Sermons tagged with Understanding

The Well, good morning. Good to see everybody. My name is Nate. I am the senior pastor here. Can you guys hear me? Is it coming through? Okay, good. Yeah, there we go. Yeah, I'm the senior pastor here, so thanks for being here. If you're watching online, thank you for doing that or catching up during the week. We're grateful for that as well. If you are watching online, you probably cannot tell that this room is full, so that feels pretty good, which means I can only draw one of two conclusions. Either as a people, we are starting to feel a little bit more comfortable, a little bit closer to post-pandemic life. Fall activities are coming to a close, and we feel more comfortable gathering together. And so maybe culture is coming back to life in general, which is great. Or you guys just really love tribulation and wrath sermons. I think it's the latter. And so we've got a lot more of that coming, baby. I'm rethinking January. We're really going to drill in on God's wrath and terrible things that we see in the Old Testament too. I'm very excited for it. Clearly you guys are as well. To that, I'm just kidding. to that end, this is a series in Revelation. It is a little bit of a different series than what we normally do. I mean, normally we go through stories and books in the Bible and things like that, but focusing on the content in Revelation is a challenge for us, but we felt as a church, having never gone through it, that it was appropriate to stop and to study the book of Revelation. And one of the reasons we do this is because the book opens up with this idea of blessed are you for studying this book. So it's worth it to move through it as a church. And I feel compelled this morning to make this delineation for your edification and expectations of what's going to happen this morning in this sermon. I don't know if you've ever thought of the difference between preaching and teaching. Many of you would have no reason whatsoever to ever try to define that in your own personal life. I am compelled to do that often. And so to me, the difference between teaching and preaching is that teaching informs and preaching inspires. So when I preach, my goal is life change, that we would open up the scriptures, that we would encounter God's goodness there, that we would be turned towards a desire for him and for our Savior and for the Spirit, and that we would leave changed. Convicted, challenged, encouraged, inspired, whatever it is, we would leave changed. Well, teaching is different. Teaching, the goal is to inform. I want you to know more about this thing than you did before you came this morning. So this week, just to be clear, is teaching, okay? Last week, I had the whiteboard up here. That was teaching. We walked through the events of the tribulation. Some folks told me it felt like a college classroom, which is generous. I would have said upper middle school classroom, but I'll take it. I'll take college classroom. Maybe it's a reflection of you guys. But anyways, take it easy. I was just, I was talking specifically about Alan Morgan, not anybody else. Last week was teaching. It was to inform you. I got a lot of good feedback on that. This week is teaching. It's on the figures that we see in the tribulation. My goal is that you would simply understand it better. So I would say if this is your first sermon experience at Grace, they're not all like this. It's not that I'm not proud of this. I just want you to know that this is a different experience than what we normally do. In Revelation, we've been spending three weeks in the tribulation. The tribulation is in chapter 6 through 17 or 18, depending. And there's really no way to go through and just do chapters like 6 through 10, and then 11 through 14, and then whatever. There's no way to group them together. So what we did is the first week we talked about God's wrath. What is the tribulation and why is it necessary? Because in the book of Revelation, we see God, the tribulation we defined is pouring God's seven-year process of pouring out his earned wrath and reclaiming what is rightfully his creation. So we talked about the necessity of God's wrath. Last week, we talked about the events of the tribulation, the seven-year period that comprises it, and everything that happens, and the seals, and the trumpets, and the bowls, and all the events that happen. And I kind of mapped them out on the whiteboard, and you guys responded favorably to that, and I really appreciate that. It was very encouraging this week. But also in the tribulation, in those chapters, 6 through 17, we see a lot of mysterious figures. We see beasts and dragons and groups of people and two witnesses and a woman in Babylon. We see all of these different figures, and it's not readily apparent all the time. There's only one that's specifically spelled out as to what it is, and that's the dragon, and we'll get there today. But the rest of them are really pretty mysterious figures, and this is where we start to encounter things like the Antichrist and the Mark of the Beast and all of that stuff. So this morning is devoted to just tackling these figures. There's six of them that we're going to look at this morning. We're going to go through them one by one. I'm going to say, here it is. This is where we find it in Scripture, and this is what we think that it could be or represent. So this is teaching this morning. And then we are going to wrap up with a spiritual point, but to get us ready for next week, when we start preaching again. Next week, I'll just say it this way. I feel incredibly intimidated by next week. Because next week basically needs to be the best sermon of my life to do adequate justice to what happens in the text next week. It is unbelievable and moving and I might yell through it, I might blubber through it, I'm not sure, but next week's got to be the best sermon of my life to even come remotely close to doing justice to the crescendo of time that happens next week. But to get there, we've got to understand everything happening in the tribulation. And part of that is the figures in the tribulation because we're going to see some of those come to life next week. With that preamble, let's begin to work our way through chapter 6 through 17 and look at the different figures that show up there and simply ask, what are they? What do they represent? What do we know about them? I would say a couple of things. First, I'm going to present to you one or two thoughts about each of them. I am not going to present to you all the views that exist of them. And as I said in week one, when it comes to revelation, be cynical of certainty. So everything I'm saying, I'm holding with an open hand. If I get to heaven and find out I'm wrong, I'm pretty comfortable with that. And I don't want anybody saying it's gospel truth, whatever I say this morning, because these are all guesses and hearsay. You're all smart adults, so we can deal in that realm. Most of you are smart adults, so we can deal in that realm. So the first figure that we see early on that we have not yet discussed, but we've mentioned and alluded to, is the 144,000. So if you have notes, you can write that down. The notes are simply a list of these things. Underneath each figure is some text that's listed. Those are the main places or the main place where we see this figure, or in this case, this group of people. Please know that that's not an exhaustive list of all the places where we encounter that figure. It's just the main place, specifically the dragon. I think I've listed, yeah, chapter 12, verses 1 through 17 for the dragon. That's three down. The dragon shows up throughout the book, okay? That's just the main place where the dragon is described. So just a little disclaimer. The 144,000, I am going to read a description for the rest of the figures. There's no good synopsis verses for the 144,000, but here's what we know about them, okay? The 144,000 are comprised of 12,000 Jewish virgin males from each tribe in Israel. And those are listed out in chapter seven in the first reference that I gave you. And there's really nothing else there that we're told. There's 144,000 Jewish males that for some reason God has sectioned off for himself to worship him in a particular way. They show up again in chapter 14, which is why I'm mentioning them, because they show up twice. If it was only the one time, I just would have kind of skirted past it because I don't have much conclusive to say about them. But because they show up twice, it feels important enough for us to at least say, why is that there? The second time they show up, we learn a lot more about them in chapter 14. In chapter 14, we learn that they are around God. They follow the lamb wherever he goes. They are being taught a song by the angels that only they can understand. No one else, we're told, can learn this song. And it's interesting that they are virgins and it says that they are blameless. They're sinless. They have been kept spotless by God for the purpose of following the Lamb wherever he goes. Now, what are they? Who are they? What do they represent? How do Jewish males know if they get into the 144,000? We really don't know that stuff at all. There's been a lot of guesses over the years. Some conservative Christian theologians have attempted to explain the 144,000 as a figurative number that's representative of all people who will ever be saved. There's a big Christian camp that kind of holds that opinion of the 144,000, that it's a figurative number, that the 12 times 12 times 12, 12 times, that is some sort of figure of perfection. The 144,000 really just means multitude. And so really it's a figurative way of saying all the people who will ever be saved in all of history are grouped together like this. The problem with that viewpoint is there is zero, absolutely zero indication in the text that that's the case. What's going on there is conservative Christians got upset that they weren't included in the 144,000 because they're not Jewish male virgins. And they're like, well, then it must mean this because then I'm in. We're just finding a way to shoehorn ourselves into God's blessing, which we've been doing for all of history. This is another instance of it. That probably doesn't hold a lot of water. There are other offshoot religions like Jehovah's Witnesses that have staked their claim in being the 144,000. That likewise holds very little merit, it would seem. The most reasonable view to me, to me, is that there's literally in heaven 12,000 Jewish virgin males from the different 12 tribes of Israel that total in number 144,000 that for some reason God has sectioned off for himself in eternity. And the real reason I bring this up is to make this point. It would seem, based on this, and based on much of Revelation, as kind of a counterbalance to the rest of the New Testament, it would seem that in the book of Revelation, we see coming out of it, particularly in God's treatment of this 144,000, that the physical nation of Israel and the actual genetic descendants of Abraham, God's chosen people, it would seem in Revelation, still matter to him greatly. That God still has a soft spot for Israel. That God still has a soft spot for his chosen people. As we read through the New Testament, it's easy to move away from that, particularly when we get to Romans and we read some of the Pauline writings where it indicates that if you have faith, then you are a spiritual descendant of Abraham and you are God's child, which is good for us because we want to be in that chosen number. We want to receive God's blessing in that way. But what Revelation shows us as kind of a counterbalance to the Pauline teachings is the nation of Israel, at the end of the day, remains important to God. I'm not going to pretend to tell you why or how or what that means, but it's my opinion that God does actually care about the physical nation of Israel. There's a lot of stuff going on in Jerusalem in Revelation. I think he cares about Israel. And I think he cares about the Hebrew people. And I think that's one of the things we can pull out of the inclusion of the 144,000 twice in the book of Revelation, second time being taught a song that only they can know. And if I'm right about that, it has implications for some of the other figures as well. So just kind of set that thought to the side, and we're going to circle back to it when we start talking about the beasts. The next figure that we see, there's actually two of them, are the two witnesses. We see them in Revelation chapter 11. They show up in the back half of the tribulation. You'll remember last week, if you were here, that the tribulation lasts seven years. And the first three and a half years, maybe, probably, is the seals being opened in heaven. The four horsemen of the apocalypse, the voice of the martyrs, the great earthquake, and then the silence in heaven as God's wrath is ushered in. And so those are pre-wrath in the first three and a half years. And then I argued last week that there seems a reasonable chance, based on Revelation 7, that the rapture could happen in the middle of the tribulation prior to God's wrath. And so we think that for the back half of the tribulation, the last three and a half years, that God has already raptured Christians up to heaven. This is why the two witnesses are important. So I'm going to read you a brief description about them and then we're going to talk about who the two witnesses are and what they do. I'm looking in verse three if you have a Bible and you want to follow along. It says this, and I will grant authority to my two witnesses and they will proph for 1260 days, clothed in sackcloth. 1260 days is three and a half years. So it's the back half of the tribulation. These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. So the text goes on. They show up, these two witnesses show up in Jerusalem, in the back half of the tribulation, to prophesy and to share the gospel. So what this tells us is God, even though he's pouring out his wrath on what we believe based on some of the passages that we looked at last week, are an obstinate people who are refusing to ask for mercy from God. God sends two witnesses in his goodness to proclaim his good news, to tell people to turn to God, to remind them that they can be saved from this wrath if they would only turn themselves to God in humble submission. And so God, even in the back half of the tribulation, remains interested in bringing people into heaven, into the place that Christ has prepared for them, into his eternal glory, into their eternal glory. God still wants to do that. And I think that's worth pointing out. Now these witnesses, they share and they prophesy, and it says that they're given the power to shut up the sky, that they can stop it from raining, and that no one can kill them. They're impossible to kill, and if you kill them, you will be killed in the same way that they are killed. And because they go around sharing the gospel, and because they keep pressing on it, and we're going to get to this point in a second where we understand this character and why it matters, the beast gets ticked at them sharing the gospel, and the beast war against them and they end up killing the two witnesses. They kill them in front of the whole world, it says, in the middle of the streets of Jerusalem. So I'm imagining this being on CNN and BBC and things like that. Or just the internet. Maybe it'll be on YouTube. Who knows? I just thought of trying to explain YouTube to the Apostle John. That would be a fun exercise. So they die, but they lay dead in the street for three and a half days because their followers won't allow anyone to approach the bodies. After they've laid there for three and a half days, God miraculously resurrects them. They walk again in front of the whole earth, and then God sweeps them back up into heaven. So their role is to come down, share the gospel, be one final sign from God of his love and his goodness, and then they're swept up back into heaven. Now, a lot of people like to ask, who are the two witnesses? And it's good that you're asking because I know for sure who they are with no doubt whatsoever. Some people, most people argue that the witnesses are Moses and Elijah. This is based primarily on the scene of the transfiguration in the Gospels, where Jesus goes up on top of a mountain, he's transfigured into his heavenly appearance, he's glowing bright as the sun, and Moses and Elijah are there, and they're talking. And just as an aside, Peter says the most Peter thing in the history of Peter, when he leans, you can find the story in the gospel where he leans forward and he goes, it's a good thing I'm here. I can make you guys some tents. You can hang out for a little while. What kind of audacity do you have to have to see Jesus the Messiah turn into his heavenly form? Bright as the sun, you can't look directly at him. By the way, Moses and Elijah are there, brought back down from heaven to have the special conference with Jesus for them to chat. How could every urge in your body not be to simply shut up and try to not be noticed? And Peter decides to go, you know, fellas, you're lucky I'm here. Shut up, Peter. What's the matter with you? Just soak it in, man. Anyways. So a lot of people think it's Moses and Elijah based on the transfiguration and because of their prominence in the Old Testament. Some people think it's Enoch and Elijah because Enoch, along with Elijah, are the only two people to never experience death, to be so righteous that God sweeps them up into heaven. And so maybe he was preserving them for this moment. Not very many people think that. I think that because who cares if I'm wrong about it? What's the difference? So I'm an Enoch guy. My dad is a Moses guy, and we will argue about it until we get to heaven. But the other thing is, it could be none of those people. It could be two women. We don't know. We don't know. It could be people that we've never met. So those are the guesses, and those are the roles of the two witnesses to prophesy, to point people to God, even in the midst of his wrath. Those are the good guys, the figures that we see in the tribulation, the 144,000 and the two witnesses. So now we get to the bad guys. The bad guys make up this term, and you may want to write this down. The next three, you might want to draw brackets and bracket them together and title them in your notes as the unholy trinity. That's kind of what they're known in eschatological and theological circles, the unholy trinity. And I'll tell you why in a little bit. The first one we see is the dragon. The dragon shows up in Revelation chapter 12. I read this passage in week one as an example for another point that I was making, but just to refresh our memory, this is the description of the dragon. Verse three, and another sign appeared in heaven. Behold, a great red dragon with seven heads and ten horns, and on his head sevenabor it here. The simple answer is it's a picture of Christmas. And doesn't that get you into the spirit? The dragon is the only figure where we are told very specifically what he is. Further on in the chapter, I believe in verse 9, John just goes and states right out that the dragon is Satan or the devil. So we know that whenever the dragon is mentioned in the book of Revelation, it means Satan. And his tail sweeping the stars out of the sky is again a picture of him bringing a third of the angels out of heaven with him when he was expelled and they became demons. In the, sorry, I've got a cold. I've been tested. It's not COVID, promise you. It's just a cold. Anyway. In the unholy trinity, the dragon takes the place of God the Father. So the unholy trinity is meant to mimic the holy trinity. