Jeff Miller

April 20, 2025

What is Finished?

Glorification: The Hope is Real

Jeff Miller

April 20, 2025

What is Finished?

Introduction:

John 19:28-30 - After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

Revelation 16:17 - The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple, from the throne, saying, “It is done!”

The Hope is Real: The Truth About Heaven (Revelation 21:1-8)

Everything is New. (Rev 21:1-2)
Every day is in God’s Presence. (Rev 21:3)
Everything that Hurts is Gone. (Rev 21:4-5)
Everything is Yours. (Rev 21:6-7)
Romans 8:16-17 – The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
Everyone is Not Going. (Rev 21:8)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said to fulfill the Scripture,
"I thirst." A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a
hissy branch and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, "It is finished."
He bowed his head and gave up his spirit. Over this past month, we've been examining God's Word to
see that the Son of God came to finish some things. And we've been trying to just answer one question.
What is finished? Jesus made the declaration, "It is finished." Well, what is? Well, I guess to put it
all in one word, salvation. The way of salvation, it's done. The work is done. And we've been spending
time looking at different facets of salvation. First, we saw justification. The guilt is gone.
You realize Jesus has taken your sin away. There are no grounds for punishment when you're in Christ.
The guilt is gone. He's made you righteous. And then we saw reconciliation. The relationship is
restored. By nature, you are not God's friend. The Bible says by nature, we are enemies of God.
And Jesus Christ came to restore the relationship with God. Pastor Taylor a couple of days ago
talked about redemption. The price was paid. There was a literal price that was paid. You see, you
have sinned against God, and it wasn't as if God was like, "Oh, that's okay. Don't worry about it. I'm
just going to forget about it." No, no, no. As Pastor Taylor pointed out, you owe God an infinite debt.
And God paid that Himself through the death of His Son. It is finished.
You know, you think of those words on the cross, "It is finished." You know,
that's not the only time that Jesus declares that something is finished.
It's only the first time. Do you know the next time Jesus says it is finished?
It is when God pours out judgment. Revelation 16-17, it's the last bold judgment. The book of
Revelation talks about there's seal trumpets and trumpet judgments and bold judgments. When the
last judgment of God is poured out, look at this, Revelation 16-17, the seventh angel poured out
His bowl into the air and a loud voice came out of the temple from the throne, saying, "It is done."
That's the next time Jesus says it is finished. Today I want to talk about the last time He says it.
Do you know the last time Jesus declares something is finished?
As after He creates a new heaven and a new earth. Revelation chapter 21, I want you to turn there.
Revelation chapter 21,
Revelation chapter 21, look at verses 5 and 6. It says, "And He who was seated on the throne
said, 'Behold, I am making all things new.'" Also, He said, "Write this down. For these words
are trustworthy and true. And He said to me, 'It is done.'"
Like, wait, wait, what is He talking about here? What is finished, the promise
of glorification? That is, the hope is real. The hope is real. We're going to talk about hope today.
Because when we talk about hope, we use it in a different way than the Bible uses the word hope.
When we say hope, what we mean is wish. You know what I mean? We say, "I hope it doesn't rain today."
What are we saying? "I wish that it doesn't rain." Or we say, "I hope that the pirates win today."
What are we saying? We're saying that our theology allows for miracles.
But you see, that's not how the Bible uses the word hope.
Biblically, church, listen, hope is the confident anticipation of receiving Jesus' promises.
Biblically, hope, it's in the bag. It's happening. I'm just waiting for it to take place. But it's
going to happen. I'm not wondering if it's going to happen. I can't wait. I know it's going to.
I'm just waiting for that to happen. That's biblical hope. That's the receipt that we hold on to
that says it's coming. I know that it's coming. And I can't wait for that day. That is biblical hope.
See, that's what we're here to celebrate today.
Actually, every Sunday we celebrate this. And actually, for the Christian,
you celebrate this every day of your life. That Jesus Christ rose from the dead.
We've been spending so much time talking about the fact that He died for our sins. Yes,
that's true. But three days later, He rose from the dead to give us the promise of eternal life.
And the Bible says that He went back to heaven. And you're like, "Well, what's He doing now? Do
you know what Jesus is doing right now? Like, right now, do you know what He's doing?"
He told us in John chapter 14 what He would be doing. He says, "I go to prepare a place for you.
Right now, Jesus Christ is building a place for His people in heaven."
We're going to talk about heaven today, the place of our hope. Do you know what heaven's like?
Sadly, there's so much confusion about heaven because people embrace ideas about heaven that
just aren't in the Bible. I think for a lot of people, their ideas of heaven come more from a
Bugs Bunny cartoon than from what God actually said. There's just so much nonsense about
that people believe about heaven. It's just not true biblically. You know what number one is,
by the way? The most nonsensical, wrong, false thing that people believe about heaven that's just
absolutely not true? Is that good people go to heaven. You have to be a good person to go to
heaven. That's just bombarded onto us from society. Good people go to heaven. Good people...
Well, that's not true. If that was true, heaven would be empty. We're going to talk more about that
in a bit. But no, you do not get to heaven by being a good person.
But you know, even Christians, honestly, even Christians are clueless about heaven.
Just grab your Christian, your average churchgoer, and say, "Well, what's heaven like?"
You're going to get answers like, "Well, I'm thinking grandma's there."
They're like, "Well, what are you doing heaven?" "Well, I guess you play a harp."
And then you sit on clouds. And yeah, that's all I got. Like, well, maybe you've been getting
your theology about heaven from Bugs Bunny or from a far-side cartoon.
But I think many Christians aren't really excited about heaven because they don't know what the
Bible actually says about it. You know, we had a funeral last week for the oldest member of our
church. She was two weeks shy of 99. And she's having a good day. What a great celebration of her life
and a celebration of the fulfillment of her faith. But I think a lot of people, even that we're sitting
in that funeral, might not have been excited because they don't really know what she's experiencing
in heaven. What is coming in the future in heaven? We need to educate ourselves, church.
I mean, think about it this way. Imagine if I booked you a three-month vacation.
Imagine that. If I booked you, I'm like, "You know what? You've been working hard. You know what?
I'm going to get you the plane tickets. You know, you just bring your wife, jump at the airport,
and get on the plane, three-month vacation on me." Would you want to know where you're going?
Would you want to know what you'd be doing? What if you said, "Oh, thanks, Pastor Jeff. That was
really nice of you. Where am I going? What am I doing? What if I said, "Don't worry about it. You'll
like it." No, I want to know where I'm going to be spending three months of my life. And I'm like,
"Oh, it'll be nice. What am I going to be doing there? Fun stuff."
Wouldn't you want more information of where you're going to be spending three months of your life?
Okay, reminder, heaven is eternal. Wouldn't you like to know what it's going to be like
for eternity? If you do, you're in the right place this morning, because that is exactly
what we're going to be seeing from God's Word. So on your outline, take some notes.
The hope is real. The hope is real. The truth about heaven.
The truth about heaven. Number one, write this down. Everything is new.
Everything is new. Verses 1 and 2 in Revelation 21, "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth,
for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,
prepared as a bride adorned for her husband." Stop there. New heaven and new earth. Why?
Why do we need a new heaven and new earth? Well, because this is talking about what's
happening in the future. And at this point, the heaven and earth now, the one that you're
sitting on right now, will be vaporized by God's glory according to 2 Peter 3, according to Revelation
2011. He talks about this new Jerusalem. Like, what is new Jerusalem? What's the capital city
of the new heaven and the new earth? And John describes it as coming down from heaven onto this
new earth. It's a fascinating study. You can really dig into it on your own. Just to give you a little
overview. Verses 15 and 17 give us the dimensions. And by the way, these are literal measurements.
The Bible is clear about that. But new Jerusalem is a massive city and it's shaped like a cube.
And each wall is 1,380 miles long. And each wall is 216 feet thick. You're like,
"Can you give me a frame of reference?" Yeah, absolutely, I can. If you were to take this new
Jerusalem and put it on our current earth, just drop it onto North America. If you were to drop
it onto North America, it would go from Canada to the Gulf of America. It would go from the Atlantic
Ocean. I'm still trying to adjust to that. I'm sorry. It would go from the Atlantic Ocean
to Colorado. That is the size of new Jerusalem. You're like, "Why do I need to know this?
That is the place that Jesus is preparing for you right now."
And this passage describes the final and eternal heaven. And over and over, he uses
the greatest word possible that he could use to describe anything. And it's the word "new."
New. Look at verse 5. This is the best verse in the Bible. And I know somebody would say,
"Well, actually, Pastor Jeff, it's all God's word." Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know. But this is the best
verse in the Bible. It says, "And he who was seated on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things
new.'" Look, that is awesome. And we can relate to that, can't we? Because there's nothing
like getting new stuff, right? Don't we love new things? New shoes? A new car? New jeans?
A new phone? I'm pleased to announce that Pastor Taylor finally upgraded from his iPhone 8.
Yeah, a little bonus celebration today. But wasn't it so exciting getting that new phone, Pastor Taylor?
You know what? I thought it was bad until Jane Auer showed me. He has, what do you have an SE?
Yeah, take good care of that, Jay. We're going to put that in the museum.
So we love getting new stuff, right? Getting a new computer. Men, get that new fishing rod. Ladies,
get the new purse. How about a new puppy? Oh, that's the best. But there's nothing like
getting new stuff. And you know, the Bible says in heaven everything is always new.
So a little tip for you. If you're in Christ and if you are, you will end up in heaven. I just want
to encourage you, if you're trying to make friends, to not walk up to somebody in heaven and say,
hey, what's new? Because they're going to say, you are an ego because I don't know if you got the
memo, but everything here is new. I had people say to me sometimes like, you know, heaven sounds
kind of boring. Like, what are you talking about? That is a clueless statement. Boring.
Everything is always going to be new.
And if that's not a beautiful enough description with that little word,
he gives us a word picture that really drives it home. He says, it's prepared
as a bride adorned for her husband. Like Jesus, what kind of care and attention are you putting
into creating this new heaven and earth, this new Jerusalem? You know, what kind of
meticulous care is going into preparing this new city? The Bible says it's like a bride
preparing herself for her husband. That's a word picture that really impacts me.
Because I've been to a lot of weddings. It's part of my job. I've been to a lot of weddings.
And you know something that I've never, ever, ever seen in a wedding is this. Like, it's wedding day
and you know, I come to the front of the chapel or the woods or the barn or whatever we're having
and like, and like, oh, they have them everywhere now, but like, I'm up there with the guys, right?
And here comes the bridesmaids and they take their place. Oh, it's the big moment.
The music shifts, right? And you know what's next. Here comes the bride, right?
You know what I've never seen? It's the doors fling open and there's the bride
in a college hoodie.
Wearing sweatpants and crocs.
Crocs will not be in heaven, by the way. Well, the Bible doesn't say. I'm just
thinking it's a safe assumption, but I've never seen her where she's got a near-terminal case of bedhead.
I've never seen that ever. Do you know what I have seen though? Every time.
A breathtakingly beautiful bride.
How did she get that way? She prepared. Do you know how much time and effort and energy and money
and detail and it goes in? She puts everything into making herself as beautiful and perfect as she can
for her husband.
And that is the kind of attention and care that Jesus is putting into preparing this place
for his people. Wrap your brain around that. But the Bible says in heaven,
everything is new.
Oh, it gets even better than that. Because number two, write this down, every day is in God's presence.
Everything is new and every day is in God's presence. Look at verse three. Verse three.
He says, "And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Behold, the dwelling place of God is with
man. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will be with them as their
God.'" Every day is in God's presence.
Don't you wish that you lived at the time that Jesus lived? Wouldn't it have just been absolutely
amazing to watch Jesus, like to sit down with Him, to hear Him teach, to watch Him heal,
to watch Him feed the thousands with the little kids lunch? Wouldn't that have just been awesome
to personally be in the presence of Jesus Christ?
Well, I got good news for you. In heaven, you're going to get that, like every single day.
Because according to verse three, we're always in God's presence.
You see, that's good news, my friends, because I think if we're honest, sometimes God seems distant
right now. I mean, He's not, right? He's not distant.
But can we just be honest in church for a second and say sometimes it feels like He is?
You know, we go through trials. We're hurting. Maybe you've been betrayed.
Disappointed. You're just worn out. And you're like, "God, where are you?"
Seems like I need you the most right now. You seem absent. Where are you?
Well, never again will God seem distant.
The Bible says He is going to tabernacle with His people. He is going to pitch a tent
in unprecedented, perfect fellowship in the midst of His people. Every day of heaven
is being in the presence of God. It's the truth about heaven. Everything's new.
Every day is in God's presence. In number three, everything that hurts is gone.
Everything that hurts is gone. Look at verse four.
"He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more. Neither shall there be
mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.
No mourning, no crying and no pain." Do you know what that means?
That means no a lot of other things. That means no depression. That means no cancer.
That means no diabetes. That means no organ failure. That means no autism.
That means no wheelchairs. That means no mental health problems.
That means no dentist appointments.
I see somebody rejoicing in the back greatly over that.
But I get to tell you in the first service, there was a group of dentists sitting
right about where the Zentcos are right now. I told them, "Look, we're going to be out of a job in heaven.
Nobody's going to need to hear about Jesus from me. Nobody's going to need their teeth fixed by them."
There's no more tears. There's no more death. There's no more goodbyes.
Every bit of pain and heartache and discouragement. Never again. Never. Everything that hurts is gone.
People ask, "Well, will I remember the failures of my life on earth?"
Because I would think if I could remember my failures of my life on earth, that, boy,
there'd be some tears over that in heaven. Will I remember the failures of this life?
I don't know. But I do know this for a fact.
That if you do remember the failures of this life, it's not going to bother you.
Because there's no more mourning or pain. I'm sure about that.
And you can get to this point, you're like, "Really?" Hang on a second.
This sounds just a little too fantastic. Really? Well, look at verse 5 again.
"And he who was seated on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new.'
Also, he said, 'Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.'"
Oh, everything is made new. Everything stays new. And you're like, "Is that really true?"
Jesus says here, "Write this down. You write this down. You take this to the bank.
You build your life on this, man. This is trustworthy and true."
Listen, this isn't fantasy stuff. This isn't like fairy tale stuff that we say to
placate children when grandma passes away.
Jesus says this is real. This is trustworthy and true.
"Every hurt is forever behind you." Everything that hurts is gone. Number four,
oh, it gets even better. I know you don't think it can, but check this out.
Number four, everything is yours. Everything is yours.
Look at verse 6, "And he said to me, 'It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega,
the beginning and the end, to the thirsty. I will give from the spring of the water of life
without payments.'" Who are the thirsty? Who are the thirsty? I hope you are.
Thirsty refers to people who realize their spiritual need and genuinely thirst for God.
Heaven is for people who know they need Jesus Christ and they receive Jesus Christ and they love
Jesus Christ. That's what he's talking about here. You see, water biblically is a symbol of
fulfillment. It's a symbol of satisfaction. "I was thirsty in a need. Now from the living water,
I have been satisfied." That's what water is talking about. That's what the Bible is talking
about when it talks about water. It's satisfaction. It's great news. That means heaven is not going
to be lacking anything that would add to your satisfaction. You know that? That means you're
not going to be walking around heaven and say, "You know what? This place is pretty good, but
I have a few ideas that would make it a little better."
You're going to be absolutely, totally, perfectly satisfied in heaven.
And this, this is your heritage. Look at verse 7. He says, "The one who conquers
will have this heritage and I will be his God and he will be my Son."
We talked about this with justification. We don't live in fear of God as judge. If you're in Christ,
that is. You're not afraid of God as judge. You live in the freedom of God as Father.
That He adopted us as His children.
But being a child has implications for the future.
Like what do you mean? What I mean is, if you're a child of God, you receive an inheritance.
Look at Romans chapter 8 here.
Romans 8 says, "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. And if
children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with Him
in order that we may also be glorified with Him."
You see, Paul wrote this to the Romans and Roman adoption was very interesting. I was reading
about it this past week. Do you know in Roman culture adopted children actually received greater
honor than naturally born children in the home? Like if a couple has natural children, it's like,
well, you just came into the world the regular way. But if you adopted someone, it was, ah, you,
though on the other hand, you were chosen to be a part of this family. But there's something else
interesting about Roman children, including the adopted children, by the way, that they all
received an equal share of the inheritance. You're like, good for the Romans. What does that have
to do with me? Here's what this has to do with you. Look at this. We are fellow heirs with Christ.
Do you know what that means? I can tell some of you aren't very excited about that. So we're going
to walk through this together. You are fellow heirs with Christ. Do you know what that means?
That means you will receive the same inheritance that Jesus receives.
So what does Jesus own? Everything. So what do you stand to inherit? Everything.
Everything. You're like, wait, wait, wait, wait, hang on a second there, Pastor Jeff.
You was talking about the new heavens earlier. Do you mean I'm going to inherit the new heavens?
Everything. And if you're like, oh, well, he's creating the new earth. Do you mean I'm going to
inherit that new earth too? That's going to belong to me? Everything. And you're like, well, that
giant city that you was talking about, am I going to inherit that too? Is that going to belong to me?
Like, look, I'll do respect. What part of everything do you not understand? Everything will belong to you.
But do you know the greatest thing that you're going to inherit?
Is God Himself? Do you see that in verse 7? He says, "I will be His God." Oh, no, let's not gloss over that
because that's like the Levites in the Old Testament. Remember, Israel was told, you know,
that they were going to receive an inheritance in the Promised Land. But you got like Deuteronomy 18-2.
The Levites did not get an inheritance like the other tribes of Israel. They were told
that God is their inheritance.
And if you get God, you get everything. If you're a fellow heir with Christ,
that means someday everything is yours.
And finally, number five, truth about heaven, everything's new.
Every day's in God's presence. Everything that hurts is gone and everything is yours.
But we do have to say this because it's in the text. Everyone is not going.
Now look, you know, it'd be real easy to come into Easter service and we're all wearing our
spiffy clothes and the music is fantastic and it would be so easy to get caught up in this passage
and get excited about a heaven that some of you aren't going to see.
Look at verse eight. John says, "But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable,
as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars,
their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur," which is the second death.
See this list? These are people that love their sin more than they love Jesus.
But I could ask you, are you on that list?
Is there anything here that characterizes you?
Understanding that murder means hateful and sexually immoral means lustful
and immoral.
Are you there?
You know the one that always sticks out to me in this list is the first one, cowardly.
What does that mean? It's not saying, being afraid of stuff is a sin, like in the sense of
I'm afraid to go camping because I'm afraid of bears and snakes.
And that's not what that's talking about at all. It's talking about being afraid to follow Jesus
Christ because there is a cost. And what will my friends think? And what am I going to have to give
up? And refusal to follow Christ, God says, "You're a coward." You mean He bought your way to heaven
with the blood of His Son? And you're too afraid to receive Him because of what your goofy friends
might think. Because of what sinful thing you might have to give up. You're a coward.
And that's not my opinion. That's God's opinion. Well, I guess it is mine if it's God's.
But He said it.
You think following Christ is easy? You think it's easy to trust God?
Do you think it's easy to say no to sin? Do you think it's easy to say yes to serving Christ
when it's inconvenient or difficult or harder than we thought it was going to be?
This ain't for cowards, okay?
All of the items on this list characterize people who have never repented. They've never received
Christ. And these are just evidences. He's saying that this is what they lived like.
And I have to ask you, if you took an honest inward look at yourself, would you say that my life is
generally characterized by a love for Jesus Christ? Or would you say my life is generally
characterized by a love of my sin, myself, my way? Which one is it for you?
Because if it's the latter, then none of these promises about heaven, none of this hope is for you.
If I can have the worship team join us back up on the platform here.
It is finished.
It is finished. Someday, you're going to hear Jesus say those words again.
For some of you, you're going to be horrified to hear him say it when he brings judgment.
And for some of you, you will rejoice when you hear him say it
because he's giving you everything, the hope of heaven.
It is finished. Today, today, we hear those words from the cross.
So if you have received Jesus Christ, your sin has been taken away. If you have received Jesus
Christ, he rose from the dead to give you eternal life. And if you have received Jesus Christ,
you do not need to wait for heaven to rejoice in him. So let's stand and let's celebrate him
for who he is and all that he's done. Let's rejoice in the victory of Jesus Christ.

