The NXR Podcast - THE SERMON - Jesus Chooses Blue-Collar Men

00:00:00.000 Amen. Please join me in standing for the reading of God's Word. Our text for today comes from

00:00:07.920 Matthew chapter 4 verses 12 through 25. Again that's the gospel of Matthew chapter 4 verses

00:00:13.820 12 through 25. I'll read the text in its entirety when I finish reading the text. I'm going to say

00:00:18.400 this is the word of the Lord at which point I would appreciate very much if you would respond

00:00:22.540 by saying thanks be to God. One final time our text today is the gospel according to Matthew

00:00:27.000 chapter 4 verses 12 through 25. The Bible says this. Now when he heard that John had been arrested

00:00:34.200 he withdrew into Galilee and leaving Nazareth he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea in the

00:00:41.440 territory of Zebulun and Naphtali so that what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled

00:00:49.200 the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali the way of the sea beyond the Jordan Galilee of the

00:00:56.920 Gentiles. The people dwelling in darkness have seen a great light. For those dwelling in the

00:01:04.420 region and shadow of death, on them a light has dawned. From that time Jesus began to preach,

00:01:12.360 saying, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. While walking by the Sea of Galilee,

00:01:18.460 he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the

00:01:25.920 sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers

00:01:31.820 of men. Immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on from there, he

00:01:38.140 saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother. In the boat

00:01:44.680 was Zebedee, their father, mending their nets. And he called them. Immediately they left

00:01:50.400 the boat and their father and followed him. And he went throughout all Galilee, teaching in their

00:01:56.980 synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every

00:02:02.520 affliction among the people. So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all

00:02:09.680 the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having

00:02:16.980 seizures and paralytics and he healed them and great crowds followed him from

00:02:22.580 Galilee and the Decapolis and from Jerusalem in Judea and from beyond the

00:02:29.260 Jordan. This is the word of the Lord. All right, please be seated. Let's go ahead

00:02:34.300 and jump right in. If I were to title this sermon, there's a few different

00:02:40.440 prospective titles that could be selected. One would be that Jesus prefers manly men, hard men,

00:02:51.200 strong men. Another could be Jesus was a country preacher, or Jesus forsakes the elites and large

00:03:02.400 cities for the rural country. There's a lot in this text, a lot that seems incredibly relevant

00:03:09.420 for our time and our place,

00:03:11.960 our political and cultural moment

00:03:14.460 that God in His providence has placed us in.

00:03:17.740 Some of these principles are timeless and universal,

00:03:21.060 as with all the Scripture.

00:03:23.040 And then some of them are within their context.

00:03:25.260 We have to be careful in exegeting Scripture

00:03:27.280 that we don't take something

00:03:28.440 and make it a universal principle

00:03:31.340 if it's simply descriptive rather than prescriptive.

00:03:35.300 The age-old example that is often provided

00:03:39.000 it is with Judas that, you know, that he went after he was found to have betrayed Jesus. He

00:03:48.800 tried to return the 30 shekels of silver and give the money back. He ultimately went and took his own

00:03:55.620 life. And, you know, there's been the old adage, you know, somebody opening up the scripture and

00:04:00.960 finding that verse and then saying, you know, you know, turning the page again and thumbing

00:04:06.240 randomly through the scripture to try to get a word from God. And the next verse they find is

00:04:10.400 a verse that says, and you go and do likewise. It's like, whoa, am I supposed to do the same

00:04:17.020 thing? That's not how to read the Bible. That's not how to exegete scripture. The Bible is not

00:04:22.080 just a series of fortune cookies. And so we do want to read scripture within its context,

00:04:27.820 but the scripture is filled with several commandments and principles that are

00:04:33.300 universal. They're timeless. They are applicable and relevant and true in all times and all places

00:04:39.960 and among all peoples. And I think that there are plenty of those in our text today. And some of

00:04:45.880 them have to do with the doctrine of fleeing. There really is a time to flee. And that's precisely

00:04:52.320 what we find Jesus doing in the opening of our text today. We're midway through the fourth

00:04:58.360 chapter of the gospel according to Matthew. And what we find in this chapter is that Jesus

00:05:04.240 receives news that John the Baptist, his cousin, John the Baptist has been arrested. And it's upon

00:05:12.700 receiving that news that Jesus withdraws. That's the opening verse of our text. Matthew chapter 4

00:05:20.020 verse 12. Now when he, he being Jesus, heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew into Galilee.

00:05:28.360 A little bit of the geographic context for some of these towns.

00:05:33.480 Galilee is a region in which there were multiple towns, Nazareth being one of them.

00:05:40.640 And in Galilee, this region, it wasn't a bustling metropolis.

00:05:45.020 This would be like going to a county or an area in Oklahoma or Kansas or Texas 20 years ago

00:05:57.420 before the disease of Austin spread throughout the land, you know.

