Preaching Christ Not Moralism

We have experienced and endured a great deal and it is amazing to think that we just met and started talking about all this four years ago. And let me just say, and with all of the honesty and candor that I can, sometimes when we're at this conference, this is the and I know nobody means this okay, but sometimes here's the way we kind of feel. We kind of feel like people come to this conference and their thought is this okay. These guys started this three and a half years ago. They found some secret paint by Numbers kit that showed them exactly what to do and when to do it. We come to the conference and if we ask them the right question, maybe they'll give it to us. Newsflash. We had nothing. We had open Bibles and some brothers who were willing to just trust it and do what it said, and the providence of God, and that's it. There's been no formula. There's been I mean, there's things that we've done well, there's things that we've done poorly. There's things that we've learned along the way. There are things that we are trying to learn even now. And one of them I'm here to share with you tonight, and that is this whole idea of how we faithfully preach Christ from all of scripture. That's something that we've been laboring over at GFBC for a while. How do we faithfully preach Christ from all of Scripture. I would say that when we started, we didn't do that. I would say that now we do it better. But we are still in the process of learning and growing at what it means to preach Christ faithfully from all of Scripture. And let me say that one of the reasons that it's difficult is because of the amount of training that Paul and I have amen and unfortunately it hadn't been the best kind of training as it relates to preaching Christ. It really hasn't. It's been the kind of training that, first of all, in some instances made it's sort of difficult to learn how to preach expositionally at all. But then when you press through that and learn how to preach expositionally, one of the things that we sort of automatically lean toward is what I call just pure exegesis. And when we're preaching just you know, pure exegetical messages, pure expository messages, especially when you get to the Old Testament, we're not preaching Christ at all. You know, there is no Gospel, there is no Jesus. It becomes a pure character study of that character in the Old Testament, you know, and it's David slew Goliath because he had faith. You need to try to be more like David. Plant text doesn't say Jesus. Therefore, I guess the text doesn't have anything to do with Jesus, and we just sort of move on from there. And by the way, that is the most common way that the Old Testament is preached, not from a crystal centric perspective, not at all from a crystal centric perspective, and that is especially that is especially difficult for those of us who are trying to exercise family discipleship within the contemporary context, recognizing that much of what we deal with is Old Testament texts that inform us about what the family is and how the family is to operate. If we're not careful, we end up just basically running through the Old Testament with a purely Hebreke mentality, and we preach messages. And this is when it came home to me. I got a letter from an Orthodox Jew who heard one of the messages that I preached from a passage in the Old Testament and loved it. I was like, you know what, it wasn't worth it. If I can preach any passage of Scripture and a person who does not know Christ can hear it and love it. A person who's a Jew, not a converted Jew, an orthodox Jew, can hear a message that I preach from the Old Testament and be so moved by it that they take the time to handwrite me a letter and were never offended by the cross I did not preach the Gospel and just landed on me like a ton of bricks. Landed on me like a ton of bricks. And so let me talk of there's three key elements that we're gonna deal with here this evening. Three key elements that we try to deal with in our preaching. And this is very important, and we always have a section on preaching at this conference because of one of the myths. One of the myths of the family integrated church is that family integration impacts our preaching so that either everything is to the lowest common denominator because the kids are in there, and the only way the kids are going to be able to hang in there is if everything becomes a children sermon, pure myth pure. That that famous hour and a half message that I preached that Sunday, that famous hour and a half message. We're in the Old Testament going through the patriarchs, and it was Jacob and Esau. It was an hour and a half on election and predestination. Okay, family, integrated church, kids of all ages in the room. Hour and a half on election and predestination. So no, we are not watering down, dumbing down, shortening anything because kids are in the room. Okay. Now, granted that was an exception, the exception of exceptions. And one of the reasons that I preached that long is because I'm using I was using some slides. I felt like, some of these things that I'm gonna say, we need to see them, We need to, you know, go through these doctrines here. So I'm using these slides. Well, when I when I did my introduction, I hadn't forwarded my first slide, so my timer didn't start. So I thought that I had only been up there for an hour, but it was thirty minutes before I put my first slide on. So Paul goes no, brother, that was that was That was more than an