Small Group Discussion
Read Romans 8:16-17, Revelation 21:1-8

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What are some wrong ideas about heaven that even many Christians believe?
What is an aspect of heaven covered in Revelation 21 that was new or surprising to you?
What does it mean that we are co-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:16-17)? What exactly do we inherit?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

April 13, 2025

What is Finished?

Reconciliation: The Relationship is Restored

Jeff Miller

April 13, 2025

What is Finished?

Introduction:

What the Cross Proves About God's Love for You.
(Romans 5:6-11)

God's Love for You is an Unconditional Love. (Romans 5:6-8)
God's Love for You is a Rescuing Love. (Romans 5:9)
God's Love for You is a Committed Love. (Romans 5:10)
John 1:12 – But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

Philippians 1:6 – And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Open up your Bibles with me, please, to the book of Romans in chapter 5.
You know, there's that old saying, "It's not how you start, it's how you finish," right?
I was thinking a lot about that concept this week, and I realized that's really true, like,
in everything, isn't it?
Like, have you ever taken an airplane flight?
What determines if it's a good flight?
How you land, right?
And I was thinking about that also.
Have you ever watched a movie that you're like, "Oh, this movie is so good," and then
it has this completely idiotic ending?
Have you ever seen a movie like that?
Do you walk away saying that was a good movie?
No.
Do you say, "Oh, that movie was terrible," because it didn't finish well?
And I don't think we ever feel this as deeply as we do being Pittsburgh sports fans.
Heavens to Mercutroy, how many pirate games have I sat through?
I'm like, "Oh, this is awesome," and then we blow it into night thinning, and we say,
"Oh, that game was terrible," or all penguin fans, how many times?
Oh, this is such a good game, and then we lose it over time.
Like, oh.
But you know, the Son of God came to do some work, and He finished perfectly.
John 19, Jesus on the cross, says after this, "Jesus knowing that all was now finished,
said," to fulfill the Scripture, "I thirst."
A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a Hissa
branch and held it to His mouth.
When Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished," and He bowed His
head and gave up His Spirit.
And in this four-week series, we're going to be answering the question, "What is finished?"
Jesus cried out, "It is finished!"
"What is?"
Well, today, today we are going to be looking at the glorious reality that the work of reconciliation
is finished.
The relationship with God is restored.
Would you bow your heads, please?
And I'm going to ask you, just take a moment and pray for me.
I was telling Pastor Taylor in my office before we came in here, "Man, I can't possibly
communicate the gravity of this passage."
You always feel that, but sometimes you feel it a lot more.
And today we're going to be looking at the love of God.
And I feel so inadequate to communicate it the way it needs to, but we're going to take
a swing at it.
All right?
I may, I'll pray for you.
Father in heaven, we're about to go after a topic that hits us in the heart, probably
more than anything.
So we talk about your great love.
So once again, we just pray against any preconceived notions any of us might have going into this.
And we would honestly just take a look at what your word actually says.
Father, transform us as only you can.
We pray in Jesus' name.
And all of God's people said, "Amen, amen.
It is finished.
The relationship with God is restored."
We started this last week that the Bible says in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, God was
demonstrating some things.
He was showing us some things.
He was, a better word, proving some things.
And in Romans 3.25, we saw that God demonstrated His righteousness.
Jesus died to fulfill the demands of God's law.
The guilt is gone.
So here, in this passage, just look at verse 8.
It says, "But God shows," again, better word, "proves," but God shows His love for us.
And that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
You see, it's this love of God He tells us in verses 10 and 11 that reconciled us.
The relationship is restored.
Look, this is one of the greatest doctrines in all of God's Word, because God is not some
cold-detached judge.
And you would wrongly take that away from Romans chapter 3 to say, "Well, God's just
this judge, and we're guilty."
Okay, and He did this judicial thing, and He pardoned us, but He's not this cold judge
in the sense of now God's looking down from heaven saying, "Turn or burn, I don't care."
Right?
Get right or get left.
Look, I made provision, accept Jesus or don't, makes no difference to me whatsoever.
The glorious truth of God's Word, it's that He loves you.
I mean He actually, really, infinitely loves you.
And last week we talked about one of the greatest struggles we have as people is struggling
with guilt.
Am I really forgiven?
But you know, there's another question that we struggle with as people, and it's this
one.
Does God really love me?
Does God really love me?
Oh yeah, I know John 3.16.
Everybody knows John 3.16.
For God so loved the world.
But maybe that's just like a general statement about God's disposition towards people as
a whole.
But does He love me?
You know, there are two things that make people question God's love.
And one is the awareness of my sin.
Some people question God's love because you're like, "You know what, I just feel unworthy."
The other thing that makes you question God's love is going through hardship.
You're like, "If God really loved me, why would He let this allow this cause this horrible
trial in my life to happen?"
But this is the question on the table today.
Am I loved by God?
In other words, am I accepted by God?
Is God on my side?
Will that ever change?
Well, I got some great news for you.
God settled all of this with the death of Jesus Christ.
So on your outline, the relationship is restored and we're focusing on the cross as we head
into resurrection day next Sunday.
And good Friday this Friday, we're focused on the cross.
Today what the cross proves about God's love for you.
Does God love me?
Look at the cross.
That answers all of it.
Let's unpack that a little bit.
Number one, the Bible tells us that God's love for you is an unconditional love.
It's an unconditional love.
You know, I get a pause here.
People say, especially in circles like ours, they're like, "Well, you know, it's not about
religion.
It's about what?
Relationship."
Oh, you travel in those circles.
It's not about religion.
It's about relationship.
And okay, that's true.
But you know, technically, technically.
God has a relationship with Jesus.
The question is, do you have a good relationship with Him?
Or do you have a bad relationship with Him?
Because biblically, there's no neutral.
It's not like there's these on fire, born-again, Bible-believing Christians,
and these evil, wicked, nasty, violent, hurtful people who hate God,
and somewhere in the middle is just that really nice person.
Not a Christian, but not...
There's no neutral.
And in this passage, you're going to see that unsaved people, people alienated from God,
are described in four ways.
They're described as weak in verse 6, as ungodly in verse 6,
as sinners in verse 8, and as enemies in verse 10.
And we have to understand that going in.
Looking at these four, weak means you're powerless to save yourself.
There is not a thing you can do to get right with God on your own.
You're weak.
You're ungodly.
You are nothing like God intended you to be by birth.
You're a sinner.
That means in the eyes of God, you are rebellious.
And in verse 10, as I said, He uses the word "enemy."
And that means you're hostile towards God.
But really, this enemy concept, it's really a two-way street.
As you see, by nature, we resent God's authority.
I don't want somebody telling me what to do.
I don't want somebody telling me the things that I want to do are wrong, so that's hostility
towards God.
But you know, it goes the other way, too.
God has a holy hatred of sin.
So we could say that we have a wicked opposition towards God, and God has a holy opposition
towards us.
It's a dual opposition.
So something major has to happen if there's going to be any kind of reconciliation between
these two parties that have such hostility towards one another.
Something huge has to happen.
Look at verse 6.
It says, "For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly."
Let's not fly through this too quickly, shall we?
Can we just pause for a moment and as much as we can try to get the weight of God's love
in this statement?
He said, "Christ died for the ungodly."
Who does that?
Who dies for rebellious, wicked, evil people?
Who does that?
It's a shocking statement.
But Paul illustrates, look at verses 7 and 8, how he illustrates this incredible truth.
He says, "For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, that perhaps for a good person one
would dare even to die."
But God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
I love Paul's illustration.
Look at verse 7 again.
He says, "One will scarcely die for a righteous person."
What does he mean by a righteous person?
Well, a righteous person is just like somebody who's upright and a good, holy person, but
maybe you sort of have a detached relationship from them.
Like for example, your favorite preacher that you listen to on a podcast.
Maybe there's somebody that you follow their podcast, you listen to them and they're preaching
really blesses you, but you don't know that guy, right?
That's Paul's point here, is like your favorite podcast preacher, besides me, but your favorite
podcast preacher, I had to clarify that, but you're like, "Jeff, you're not even in the
top 15."
Moving on.
That favorite podcast preacher of yours, if you had an opportunity to die so that he
could live, would you do that?
Probably not.
That's why he says scarcely.
There might be one or two of you, like, "Yeah, I would do it."
But Paul's like, "That's pretty scarce that somebody would die for a good person."
You don't really know.
But then he dials it up a notch, he goes, "Perhaps for a good person one would dare even to
die."
And now he's talking about maybe that holy, upright, good Christian person that we know
and love.
All right?
So if I were to ask, "Okay, forget about your podcast guy, would you die for Pastor Taylor?"
You're like, "Wow, that really ups the ante.
I would really strongly consider that one."
And now we get the weight of verse 8 when he says, "But God, but God on the other hand
shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
See Paul says maybe somebody would die for a good man, but no one would die for an evil
man.
But that's exactly how God showed His love for you.
God loved you when you were a wuze.
You're like a what?
A wuze.
I just made that word up.
W-S-E, a weak, ungodly, sinful enemy.
That's just in the text.
I just paraphrased it.
God loved you as a wuze.
And God didn't say, "Look, when you get your act together, then we'll talk about salvation."
God didn't say, "When you start living a certain way, then I'm going to love you."
It says, "While we were still sinners, what God says is, 'Look, I love you.
I sent my son to die for you.'
You come to me and then we'll get your act together."
See God knows you better than you know yourself.
And He loves you at your worst.
So that's where Paul starts.
God's love for you is unconditional.
Secondly, what does the cross prove about God's love for you?
God's love for you is a rescuing love.
It's a rescuing love.
Look at verse 9.
He says, "Since therefore we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we
be saved by Him from the wrath of God."
I love this.
You're going to see this a couple of times in this passage.
Much more.
Much more.
What he's saying is, "If Jesus' death could do this, then much more Jesus' life can do
this."
So here, Jesus' blood justified has made us righteous before God, which is...
I tried so hard to think of a way to describe that and I wrote down, "Infinitely enormous."
I don't know.
If Jesus' blood could make us righteous before God, which is infinitely enormous, even way
bigger, He says, "We will be saved from the wrath of God."
And that is a profound thing in the cross of Jesus Christ that God was saving you from
Himself.
He was saving you from His own wrath.
But you know as a pastor, bless you as a pastor, oftentimes I hear people say, in wanting to
argue, certain doctrines people will say, "You know, you're talking about God's wrath.
A loving God wouldn't send someone to hell."
Look, I believe that God is love and a loving God wouldn't send somebody to hell.
Have you ever heard that?
Pastor Taylor, I'm sure you've heard that a lot.
A loving God wouldn't send someone to hell?
Well, there's a lot of problems with that statement.
One, it ignores what the Bible actually says about hell.
You know, Jesus talked about hell more than anybody.
Something like twice as much as He talked about heaven.
So not only does it ignore what the Bible actually says about hell, it also ignores God's holiness.
A holy God can't tolerate sin.
So help me understand, if you're somebody that doesn't believe in hell, if you're somebody
that still subscribes to the loving God wouldn't send somebody to hell, are you saying that
somebody can live their entire life rejecting their Creator, living in flagrant sin and rebellion,
they want nothing to do with God, and they want nothing to do with God's gifts, and someday
when they die, God's going to be like, "Hey, that's okay.
Come on into heaven.
Let me show you around."
Like, how does that work?
By the way, an unsaved person would be miserable in heaven.
Do you know that?
An unsaved person would be absolutely miserable in heaven.
You're like, "Why?"
Now, that unsaved person has spent their life saying, "I don't want anything to do with
God, God's truth, God's people, worship.
I don't want anything to do with that."
You know what heaven is?
God, His truth, His people, and worship, that would be absolutely miserable to spend in
eternity.
What the God you want nothing to do with.
So you're ignoring God's holiness when you're selecting which doctrine you want to adhere
to.
Oh, and here's one.
A loving God would send someone to hell.
I like to quickly remind people that God's love is not in question.
What more could God have possibly done to save you?
The Bible says, Romans chapter 8, "God spared not his own son.
God was willing to kill his son so that you could be saved."
I wouldn't do that.
If your salvation meant that I had to kill my son, you'd all be gone to hell.
And I wouldn't think twice about it.
What more could God have possibly done to demonstrate His love than by giving the most precious thing
that exists, the life of His Son.
So don't please, don't come at me with this, a loving God wouldn't send someone to hell.
God's love is not in question here.
But church, if we brush off God's wrath, we're also brushing off the impact of the cross.
We're brushing off the impact of the cross as minimizing the greatest act of God's love.
But let's get real personal.
Like I said at the beginning, one of the biggest reasons we doubt God's love is because we
endure hardship.
And I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand.
But I imagine it would be high 90% of you.
If I said raise your hand if you've ever questioned God's love because of a trial that you're
going through.
I bet most of those hands would go up.
And I just want to lovingly encourage you.
When we get in that mindset where we're doubting God's love and a hardship, what we're assuming
is the way that God shows love is keeping me from trials.
We've already attached that love language to God when His Word does not.
And we think, okay, so God shows me love by making my life easy and trouble free.
So if God doesn't do that, then He must not love me.
Well, we studied the book of Job last fall.
If we learned anything, it's that God loves me through hardship.
No, no, no, no.
God loves me with hardships.
God shows the greatness of His love by meeting our greatest need, which is to be rescued
from sin and hell.
And if that's all God's love ever did for you, is to rescue you from hell.
If that was all He ever did, you should be eternally grateful.
Like the goofy guy in the infomercial.
But wait, there's more.
And number three, write this down.
God's love for you is a committed love.
What does the cross prove about God's love?
Well, it proves it's unconditional and it proves it's rescuing.
And thirdly, it proves that God's love for you is a committed love.
Look at verse 10.
For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more
now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life.
Very similar to verse 9 with the much more thing, but there's a different emphasis here.
In verse 9, He says we will be saved from His coming wrath.
And here He's saying God will keep us saved in the meantime.
In other words, He's saying if God could reconcile us by the death of His Son, much more He can
keep us saved by the life of His Son.
Remember to put it another way, if God loved you when you were His enemy, how do you think
He's going to love you now that you're His child?
That's why He uses that word here.
That's the word of the day.
Reconciled.
This in verse 10, telling us this, God is committed to a restored relationship with
you.
How committed?
How committed is God?
How committed?
He adopted you as His child.
Talk to somebody here that's adopted someone and ask that parent of the adopted kid, "How
committed are you?"
They're committed.
John 1.12 says, "But to all who did receive Jesus, who believed in His name, He gave the
right to become children of God."
In Christ, we are God's children and He is our heavenly Father.
And as you parents know, your kids will always be your kids and nothing can ever change that.
No matter how bad your kids are, no matter what bad thing they've done, nothing will ever
change that kid from being your kid.
When we planted this church back in 2011, we were meeting at Marshall Middle School,
which is right beside Covenant Community Church.
I was friends with Pastor John Price, who was a pastor there.
He invited our church over to, they had a church picnic on their property.
He said, "Hey, why don't you guys come over and invite your church, come over, we're
going to get the bouncy houses and have a big thing, have a bunch of kids.
And why don't you bring your family over and like to introduce you, kind of like welcome
to the neighborhood kind of thing."
I'm like, "Oh, that sounds like a great time."
Well, so our family went and Aaron and I were in the pavilion talking to some of these wonderful
people at this church.
And our kids were much littler at the time.
And all of a sudden, I hear Cade's voice.
He says, "Hey, Dad!
Dad!
Dad!"
I look over.
Cade and Owen are standing in the yard in the green space in Covenant Community with
their pants around their ankles, urinating on the lawn.
And I look over and Cade hollers, "Look, Dad!
We made a P-cross!"
And these dear sweet people we were talking to said, "Are those your children?"
I said, "I've never seen those kids!"
Somebody really needs to rein them in, you know what I'm saying?
You know, as badly as I wanted to put them on eBay that day.
I didn't.
And Cade will tell you, grab him, he'll tell you something I've told him over and over
throughout his life.
He says, "Look, I love you on your best day and on your worst.
And I've told him nothing will ever change that because you're my son."
And it's the same with God's kids.
You've been adopted.
And you know, I've been reading the Bible for a long time.
There is zero Biblical language about being unadopted.
We touched on this last week, you know, people often ask, "Can I lose my salvation?"
And the answer to that question is, "Well, you know, if I could lose my salvation, then
I definitely would.
But thankfully, it's not up to me.
Because what Paul's teaching here is it's not really about how tightly I'm holding
on to Jesus.
It's how tightly he's holding on to me.
So if you've ever struggled with, "Can I lose my salvation?"
Here's a great verse.
You're going to help me out here.
Philippians 1-6, can we get that on the screen?
Let's do a little Bible study here, shall we?
Paul says, "And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it
to completion at the day of Jesus Christ."
That means to the very end.
All right, so help me out here.
Did God begin a good work in you?
Well, if you're a follower of Jesus, then the answer to that is, "Yes."
Okay, next question.
"If God began a good work in you, is he going to finish it?"
Yeah, he is.
Oh, one more question.
Are you sure?
Paul said he was.
I am sure of this.
That when Jesus starts something, he finishes it.
True of the cross and the atonement.
True of his death.
Yes, true of that, but also true of adopting you and raising you and getting you to the
finish line of heaven.
If God didn't save you and say, "You know what, kid, good luck, you're on your own,
don't mess this up, I hope to see you in heaven."
Paul makes it very clear here that God's love for you is a committed love.
We have the worship team.
Join us back up here.
Church, God loves you.
As we said and can't emphasize enough, that is not in question.
He showed us that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
We are rescued from His wrath.
He is committed to keeping us all the way to heaven.
The real question that we have to ask is not does God love us, but do you love God?
God demonstrated His love for you.
Are you willing to demonstrate your love for Him?
You're like, "How do I do that?"
Well, let's look at what the passage says.
Look at verse 11.
He says more than that.
Which is a hilarious statement.
More than all of this.
He says, "We also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ through whom we have now
received reconciliation."
I just want to ask you, church, will you rejoice?
Rejoicing is the natural emotional result of being reconciled.
And your worship should be an overflow of love and joy and gratitude for Jesus Christ,
for all He is, and for all He's done, and for all He's promised that He will do.
Let your worship be an expression of love.
Would you stand and lift up your voices and demonstrate love for Jesus Christ?

Small Group Discussion
Read Romans 5:6-11

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Have you ever questioned God’s love for you? Why? What is God’s response, based on this passage?
What 4 words are used to describe lost people in this passage? How does this speak to the idea that “deep down, man is basically good”?
Read John 1:12 and Philippians 1:6. What do these verses teach us about God’s love being a committed love?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

April 6, 2025

What is Finished?

Justification: The Guilt is Gone

Jeff Miller

April 6, 2025

What is Finished?

Introduction:

3 Things to Remind Yourself When You Feel Guilty: (Romans 3:21-28)

You Are. (Romans 3:21-23)
But God is Totally Satisfied by the Cross. (Romans 3:24-26)
Proverbs 17:15 – He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous are both alike an abomination to the Lord.

Exodus 23:7 – Keep far from a false charge, and do not kill the innocent and righteous, for I will not acquit the wicked.