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. So in the unholy trinity, the dragon is God the Father. He is the one that imbues the beast with power. He is the one that gives the message to the false prophet that we're gonna talk about here in a little bit. He is the one kind of directing the show, so to speak, in this point in history, and the one kind of pulling all the strings. So the rest are doing the will of the dragon in the same way that God the Son and God the Spirit do the will of God the Father. So that's kind of how they work together. And we don't need much explanation of Satan. I think we're pretty clear on what his role is. His role is to take as many people away from God as he possibly can. He's fighting to hurt God in every way possible. The next figure that we see is the beast from the sea. The beast from the sea. This beast comes out of the sea in chapter 13. I'll read you a brief description of him like a leopard and head like a lion and all that stuff. I have no idea. Your guess is as good as mine. Anybody who says different isn't being truthful. So whatever. With that description, it's an impressive beast is the thing to take away from that. What's important is that it's imbued with the authority of the dragon and given the right to rule. So the beast is often referred to as the antichrist. So that's something that we've all heard before. If you watched horror movies and didn't read the Bible growing up, you still heard the term Antichrist at some point or another. And we have been looking for the Antichrist, wondering who the Antichrist is going to be. This is a thing that we concern ourselves with. I think every president that's ever in my lifetime has been accused of being that. And then there's historical figures like Hitler and sometimes the Pope gets lumped in with this of being the Antichrist. The reality is the Antichrist has not made an appearance yet. And it's going to be a lot more powerful when it does than anything we've tried to name it over the years. The other thing I would tell you is this. The word, term, title, Antichrist is not in the book of Revelation. At no point does John say this is the Antichrist. We get the idea of the Antichrist from 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John when the same guy who wrote Revelation is writing letters to the church and he's warning them about the Antichrist and Antichrists, plural. So not only is there a the Antichrist, but there are other Antichrists. Any Antichrist is someone who tries to take on a messianic persona and trick other people into believing that he is somehow or she is somehow the Messiah and they should follow him or her. For those with a long enough memory, before Waco, Texas was a home goods store, it was the place where you thought of David Koresh. He was an antichrist, but not the antichrist. So because of what John wrote, we look for the antichrist, and many see him in Revelation and go, the beast, this has got to be the antichrist, and it very likely is. It's just important to me to point out to you that at no place does Revelation claim that, okay? But we're gonna treat him as if he is. The role of the Antichrist is to trick the world into thinking he's the Christ, is to trick the world into thinking he is the Messiah. So we think of the Antichrist as being evil, but it's important to know that when he shows up, he's going to seem inherently good. Particularly in the midst of a tribulation, he's probably going to be promising health and wealth to people and protection to people. And we know that the Antichrist sets up his own kingdom and sets up his own religion. He is the king of the kingdom. He is the focal point of the religion. And the whole world is to gather around and worship him. And he institutes this policy where you can be particularly effective with the Jewish audience, which we learned based on the 144,000, God still cares about deeply. If you've ever heard me preach through the Gospels, if you've been in a Bible study with me working through the Gospels, one of the things that I like to point out, because it helps us understand our Gospels so much better, is that no one around Jesus really understood who he was and what he came to do. Everyone's expectation of Jesus when the Messiah came was that he would be a physical king and sit on a literal throne, that he would be the most powerful physical ruler in the world. He would establish a worldwide empire and the whole world would worship him as a God while he did it. King, emperor, deity. That's their expectation of Christ. Now we get to the end of time and the Antichrist comes to impersonate and to deceive and what does he do? He meets the expectations that everyone has ever had of Jesus. By uniting the whole world under one empire, sitting on that throne, being the emperor and the deity that is the focal point of all the worship of the world. Okay? Which, sadly, is going to be particularly effective with the Jewish community. In 2012 or 13, I went to Israel. And one of the things I got to do is on the night of the Sabbath, on Friday night, I went to the Wailing Wall. It's the wall of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. It's a holy place. And there was all these men dressed in traditional Jewish garb with the phylacteries and things on their forehead and the whole deal. And they're praying and they're wailing and they're rocking and they're singing and they're praying to God. And it broke my heart because God sent Jesus for them. And they don't yet believe in Jesus. They're still waiting for a Messiah to come and sit on the throne and be the emperor of the world on a focal point. They are primed and ready for the deception of Satan at the end of time. For the deception of the beast. Satan is very intentionally digging at God the best he can as he deploys his strategy to tear people away from God. So that is the Antichrist. In the unholy trinity, he's clearly taking the role of the son, right? But there's one more in the unholy trinity. That's the beast from the earth that's talked about later in the chapter. His brief description is this. Chapter 11. Then I saw another beast rising out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb and it spoke like a dragon. It exercises all the authority of the first beast in its presence and makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast whose mortal wound was healed. We're not going to get into the mortal wound thing, but we see that the role of the beast from the earth is to point people towards the beast of the sea. That's why he's often called the false prophet. So there's the Antichrist and the false prophet that have been prophesied about, and most people believe that these beasts fulfill those roles and round out the unholy trinity. And we see him as being the spirit. The spirit points us to Jesus. The spirit speaks to us in personal ways and directs us to Jesus and shows us what we ought to do. And so the false prophet, the beast from the earth, directs people towards the beast and towards the authority of the beast and acts as an evangelist for the beast, okay? And again, we don't see false prophet. We don't see unholy trinity show up in the Revelation text. We just use those terms to help us understand who they probably are, okay? So that's the unholy trinity. And those are the ones, those are the beasts that when they get tired of watching the two witnesses win souls to heaven, that go and attack them and kill them. These are the beasts that in, I think it's the sixth seal or the fifth bowl of wrath, God darkens their kingdom. He darkens the kingdom of which the first beast, the Antichrist, sits on the throne. These are the beasts, along with the dragon, that assemble the armies of Gog and Magog at Armageddon for the final battle, for the final scene in history. They're the ones that God curses when he sends a huge earthquake and breaks Jerusalem into three parts. This dragon and these beasts are the ones that are thrown into the pit and locked up for a thousand years for the millennial reign of Christ, which we'll talk about in two weeks. And then come back out and are loosed and are allowed to tempt the world for a short time before Jesus finally and victoriously throws them in the lake of fire for all of eternity. These are those beasts, okay? So those are those figures from Revelation. There's one more figure left to talk about. Her name is the least comfortable to say out loud, but she's the whore of Babylon or the great prostitute. We see her in chapter 17. We're told about who she is, and we're told in chapter 18 the author delights in her demise, like in a song. I'm going to dive into some research on that so I can adequately sum it up for you next week because it transitions into Jesus showing up in chapter 19, which is the best part. But this figure in chapter 17, known as the whore of Babylon, I will argue to you, renders Revelation chapter 17 as the most mysterious, unknowable chapter in the whole Bible. I don't think there's any way to know who she is and what's going on there. What we know for sure is that she represents a city. We don't know what city. People over the years have tried over and over again to guess. In the text, there's some indications that it could be Rome. That seems to be the strongest indication in the text because it's noted in chapter 17 that she is, oh, here's her description. I'm sorry, I almost forgot. And then I'll was written a name of mystery, Babylon the Great, the mother of prostitutes and earth's abominations. Another quick point to make here, it says at the beginning that she is arrayed in purple and scarlet. If you dig into the Greek there, those color words can also be translated electric blue and silver. So Panthers fans, just be careful. You never know if you're wearing evil, evil colors. I'm just looking out for you guys, you know? For those that don't know, I'm from Atlanta and I hate the Panthers and I just made that up. That's not remotely true, okay? It's very clear in the text that she's representative of a city. It's hard to know which city. There's indications that it could be Rome because it says that she is drunk off the blood of the martyrs of Christ. And at the time of the writing, Rome had essentially declared a holy war on the followers of Jesus and was martyring them left and right. So that matches up. And then there's a mention that she sits on seven hills. And if you've ever been to Rome or studied Rome, you know that Rome is defined in its geography by seven hills. And so there's some lining up there. And it's very easy to say, well, that's got to be Rome. The problem with that is that would mean that whatever happens in Revelation has to take place when Rome is the most powerful city in the world, which was true at the time of the writing, but is no longer true. So if you want to say it's definitely Rome, you have to either commit yourself to compressing the timeline of Revelation to a degree that all of it's already happened, and then we have to figure out what the implications are with that interpretive style. Or you have to think that maybe Rome is going to be thrust into the forefront at some point later on in the future. Maybe that's where the beast decides to sit and brings it back to prominence as he leads his world empire. But when you get there, you're just guessing, man. It may as well be Tupelo, Mississippi for the guesses that you're making because you have no idea what's going to happen in the future. Which renders this chapter and understanding exactly who she is or what city she represents impossible and is the most mysterious chapter in the Bible will very likely only be known within the generation that it happens or in eternity for most of us. What we can know is she, the city that she is, embodies all the sin and all the willful rejection and all the flippant dismissals of Christ and his blood and God and his goodness throughout history. We could think of it like we would culturally think of Vegas. Just a city that thumbs its nose at Christian sensibilities, thumbs its nose at the idea that a God could exist who would actually care about what we do and honoring him with our bodies and our morals and just pursues hedonism and throws everything and greed and throws everything else to the wind. The whore of Babylon is the personification of reckless, unfettered, selfishness, evil, greed, and what we would call sinning for all of history. It is the embodiment of rebellion from God is how we understand her. So those are the figures of the tribulation. I would end with this thought as we try to wrap all that up and prepare ourselves for next week. Deception has always been and will always be Satan's strategy. Deception has always been and will always be Satan's strategy. The whole purpose of the unholy trinity is to trick a generation of people into believing that they are the Godhead, that the beast, that the Antichrist is the Messiah, that you are good and right and wonderful to put your faith in him and follow him. And in doing so, deceive people away from God and hurt God the Father's heart as he watches his creation march away from him being deceived, believing that they are doing good. That's the insidious part of it. It's not that these people are choosing to worship Satan because you stink God, we love Satan. They think they're worshiping God. They think they're following the Messiah. It's a deception of Satan and it's evil. And it's important for us to realize that now because deception will be then, was in the past, and is right now, the language that Satan speaks. It is the way that he pulls you away from your creator. And it's worth simply asking as we wrap up, what lies are we believing that are pulling us away from our God? There's any number that we could place there. Some of us believe the lie that politics are the way to fix our culture. Some of us believe the lie that if we just get the next thing, we'll be happy. Some of us believe the lie that if that thing wouldn't have happened in the past, that we could be happy right now. Some of us believe the lie that we're the main character of the story of the world. Not me, other people. It has never not been a profitable exercise for me in my spiritual life to not sit and contemplate. If Satan is the author of lies, he's the father of deception, and his efforts to pull people away from God are going to culminate in the greatest deception, what lies am I believing now that I need God to free me from? If you want a spiritual exercise from this teaching this morning, that would be the place that I would lean into. And if it makes you angry that Satan has been lying to people for all of history and has been hurting and harming you with his lies, if you see your children believing the lies of Satan and it hurts you to watch them walk in those lies. Guess who else is upset? God. And next week, we'll see him send his son to a wrecked shop and make someone pay for those lies. And it's pretty great. Let me pray for us. We'll go throughout our weeks. Father, we thank you for the book of Revelation. We thank you for being so clear with us in ways of what to expect, what's going to happen, how things are going to go. God, I pray that we would have a better understanding of this book and the things that occur in it now than we did weeks prior. Lord, my words that have been unclear or clumsy or poorly or irresponsibly chosen, I just pray that they would be forgotten or forgiven. The things that are right and good and true, let us lean into those and hold tight to those. Let our study of this book enliven our hearts towards you and help us want to know you and understand you more. God, I pray for all of these folks as they go throughout the week. I pray for the folks listening as they go throughout their week. May you show up, God. Would they see you? Would you be present to them? For those who need encouragement this week, I pray that you would breathe that into their life in a way that only you can so that there's little doubt that you love them and care about them. Thank you for loving and caring about us. Thank you for loving and caring for this church. Thank you for all that you're doing here and all that you're allowing us to do through your spirit. It's in your son's name we pray. Amen.