00:06:02.780 But that's what it would be like, that Jesus is withdrawing.

00:06:07.340 And he's withdrawing specifically from what we can tell

00:06:11.140 looking at other gospel accounts.

00:06:14.040 In particular, the gospel according to John,

00:06:17.980 Jesus is withdrawing from Jerusalem.

00:06:21.600 That's where he was previously.

00:06:23.220 So in Matthew's gospel, it kind of just transitions directly from Jesus being tempted in the wilderness by Satan, which is what we looked at the past two weeks.

00:06:35.000 Then we find in verse 12, the scene has now changed.

00:06:39.060 Jesus is withdrawing to the country, to Galilee, to a rural area.

00:06:45.320 But if we look at John's gospel, if you have your notes, by way of introduction, I've written this.

00:06:51.400 the Gospel of John reveals where Christ went in between his temptation and then his preaching in

00:06:58.100 Galilee. After his temptation, Christ went up to Jerusalem to the Passover. That's the Gospel of

00:07:04.620 John chapter 2. And then we see his discussions with Nicodemus. That's John chapter 3, which is

00:07:12.340 also taking place in Jerusalem. And his discussions with the woman of Samaria. And that's in John

00:07:19.680 chapter 4. And then after that, back in John's gospel, we see him returning into Galilee and

00:07:28.380 preaching there. Now, what's most important for us from the very outset of our text today is to

00:07:35.940 recognize that Jesus came to preach. Now, Jesus came to earth for many reasons. John the Baptist,

00:07:43.880 when seeing Jesus, he says,

00:07:46.320 Behold, the Lamb of God

00:07:47.560 who takes away the sins of the world.

00:07:50.520 And so it is biblically accurate

00:07:52.300 and faithful to say that Jesus came to die.

00:07:55.920 That God gave him a body,

00:07:58.280 that he took on flesh in his incarnation

00:08:01.460 for precisely that reason.

00:08:04.280 And that's even fulfilling the scriptures

00:08:07.160 in the Old Testament.

00:08:09.020 That you have prepared for me a body.

00:08:12.580 For what purpose?

00:08:13.540 Why? Why was God's anointed one, Jesus Christ, enfleshed?

00:08:19.200 Well, so that he could die.

00:08:21.720 The divine is immortal.

00:08:23.760 God cannot die.

00:08:25.580 God is without passions.

00:08:27.480 Not only that God does not emote passions in that sense,

00:08:32.880 but in the Latin use of the term passions is suffering.

00:08:37.320 Like the famous movie, The Passion of the Christ.

00:08:40.840 Speaking of the suffering of the Christ.

00:08:43.540 the crucifixion of the Christ.

00:08:45.340 So the divine is immortal.

00:08:46.620 He does not suffer.

00:08:48.480 He is without passions,

00:08:50.660 without suffering,

00:08:52.040 and certainly without death.

00:08:54.080 But the divine second member of the Trinity,

00:08:57.260 Jesus Christ, the Son of God,

00:08:59.840 took on a second nature,

00:09:02.040 a human nature,

00:09:03.240 for the precise reason

00:09:04.800 so that he could die, 0.86

00:09:07.180 so that he could take upon himself 0.88

00:09:08.860 the sins of his own

00:09:10.760 and then receive the due penalty

00:09:13.200 for those sins, which is, as Romans tells us,

00:09:16.620 Romans 6.23, the wages of sin is death.

00:09:20.840 So Jesus came to die.

00:09:23.200 That's true.

00:09:24.500 But Jesus also came to preach.

00:09:28.560 Jesus is the great preacher.

00:09:31.520 And all of the fantastic, incredible signs and wonders

00:09:36.880 which He performed, all the miracles of Christ,

00:09:40.060 His exercising of demons, His healings of those who were infirmed and sick, and even raising the dead.

00:09:50.940 All of these miraculous signs and wonders which Jesus performed were in service of His sermons, His preaching.

00:10:00.720 They were given as signs and wonders, verifying, validating, serving as his credentials, that his preaching, his message was, in fact, true.

00:10:14.760 That if anyone was to doubt, is this really a prophet? Is this really a preacher sent from God?

00:10:22.020 Should we trust what he says? What are your credentials? Who sent you?

00:10:27.480 And Jesus would answer these kinds of questions, thinly veiled accusations, depending who they were coming from.

00:10:35.920 And he would say, the Father sent me.

00:10:38.640 That I have two witnesses in accordance with the law of Moses.

00:10:44.520 That I'm bearing witness. My Father bears witness.

00:10:47.280 He is the one who sent me. I'm not ministering of my own accord.

00:10:50.300 I have been commissioned and sent, and even the Spirit bears witness to my ministry.