Acts 17:30 – The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
And Justification is a Gift to Be Received By Faith. (Romans 3:27-28)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Our next four messages, including Good Friday, which I just found out is on a Friday,
will be talking about one of the most profound statements Jesus Christ ever made.
And it was on the cross when he cried out, "It is finished."
So we're going to be examining the question, "What is finished?"
Think about finishing things, right?
From a very early age, hopefully we've all been taught the importance of finishing things, right?
Didn't you hear that growing up?
And maybe some of you now parents are saying, "That's your kids."
Hey, finish your supper. Finish your chores, right?
Finish your homework.
And we're taught that there are consequences when we don't finish.
Well, the glorious reality that we're going to be looking at over these next four messages is this.
The Son of God came to this earth to do something, and he finished it.
So the question is, what is finished?
Now let's go to the scene, John 19, verses 28 through 30.
It says, "After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said,"
to fulfill the Scriptures, "I thirst.
A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hissy branch
and held it to his mouth when Jesus had received the sour wine.
He said, 'It is finished.'
And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit."
What was finished?
Well, today we're going to look at one thing of many that was finished.
Today we're going to talk about the work of justification.
Meaning our guilt is gone.
I'd like you to buy your heads with me, please, and I just want to take a moment.
If you would please pray for me to accurately communicate the Word of God as I should.
And I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive what it is the Lord wants to teach us today from His Word.
Alright? Let's pray.
Father in heaven, as we turn to Your Word, it's a thought that makes us tremble to think that right now
we are about to talk about the most important thing anyone will ever hear for their entire lives.
And Father, we recognize that as no overstatement whatsoever.
We can't begin to fathom how important this message is.
This message has just been so distorted and twisted and changed,
and we just want to get back to what Your Word actually says.
See what You said, God, and we want to not align our lives with our concept of You, God,
but we want to align our lives with what You actually said.
So I'm asking, Father, You would open our hearts up this morning
and that You would bring much glory to Yourself through the straightforward understanding of Your Word.
We pray in Jesus' name, and all of God's people said,
"Amen! What is finished, the work of justification, the guilt is gone."
Do I have to sell anybody on guilt?
We've all struggled with guilt, and some of us might be struggling with guilt right now.
What is guilt? Well, guilt is just that bad feeling that we get when what I did was wrong.
There's another word that's often connected to guilt, and it's the word shame.
And shame's a little different.
See, shame is the feeling of guilt that I have when people know what I did wrong.
You know what I mean? Like, you could have a secret sin that nobody knows about,
and you might feel guilt over that, but you don't feel shame because nobody knows.
But if that secret sin gets made known, if people know about it, now all of a sudden,
people must think of me differently. That's what shame is.
How I think people think of me now because of my guilt.
The point is this, my friends, we have both of those before God.
We have guilt. I disobeyed. We have shame. God is surely disappointed in me.
I want you to look at verse 24. We're going to back up here and get to context.
I just want you to look at this first phrase in verse 24.
This is Romans chapter 3, right?
He says, "We are justified by His grace as a gift."
That's what we're talking about today. Justification. What is that?
It's the most important thing you will ever hear.
Justification is God pronouncing a guilty sinner as not only being not guilty,
but being perfectly righteous instead. It's a legal term.
It's the opposite of condemnation.
But listen, it's more than pardoned.
So when you pardon someone, you're just taking away the penalty of what they did.
Penalty for, excuse me, what they did wrong.
Justification is so much more than that.
It's not just canceling the penalty, but actually making righteous.
Think of it this way. In God's justification, it's not just you won't be punished.
God says you can't be punished because there are no grounds whatsoever for punishment anymore.
Do you see the difference?
But even as Christians, we still wrestle with guilt, don't we?
I mean, look, if you've done something wrong to somebody else,
you need to take steps to make that right.
And Pastor Taylor did an amazing job last Wednesday at our latest workshop.
So we're not talking about that today.
But today we're talking about guilt before God.
Am I really forgiven?
Have you ever wrestled with that?
Am I really a child of God?
Or is God disappointed in me?
Well, from God's Word today, I want you to jot some things down.
Here's three things to remind yourself when you feel guilty.
And if you don't feel guilty now, you will.
I mean, like, eventually, I didn't mean like...
In 30 seconds, you're all going to be bowing your heads.
We all struggle with it from time to time, don't we?
Is it just me?
Okay, alright.
Three things.
Look, we're not trying to pile on here, okay?
Here are three things to remind yourself when you feel guilty.
Number one, you are.
Like, wait, wait, wait, wait.
I came here to feel good, Pastor Jeff.
Look, listen, it has to start here.
Because if you don't really think that you're guilty before God,
Jesus won't really mean anything to you.
Look at verse 21.
He says, "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested
apart from the law."
Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it.
So up there, the Old Testament law was to teach us that we are sinners.
That was the purpose of the Old Testament law.
It was to teach us that we have broken the law of God.
And even if you just reduce the Old Testament law to the Ten Commandments,
just looking at those shows us adequately that we are really law sinners.
I mean, let me ask you, have you always made the worship of God
and your walk with God the absolute most important thing in your life?
Has it always been number one?
No.
Well, if not, then you've broken the first couple of commandments.
You should only have one God.
You shouldn't have worshiped anything else other than God.
You're guilty.
Have you always honored your parents perfectly?
Like, no, there are times I haven't.
Well, you've broken the fifth commandment,
which says honor your father and mother.
Have you ever hated someone?
According to Jesus, you've broken the sixth commandment,
which says you shouldn't murder because it starts in here.
Have you ever lusted?
Jesus said that's the same thing as committing adultery
and you've broken the seventh commandment.
Have you ever stolen anything?
That's breaking the eighth commandment.
How we doing?
How we doing?
You're like, I'm doing pretty good.
Okay, have you ever told a lie?
You're like, I think maybe I just did.
Well, if you've ever known the truth
and intentionally said something else,
then you've broken the ninth commandment.
Have you ever wanted something that God gave somebody else?
Like, what's the big deal?
I'll tell you the big deal.
That's breaking the tenth commandment.
That's called coveting.
So you see, that's the purpose of the law was to show us,
oh, I'm not a righteous person on my own.
We need to be made right with God,
but the law shows us that we're sinners.
We're sinners.
It can't make us not guilty.
The Old Testament law can't do that.
Look at verse 22.
He goes on.
He says, "The righteousness of God
through faith in Jesus Christ
for all who believe."
Stop there for a second,
because we have to make a key distinction here.
Because if you miss this,
you're going to be really lost here in a second.
He's talking about the righteousness of God.
He says it twice.
That's the theme of this passage.
What is the righteousness of God?
Hang on.
There's a distinction.
In verses 25 and 26,
he talks about God's righteousness.
Listen, God's righteousness is different
than the righteousness of God.
Those are two different things.
And it's going to be crystal clear in the context
so long as you stay tuned in to what God is saying here.
Like, what's the difference?
Here's the difference.
Listen, God's righteousness is the righteousness that God owns.
The righteousness of God is the righteousness God gives
to believers.
So he's saying -
one other run at that one -
God's righteousness is the righteousness that God owns.
That's just another way of saying God's holiness.
God is holy, He's perfect.
That's what God's righteousness is.
But when the Bible talks about here,
the righteousness of God,
it's talking about the righteousness that God gives to believers.
And again, that's going to be very clear in the context.
But I don't want us to get tripped up on the terms.
So, Paul is claiming here that God makes us righteous through faith,
implying that we need to be made righteous,
implying that we're guilty.
You see that?
Look at verse 22, he goes on.
He says, "For there is no distinction,
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
Look, when we talk about being guilty before God,
he says there's no distinction.
It doesn't matter if you grew up in a Christian home.
Or if you grew up in a home that didn't even have a Bible in it.
It doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter
if you're the most rebellious sinner in the world.
Or if you're just a pretty good person.
He says we all have fallen short of the glory of God.
Like, what glory of God? What is that?
That's God's image.
That's God's intention for man.
We all failed to live up to being the people
that God has created us to be.
We've all fallen short.
Listen, it doesn't matter how short we've fallen.
Because we've all fallen short.
Imagine, we're standing on the shore of New Jersey,
facing the Atlantic Ocean.
And there's me.
And there's my man, Max.
And there's the Steelers quarterback.
Who's the quarterback for the Steelers now?
Oh, I'm sorry.
I pushed a hot button.
Let's just say Ben Rothlessberger.
So let's say we're all standing on the shore of New Jersey.
All right, me, Max, and Ben Rothlessberger.
And we're each given a football.
And we're told that we need to throw that football and hit England.
I can do that. I mean, how far is England?
And I -- everything that I got, I throw it.
And it goes 10 feet into the ocean.
And Max was like, "Pastor Jeff, step aside."
Whoo!
Tight spiral, 100 feet.
Whoo!
Into the ocean.
Ben Rothlessberger steps up.
And he's like, "I'm going to show you I still got it."
And whoo! He throws it 200 feet into the ocean.
Which one of us hit England?
Right?
We all fell short, didn't we?
You're like, "Well, Jeff, you fell way shorter than Ben."
Okay.
But we all fell short. Do you see the point?
It doesn't matter how short you've fallen.
We all fell short of God's glory.
And that's a big deal.
Listen, church, we can't minimize that by saying,
"I'm not really that guilty."
We can't compare to say, "Well, I'm not as guilty as other people."
And we can't trivialize it to say, "Yeah, okay, I'm guilty."
So what?
We need to confess it.
I -- and by that I mean me --
I am guilty of breaking God's law by my disobedience.
So if you're struggling with guilt,
this is just your friendly reminder that you are guilty.
But number two,
but God is totally satisfied by the cross.
You are guilty, but God is totally satisfied by the cross.
Look at verse 24 through the first part of 25.
He says, "Okay, for all of us who fall short of the glory of God,
a lot of us probably have that verse memorized, right?"
But He says, "And are justified by His grace as a gift
through the redemption it is in Christ Jesus,
whom God put forward as a propitiation
by His blood to be received by faith."
Look, the cross of Jesus Christ is God's means
of making sinners righteous.
Now, there's a word here in these verses we just read.
You need to underline in your Bible right now.
And we're going to have people at the door handing you an Easter devotional
and checking your Bibles to make sure that you underline this.
But it's one of the most beautiful words in the entire Bible.
And it's the word "propitiation."
I think John uses it in 1 John as well.
It's a beautiful word.
Like, well, what is "propitiation"?
Propitiation literally means to placate anger.
I know some theologians try to dance around that.
Like, almost to soften the blow.
But no, that's what it means.
It means God is furious over sin.
Propitiation means He's not angry anymore.
It means that Jesus' death satisfied God.
Because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross, God saw that.
And He said, "The full penalty has been paid.
My wrath has been fully poured out.
Punishment has been fully doled out."
God says, "I am satisfied."
You know, when we talk about salvation,
sometimes we say, in our evangelism mindset,
we say, "How do we get men to accept God?"
And that's really not the question we need to ask.
The question is, how do we get God to accept men?
Because, listen, God was the one who was offended.
Not me.
God was offended.
So any talk about salvation and being righteous
and any talk of that has to satisfy God.
And you see, that's where every other religion in the world,
besides Christianity as presented in God's Word,
straightforwardly, every other religion teaches
that there are things that we have to do to satisfy God.
There are religious works or some kind of action
that we have to take to make God satisfied.
The Bible says we can't do it.
Nothing we do can satisfy God.
Look at verse 25 again.
It says, "Whom God," talking about Jesus,
"put forward as a propitiation by His blood
to be received by faith."
Look at that.
The Bible says, "God put Jesus forward."
Do you see what's happening here?
We sinned against God.
We deserve God's wrath.
And God took His Son and put Him forward.
That means He demonstrated some things.
He put Jesus on display.
God showed us something on the cross.
What did God show us on the cross?
Well, later in Romans 5, verse 8,
it says that God demonstrated His love on the cross.
So love for sure.
Here, specifically, He's saying that on the cross,
God showed that His Son fully paid the penalty
that the law demanded.
So now, God says, "Because of my Son..."
Look, I'm showing you this.
I'm showing you.
This is what my Son did.
Now, I'm satisfied.
Propitiation.
Propitiation.
This is where theology is important, my friends.
Christian, listen.
I want you to listen real close, Christian.
God is not mad at you.
He's not.
Because of Jesus,
God has no wrath left for you.
And to think that He does
is to minimize what Jesus accomplished on the cross.
But some Christians think that
God poured out His wrath on Jesus.
They believe that.
But they think that God's still mad at them.
Like, God is just like,
"Yeah, I know that you received my Son,
but I'm so upset with you for what you did."
He's not.
That's what that word "propitiation" means.
There's no wrath left
for the one in Christ Jesus.
God is satisfied.
Look at the end of verse 25.
This gets a little technical, so look.
It says,
"This was to show God's righteousness."
Because in His divine forbearance,
He had passed over former sins.
It was to show His righteousness