The Pretty epic, huh? I mean, looky there. The sermon is half as good as the video. Y'all are going to leave here with your hair on fire. This is great. Well, good morning. My name is Nate. I am one of the pastors here. So thanks for being here. I thank you for watching online or catching up during the week if that's what you're doing. This is clearly the start of our series in the book of Revelation. I have been studying and prepping for this as far back as the summer because Joseph was a fun series. I loved doing Joseph. I love narrative series where we're just telling stories and seeing what we can learn from the story. The prep time on a Joseph sermon is about two and a half or three hours. The prep time on the Revelation sermon is 10 times that for each one. So you got to start those early. But because I've been doing so much studying, I'm very happy to tell you guys that I have all the answers for you. I'm going to tell you very clearly what happens in the book of Revelation. You can't ask me a question that I won't be certain about. And this is going to be a very productive time for the church. So I'm very much looking forward to it. Revelation, for some of us, has a lot of baggage. For some of us, it doesn't have very much at all. I grew up in a Southern Baptist church in the 80s and the 90s. And when you grew up in a Baptist church in the 80s and the 90s, Revelation was a big deal. I don't know if you guys realize that or what your church contexts are, but there was a season in church life when having strong opinions about the tribulation and the rapture was just a part of church. I actually talked to a church one time in a former life. I was a teacher at a private high school, and one of the churches was a small country Baptist church. And they said, hey, we're looking for a pastor if you know anybody. And I said, okay, well, you know, I'll keep my eyes out. And they said, but we're only going to hire people if they believe in a pre-trib rapture. That's a non-negotiable for us. And I started laughing. He's like, why are you laughing? I'm like, oh, you mean that? Like, that's really important to you. And they're like, yeah, absolutely. Well, are you not pre-trib rapture? Because if you're not, I don't want you teaching my daughter Bible. I'm like, rapture is not coming up. All right. We're not covering that in 10th grade Bible. Don't worry about it. I wonder how many of you though have had, like, when I say pre-trib, mid-trib, post-trib, 1260 days, the four beasts, the man, the eagle, the lion, the ox, the 144,000 Jewish males from the tribes. How many of you know what I'm talking about? You've heard those things before. Okay. And then I won't ask the rest of us, how many of you are like, I got no clue, man. Like, no idea on this. You don't have to raise your hand. But yeah, so like, how do we approach like that wide of a swath of information and knowledge about this book? Because there's some of us that have been a part of really in-depth Bible studies and there's some of us who we've avoided it all together. So in thinking about how to approach the book of Revelation for these next seven weeks, I really thought it was worth noting the tendencies that we kind of tend towards as we approach the book of Revelation. Because again, some of us are very experienced with it, and some of us have never opened it because it's scary or intimidating or whatever. So as we begin, I kind of wanted to begin the series with this thought as we think about how do we approach the book of Revelation. I would contend that most people either overcomplicate or oversimplify Revelation. Most people in their approach to it have a tendency to either overcomplicate it or vastly oversimplify the book. And what I mean is we can overcomplicate it so that we miss the forest for the trees. We can overcomplicate it so much and drill down on things so much and ask so many questions about it. When is the rapture actually going to happen? Because of this verse, I think it's going to happen in the middle of the tribulation. When is the tribulation? When's that going to happen? Are there Christians going to be on the planet during this part of the tribulation? When is the tribulation? When's that going to happen? Are there Christians going to be on the planet during this part of the tribulation? Are people, can you still get saved during the tribulation? What are the four creatures and the beasts and the angels and which angels have which wings and what do they represent and what's going on with the dragon trying to eat the baby and all these different things? what is the mark of the beast? Is it the vaccine? What is all that stuff, right? And so we can kind of drill down and the answer is no, stinking no, that's not the thing. The vaccine is not the mark of the beast. Anyways, we can get so concerned in drilling down on these details that we kind of miss the message of the book. And the thing about all those details that we'll talk about in a little bit and throughout the series is many of them are really not knowable. So to try to figure out what is the creature that comes out of the abyss that has a tail like a scorpion and stings you and it ails you for five months? Is that an attack helicopter or is that a scorpion? I don't know. And you don't either. And there's no way to know. So let's stop worrying about it, right? So we can overcomplicate it and get so mired in the details of the book that we miss the message. But we can also oversimplify it. I had somebody in my men's Tuesday morning Bible study who he's involved in a study in Revelation right now with another small group. He's cheating on me with another small group and it's hurtful. But he said, we were talking about Revelation and he waved his hand and he goes, Jesus wins. That's all you need to know. And listen, that's true. And this is a man who clearly he cares about Revelation and I don't mean to disparage him, but in that moment of just going, meh, Jesus wins, I would tend more towards that camp in my own interpretative approach of it, but that's not enough either. What happens when we overcomplicate or oversimplify the book of Revelation is that both approaches cheapen the message of the book. Both of those approaches really end up cheapening the message of the book in general. If we get so caught up with the details that it matters to us deeply who the 144,000 are and we search through the Bible to try to piece that one together, and we miss the overarching message of the book because of it, then we cheapen the message of the book. If we just dismiss it and say, listen, Jesus wins, that's all you need to know, then we cheapen the message of the book as well because there's a reason that Revelation exists. There's a reason that God called John up to heaven and gave him a vision of what's going to happen at the end of time. There's a reason he told him to write it down. There's a reason that people have died for the preservation of Scripture over the centuries. There's a reason that this book was canonized, was put in the Bible as part of every Bible that's ever been printed. There's a reason that God ends His revelation to us with this book. There's reasons for that, and so it's worth studying. And I would contend that the book of Revelation matters very much to God. And I would actually base it on the way that he starts the book. This is John writing it. Revelation chapter 1, verses 1 through 3. Listen to this. This verse, particularly the third verse, tells us that revelation is important to God. This book is important to God. And it says, blessed are those who read aloud, because this was a letter. It was written to the churches. And so there wasn't a bunch of copies. Gutenberg hadn't showed up yet. So there was just one letter and one person would read it aloud. So it's basically blessed are those who read it, blessed are those who study it, blessed are those who invest time in it. So God says that we will be blessed by doing this. And, you know, I was talking to Erin Winston, our great children's pastor, I think a year and a half or two years ago when we were talking about series ideas. And she just mentioned to me that she can't remember Grace having ever done a series in Revelation. And I thought, well, goodness, our church needs to know about this. Our church needs to know this book. We need to kind of demystify it and walk through it and see what we can learn from it. And we wanted to do it for a long time, but then the pandemic hit and this didn't feel like what I wanted to do strictly over video, right? I wanted this to be in person because some of the stuff that we have to talk about in the book is hard. That's not this week, but it's coming. And so I thought that it would be worth it to do this series together. And it'd be worth it to not overcomplicate things, to try to train ourselves to focus on the message of portions of it, rather than get mired in the details, but also get into it enough that we feel like we can understand it. So as we approach Revelation, we do need to do some background work to really understand why it was written. It was written by John, the disciple whom Jesus loved. He was in exile on the island of Patmos about 90 AD is what we think, is when we think it was written. So about 60 years after the death of Christ. He's the last living disciple. All the other disciples have died a martyr's death. He is the last stalwart of the disciples and the bastion of the early church. John really lived a remarkable life. And so God calls him up to heaven and shows him a vision and he writes it down and that becomes Revelation. And what we need to understand is that Revelation was written to bring hope to a suffering church. Revelation was written to bring hope to a suffering church. To be a Christian at this point in history is to take your life into your hands. To be a Christian is to put yourself and your family at risk. It's to go into the catacombs, into underground graveyards, to have your Easter worship service because you cannot be seen in public doing this because you will be killed. It's to know friends and loved ones who have been dipped in tar and used as live torches to light the path into Rome. It's to watch your friends and loved ones get taken and thrown into the gladiator arena with animals that rip them apart. It is a tough time to be a Christian. And so John wrote this letter to them from God to give them hope, to encourage them, to help them hang in there, to help them see a path to a better day. And so when reading Revelation, we can never separate our understanding of it from how the original audience would have understood it. We can never make it mean something that it wouldn't have meant to them. But that also means that it's right and good for us to approach it, mining it for hope. That's the best reason to approach Revelation. It's not necessarily to know what's going to happen at the end of times with great detail, but to cling to the hope that the book offers us throughout it. This is why I love Revelation. If you've heard me preach any messages for any time at all, you've heard me say things like there's coming a day when Jesus is gonna make all the wrong things right and the sad things untrue. You've heard me talk about Revelation 18 and 19 where he comes down with righteous and true tattooed on his thigh. He comes back not as the Lamb of God, but now as the Lion of Judah and he's coming to wreck shop. You've heard me talk about that because I take great solace in that in my personal faith. You've heard me talk about Revelation 21 when God will be with his people and we will be with our God and there'll be no more weeping and crying in pain anymore. You've heard me talk about that because it's in Revelation and it's hopeful and it's what we cling to. So when we read it, our top priority, our first priority ought to be to mine it for hope and to let it encourage us in our faith. That's far more important than some of the other details. And it's important enough to dig in and to see how it might offer us hope the same way it did the early church. As we seek to understand and interpret the book of Revelation, a couple rules of thumb for us as we walk through it together. The first is, it's not completely linear, but sometimes it is. It's not completely linear, but sometimes it's linear. And when I say linear, what I mean is just event after event from start to finish. The gospels are linear. The gospel of Mark starts at the beginning and moves through the story of Jesus to a crucifixion and then ascension. That's linear. It's just, it's all happening on the same timetable, right? Well, Revelation's not like that. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it moves through and it moves, this event happens, and then the very next thing he talks about is the event that follows the one that he just described. But sometimes he jumps. He says, I turn and I saw. And I'll show you in a second what I'm talking about. He says, then I turned and I saw, and it's something else is going on. And the thing that he's talking about over here happened before the thing he just got done talking about. Or it happens years after the thing he just got done talking about. And then in the next chapter over, he's going to talk about the stuff that happens in the middle. And then the next chapter over, he's going to talk about stuff that happened before that. So sometimes it's linear. Sometimes it's not. So you just have to know as you're reading it that he's not presenting us from chapter 1 to chapter 22 all the things in order. Another thing you should know is that it's not completely literal, but sometimes it is. It's not completely literal all the time. Sometimes it's figurative. Sometimes it is literal. Sometimes the words that you're reading are actually going to happen. They're descriptive of a thing that really will take place. Sometimes you're reading it and it's figurative language to describe to you in the best way that John can what it will be like. Or because God is intentionally using powerful imagery, it's a picture of other events that have already happened. So as we're reading it and as we're studying through it, and there's a reading plan that will be, it would be on the, is it on the table this morning, Kyle? Okay. It's there and it'll be online as well beginning tomorrow morning. I hope that you'll read through Revelation with us. I hope that you'll be talking about it in your small groups together. But as you read and study, we need to be asking ourselves as we look at the text, is this literal or figurative? Is this linear? Is this happening in order? Or have I jumped back or to a different place? We'll need to know this as we read. Now, some examples of where it's figurative and nonlinear or literal and linear are easy to find. So I'm going to read a passage from Revelation chapter 12. You don't have to turn there. You can just listen to my words as I read. This is a famous scene in the book of Revelation. Just listen. I don't know what diadems are. I think maybe crowns. Cool. Let's just go on to the next thing, right? What's going on there? Well, what's happening there is that John is neither being literal, nor is he being linear. Most scholars agree, and it's not certain, so I don't say it with certainty, but most scholars agree, believe it or not, that this is a picture of Christmas. What if I preached that this December 25th, right? What if I made that the Christmas message? Boy, that would be something. Most scholars believe it's a picture of Christmas. It's figurative. It's powerful imagery that God is using to drive home a point. And that in this depiction, the woman very likely represents Israel. The baby is Jesus. The red dragon is Satan. And Satan is trying to thwart Jesus, thwart the efforts of God. But God rescues Jesus back up to his throne, which means God's throne and Jesus' throne. And then Israel is nourished in the wilderness, which could be a reference to their exile in Egypt as slaves, or it could be a reference to the flight of Mary to the wilderness once Jesus is born and they have to go to Egypt for a couple years because Herod is trying to find and kill baby Jesus. The tail sweeping a third of the stars out of the heaven down onto earth, that's a reference to the fact that when Lucifer was kicked out of heaven and became Satan, that he took a third of the demons with him. So this isn't linear because it's Christmas. This happened 90 years before John even wrote it. And certainly not in order with the other things going on in the book. And it's not even linear within its own depiction because it's talking about fleeing to the wilderness and it's talking about the demons falling from heaven, which happened thousands of years before any of this stuff and the rest of the story was ever happening. And then the 1260 days at the end of it is a reference to half of the tribulation period that Revelation divides in half often in months or in days. So it's literally, as far as the time frame is concerned, it's covering thousands of years in a paragraph. It's got a ton going on there. And it didn't literally happen. It's figurative imagery. So that's neither literal nor linear. But sometimes Revelation is those things. Listen to Revelation 21. At the end of the book, John is given a vision. He's carried to another place where Jerusalem begins to descend. A new Jerusalem begins to descend out of the sky. God is setting it Its length the same as its width. And measured the city with his rod. 12,000 stadia. Its length and width and height are equal. He also measured its wall. 144 cubits by human measurement. Which is also an angel's measurement. Which is nice to know. If you're measuring in cubits. You're measuring as the angels do. So well done. The wall was built of jasper while the city was pure gold, clear as glass. The foundations of the wall of the city are adorned with every kind of jewel. The first was jasper, then sapphire, a gate, emerald, onyx, chameleon, chrysolite, beryl, and he goes on and on. And then he says, and the 12 gates were 12 pearls, each of the end of the book. It happens at the end of the story. It happens at the end of time. We can read that, see where it's happening in the book, and know that that's how it's going to happen in time. And it's literal. That's not figurative speech about the specific jewels that are going to be the foundation of the wall or the way that the city is going to look or the size of the city. That's a literal interpretation. So again, as we read, we need to ask, is what's happening here, is it literal or is it figurative? Is it linear? Is it happening in the order in which it's presented? Or in its proper context, should it go in another place? When I was explaining this to Jen this week, she was asking how I was going to approach it, and I was kind of walking her through portions of the sermon. And Jen, she's my wife, for those of you who don't know her, not just a lady I talk to sermons about, but that would be cool. I have one of those. When I told her what I was going to do and how it sometimes is literal, sometimes linear, and sometimes it's not, she said, yeah, but, and she's asked the question that you guys all should have by now. She goes, yeah, but how do you know? How do you know when it's supposed to be one and not the other? Well, that's the tricky part. And the only possible answer to it is you have to work hard. How do I know when it's literal and when it's figured if you have to study? Listen, some books of the Bible are really easy to understand. Proverbs. You don't need to study Proverbs. Just read Proverbs. And it says that we should consider the ant and work even when we don't have to. There's no mystery going on there. That's pretty simple. When it says whatever you do, get wisdom, that's simple. Revelation, not simple. If you want to understand it, it takes hard work. It takes discussion. You have to read a lot of sources. You have to listen to a lot of people. There's no easy path to understanding Revelation. I can't stand up here in seven weeks and explain it to you in a way that will make sense and get everything right. I just can't do it. And people who claim that they can are dumb. They're just being intellectually dishonest. Which is why I think it's important for me to kind of share this idea with you, not just for this series, but as you encounter Revelation as you move throughout the rest of your life, which is simply when it comes to Revelation, be cynical of certainty. When it comes to the book of Revelation, when it comes to who you're listening to and what you're reading and how you're talking about it and how people are presenting ideas to you in whatever form you would consume them, we are wise when it comes to Revelation to be cynical of certainty. Now there are some things in the book of Revelation that we ought to be certain about. Jesus is there. He's in heaven. God is sitting on his throne. He's surrounded by angels. There's going to be a new heaven and a new earth. Satan's going to be dealt with. People are going to be judged. We're going to be called up there. Like there's things that we can be certain about, but there's other things you simply can't be certain