00:10:55.460 And if that were not enough, my ministry has been validated furthermore by many signs and wonders.

00:11:03.780 The blind see, the deaf can hear, the lame can walk.

00:11:09.840 Jesus came for multiple reasons.

00:11:13.420 But certainly we should not skip over too quickly the fact that Jesus came to preach.

00:11:19.940 And the first thing that we find in Matthew's gospel, in the beginning of Jesus' preaching ministry, is that he starts preaching in the country.

00:11:31.740 He starts preaching in the rural setting of Galilee.

00:11:37.160 And he quickly withdraws by intent, by design.

00:11:43.140 None of this is haphazard.

00:11:44.520 But by design, he withdraws from Jerusalem, the capital city of Israel.

00:11:51.440 And he begins his preaching ministry in Galilee.

00:11:55.760 And this doesn't mean that Jesus doesn't love Jerusalem.

00:11:58.560 We know elsewhere in the Gospels where he says,

00:12:01.800 Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets.

00:12:07.800 How much I've longed like a mother hen who would gather her chicks under her wings 0.83

00:12:13.920 for protection and nurturing.

00:12:16.660 How much have I longed to gather you,

00:12:19.660 but you would not come to me.

00:12:22.820 So Jesus loves Jerusalem.

00:12:24.780 It's not that He hates the city.

00:12:27.360 It's not that He hates the capital of Israel.

00:12:29.960 He loves Jerusalem.

00:12:31.460 But at the same time,

00:12:32.740 He's honest about Jerusalem

00:12:34.880 and He recognizes who they are.

00:12:37.320 And who is Jerusalem? 0.70

00:12:38.940 Killer of the prophets 0.95

00:12:40.220 and those who would not come to Jesus. 0.56

00:12:44.500 That's what the city is.

00:12:46.740 What is the city?

00:12:48.280 A place that hates Jesus.

00:12:52.700 Now, it doesn't always have to be that way.

00:12:54.920 That's why I kind of, you know,

00:12:56.480 started from the get-go with this sermon

00:12:58.640 by saying not all of these things

00:13:00.460 are timeless, universal principles

00:13:02.300 applicable in every place

00:13:04.060 and every time with every people.

00:13:06.920 For instance, if we're not careful,

00:13:10.180 I guess what I'm trying to communicate is

00:13:11.760 if we're not careful,

00:13:13.200 then we can develop a subtle aversion in our hearts and minds towards all credentials, all well-to-do types of people and places.

00:13:29.220 We can kind of develop this subtle or not so subtle in many cases, aversion towards institutions.

00:13:36.140 And it's worth remembering that in our own history, here in these United States, that there was a time where the most credentialed institutions and largest cities of our country were the most Christian places you could be.

00:13:53.300 Princeton was Christian and Harvard was Christian at all these places these were seminaries with 0.81

00:14:01.620 the most brilliant minds and not just brilliant minds that have compromised and sold out but

00:14:06.540 brilliant minds attached by the grace of God to you know beating hearts that really did have

00:14:13.520 genuine affection and love for Jesus Christ and we do need to be careful about this because the

00:14:19.600 reality is our country, our country is simply too large. And what I mean by that is not that we

00:14:27.480 couldn't have more people eventually. I believe that the knowledge of the glory of God, as the

00:14:33.420 scripture says, one day will cover the whole face of the earth as the waters cover the sea. And part

00:14:38.100 of that is not just the work of an evangelist and spreading the gospel and God by the Holy Spirit

00:14:43.500 and his ministry and power, regenerating hearts so that many are converted to faith in Jesus Christ.

00:14:49.000 that's part of it certainly that's the tip of the spear but part of it also is not just the

00:14:53.300 great commission right spreading the gospel but also the cultural mandate it's the great

00:14:58.680 commission doesn't replace the cultural mandate right that's the temptation of modern pietistic

00:15:05.300 christians is that we spiritualize everything we take every natural principle that you could find

00:15:10.620 in the scripture and you give it a spiritual interpretation but exclusively a spiritual

00:15:16.340 interpretation so be fruitful multiply right get married and have kids and what do we say well this

00:15:22.340 is the new testament and so the way we you know get married and have kids is we're married to

00:15:26.780 christ by joining his church and baptism and church membership and we have spiritual children

00:15:31.560 by doing the work of an evangelist and preaching the gospel and seeing new christians made uh-huh

00:15:36.840 that's great and it's that and have some real kids do both and say well i don't want to do the kid

00:15:45.080 thing. Why? Because you'd have to get a job. That's why. Because it's hard. It's hard. But it's both.