hour. She said, Oh, okay, I my bad. So that's the myth, and that's not true. The second myth is that we're always preaching on family because family is who we are. Family is what we're all about. We get up there every Sunday and we preach on family. So people ask us, you know, if singles are alienated, or if people without you know, husbands are alienated, or if people who whatever are alienated, because we talk about family all the time. And my first response is, who can come up with that many messages on family? Amen, Nothing could be further from the truth. That's not what we're doing. And anybody who's been at GFBC and knows about our approach to preaching at GFBC just finds that completely and utterly laughable, that whole myth that somehow we're just always preaching messages on family. So three key areas when we talk about preaching Christ from all the scripture. Number one, we're talking about proclamation of the Gospel. We preach the Gospel. That's what we're called to do, to preach the Gospel. Okay, So whatever we're doing, we must be preaching the Gospel. Whatever we're doing we have to be preaching the gospel. You guys who are interested in planting churches out there, if you're worried about what to preach, you're probably on the wrong track. We preached the gospel period. That's all we got is the gospel. Secondly, we practice systematic exposition. Systematic exposition what does that mean. That means we preach systematically through texts, but not just through individual text Let me tell you what we've done in the last three and a half years. Three and a half years ago, we got started and we preached through the Book of Ephesians. After we finished the Book of Ephesians, we had been through an epistle. So we decided that we're going to go through a gospel. So we preached through Mark. Well after we preached through Mark, we had been through an epistle. We had been through a gospel. We needed to get into the Old Testament. They had to get some law, so we preached through Genesis one through eleven. After we preached through Genesis one through eleven, laying the foundation for a biblical worldview, then we went and we preached First John, going back to an epistle. After we finished First John, we came back and we did the Life of Abraham, getting back in Genesis. After we finished the Life of Abraham, we went to the Sermon on the Mount, back to the Gospels. Now we finished the Sermon on the Mount, we've come back to Genesis, and now we're doing the finishing up the Life of the Patriarchs. And after we've finished the Life of the Patriarchs, one of the things we're talking about is elders that will probably after this go and preach through Romans. We'll probably break that into sections, just like we did Genesis, so systematic exposition. We need some epistles, we need some Gospels, we need some law. After we finished Genesis, we'll probably get some wisdom or some history. But again, we preach the whole Council of God, and we preach it systematically. Even in our services when we have our Old Testament reading and our New Testament reading, we're systematic in our approach to which New Testament portions and Old Testament portions that we read. Because we believe that all scripture is breathed out by God, profitable for teaching, rebuke and correcting and training in righteousness, all of it. So we read all of it. So we'll we'll read some gospels, we'll read some epistles. Well, you know, we'll we'll get some some some acts going there. We'll we'll do it all that. That's our approach. If somebody could bring me my adapter back there for some power, that'd be good right about now. So that's our approach when we're reading, even when we're reading through the scriptures, let alone when we're preaching through the scriptures. So whatever we're doing, we're proclaiming the gospel. Secondly, we're practicing systematic exposition. And thirdly, we do it all, thank you, sir. Whether redemptive historic hermeneutic a redemptive historic hermeneutic, and that's just a fancy theological term for saying, we do it believing that the whole Bible is about Jesus, that the whole Bible is about God's redemptive plan, and his redemptive plan is ultimately summed up in the person and work of Jesus Christ. So wherever we are in the scripture, we're looking at that passage of scripture through a redemptive historic lens. Okay, So those three things we're preaching the gospel. Secondly, we practiced in systematic exposition. And thirdly, we're doing all of this with a redemptive historic hermeneutic and a redemptive historic foundation. Now here's what I want us to do. If you have your bibles, where you open your bibles to First Corinthians chapter two, First Corinthians chapter two, and we're going to look at a passage of scripture that really sort of sums up the philosophical underpinnings of this kind of approach, First Corinthians chapter two. And we'll look at those first five verses of First Corinthians chapter two that sums up Paul's ministry in Corinth. And again, you know, all of the mess in corinth. We realize all of the different kinds of philosophers that were there, and philosophies that they engaged in listening to, all the different kinds of rhetoric to which they were exposed. We understand that about Corinth. And in the midst of that, Paul makes this statement here early on in First Corinthians, he says, and I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling. And my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God a