at the present time,
so that He might be just
and the justifier
of the one who has faith in Jesus.
We define this term in the outset,
but two times here,
He says that the cross
was to show God's righteousness.
Do you know what He's saying?
The cross proved
that God is righteous.
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Time out, time out.
Time out.
Hang on.
Why would anyone
accuse God of not being holy?
What do you mean?
What possible grounds would someone have
to point to God and say,
"God, you messed up here.
God, what you did
or what you didn't do here,
that's not holy, God.
That's not righteous."
What grounds would somebody have for that?
Listen very closely,
because this is what Paul's talking about.
We're going to do a little theology here
for a couple of minutes,
and I know what's the point.
You're going to see here in a couple of minutes
that this will change your life
if you really understand this.
So here we go.
What's Paul talking about here?
When he talks about his divine forbearance,
passing over former sins.
What's he mean?
Listen, in the Old Testament times,
which was before the cross, right,
God justified wicked people.
And that is controversial.
You're like, "Why?
Why is it controversial
that God would justify the wicked
in Old Testament times?"
Oh, I'm so glad you asked.
I'll tell you why.
One reason is,
He forbid us to do that.
Look at Proverbs 17-15.
"He who justifies the wicked
and he who condemns the righteous
are both alike in abomination to the Lord."
Do you see that?
Do you know what abomination is?
In my Bible, I put a little exclamation point
in the margin every time I see that word.
That's like something that is so wicked,
it like makes God sick.
God's like, "I hate that."
And here God says,
"I can't stomach when the wicked are justified."
You're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second.
You're saying that we can't do that,
but you did that, God,
before the cross."
Hmm.
Is that righteous?
Well, actually,
it gets even worse
if we're barking up this tree,
because earlier in your Old Testaments,
God actually said
that He would never justify the wicked.
Exodus 23-7,
it's pretty self-explanatory.
And God says, "I will not
acquit the wicked."
Do you see the problem?
Somebody would say,
God in the Old Testament times did
what He forbid us to do,
what He swore He would never do,
what He would never do.
And we're talking about God being holy,
God being perfect, God so righteous.
How can we say that?
And Paul doesn't -
I love this because
he doesn't shy away from that.
He runs right at it
when he says this was to
show God's righteousness
because -
look at this again -
in His divine forbearance,
He passed over former sins.
Again, it was to show His righteousness.
In other words,
He's saying in the Old Testament times
God tolerated sin.
Like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
How can we say God's righteous?
I mean, in the Old Testament,
there was no perpetuation.
There was no cross of Jesus Christ yet.
So when somebody sinned in the Old Testament,
if God is the holy judge
that you say that He is,
why didn't He immediately just judge sinners?
They didn't have
the blood of Jesus Christ to proclaim.
I mean, you look at the guys in the Old Testament -
Abraham, Moses, David -
I mean, pick one -
all sinners.
And yet, when you read
God's interaction with them,
over and over,
we see God giving them the promise of eternal life.
Was that really a righteous thing to do
for people that couldn't put their faith
in Jesus Christ
since He hadn't come yet?
How could God give them that promise?
Somebody would say,
"Oh, that was the Old Testament sacrifices."
Couldn't do it.
They covered sin,
but they didn't take away sin.
And somebody else might say,
"Well, it was their good works."
It was their good works.
That's how God was able to...
No.
Nowhere does the Bible say
you can earn your salvation.
So what's He saying?
He's saying in verses 25 and 26 here,
"And God's forbearance,"
another word for patience.
He passed over former sins.
And that word "pass over"
doesn't mean forgive.
It literally means He overlooked their sin.
God's patience
caused God to not punish their sin immediately.
This is exactly what Paul was talking about.
Very curious verse in Acts 17, verse 30,
on Mars Hill,
exact same thing he's talking about.
The times of ignorance,
God overlooked.
And now He commands all people
everywhere to repent.
So how was God able to do that?
See, this is what Paul's talking about here.
It was still, even in Old Testament times,
it was still because of Jesus Christ.
You're like, "Well, how can they believe in Jesus
if they don't know about the cross?"
Look, God is outside of time.
And if you study your Bibles like Revelation 13.8,
Jesus Christ was always the Lamb of God.
That wasn't some radical idea
that God dreamed up one day
about 2,000 years ago.
Like, "Oh, I got an idea."
Now, that was always the plan.
So here it is.
Listen close.
Even before the cross happened,
God overlooked sin based on what was already determined
that His Son was going to do.
So what He's saying is this,
the cross of Jesus Christ reaches back
to the Old Testament saints.
They were pronounced righteous
because of what Jesus was going to do,
just as we are pronounced righteous
looking back based on what Jesus did in our past.
And kids that haven't even been born yet
that eventually will receive Jesus Christ,
their sins are already forgiven in Christ.
You're like, "Okay, so what's the point?"
What's the point?
Well, there's two points actually.
Number one, it answers one of the most commonly asked questions
that I get as a pastor.
People ask me all the time,
"How are the people saved in the Old Testament?"
Because if Jesus is the only means of salvation,
and I believe that,
then how were they saved in the Old Testament?
The answer is still Jesus.
Their faith was based on what God was going to do.
That's why God was overlooking their sin, so to speak.
But listen, here's why this theology is so important for you.
What were we talking about today?
Guilt, right?
See, this answers the guilt question.
As a Christian, when I sin,
and I will,
is God mad at me?
No.
Do I have to ask for forgiveness?
Do I have to plead the blood of Jesus over my sin
every time that I sin as a Christian?
The answer is no.
Or how about this one?
What if I sin and then I die?
Can I go to heaven since I sinned
and I didn't ask for forgiveness for that particular sin?
I have known,
pastors, I have known pastors that have taught that,
that you better die on a good day.
Because let's say you're living this perfect walk with Jesus' life.
And let's say you have a blow-up with your wife on the way out the door.
And you sinfully speak to her.
And you get in the car and go to work,
and you die in a car accident, you're going to hell.
Because that sin wasn't confessed and repented of
and covered under the blood of Christ.
I know pastors that teach that.
That is completely wrong.
That's why this theology is so important.
Listen, when Jesus Christ was on the cross,
do you realize all of your sins were yet future?
Do you realize that?
All of your sins were paid for,
even the sins that you haven't committed yet.
So if you are in Christ,
and if you sin and you will,
you don't need to ask for forgiveness.
Because you already have it.
So listen, somebody is going to misconstrue this.
So just grab the shoulder of the person next to you and shake them.
And tell them to pay attention.
Thank you.
Because somebody is going to misconstrue this.
Listen, when you sin, church,
you need to confess your sin.
Then you need to thank God
that He has forgiven you in Jesus Christ.
And you need to turn from your sin.
Because you don't want to do anything in your life
that would dishonor the name of your Lord.
But it's not as if God just keeps forgiving you over and over.
He forgave you once when you received Jesus Christ.
And that lasts for all of eternity.
Do you see the security in that?
So listen, whether it was Moses' sin
or a sin that you are going to commit tomorrow,
all sins have been taken away.
God is satisfied because of the one-time sacrifice of Jesus
that covers all sins of all believers.
There is incredible freedom in that.
Three things to remind yourself when you feel guilty.
Number one, you are.
Number two, but God is totally satisfied by the cross.
Number three, justification is a gift to be received by faith.
Look at verses 27 and 28.
He says, "Then what becomes of our boasting?
It is excluded by what kind of law?
By a law of works? No.
By the law of faith.
For we hold that one is justified by faith
apart from works of the law."
In this passage, faith has come up,
have you been counting?
Six times.
And yes, I'm counting when he used the word "believe"
because that's what he meant.
Verse 22, including the word "believe," he says it twice.
Verse 25, 26, 27, 28.
Faith, faith, faith.
And then he's like, "So what does that do for our boasting?"
Pretty dumb, right?
To have the audacity to think that you have anything
to contribute to your salvation at all?
What could you possibly boast about?
What do your works have to do with the death of Jesus?
You realize when Jesus was on the cross,
when Jesus was actually on the cross,
most of you weren't even born yet.
I was going to say all,
but I don't know how old all y'all are.
So I think it's safe to say when Jesus died,
most of you weren't born yet.
So what did you contribute to that exactly?
See, the cross of Jesus Christ eliminates
even the very possibility of salvation by human works.
Faith. Faith is the only way.
Faith isn't one way to be saved.
It's the only way.
And don't think that faith is some sort of merit.
Like, okay, God did His part in salvation,
and now I'm going to do my part in salvation.
It's not even really like that,
because earlier he was talking about grace in verse 24,
and grace by its very definition is non-contributory.
Do you know what that means?
If you put forth anything to contribute towards it,
it's no longer grace at all.
So what is faith?
I like how one writer put it.
He says faith is simply the eye that sees.
He said faith is simply the mouth
that drinks from the living water.
And he said faith is the hand that receives the gift.
I like that, because by the way, in verse 24,
he calls it a gift.
It is a gift.
Imagine that it's my birthday today.
It's not.
My birthday is September 23rd.
I don't see a lot of you writing that down.
I can wait. September 23rd.
But we're - for today,
we're pretending that it's my birthday.
And imagine this afternoon,
you showed up at my house
and you had a gift for me.
Something you went out and you bought
and you wrapped it,
and you were so excited to give me this gift.
And you come to my house
and you ring the doorbell and I open it up
and you say, "Happy birthday."
There's four ways that I can respond to that.
Right? First way is,
I can slam the door in your face and say,
"I don't want your stupid gifts."
I wouldn't do that.
But that's an option, right?
I mean, I could do that.
Second option is you ring the doorbell,
open it up, "Happy birthday."
And I look at the gift and I say,
"That's awesome. Where's my wallet?"
Like, "How much do I owe you for that?"
Let me see how much cash I have.
I can probably pay you for that right now.
Or can I write you a check?
How would you feel
if I offered to buy the gift that you got me?
Pretty lousy, huh?
That's another option.
Or a third option is you ring the doorbell,
I open it up, "Happy birthday."
And I take the gift and I'm like,
"Wow, you know what?
This looks great."
Thank you. This looks fantastic.
And I set it down by the door.
And then you come to my house.
Six months later, and that gift is still sitting there.
Except now it has an inch of dust on it.
And you would think to yourself,
"You know, Jeff actually seemed excited
when I handed it to him,
but he didn't really receive it, did he?"
He didn't really do anything with it.
He just kind of set it aside.
Or the fourth option,
you ring the doorbell, "Happy birthday."
I got you a gift.
The fourth option is I take the gift
and I say, "Thank you."
Thank you so much for this.
And I receive it, and I use it.
And you realize those are the same four ways
that you can respond to God's gift in Jesus Christ.
You have those same four options.
That God says, "I am satisfied."
I have paid the price of your sin
with the blood of my son.
Here is a gift.
And for some people, they take the first option.
They slam the door and say, "No.
God, I'm not interested in your stupid gift."
Some people take that option.
Some people take option two,
and they think they can buy it.
"Oh God, that's so wonderful what you did for me in Jesus.
Now, let me earn that.
And I'm going to start doing this at the church
and I'm going to work at the soup kitchen
and they think that they have to earn the gift.
And I would suggest to you that God
is probably just as insulted
at that notion as I would be,
or as you would be rather,
if I tried to pay you for the gift that you got me."
It's insulting to try to buy a gift.
The third option,
and I think this is the most taken option in churches, honestly.
That's what most people do with the gift of Jesus Christ.
They're like, "Yeah, that you're sitting here
and worshiping the Word,
and you're just like all into it.
You're like, "Yeah, yeah, I need this.
Yeah, that's fantastic."
And you set them aside.
And you never really receive them.
You just sort of discarded them.
Not flagrant rejection, but,
shall we say, practical rejection.
The option that the Lord wants you to take
is that you receive the gift.
To understand why you need it,
and you thank God that He gave it.
That Jesus bore God's wrath on the cross.
God is satisfied with what Jesus did.
The guilt is gone by the gift of God.
Did you receive that?
So worship team makes their way back up.
I'd just like you to bow your heads.
And I'm sure sitting here today,
there are some Christians that have wrestled with guilt
that have needed to take a fresh look
at what exactly Jesus accomplished on the cross.
He didn't accomplish opportunity
for us to earn favor with God.
Jesus accomplished our salvation in full.
Jesus accomplished the full removal of our guilt and shame
by bearing God's wrath on our behalf.
But there might be somebody here
that's really hearing this for the first time.
Whether it's somebody sitting here,
listening to this podcast,
or watching the stream.
Today's the day that you need to stop setting the gift aside.
And receive what it is that God has for you.
Father in heaven.
Father, this to me is the most mind-blowing concept
in the entirety of your Word.
God, I've never really wrestled with creation
or the trinity or eternity, things like that.
But God, the fact that you can pronounce a sinner righteous
is mind-blowing.
God, we thank you for the work that you accomplished on our behalf
through the death of your Son.
Father, if there's anyone here
who needs to take that step,
who needs to receive Christ,
who needs to make their public profession of faith and baptism
here in a few weeks.
Father, I pray that you would give them the faith
to not put it off,
to not talk themselves out of it,
but to see the value,
the incomparable value of Jesus Christ.
What He's done, and in so doing, Father,
they would run to you.
So just now, Father,
we've heard from you,
and now we're going to express back to you
love and thanksgiving
for what you've done on our behalf.
So Father, might this worship
be a pleasing aroma,
may it be a sweet sound in your ear
as we revel in your love and grace.
We pray in Jesus' name, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Romans 3:21-28