00:15:53.960 It's both. It's nature and it's the natural reality and the heavenly reality. One simple

00:16:01.200 principle, and many of you have probably heard it ad nauseum these last few years, and for good

00:16:06.240 reason, because it seems like so much of evangelicalism has forgotten this. But one just

00:16:11.920 general very basic principle that kind of serves as a compass that keeps you on track it's like

00:16:18.460 true north is this short and simple phrase that grace does not eradicate or destroy nature but

00:16:28.640 rather grace elevates and restores nature say that again grace does not eradicate or destroy

00:16:37.160 nature but rather what grace does is it elevates and restores nature what does that mean it means

00:16:46.080 that that grace god's grace the spiritual heavenly realities what god has all his promises for us in

00:16:54.180 christ jesus and christ work that that is actively actively uh working out playing out before our

00:17:02.160 very eyes, God restoring the world to himself in Christ Jesus, that what this does is it doesn't

00:17:09.360 get rid of natural law and natural principles, God's created order, the way that he made things

00:17:15.740 originally in the beginning, which he said is good. It doesn't get rid of these things or undo

00:17:21.900 these things. It simply restores these things. Nature has been perverted. Nature has been

00:17:28.840 twisted and tweaked. Nature itself actually cries out. All the creation cries out with eager groans

00:17:36.120 and expectations for the sons of God to be revealed. Why? Because the sons of God and some

00:17:41.920 spiritual reality will replace nature? No, but rather in the redemption of the sons of God,

00:17:47.580 nature too knows that it will also be redeemed and restored right alongside the sons of God.

00:17:55.020 There's a dynamic difference.

00:17:56.640 What I'm saying is there's a dynamic difference in pushing back on the curse. 0.96

00:18:00.760 The curse that is upon nature, which is good and right and part of the mandate of Christians. 0.92

00:18:08.000 There's a difference in pushing back on the curse that is upon nature versus pushing back on nature itself. 1.00

00:18:14.380 What's an example to illustrate that point?

00:18:16.760 pushing back on the curse that is upon nature

00:18:20.340 because sin entered the world

00:18:21.660 would be like trying to cure cancer

00:18:24.220 and doing so ethically.

00:18:27.220 Assuming that cancer is cured

00:18:29.560 and it's cured ethically

00:18:31.120 in a way that doesn't bring more harm than good,

00:18:34.640 in a way that is permissible according to God's law

00:18:37.480 and what God has provided in nature itself. 0.95

00:18:42.020 The Christians who are seeking for a cure 0.73

00:18:44.720 and a solution to those kinds of problems, 1.00

00:18:47.360 that's pushing back on the curse

00:18:49.920 that is upon nature. 1.00

00:18:52.000 Trying to change your gender

00:18:53.980 is not pushing back on the curse upon nature, 0.99

00:18:56.980 but trying to push back on nature itself.

00:18:59.800 That's the difference.

00:19:01.440 And in those kinds of scenarios

00:19:02.880 where you're trying

00:19:03.880 not to push back the curse on nature,

00:19:07.300 but push back against nature itself,

00:19:09.680 the reality is that nature will always win.

00:19:12.700 Eventually.

00:19:13.760 Give it enough time, and nature finds a way.

00:19:17.580 As a wise prophet once said in Jurassic Park,

00:19:22.320 nature finds a way.

00:19:25.100 I mean, that's basically the fundamental plot line.

00:19:27.480 You know, spoiler alert, if you don't want every single horror movie

00:19:30.840 for the last 30 years to be spoiled, then go ahead and do earmuffs.

00:19:33.960 But for everybody else, if you're willing to have the plot spoiled,

00:19:38.160 the basic plot line of every horror movie for the last 30 years is this.

00:19:41.700 man seeks to elevate himself as God

00:19:45.760 and somehow reverse nature.

00:19:48.580 And then nature wins.

00:19:51.120 That's pretty much what happens.

00:19:53.640 Nature finds a way that nature wins.

00:19:56.400 You can, by God's grace,

00:19:57.920 push back on the curse upon nature,

00:19:59.600 but not nature itself.

00:20:01.600 So what does that mean for grace restoring nature?

00:20:06.520 What does it look like for the grace of God

00:20:08.380 to redeem men?

00:20:11.080 Well, it doesn't look like men no longer being men.

00:20:14.120 It looks like men being masculine, but being masculine in a righteous manner, a righteous masculinity.

00:20:23.520 Whereas you would hear from much of the church today, if asked, you know, what does it look like to be a man?

00:20:30.060 they basically would

00:20:32.760 they would basically prescribe to you

00:20:35.640 at least 90% of what the Bible says 1.00

00:20:39.460 it looks like to be a woman 0.98

00:20:40.700 and you'd be like no that's not true 1.00

00:20:43.180 that's the world

00:20:44.180 that's transgenderism 1.00

00:20:46.280 well wait a second 1.00

00:20:47.440 I mean think about it

00:20:48.920 from a young age

00:20:50.580 what are boys taught again and again

00:20:52.620 be quiet and gentle

00:20:54.780 the Bible literally says

00:20:58.260 that the beauty, inward beauty of the heart

00:21:01.460 of a woman is a quiet and gentle spirit.

