parents of Christ. But God has given us roles and responsibilities that are no less important – whether as a husband, or as a wife, or as a parent or as a child. And we should fulfill every role well because God requires obedience from us. And if we are obedient, God will use us to accomplish His purposes in this world. He knows how to use ordinary people like us to do that. May the Lord use each of us well for His glory.

John 07:1-13 - Doing the Right Thing at the Right Time

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 8am & 11am Svc, 2018-07-15

Text: John 7:1-13

One of the hardest things to do in life is making decisions that may affect our future. It may be a decision about your course of study or your career. It may be a decision to live overseas or migrate or to take up a new job offer or a new opportunity for service to God. In every decision you make you should always seek to do the right thing. But how can you know what God wants you to do? How can you avoid the nagging fear that you may be making a wrong decision – a decision that may set the course of your life on a perilous course?

To make matters worse, even when you know the right thing to do, sometimes you don’t do it at the right time. You act when you should wait, and then everything turns out badly because you had acted too soon. Or you wait when you should act, and the window of opportunity is already gone forever by the time you start to act.

One person that we can learn from is our Lord Jesus. He was always doing the right thing at the right time! Jesus began His earthly ministry at the age of 30. Then within His 3½ years of ministry He did everything that He came to do – to preach the kingdom of God, train His twelve disciples and to make an atonement for sin by His death on the cross. The Lord Jesus was always focused on doing the will of the. Father, and on doing it at the right time. One passage that shows this is John 7:1-13.

This passage relates an event that happened sometime in October of the year AD 29. This was the time of the Feast of Tabernacles. It was one of their three Temple feasts that required all male Jews to come to Jerusalem. Jesus had visited Jerusalem many times before this: You may remember that in John chapter 2 He had cleansed the Temple while He was in Jerusalem. In chapter 5 He had healed a paralyzed man at the Pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem.

But this miracle of healing greatly offended the Jewish leaders because He had done it on a Sabbath day. They also took offence at His claim to be the Son of God and at His rebuke of their sins. And so the authorities in Jerusalem began to oppose Jesus severely. They spread rumours that He was deceiving the people, and so no one dared to speak openly about Him anymore (vv.12,13).

All this forms the setting for what we see here in this passage. It would now be extremely dangerous for Jesus to go to Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles. The Jewish leaders were waiting for Jesus to come so that they could get hold of Him and kill Him (v.1). But Jesus was not at all afraid of being killed. In fact, six months later He would submit willingly to being arrested and put on trial by them, and then handed over to the Roman authorities to be crucified. And so He would go to Jerusalem, but only at the right time. This brings us now to the first significant thing that this passage reveals about Jesus:

It reveals that our Lord Jesus had a very keen understanding of when He should do anything. When His own brothers (who were actually His half-brothers, since they had the same mother but not the same father) suggested that He should go to Judaea with them and reveal Himself to the world by doing miracles there, His reply was, “My time is not yet come: but your time is alway ready.” (John 7:6) But later on, when the time was right, He did go to Judaea and perform many great miracles there – including the healing of a man who was born blind in chapter 9, and the raising of Lazarus from the dead in chapter 11. What Jesus said to them in this verse indicates that He was living by God’s time table, not theirs. 

Secondly, this passage reveals that our Lord Jesus had a keen sense of the way He should do anything. Look at vv.9,10 – “When He had said these words unto them, He abode still in Galilee. But when His brethren were gone up, then went He also up unto the feast, not openly, but as it were in secret.” Did Jesus suddenly change His mind about going to Jerusalem? No He did not. He had already decided to go there ‘not openly but in secret.’ i.e. without any fanfare or publicity.

The brothers of Jesus had a totally different agenda from Him – they wanted Him to have maximum publicity. What do you think would happen if Jesus were to go to Jerusalem with them? They would bring much public attention to Him. This is clear from what they told Him in verse 4 – “For there is no man that doeth any thing in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. If Thou do these things, shew Thyself to the world.” But doing this now would be premature and it would only bring disastrous results. Hence, our Lord wisely told them to go first, without Him. And He would then go by Himself later on.

Now, things would have been quite different if the brothers of Jesus shared the same priorities and purposes as Him – then He would have no problems going up with them to Jerusalem. But at this time they were still unbelievers. It was only later on, after Jesus had resurrected from the dead that His brothers believed in Him and truly understood His priorities and purposes (cf. Acts 1:14). In fact, two of them – James and Jude – went on to become inspired writers of the books which bear their names in our Bible. But here in John chapter 7 they were still unbelievers, and thus their attitudes and priorities in life were quite different from His. What mattered most to them was for Jesus to gain more fame, popularity and power. Then they would be able to enjoy all the benefits this would bring to them as His family members.

Can the brothers of Jesus be blamed for thinking like this? No, because they were merely following the way of the world.  This is brought out plainly in the reply that Jesus gave them in v.7 – “The world cannot hate you; but Me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil.” What Jesus said to them here indicates that He was living by the way of God which differs with the way of the world. 

And for Jesus, living by the way of God meant going up to Jerusalem despite knowing all the awful trials and suffering that would befall Him there, because He had come into this world to die for our sins on the cross. What mattered most to Him was to do only what God wants Him to do.

Is that what matters most to you too? Have you surrendered your life to do all that God wants you to do, even when it is contrary to what you want to do, or to what others would want you to do? Are you living by the way of God or by the way of the world?  How then can you know what God wants you to do? Here are six basic steps…

1. Surrender your own will. Begin by having the right attitude – the attitude that Christ had when He prayed at Gethsemane: “Not My will, but Thine be done.” (Luke 22:42) This was also Paul’s attitude when he met Christ on the road to Damascus. He said – “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6) And when God shows you what He would have you to do, be ready to respond, “O Lord, Thy will be done.” Surrendering your will means that you willingly accept whatever God has in store for you, even if it is not to your liking, and even if it goes against your own personal preference.

Sometimes when a person comes to me for biblical advice to handle a situation, I discover that what he really wants is an endorsement of what he had already planned to do. And so when my advice turns out to be different from that, he argues with me and refuses to heed my advice. If you are really sincere about wanting to discern God’s will for your life, you must not do that. You must settle it right within your heart that what you want is to know God’s will and do it. This is the first step to discern the will of God. When you have done this, you can go on to the second step which is to:

2. Ask God to direct your path and trust that He will really do so. This is based on Proverbs 3:5-6 – “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.” I want you to observe that the last part of v.6 does not say, “…He may direct thy paths” but ‘…He shall direct thy paths.’ This shows that God is more willing to give you all the guidance you need than you are to seek after it.

Listen to what He says in Psalm 32:8 – “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with Mine eye.” But please, don’t expect God to reveal His entire plan for your life. He will lead you only one step at a time. There is a good purpose for this – so that you will build a closer relationship with God by having to rely on Him to lead you all the way to the end of your life.

What you do after this step is important. People often want a quick solution. They want to get the answer from God in the shortest possible time and with the least amount of effort. So, when faced with a major decision they resort to using unscriptural methods to discern God’s will. They ask for a special sign from God (like Gideon did when he put out a sheep’s fleece overnight, Judges 6:37) or they draw lots. One method that some have used is bibliomancy. A person asks God to show His will for a decision, then he flips the Bible randomly to any page and points at random to any verse. Then he reads it to see what message it has for him.

You may have heard the story of someone whose finger landed on Matthew 27:5 (“And [Judas] … went and hanged himself.”) Not satisfied with the answer, he tried it again. This time his finger landed on Luke 10:37 (“Go, and do thou likewise.”) Imagine how shocked he was when the next verse he got through bibliomancy was John 13:27 (“That thou doest, do quickly.”) This is the wrong way to seek God’s will for your life. The right way to seek God’s will requires time and patience to carry out the next few steps:

3. Pray for wisdom. James 1:5 says – “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.” Wisdom is not the same as knowledge. Wisdom is knowledge which is rightly applied. For instance you may know the Bible quite well. But the Bible is not an almanac where you can find every specific detail about your life. So, if you are a young person seeking to know what God’s will for your life is, you won’t find it spelled out in the Bible. What you will find instead are some useful guiding principles that help to narrow down your options by eliminating all options that are morally wrong. It takes wisdom to know which guiding principles in it are most relevant to the situation you are facing, and how they can be used to make the right decision.

For instance, when choosing a life partner, your prayer for wisdom may lead you to Proverbs 31:30 (“Favour is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the LORD, she shall be praised.”) or it may lead you to 1 Samuel 16:7 (“Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.”) The principle behind these verses is the same: What God wants you to look for is not someone with good looks but one who has good character and godliness. The world puts far too much value on externals – but we must not be conformed to the world’s way of evaluating people.