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Why do you think many Christians still struggle with guilt and shame?
Explain the term “propitiation” (Rom 3:25). Why is this such an important aspect of the Gospel? What does it mean for a Christian in practical terms?
What does it mean that God “passed over former sins” (Rom 3:25)? How could a Holy God just overlook sin (see also Acts 17:30)?

Breakout
Pray for one another to be salty and bright.

Jeff Miller

March 30, 2025

The Heart of the Disciple

You Are God's Influencers

Jeff Miller

March 30, 2025

The Heart of the Disciple

Introduction:

Influencer = Social media professional who has built a sizable following around a relevant topic, and can therefore influence their followers to take an action, thanks to their credibility and authority.

As Salt and Light, I Am God's Influencer 
(Matthew 5:13-16)

My Influence is Expected.
My Influence Comes from Me Being Different.
My Influence Is for God's Glory.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Open up your Bibles with me, please, to the book of Matthew in chapter 5.
Today we are going to talk about influencers.
Now the young people here already know something about this, but those of us who
are older, this is, I'm in that category too, this might be a new
concept to some of this. But what is an influencer? We have a definition here, can
we get the definition up on the screen? This is what an influencer is, okay?
It's a social media professional who has built a sizable following around a
relevant topic and can therefore influence their followers to take an
action thanks to their credibility and authority. That's what a social media
influencer or an influencer, that's what that is. And those relevant topics,
that's a lot of different things, right? It's food, health, fashion, pop culture,
travel, gaming, beauty, you name it, there's somebody out there that is an
influencer. They are internet celebrities. And by that, some of them were already
celebrities and they got online. And some of them are people who became
celebrities because of their online presence. There's lists of the top ones.
I was looking up all these lists and you can do this sometime, not now, but I was
looking up lists of who were the biggest influencers of our day. And for
sake of time today, I'm just going to share top five. Here's the top five,
according to this one list for whatever that's worth. The number one biggest
influencer, Cristiano Ronaldo. I don't even know who she is. Is anybody a soccer
player? Not football. That is a different sport. We call it soccer like good
Americans. Okay, so apparently Cristiano Ronaldo is a soccer player and on this
list, the biggest influencer in the world currently. Number two, I think I heard of
her. It's Selena Gomez. Isn't she like an, is she an actor or something? Okay,
actor, singer. Okay, all right. Number three is Mr. Beast. Probably not his real
name. Number four is Lionel Messi. Messi, another soccer player.
What? I played soccer in high school and college and it was not popular back then.
Now two of the top five so far. Oh, number five. I know number five. Number five is
the Biebs as his followers like to call him. Justin Bieber. That's number five.
Did you know God has a face for his brand? God has a spokesman. God has someone
to endorse his relevant topic. Do you know who that is? It's you. It's you.
Think it by your heads with me and I want you to pray for me. Once we turn to God's
word that I'll be faithful to communicate it and I will pray for you to
have a heart open to receive what God has for us today. Let's pray.
Father, your word tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing through the
Word of Christ. The only transformation that can happen is supernatural
transformation. It has to come from you. And I pray, Father, that as we encounter
your word, as we encounter you, we are profoundly changed. We pray these things
in Jesus' name. And all of God's people said, "Amen." We just finished what was
like an eight-week series on the Beatitudes. And the Beatitudes describe
what a follower of Jesus is like. Verses 13 through 16 describe the function of
the believer in the world. You are God's influencer. You are. When you live as
described in the Beatitudes, you influence the world. Like, well, how does that
happen? Well, let's see what our Lord says. Matthew 5 verse 13. He says, "You are the
salt of the earth. But if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be
restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and
trampled under people's feet. You are the light of the world." A city said on a
hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket. But
on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house, in the same way, let your
light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory
to your Father who is in heaven. Jesus here is saying, okay, here's the short
version. The world is decaying and it's dark. Have you noticed? What it needs is
salt and light. Let's talk about salt and light for a second, shall we? When it
comes to salt, look, in our day, we kind of take salt for granted. It's everywhere.
It's on every table, it's in your cabinet. It's everywhere, and it's cheap. But the
people that lived in Jesus' day would have had a different view of salt. To the
Greeks, they considered salt divine. The Romans said that there is nothing more
valuable than two things, sun and salt. In fact, Roman soldiers were actually paid
in salt. Do you ever hear that expression? He's not worth a salt? Ask where that comes
from. True story. It was so important in so many ways. People would use salt in
making covenants. Salt was used in Old Testament sacrifices. Salt was used for
flavor, obviously. Salt is an antiseptic. Like, well, how did Jesus mean it?
I believe the main primary focus of Jesus' teaching here is salt as a
preservative. Salt prevents corruption. You see, in Jesus' day, they didn't have
refrigerators. They didn't have a deep-freeze chest in the garage like we do.
So in order to preserve meat, you would literally have to rub salt into the meat
to keep it from spoiling. And in the same way, Jesus' followers are the salt in the
meat of the world. We are what's preventing the world from totally rotting right now.
But the Bible says, 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, the book of Revelation, when
the church is removed from the world in the rapture, the world is going to go to
hell. It's going to get horrific because the salt's been removed. It's gonna rot.
So the implication here of salt is that the world is polluted and corrupt and it
has this tendency to rot like meat. And what it needs is your influence. It needs salt.
Let's talk about light for a second. Also, much more valuable in Jesus' day
because, again, we kind of take it for granted, don't we? We're so used to having
electricity and flicking the lights on. But don't we just lose our minds when a
storm takes the power out and there's no light? I know our house does, but they
didn't have that electricity. So light would have been a much more valuable
thing to them. But you know, Jesus said, "I am the light of the world," back in John
chapter 8 and verse 12, "and here Jesus says you are the light of the world." So
which is it? And the answer is both. It's both. It's His light through us. Just as
the moon doesn't produce its own light but reflects the light of the sun, that's
how it is for followers of Christ. We are to reflect the light of Jesus Christ in
our lives. Now when the Bible talks about light, it's talking about revealing
God's truth. This is what the Bible refers to when it's talking about light,
right? Psalm 119, 105, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." So
light has to do with the revelation of God's Word. It is the light that tells us
the cause of the darkness. It is the light that shows us that our problem is
we're separated from God. But it's also the light that shows us the way out of
darkness. It's the light of God's Word that says there is a way to get back to
God, and that is through Jesus Christ, who died for your sins, who rose from the
dead to give you eternal life. It's through faith in Him. That's how you get back to
God, and that is only revealed in the light of God's Word. So the implication
when Jesus talks about light is this, the world is dark. Sin has made this world a
very dark place. What it needs is light. It needs your influence. So on your
outline, I encourage you to take some notes here. Here's the sermon, "As Salt and
Light, I am God's Influencer. I am. And if you claim to be a follower of Jesus
Christ, you are an influencer for God. You are." Let's unpack this a little bit.
Shall we, number one, write this down, "My influence is expected." My influence is
expected. Interestingly, in the Greek, we talked about this in the Beatitudes. It's
here too. You know, you as emphatic in the Greek. So literally, you could
translate this. Jesus is saying, "You are the only light in the world. You are the
only salt in the world." You know, I was thinking about salt this week. You know,
something really interesting about salt, as valuable as it is, it's really no good
on its own, is it? It's not good by itself. I mean, when was the last time you
went to Pantera bread, and you said, "Yeah, you know what? I'm not really that hungry.
I'm just gonna have a bowl of salt." Like, who does that? It's no good on its own.
Salt is always used for something else. And you know, thinking about that further,
light is the same, isn't it? Light is always used for something else. Meaning
this, when you turn on the lights, you don't do it because you're like, "You know
what, man? I just really like light." Like, nobody just really likes light. Why do you
turn it on? Because it's light that illuminates what's in the room. Light has
no other purpose. So salt and light always used for something else. Always used
for something else. You know what? You are so valuable. You are. But like salt,
you're not valuable for yourself. Here's what I mean. If all God wanted was for you
to be saved, then the moment you receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, God
would just take you to heaven. Like, we're done. Good job. I wanted you to be saved.
But He doesn't do that. God, when you're saved, God keeps you on this earth for one
reason. It's influence. He keeps you here to be salt and light. You see, that's what
Jesus is saying here. There is no salt and light except from a Christ follower
who is going to show and tell the people around you about Jesus. Like, well, you're
the pastor, isn't that your job? No. Look, it can't be. You're going to encounter
people just through the course of your every day that I'm never going to meet.
You're going to work with people and there's people in your family. The
pastor Taylor is never going to meet. So whose job is it to let them know about
Jesus Christ? That's yours. That's why God has you there. There's no alternative.
There's just not another option. But you know, side note, it's an interesting
paradox. Last week we were talking about persecution, right? And people hating you
because of Jesus. Isn't it an interesting paradox that the world hates us so much,
but the world needs us so desperately? Look, you're expected. You are expected to
be salt and light. That is so clear from Jesus' words. It is just an
expectation. That's why Jesus gives warnings of being useless. Did you see
that? He says, verse 13, "If the salt has lost its taste." And then over in verse 15,
he says, "Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket." What's the point?
Well, the point is this. If salt isn't salty, it's useless, right? And if light
doesn't shine, useless. What Jesus is saying here is when salt isn't salty,
when light isn't bright, what that means is you've lost your influence. You've
lost your influence. It's a terrible place to be when you lose your ability to be
salt and light for Jesus Christ. You're like, well, how does that happen? How do
you lose your influence? How does salt lose its taste? How do you hide your
light? Well, it happens through sin. That's how it happens. Constantly
complaining, you're losing your saltiness. Gossiping, you're losing your
saltiness. Do you have a hair trigger temper? You're losing your
saltiness when that erupts. I'm inappropriate with the opposite sex in
any way. Flirtation, direct messages to full-on affairs. You're losing your
saltiness when you're involved in sin. Jesus gives a hard wording about that
here. He says you're not good for anything when that happens. I can just
speak personally, you know, over the years there have been several pastors who
have been a big influence influence. Several pastors have been a big influence
on me. Some local guys, some national names. People who have disqualified
themselves from ministry because of flagrant sin. And in a lot of the cases
it was affairs. Whether it was emotion or physical, that seems to be the
predominant disqualifier. And look, right wrong or indifferent, you can reach your
conviction on this. But I gotta tell you, I've thrown away a lot of books and a
lot of sermons and a lot of materials for ministries. Because those pastors lost
their influence, how can you preach this? And for years secretly live a
completely different way. How can you do that? You don't have audience with me
anymore. You're like, yeah, that's terrible. Well, what about you? What about
your influence with your unsafe family, with your friends, with your co-workers?
When they know that you're a Christian, and by the way they absolutely should,
look, when they know you name the name of Christ, they're watching you. They are
watching everything you do. They're watching your attitudes. They're listening
to every word that you say and how you say it and what you talk about. They're
listening. They're watching. I have to ask you, do they
see sin? Or maybe you just try to tone down the salt a little bit when
you're around them. Maybe when you're around them, you don't want to be the
weird religious wackadoo. So you're just, let's just dim the lights a little bit.
Can we just dim the lights a little bit? Jesus says, if that's the case, He says,
you're not good for anything. Like, Jesus is saying, why do I have you here? Why do I
have you here if you're not going to be salt and light? You're no good. It's a
hard warning. But notice, Jesus didn't say after the beatitudes, okay, now would
you pretty please be salt and light? He said, you are. You are. So really the
question is, how salty are you? How bright are you? Because you're going to
influence people one way or the other. And Jesus is expecting His influence on
this world to happen through you. So your influence is expected, number one.
Number two, right this time, my influence comes from me being different. My
influence comes from me being different. That's something else about salt and
light. It has to actually be touching what it's going to affect. Did you know
that? If the salt's going to be of any use, it has to be on the food. I know that's
profound, right? What did you learn in church today? He said something about the
salt's no good unless it's on the food. Right. Right. The light must be mingled
with the darkness, right? But at the same time that it's touching, it's also
distinct. What I mean is salt and light are unlike the medium on which they're
placed. So the point is we are to be different from the world. We're to be
as different as the salt is from the meat. We're to be as different as the
light is from the darkness. And that means my friends, we're not we're not
self-serving. We're not materialistic. We're not worldly. The influence happens
when we're different from the world. And somehow we have a hard time as
Christians remembering that. We think that we are going to attract the
world by imitating them. We have this game in our minds where we say, "Well, I'm
going to show them that I'm no different than them. And they're going to see that
I'm cool and I'm relevant and then I'm going to be able to give them the gospel."
We think being like them is going to attract them.
Just imagine you have this co-worker and you have an exchange like this.
Your co-worker says, "Hey, you want to hear a dirty joke?" And your reply is, "Yes." And
then I will tell you one because I'm cool. Your co-worker says, "Hey, did you check
out that new lady that they hired? She is fine." And your reply to that is, "Yes, I
also think she is smoking as you do because you and me are the same." Your
co-worker says, "Hey, do you want to have too much beer later?" And your reply is, "I
sure would because that would be relevant to my relationship with you
because I'm just like you." And then maybe after our beers I will tell you how
Jesus changed me. Changed you? From what? Even in the church. Even in the church.
There's this tendency, we want to attract unsaved people so we think we've
got to be just like them. Let's put on a show. Let's make it like a secular
concert. Let's get the laser lights and the smoke machine and put on a big
theatrical production here. Let's be like the world. That'll win the world, won't it?
Because don't we want people to be comfortable? We hate that, don't we? When
churches are like, "We want you to come and be comfortable." Church is the last
place you should be comfortable. Standing in the face of the Word of God is
the last place you should feel comfortable. The church is, "Let's be like the
world and what that means is we're going to have to not take such a
hard stand on the truth of God's Word because we want to win the world, right?
And in order to do that, we got to be like the world." I was shown a church
recently online was advertising, "You can get baptized there." But the interesting
kicker was, they said, "You can get baptized any way you want."
Any way you want. You want to get dunked? Well, don't you? You want to get
sprinkled? We'll splash you? You want us to dip our hands in water and touch your
forehead? We'll do that. You name the way you want to get the water on you. We'll get
the water on you. As our Lord would say, "What is going on?" I heard this quote one
time that always stuck with me. Somebody said, regarding the church, they said,
"Just when the world needs us the most, we become just like them." And look, if we're
just the same, we got nothing to offer them, right? And if we learn anything from
the Beatitudes, it's this, kingdom of heaven people live different than kingdom
of earth people. We are not the same. We are not made out of the same stuff that
the world is made out of. We are salt and light. My influence comes from being
different, right? And finally, number three, my influence is for God's glory. My
influence is for God's glory. Look at verse 16 again. Jesus says in the same way,
"Let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give
glory to your Father who is in heaven." Good works. Good works. You do good works?
Well, you have to check your motives for that, right? Because it's not about what
people think about me as much as what they think about God. But Jesus said,
"They'll see our good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven."
Meaning this, "I do what I do because I love Jesus." And people are going to see
that, and that is going to give me the opportunity to share the gospel with
them, to invite them to church where they're going to hear the gospel. And
our hope is that they receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, because
that is the ultimate way that God has glorified.
But if we're going to be influencers, we have to be salt and light both.
Because you can read this passage and be like, isn't Jesus kind of saying the
same thing with the salt and the light? Like, why did He use two pictures? Why
didn't He just keep it short and use one? Because there's some key
differences between salt and light. The one I want to focus on is this. We could
spend so much time on this, we don't have it. But I want to say this. Jesus is
saying you have to have godly conduct, that's salt. And you have to have the
gospel message that's light. You have to have both.
Meaning this. You can't just walk away from this message and focus on one of
these aspects, but not the other. Meaning, let's just say you're only
going to focus on being salt. Okay, you're like, you know what, he's right
about the salt, you know what, I got to work on that. I'm just only going to focus
on being salt. I'm just going to focus on my walk with Christ, but you never
actually share the gospel with anyone. Well, the question is how is anybody
going to glorify the Father if you never tell them the gospel? Do you think
people are going to see your good works and just automatically, somehow,
miraculously understand the content of the gospel just because you're doing
good works? There was a saying that was thrown around years ago. You know those
sayings that sometimes creeps into the church that Christians use that sound,
they sound so like magnanimously spiritual, but they're really, when you
think about it, really kind of empty. This is one that kind of drove me nuts.
Years ago, people would say, preach the gospel and use words if necessary. Remember
that one? Preach the gospel and use words if necessary. Look, words are
necessary. Words are necessary. No one hears the truth just by watching
somebody's character, but on the other hand, if you're like, you know what,
you're right, I'm not going to worry so much about the salt. I'm not going to
monitor my salt content so much. I'm going to focus on being light.
But look, if you're just running around telling everyone John 3.16, but you're
not personally walking with Christ, there's no good works backing up this
message that you're preaching, you're going to leave people asking, why should I
listen to his message? Because he doesn't seem any different than me. You got to
have salt and light both. See, salt refers to your general conduct. Light is the
specific word. Salt talks about who you are. Light speaks to what you do. Salt is
being the example. Light is carrying out the work of evangelism. Salt is living it.
Light is telling it. See, that salt can't save anyone. Salt holds back the
corruption. You need the light of God's truth to lead the salvation, but the
light has to be backed up by the salt of God the character and good works. That's
Jesus' point here. And the end game? The end game is the same end game for
literally everything in the universe. The glory of God.
We get that definition of the influencer back up here. I looked at a few
definitions here, but I thought, wow, doesn't this definition really speak
to the same kind of stuff Jesus was talking about here? Look, here's what I
mean. Has our Lord built a sizable following?
A little bit. You may have heard of him. He built a sizable following. Does he have
a relevant topic? I would argue the most relevant topic ever, eternal life. Is our
Lord interesting in influencing His followers to take action? That's why
we're here. Like, well, how does that happen? There's last two words jumped out
to me then. Credibility and authority. What's credibility? That's salt. And what's
authority? That's light. Look, God has given us a new mission field to reach at
Harvest Bible Chapel. God has given us a community without a church where we can
be salt and light. So there's an exciting new chapter ahead for Harvest Bible
Chapel. And just now we're going to have our town hall meeting, getting an update
on how God is moving. And my friends, you were in the presence of a miracle
today because I got done early. We'll do the directors cut in the next service.
So why don't you just want to take a couple minutes? We're gonna start at 10
promptly, Pastor Rich. So once you take a couple minutes, if you need to check on
little Joey or use the restroom and then at 10 o'clock sharply, Pastor Rich is
gonna come up here and we have an amazing update for you on what the Lord's
doing. So let me pray real quick and then we'll reconvene here at 10. Father in
heaven, I just want to close this time in your word by asking you to empower us to
be what you've already pronounced us to be. You've said we're salt and light, God,
we need the wisdom of your word and the power of your spirit so that we can carry
out that function in a way that glorifies your name. Thank you Father for all that you've done.
We're excited at what you're going to do. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:13-16