00:21:06.440 But that's always, almost always,

00:21:09.340 within even the realms of the church applied to men.

00:21:13.480 And then what kind of counsel and advice

00:21:15.560 do women receive, especially young women?

00:21:19.520 You should be ambitious and assertive, strong.

00:21:24.200 How many times is that word strong

00:21:26.360 prescribed these days to women?

00:21:30.380 And then how often is it prescribed to men?

00:21:33.920 Men are rarely told in today's culture

00:21:36.900 and today's church culture to be strong.

00:21:40.200 Instead, men are told to be tolerant.

00:21:43.720 They're told to be gentle.

00:21:45.860 They're told to be quiet. 1.00

00:21:48.620 And women are told to be dominant, 0.93

00:21:51.320 to be assertive, to be strong. 1.00

00:21:54.320 Don't be a doormat.

00:21:55.300 Don't let anybody walk over you.

00:21:58.100 You assert your will.

00:22:01.260 If you want good advice as a man,

00:22:04.580 what you typically can do is just go to the Christian bookstore,

00:22:08.980 find a book written for women and follow that.

00:22:14.340 And if you want good advice as a woman,

00:22:17.540 just kind of perk up your ear a little bit

00:22:20.480 and listen to what evangelical pastors

00:22:22.400 for the last 30 to 40 years have been telling men.

00:22:25.300 And do that. 0.89

00:22:26.560 Every time a pastor tells your husband to be quiet,

00:22:29.380 say, that's for me.

00:22:30.220 I receive that.

00:22:32.960 And you'll do really well.

00:22:34.840 You'll do really well.

00:22:37.500 I guess what I'm saying, I'll just say it plainly. 0.98

00:22:39.240 The church hates men. 0.98

00:22:41.280 You know this. 1.00

00:22:42.380 That's why you're here. 0.75

00:22:44.140 That's why you're not in that other church

00:22:46.280 that you could be in.

00:22:47.920 Because you're a man,

00:22:49.060 and you're tired of being hated.

00:22:51.060 And hopefully there are some other reasons as well,

00:22:52.920 and I think there are, but that's one of them.

00:22:54.460 It's one of the reasons why churches like ours are growing.

00:22:59.220 Well, that's a pseudo grace.

00:23:02.140 It's not real biblical grace.

00:23:03.480 It's a pseudo facade of grace seeking to eradicate God's natural design rather than elevate and restore it.

00:23:11.280 That's pushing back not on the curse of sin that is upon nature, but pushing back on nature itself.

00:23:17.240 And that play inevitably always fails.

00:23:21.600 It only appears optically, a thin veneer.

00:23:25.240 It only appears to succeed, and only temporarily,

00:23:29.880 only for a moment in the big scheme of things,

00:23:32.500 but it always eventually fails.

00:23:35.940 So, all that being said, the point is,

00:23:38.320 going back to institutions, going back to our country,

00:23:41.180 all these things, the knowledge of the glory of God

00:23:43.940 covering the whole earth,

00:23:46.540 as the waters cover the sea,

00:23:48.260 eventually we will have

00:23:50.000 as the not just Great Commission

00:23:51.420 but also cultural mandate

00:23:52.920 nature as this is obeyed

00:23:55.180 and followed as well

00:23:56.380 we will have more image bearers

00:23:58.700 filling the earth. 0.60

00:24:00.360 I don't believe that the earth

00:24:01.760 is overpopulated

00:24:03.160 not even close.

00:24:04.800 It's not about population.

00:24:07.200 That's not the problem.

00:24:09.660 That's not the argument being made.

00:24:12.060 However I will say again

00:24:13.760 as I said earlier

00:24:14.720 these United States

00:24:16.620 I believe the country is too big it's too big and that doesn't mean overpopulated

00:24:23.720 but what I mean by that is you cannot have a country of 330 million people and not have

00:24:30.580 any credentialed trustworthy institutions I I don't have the time nor do I have the knowledge

00:24:40.740 the skills or experience every time my kids are sick

00:24:45.740 to go on WebMD and pretend to be a doctor.

00:24:51.920 And I really don't think it's arrogance for most of us.

00:24:56.660 Maybe a few exceptions.

00:24:58.600 But for the most part, I don't think it's that half of the country in 2020

00:25:02.080 just was blinded by pure, unadulterated arrogance

00:25:06.600 and just woke up one day and said, I'm a doctor now.

00:25:10.740 I don't think that's what happened.

00:25:13.060 I think instead what happened was that half of the country realized,

00:25:18.540 but they're lying to me.

00:25:20.960 We know they're lying because they keep flip-flopping.