And be careful how you apply God’s Word to your situation. An English pastor once promised to serve in a church in north England, but after that he received an invitation to a more attractive post in south England. As he was wondering what he should do, he read a verse from Isaiah 43:6 – “I will say to the north, Give up…” And so he thought that God will cause the northern church to terminate his prior commitment so that he might be free to take up the more attractive offer from the southern church. But this didn’t happen. When the pastor looked again at Isaiah 43:6 he saw that the next part said, “…and to the south, Keep not back:” He also realized that the verse is all about the regathering of God’s people from exile back to the Promised Land. How foolish he was to have taken it out of context!

Wisdom requires us to use our minds well. There are no short cuts. We need to ask the right questions. We need to give careful thought and prayer to each portion of Scripture. Doing all this requires time and effort. This is one reason why some are unable to discern God’s will for their lives – they are too impatient or lazy. They do not want to put in the time and effort that is needed for it. They want God’s answer to come to them instantly like a bolt out of the blue, in the form of a sign, a dream or vision or a so-called word of prophecy.

But God has given us renewed minds that are capable of evaluating several options and discerning the best one to choose. He expects us to reason things out carefully with the wisdom He gives us to make sound judgements. We better learn to use this God-given mind well to make such judgements, because one day we will have to judge angels and the world when we reign with Christ (1 Corinthians 6:2). And if we worry that our judgements are not sound enough, there is another help that God has given us – fellow believers. This brings us to the next step, which is to…

4. Consult spiritually mature believers for their advice. Proverbs 15:22 tells us – “Without counsel purposes are disappointed: but in the multitude of counsellors they are established.” Don’t choose people who will say only what you want to hear, but choose those who are willing to give advice that you may not like to hear.

Young people should not leave out one important resource you have for wise counsel: Your parents. Why? Because they usually have a lot more valuable experience, and more importantly, they have your interests at heart. Proverbs 1:8-9 says – “My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother: For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.” Other sources of Christian counsel include pastors, your BS leader or SS teacher, and good Christian books. But be careful to check that what they say is aligned with Scripture before you apply it. When you have taken this step, then you can go on to the next…

5. Carefully consider the circumstances you are in. God may reveal His will for you by opening doors of opportunity. As He said to the church of Philadelphia in Revelation 3:8 – “behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it…” But be careful –Satan can open doors too, and they are called temptations. Just because someone offers you a job which does not require any work but has an attractive compensation, this does not mean that it is God’s will for you. It may involve sinful practices and cause you to compromise your Christian testimony. Make sure that you obtain as much information as you can about any offer before you make any assessment of it.

Sometimes, there may be several options open to you. How can you know which is the one that God wants you to take? You can trace the path that God has been leading you from the past to the present – Are there any consistent indications which seem to favour one of your options above all the rest? Weigh the pros and cons of each option – write down all the possible outcomes of taking each of them. If all their outcomes are good, then look for the best one among them. But if the outcomes are all bad, then look for the option which has the least unfavourable outcome.

At this point it would be good to address the question: What if I choose the wrong option? Do you sometimes wonder whether you had made a hasty decision in the past that is not according to God’s will? Do you wonder what your life would like be today if you had chosen a different course of study or career, or if you had married a different person, or if you had lived in a different neighbourhood, or if you had attended a different church? Should this make you feel very worried that you may have missed God’s will for your life? – That you are now doomed to settle for ‘second best’?

The answer to this is found in understanding God’s sovereignty. We need not be anxious because Romans 8:28 assures us that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” All things have already been determined by God. God’s will for your life therefore includes all your personal responses and even the errors you had made in discerning His will. Everything has been taken into account. God does not have to modify His plan for your life if you happen to choose wrongly. Nothing can ever stop Him from accomplishing His purposes. Psalm 23 assures us that the Lord is our Shepherd who leads us all the way, and He lovingly ensures that we will not miss any blessing that He has planned for us to have. We can therefore say with confidence, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.” (v.6)

But someone may then ask: “If God has already known and ordained every choice I make, does this mean that I can choose any way I like, without bothering to discern God’s will?” The answer is No. You are still responsible to make the best possible choice you can make, trusting that what you choose is indeed God’s will for your life. And going through these five steps will help you to arrive at the option which is the most likely choice God wants you to make. After you have done that, you must then go on to the sixth step – and this is the one which is most subjective:

6. Be sensitive to the inner conviction of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will give you a deep-seated peace in your heart when you are in line with God’s will. Thus, you should see if choosing that particular option in question brings peace to your heart. If you have a sense of restless unease instead of peace then it may not be the choice you should make.

Paul described this in 2 Corinthians 2:12-13 – “Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ’s gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the Lord, I had no rest in my spirit, because I found not Titus my brother…” One way to tell whether the peace or unease that you feel is from the Holy Spirit is to see how long it persists. The Spirit’s conviction is not just a momentary feeling or passing impulse. It is a lasting impression that refuses to go away. It will keep coming back to you until you take notice of His conviction.

Thus we have seen the six basic steps for discerning what God wants you to do: 1. Surrender your own will; 2. Ask God to direct your path; 3. Pray for wisdom; 4. Consult spiritually mature believers; 5. Consider the circumstances you are in; and 6. Be sensitive to the Spirit’s conviction. Now we come to the most important part.

Discerning what God wants you to do is of no use until you actually do it. When God shows you His will, it is not for you to waste time deciding whether you should really carry it out or not. The language of submission is: “God has said it. That settles it. I will now do it.” Do not ever think that you are wiser than God, and try to modify His will to suit your own situation for your own convenience.

And as you commit yourself to do the will of God, please make the Lord Jesus your example for the manner in which you do it. To our Lord Jesus, doing the will of God was even more important than His own life. We have seen this revealed in our passage of study in John chapter 7 – Jesus went up to Jerusalem despite knowing all the trials and suffering He would have to face there from the Jews who hated Him. Never before has anyone ever given up so much for the sake of doing the will of God, as our Lord Jesus Christ!

If Jesus has gone through so much to do God’s will to save you from sin and eternal death, is it too much for you to do God’s will instead of your own will? Perhaps there may be someone here who is still not saved. Well, God’s will for you right now is that you turn from your sins without delay and turn to Jesus alone for salvation. This is the right thing to do, and there is no better time to do it than right now. Many people have put off doing this until it is too late – time runs out for them!

If you are already saved, will you commit yourself now to do the will of God for your life? God has a special purpose for each of us to fulfill in life, which will contribute towards His grand eternal plan. Living the Christian life means finding out that particular purpose He has set for you, and then fulfilling it. You must live your life with a sense of mission. There must be a good reason why the Lord has placed you where you are right now, why He has given you unique gifts and bestowed you with certain abilities. Will you commit yourself to find out what He wants you to accomplish with all these things? Will you seek to do the right thing at the right time? May the Lord speak to our hearts as we ponder over this.

John 08:48-59 - Do You Honour Christ?

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 10.45am Svc, 2009-04-19

Text: John 8:48-59

If you have been following the news lately, you may have read about the dramatic rescue of a ship's captain last Sunday from Somali pirates who had held him hostage in a lifeboat for 3 days. Besides his family, the ones who were most happy and relieved to hear of the rescue of Captain Richard Philipps were 19 crew members of his ship. He was their hero because he had surrendered himself to the treacherous pirates in order to save all of them. He was given a hero's welcome when he returned home 2 days ago. Philipps was quick to disclaim the honour that was lavished on him, saying that the real heroes are the U.S. Navy and those who had rescued him and brought him home. But there is no doubt that he will go down in naval history as a good captain who was willing to sacrifice his own life for the sake of his men. 

Do you know that we have a Captain who was willing to sacrifice Himself to save us? This Captain of our salvation is none other than our Lord Jesus Christ (cf. Hebrews 2:10). If not for Him, we would all perish in the eternal fires of hell. He is truly our great hero who gave His own precious life to die on the cross for our sins. What this means is that we now stand eternally indebted to Him. No one deserves more honour from us than our Lord Jesus. We should certainly honour Him most abundantly. Our lives should be lived for His glory and honour, so that the name of Jesus will always be exalted in us and through us. 