about. And for someone to present you information in a way where they are certain, where they don't even acknowledge that there's other theologians, there's myriad other views of this particular passage or this particular idea, and they don't even acknowledge that those exist, well now, I don't know if I believe you about anything. I was listening to a pastor that I really like a lot. He's been one of my go-to guys for years. And his church did a series in Revelation last year. And I thought, oh, well, shoot, I'm just going to listen to his and then steal it. That'll really cut down on the prep time here. This is going to be great. But as I listened, he got to a portion, I think it's in chapter four, where there's these four creatures, these four beasts that are really mysterious. And one is like a lion, one is like an ox, one is like an eagle, and one is like a man. And there's this incredible description of them. And the same four creatures are described in Ezekiel, in an Old Testament book of prophecy, with stunning accuracy and similarity to the four creatures in Revelation. There's very little doubt that both authors, that both John and Ezekiel saw the same four creatures. Now, what are they? And what do they represent? I don't know. But the pastor that I really liked when I was listening to him, he said, well, the ox represents this, the lion this, the eagle this, the man this. Does it not? And then he moved on. And he said it as if he was certain of it. And he said it as if there was no other possible explanation than the one that he just shared. When the reality is we only see them in Ezekiel. We only see them in Revelation. Very little explanation is offered about them in either place. So to presume that we know who they are, what they are, what they represent, and why they exist is not fair. It's not intellectually honest. The most intellectually honest thing to say about them is, they're pretty cool. That's it. They matter a lot to God. They're going to be neat when we see them. They're probably going to be scary. It's going to be awesome. What do they represent? I don't know and neither do you. And don't act like you do. We can make educated guesses. There's plenty of room for that. But we ought to be cynical of certainty as we move through this. And I'm saying that, hopefully, not for your benefit in this series, because hopefully I don't get up here and start teaching you things with certainty that I don't understand. Hopefully I'll teach them honestly and present the sides that exist and are merited. But I say that to you as you move throughout your lives and as you encounter other Revelation studies. Be cynical of certainty. So that's how we want to approach the book. I told you that we would mine Revelation for hope. And there's an incredible space to do that in the first chapter of Revelation. And that's where I want us to focus as we finish up the sermon today. I will also say this for those who know your Bibles well. Chapters 2 and 3 in Revelation are the seven letters to the seven churches. They are wonderful letters. They're hugely important. They're incredibly informative for us, not just of the ancient church, but what our modern churches ought to look like. They're a hugely impactful portion of the book of Revelation. They are so important and so impactful that we're going to skip them. Because I'm not going to reduce them to a week and preach them to you like that. So we're going to skip them. I'm going to set them aside. At some point in the future, we're going to come back and we're going to do a seven-part series as we move through those letters together. But if you know your Bible well, and next week we just open up and we get to chapter four, and you're thinking, why didn't we do the seven letters to the seven churches? That's why, because they're too important to reduce to a week. And Revelation would get too boring to expand to 14 weeks. All right, so we're going to do those later. But as we look at chapter one and we begin to move through the story, I wanted to bring us to what I believe is maybe one of the most poignant moments in all of Scripture. And we find it towards the end of the first chapter. We're going to start reading in verse 12. This is John writing. He says, And these are the words of Jesus now, which will always show up in red during the series. and I have the keys of death and Hades. I get chills every time I read this. John is swept up into heaven. He's told, you're gonna see some stuff, write it down. And he looks and there's someone who is white like snow, who is shining in brilliance, who has a voice like raging waters. And he sees him and he's so terrified that he falls on his feet. He falls at his feet. He collapses in fear. And we learn from those words in red that it's Jesus. And Jesus places his hand on John's shoulder, presumably. And he says, Behold, I am the first and the last. I have died and yet I live. Other translations say the Alpha and the Omega. And I have the keys to death and Hades. I've conquered them. Which is a remarkable moment. But it's more remarkable when we reflect on who John was and what John did. Do you understand that John calls himself in his own gospel the disciple whom Jesus loved? You should probably be pretty certain of your standing before Christ if you want to go around touting that nickname. This John is the John that was the disciple whom Jesus loved that may have been, some scholars think, as young as 10 years old when he was following Jesus. He was so close with Jesus. They were such intimate friends that at the Last Supper, Jesus was close enough to John that he was able to whisper in John's ear that Judas was going to betray him before anybody else did. He was able to communicate with John that closely at the Last Supper because John was, of course, next to Jesus because he was the disciple whom Jesus loved. When Jesus was hanging on the cross dying, when he's watching his savior and friend die, Jesus looks at John and Jesus only said a few things on the cross because you had to push up on the nails to do it. And he looks at John and he says, will you care for my mother? John, this is your mother, Mary, now. That's quite the commission. Can you imagine Jesus himself putting the care of his aging mother in your hands? And if you yourself knew that the end was near and that someone needed to care for your aging mother, who would you choose? Your most intimate and trusted of friends. And John went on from that moment and he cared for Mary. He went on from that moment and he led the church and the council. He saw them through this conversion of Gentiles, this difficult period in the book of Acts. He preached the gospel. He spread the word about his friend. And this whole time, he was promised by Jesus. You see it in the gospels when he tells the disciples, where I'm about to go, you can't go. And they said, we want to come with you. He goes, you don't understand. Jesus is telling them, I'm going to die and I'm going to ascend into heaven and you can't come with me. but where I'm going to go, I'm going to prepare a place for you and it's going to be great and you'll be with me there one day. Do you understand that John, he clung to that hope. He trusted his friend Jesus. He trusted his Savior and he spent the rest of his life caring for the mother of Christ. He spent the rest of his life proclaiming the message of Christ. He spent the rest of his life building the kingdom of Christ. But John eventually ended up as the head of the church in Ephesus, and there he discipled a man named Polycarp and Erasmus, who were the early church fathers that we begin now the church history that leads down to us. John is the linchpin in this. He watched all 11 of his friends, all 11 of the disciples die a martyr's death. And now he's an old man on the island of Patmos writing the last thing that he's going to write. And he's missed his friend Jesus. And he's looked forward to seeing his Savior again. And he spent every day living for his Savior. Every day building the kingdom for his Savior. Every day pointing people towards his Savior. And when he gets to heaven, he sees a figure that he doesn't recognize and he falls to his knees. And out of that figure comes the voice of his Savior, Jesus. Out of that figure comes the assurance that John has waited for and longed for his entire life. Out of that figure rushes the peace that only Jesus brings. He gets his reunion moment. He gets his welcome home. And it tells us that meeting Jesus is the best promise in the whole book. Meeting Jesus face to face, hearing his voice, seeing his eyes, feeling his embrace, that is the best promise in the whole book, man. There's other stuff that happens. We get to be with God. We get to spend eternity. There's going to be loved ones there. It's going to be perfect. There's no more weeping or crying or pain anymore. We're going to experience all of that. It's going to be an incredibly peaceful, joyful existence. But none of it, none of it is better than seeing Jesus in person. None of it is better than your welcome home moment. When he hugs you and he says, I've prepared a place for you. And he invites you to the marriage supper of the Lamb. I was thinking about it this week. What it would be like to finally meet my Savior. And how I would probably feel compelled to say I was sorry. And how he would probably just say, don't worry about it. I've covered over all those sorries. And how we would be compelled to say, I'm sorry, Jesus, I should have done more. And he would say, that's okay. I did enough. I did it for you. And I've thought about that moment when the burdens of hope and faith don't have to be carried anymore. When we can cast those things aside because our Savior is looking us in the eye. After all the stresses and all the struggles and all the triumph and all the worry and all the anxiety and anything else that we might experience, the loss and the pain and the sufferings and the joy, whatever it is, after all of it, we as weary travelers will end our spiritual pilgrimage in heaven at the face of Christ and he will say, welcome home. And maybe he'll even say, well done, good and faithful servant. But that's the best promise of the book. That if we believe in Jesus too, that one day we will see our Savior face to face and we can rest. And if you love Jesus, and that's not the part of heaven you're most excited about, I don't know what to do for you. I hope this series can change that. But more than anything else, as we move through this book, that's what we cling to. That Jesus is there waiting for us. And we'll get that reunion moment too. Where we get to meet our Savior face to face. Now, before I close, I never do this because if I tell you guys that I won't be here for a particular weekend, then what I've found is you don't come, which is mean. That's just mean to whoever is preaching that's not me. But I'm going to tell you this time that I'm not going to be here next weekend. I've got a bunch of my buddies I've talked about before. A bunch of us turned 40 this week, so there's going to be seven of us in a cabin in North Georgia making questionable decisions. We planned this back in the spring before I knew that this would be week two of Revelation, which is a week I'd rather not miss. So when I was thinking about who should I get to preach it, Kyle's great, Doug Bergeson's great, we've got plenty of folks here who would do a fantastic job with it. But there's one person who I know that knows more about the book of Revelation than anybody else I know. I'm not saying he knows the most about the book of Revelation, just more than anybody else that I know, and that's my dad. So dad's going to come next week and he's going to preach Revelation 4 and 5. And you'll get to see half of the equation of where all of this came from. To give you a literal picture of how deeply he loves this book, I wanted to take you to Israel with us. Dad and I had the opportunity to go to Israel, maybe about 2013. And we did the tour. We're up in Galilee. We were there for a whole week or eight days or something like that. And we get down to Jerusalem and we're in the Garden of Gethsemane. And from the Garden of Gethsemane, which is where Jesus prayed the night that he was arrested and then crucified, you can actually see the walls of Jerusalem, and you can see the Temple Mount. And so this is what you see from the Garden of Gethsemane. And you can see in kind of the bottom right-hand corner of the portion of the wall is a gate. That's the eastern gate. And when we were just walking along and we saw that, my dad said, that's the eastern gate. And I said, oh, cool. And then I looked at him and he was crying. And I said, dad, why are you crying, man? It's a gate. And he says, that's the gate that Jesus is going to walk through when he returns. And it moved him. And he doesn't get moved to tears very often. But he was moved by that. Because one day Jesus is going to come back and he's going to walk through that gate. And he knows it. And he believes it. And he knows his Bible. And he knows it so well and he believes it so much that it moved him to tears. So I couldn't think of anyone better to come and teach us a portion of the book of Revelation next week. So I hope you'll come. I hope you'll be kind to him. I hope he tells you some stories about me that make you laugh and like me a little bit less. And just you're thinking, oh, he must be an experienced teacher and have done this before for Nate to be asking him to do this here. No, he's an accountant. He's taught Sunday school a bunch of times, and I think it's going to be really, really great. So I hope that you'll give him a warm welcome when he's here next week and know that I'll be beaming from ear to ear watching him online with my buddies. So with that, let's pray, and then I've got an announcement for you guys, and we'll worship some more. Father, thank you so much for who you are and for how you love us. God, thank you for this book of Revelation. I pray that we would see clear and simple messages coming out of it. God, I pray that you would give us wisdom as we move through it. Give me wisdom as I teach it. Wisdom that I have no business having. Maybe just a special blessing for these next few weeks. God, I pray that we would always find the hope in it. That we would always see the justice in it, that we would always see the good news that we can cling to, God. Be with us as we go through the series. I pray that it will enliven our hearts to you. I pray that it will increase our passion and desire for you. And I pray that it will give hope to folks who might need it really badly right now. We pray all these things in your son's name. Amen.

We serve a God who's working through time to bring about His will and ultimately our good. We see the evidence of His sovereignty in the book of Genesis with the life of Joseph. To know and understand the story of Joseph is to get a glimpse into the very heart of God and to be assured that we can trust His plan. Now Joseph remains in prison after being falsely accused by Potiphar's wife. We learned last week that God's favor rested on Joseph, which resulted in his being in charge of the other prisoners. Two of the prisoners under his care were Pharaoh's cupbearer and baker. These two men had dreams that Joseph was able to successfully interpret. In exchange for the interpretations, Joseph asked that the cupbearer would remember him to Pharaoh so he could get out of prison. But the cupbearer forgot about Joseph, and so he remains a prisoner. Joseph must once again choose to trust God and cling to the hope that he has a plan. Morning. Thanks for being here and online. It's great to be with you all. My name's Doug Bergeson, and I'm a partner here at Grace. It's been one day shy of exactly a year since I last preached, so I hope I'm not too rusty. I was asked to speak this past April, but had to decline as I was having a full hip replacement. I only mention that because, and I didn't anticipate it was going to be dark, but if you had seen me spring up on stage, you would have reacted, wow, what quickness, what energy, what, for lack of a better word, cat-like agility. Though I looked like a janky, wrinkled, liver-spotted 64-year-old on the outside, on the inside, I'm now literally bionic, mostly titanium and advanced ceramics. So I just thought that was important for you to know. But getting back to not having preached for a year, I am clearly not the only one who was worried that I was going to be a little rusty. Now, I need to be careful here. I'm flattered and privileged to have been asked to speak. However, over a seven-week sermon series covering 26 chapters in the book of Genesis, Nate has asked me to speak on one verse, Genesis 41.1. Not one chapter, one verse. What's up with that? Now, not what I'd call a ringing endorsement or an unwavering vote of confidence, right? 26 chapters over seven weeks, and I get one verse. Not that anyone would be petty enough to count, but in a series in which Nate will preach on 872 verses, I've been asked to preach on one. And to be perfectly honest, that's not even that good a verse. This is what it says. When two full years passed, Pharaoh had a dream. You tell me, am I overacting? I don't think so. Thank goodness I have a phenomenally large ego, or else I might have been easily devastated by such an obvious slight. A lesser, weaker person, perhaps one humbler and more grounded, probably would have been. Frankly, I don't know what to say about this verse. I don't have much to add. So, and I know this is a little unusual, I'll read Genesis 41.1 one more time, and then I'm going to ask Steve and the band to come back up and lead us in worship for the remainder of the time. Now, for those of you who know me, when I said I had nothing to add, you immediately knew I was kidding. I always have something to add, even when I don't. However, this morning, I hope and pray I do have something to add and that it's helpful. In preparing for this morning and thinking about what I might have to add, I ran across a quote from Howard Hendricks who was a former pastor and professor of theology who passed away several years ago. Hendricks said, it is not too difficult to be biblical if you don't care about being relevant. It's not difficult to be relevant if you don't care about being biblical. But if you want to be both biblical and relevant in your teaching, it's a very difficult task indeed. So as we continue this week to move through one of the greatest stories in the Bible, Joseph from the book of Genesis, That is my goal, to be both biblical and relevant. And to begin, I'd like to open us in prayer using the Apostle Paul's words from his letter to the churches in and around Ephesus, written while he was in prison. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give us the spirit of wisdom and revelation so that we may know him better. Amen. Those two words, wisdom and revelation, are going to be key for us this morning. Wisdom, according to the Bible, is acknowledging and submitting to the fact that God is God and that we are not. And revelation is the process by which God makes something known that was previously secret or unknown. Although God can reveal things to us in other ways, such as through nature, the primary way he chose to reveal things to us is through his written word, the Bible. Now, for most of us who call ourselves Christians, that's not a very controversial statement. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, of course. The Bible is God's revelation to us. In fact, most Christians I've met or read or listened to hold the Bible in high regard and would make that claim without question. Yet it is also my experience that many of us, including me, who make that claim, take our eye off the ball a little bit and lose sight of just what it means for the Bible to be God's revelation to us. How do we take our eye off the ball? How do we lose sight of what it means for the Bible to be God's primary way of communicating and revealing himself to humankind? Well, we do it in a variety of ways. One popular method is by making Scripture primarily about us. How do I lead a good life? How do I raise my kids? How do I handle this or that problem? How do I have a God-centered marriage? Et cetera, et cetera. Now, don't get me wrong. Those aren't bad things to seek and to want to know. They just aren't the primary things, the first things we need to know. Another way we lose sight of what it means for the Bible to be God's revelation is when we make it say what we think it should say or what we want it to say. It's an easy and not uncommon thing to do. Happens all the time in churches. We interpret things a certain way, emphasize some things at the expense of others, ignore or downplay the historical, cultural, literary, and or biblical context of a passage to shape its meaning. When we do that, we read Scripture through our lens rather than God's. And that's not okay. Not if we profess the Bible to be God's revelation, God's word to us. This is no small point. What makes scripture the most valuable thing we will ever read is that it is God telling us about himself. This is who I am. This is what I'm like. This is what's important to me. This is how I operate. This is what I intend to do, and this is how I'm going to do it. It is God's take on things, his revelation, his perspective, his lens. The Bible is also history, but not any old history, not history for history's sake, but a very special history for, again, it's God's take on history, what he deems important, what he thinks we should know. And that is what gives Scripture authority over our lives. It is God's revelation of himself, his purposes, and his plans. Given that, the first question we should always ask ourselves when we read the Bible, the very first question is, what is this passage revealing to me about God? I'll say that again. When we read the Bible, the first question we should be asking ourselves is, what is this telling me about God? My favorite commentary series is the NIV application commentary. As I can't say it any better, I quote, there is nothing more fundamental to biblical revelation than the picture of God that it offers. If we set aside the picture of God affirmed in the text, we have lost our last foothold of authority, unquote. So, despite having been given only one verse, the reason I was still so excited to preach and so looking forward to this morning is that the story of Joseph has few, if any, equals in so clearly and powerfully revealing two giant things we need to know about our God. The first is that he's going to do what he intends to do, what he says he's going to do. And the second is that he's going to do it his way, not our way. Now let's turn back to our story and see the picture of God that it reveals and what it might mean for us today. As a quick recap, way back in time, long before Joseph, humankind had fallen into sin and self-destruction by choosing to reject their creator, the one and only true God, and the world was a complete mess. God began his magnificent plan to forgive, redeem, and restore fallen humanity by choosing one guy to whom God made a most lavish and unconditional promise. To this one guy, a man named Abraham, God promised land, a multitude of descendants who would become a great nation, and that through Abraham's offspring, all peoples in the world would be blessed. The remarkable promise was affirmed to Abraham's son Isaac, and again to his son Jacob. And this is where we are introduced to Joseph, the 11th of 12 sons born to Jacob and Jacob's absolute favorite. We meet Joseph when he is 17 and quickly learn that Jacob's unconcealed love and favor for Joseph, evidenced in part by a fancy robe, have poisoned the waters between Joseph and his older brothers. It probably didn't help that Joseph had given an unflattering report to his father about his brothers and the crummy job they were doing tending the flocks. And if that wasn't enough dysfunction for one family, and apparently it wasn't, Joseph thought it might be a good idea to share with everyone two separate dreams he had which both foretold of a time when the entire family would bow down to him. Scripture matter-of-factly states that his brothers hated him all the more. Imagine that. So the next time Joseph visited his brothers in the countryside, they conspired to kill him. At the very moment they were deciding Joseph's fate, a caravan of merchants heading to Egypt approached their camp. And the brothers had a brainstorm, kind of like a V8 moment. Rather than kill Joseph and deal with all that guilt, why not just sell him to these merchants and make a little cash to boot on the side? As an aside, the text seems to imply that you feel better about yourself and a lot less guilty if you simply sell a sibling into slavery rather than actually killing him. Just something to think about for those of you not getting along with all your brothers and sisters. Anyways, that's what they did. They sold Joseph, and they took his fancy robe, dipped it in goat's blood, and convinced their father that Joseph had been torn to pieces by a wild animal. The story continues with remarkable twists and turns, wild ups and downs for Joseph. He's first sold into Egypt to Potiphar, Pharaoh's captain of the guard. And when his new master sees that the Lord is with him and gives him success in everything he does, Joseph is put in complete charge and entrusted with all that Potiphar owned. But when, out of loyalty to Potiphar and fidelity to God, Joseph refuses the repeated advances of Potiphar's wife, she falsely accuses him of assault and he is thrown into prison. But once again, the Lord is with Joseph, this time prompting the prison's warden to eventually place Joseph in charge of the entire prison and all of its prisoners. Later, when the chief cupbearer and the chief baker both offend Pharaoh and are tossed in jail, they are attended by none other than Joseph. While in custody, both officials have disturbing dreams the very same night. When he heard the cupbearer's dream, Joseph explained that in three days, the cupbearer would be restored to his former position. And Joseph asked that when that happened, for the cupbearer to please remember him and plead his innocence before Pharaoh. Upon hearing such an upbeat interpretation for the cupbearer, the chief baker asked Joseph about his dream and was told that in three days Pharaoh would cut off his head and impale his body on a tree. Not as upbeat. Three days later, everything happened just as Joseph had said, and now, starting with the last verse of Genesis 40, we come to today's scripture. The chief cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph. He forgot him. When two full years had passed, Pharaoh had a dream. So just halfway through our story, it's becoming increasingly clear that what God is revealing to us about himself, what he deems of tip-top importance for us to know, is that he's going to do what he says he's going to do no matter what. And he's going to do it his way, not our way. So that begs the question, the big question for us this morning, what is God's way of doing things? What does His way look like in practice? For starters, not like anything you or I would dream up. Steeped in mystery and far beyond our full comprehension, God's way uses people and circumstances which make little sense to us and which we would never choose. Operating according to his own timetable, God could pretty much care less about ours. Actively at work in all human decision and action, both good and evil, God's way by its very design frustrates and confounds human wisdom, intuition, and preference. And as an added kicker, not only won't we necessarily understand how God is at work in any given situation, oftentimes it won't even be obvious that he's working at all. Today's scripture may be short, but it is packed with significance as it illustrates God's way in action, focusing on the following three short snippets of text. The cupbearer forgot, two full years passed, Pharaoh had a dream. We see three defining features of God's way of doing things. All three are inextricably linked, all are shrouded in mystery, all are beyond our full understanding. And all are woven together in a way that ultimately and inevitably accomplish what God wants done. The first snippet of text, The Cupbearer Forgot, highlights the upside-down, counterintuitive nature of how God works. My first reaction is, what? The cupbearer forgot about Joseph? Are you kidding me? How is that helpful? Joseph did everything right. How is that fair? Yet almost without exception, we see in the story of Joseph and throughout all of Scripture, God's overwhelming preference to use people and circumstances that defy the odds and confound human wisdom and logic, devastating and demoralizing turns of events, great sorrows, constant obstacles and roadblocks, deeply flawed characters, good punished while evil seems to thrive, conflict, jealousy, forgotten obligations, in parentheses, see cupbearer. The list goes on. of the crummy circumstances that God seems to relish. Although we don't know all the reasons, Scripture does explain that God operates this way to humble us and to disabuse us of any notion that we deserve the credit, to make it perfectly clear that it is He who is responsible. He is the one in charge, and it is He who is at work. In 1 Corinthians 1, two full years past, illustrates what might be the most vexing and frustrating feature of God's way of doing things, his timing. It's now been 13 years since Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery. By all accounts, Joseph has done the right thing at every turn. It's even been obvious to those closest to him and in the best position to know yet here joseph still sits in prison and now when the tides of fortune finally appear to be moving in joseph's favor and he at last has an important advocate to plead his innocence before pharaoh the cupbearer completely forgets about Joseph, who then remains in prison for two more years. It's enough to want to pull your hair out, particularly if you're Joseph. But again, rather than being the exception, Joseph's experience with God's timing is more the rule in Scripture. Over and over again, we see periods of waiting, periods of silence, periods of struggle and sorrow, periods of absence and denial, periods of the wilderness, periods in exile. These occur on a grand global scale, as well as in the smallness and intimacy of individual lives and families. In the Bible, God reveals himself to be both a promise maker and a promise keeper. But just as we see with his magnificent promise to Abraham, which won't reach its complete fulfillment for another 2,000 years in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Bible is really a story of the land in between. That time between promise and fulfillment, often very long. This is where the story of Joseph takes place. This is where God operates. And to further compound the mystery and complexity of God's timing, just as with his promise to Abraham, many of God's promises unfold over time, with some elements fulfilled sooner, while other elements of the very same promise must wait. We tend to focus on the ending and are anxious for its resolution. God, on the other hand, is all about playing the long game and is infinitely more patient, knowing that to achieve what he has ordained and promised, there is simply no substitute for the land in between. If given the chance, we would skip right past this land, avoiding its mystery, its uncertainty, its challenges, its obstacles, its disciplines, its heartbreak, disappointments. It's waiting. We hate wandering in the wilderness. I'm sure Joseph did too. Yet God's redemptive purposes don't happen without it. It's in the land in between that God shapes and changes us, redeems and refines us, preparing us for and moving us towards the ultimate promise fulfillment that will be eternity within. The third and final snippet of text is Pharaoh had a dream. And as we'll see next week, the dream prompts the cupbearer to finally remember Joseph. Was that just lucky that the Pharaoh had this dream? A coincidence? A bit of good fortune finally for Joseph? Not according to the Bible. This might be the most mysterious feature of how God operates. The scripture reveals that God sustains his creation and is involved and exerts his sovereign influence and control over all things. In so doing, God moves all of history steadily, inexorably, towards his appointed end. To be completely candid, even as I speak about it this morning, I struggle with this notion that God is involved in exerting his influence and control in and over all things. On the lighter side, I've been around church long enough to have heard the story of the person who, when going to Bible study on a rainy Wednesday morning, was late and praised God that a parking spot opened up right near the front door just as they pulled up. Isn't God great? Oh, all I can do is roll my eyes. Really? I don't want to be overly cynical, but come on. What about poor Sally who got there early and had to park all the way around the block and is now stopping wet? Was God judging her? Does he not favor and love her too? Is God really involved to that level of detail? But on a more serious note, what about all the terrible and tragic, unfair and absolutely evil things that happen in the world and sometimes in our lives? How can a just and loving God be involved in those things too? Now my go-to default answer has always been to ascribe all the bad things to the fact that we live in a fallen world, a world in which, for the time being, God accommodates the presence of evil and everything doesn't happen according to his will. But when I read the story of Joseph and reflect on the full testimony of scripture, I know my default answer is too simple, a bit too cut and dried. Our tendency is to want to attribute to God only the good things that happen and give him a pass on the bad things, explaining them away by saying it's a fallen world. However, God doesn't ever ask us for a pass. He doesn't need or want a pass from us. We might not intend to, but when we think he needs a pass, we shortchange and underestimate his mystery and his sovereignty. Rather than needing a pass, the story of Joseph affirms the picture of a God who is in control of all things and uses his influence in all things, even very bad and sinful things, to advance his redemptive plan. Very early on in the Bible, God is revealing that there is no human choice or decision that can derail what he intends on doing. In fact, we see God using those sinful choices to further rather than frustrate his plans. Scripture leaves the clear impression that more than simply allowing bad things to happen to Joseph, God is actively orchestrating, arranging, and in a sense, cooperating with those things. Joseph is only 17 when he is sold by his brothers, and he is 30 before things start turning around for him. Yet all those intervening events, conspiracy to murder, sold into slavery, framed and falsely accused, wrongly convicted, imprisoned, forgotten, all are woven together to bring us to this point in our story. The Bible teaches both God's sovereignty as well as human responsibility for our thoughts and actions. Now, if you find that difficult to reconcile, how can God be involved and in control and yet hold us accountable? If you can't tell where God's influence ends and human responsibility begins, if you find it even a bit frustrating that you can't fully understand or that it seems unfair, Scripture has a clear and consistent answer for you. Tough. Tough. I am God and you are not. It's of ironic, as we like to think we live in the age of science and enlightenment, but how enlightened are we really? As difficult as this idea might be for us to wrap our minds around, our modern minds around, it wasn't for Genesis' original audience, the Israelites. They didn't struggle with trying to figure out when, where, how, and if God intervened in human affairs. They did not think things unfolded naturally and that only on occasion, if at all, God might supernaturally intervene. Rather, they understood that things only happen naturally, like rain in its season, because God ordained it. In their worldview, nothing happened independently from God's cause and effect. Events and decisions were never either natural or supernatural, but always both and. Our way of looking at the world would seem odd and naive and perhaps even heretical to the Israelites, as if there was some dividing line between the natural and divine. They wouldn't spend much time trying to figure out if God was involved in a particular situation or not because they knew he was always involved somehow, some way. That doesn't mean that God and nature are one. They're not. But only that God is involved all the time. So we see in these three short snippets of text, the cupbearer forgot. Two full years passed. Pharaoh had a dream. God is revealing the mysterious and confounding methods, means, and timing of how he goes about accomplishing his purposes and plans. Reflecting on this, I was reminded of a Hertz car rental commercial from the 1990s. It opens with two businessmen, one an executive and his junior assistant, hustling out of a crowded airport. The boss says to his assistant, we've got to move fast, Kirby. I hope you've booked Hertz. Kirby replies, not exactly, but this company is fast. The boss asks, as fast as Hertz? Not exactly, but they do have a special place to pick up the car. Like Hertz? Not exactly, but it'll be waiting. Under a canopy with the keys in it? Not exactly, but they do have a special place to pick it up. Protected from the weather? Not exactly. The final scene is of the two men in their suits running to their car in the pouring rain. And the boss asks, counting on that promotion, Kirby? No, not exactly. I still love that commercial, even though I messed it up there, and have adapted it to the story of Joseph and what it means about God's way of working. Are we always going to understand what God is doing in our lives and how he's doing it? Not exactly. Is God concerned that everything makes sense to us? Not exactly. Does God care if everything seems fair? Not exactly. Does God want everything to go smoothly for us, avoiding obstacles and challenges that might confuse and discourage us? Not exactly. Doesn't God prefer to use mostly A-teamers, people who seem to have their acts together, rather than the weak, the flawed, and the foolish? Not exactly. Does God care if we're super busy or in a big hurry and have important things to do? Not exactly. Is God involved in control of only the good things in our lives? Not exactly. There is a sweeping passage from the book of Isaiah which captures in poetic language what the story of Joseph reveals and affirms so powerfully through story. Reading from the prophet Isaiah, chapter 55. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. He says, So God's thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways are not our ways. They are higher, better, eternal. And God's word that goes out from his mouth will not return to him empty, but will accomplish all that he intended and achieve the purpose for which he sent it. So when God says he's going to do something, he's going to do it. So why is this so important? Why should this matter to us today? Because God still works this way. Seeing the mysterious and perplexing way he operated in the life of Joseph, we should not be surprised when God operates that way in our lives. Why is this important? Why should this matter to us today? Because we live in the land in between. God's redemptive plan is ongoing, still somewhere between promise and fulfillment. I was raised in a church which taught that once you placed your faith and trust in Jesus Christ, that you were saved, sort of past tense, and you were pretty much good to go. I've since come to believe, based on a fuller reading of scripture, that's not really true. More accurately, I'm in the process of being saved. While now free from the penalty of sin, which Jesus bore on the cross on my behalf, the fullness of God's promise still lies in the future. When not only will the penalty of sin have been paid, but the very power and presence of sin and death will be vanquished, and we will be resurrected to new life. But for the time being, we are in the land in between, and God is still working in all things for good as he moves all of history towards his appointed end. Why is this so important? Why should this matter to us today? Because it frees us to trust in him. When we finally stop trying to fit God in a box that we can understand, when we stop foisting our expectations and preferences on him, when we finally accept the fact that we won't understand what he's doing most of the time, why he's doing it, or how it might possibly be good or redemptive, it's actually easier to let go, easier to trust, easier to rest in the knowledge that God's got this. In closing, we will never understand God's ways, how he operates to accomplish his purposes, but we don't need to, as he is always faithful and always true to his word. And like so many people of faith down through the ages, we can find great comfort and confidence knowing and trusting in that. Even Jesus' disciples had no clue what was happening or why at the end of Jesus' ministry and were completely overwhelmed and distraught at his death. Only later were they able to look back and understand that God was in control all along. The disciples explicitly acknowledged this when they prayed the following words. Indeed, Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. God, they only did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. In just a minute, the band is going to come back up here to perform a song, Promise Keeper. It's an absolutely gorgeous song, and as our closing prayer, and I'd like to ask you to bow your heads and close your eyes, I'm going to read a few stanzas of unfolding, with everything I've seen, how could I not believe? You are a promise keeper. Your word will never fail. My heart can trust you, Jesus. I won't be overwhelmed. I'll see your goodness in the land of the living. I'll see your goodness right here, right now. You know the ending before the beginning, and I know that you have worked all things out. Amen. Thank you.