00:25:24.560 Masks aren't effective.

00:25:26.680 Oh, by the way, now you have to wear a mask.

00:25:30.220 Six feet.

00:25:32.160 Where'd you get the data?

00:25:33.780 We made it up.

00:25:36.900 The vaccine, it's safe.

00:25:38.560 and perfectly healthy 30-year-old basketball players

00:25:42.740 in the NBA, they've always just fallen over randomly

00:25:45.500 in the middle of a game with heart arrest.

00:25:48.560 We know.

00:25:49.840 It's always the way that the world has worked.

00:25:52.960 Well, half of the country, I think, woke up,

00:25:55.620 and I don't think it was arrogance.

00:25:56.840 I think it was just, wait a second. 0.91

00:25:59.700 They're trying to kill us. 0.99

00:26:02.860 And the other half of the country, 0.66

00:26:05.120 it's not that they're humble. 1.00

00:26:07.120 is that they're stupid. 1.00

00:26:10.680 There's another name for it, 1.00

00:26:12.080 to be more polite. 1.00

00:26:12.980 I shouldn't say stupid. 0.99

00:26:14.160 I should use the proper term. 1.00

00:26:15.800 They're Democrats.

00:26:19.880 So, the point is

00:26:22.560 that a nation as large as ours is,

00:26:27.100 we can't be experts in everything.

00:26:29.380 It is actually a blessing.

00:26:31.620 I've said this before

00:26:32.880 with some of the podcasts

00:26:34.240 that I've produced.

00:26:37.120 If God would be so kind that eventually, I don't know, maybe it's 10 years or 50 years or 100 years, but if America really does get back to its Christian roots and we have, by the grace of God, a Christian nation again, Christian nationalism or whatever you want to call it, if that becomes a reality, I think, I could be wrong, but I think one of the conditions of that reality is that someone like Joel Webin would not have a YouTube channel with over 100,000 subscribers.

00:27:07.120 Do you know why? Because you would have more order, you would have more standards, right? There was a time that, you know, the New York Times, if they got something wrong, the very next day they had to print a retraction on the first page, say we missed that.

00:27:26.400 There were journalistic standards.

00:27:29.120 And nowadays it's like your choices are this.

00:27:31.060 You can go to the elites and you can be professionally lied to.

00:27:37.340 Or you can go to the homegrown, organic, you know, back halls of YouTube, whatever, and

00:27:46.360 find Joel Webin, you know, and find the King's Hall and whatever, whatever your fancy is.

00:27:55.080 And here are people who are not lying to you, but just to be frank, there are not journalistic standards for a podcaster.

00:28:05.460 There aren't.

00:28:07.020 So you've got guys who are doing their best, but are probably missing some things.

00:28:13.100 The difference is, do I want people who are intentionally missing things? 0.80

00:28:17.340 And the things that they're missing on purpose are the things that will kill me because they want me and my family dead.

00:28:23.240 or guys who accidentally miss things.

00:28:25.940 And in general, they get the general truth right,

00:28:28.400 but they miss some details because, back to the text,

00:28:33.300 they're like Jesus' disciples, blue-collar, rural, Galilee fishermen,

00:28:40.140 and they're a little bit rough around the edges.

00:28:44.440 What I'm trying to say is that what Jesus does in our text today, 0.63

00:28:48.880 Leaving Jerusalem, leaving the city, leaving all the credentialed scribes, Sadducees and Pharisees and going to the countryside and choosing blue collar fishermen to be his disciples.

00:29:04.680 I don't believe is a universal, timeless principle to say degrees don't matter, credentials don't matter, the realm of academia is of no benefit.

00:29:19.080 I don't think that that's the principle we should glean from the text today.

00:29:22.780 And I'm tempted to, just to be honest.

00:29:26.000 But I think that that would be eisegeting, that is reading into the text, the opinions of man, rather than exegeting, reading out of the text.

00:29:33.200 what God actually intends.

00:29:35.760 A lot of times we see ourselves in the Scripture

00:29:39.240 a little bit more than we should.

00:29:42.500 We should see ourselves in the Scripture at some level

00:29:44.880 because really all that is at the root level

00:29:48.320 is simply trying to apply the Scripture,

00:29:50.380 not just reading it in a heady way

00:29:52.740 where it's all theoretical,

00:29:54.720 but reading it in a practical way

00:29:56.740 where we're trying to apply the Scripture

00:29:59.040 and its principles to our daily lives.

00:30:01.580 That's good.

00:30:02.320 That's what Christians should do. 1.00

00:30:05.380 But there's a way of going beyond that

00:30:07.180 where we're not merely looking for practical application,

00:30:10.300 but there's a way of reading the text

00:30:12.840 where it's no longer Christ-centered,

00:30:14.540 but it's me-centered,

00:30:16.520 where every text of the Bible essentially,

00:30:19.820 you know, what is the general interpretation?