But what does it really mean to honour Christ? What are the full implications of honouring Christ on the way we live? For some people, honouring Christ merely means regarding Him as one among many other honoured people. Do you know that many who claim to honour Christ are merely paying lip-service to Him? They claim that they know Him and they sing the most glorious praises of His name, but their lives and conduct are as worldly and sinful as those who do not know Christ! In fact more dishonour is being brought to the name of Christ by those who claim to know Him than by those who don't know Him at all. This is one reason why many non-Christians do not want to listen to the Gospel any more - they have been terribly stumbled by Christians who dishonour Christ in their lives. As we look at God's Word this morning, I would like all of us to take a close look at ourselves to see if we are truly honouring Christ in our lives. From our study of John 8:48-59I would like to suggest that there are 4 questions that can help us to determine if we truly honour Christ. 

I. Do You Assess His Person and Character Correctly? (vv.48-50)

You may remember that in a previous sermon 4 weeks ago, we saw that Jesus was speaking to a group of Jews who were looking for an opportunity to accuse Him, arrest Him and kill Him (7:1,25). When these Jews claimed that Abraham was their father, Jesus challenged that claim by showing the vast difference between them and Abraham in their treatment of Him. Then the Jews claimed that God was their Father. But Jesus showed that this really was an empty claim because they do not love Him, the Son whom God had sent to them. Finally Jesus revealed who their spiritual father really was. He said to them very boldly, 'Ye are of your father the devil' (v.44). This was certainly not the nicest thing to say to them, but it had to be said for their own good. What they needed most was to humbly accept the truth of their spiritual paternity and to seek God's help to change it.

But instead of doing that, these Jews now hit back at Him: 'You have the cheek to say that we are sons of the Devil. Well, listen to this - WE say that you are a Samaritan and that you have a devil in you.' This was not merely an attempt to insult Jesus with the most horrible names they could come up with at the spur of the moment. It was something that they had deliberately thought out. We see this in the words of v.48, 'Say we not well that thou are a Samaritan, and hast a devil?' In other words they claimed to have rightly assessed Jesus to be a Samaritan and to have a devil. 

Calling someone a 'Samaritan' does not necessarily mean that he comes from Samaria. It was a term of reproach that could be applied to any Jew who was deviant in doctrine or who was disloyal to the Jewish nation. The other insult - the one about having a devil - was not new. In John 7:20 when Jesus asked the crowd why they sought to kill Him, they replied, 'Thou hast a devil: who goeth about to kill thee?' The term 'thou hast a devil' was therefore meant to imply that Jesus was a demented or insane person. So what the Jews said in v.48 reveals their claim to have rightly assessed Jesus to be a deviant, disloyal and demented Jew. Hence they think they do not need to take whatever He says or does seriously. But by doing this they not only discredited all His words and His works. They also dishonoured Him.

Today there are also people who make the same claim: They think they have rightly assessed Jesus but end up dishonouring Him. And although they have not gone to the same extent as these Jews who said that Jesus was deviant, disloyal and demented, the dishonour they have done to Him is no less serious. For instance, there are cults that rob Jesus of His deity, like the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons. And many today believe that Jesus was nothing more than a great teacher or prophet. Three years ago, 'The Da Vinci Code' by Dan Brown popularized the utterly horrendous notion that Jesus secretly married Mary Magdalene and fathered a child by her, and that this was skillfully covered up by the Church. At the time that the Da Vinci Code movie was released, there was also much publicity about a newly-discovered Gospel - 'the Gospel of Judas' - which grossly misrepresented Jesus as a bringer of higher knowledge who constantly laughs scornfully at the ignorance of his disciples. These are just a small sampling of the many perversions and misjudgments of the character and person of Christ that are circulating the globe today. Please understand this: They are utterly dishonouring to Him. Jesus says to those who hold or perpetrate them as He said to the Jews in v.49 'Ye do dishonour me.' If you entertain any unbiblical notions, ideas and theories about Christ, you dishonour Christ. If your concept of Him is based on some legend, fable or story that you read outside the Bible, you dishonour Christ. If you want to honour Christ, your assessment of His character and person must not be based on what you or others think He is. It must be based solely and entirely on who He really is, as revealed in the Scriptures. So the first question that can help to determine whether you truly honour Christ is, 'Do you assess His person and character correctly?' The second question is:

II. Do you Accept and keep His Word reverently? (vv.51-53)

When the Lord Jesus speaks, do you pay attention and listen carefully? Do you accept whatever He says as God's authoritative truth? Do you respond to it with trust and obedience? Do you say, 'Jesus says it. That settles it. I believe it'? Or do you doubt what He says? Now, if you doubt and question what Jesus says, as the Jews in our passage did, you dishonour Him. Please look at what Jesus said in v.51 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.' This is one of the most precious promises in the Scriptures, for it deals with the affliction that is most distressing to all mankind - the inevitable end called death! 

There is surely no heart that has never been weighed down or troubled with the thought of death. Are we not reminded of death everyday? - death by earthquake and fire, death by political rioting and violence, death by mass food poisoning, and the death of friends and loved ones by old age and terminal cancer. Within the past 2 weeks alone, I conducted one funeral and attended two wakes. 

If it were not for this amazing promise of eternal life from Jesus, such events would only spell utter futility and hopelessness for all of us, for there would be absolutely nothing good to hope for beyond death. But the promise of Jesus has turned death into a passageway to a better life. Now, those who trust in Jesus to keep this promise will still die like everyone else, but they will not see eternal death, and all fear will be removed from the process of dying. As Stephen breathed his last breath, he saw Jesus standing in heaven and he said, 'Lord Jesus receive my spirit' (Acts 7:56,59). When Lazarus the beggar died, angels carried up up to heaven (Luke 16:22) How blessed it is to die the death of the righteous (Numbers 23:10)! And this promise of Jesus comes with the greatest possible assurance from Him, for the literal translation of v.51 goes like this, 'If a man keep my saying, he shall certainly never see death for ever.'

What amazes us is that Jesus said this not to those who loved Him and followed Him, but to those who hated Him and were fully against Him! It was the most undeserved offer of eternal life to the Jews who had just dishonoured Him so blatantly. But it indicated that there was still hope left for them, if only they would change from rejecting to accepting everything He had said to them. But what did the Jews do with this precious promise? Verses 52 and 53 reveal their awful response. Not only did they reject it, they used it as ammunition for another vicious attack on Jesus! They said, 'Now we know that thou hast a devil. Abraham is dead, and the prophets; and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death. Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead? and the prophets are dead: whom makest thou thyself?' Can you see how they misinterpreted the words of Jesus? They assumed that the word 'death' in His statement refers to physical death. Since Abraham and all the Old Testament prophets had died, there is no way that Jesus can keep anyone from dying without being greater than Abraham and the prophets. Therefore they concluded that He is mad. 

I trust that you can see what terrible dishonour these Jews had done to our Lord by twisting His wonderful words of life for their own ends. The priceless promise of eternal life had been offered to them so graciously, but they spurned it. They were just like the proverbial swine who trample the most precious pearls under their feet and then attack the one who had cast the pearls before them (Matthew 7:6). How can the wonderful words of life from Jesus be treated like this? 

Before we judge these Jews, let us inquire whether we are doing the very same thing. If we truly want to honour Christ we must not be careless in the way we treat His Word. Firstly, we must listen attentively when He speaks. Nothing is more dishonouring to a speaker than to have his audience pay little or no attention to what he is saying to them. He might as well not speak to them at all. Secondly, we must take the trouble to understand accurately what Christ means by what He speaks. And if we don't understand what He means, then we should bother to ask and enquire until we are sure that we do not misconstrue His words and make the wrong conclusions. 

Perhaps you have dishonoured Christ by failing to treat His Word with reverence. Perhaps you have not been listening to it attentively. You read the words in your Bible, but nothing registers in your mind because it is pre-occupied with other thoughts. And perhaps when you come across something in the Bible that you do not fully understand, you don't bother to search and find out its meaning. Or worse still, perhaps you allow your imperfect understanding to lead you to misconstrue His Words, and you end up teaching others what Jesus Himself never taught. Please consider your ways and do not dishonour Christ by any of these means.

Now, these 2 steps that we have just seen - listening to His Word attentively and understanding His Word accurately - are essential to honouring Christ, but the honour is still incomplete until we keep His Word actively. In verse 51 Jesus said, 'If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.' The word 'keep' here does not merely mean safely keeping something that one has been entrusted with. It means observing it, fulfilling it, and obeying it. And this is really the most important part of your response to the Word of Christ. The book of James says that if you are only a hearer of the Word, you deceive your own self (James 1:22). You must be a doer of the Word and not just a hearer. 