man. Hallelujah, Praise the Lord. There's this underlying philosophy for what he preached, why he preached, and how he preached when he was in Corinth. Three things I want you to see here. First is this, The Gospel is not an appeal to the wisdom of men, but instead a proclamation of what God accomplished in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Let me say that again. The Gospel is not an appeal to the wisdom of men. It is instead a proclamation of what God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ. So if I'm preaching the Gospel, I must be preaching about what God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ. If I am not preaching and proclaiming what God has done in the person in work of Jesus Christ, i am not preaching the Gospel. Let me say that again. If I'm not preaching, if I'm not proclaiming what God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ, I am not preaching the Gospel. And from the time I got out of seminary, well before that, I started preaching before I went seminary, all the way till just not long ago, last couple of years. If I'm preaching in the Old Testament, I wasn't preaching the Gospel. A great percentage of the time, I just wasn't. And even if I was, here's what I was doing, I'd go and I'd sort of do you know this kind of you know, character study thing here in the Old Testament, where this is what this message is about. Here's the stuff that you need to do. This person did this, you need to do it too. And then at the end, you know, if you don't know Jesus, here's how you need to know Jesus. That sound familiar to anyone, That's the way virtu will lead. Everyone today preaches the Old Testament, and unfortunately much of the New Testament list there's something right there about the person in work of Christ. We do the same thing in the New Testament, say the people who preaching in the New Testament and not preaching the Gospel because they are not proclaiming what God has done in the person in work of Jesus Christ. Let me say this, the Gospel is not the force spiritual laws. That's not the Gospel. The Gospel is an announcement of what God has done in the person and work of Jesus Christ. The Gospel calls man to account and forces man to come to grips with the fact that in and of himself he is undone, and it is only what God has accomplished in the person and work of Jesus Christ that gives him any semblance of hope. We see that in Paul's first statement. He says, and I when I came to you, brothers, you wise individuals, you individuals who love philosophy, who love rhetoric, who love lofty speech. When I came to you, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. This word that he uses here. I decided that this word he uses here in the Greek is a word that means to make a judgment based upon the correctness or value of something. Often the Greek term chreno is used is translated to judge. He makes a judgment as though. Paul says, before I got to Corinth, I sat down with myself and I said self. H Self said, yep. I said, you know, these people in Corinth, they love rhetoric and they love philosophy. They love a whole bunch of different stuff. Himself said yep. And I said self, you know, we know philosophy. H Self said yep. But I said self, we need to make a determination right here and right now. We are not going to try to impress these people. We're gonna try to win them. We know nothing except Jesus Christ and him crucified. We're not We're not going to appeal to wisdom. The wisdom of man is foolishness. We're not going to appeal to it. And we know nothing but Christ and him crucified. Now does that mean that Paul decided that he would not address any other issues. Nothing could be further from the truth. We know that he addressed myriad issues when he was in Corinth and everywhere else. For that matter, But all of the issues that he addressed he addressed from the perspective of the Gospel. Amen, well, we'll explain that more momentarily, but listen to this. He's already made a statement about appealing to wisdom in chapter one. Back up the verse eighteen. For the word of the Cross is folly to those who are perishing, But to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning. I will ForwArt next verse, where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater? Of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world, For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to say those who believe he can do. For Jews demand to sign, and Greek seeks seek wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to gentiles. We preach Christ Crucified knowing that it's a stumbling block and an offense. We are not appealing to men's wisdom, but we are actually coming against it in full force with the Gospel. But to those who are called both Jews and Greeks Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. We do not appeal to the wisdom of men. Here's a question I get all the time because I go places and I talk about apologetics all over the place, and I practice presuppositional apologetics. We come from the text, okay, not trying to just win men based on their own reason or my reason based versus their reason. And here's what I hear from people I'll get. I'll get these sort of emails from students all the time, or not just students, who are just various people in churches, and they'll say, you know, I have this friend of mine and they're really smart. Around here. It's I have this friend of mine and they're a rocket scientist over at NASA, and I was just wondering if you