Good morning. My name is Nate. I am the senior pastor here. If I didn't know any better, it would seem like your senior pastor guilted you into attendance this morning. This is great. Thanks for being here. I hope we keep it rolling. We are resuming our series today called One Hit Wonders, where we're looking at different passages in the Bible that we don't often get to stop at or pause at or focus on. And this morning, we're going to be in a passage at the end of Habakkuk. We'll be right back. Habakkuk. Very few people know where it is. You're probably going to have to get your table of contents involved. There's no shame in that. It's one of the minor prophets towards the end of the Old Testament. So join us in Habakkuk. What we're going to find there, I think, is a passage that is tucked away and little known, but it really brings to me a lot of hope and a lot of faith, sometimes when we need it the most. But as we approach that passage, I'm reminded of these rites of manhood that I would hear of as a kid growing up. You hear about these different tribes across the globe that have different tests for children to become adults. They throw you into the wilderness for a few days, and if you come back with like 10 beaver pelts, then now you are a man. There was the Maasai tribe I was reading about this week out in Africa. They don't do this anymore because it's illegal, but for generations, what they would do is on your 10th birthday as a little boy, they would send you into the savanna with a spear, and you had to kill a lion and bring back proof of this kill, which is an insane test for a little boy. But in the Messiah's defense, if a 10-year-old can do that, dude's a man, okay? I believe them. That's a legitimate test. But you've heard about these rites of passage and these tests of manhood or adulthood before, right? And I actually think, I bring that up because I think that there is a test for our faith in the Bible. I think that there is actually a test that all believers at some point in their life must go through, must experience, and must come out the other side as proven and mature. And I'm arguing this morning that we find that test in the end of Habakkuk chapter 3 and verses 17 through 19. So read them with me, and then we're going to talk about why I think this really is suchber verse. This is a difficult thing to be able to say. So I'm going to contend with you this morning that being able to authentically claim this passage is the mark of mature faith. Being able to authentically claim this passage, Habakkuk 3, 17 through 19, to be able to say this out loud to one of your friends, to be able to say this out loud to God himself, To me, to be able to authentically claim this verse, claim this passage, to say it out loud and to mean it, is the test of a sincere and a mature and authentic faith. And if we look at the verse and the context in which it comes, I think you'll see why I think this. Because the picture that Habakkuk is painting here follows three chapters of devastation. Three chapters of the nation of Israel being laid low. Three chapters of the consequences of their action resulting in poverty and death and famine. Three chapters of hopelessness. And so here at the end, he's saying, even in light of all of that, in light of all the devastation that we just experienced, in light of where I find myself now, and listen to this, even though the fig tree will no longer produce and the olive crop fails and there are no herds in the fields, what he's saying is, even though the present looks bleak and the future looks bleaker, even though today stinks and tomorrow looks worse, I don't find any good reason to hope in a good and bright and hopeful future, even though that's true, yet I will choose to find my joy in the Lord and find my strength in him. Do you see the power of that statement? And for many of us, we know what it is to feel like the present stinks and the future doesn't look much better. We know what it is to look around and think to ourselves, though the fig tree does not blossom, though the olive is not going to produce a crop, though the things that I relied upon are no longer there. We've walked through those moments, right? And I'm not talking about small disappointments. I'm not talking about little fissures in our life that upset our otherwise peaceful existence. I'm talking about the hardest of times. I'm talking about my dear friends in the church who they have some good friends who are in their early 30s, I would presume, and have young children, and she has been battling cancer for months, if not years, and has recently found out that her body is so riddled with it that she will not survive this. That's today stinks and tomorrow's not looking good either. That's hard. That's what Habakkuk's talking about. I've mentioned before my friend Carla Gerlach who lost her husband at the age of 30, my college roommate to a widow-maker heart attack with three children under the age of five. That's sitting in the middle of a present that stinks and looking towards a future that doesn't feel very hopeful. We know what it is to walk through these difficult times. That's raising a child and then watching them make decisions that hurt us so much and not knowing what to do. That's experiencing a parent with dementia or with a difficulty that has now been imposed upon you and you have to love them and carry them through it. I've seen that happen over and over again in our congregation as some of us age and take on the role of caretaker of our parents, that's a difficult spot. That's in the middle. What Habakkuk is talking about is how we feel in the middle of a divorce, in the middle of finding out about infidelity, in the middle of getting the call about the difficult diagnosis, in the middle of the difficult relational thing that we don't know if we're going to see through it. It's how we feel in the days and months after we lose our job or after someone hurts us deeply. That's what Habakkuk is talking about. And so what he's really saying in this passage, to put it in our language, is that even when God disappoints me, I will choose to find my joy and strength in him. Even when my God disappoints me, I will choose to find my joy and strength in him. I debated on that word disappoints because you could say, even though I'm disillusioned by, you could say even though I'm confused by, even though I'm let down by, even though I don't understand my God right now, I will choose to find my joy and strength in him. And where the rubber meets the road on that is when as a believer, you know that God is good and you know that he is sovereign and you know that he is loving and you know that he is all powerful and you know that he could have stopped this thing if he wanted to, but he didn't and you don't know why. You know that it's in his power to cure that cancer. You know that it's in his power to prevent that heart attack. You know that it's in his power to heal this person, to mend that relationship, to see this thing through. You know he can do it and he didn't. And you're left with, but why, God? Why didn't you do that? It's a feeling we feel whenever there's another shooting. God, you could have stopped this, and you didn't. Why didn't you? It's a feeling that Mary felt when Jesus let her brother Lazarus die. And she wept and she said, why didn't you get here sooner? And in that moment, when we're disillusioned by our God, when we don't understand why he let this happen, and there's no words that anybody can say that can comfort us, to choose in that moment to say, God, I don't understand you, but I trust you. God, I don't understand you, but I find my joy in you. And God, I don't understand why you let this happen, but I'm going to lean on your strength to get me through the season of disillusionment and confusion and disappointment. To be able to do that, to be able to choose that despite the confusion and disappointment that we're walking through, to me that is the test that produces a mature and authentic faith. To me, when you've been forced into making that choice, is when your faith becomes sincere and mature and authentic. And listen, there's some middle ground there. I've talked to people walking through this season. There's some middle ground there. There's some people who will say, yeah, life stinks and it's really hard right now. And God, I don't know if I trust you and you could have fixed this and you didn't and I don't know why. And they, even though they love God, they trust God, they still follow God and believe God, they are not yet prepared to say, and I will find my joy and my strength in him. They're not there yet. There's a middle ground where you don't understand what God has allowed, where you know you trust who he is, but you're not yet ready to fully embrace the reality of it. You're not yet ready to fully say, even though I find my joy in you, I rejoice in you, and I find my strength in you, and I know that you will make me walk in high places. There's a middle ground there. And if you are in that place, that middle ground, between God, how could you let this happen, and not quite ready to say, I want to rejoice in you again, this sermon is specifically for you. And the reality is we all face these tests. We, all of us, if you are a Christian, at some point or another, is to be disappointed or disillusioned by God and to feel that he has let you down. It's to go through this test. And the Bible is very clear. It's very open with us. We should see it, right? This shouldn't be a surprise to us. The Bible is honest with us that this test is coming. I could share with you myriad verses, but I've gotten just three here for us to consider this morning. In Proverbs, Solomon writes, He speaks of this test that's coming. The fire burns the gold and the purity rises to the top and there's something to this in the way that the Lord tests us as well. Peter writes famously, 1 Peter 1, verses 6 and 7, He says, on the vine, that today looks bad and tomorrow looks worse. And even though that happens, I will rejoice in the revelation of my Savior, Jesus Christ. I will look forward to the day when he returns and he makes the wrong things right and the sad things untrue. I will cling to that, even though I don't understand God, even though he doesn't make sense to me, even though I would do it differently if I were God. I will choose to trust that in eternity I will understand him, That if I ever possess the capacity to understand what God's doing and why he allows things to happen in this way, I'll sit back and I'll go, you're right. You were good. And I love you. He allows these tests to produce in us a perseverance that will result in glory and honor, praise and the glory and honor of the revelation of Jesus Christ. And then Peter writes at the end of that same book, 1 Peter 4, verse 12, I kind of like this one a lot. Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you. Don't be surprised when we walk through the test. Don't be surprised when life is hard. Don't be surprised when there's a season and you look around and you go, God, where are you? When you relate to the Psalms where David writes, how long, O Lord, will you hide your face from me? Where are you, God? I cry out to you, and I do not see you. Don't be surprised when those trials come, and we look around, and we say, this isn't right. This isn't fair. God, you could have done something about this. He says, don't be surprised as if this is something unexpected. The reality is the test happens. And I want you to know this too about the test. Our father doesn't delight in testing his children. He simply knows that a fallen world will test us. Our God in heaven, our good father in heaven is not up in heaven looking at your faith going, hmm, they seem to be doing pretty well. How can I tighten the screws to see if they really mean it? What can I do to make them to kind of poke and prod them and see if they really mean this or if they're going to fade away? He's not up in the heaven tightening the screws. He doesn't take delight in watching you squirm. That's not what he's doing. He simply knows that in a fallen world, his children will be tested. And he weeps with us. And he offers us his presence. And he offers us his hope. And we're told that those who hope in the Lord will soar on wings like eagles, that we will run and not be weary, that we will walk and not be faint. We're told things over and over again. We're told that God is our refuge and our strength. We're told that we can trust him, that he is our ever-present help in times of trouble. We're told that he is close to the brokenhearted, and he comforts those who are crushed in spirit. We're told blessed are the meek, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. We're told over and over again throughout Scripture that God is close to us in our brokenness, that when we are in the middle of this test is when God is closest to us if we will only be able to feel him, if we'll only have the ears to hear him and the eyes to see him and the heart to know him. We're told that the test comes. And it doesn't come because our God delights in testing us and watching things be hard. The test is coming because this world has fallen. Because in a fallen world, people get cancer. In a fallen world, sin begats abuse, begats divorce, begats pain, begats generational scars. In a fallen world, people die too soon. In a fallen world, people get addicted. In a fallen world, we have to watch our parents become people who no longer know us. And those things will test our faith. Those things will make us look at God and say, couldn't you have done something about this? Because of that, I think it's important for us to think, I actually think it's important for us to remember the story of John the Baptist who had this very moment. John the Baptist was this great prophet. He was the last of the great prophets. And he was the one to announce Jesus as the Messiah who was to come. He was the one to introduce Jesus to the people of Israel. Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist. And subsequent to that, John the Baptist is arrested. He's being held in prison by Herod, and he is going to die. And he sends one of his disciples to Jesus. And he asks Jesus, are you the coming one? Are you the coming one or should we hope for another? And we have no reason to know this, but this is a reference to Isaiah 35, which is a messianic prophecy, a prophecy about the Messiah that is to come. And he calls in that, in Isaiah 35, Jesus is referred to as the coming one or the one who is to come. And it says that when he arrives, that the blind will see, that the deaf will hear, and that the lame will walk, and that the prisoners will be set free. John the Baptist is a prisoner. And he sends a messenger to Jesus to say, hey, are you the guy? Because your word promises that when the guy shows up, I'll be let out of prison. Or should I hope for another? And Jesus tells that disciple to go back to John and say, go and tell John that the blind do see and the deaf do hear and the lame do walk and the prisoners will be set free, but you won't be set free, John. And then Jesus says, blessed are those who don't fall away on account of me. Blessed are those who have expectations of me that I don't meet. Blessed are those who are confused by my actions and my choices, and still choose to trust that I am sovereign and that I am good and that I love you. John the Baptist walked through this very test. All saints walk through this very test. Because of that, I think it's important for us to think of our faith as a clay pot. Think of the faith that you have as a clay pot. If you grab clay and throw it on the pottery wheel and start to form it, you can make it into a thing. I don't know anything about pottery. I've seen it in enough movies and TV shows that I feel like that's what you do, right? You slam it down and you press the pedal and it spins and you can make it into a thing. You can make it into a bowl or a pot or a vase, right? And if you just take the wet clay and you form it into a shape, it's there and it's real and it exists and it's not not clay. It's not not pottery. And you could probably even hold stuff in it if you wanted to. It could probably even serve a purpose. But that piece of pottery is not finished until it goes into the kiln and it comes back out of the fire. That pottery is not hardened. It's not mature. It's not ready to serve its purpose. It's not ready for use. It's not trustworthy until it comes out of the kiln formed and fashioned and fired. And after a couple decades now of being in ministry and being in church my whole life and watching people's faith and watching how it grows and how it fades and how sometimes it seems to go away and sometimes it seems to come back and then sometimes it seems to move into maturity. I am certain of this. Our faith isn't as mature as it could be until we walk through that fire. Our faith is most trustworthy when it's put into the kiln and it comes out the other side hardened and authentic and mature. Our faith, to me, isn't yet mature, isn't yet strengthened, isn't yet completely trustworthy until we've been put in the fire and we've been forced to choose God when sometimes it doesn't make sense to choose Him. And say, but even so, in the words of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, we trust that God will protect us from this fire, but even if he doesn't, we will declare his name. Please understand that the test is not, the fire is not the circumstances that we find ourselves in because those will come and go. To me, I firmly believe that the fire is that moment, it's that season when we question, can I really trust this God? It feels like he let me down. Can I really trust him? Can I choose? When faith isn't easy, when faith doesn't come naturally, when faith isn't fun, when faith is a choice, will I then choose God? When it doesn't make any sense to me, will I trust his wisdom over my own? Will I trust that in eternity, when I can look my Savior in the eye, that I will understand the way that he ordered his creation? I really do think that that's the test of genuine faith. And there's something to that fire, too. And that picture of gold being purified through it. You know, the reality is, as hard as it is to hear, the fire burns off the impurities, right? And so what we find usually when we go into these crucibles and we go into these tests, and the real test is not the circumstances around us, but having to choose God in spite of our confusion. The real test is choosing Him anyways. And allowing some of our impurities to be burnt off. Acknowledging I've been carrying expectations from God for a long time that he never gave me. I've lived, and I know that this is hard, but I've watched it happen. I've lived in myopic faith where my assumption is that by my actions I can control him. And God, I've been good, so you should order the universe to not harm me. That person was so good. They were such a good man. They were such a good woman. They went too early. God, how can you let that happen? That assumes that God pres think the fire forces us to see that maybe we've built a myopic faith. Maybe he's opening our hearts to a grander vision of eternity in his kingdom. Maybe we open ourselves up to God, what did I bring into this test that doesn't belong here? So that when we emerge from the other side, we can authentically claim Habakkuk 3, 17 through 19. This is why James writes in the first chapter of his book, Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you endure trials of any kind. For we know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance, and perseverance, when it takes its full form, will leave you perfect and complete, not middle space. When you find yourself in the fire, take heart in knowing that your Father is shaping you into a saint who can claim Habakkuk 3, 17 through 19. If you find yourself in that sacred middle ground and that land between God, you've disappointed me. I believe in you. I want to. I want faith, but I can't yet find my joy in you. If you find yourself there in that fire, take heart. You are in the midst of your test. And when you grab onto God and you choose faith, you will come out the other side persevering. You will be perfect and complete, not lacking anything. You will have a fire-tested faith that was hardened through experience, and you will be able to use your faith as a blessing and beacon to others. To this day, the people whose faith I respect most are the people who have walked through this fire and chosen God anyways and now use that to help walk other people through their test. So if you've been through the test, if you've been forced to make that choice, forced to choose faith, you know how formative that is. You know how solidifying that is of your faith. You know that that season of life, no matter how difficult it was, if you have a sincere faith now, is one that you look back to and flag as the time when I really moved into maturity. You know that that instance, that season of life, anchors your faith now and now so that when things happen around you, they are not near as difficult to deal with. Those of you who have not yet walked through that fire, you will. And when you do, remember those words of Peter. Don't be surprised by this. We all walk through this. Choose God. Choose to find your joy and strengthen him. And for those of you in that middle ground right now, who know God and trust him, but are not yet in your heart at a place where you feel like you can worship him, where you can find your joy in him. God has grace for that. God doesn't rush that. God loves you and is closest to you as you walk through it. My hope and prayer is that we will be heartened by that, that we will be encouraged by that, and that we will be a faithful of people who have chosen God and have mature, authentic walks with him that will stand the test of time, that will be perfect and complete, not lacking anything. Let's pray. God, you're good. Even when we don't understand how you're good, you are. Even when we can't see a hopeful future, God, we know that you do. Lord, I pray specifically this morning that you would be with those who are in the fire. I pray that they would feel your comfort, that they would feel your presence, that they would feel your peace, that they would feel your love. God, fill us with your spirit so much so that even though we don't understand how or why, God, that we would still trust in you. Give us the strength of faith to find our joy and strength in you. Be the one who strengthens us even as we walk through the fire. It's in your son's name we ask all these things. Amen.