And this applies especially to the unsaved. Perhaps there may be someone in our midst who has not yet come to Jesus Christ for salvation. If you are that person, please don't stop at just hearing His precious promise - 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.' (v.51) Listen to the voice of Jesus speaking to your heart. He is calling you to do something: He wants you to receive eternal life from Him by turning to Him in faith and humble repentance. Without doing this, you will see not only physical death but eternal death as well, because your sins will bring you under God's condemnation. But Jesus is able to save you from eternal death because He died on the cross, in the place of sinners. 

Now He calls you to turn to Him. Will you keep His saying? Will you obey Him and have the eternal life only He can give? Please make no delay in turning to Christ for salvation, for it does Him no honour to make Him wait too long for your response. Come to Him right now, if you believe that Jesus deserves the honour He claims from all men. And the honour that Jesus claims, dear friends, is nothing but the greatest honour we can give. This leads us now to the third question that can help us to determine if we truly honour Him:

III. Do you Ascribe all Greatness to Him?

Please look at v.54 of our scripture passage. Here Jesus answers the Jews' question, 'Whom makest thou thyself?' He says that it is God the Father who honours Him. This glorious truth is fully elaborated in Philippians 2:9-11 which tells us that, 'God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.'

If you confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father, then please regard Him as the greatest person in your life - greater than your favourite leader or teacher, greater than your favourite soccer player, actor or singer, greater than your closest friend, your parent, spouse or child, and most of all, greater than yourself. Christ must be Lord of all, otherwise He is not your Lord at all. The presence of any competitor or rival to the highest place in your heart dishonours Him. 

Now, the Jews who opposed Jesus thought very differently from this. From what they said in v.53 it is obvious that they held Abraham in the highest esteem. No one other than God could be greater than Abraham. In fact the Jews still revere him now as the beginning of the Jewish people. Hence the slightest suggestion that anyone is greater than Abraham made them bristle with rage. And it was their excessive esteem for Abraham that ultimately prevented them from accepting Jesus. 

Hence, Jesus had to correct their thinking by revealing what He was to Abraham. Firstly, He said in v.56, 'Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day.' Jesus and Abraham had met and known each other personally. We had seen in a previous message that this encounter took place in Genesis chapter 18 just before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. It was one of the pre-incarnate appearances of Christ. By saying that Abraham rejoiced to see His day, Jesus showed the Jews that He deserved at least equal esteem with Abraham from them. But what was their response to this? It was one of scorn and disbelief - 'Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?' (v.57)

If this was too hard for them to accept, they would definitely not be able to accept what Jesus said next 'Verily, verily I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.' (v.58) This implies that Jesus deserves to be esteemed not merely as a friend of Abraham, but as the God of Abraham. The words 'I AM' in this verse is actually the name God used to reveal Himself to Moses at the burning bush in Exodus chapter 3. (Exodus 3:13-14 'And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them? And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.') The name 'I AM' is a very unique name. it speaks of God's eternal existence. It tells us that from everlasting to everlasting He is God (cf. Psalm 90:2). Therefore the saying, 'Before Abraham was, I am,' was a direct claim of Jesus that He is God. 

If anyone should ever tell you that Jesus never claimed to be God, you must show him this verse, John 8:58, for it is the most direct claim to deity made by Jesus in the four gospels. And any Jew who heard what Jesus said in this verse would understand that Jesus was saying, 'I am God.' That is why the very next verse says that they took up stones to cast at Him.

They thought that He was only a man and therefore His claim to be God makes Him guilty of blasphemy. The irony of it all is that this claim was true, but because of their spiritual blindness and refusal to regard anyone to be greater than Abraham, they simply could not accept it, and they ended up dishonouring the One they should have honoured. 

Let us be careful not to do the same thing to Christ. If you truly want to honour Christ, please do not let your esteem for anything or anyone in your life become greater than your esteem for Him. Christ must always have the highest place or pre-eminence in your life. All things must be placed below Him. You should ascribe all greatness to Him alone, and not only that: You should also aspire to see His day, as Abraham did, according to v.56 'Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.' From this we derive the fourth and final question that can help us to determine whether we truly honour Christ:

IV. Do you Aspire to See His Day with Gladness?

Awhile ago we saw that the Jews of Jesus' day took up stones to cast at Him. Their hostility to Him had been growing throughout the events in chapters 7 and 8 of John. Initially they tried to trap Him and arrest Him. They got into some heated debates with Him, and then, as we saw earlier in this sermon, they used name-calling on Him. But now for the very first time, they resorted to using violence - by attempting to stone Him to death. About six months later they would succeed in doing their worst to Jesus, putting Him to death on the cross. Compare all this with the way that Abraham responded to Christ. Jesus said, 'Abraham rejoiced to see my day.' Even before his encounter with the pre-incarnate Christ recorded in Genesis 18, Abraham already knew that the Saviour of the world would come one day as his own descendant. God had revealed to him that all the families of the earth would be blessed in him (Genesis 12:3). 

And after his encounter with Christ, Abraham was given a dramatized preview of the work of Christ, when God commanded him to sacrifice his son Isaac on Mount Moriah. Just when Abraham was about to plunge the knife into his beloved son, God stopped him and commanded him to sacrifice in Isaac's place, a ram which was caught in a nearby bush (Genesis 22:1-13). Abraham's joy and sense of anticipation must have increased with each new glimpse he received of the day of Christ. 

We can only imagine how glad Abraham must have been when the birth, life, death and resurrection of Christ finally took place on earth, and Abraham beheld all these events from heaven. 

This kind of rejoicing, gladness and eager anticipation is really most honouring to Christ, for it reveals a heart that is on fire with love and desire for Him. And the question we should ask is whether we have this kind of gladness and joy when we think of Christ. Does the very mention of His name thrill your soul? Is He the One that your heart yearns for? Do you aspire to see Him face to face? How much do you long for that blessed day when Jesus will return to earth with the clouds of heaven and take you home to be with Him forever? If you aspire to see the day of Christ with the greatest delight, you honour Christ; you truly honour Christ! 

But on the other hand, if you have little or no feelings for Him, or if you have no delight at the prospect of seeing Him, you do dishonour Christ. Or worse still, if you have grown weary with Him and you wish that your life could be rid of Him and of His claims to lordship, then beware that His words in v.49 are the words He wants you to hear today 'You do dishonour me.'

In today's message we have seen that the Jews dishonoured the Lord Jesus because they had failed in at least four ways - (1) They did not assess His person and character correctly, concluding that He was a Samaritan and that He had a devil; (2) They did not accept and keep His Word reverently, but doubted it and used it against Him; (3) They did not ascribe all greatness to Him, because of their greater esteem for Abraham, and (4) They did not aspire to see His day with gladness, but tried to stone Him instead. 

We have also seen how utterly unreasonable it is for us to treat Christ with dishonour, since God has highly exalted Him and given Him a name above all names; since Christ speaks such wonderful words of life to us; since Christ is none other than the great I AM, and since Christ came into the world to redeem us and He will come again to receive us. Let us all resolve therefore, that with God's help we will honour Christ in everything we do, in every choice we make, in every word we speak, in every thought we think and in every breath we take.

John 09:1-41 - Was Blind, But Now I See

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 8am Svc, 2009-05-17

Text: John 9:1-41

One item that has been in the news lately is the fast-spreading H1N1 flu, which has claimed 70 lives, infected over 8,000 people and has spread to 39 countries. It is difficult to stop this virus from spreading because a person may be infected without knowing it. By the time his symptoms have developed and become full-blown, he may have unknowingly passed the virus on to hundreds of people who did not have the slightest inkling that they were in close contact with a H1N1 flu carrier. We must be thankful that the mortality rate is only 0.16 %, though the authorities fear that the virus may become a deadly pandemic later on.

Do you know that sin is just like a virus? Sin is the most deadly pandemic of all time, because it affects the whole human race and brings eternal death. Its virulence, morbidity and mortality rates are all 100%. But not everyone takes it seriously. Sin is like the H1N1 virus: Not everyone who has it knows that he has it. Why? Because many are spiritually blind to their own sinful condition and to their dire need of salvation. According to 2 Corinthians 4:4, '[Satan] hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.' Even though truths concerning God's existence and power are so evident in the wonders of nature, they can't see them. Even though truths concerning God's mercy and grace to sinners are clearly expressed in His Word, they cannot perceive them. They are blind to them and worse than that, they do not even know that they are blind. 