could share with me anything that you could. And it's always predicated on this person is really smart. In other words, if they were dumb, God could get them. But they're in a different category, So they need something. You know, the Gospel may be sufficient for dumb people, but the Gospel is not enough for a rocket scientist. That's not what the Bible teaches. We preach Christ. Yeah, but he's a rocket scientist. It's foolishness to him. Yes, exactly. We preach Christ. That's what we preach. We preach Jesus and him crucified. Yes, but this person, you know that they're they're a professor of you know, ancient literature, and they have all these questions about the documents and this and that. We preach Christ. Yeah, but that just doesn't seem to be enough. That's your problem. The minute you stop believing that the Gospel is sufficient, you've left the reservation. It is enough, It's more than enough, It's more than enough. Does this mean that we ignore Peter's admonition to always be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks us the reason for the faith that is in us? No, not at all. But understand what Peter says there. Peter says, always be ready to answer the question why do you believe what you believe? Peter doesn't say always be ready to match wisdom with wisdom, because wisdom will win the day. And in fact, the context of Peter's statement about apologetics is the context of suffering. When you look at First Peter Chapter two and First Peter Chapter three. Here's what Peter's saying, even if they're going to kill you, always be ready to open your mouth and say it, even if it will cost you your life. Know what you believe in, why you believe it, and communicate that effectively to others. What do we believe? By the way we believe the gospel? We believe the gospel, we preach Christ. If we're not convinced of that, we'll preach other things. Okay, we'll preach family integration, we'll preach you know, home education, we'll preach whatever you name it. We'll preach those things. Now do we address those things, Yes, we absolutely address those things, but only as we preach Christ. We already said earlier, the whole idea of family integration, and by the way, the idea of education and the way we educate our children. What's that about? That is about faithfulness and discipling. What's discipling about? It's about faithfulness and the Great Commission? What's the Great Commission about? It is about the gospel going forth to Panta ta Ethne All peoples, it's about the gospel. It's about training people in the gospel, and that's it. That's it, folks. If we have family integration as a structure, but we lose the gospel, we've gained nothing. We've gained nothing. We preach Christ. We preach Christ. So what your kids don't go to the youth group? Who cares if you're not preaching Christ? Amen? Who cares that you've decided you're going to build your family on do the rhodomy six if you don't understand that that's not enough to save. We preach Christ and him crucified. That's what we preach, and we preach Him from all of scripture. Listen to this from Luke, because Jesus believed this, that the whole Bible was about him Luke, Chapter twenty four, beginning in verse twenty four. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said. But him they did not see. And he said to them, old foolish ones, this is Jesus, now, oh foolish ones, slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory? And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the character studies of each of the individuals there, and how they could work harder at being like them. No, interpreted to them in all the scripture the things concerning himself. Jesus taught himself from all of scripture. From all of scripture John one and verse forty five found Nathaniel and said to him, we have found him of whom Moses in the law. And also the prophets, wrote Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. Did you hear that we found him? This is what they were writing about John Chapter five and verse forty five. Jesus says, for if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me Acts Chapter eight, Verses thirty four and thirty five. The Ethiopian Eunich can hit up there reading Isaiah. Philip finds himself running by the chariot. Why he doesn't know yet, And the eunuch said to Philip about whom I ask you? Does the prophet say this about himself or about someone else? Phillips gotta be going. You're getting me right. I'm running up here. You a need fiopian, you need fiopian. And you just happen to be reading Isaiah, and right there in Isaiah about the suffering servant, and you're asking me who he is talking about. Then Philip opened his mouth and beginning with this scripture, he told him, you just got to understand a character study of Isaiah and be more like him. No, told him the good news about Jesus wepreach Christ and him crucified. No matter where we're preaching, no matter where we're preaching. Two, the Gospel does not rely on the effectiveness of man for its effectiveness. To say, gospel does not rely on the effectiveness of man for its effectiveness. To say, one of the things that has harmed the church more than anything that I've experienced in my lifetime, as I've been preaching for twenty years, twenty years, and one of the things that I've seen, of all of the bad stuff that I see in the church, there is more of it that could be laid at the doorstep of Charles Finny than any other person. Horrible, horrible, absolutely horrible, and one of the