I see the evidence of your goodness all over my life, all over my life. I see promises in fulfillment. All over my life. All over my life. Help me remember when I'm weak. Fear may come, but fear will lead. You lead my heart to victory. You are my strength, and you always will be. I see the evidence of your goodness all over my life. All over my life. I see your promises and fulfillment all over my life, all over my life. See the cross, the empty grave, the evidence of your goodness. Jesus. I see your promises in fulfillment all over my life, all over my life, yeah. I see your promises and fulfillment all over my life. Yeah, you're all around us. So why should I fear? The evidence is here. Why should I fear? Oh, the evidence is here. I searched the world, but it couldn't fill me. Melted deep rays, treasures of fame were never enough. Then you came along and put me back together. And every desire is now satisfied here in your love. Oh, there's nothing better than you. There's nothing better than you. Oh, there's nothing, nothing is better than you. Come on, tell them. To show you my weakness My failures and flaws Lord, you've seen them all And you still call me friend Cause the God of the mountains Is the God of the valleys There's not a place Your mercy and grace won't find me again. Oh Come on. Tell them now. Come on, choir. Oh, there's nothing better than you. Nothing. You turn bones into armies. You turn seas into highways. You're the only one who can. Somebody give a praise in this house. I don't think we're finished yet. Come on. Come on, one more can. You're the only one who can. You're the only one who can. Jesus, you're the only one. Come on, give Him one more shout of praise. When all I see is the battle, you see my victory. When all I see is the mountain, you see a mountain moon. And as I walk through the shadow, your love surrounds me. There's nothing to fear now, for I am safe with you. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees, with my head lifted high. Oh God, the battle belongs for you. Thank you, God. God, you see the end to tell. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees. With my head lifted high. Oh God, the battle belongs to you. And every fear I lay at your feet. I'll sing through the night. Oh God, the power of our God. You shine in the shadow. You win every battle. Nothing can stand against the power of our God. In all mighty fortunes, you go before us. Nothing can stand against the power of our God We wanted to let you know that our mission here at Grace is to connect people to Jesus and to connect people to people. One of the best ways to communicate with us here at Grace is through our connection cards. If you would like to speak to a pastor at Grace, if you have any prayer requests for our prayer team and our elders, or if you're not receiving our Grace Vine weekly emails, this would be a great way to fill it out and let us know. If you're watching with us online, you can click the link below and submit the connection card there. Or if you're here with us at Grace, the connection card is in the seat back pocket in front of you. Just be sure to drop it on your way out in the box next to the doors. Thanks so much for joining us this morning and we hope that this service is a blessing to you. Well, good morning, everyone. It's great to have you here at Grace Raleigh. I'd like to ask you to stand. My name is Steve Goldberg. I'm the worship pastor here at Grace, and it's great having people here in the room. It's great having people at home joining in with us. I thought that this morning we could start off with the scripture of John 3.16, that God so loved the world that he sent his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life, come to the well that never runs dry. Drink of the water, come and thirst no more. Come all you sinners Come find his mercy Come to the table He will satisfy Taste of his goodness Find what you're looking for. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save us. Whoever believes in Him will live forever. bring all your failures bring your addictions come lay them down at the foot of the cross Jesus is waiting there with hope in our hearts For God so loved the world praise god praise god from whom all blessings Praise Him, praise Him For the wonders of His love For God so loved the world that He gave us His one and only Son to save The power of hell forever defeated Now it is well, I'm walking in freedom Oh God so loved, God so loved the world Bring all your failures, bring your addictions. Come lay them down at the foot of the cross. Jesus is waiting. God so loved the world. Amen. God sent his son. They called him Jesus. He came to love, heal, and forgive. He lived and died. To buy my pardon. An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives. Because He lives, I can face tomorrow. he lives all fear is gone because i know he holds the future And life is worth the living Just because He lives And then one day I'll cross that river I'll fight my spine No war with me And then as death Gives way to victory I'll see the lights of glory and I'll know He lives. Because He lives, I can face tomorrow Because He lives All fear is gone Because I know He holds the future And life is worth the living Just because He lives. And life is worth the living just because He lives. Amen. Amen. All right, y'all can have a seat for a moment. Good morning, Grace Raleigh. It is fabulous to see your smiling faces in here. And welcome to those of you that have joined us online. It is a beautiful and sunny Sunday morning, Welcome to the world for this beautiful sunny weather because in two weeks, the mission committee will be here to gather all of the goodies that you choose to bring. So if you go to Grace Raleigh's events page, you will find a list of things that the mission committee is looking for for the Interfaith Food Shuttle. You will buy those. And then on either that Friday or either that, I'm sorry, that Saturday or that Sunday, you can drive through. The hours are listed on the screen. You can drive through. They will come out to your car. They will pick it up. They will bring it inside, and they will take care of it. So all you have to do is go to the grocery. And I guess these days you could even have it delivered to your house. So that is fabulous. And speaking of driving by and dropping off, if you are the parent of a 6th grader through 12th grader, today is the day you get to drive by and push them out of the car. Woo-hoo! We are so excited to announce that Grace Students is back up and running live and in person. Kyle will be here tonight in all of his fun. And we have the cool thing happening too that he's live streaming the service. So if for some reason your 6th through 12th grader can't be in the building tonight, no problem. Email Kyle, kyle at graceralee.org. And he has all the information and the links that you need to be able to be attached to the live stream and join in that way. They're now going to start into a routine of being in person one week, meeting online together the next week in person, and you get the idea. But email Kyle for any information that you guys might need. So thank you again for coming, for being a part of Grace Raleigh thisbbling together another meal just to check that off the list. Have you ever wondered if you have the balance right? Have we worked hard enough? Have we played enough? What will our children remember about us? Have you ever wondered if you've done it right? Is it possible to even really know that? Did we give our passions and energies to the right causes? Have we given ourselves to the things that matter the most? Or in the end, is it all just favor? Well, good morning. It's good to see everybody here. This is as full as the church has been since last February. That's crazy. Man, you guys, apparently, we've been going through Ecclesiastes. Y'all love depression and hopelessness. So thanks for showing up to that. You're like, I got to get out of the house now. Maybe that's what I needed to do the whole time, which is make you really, really sad. So you had to come see people. This is great. If you're still joining us at home, we're so grateful for that. This is the third part in our series called Vapor, where we're moving through the book of Ecclesiastes. We've said the whole time that we've saved the dreariest book of the Bible for the dreariest month of the year. And what's really fun is that this is the joyful sermon. This is the one, this is the good news. This is the one where we celebrate. We only did two songs up front because we want to end praising God together, and he gave us sunshine to do this. So it seems that the weather is matching the rhythm of the series, and I think that that's fantastic. In the first week, we started out and we talked about this idea of a hevel or vapor or smoke, and we concluded that Solomon would argue that a vast majority of Americans are wasting their life, right? Which means a vast majority of us are probably investing our life pursuing things that ultimately we can't grab onto or vapor or smoke. They're here one day and they're gone the next. And so that really left us with this question at the end of that week, is there a worthwhile investment of our lives? And if you have notes, you see that at the top of your notes. I think that's been a question that's been lingering in the series. Is there really a worthwhile investment of my life or is it all just a waste of time? Is everyone here just, we're all just chasing vapor? And I think that there's a good answer to that question, but last week we answered it a little bit, but we stumbled into another harsh reality. The harsh reality that even if we pursue wisdom with our life, even if we're obedient, the godliest of the godly, that does not insulate us from pain. Our godliness doesn't protect us from grief, right? And so what we learned by looking at that beautiful passage in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, there's a time for mourning and there's a time for joy. There's a time for grieving and there's a time for healing and there's a time to be hurt. There's a time to live and there's a time to die. Like we saw that passage. And what we learned is that pain is not punitive. God's not tightening the screws on us to punish us. Pain is the result of a fallen world, right? And that the harsh reality that Solomon gives us in Ecclesiastes is that no matter what we do, we're going to hurt. No matter how godly we are, there will be seasons of mourning in our life. And so that leaves us, I think, with another really difficult question. Can I ever hope for true happiness? Can I ever, on this side of eternity, grasp onto something that isn't Hevel or vapor or smoke? Can I grasp onto a joy that is immutable and unchangeable, that is resistant to circumstances in life, that even as the storms come, I can still find myself in seasons of joyfulness and contentment? Is it even possible to do those things? And I think those are the two big questions that we bring into this week. Is it possible to pursue anything that really matters? And is it possible to grab onto anything that looks like actual true contentment and joy? And the answer to those questions, I think, is yes. And Solomon answers those questions multiple times in Ecclesiastes. I think in four separate passages, he addresses those with the exact same answer. Four different times, he gives this answer, and I love this answer. I think there's so much bound up in his choice to answer the questions in this way. But like I said, he says it in four separate times. I'm going to read you two of them so that you can get a sense. They're in your notes. If you have them, they'll be on the screen if you're following along at home. But here's what he writes in Ecclesiastes, Solomon repeats this idea. That at the end of the day, what's left for us to do is enjoy our toil, enjoy our food and drink, and honor our God. The end of the book, he ends. The end of the matter is this, all has been heard, fear God and keep his commandments. This is the whole duty of man. We talked about that last week. And it's important that as we look through what I think is kind of this formula for contentment, that we understand that when he's talking about eating and drinking, when we see eating and drinking in the Bible, that is almost always a reference to a communal activity. Eating and drinking is inherently communal. The Bible rarely talks about eating for sustenance, right? It rarely talks about food as this way to be healthy. It always talks about food and bread and gathering around a table as a form of community. And so when he says that there's nothing for man to do except to find joy in what he does and to eat and to drink. What he means is when we look around the table, when we have our meals, if we love the people who are around us, that's good. That's a gift from God. We go out to eat, we're eating with our friends, and we look around and we have genuine affection, we enjoy these people. That's a gift from God. When you look around your table and you have family there and you love that family. Now listen, we're all parts of families. We know that love isn't just sing song and fairy tales all the time. Sometimes it's hard, but at the end of the day, if you know that I love you and you love me, then that's a gift from God. And so when he's talking about food and drink, he's really referencing community. And then when he talks about toil, enjoying your toil, I have a men's group that meets on Tuesday mornings at 6.30. Anybody can join us if you want to. Just email me. Well, the more the merrier there. And we were talking about this word toil. And to a room full of men, it means career, right? It means work. It means what's your job? But Solomon uses that word a lot more broadly than that in Ecclesiastes. And the word toil really doesn't refer to your job or your career as much as it refers to the activities that you have set aside for that day, the productivity of that day, whatever it is you're going to do. Because we have some men in the group who are retired. If it's only about work, career, then they have no shot at happiness, right? They better get back to it. But really, it's broader than that. It really means, Toyo, what do you have set for yourself today? What productivity are you going to engage in today? And then in this verse, he says that we should do good. And he defines doing good as honoring God with our life, fearing God and keeping his commandments. And it's with these understandings that I kind of arrive at this conclusion of kind of Solomon's equation for contented joy and apex happiness. And I really do think it's this. People you love plus tasks you enjoy plus honoring God equals apex happiness. Listen to me. If when you eat, if as you move through your day, you look around and the people in your life bring you joy, and when you wake up, you're looking forward to the things that you're going to do in that day. Maybe not everything, but the point of the day brings you joy. And you're honoring God with your life. If those things are true of you, then I want you to know this morning, you are apex happy. It doesn't get better than that. Sometimes our problem is just that we can't see it. But I'm telling you, man, if you wake up every day and you get to have breakfast with your family or you go out to lunch with some people at work that you enjoy or you look forward to seeing some friends at small group or something like that, if you look around at your community and you're surrounded by people you love and you look at your days and God has given you something to put your hand to that you enjoy, that gives you a sense of purpose, that helps you become who he's created you to be and use your gifts and abilities to point people to Jesus as you move throughout your days, if that's what you get to do and you're honoring God as you do those things, then listen to me, you are experiencing apex happiness in your life. And I think that we get it so messed up sometimes. We do all the things that Solomon talked about in the first two chapters, and we chase all the things. We run out there and we chase all the success and all the relationships and all the money and all the fulfillment and all the pleasure and all the stuff that's out there. When really what's true is God has already given us everything we need for joy. God has already provided in our lives everything we need for joy. And listen, if you don't have those things, if you look around, you're like, I don't like any of the people in my life right now. If you don't have a fulfillment in your job, if you're not honoring God with your life, then guess what? Those things are attainable. Those things aren't out there and forever away. Those things are attainable. They're right around you. God gives us everything we need for joy within our reach. That's why I brought this chair today. This chair here is my chair from my house. This is my chair in my living room. This chair sits in the corner of our living room, and opposite me is we have a little sectional couch. There's other people who sit in this chair sometimes, but for the most part, it's me. When I sit in this chair, I get to watch dance recitals. I get to watch Lily come in with her friends, and they sing Elsa to me. And I pretend to care about Elsa. I get to watch dumb little magic tricks. We went to some restaurant and they gave her some pot with a magnet on the bottom and there's a plant that comes out of the wand and she comes in and she does the abracadabra, the whatever, and then she pulls it out and for the 37th time, I'm amazed by this magic trick, right? I sit in this chair and Jen sits on the couch and we talk about our days. We talk about what's hard and we talk about what's fun. From this chair, when someone rings the doorbell, if I angle my head just right, I can see down the hallway to the front door and I can see the little face that's there to come play with Lily. If they're all over, I can look this way out the window and I can look at them all, all the neighborhood kids jumping on the trampoline that we got to get for her. In the mornings when I'm doing life right and I'm downstairs reading like I'm supposed to, at about 6.45, 7 o'clock, I can look up the stairs and see Lily up there and motion her down to come sit in my lap and tell me what she's going to do that day. When we have friends over, which I love to do, eventually we end up in our living room and we sit around and we talk and we giggle and we laugh. In the pandemic, I worked from this chair. I set up a little table right here and I do my Zoom calls and I argue with the elders and that's pure joy except for Chris Lata. I love working from that table. I can see all the things that bring me the most joy from this chair. And if I go out there chasing joy, if I go out there trying to track everything down, what am I going to do? Buy a new house for this chair These are from old David. If this church grows to 2,000 people and I get to feel what that feels like, do my conversations with my family and friends get any better from sitting in this chair? No, man. This is it. And sometimes it's not the chair, right? Sometimes it's the kitchen. Sometimes it's when I get to cook dinner and Jen sits on the stool and we talk about our days. Sometimes it's the