But we who have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ have our eyes open to the wonderful truths that God has revealed, and by God's grace we can see how sinful we really are. This morning as we continue studying the Gospel according to John, we will find 3 things that we need to perceive well: and they are given in your outline as: I. The wonderful works of God that were manifested in Jesus Christ, II. The amazing change Christ has wrought in your life, and III. Your own need for spiritual knowledge and discernment. 

I. The wonderful works of God that were manifested in Jesus Christ (1-7) This chapter describes how Jesus healed a blind man, so that he was able to open his eyes and see. If you were a blind person and had never seen anything but darkness before, and then all of a sudden your eyes are opened and you behold things for the first time in your life, how would you respond? You would feel as if somebody has turned on the light in your life, and you would be quite overwhelmed with your new sense of sight. 

In all of known history, no one has ever had the power to give instant sight to the blind except our Lord Jesus Christ. And the Scriptures record that He did this more than 7 times in his 3-year ministry on earth. There was never an instance where Christ was not able to restore sight to a blind person who was brought to Him. Today even with the latest developments in ophthalmology not every blind person can have restored eyesight. Those with eye conditions like cataracts and glaucoma are able to see again after surgery, medication and rest. 

But even the greatest eye specialist in this world is not able to give sight to those who are born blind (which make up 5% of all who are visually impaired). This is beyond medical science and it requires nothing less than God's power. And this is exactly what took place here in John chapter 9. Look at v.1 'And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth.' The verses that follow describe how this man who was born blind was able see by the power of Christ. 

Do you know what this involves? - It requires nothing less than the power to create out of nothing. We know that Jesus has this power because according to John 1:3 'all things were made by Him; and without Him was not any thing made that was made.' A person who is born blind does not have a full set of components that are necessary for sight. In order to give sight to this man, Christ had to create all the missing components of sight - eyes with a perfectly functioning retina, lens, iris, finely coordinated muscles, and a fine network of optic nerves that conveys images to the brain, together with all the complex circuits in the occipital lobe of the brain found at the back of our head - all these had to be present in perfect functioning order if the man was to see anything. And the healing that Christ performed was most excellent. When the man came back seeing he did not see blur images and shadows. He could see things sharply and clearly with perfect 6/6 vision, as we would say today. 

Making the blind to see is just one of the many wonderful works of God that Christ manifested. And like all of God's wonderful works this one should evoke a spontaneous response from us, as we say, 'O Lord, how great Thou art!' The man who was healed worshipped the Lord Jesus at the end. What about us? The more and more we study the life of Christ the more we should respond with heartfelt, sincere worship. Let us give Him all the best praise for the marvelous works He has done. For such wonderful works as creation and redemption He surely deserves the fullest praise, glory and honour. And we who are saved have even better reasons for giving ourself in fullest worship to God - because we are been the objects of these wonderful works. If you have truly believed in Christ, you have personally experienced a wonderful miracle wrought by God, which is:

II. The amazing change Christ has wrought in your life (8-34) This is the second point of our message. You may notice that as the blind man who was healed began to understand more and more what Christ had done for him, he was changed. In the end he regarded Jesus as being worthy of his worship. In v.38 we see him rendering unsolicited worship to Jesus spontaneously. His physical healing led to his spiritual healing. The opening of his physical eyes had resulted in the opening of his spiritual eyes. 

How did this change happen? Let us try to re-live this amazing account. This man was helpless - he was born blind and was resigned to being blind forever. He sat begging near the Temple in Jerusalem everyday, pitied by those who passed by and depending on others to help him. Never in all his thoughts did he imagine that one day his eyes would be opened. But that day came unexpectedly. Jesus came to Him, rubbed some wet clay into his eyes, and told him to go and wash in the pool of Siloam. By faith the blind man obeyed. Now it must have taken a lot of effort for a blind person to find his way to this pool which is on the southern end of the city. He had to grope his way through the busy streets. If he did not have faith in the words of Jesus, he might have given up. Then when he finally reached the pool and washed off the clay he opened his eyes, and for the very first time in his life he could see the light of day, he could enjoy beholding the wonderful sight of all things around him. 

This is actually a picture of how we were saved. Before our salvation we were just like that blind man. We were helpless in our state of sin. We were spiritually blind and incapable of doing anything to change our sinful condition. How pitiful our condition was, before the Lord saved us. But one day Jesus came into our lives and His command went forth 'Go wash yourself at the fountain filled with blood - the blood that I shed at the cross.' By faith we obeyed Him. We put our trust in Him, and when our souls were washed we immediately experienced the removal of our sins. For the first time in our lives we could see and understand the truth, we could enjoy the wonderful delights of our relationship with God. And we can now testify like the blind man did in v.25 'One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see.' John Newton took these words and used them in his famous hymn 'Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.' 

Coming back to our text, we see how the Lord's amazing grace caused the man to see one thing more clearly than anyone else around him - Who Jesus really is. And in the end, he was the only one who worshipped Jesus. The experience of being healed and the intense questioning that he went through after that, made him realize who Jesus really is. At his first encounter with Jesus he had only heard His voice and felt the tender touch of His hands applying the wet clay to his eyes. When he came back seeing, Jesus had gone. 

Look at v.11 - When people asked him how he was healed all he could say at this point was that 'a Man called Jesus did it to me.' Perhaps he was still too overwhelmed with his new ability to see, that he had not fully grasped its implications. Now look at v.17 - after further questioning, it dawned upon him that Jesus must be more than a man - he now said, 'He is a prophet.' Look now at v.33 - When the religious authorities tried to convince him that Jesus could not have healed him, he became even bolder to reply to them, 'If this man were not of God, he could do nothing! 

Do you see how he had progressed in his understanding of who Jesus was? - no longer a man, no longer a prophet, but a special emissary from God. Look now at v.35 and 36 - When the man was cast out by the Jews, he was ready to confess that Jesus was not just a man, not just a prophet, and not just a special emissary from God, but the Son of God, the long-awaited Messiah of the Jews.

Finally in v.38 this man said to Jesus, 'Lord, I believe' and he worshipped Him. He now fully acknowledged Jesus as his Lord and master and more than that - as being God Himself who alone is worthy of worship. The Jews are careful not to render worship to any man as this would violate the 2nd commandment. If anyone would ever ask him why - Why do you worship Jesus and call Him Lord, he would be able to say, 'Because I have personally experienced His amazing grace - I was blind and without any hope at all, but now, through Him, I see!'

Perhaps there might be someone here who has never experienced that amazing grace in your life. Are your eyes still closed? Are you still blind to who Jesus really is? Perhaps you do not think that you are blind. And you have been fooling yourself into thinking that you can see, when you really cannot see who Jesus is. In our passage there were many people who were like that. They did not end up acknowledging Christ as their Lord. They did not worship him, unlike the man born blind who did. Let us consider who these people were, and as we do that I hope you will see: 

III. Your own need for spiritual knowledge and discernment (35-41) This is the third a.d final point of our message. There are altogether 3 identifiable groups mentioned here: (1) The neighbours of the blind man, (2) the Pharisees, and (3) the parents of the blind man. What was it that kept each of these groups from seeing who Jesus really is? 

Let us consider the first group -the neighbours. Look at vv.8-12. 'The neighbours therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind, said, Is not this he that sat and begged? Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am he.' What made the man's neighbours so blind was their desire to seek a natural explanation for the miracle. In their minds it was impossible for a man born blind to see. So how did some of them explain it? It has to be a different man, but one who happens to look exactly like the blind man. Perhaps he had a twin brother who looked just like him, but was not blind. This healing was therefore a hoax, a fraud, a cruel trick rigged up to look like a miracle. So they asked the man for proof 'Where is he that healed you%sF Show him to us!' And he said, 'I don't know.' And perhaps they concluded that there must be something fishy about this if the man cannot show them the One who had healed him. 

This is perhaps the main reason why many today still refuse to accept the claims of Christ on their lives. They are blinded by their own personal rejection of anything that is miraculous or supernatural. They are convinced that they already know everything there is to know. Instead of believing in the miracle of Christ's resurrection from the dead, they try to explain that the disciples had stolen his body from the tomb and had made up stories that they had seen Jesus alive from the dead. But because they think they know everything, they remain totally blind to the life-giving truth of the gospel. What they need now is the work of God's grace to open their spiritual eyes, so that they may be able to see how utterly lacking they are in spiritual knowledge and discernment. As long as you insist that you know everything, you will not be able to learn and benefit from God's teaching and instruction. 

Beside the neighbours of the blind man, there was another group in our passage that also remained blind to the implications of the miracle. But their blindness stemmed from a very different reason from the neighbours of the blind man. It was a deliberate blindness, based on prejudice against Christ. Look at vv.13-16 'They brought to the Pharisees him that aforetime was blind. And it was the sabbath day when Jesus made the clay, and opened his eyes. Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see. Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day.'