overarching problems that we have. That is a direct result of the life and ministry of Charles Finny is the idea that somehow it is the effectiveness of the measures employed that determines the effectiveness of the gospel preached. And we believe that. We believe that. We believe that the preacher has to be more articulate. The preacher has to be funnier. The preacher has to be more engaging. The preacher has to be more charismatic. The preacher has to tell more stories. The preacher has to do the preacher has to do this because if he does this, he can move men. And by the way, this is true. The preacher can move men. I learned how to do it. You can move men, you really can. We've seen it, have we not. He gets up and he engages the crowd. And after he engages the crowd and he tells them stuff and kind of get the crowd with him and get the crowd laughing, and this and that and the other. Then you tell a few stories, and all of a sudden you flip the script and you get real somber, and you bring some sort of legalistic guilt trip on the peace people about what they're not doing, and how bad their life is and how desperately they need to make it better. You get them realizing all the stuff that they haven't done that they're supposed to do, and you play the real soft music. While the real soft music is playing, you just tell him. He's calling you. He wants you, don't you want him? He went all the way to the cross for you. Can't you come to the front of the room for him. Look at your life. You know you haven't lived right. You know you haven't obeyed him. You know you haven't read your Bible like you ought to. You know you haven't shared your faith like you ought to know. You know you've been preachers coming down that you know everybody's coming down. There's anything in your life that needs to be made right with God. You just need to come. And we moved towards this ca farsis at the front of the room. That's finny. Yes it works, but does it save No, it doesn't. But what it does is it creates this very real and very measurable experience so that the guy can then send out his brochure to other churches and talk about how he went to a town of thirteen thousand, and they had fifteen thousand decisions for Christ. You'll just invite me to your town. We can do the same there. And it's horrible. It's horrible. And all of a sudden, we begin to measure men by their effectiveness and success as opposed to measuring men by their faithfulness. That's why you can have a guy with a huge church who's a heretic, and nobody will say he's a heretic. Why well, because the church is growing. That's got to be God, right, folks. Nothing grows faster than cancer. Not all growth is good growth. It's not. People are accumulating for themselves, Teachers in accordance with their own desires. They have itching ears. They've turned aside from the truth, and they've turned to myths. That's what's happened. That's what's happened. But because we have this sort of success driven mentality, we look at the guy who's preaching the myth and getting the crowd, and we begin to tweak the gospel message so that we can compete with him. The Gospel does not rely on the effectiveness of man for its effectiveness to save Paul says verse three and four. I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling. And my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power. Amen, fear and trembling. Fear and trembling. It got to humble us to handle God's word before God's people. Not to humble us. It'll terrify us to handle God's word before God's people. Study to show yourself approved under God, a workman who does not need to be ashamed. Why Why because he handles accurately the word of truth. In other words, if you don't you need to be ashamed. It out of humble us. He says, he was there in weakness and fear and trembling, and what they saw was not a demonstration of his abilities, but a demonstration of the power of God. That's why he's able to say in Romans chapter one, for I'm not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. To the jew first and also to the Greek, the Gospel is the power of God for salvation. The gospel, not the preacher. The Gospel is the power of God for salvation. The message not the messenger. We used to understand this. You know what the thrust of missions used to be. The thrust of missions used to be going places, learning people's language, and getting the scriptures into their language, because we actually believed that what they needed was the Bible. The thrust of missions today god places and learning how to relate to people because we believe they need us. They need us. No, the Gospel saves, not us. Listen to this for Timothy four one through five, we've already referred to it. I charge you, in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead by his appearing and his kingdom, preach the word. Be ready in season out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience and teaching, for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off in the myths. As for you, always be sober minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, and fulfill your ministry. That's what you do, no matter the trend, no matter the fad, that's what you do. Just preach the Gospel. The Gospel is the answer. The Gospel is the power, not you being a certain person. It's the Gospel. Once we believe that it is us and our ingenuity and our creative creativity and craftiness. Once we believe that, then we go right back to the programmatic, pragmatic, efficiency