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
In what ways are disciples of Jesus like salt? Like light?
How does salt lose flavor (the believer lose their influence)? In what ways do we put our lamps under a basket? Why does Jesus say someone in that state is “no longer good for anything”?
Why is it important to both salt AND light? Why not just focus on one or the other?
How do you really know if you are doing good works for other people’s attention or God’s glory?

Breakout
Pray for one another to be salty and bright.

Jeff Miller

March 23, 2025

The Heart of the Disciple

Congratulations to the Hated

Jeff Miller

March 23, 2025

The Heart of the Disciple

Introduction:

The Heart of the Disciple: Congratulations to the Hated! (Matthew 5:10-12)

Who Are “Those Who Are Persecuted”?

1 Peter 4:3-4 – For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. With respect to this they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you...

Luke 9:23 – And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

2 Timothy 3:12 – Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted…

Why Are We Congratulating Those Who Are Persecuted?

Acts 5:40-41 – And when they had called in the apostles, they beat them and charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go. Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.

How Do I Respond to Being Persecuted?

Three Reasons to Rejoice in Persecution:

Persecution Proves I Belong to Jesus!
1 Peter 1:6-7 – In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
I Have a Reward in Heaven!
2 Corinthians 5:10 – For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.
I'm in Good Company!
John 15:20 – Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