These Pharisees knew allkabout Jesus well, because they had been following His ministry and works closely from the time He began. Earlier in our study of the Gospel of John, we had seen that when Jesus healed the paralyzed man at the Bethesda pool, in chapter 5, the Pharisees already began to oppose Him, not because of the miracle itself, but because He had supposedly broken the law of the Sabbath day by commanding the man to take up his bed and walk. But Jesus was not a Sabbath-breaker. He had only refused to comply with their man-made rules about the Sabbath. God's commandment only forbade Jews to work for a living on that day. The Pharisees were the ones who added on many unnecessary restrictions to the Sabbath law. Even the most ins)gnificant actions were forbidden. So when Jesus chose to heal the blind man by making clay and applying it to his eyes, they were greatly offended and they turned against Him. 

Jesus could easily have healed the blind man without applying any clay to his eyes. He could have healed him by just speaking a word, 'Open your eyes and see!' as He had done when he healed other blind men. And the Pharisees would have had no problems with that. But to them even the act of wetting some dust from the ground to make a little clay with one's hands is forbidden on the Sabbath, because that is what a potter does in his work of making pots. This shows us that the reason why the Pharisees failed to acknowledge and worship Jesus is that they were prejudiced against Him. They had judged Him even before He proved Himself. Therefore to them, everything He did could never be right, even if it was clearly a great miracle. To them, Jesus could never be the Messiah because by their definition He had broken the Law and He was therefore a sinner. 

Unknown to them it was not they who had judged Jesus, but rather, it was Jesus who had brought judgment on them through this event. In v.39 Jesus reveals, 'For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.' That one act of making clay to heal the blind man was purposely done to bring out the dark spiritual blindness of these Pharisees which was due to nothing but their own personal prejudice against Christ. 

Sadly there are many people today who reject Christ for the very same reason: just because what He was and what He did does not fit into their own preconceived ideas or concepts of what the Saviour of the world should be and should do. Some are looking for a Saviour who will give them everything they want and will demand nothing from them. Others are looking for a Saviour who will recognize and praise their religious works of piety and devotion.

Perhaps there may be someone here who is like that. As long as you allow yourself to be prejudiced against Christ based on your own ideas of what He should be, and on human standards of judgment, you will remain blind to the wonderful truths about Him. If you do that, then according to v.41, your sin remains, no matter how much you claim to see the truth. What you need to do, is to simply and humbly receive Jesus as He is, without judging Him at all, but recognizing that He alone can meet your great need for spiritual knowledge and discernment. Then, you will receive sight and your eyes will be opened.

In our passage there was a third group of people who did not end up worshipping Christ. But what was it that kept them from having their spiritual eyes opened? It was not a refusal to believe that a miracle had really happened - because they were very closely related to the man and they knew that he was really healed. Neither was it due to any prejudice they had against Christ. 

Let us look at v.20-22 'His parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind: But by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him: he shall speak for himself. These words spake his parents, because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already, that if any man did confess that he was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue.' Why did the man's parents not join him in acknowledging and worshipping Christ for the wonderful way in which He had healed their son? After all they were the ones who hadkraised him up in anguish from birth because of his blindness. Should they not be most happy that their blind son could see? Yes. But there was an obstacle in the way - an obstacle that was so huge and so intimidating to them that they chose to remain blind to the implications of the miracle - it was their fear of the Jews. 

Did you know that fear can make a person blind? Sometimes people see something very significant, but because they are afraid of the consequences of acknowledging it, they look the other way and pretend that they had never seen it. It is so much easier and more comfortable and convenient, to pretend that it is not there. There are some people who do not want to take the step of acknowledging Christ as their Saviour and Lord, because of what others would think of them if they did. 

Perhaps there may be someone here like that. Per(aps you come from a very staunch non-Christian family that has faithfully kept up all the religious rituals and traditions for many generations. And then all of a sudden you are confronted with the truth of the Gospel and you have to decide what to do with it. But when you think about committing yourself to believing only in Jesus Christ, you realize that if you do that you will face the most awful opposition at home and even persecution from your loved ones. You imagine the angry words expressed by your parents, your siblings and spouse who accuse you of being the black sheep of the family. The thought of being labelled as a troublemaker or traitor makes you tremble. It makes you afraid to acknowledge the truth. And then you ask yourself, Is it worthwhile going through all that? If you allow your fear to overcome you, then you will say 'No' and continue on in life pretending you had never seen the truth. But you are only fooling and deceiving yourself. You are living a lie.

Please do not allow fear to make you blind to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is worthwhile to go through some emotional crises for a while and even to be cast out of your home for Jesus' sake, because you will not be left alone. Jesus Himself will give you the courage you need, the strength you need, the assurance and comfort you need. 

Just look at what happened to the man in our passage. Look at how different he was from his parents. Surely he knew, like his parents, that by confessing Jesus to be the Son of God, he would be excommunicated by the Jews, he would lose all his friends, and would be branded as an outcast of society. This could have been a frightening prospect to one who had just received his sight and was ready to begin a new life with the same capacities as all normal people. And yet he was willing to give up all that for the truth and for the sake of the One who had touched his life and opened his eyes. Here was a person who was true to his convictions, who refused to take the easy way out or to deceive himself. And for that he was cast out and was alone, rejected of men. 

But look at what happened in v.35: 'Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God?' The Lord Himself came to minister to him. Now the man did not know at first that it was Jesus who came to him, because he had never seen Jesus but had only heard His voice and felt His gentle hands rubbing his eyes with wet clay. So he responded in v.36, 'Who is He, Lord, that I might believe in Him?' Can you sense the earnestness and anticipation in his tone? 'I need to see Him, I need to trust Him, I need to commit my life to Him and follow Him, and learn from Him if only I can find Him.' What joy must have filled his heart when Jesus said, 'It is He that talketh with thee' 'I am the one!' That, to him, was more than enough to compensate for all the anguish of being cut off from society: To behold and worship His Saviour, His Lord. One item that has been in the news lately is the fast-spreading H1N1 flu, which has claimed 70 lives, infected over 8,000 people and has spread to 39 countries. It is difficult to stop this virus from spreading because a person may be infected without knowing it. By the time his symptoms have developed and become full-blown, he may have unknowingly passed the virus on to hundreds of people who did not have the slightest inkling that they were in close contact with a H1N1 flu carrier. We must be thankful that the mortality rate is only 0.16 %, though the authorities fear that the virus may become a deadly pandemic later on.

As we come to the end of our message, I would like you to consider how you can apply God's Word to your life. And to do please ask the same question that is found in v.40 - 'Are we blind also?' Are you blind to the wonderful works that God has wrought through Christ like this healing of the blind man? Are you blind to the amazing change that Christ has wrought in our own lives? Or are you blind to our own need for spiritual knowledge and discernment, because of your pride, or prejudice, or fear? If you can see these things, you will worship God like that man did. Let us therefore seek to see them clearly and not choose to remain blind to them. For as John Heywood said, 'There are none so blind as those who will not see' (1546, English writer).

John 08:37-47 - Who Is Your Father?

By Rev Charles Seet

Preached at / Published Life BPC 10.45am Service, 2009-03-22

Text: John 8:37-47

The title of this message may sound like a question from a paternity suit. Determining who the father of a child is can be done quite easily today without great expense because of the availability of DNA testing. DNA is the genetic fingerprint found in every cell of one's body. It therefore settles the matter of paternity once and for all and is accepted as conclusive evidence in any court of law. 

But in days of yore, before such scientific tests ever existed, it was not easy to determine who the biological father of a child was, whenever such questions arose. People could only rely on similarities in a person's appearance. And so, if a child bore a strong resemblance to a certain man, that man may soon find himself entangled in a paternity suit! But external resemblance is not a reliable indicator of paternity, because many people look almost exactly like someone they are totally unrelated to. 

During my army days many years ago, I had a platoon mate who was the spitting image of Minister Mentor Lee, except that he was a lot younger. Everywhere he went, heads would turn to look at him and I could tell that he had grown accustomed to it and enjoyed it. But the moment he opened his mouth and spoke, all resemblance was gone - his broken English spoken with a strong Hokkien accent, removed any remote possibility that he might be a very important son.