driven approach to the way that we do ministry. But if we believe that the answer is the Gospel, changes everything. He says number three, Failing to preach the Gospel results in misplaced faith. That's why it's important. That's why it's important to preach Christ from all the scripture. Failing to preach the Gospel and proclaim what God has done in the person and work of Christ ultimately results in misplaced faith. Listen to what Paul says in verse five that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. That's his goal, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but instead your faith might rest in the power of God. Not in me, but in the power of God. That's the answer. It is the Gospel and the power of the Gospel. What does that misplaced faith look like. Let mean, just just make this real practical for a moment, when we don't preach the Gospel, and when instead and when we don't have a redemptive historic approach to the Bible, and when we instead use the Bible as you know, something to be mind for principles that we can apply. Ultimately, there are a couple of ways that we can go astray. One of those is legalism. Legalism works righteousness. See, we all have a natural bent toward works righteousness, all of us. You want to save yourself. I want to save myself, you and I both when we get to heaven. What we want to hear from God is, man, you did a great job. That was awesome. I mean, you know Jesus what did he did on the cross? That was good stuff. But man, that stuff that you added, whooah. Come on, now, let's just be honest. That's what we want, and we want to be able to stand before other people and talk about how much better we are because of what we do. It works righteousness. Now, bring a preacher who doesn't preach the Gospel to bear and here's what we find. We go to the Old Testament, we're preaching the life of Abraham, and we find Abraham did this and it was good. Therefore you go and do likewise so that you can be like Abraham. Abraham did that and it was bad. Therefore don't go and do that so that you won't be like Abraham. Ultimately, Abraham just becomes this sort of case study for us, and one of the results of that is that basically we move towards works righteousness. I want that you want that at the end of the sermon, here's what we want. I want to have a list of three to five things that I need to go and do better at it so I can feel my sense of accomplishment. And that feeds our work's righteousness muscle. It wants that, it desires, that it yearns for that. Here's some stuff you need to go and you need to work on, and you need to do better, and that works righteousness muscle. That carnal man he goes, Yes, that's what I'm after, but he can't do it. That's why he's got to come back next week and get three three to five more things. You can't do it. By the way, that's why we loved rededications. What is that I mean, think about that for a moment. Rededication. You come up to the front of the room and you rededicate yourself. Why because the first dedication didn't work? Is that the gospel? Is that the gospel? No, that's not the gospel. You know what rededication is. Rededication is works righteousness on steroids. That's what it is. Rededication says I tried hard that first time, but it wasn't quite hard enough. But this time, I really mean it. That is not the gospel. It's not the gospel. It works righteousness. And if all we do is go to the Old Testament and find character studies, or even go to the New Testament, find character studies, you know, gone to the rich young ruler. And basically the whole point of the rich young ruler is you need to do a better job with your money than the rich young ruler did with his money. You just need to work harder. That's it. It's legalism. It works righteousness. That's us attempting to justify ourselves. The other problem is moralism. Moralism, we just sort of moralize the text, and this is bad for our kids. Here's what happens. You come to the Old Testament, and all the Old Testament is for your kids is Esop's fables with Bible versus attached. The moral of this story is, if you want that, just go get Esop's fables. Don't bring God into that. If all you want is moralisms, go get something that's designed to give you moralisms. The Bible is not designed to give you moralisms. The Bible is designed to unfold God's redemptive plan in the person and work of Jesus Christ. It's not about moralisms. You can't get there from here. Oh then what do you do with Abraham? Oh? I don't know. Perhaps what Paul does with Abraham and Romans. Paul does not treat Abraham as a case study for how you do better. Paul interprets the life of Abraham as an example of justification by faith. That's what he says. The life of Abraham is about. It's about justification by faith. That's it. That's the message. And so you know, when we go to Daniel and other books and things of this nature, here's the question, what is the picture of redemptive history that's unfolding there. Here's another thing we have to avoid, allegory. That's the ditch on the other side of the road. Well, all of the Bible is about Jesus. Therefore there has to be a wonder one correlation between what I'm reading here about this character in the Old Testament and the life of Jesus Christ. So symbolically this must be you know this, and that must be the cross, and that must be No, no, not at all, not at all, And so we go. You know, the famous message about David and Goliath and those five smooth stones. There is a legendary