mornings when Ruby and Lily are on the bed and I'm in the chair in the corner of that room and we're all talking, just enjoying our times. But here's what I know. I can go out there chasing whatever I want to chase. But my times of most profound joy come when I'm right there. They come when I'm around the people that I love the most. They come when I'm soaking in the blessings that God has given me. And this is what we need to pay attention to. Solomon tells us these are God's gifts to us. If people in your life that you love, who love you, they're God's gift to you. Drink them in. Hug them more. Tell them more that you care about them. Tell them more that you're grateful for them. Tell them more that they are a gift from God in your life. You have a thing to do every day that you like to put your hand to, whether it's raising kids or volunteering somewhere or spending time in your neighborhood or going to work or looking forward to seeing your friends or whatever it is. You have things that God has given you that make you productive, that let you feel like you are living out His intended will for you? That's His gift for you. That work, that toil, that's His gift. It's designed for you. And then if we honor God, His invitation to honor Him is His gift to us because He knows that when we live a life honoring Him, we live a life of fewer regrets. We live a life of deeper gratitude. We live a life with a deeper desire for Jesus if we'll just revel in his gifts. This helps me make sense of the Honduran children I saw at one time. For years of my life, I would go down to Honduras with some regularity to take teams down to visit a pastor named Israel Gonzalez. Israel is one of my heroes. The things that he's done for the kingdom are unbelievable. And he is based in a city in central Honduras called, called, uh, Swatopeke. He and his wife have set up a free clinic there. He has a church there. And then from that church, what they do is they organize these goodwill parties and they bring teams down and you get together hot dogs and little tchotchke gifts and you go up into the hillsides. There's mountains surrounding Ciguatapeque and you go up into the mountainside and you go to these villages and he throws these goodwill parties and he hopes that by doing this, these villages that are deeply Catholic, but Catholic in such a way that shuts them off to faith rather than turns them on to faith. And so they're lost communities. And he goes and he throws these parties, and by throwing these goodwill parties, they invite him into the community to plant a church. He's planted 14 churches that way, last I checked. And I would go on these parties. And you go up into these mountains surrounding Suwatopec into a village. And that's not derogatory. It's literally a village. Homes are built of mud and wood, makeshift roofs, one or two rooms, literally dirt poor. I've had the opportunity in my life to be in a fair amount of other countries and to see poverty on multiple continents. Honduras is just about the worst. But yet when we would go there, we would get out and there would always be these children there. And these children would have the biggest, goofiest grins on their face ever. They were so joyful, and they would laugh, and they would play, and they were happy to see you, and it never got wiped off of their face. And I always wondered, kid, how can you be so happy? Don't you know you don't have a Barbie house? Don't you know you don't have a PlayStation? Don't you know your soccer ball stinks? Those kids had it figured out, man. They had people around them who loved them. They had things to do each day that they looked forward to. And they hadn't lived enough life to carry the weight of what it is to not honor God with our choices. They were walking in apex happiness. And I carry all my American wealth down there and privilege, and I look at them and I'm jealous. Because they figured out something that we haven't. And I just think that there is this profound truth that everything that we need is right there within our grasp. We don't have to run around out there chasing vapor and Hevel. God has given us these gifts already. And in that truth, in that truth that everything we need for joy is within our grasp? We answer those two questions we started with. Is there a pursuit that's actually worth investing my life in? Yes. The people you love, the tasks that give you purpose, and honoring God. You want to live a life that matters? You want to get to the end of it and wonder if it's all vapor? Or not have to wonder that? Then invest your life in the people that you love and the tasks that God has ordained for you. Ephesians 2 says that we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus, that we should do good works, that we should walk in them. Walk in those good works that God intended you for and honor God with the choices that you make. Those are worthwhile pursuits. You will get to the end of your life if you pursue those things and know that it was a life well lived. And he actually doubles down on this idea of pursuing relationships with other people. I don't have a lot of time to spend here on it, but again, this is a passage that I can't just skip over as we go through the book of Ecclesiastes. He doubles down on this idea of having more folks in our life when he writes this has not another to lift him up. Again, if two lie together, they keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken. Solomon doesn't take a lot of time to tell you to invest in a lot of things in Ecclesiastes. If you've been reading along with us, he doesn't tell you to do a lot of stuff there. He just kind of tells you, hey, this stuff's a waste of time. You should honor God. And then he tells you how we got to that conclusion. But here he stops and makes sure you understand the value of having people in your life who love you, who you love in return. And he sets up life as this struggle, this fight, because it is a struggle and a fight to choose to honor God with our lives. It is a struggle and a fight to keep our marriages healthy. It is a struggle and a fight to direct our kids in the right way, to love our families well, to share our faith, to be evangelists in our community, and to make disciples of the people who are around us. That's hard. And Solomon says, if you try to do this alone, woe to you when you fall and you have no one to pick you up. Woe to you when addiction creeps in and there's no one you can tell. Woe to you when doubts creep into your faith and there's no one you can talk to. How hard it must be for you when your marriage gets rocky and there's no one to fight for it. If there's two, he says, you've got a fighting chance. If there's three, that's not quickly broken. We need people in our lives to fight for us. We need to fight for the people in our lives. It seems to be a big value to us. That will help us ensure that we always have people to eat and drink with that we love and enjoy. So I thought it was worth pointing out Solomon's emphasis on this. The other question that remained from the previous weeks is, can I ever hope for true happiness? Yes. Yes, because here's the thing. If the bad things in Ecclesiastes 3 are true, then so are the good ones. Last week, I read the passage and I said, listen, pain is coming for all of us. It's going to hurt. We're going to mourn. We're going to grieve. No one gets to dodge that based on our godliness. It's going to happen to all of us. We will walk through hard times, but here's the reality. If that's true, then the flip side is true. If the bad things are true, then God says we will walk through seasons where we experience the good things. Look at the good things. There is a time to be born, to plant, to heal, to build up, to laugh, to dance, to gather things together, to embrace, to keep, to sow, to speak. A time for love and a time for peace. If we're going to have to walk through hard times, there's going to be good ones too. And I just think that the blessing from Ecclesiastes is this. It hits us with some hard realities. It's stark. It's unflinching. Hey, most of us are wasting our lives. And no matter what you do to invest it well, you're going to hurt. Those are hard truths. But I've said the whole time that if we can accept them on the other side is this joy that is waiting for us. And this is the joy. The joy is, yes, there's big things going on that we can't control. But in the midst of all that stuff that we can't control, God gives us these gifts, these moments of joy, these pockets to lean into where we celebrate him, where we're grateful for him, and we acknowledge those things as gifts. And I just think that if we accept the difficult realities from this book, then we can start to look for these little pockets of joy in our life, and they will bring us such more fulfillment than if we just move through them waiting to get to the next thing. At our house, we do a thing called Breakfast Sammy Saturday, all right? I like a good breakfast sandwich. I know it's hard to tell by looking at me, but I like a good, I put butter down, I toast the bread, I do the eggs, I do some bacon, do some cheese on there, and then I put it all together on the blackstone, cut it in half, and the good egg bleeds out onto it. It's all the goodness, and then you dip your sandwich in there. It's the best. I love breakfast Sammy Saturdays. You guys are not enthusiastic enough about this. You need breakfast Sammy Saturdays in your life. Well, I'll just let you guys sign up. Come over to the house. I'll make them for you. We love it. But it's just kind of a thing that I do. I like it. I make one for Jen and Lily, and they kind of eat half of theirs. I'm more excited about it than anybody else. But then one day, Lily brought this home from preschool, and it made me cry right on the spot. That's breakfast Sammy Saturday. She drew my griddle. She put food on it. Apparently, I make pizza there. And she brought it home to me. Now, the thing about this is, it was an assignment at preschool. She was told, just make whatever you want. It's an art project. And she made breakfast Sammy Saturday. And she brought it home to me. And she said, look, Daddy. And she told me what it was. I started crying right there on the spot. I got these big old alligator tears in my eyes looking at Jen. What a cool thing. And sure, life's going to be hard. She's going to be a teenager. She's five now, so she's kind of maxed out on cuteness, and now it's just hyper sometimes. But even though I know that there's hard times ahead, even though I know she won't always appreciate things like Breakfast Sammy Saturday, I know she does now. And I know that that's a gift from my God. And I know that what Ecclesiastes says is the best thing I can possibly do is to drink deeply of that. The best thing we can possibly do is find joy in these moments that God allows. We don't know how long we'll have them. I was talking with a friend last night who's got a new infant. And he said every time he gets up with the infant in the middle of the night and holds her, that it's a privilege. Because he doesn't know when that last time's going to be. And that's the truth of it. I think that we have so many pockets of joy in our life every day. If we have people that we love, if we have something to do that we appreciate, if we're choosing to honor God with our life. And I think that because we're so busy chasing vapor, sometimes we miss these sweet little moments that can all be had right here if we're just paying enough attention. That's why I think on the other side of these realities awaits for us this profound joy. And I think that when we realize that, that when we realize that God has designed these things to bring us happiness in our life, that what's really important is if we don't believe in a God, if we're atheistic in our worldview, then that's it. The joy terminates in those moments. That's all we have. But if we are a spiritual people who believe that God designed these things and these blessings in our life to make himself evident in our life, then our joy doesn't terminate in the moment. It turns into exuberant praise. It reminds us that we have a God that designed this for us. And the other part is, and this is incredible, that the joy that we're experiencing in that moment is only a glimpse of the eternity that he's designed for us and won for us with Jesus, which is what we're going to come back and talk about next week, is how these things are glimpses to the eternity that Jesus has already won for us. So in a few minutes, the band is going to come, and we've saved two fun, exuberant songs to praise God together. And while we do that, I want to encourage you to keep those two thoughts in your head. What are the things that I can see from my chair? What are the joys that God has given me that are within my reach from places that I already have in my life? What are the things that maybe I'm missing because I'm chasing stuff that I don't need? And then let's reflect on the reality that there is coming an eternity where that's all we experience. It's no more just pockets. It's reality. And that is something for us all to celebrate. Let me pray for us. Father, you are so very good to us. You've given us so much. Lord, I pray that we would be grateful for those blessings. I pray that you would steep us in profound gratitude for the things that we have, that you would show us what we need and what we don't. God, if there is somebody here or who can hear my voice, who doesn't have people in their life that they love, God, would you bring that to them? Would you provide that community for them even here at Grace? Would you give them the courage to slip up their hand in some way, to fill out some sheet, or to send some email, or make some phone call, or some text, and help them engage with relationships that matter to them. God, if there are people who don't have something they enjoy in their days, would you give them the courage to find that? Show them how you designed them and what you created them for. God, if we are not honoring you with our lives, I pray that you would give us the courage to do that. Let us praise you exuberantly, God, for the joys that you have given us in our lives. It's in your son's name we pray. Amen. Amen, amen. Thank you, Nate. Let's all stand up. guitar solo Our God, firm foundation Our rock, the only solid ground Let's lift his name. you are the only king forever you are victorious Unmatched in all your wisdom In love and justice you will reign and every knee will bow we bring our expectations our hope is anchored in your name the name of jesus Jesus you are the only king forever forevermore you are victorious We lift our banner high. We lift the name of Jesus. From age to age you reign. Your kingdom has no end. We lift our banner high. We lift the name of Jesus. From age to age you reign. Your kingdom has no end. You are the only king forever. Mighty God, we lift you higher. You are the only king forever. Forevermore, you are the only king forever Forevermore, you are victorious. He is doing great things See what our Savior has done See how His love overcomes he has done great things. We dance in your freedom, awake and alive. Oh Jesus, our Savior, your name lifted high be faithful forever more you have done great things and I know you will do it again for your promise is yes and amen you will do great things God you do great things Oh Oh you have done great things you've done great things every captive and break every chain oh god You have done great things. You have done great things. Oh God, you guys here today. God bless. Have a great week. Thank you. Come all you weary, come all you thirsty, come to the well that never runs dry. Drink of the water, come and thirst no more. Well, come all you sinners, come find His mercy. Come to the table, He will satisfy. Taste of His goodness, find what you're looking for. For God so loved the world that He gave us, His one and only Son to save us. If you never believed in Him, you'll live forever. Here we go. We'll live forever. God so loved the world. Praise God. Praise God. From whom all blessings flow. Praise Him. Praise Him. For the wonders of His love. Praise God. Praise God. Praise God. Praise Him. Praise Him. For the wonders of His love. His amazing love. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save. For God so loved the world that He gave us. His one and only Son to save us Whoever believes in Him Will live forever Oh, the power of hell Forever defeated Now it is well I'm walking in freedom For God so loved the world. Amen. You are here, moving in our midst. I worship you. I worship you. You are here, working in this place. I worship you. I worship you. You are here. Working in this place. I worship you. I worship you. You are way maker. Miracle worker. Promise keeper. Light in the darkness. darkness my god that is who you are Jesus. Jesus I worship you. I worship you. You're mending every heart. You are here and you are mending every heart. I worship you. I worship you. You are here and you are way maker, miracle worker, promise keeper, light're the way maker. Yeah, sing it again. Oh, that is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. My Jesus. That is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. That is who you are. My Jesus. Yes, even when. Come on. You never stop. You're the way maker. Oh, that is who you are. Oh, it's who you are, my Jesus. Miracle worker. That is who you are. is above depression. His name is above loneliness. Oh, His name is above disease. His name is above cancer. His name is above every other name. That is who you are. Jesus. oh i know that is who you are When darkness tries to roll over my bones When sorrow comes to pain is all I know, oh, I won't be shaken. No, I won't be shaken. I am not captive to the light. I'm not afraid to leave my past behind. Oh, I won't be shaken. No, I won't be shaken. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. My fear doesn't stand a chance when I stand in your love. Oh, I'm standing. There's power in your name. Power in your name. There's power that can break off every chain. There's power that can empty out a grave. There's resurrection power that can save. is Thank you. I'm standing in your love. I count on one thing. The same God that never fails will not fail me now. You won't fail me now in the waiting. The same God who's never late is working you're working Yes, I will bless your name. Oh, yes, I will sing for joy. My heart is heavy God that never fails. Will not fail me now. You won't fail me now in the waiting. This ain't God who's never late. He's working all things out. You're working all things out. Oh, yes, I will lift you high in the lowest valley. Yes, I will. For all my days. Oh, yes, I will. And I choose to praise, to glorify, glorify the name of all names that nothing can stand against. And I choose to praise, to glorify, glorify the name of all Thank you. The name of all names. That nothing can stand against. And I choose to praise. To glorify, glorify the name of our names. That nothing can stand against. Oh yes, I will lift you high in the lowest valley. Yes, I will bless your name. Oh, yes, I will sing for joy when my heart is heavy. All my days. Oh, yes, I will. Thank you. Come let us bow at his feet. He has done great things..