While resemblance may not be a good indicator of physical paternity, it is actually a reliable indicator of spiritual paternity. When a person becomes a child of God, he will soon begin to manifest traits in his conduct and character that make him resemble his heavenly Father. Therefore if someone claims to be a child of God but he bears no resemblance to his heavenly Father, his claim is not true. Who, then, is his father? This is a question that we need to consider for ourselves, as the consequences of having the wrong father are quite devastating.

This morning we are going to study a passage of Scripture that teaches how to determine one's spiritual paternity. In our previous sermon on John's Gospel we had seen that Jesus was speaking to the crowds at Jerusalem at the end of the Feast of Tabernacles. But as He spoke to them a group of Jews began to oppose him and debate with Him. They were the Pharisees who were looking for an opportunity to accuse Him, arrest Him and kill Him (7:1,25). Therefore when Jesus said in v.32, 'And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free,' they retorted, 'We be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free?' (v.33) 

I. Is Abraham Your Father? (vv.37-40)

Please take note of the reason that was given by them, why they did not need the freedom Jesus offered to sinners: It was the fact that they were Abraham's descendants. This is the first time that Abraham's name appears in John's Gospel, and after this it appears 10 more times, and all within this chapter. Since the Jews were so proud of being Abraham's descendants our Lord used this very fact to show them that they were not as free as they had imagined. Let us see how He did this: In v.37 Jesus said, 'I know that ye are Abraham's seed' There is no question about the physical paternity of these Jews. Jesus did not dispute that. But look at what He added: 'but ye seek to kill me, because my word hath no place in you.'

Here Jesus raised a very valid point: What the Jews claimed to be and what they were doing to Him did not match at all. He develops this point further in vv.39 and 40 when the Jews kept insisting that Abraham was their father. Jesus said to them, 'If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham.' In other words, they did not bear any resemblance to their father. They were totally unlike Abraham. What would Abraham have done if He had met Jesus Christ? Well actually the question should be rephrased, 'What did Abraham do when He met Jesus Christ?' because Jesus said in v.40, 'This did not Abraham.'

This implies that Abraham did meet the Lord Jesus even though he lived about 2,000 years before Him. To find out when this happened, please turn to Genesis 18. The first 3 verses reads: 'And the LORD appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day; And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground, And said, My Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant.'

This was the beginning of an interesting encounter that Abraham had with 3 heavenly visitors who were passing by his home. Thinking that they might be weary and hungry travellers he went out to them and offered hospitality and refreshments. They accepted his offer. As they were enjoying their meal, one of them informed Abraham that Abraham's wife, Sarah, would soon bear him a son (v.10). Sarah overheard this and laughed to herself, because she was already 90 years old (v.12). The visitor immediately asked Abraham why Sarah had laughed to herself and had doubted that she could bear a child (vv.13,14). 

Through all this, Abraham realised that this visitor was no ordinary person but was God in human form. Later on, the other two visitors went down to Sodom and Gomorrah, and we find out later that they were actually angels. But the Lord remained with Abraham (v.22). And when He told Abraham that He was going to judge the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah for their sins (vv,20,21), Abraham, who had a nephew living in Sodom, pleaded that the city would be spared from destruction if there were some righteous people dwelling in it (v.23). The way that Abraham pleaded with the Lord here is most revealing. It was filled with faith in the Lord's righteousness as the Judge of all the earth (v.25). It was also filled with deep humility (v.27) for Abraham knew that he was standing in the very presence of God.

I would like to submit to you now that the One whom Abraham met and pleaded with here in Genesis 18 was none other than our Lord Jesus Christ. Long before Christ was born into this world, He had already appeared on earth at various times. These pre-incarnate appearances of Christ are known as 'Christophanies'. This then, is what Jesus meant when He said to the Jews in John 8:39,40 'If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham.' (i.e. 'Abraham did not do this to Me.')

What did Abraham do? He treated Jesus with great hospitality. These Jews treated Him with great hostility. Abraham received the truth from Jesus with faith. These Jews rejected His truth with unbelief. Abraham pleaded with Jesus to spare the righteous when judging the wicked. These Jews judged Jesus unrighteously and sought to kill Him. Can you see that the works of these Jews were clearly not the works of Abraham? How then could they claim Abraham as their father? Abraham would be ashamed to call them his children!

But what about us? Would Abraham be ashamed to call us his children? Do you know that all of us who are saved through faith in Christ are actually children of Abraham even though we are not his descendants? Romans 4:16 makes this clear ('Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all.') 

Now please consider this: If Abraham is your spiritual father, then you ought to bear his resemblance. And this resemblance is to be found in your treatment of the Lord Jesus Christ. According to Genesis 18, when the Lord came to Abraham's home, Abraham gladly welcomed Him and treated Him as his honoured guest, giving Him only the best of everything he had. Compare this now with what you have given to the Lord Jesus, since the day He came to dwell in your heart. Have you given Him the very best of all that you have, or have you given Him the 'odds and ends', the left-overs of your time, talents and treasures? Have you treated Him as your honoured guest?

Besides that, when the Lord gave His word of promise to Abraham, Abraham trusted fully in it. And he saw the wonderful results of doing this - He was blessed with a son called Isaac in his old age. Are you like Abraham? Do you bear his resemblance? Do you trust fully in the words of promise that Jesus speaks to you when you hear or read His Word? Or do you doubt His Word and worry that your trials will surely overwhelm you? 

And here is one more point of resemblance for you to consider: When the Lord revealed to Abraham that judgment was about to descend upon the wicked, Abraham spent time communing with Jesus to plead for the salvation of his loved ones. How much time do you spend communing with the Lord in prayer to plead for the salvation of your unsaved loved ones, when you know that God's judgment is coming? How burdened are you for them to be spared from the wrath to come?

Please try to answer these questions honestly before the Lord. They will help you to evaluate how much resemblance you bear to your spiritual father, Abraham. And this, in turn, will help you to see how much resemblance you bear to your Heavenly Father who is God Himself. This brings us to the next part of our passage, where we see the Jews claiming that God was their Father.

II. Is God Your Father? (vv.41-43)

John 8:41 'Then said they to him, We be not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God.' This claim may seem to be a lot easier to make than the previous one, since all men are created in the image of God and bear His likeness. So everyone can surely claim God as their father, can they not? This idea that God is the Father of all mankind has become very popular today. It is called 'Universalism.' Universalists believe that all Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists should regard each other as God's children and as brothers in one universal brotherhood. They also promote the notion that there is no need for us to spread the Gospel and win souls to Christ, since every religion ultimately leads men to God.

If anyone here has been following this kind of thinking, God wants you to know that it does not come from Him. It denies the fact that sin has estranged man from God and only those who are reconciled with God through Christ can be called God's children. Therefore Universalism is a man-made doctrine that has no biblical basis. And it is also a very dangerous doctrine that has given countless souls a false security and sent them to die eternally in hell. Many have been misled into believing that God is their Father when He is really not their Father. And such were the Jews in our passage who claimed rather boldly in v.41: 'We have one Father, even God.'

There is one criterion that must be met for anyone to claim that God is their Father. It is spelled out in v.42 where Jesus said, 'If God were your Father, ye would love me.' This means that all who have God as their Father will love the Lord Jesus. They will have warm feelings for Him. They will be attracted to Him and seek to follow Him. They will find their greatest delight in being with Him, in walking with Him and in hearing His sweet voice. And they will testify to all, 'Yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend.' (Song of Solomon 5:16). 

The question that everyone has to answer is: Do you love the Lord Jesus? Everything depends on whether you love Him or not. God's Word makes it clear that only those who have known the Lord Jesus, received Him as their Saviour, and loved Him as their Lord and Master can truly call God their Father. But if you say that you love Jesus, how much do you truly love Him? One way that you can tell is through your attitude to His Word. If you love Jesus you will say of His Word, 'It is the voice of my Beloved!' (Song of Solomon 5:2) You will cling to every word that you read from His Book. You will meditate on everything that He says to you from its pages and store them in your heart. And you will do whatever He tells you to do.

But if you do not love the Lord Jesus, then the very opposite would be true of you. You would have no appetite for His Word. It sounds just like a foreign language to you. You cannot understand it, neither can you respond to it. And this means that you do not belong to God's family. You are not one of His children. Jesus said this of the Jews in v.43 'Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word.' In verse 47 He said, 'He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.' Later on, in John 10:26,27, Jesus said to these Jews, 'ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.'

And so dear friends, please answer the question that Jesus asks you today: 'Do you love me? Do you hear my voice?' If you examine yourself and come to the conclusion that you do not really love the Lord Jesus, please don't give yourself any rest. You must do something about your spiritual state, because if your lack of love for Jesus comes together with a tendency to commit sin habitually, it may mean that your spiritual father is the one mentioned in v.44.