message in Southern Baptist's life about those five smooth stones. And each of those five smooth stones was another aspect of Baptist life, you know, that we need to pick up and sling at the giants of our you know, yeah, Sunday School, you know BTU all this, there was the lesson just allegory. Oh not allegory. Well, what do you do with something like the life of you know, David and Goliath. What am I gonna do with that? If the whole Bible is about Christ and it's about god redemptive plan, what do I do with that? Oh? I don't know. Maybe there's something there that helps us understand the person in work of Christ. How can David and Goliath help us understand the person in work of Christ? Oh, I don't know. How about the fact that David, the ancestor of Jesus, stood in the stead of his people as a substitute, took on Goliath as a substitute, defeated him as a substitute, thereby bringing victory for all of the people whom he represented. How about that? It's redemptive history, folks, It's there, it's there. Is it always easy to find? No, it's not always easy to find. Sometimes it's in the bigger picture. But again, if we dig, and if we work, and if we come with a presupposition that the Bible is about God's unfolding redemptive plan and the person and work of Christ, we get there. We get there, but we avoid legalism and moralism and allegory in the process. We preach Christ. We preach Christ. Otherwise all we have is another mechanism that we've set up to get around the Gospel and to reinforce our natural bent towards Work's righteousness. Paul goes to Corinth, and he uses their wisdom, and he floors the people because he uses their own wisdom and their own tactics. Now, all of a sudden, these people who are already Hey, I'm of Apollos, and now all of a sudden, these people just make him one of those guys as well. And it's all about the cult of personality. No, it's got to be about Christ. It has to be about Christ. So when we teach the Bible in our homes, when we're reading the scriptures with our children, help them understand the big picture of God's redemptive history. Help them grasp that. Help them hold on to that. Don't turn the Bible into Esop's fables. Don't do that. It's about God and the work that God is doing to bring about the redemption of his people. Get that, hold on to that. Does that mean that there's never any importance or significance to those examples. Now there's absolutely importance and significance to those examples. We look at those individuals and we see ourselves. Amen, here's Abraham. Forget that. Now we're looking at Jacob in church. We looked at Isaac. He's horrible. He's absolutely horrible. But that's good news, people, because I am too. Amen. Jacob horrible, he's terrible. He needs God bad. You know what I do too. It reinforces the doctrine of election, and it says God does not look down at you and see anything in you that he deems worthy to redeem for himself. Just like Jacob, you are saved, you are rescued, You are redeemed in spite of, not because of, who you are. We need to hear that when we see the failures of the people in the Old Testament, and the patriarchs and others who are great heroes of the faith, when we see their failures, we need to remind ourselves there is none righteous, no, not even one. Even this great hero of the faith, Abraham, he fell and he failed. David's on the top of the world with Goliath, and he's the scum of the earth with Bethsheba. Why because the Bible doesn't want us to hope in David. His significance rests in the one who sits on his throne. That's the significance of David, not as a character study for you to be more like him. That's ridiculous. Why would you want to be more like David when David was not the answer. Otherwise he'd have been the one hanging on the Cross. It's Christ. It's Christ. It's all about Christ. It's all about God's redemptive plan to call to himself a people for himself in spite of their flaws and faults and sins. The last thing we need to do, if that's what we believe about the Gospel, is to somehow get people to think that what it's really all about is them working harder themselves at not being what they are. No, you need to give yourself to Christ. That's your only hope, that's your only answer. If I give you three things to go do, here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna forget two of them, and you're gonna mess up the third, but you'll still be better than most people. So you'll feel good about yourself. Now, here's one thing, and one thing only trust Christ and him alone. He's your only hope. But here's the good news for those who are saying, well what he's saying. Then you know we don't call people to you know, deliver a righteous life. Oh, we absolutely do, and reminding them all the while that number one, they can't do it. But number two, it is him who works enough both to will and to do his good pleasure. So even when I do accomplish something, it is not for me to pat myself on the back, but merely to recognize that God is conforming me to the image of his son. And I praise him for even my flawed efforts, because He's gaining much glory for himself in the process. I praise him for making me a new creature, for changing the desires that I have. I praise him for reminding me in his word of how short I have fallen and how desperately I need Christ. So, yes, we need to hold up those admonitions in scripture. But we need to hold up those admonitions in scripture not in such a way that says to our children, you work harder and you