Open up your Bibles with me, please, to Matthew chapter 5.
Matthew chapter 5, as we are coming at the end of an eight-week-long congratulations
party as we look at the Beatitudes.
This is the introduction to the greatest sermon ever preached.
And every Beatitude begins with the word "blessed."
And the word "blessed" means congratulations.
If I asked you, "What is a Christian?"
We could probably go around the room and get dozens and dozens and dozens of different
responses to that.
What is a Christian?
What does a Christian do?
What does a Christian look like?
How does a Christian act?
As we go through the Beatitudes, understand from the mouth of our Lord, this is what
a Christian is.
So it really doesn't matter what I think a Christian is or what you think a follower
of Jesus is.
This is what Jesus said a follower of Him looks like.
This is what Christians are meant to be.
And as we've said through this whole series, there's a spiritually logical flow in the
Beatitudes.
Jesus wasn't just pulling out these random sayings.
There's a flow here.
It's like a staircase.
It's like steps on a ladder.
Let's look at them again.
Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
Blessed are the pure in hearts, for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom
of heaven."
Look at this flow here.
What I want you to see here, the first three Beatitudes address our need.
We're poor in spirit, and we should mourn over that.
And we need to stop thinking of ourselves first and live a life of complete unselfishness.
That's meekness.
That's the need that we have.
And then the need is satisfied as we hunger and thirst for righteousness.
And then the next three Beatitudes show the result.
We become merciful.
We become pure in heart.
We become peacemakers.
Today, this last one, this is the outcome.
If you are sincerely following Jesus Christ, if Christ is alive in you and He is changing
you, I've got to tell you, this is kind of a shocking statement that Jesus says, "You
know you made it."
When people hate you.
Wow.
Before we dive into this, let's just pause for a moment.
I'm going to ask that you would please pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's
Word, and at the same time I will pray for you to receive what it is the Lord wants to
tell us in His Word today.
All right?
Let's just take a moment.
Please pray for me.
Father in heaven, as we come to Your Word, this is a hard one.
But we're not cherry picking.
Just trying to cover the parts of Your Word that might be easier on our ears, Father.
We want to hear everything that You had to say.
This is a hard one.
I pray, Father, for all of us, You would open our hearts for a time of self-examination
and also a time of maybe a change of perspective.
To Your glory and honor, Father, let Your Word take root in our hearts.
To make us the people that You've called us to be, to make us the people that Jesus described,
as followers would be.
I pray these things in Jesus' name.
All of God's people said, Amen.
All right, we're in week 8 of the party.
Anybody else have like party fatigue?
You're like, "All right, you know what?
In any other party I would have gone home long before this."
But look, we've got one more week of party, all right?
So are you ready?
Today, we want to wish a hearty congratulations to the hated.
You ready?
Let's do it!
I get to tell you, it feels strange.
You're hated.
Congratulations!
I'm so happy for you.
You're hated?
Wow, that's awesome!
Like, man, you're going to have to explain that one.
Well, let's look at what our Lord says.
"Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness's sake, for theirs is the kingdom
of heaven."
So the first question we have to ask is, "Who are we congratulating here?
Who are the persecuted?"
Well the Greek word persecuted means pursue.
The word we would use in our day is harass.
This verb tense talks about somebody who continually allows themselves to be put in this position,
the persecuted.
You're like, "Well, persecuted like how?"
Well, Jesus tells us.
Look at verse 11.
"Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil
against you falsely on my accounts."
So you see this persecution, there's two sides of the coin here.
There's reviling.
That's face to face.
That's, I'm assaulting you with words in your face, or we would just call that insulting
you.
Right?
But then He says, "Uter evil falsely."
That's not in your face.
That's behind your back.
That's slandering you.
That's, I want to ruin your reputation.
I want people to think lesser of you.
So I'm going to say things about you behind your back.
And what I don't know, I'm just going to make up because I want people to think of you in
a negative light.
But you have to notice here, Jesus says persecuted.
Look, you've got to get this because if you miss this, there's somebody going to be walking
out of here strutting like a rooster because you missed it.
Jesus says it's for righteousness sake.
Verse 11, He says it's on account of Him.
And that's so important when we talk about persecution.
It's not persecution because you're obnoxious.
Okay?
It's not persecution because you're a jerk to everyone.
And you wear your religion like some kind of an honor badge that you think it's your
job to slap everybody in place.
People treat you negatively because you're a jerk.
That's called consequences.
That's called you're reaping what you're sowing there.
So He's not talking about that.
He's also not talking about putting on a show.
Right?
It's not trying to be as over the top, self-righteous as you can be so that you get people's attention
so that they say something about you so you can be like, "Oh, I'm so persecuted."
He's not talking about that either.
Look at Daniel.
Daniel quietly softed the Lord and He was persecuted.
Right?
Jesus isn't talking about getting a rise out of people on social media by trolling them.
You know exactly what to post, exactly what to comment, and you know it's going to get
a rise out of people and people are going to say things and you're going to be like,
"Oh, I'm so persecuted."
No, you're not.
You're being a jerk.
Okay?
That's not what Jesus is talking about at all.
He clarifies that twice here.
It's being hated, being persecuted because of Jesus.
It's because of His righteousness.
It's because you strive to be like Jesus.
Or in the context of this sermon, you're just striving to live out these Beatitudes that
He laid out.
You're just striving to be that kind of person.
And you're hated.
Isn't it sort of ironic?
What did Pastor Taylor preach about last week?
The previous Beatitude.
What was that one?
Okay, two of you were here.
There were more of you here than that.
What was the previous Beatitude?
Peacemakers.
Isn't that interesting?
Blessed are the peacemakers and then...
Blessed are the persecuted.
What's going on there?
Well, it is very simply this.
Christians strive for peace with all men, but all men don't return the favor.
And you're like, "Wait, hang on a second, man.
Why all the hatred, man?
Why the hatred?
Why can't we just live and let live, man?
You know what I'm saying?
Why do they hate?
Well, Peter tells us that.
Peter answers that very question.
Why do people hate you for trying to follow Jesus?
Look at 1 Peter chapter 4 verses 3 through 4.
He says, "For the time that has passed to feces for doing what the Gentiles want to do."
And in this context, Gentiles is sort of a figure of speech for unbelievers.
He says, "Living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and
lawless idolatry."
Do you see that Peter says, "Listen, Christians, we're done living life like it's one long
beer commercial."
All right?
He says, "With respect to this, they are surprised..."
The unbelievers are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery
and they malign you.
Do you see that?
He's saying that people are going to slander you, malign you, because you're different.
You live as a citizen of heaven.
You don't live a sinful lifestyle and lost people view that somehow as you condemning
their sin.
Lost people feel like when you try to follow Jesus.
And even if you don't say a word, they feel like you're calling them out.
"Oh, oh, oh, you think you're better than me?"
"Oh, you don't do that stuff, oh, oh, Mr. Holier than thou, huh?
Whatever happens to thou shall not judge, huh?"
And you're like, "Well, I'm not judging.
I just don't live that way because of my faith in Jesus Christ.
They're going to hate you for that."
And maybe you're like, "Well, you know what, though, Pastor Jeff, I wouldn't say anything
to anyone because I believe.
I believe in keep your religion to yourself."
And I would say, "I ain't good either."
According to Jesus.
In Luke 9.23, Jesus said, "For whoever is ashamed of me, oh, oh, look at the end of my words.
Of him will the Son of man be ashamed when he comes in his glory, in the glory of the
Father and of the holy angels."
Do you see that?
End of my words.
It's not just ashamed of Jesus.
It's also being ashamed of what He said.
It's being ashamed of what He taught.
So what do we do?
We try to avoid persecution by making the gospel tolerable.
And we say things like, "Well, there's not just one way to heaven.
You know, we're all kind of on our path.
And as long as you're sincere, I think God sees that.
And there's not just one way to heaven.
I don't really think there's a hell.
You know, I know there's some Christians that believe that.
But I don't really think that's - I don't really think a loving God would send somebody to
hell.
And you know what, man?
Love is love, right?
And we're ashamed of what Jesus said when we talk like that.
When you're with your family, your unsafe family members specifically, when you're with your
unsafe friends, when you're at the workplace, the sort of just kind of hides your faith.
We're ashamed of Jesus' words.
It's a problem.
Try this.
Try saying things like, "I believe that marriage is for a man and a woman because that's what
God said."
Say things like, "I believe that the unborn are people who deserve to live."
Try that one.
Try, "I believe that Jesus is the only way to heaven because He's the only one who died
for my sin and rose from the dead to promise eternal life."
He's the only one who did that.
So I believe He's the only way to heaven.
Say that.
People will hate you.
And you're going to be persecuted for righteousness' sake.
And you're like, "You know what, Pastor Jeff, the world is rough, man.
The world's rough.
It's rough out there.
It's not just the world.
Some of the worst persecution of Christians happens in the church.
Think about this.
Jesus' ministry.
Who gave Jesus the most problems?
Was it the unsaved pagans?
It was the hardcore religious people, wasn't it?
And what about the book of Acts?
The book of Acts, the first four chapters, it's attacks from the outside, still from religious
people, but it was attacks outside the church.
And the church was standing strong.
And then what happened in Acts chapter 5 and chapter 6?
All the problems came from within the church.
And things really got hard then.
And church, I've got to tell you, the worst insults that I've ever received, the worst
slander about me that's ever been spoken, the worst accusations that I've ever experienced
have come from church people.
It shouldn't be that way.
That's how it is.
And maybe there are some people sitting here.
And if we're being honest, some of the ways that you're talking about people and the leadership
of the church, you're being divisive.
And maybe you're not the persecuted.
Maybe you're the persecutors.
You're like, well, why would church people do that?
Same reason.
You take a stand on what the Bible says.
You stand for righteousness.
Blushly, worldly-minded people in the church are going to attack you.
By the way, look at verse 11 again.
Jesus says, "Blessed are you when others revile you."
Notice He didn't say "if."
Like this is going to apply to some of my followers.
No, He didn't say that.
Listen, if you're a true follower of Jesus, it's when it's going to happen to you.
You are going to be persecuted in some way, shape, or form to some degree for your faith.
This is for all true disciples.
And if you're not getting any kind of backlash because of your faith in Jesus Christ, that's
actually a bigger problem than if you're facing persecution.
This is for all true followers.
Paul says this in 2 Timothy 3.12, in case it's unclear.
"Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted."
So you think you're going to stand for Jesus and Satan's kids aren't going to hate you?
Let's not be so naive.
That's who the persecuted are.
You're like, "Wow, so why are we congratulating them?"
Well, let's look at the text.
First time, why would we congratulate people that are hated, persecuted for righteousness'
sake?
Well, look what Jesus says, "For theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
The kingdom of heaven.
We talked about this, didn't we?
It's the place where Jesus is ruling.
Like, where is the kingdom of heaven?
Right now, it's in the heart of every believer.
Hers is the kingdom of heaven.
The first and last Beatitudes are bookended by this statement.
That was the very first thing Jesus said.
"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
What Jesus is saying is the first thing, and the last thing you need to know is when you
receive Him, you get His kingdom.
Oh, and by the way, with all these Beatitudes, all of these results, all of these things
we've been congratulating people for, you realize every single promise, every congratulation
of every Beatitude are all facets of a diamond called salvation.
These are all just figures of speech describing salvation.
Receiving the kingdom of heaven, that's salvation.
Being comforted by God, that's from salvation.
Inheriting the earth, salvation.