III. Is the Devil Your Father? (vv.44-47)

'Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do...' Here is one spiritual paternity that I am sure no one would ever claim, for no one in his right mind would want to have the Devil as his father. And therefore I don't think any of us would take kindly to someone saying, 'Your father is the Devil.' It is certainly a terrible thing to say to anyone and is bound to evoke a strong reaction. But in the case of the Jews that Jesus spoke to in our passage, it was absolutely needful and necessary for Him to say it, because it was true. And we are confident that Jesus would have said it with their best interests at heart because He came to save the lost.

Sometimes the truth which must be revealed for a person's own good is a truth that hurts. Withholding it from him would only make things worse. A mistaken paternity is one such a truth. According to one website, worldwide studies based on genetic screening have shown that the rate of mistaken paternity is about 2-3 %. This means that 1 out of every 40 children in the world are actually mistaken about who their real father is. Now, some may think that ignorance is bliss for such matters. But this holds true only when there are no medical implications. If a child's real father has a genetic disease that the child may inherit, the consequences of being mistaken about one's paternity can be fatal.

The same thing is true of being mistaken of one's spiritual paternity, except that the end result is much worse - eternal death. And therefore it is of utmost importance that we should not be mistaken about our spiritual paternity. We must not be afraid to face the truth, even if it hurts. 

So let us carefully consider the question, 'Who is your father?' If God is your Father you can be very thankful. But if the Devil is your father, your soul is in the greatest of all dangers. But how can you tell if the Devil is your spiritual father? The answer is given at the beginning of v.41 where Jesus said to the Jews 'Ye do the deeds of your father.' The key is to look for signs of resemblance in character and conduct. The more resemblance that one bears to the Devil and his deeds, the greater the likelihood of his paternity. Let us look at how Jesus described the Devil and his deeds in v.44 'He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.'

There are two things about the Devil that are mentioned here: The first is that he is a murderer. Someone may say, 'Well, that leaves me out - I am not a murderer!' But we must look at who Jesus was applying this to - it was not to a group of murderers, but to those who were seeking to kill Him. It was the evil attitudes and intents of their hearts that made them resemble their spiritual father. Jesus also mentioned this in His Sermon on the Mount: 'Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.' (Matthew 5:21-22)

This ought to make us very concerned, especially if we have been harbouring an intense anger or dislike for anyone, or if there is hatred simmering in our hearts against someone and we cannot bring ourselves to forgive him. If such feelings persist for long, we must beware, for they give us a strong resemblance to the father of all murderers.

The other thing that Jesus mentioned about the Devil in v.44 is that he is a liar. He deliberately deceives people and leads them away from the truth. His word cannot be trusted. He masquerades as an angel of light. He uses every means at his disposal to make men believe a lie. 

And signs of his spiritual paternity are found everywhere, for this world is filled with dishonesty, cheating, fraud, pretence, hypocrisy and lack of integrity. But if any of these things are found in our lives without ceasing, we must beware, for they give us a strong resemblance to the father of all liars.

There are other characteristics of Satan besides the 2 that are mentioned in v.44, such as his pride, rebellion, and covetousness. These are all included under the phrase 'the lusts of your father' at the beginning of the verse. But the point we need to emphasise is this: When our lives persistently exhibit the deeds or lusts of the Devil we have strong reason to suspect that he is our real father. And this suspicion is confirmed when we also bear no resemblance to Abraham, and have no love for the Lord Jesus Christ. 

So what should you do, if you are convinced that you are a child of the Devil? Is there a way to get rid of his awful paternity and influence in your life? Yes, there is: It is found in the words of Jesus in John 3:7, 'Ye must be born again.' God is the only One who can change you from being a child of the Devil to being a child of God. This is revealed in John 1:12,13 'But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.'

And what should you do if this message has helped to confirm in your heart that you are not a child of the Devil but a child of God? Be very thankful, and make sure that you continue to bear the marks of resemblance to your heavenly Father in your life. Ephesians 5:1-2 tells us, 'Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children; And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.'

  1. John 08:31-37 - Freedom from Bondage
  2. John 08:12-30 - The Light of the World
  3. John 08:1-11 - Who Should Cast The First Stone?
  4. John 08:1-11 - Forgive the Way Jesus Forgave

Subcategories

Gospel in Dialect

Do you face a language barrier when trying to witness for Christ to dialect-speaking relatives? Or do you need to polish up your Mandarin in order to share the Gospel with your Mandarin-speaking friends? This Gospel toolkit will help you to learn how to share the Gospel in Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and Teochew.

There are 15 lessons covering the various topics in gospel presentation. Each lesson consists of a set of phrases, written in English, Chinese characters and Hanyu Pinyin.

To hear the proper pronunciation of the phrase, click on the respective plugin associated with each phrase. When the phrase is read for you, you should repeat it aloud. You can keep on playing back the phrase and repeating it aloud until you have mastered the phrase. Then go on to the next phrase in the lesson.

As you learn to speak new phrases, keep on reviewing the ones that you have learnt. Finally, test yourself to see if you can say the following in Mandarin / dialect aloud: 

Family

Introduction

Why a family resource page?  It has been often said that the family is the most important institution in the nation.  But never has this sentiment been as greatly emphasized in our history as a nation than now in recent times.  Indeed, the family is the most important institution because it is the first environment to which every person is exposed; it is the primary influence of a person, especially in his early formative years.  And failure of the family to influence and mould the child positively has contributed to the moral and ethical breakdown of societies.  Even the expert opinions of sociologists and psychologists point to the truth of this statement.  Counselors and mental health workers increasingly have to rely on Family Therapy to deal with the problems of the clients, seeing as how many adult conflicts and problems are actually conflicts and problems not resolved in youth within the family.  Of course, it is not surprising to find such delinquency and immaturity in the world.  And sadly, it is not surprising to find such worldliness and worldly problems in the church, as families capitulate their God-given rights.  More than ever, there is need for a family resource page, where families can be encouraged and taught to raise up Godly homes and to revive the Covenant family.  

And one of the main emphases of this resource page is on the subject and discipline of Family Worship.  According to the Westminster Directory of Family Worship, we are told that “BESIDES the publick worship in congregations, mercifully established in this land in great purity, it is expedient and necessary that secret worship of each person alone, and private worship of families, be pressed and set up; that, with national reformation, the profession and power of godliness, both personal and domestick, be advanced.”  Herein, it is suggested that national and ecclesiastical revival finds its genesis in the home.  And this is biblical. 

The theological foundations of family worship is in Deuteronomy 4:9,10 where believers are told to “keep thy soul diligently…[and to]…teach them thy sons, and thy sons’ sons when the Lord said unto me, Gather me the people together, and I will make them hear my words, that they may learn to fear me all the days that they shall live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children.” 

It is also in Deuteronomy 6:4-7 where the words which God had commanded believers should be taught diligently to their children, that they should “talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.”  The chief Christian educators of our children are their parents, who have been given this sacred duty.

Psalm 78:2-7 also teaches this, especially when it says regarding the law “which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children: that the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be born, who should arise and declare them to their children: that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments.” 

According to Dr Joel Beeke, “Every church desires growth. Surprisingly few churches, however, seek to promote internal church growth by stressing the need to raise children in covenantal truth. Few seriously grapple with why many adolescents become nominal members with mere notional faith or abandon evangelical truth for unbiblical doctrine and modes of worship. I believe one major reason for this failure is the lack of stress upon family worship. In many churches and homes family worship is an optional thing, or at most a superficial exercise such as a brief table grace before meals. Consequently, many children grow up with no experience or impression of Christian faith and worship as a daily reality.”

“Would we see revival among our children? Let us remember that God often uses the restoration of family worship to usher in church revival. For example, the 1677 church covenant of the Puritan congregation in Dorchester, Massachusetts, included the commitment ‘to reform our families, engaging ourselves to a conscientious care to set before us and to maintain the worship of God in them; and to walk in our houses with perfect hearts in a faithful discharge of all domestic duties, educating, instructing, and charging our children and households to keep the ways of the Lord.’”

Douglas Kelly says that “Family religion, which depends not a little on the household head daily leading the family before God in worship, is one of the most powerful structures that the covenant-keeping God has given for the expansion of redemption through the generations, so that countless multitudes may be brought into communion with and worship” of God. 

So may these resources help all Lifers to build up their families in the fear and admonition of the Lord; that Family Worship would not be an optional exercise but a time of day and activity well-sought after by Godly parents and children.  Amen.

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