get here, but in such a way that says to them, here's the picture of righteousness. Here's the picture of holiness we so wanted and we so desire it. And maybe you can't have it without Jesus. You can't see you begging to change your heart, you begging to save you, You beg God to make you more like him. And every time you see an accomplishment in your life, recognize that that's God answering that prayer, and whenever you see a failure in your life, recognize that that's God reminding you of your desperate need for Christ. You can have legalism, you can have moralisms, you can have allegory. Give me the gospel, Give me the Gospel. And it absolutely breaks my heart that you can turn on Christian radio and listen all day long and never hit the gospel. You can hear God's preaching from the gospels and never hear the gospel. It's legalisms and moralisms and allegory, no gospel, none whatsoever. So as you leave from this place, remember what you've heard. But above all, remember that it's useless unless what you heard was rooted and grounded in the Gospel. And I believe it has been understand that this whole thing, I will say it again, this whole issue of family integration. Understand. Remember our vision is to be a kingdom minded christ exalting, multi generational community of faith. That's our vision, That's what we desperately desire to become. How do we get there? What's our mission? Proclaiming the supremacy of Christ to all men with a view toward biblical conversion and comprehensive discipleship. That's what we're after, not proclaiming the supremacy of the family to all men, proclaiming this premiscy of Christ to all men. Not with a view toward better ordered families. No, with a view toward biblical conversion and comprehensive discipleship. That's our view. And remember that family integration piece. The reason that we hold to it with tenacity is not because we don't like youth groups. Not because we don't like youth culture. That's not why we hold to it. We hold to it because as we look at redemptive history, we see again and again and again God has this multi generational plan of one generation teaching his words to the next. It's the transmittle of the Gospel over and over and over again. Here's what we're saying. You want to understand family integration here, It is your kids need the Gospel, and once a week is not nearly enough. So your a home needs to be a gospel outpost where you commit yourself to reiterating the Gospel to your children again and again and again and again and again. And then you come to church and we'll reiterate it all together with a group of individuals who number one, are also doing it in our homes, and number two, trusting our elders to faithfully uphold God's word and preach Christ so that they hear it again. That's what we're about. Do we always get it right? No, we don't, because we are flawed and frail and fragile human beings, and so sometimes we blow it completely and utterly, and we stand up and we preach as best we can, and it just works righteousness again. And we go to bed on Sunday night and can't sleep because we realize, I didn't preach Christ. I didn't I massage that works righteousness muscle again. I didn't hold up Jesus before the people to be praised and adored and utterly desired above all else. But I held out hope that if they did a few things over here and tweaked a couple of things over here, they could make God feel better about them. And we can't sleep, We can't wait until we get up and get to try it again. So whatever you're doing, whatever you're building, preach the gospel literally. It is all we have. Preach the Gospel. Let's pray, Father, thank you for the work that you accomplished that we could not, in the active and passive obedience of our Master's Savior and Lord Jesus Christ, who in his active obedience kept the whole law where the first Adam did not and where we could not, and who in his passive obedience, suffered our penalty in the death that he died thereby satisfying your just wrath and imputing righteousness to those who come to him by faith, so that we might stand justified forgiven not as a result of what we have done, but in spite of what we have not and could not and would not. Thank you for the way that you unfold this truth throughout the scriptures, from Genesis to Revelation, telling one coherent story that cries out to man. You are wicked and ruined, and God has provided the only answer and the person in work of his son, Jesus Christ. Thank you that your law reminds us of our sin and our desperate need of a savior. Thank you that the books of Wisdom remind us of how imperfect we are, how wicked we are, how true and good and glorious you are, and how much we desperately need Christ. Thank you for the prophets who remind us of your attitude towards sin and the wrath that is to come. And how yet again Christ is our only hope and the only answer. Thank you for the Gospels that unfold for us the culmination of these things in history. Thank you for the epistles that lay out for us what the Christian life then looks like as a result, and what the Church then looks like as a result of the person and work of Jesus Christ. And thank you for that last book of all that reminds us that in case we were wondering, you are in control of the affairs of men, and Christ shall be vindicated on the earth. Remind us of this story. May we cherish it, May we depend on it nothing more and absolutely nothing less, to your glory and your honor, and for the praise of your great name. Amen.