00:30:23.900 Well, the general interpretation of every text of the Bible

00:30:26.240 is that come to find out everything I'm doing is great.

00:30:30.380 and the Bible affirms everything about me

00:30:33.380 and I don't really even need to change a thing, right?

00:30:36.440 There'd be a way of reading our text today

00:30:38.060 that says you should go to churches

00:30:41.740 in the country, in Wahlberg

00:30:45.040 with pastors who intentionally don't have a PhD.

00:30:49.920 Oh, what a coincidence.

00:30:52.900 You know, it works great.

00:30:54.680 I think that there is some truth there

00:30:58.580 that's timely in different seasons, different eras of time.

00:31:03.960 And I think that we're living in one of those times.

00:31:06.560 But I don't think it's time-less,

00:31:08.880 that it's universal, applying in all places, in all times.

00:31:12.760 Christendom is something that you have to reconcile with.

00:31:16.560 You have to reconcile with the reality that in the West,

00:31:20.160 in Europe and in America,

00:31:22.280 we had 1,500 years of civilization built off of the Christian worldview,

00:31:30.580 the principles of Scripture, and it wasn't just country bumpkins.

00:31:35.520 It was incredibly learned men.

00:31:41.580 It was philosophers, doctors, academics, institutions, art, all these things.

00:31:50.760 It wasn't just the Shire, but it was Gondor.

00:31:55.900 It was the capitals of civilization.

00:31:59.240 And I do believe that that is the goal,

00:32:01.280 that the knowledge of the glory of God really would cover the whole earth.

00:32:05.720 And you're not going to win the whole earth if you don't win institutions.

00:32:12.340 Now, what do you do if all of your institutions have discredited themselves?

00:32:17.240 Well, there's a lot of debate about that.

00:32:20.120 Do you do the long march through the institutions?

00:32:22.680 That's what leftists did.

00:32:23.760 That's what Marxists did.

00:32:25.280 And they told us that that's what they were doing.

00:32:27.220 They made their manifesto and all their plans 40, 50 years ago.

00:32:31.860 And they were patient, played the long game.

00:32:33.800 And slowly but surely, they walked through all the institutions.

00:32:39.080 They walked through the universities.

00:32:40.680 They walked through media.

00:32:42.340 They walked through all these different things.

00:32:44.020 to the hospitals and medicine and they won they absolutely won academia is it belongs to leftists

00:32:56.360 it no longer belongs to conservatives and for every college you could name that might be well

00:33:02.660 what about you know hillsdale you know okay maybe you know and there's one versus a hundred or a

00:33:12.840 thousand. Conservatives lost. And part of the reason that we lost is because, well, part

00:33:22.020 of it is because conservatives always try to play fair. Conservatives always try to be

00:33:26.140 nice. Conservatives, it's like, well, that would be wrong. That's using the same standards

00:33:32.540 that the left uses. And, you know, like, I remember seeing a picture one time where

00:33:37.700 It was an epitaph, a tombstone.

00:33:40.840 And it says, here lies conservatism.

00:33:43.240 And then the quote on it was,

00:33:44.580 could you imagine if the standards were reversed?

00:33:49.720 That doesn't work.

00:33:51.760 It's not enough.

00:33:53.060 It's not enough to just take the high ground.

00:33:57.020 Well, we won't have double standards.

00:33:58.740 We'll have real standards.

00:33:59.740 That doesn't work.

00:34:01.180 Eventually, you have to take institutions 0.98

00:34:03.500 or you can do what Christians and conservatives

00:34:06.580 have done for hundreds of years,

00:34:08.300 you can build new ones.

00:34:10.260 But once you build those new institutions,

00:34:12.280 you actually have to keep them.

00:34:15.260 And you can't look at the principles of compassion

00:34:18.120 that really are Christian principles

00:34:20.160 etched out for us in Scripture

00:34:22.140 and allow compassion to ultimately become a virus.

00:34:26.740 It becomes weaponized by people who hate you,

00:34:29.540 hate your children,

00:34:30.840 and are used against you

00:34:32.160 so that everything you build is taken from you

00:34:35.160 over and over and over again.

00:34:38.580 So Jesus flees to Galilee. 0.53

00:34:41.200 He goes to countrymen. 0.99

00:34:43.240 He goes to unlearned men.

00:34:44.980 He goes to hard men.

00:34:47.400 Fishing is not only is it something

00:34:49.960 outside the realm of academia.

00:34:53.200 It's not just that fishermen

00:34:54.640 are men without degrees.

00:34:57.800 It's not just that they're doing hard work,

00:34:59.560 but they're doing hazardous work.

00:35:02.900 Fishing is dangerous,

00:35:04.380 especially at that time.