Being satisfied, only in salvation.
Receiving mercy, that's salvation.
Being able to see God, that's salvation.
Being called a Son of God, that's adoption, which is, tell me, salvation, right?
Receiving the kingdom of God is salvation.
So why are we congratulating those hated because of Jesus?
Because it proves that Christ is in you.
Wait, wait, you mean people who would hate Jesus if He were here, hate you instead because
you remind them of Jesus?
That.
That is a high honor.
That is a really high honor.
And somebody right now is like, "Oh, you know what, Pastor Jeff, I don't think we should
think that way."
And I would say, why not?
The early disciples did.
Acts chapter 5 says, "When the counsel had called in the apostles, they beat them and
charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus and let them go."
Now I would think the next statement would be, and the apostles left cursing them under
their breath, the apostles left crying, "Why God, why did this happen to me?"
That's what I would think the next line would be.
But you see what the next line is?
It says, "Then they left a presence of the counsel rejoicing that they were counted worthy
to suffer dishonor for the name."
See that the early apostles, they weren't waiting for Harvest Bible Chapel to have our
little congratulations party before they started celebrating.
They were congratulating themselves.
What an honor to so act like Jesus that sinners treat you like Jesus.
That's an honor.
And that is why we're congratulating those who are persecuted.
So there's one more question that we have to answer today.
The third question on your outline.
How do I respond to being persecuted?
How do I respond to being persecuted?
You know, this beatitude is obviously very different than the rest.
The other beatitudes are about what happens in me.
But this beatitude is about what happens to me.
But you know another difference is this is the only beatitude that Jesus elaborates on
right here.
And you're like, "Wait a minute.
Is this the part of the sermon where you tell me how to be persecuted?"
No.
I don't need to tell you how to be persecuted.
You follow Jesus Christ, you will be.
That's the point.
You strive to live this kind of a life.
You will be.
The question that we need to answer is how do I respond to that?
That's the question.
And the answer is not retaliate.
"I'll get you for this."
It's not that.
It's not resenting people like, "I hate you for this."
It's not that.
And it's not even becoming depressed or sorrowful.
Like, "I hate this."
It's not that either.
Look at verse 12.
Because Jesus actually tells us how to react.
Look at this.
"Rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven.
For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."
Jesus says, "Here's how you react.
People hate you because you follow Him?"
Jesus says, "Rejoice."
And you're like, "Really?
Yeah.
Jesus actually doubles down on that, doesn't He?
He says, "Rejoice and be glad."
Why should I rejoice and be glad when people are against me because of Jesus?
Why would I do that?
How in the world is that an occasion for happiness?
Well Jesus tells us that too.
We don't have to guess.
But He tells us right here.
So the three reasons to rejoice in persecution, jot these down.
I'm going to go through these quickly.
These are the three reasons Jesus gives right here.
Number one, persecution proves, "I belong to Jesus."
We already touched on this briefly already.
But like the rest of the Beatitudes, there's a congratulations on what results.
He says, "Yours is the kingdom of heaven," meaning you belong to Jesus.
Do you want to know if your faith is real?
Or would you just rather stumble through life wondering, "Do I really believe?"
I mean, do I really believe in Jesus Christ?
Is my faith a real thing or is it just kind of in my head or have I deceived myself?
Is my faith real?
Well, your faith needs tested and there's only one way that happens.
See what Peter says again.
First Peter 1, he says, "In this year rejoice."
Oh, there's rejoice again.
For what Peter?
"Now for a little while, if necessary, you've been grieved by various trials, persecution
being a big one, so that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold, that
perishes though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and
honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ."
Well, here's the point.
Anyone can say that they believe in Jesus Christ at a prayer meeting.
Or go to a small group and say, "I just want you to know I believe in Jesus Christ.
Do you think there's going to be any pushback there?"
No, there's not.
It's easy to say it there.
But do you still believe when it's not so popular?
Do you still believe when you're insulted for it?
When you're rejected for it?
When you're falsely accused because of it?
Do you still believe when your faith costs you something?
You see, when following Jesus is painful, but you refuse to walk away because His promises
are so glorious and His ways are so right?
When Jesus Himself is so worthy, you don't really prove to Jesus what your faith is made
out of.
As much as you've proven to yourself what your faith is made out of, because I've got
a feeling Jesus already knows.
That's reason to rejoice.
Resurrection proves I belong to Jesus.
Number two, I rejoice.
I have a reward in heaven.
Look at verse 12 again.
"Rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven."
Be like, "Well, what's your reward?
What's your reward?"
Well, there's all kinds of rewards in heaven.
Actually, you could kind of look at heaven as one big reward, right?
And I mean, you've got this, "There's no sickness, and there's no war, there's no unhappiness."
Oh, how about the best thing in heaven?
Jesus Himself.
All of that's true.
And at the same time, the Bible says that each individual gets special individual rewards.
And how much of these you get is based on how you live now, including facing persecution
because of Jesus.
Saint Corinthians 5:10, Paul says, "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of
Christ so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether
good or evil, there's different levels of rewards based on your faithfulness now, based
on your faithfulness in the face of persecution."
Like, "All right, well, what are those rewards then?"
I don't know.
But here's something I do know.
Jesus says they're great.
And if Jesus says something is great, that's what I was thinking.
If Jesus says it's great, then it must be pretty great.
If God Himself refers to something as being great, then it must be spectacular.
So church, can we just believe Jesus and wait 15 minutes and find out what it is?
I'm going to tell you all the stupid insults and slander are going to look pretty petty
in light of whatever Jesus has for you.
And that's a reason to rejoice.
I have a reward in heaven.
Number three, third reason to rejoice.
And the face of persecution is, "I'm in good company.
I'm in good company."
Look again, verse 12.
Jesus says, "Your reward is great in heaven."
But then he taxed on this statement too.
He says, "For so they persecuted the prophets who were before you."
Are you being persecuted for your faith to some degree in some way?
And if you follow Christ, you should be.
Well Jesus reminds us here, "You're in good company."
I mean, man, think of the people in the Old Testament.
Abel, Moses, David, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel.
You're in some pretty good company.
Oh, how about Jesus himself?
You know, Jesus spoke of this in John 15 when he said, "Remember the word that I said to
you, a servant is not greater than his master.
If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.
If they kept my word, they will also keep yours."
Okay, hang on.
How is this a motivation to rejoice?
How?
Okay, so you're saying I should be motivated by the fact that other people were persecuted
too?
Like, how is that a motivation?
You know, we love the name drop, don't we?
Oh, you say you don't.
You say you don't.
You run into somebody famous at the airport and keep your mouth shut.
You won't.
I ran into Jerome Bettis at the airport one time, literally ran into him.
Like physically, ran into him.
I knocked him back about five yards.
Okay, I made that part up.
I did make that part up.
We love the name drop.
I felt good telling that story.
Why do we do that?
Why do we name drop?
Because there's something in us that we're kind of proud of our associations.
You know what I mean?
There's something in us that we like that.
Four years ago, Aaron and I were at a church conference in Orlando.
And we were having breakfast.
It was this big dining room.
Aaron and I were having breakfast.
And this stranger comes and sits at our table.
He just sits there literally right beside me.
And dude was so weird.
Now listen, I am not criticizing.
I'm weird.
My wife married weird.
All right?
I'm not criticizing.
The dude was just strange.
He just sat down with us.
He had these giant like plastic rimmed glasses like really big.
And he had this enormous mustache.
He looked like a cartoon character.
And if you know me, I was like so fascinated by him.
I think people were so fascinating.
But when like this cartoon character sits down, he was so strange.
And he was going on and on and on about some exercise bike that he bought.
I'm like, they're still making exercise bikes?
Like people are still doing that?
You can buy a bike with two wheels and take it on the road.
Like he was so strange.
But he sat there and talked to Aaron and I the whole breakfast about his exercise bike.
And then he gets up and leaves.
And Aaron and I are like, who was that?
Well then we go into the auditorium for the conference.
And Aaron and I take our seats.
And there's a time of worship.
And then somebody gets up and announces.
They're like, we'd like to introduce our main speaker for the event.
Paul Tripp.
He came out on the stage and Aaron and I are like, that's him.
That's the guy we had breakfast with.
I walked around the rest of the conference like, I don't want to brag or anything.
But I had breakfast with Paul Tripp.
You know, it was just kind of a thing we do once.
Yeah.
Oh, it was great.
We were talking mustaches and exercise bikes.
Are you being persecuted because of your faith?
Do you realize that's the occasion for the ultimate name draw?
You're like, I get to be hated because of Jesus.
Do you realize what that means?
I'm in company with the Lord of the universe.
They can't get him so they come after me.
Isn't that awesome?
I'm with Jesus.
Way cooler than Paul Tripp, by the way.
When you feel like your faith has made you an outcast, hey, hey, that's just for now.
Someday you're going to be walking around heaven with the prophets who came before us
who were persecuted for their faith and you're going to look around these people in heaven
and say, you know what?
It was rough at times being insulted, being slandered, but now I see that I'm in good company.
That is a reason to rejoice.
So as our worship team makes their way back up to the platform here, I have to ask you,
has being a Christian resulted in people reviling you?
Has being a Christian resulted in people insulting you and lying about you?
Do people hate you just because you follow Jesus?
Well then, on behalf of the elders, the ministry team, and all of the nursery workers at Harvest
Bible Chapel, we would like to wish you a truly heartfelt congratulations.
Yours, yours is the kingdom of heaven.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:10-12

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What are different ways persecution is carried out? Have you ever personally been persecuted because of your faith, on some level? If not, why not?
Read 1 Peter 4:3-4. What exactly motivates nonbelievers to slander Christians who refuse to live a sinful lifestyle?
Why do you think Christians aren’t persecuted in America the way Christians are persecuted in other countries?
In your opinion, which of Jesus’ reasons for rejoicing in persecution is the most compelling / motivating? Proof of salvation, reward in heaven, or being in good company?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Glorification: The Hope is Real

Introduction:

The Hope is Real: The Truth About Heaven (Revelation 21:1-8)

Reconciliation: The Relationship is Restored

Introduction:

What the Cross Proves About God's Love for You.
(Romans 5:6-11)

Justification: The Guilt is Gone

Introduction:

3 Things to Remind Yourself When You Feel Guilty: (Romans 3:21-28)

You Are God's Influencers

Introduction:

As Salt and Light, I Am God's Influencer (Matthew 5:13-16)

Congratulations to the Hated

Introduction:

The Heart of the Disciple: Congratulations to the Hated! (Matthew 5:10-12)

Who Are “Those Who Are Persecuted”?

Why Are We Congratulating Those Who Are Persecuted?

How Do I Respond to Being Persecuted?

Three Reasons to Rejoice in Persecution:

Upcoming Small Group Questions CLICK HERE

How much of the Bible have we covered since 2011?

Introduction:

The Hope is Real: The Truth About Heaven (Revelation 21:1-8)

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

What the Cross Proves About God's Love for You. (Romans 5:6-11)

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

3 Things to Remind Yourself When You Feel Guilty: (Romans 3:21-28)

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

As Salt and Light, I Am God's Influencer (Matthew 5:13-16)

Audio Transcript

Introduction:

The Heart of the Disciple: Congratulations to the Hated! (Matthew 5:10-12)

Who Are “Those Who Are Persecuted”?

Why Are We Congratulating Those Who Are Persecuted?

How Do I Respond to Being Persecuted?

Three Reasons to Rejoice in Persecution:

Audio Transcript

What the Cross Proves About God's Love for You.
(Romans 5:6-11)