00:35:06.800 I mean, just think of the instances

00:35:08.100 that we have in the gospel narratives

00:35:09.700 of them on a fishing rig,

00:35:12.060 a boat in the sea,

00:35:14.440 and a great storm arises.

00:35:16.460 It threatens to capsize the boat.

00:35:19.000 And the disciples of Jesus

00:35:20.340 are convinced that they're going to die.

00:35:23.780 And they're convinced

00:35:24.540 because they've been in scenarios like this before.

00:35:28.800 Jesus goes to unlearned men,

00:35:31.480 hardworking men,

00:35:33.060 blue-collar men, and men who are also dangerous men.

00:35:38.020 They are well familiarized with peril,

00:35:41.580 with hazard, and with challenges.

00:35:45.060 This is where Jesus goes.

00:35:47.580 This is where the gospel of Jesus begins.

00:35:50.440 This is the origin place of Jesus' preaching ministry.

00:35:55.620 But I want us to keep the 30,000-foot view in mind.

00:36:00.140 This is where Jesus starts.

00:36:01.920 once everything has been perverted,

00:36:05.280 once every institution has been captured.

00:36:09.180 When Jesus comes on the scene, think about this.

00:36:12.600 When Jesus comes on the scene,

00:36:15.620 the religion of that day

00:36:17.840 had been utterly and completely perverted.

00:36:22.860 Every ounce of it had been twisted

00:36:25.600 to where basically you could do,

00:36:29.220 like I said, you know, humorously,

00:36:30.880 but truthfully earlier,

00:36:32.760 what's your advice for men?

00:36:34.320 Okay, I'll do the opposite. 0.88

00:36:35.580 What's your advice for women? 1.00

00:36:36.800 Okay, I'll do the opposite. 0.88

00:36:38.180 That's what Jesus was coming into.

00:36:40.540 I mean, Jesus, basically,

00:36:42.000 the summation of almost all of his sermons

00:36:44.340 is the Pharisees are saying this,

00:36:46.940 do the opposite.

00:36:49.240 God's Word, the Mosaic Law,

00:36:52.880 and its root form, 0.94

00:36:54.120 before it was twisted and perverted

00:36:56.020 and tweaked,

00:36:57.580 actually was the opposite.

00:37:00.480 That's the moment, the cultural moment, the political moment that Jesus comes into.

00:37:06.980 He comes into a moment where the church has been captured. 0.77

00:37:11.660 Judaism has been captured.

00:37:15.020 For 400 years, the word of the Lord was rare. 1.00

00:37:18.880 The skies had been turned to brass.

00:37:21.800 So there were no prophets.

00:37:25.160 No one was hearing the word of the Lord.

00:37:26.940 and the religious rulers of the day,

00:37:29.320 the scribes and the Pharisees and the lawyers, 0.94

00:37:32.520 they had all perverted the truth of God

00:37:35.080 to where the doctrines of man

00:37:39.660 had so eclipsed the word of God

00:37:42.360 that if anyone was to go to the synagogue

00:37:44.940 and hear a sermon,

00:37:46.100 they would have been told

00:37:47.460 everything that God actually hates

00:37:49.960 instead of the things that God loves.

00:37:53.680 That's the religious scene

00:37:55.400 that Jesus comes into.

00:37:56.940 the cultural scene that Jesus comes into.

00:38:00.120 And the politically, the political scene

00:38:02.280 is that Israel is under the thumb of Rome. 0.77

00:38:08.560 Israel is a conquered nation.

00:38:12.620 That their rulers are not really for them. 0.98

00:38:18.320 Their rulers are Romans. 0.96

00:38:20.720 They don't actually have a country anymore. 0.98

00:38:23.360 They get to pretend to have a country. 0.98

00:38:26.940 They get to have their pretend religion 0.95

00:38:29.260 and their pretend culture,

00:38:32.140 but not anything that's real.

00:38:35.280 They don't have real liberty.

00:38:36.740 They don't have real freedom.

00:38:38.820 They're a province of an empire,

00:38:41.220 a political empire that has conquered them wholesale,

00:38:45.600 and it is not for them,

00:38:47.640 but for itself and its elites.

00:38:52.020 In other words, again, 1.00

00:38:54.520 I don't want to eisegete.

00:38:56.080 I'm trying all this as disclaimer to preach the Word of God faithfully.

00:39:00.260 But the point is, the scene that Jesus arrives on in his preaching ministry

00:39:07.740 is a lot like what's going on with us today.

00:39:13.360 The Pharisees and Sadducees and religious rulers, they've all been bought and paid for. 0.96

00:39:19.240 They're corrupt and perverse, and they're teaching the doctrines of men 0.98

00:39:22.520 in such a way that it completely overshadows and eclipses. 0.98

00:39:26.540 And worse than that, it doesn't just hide,

00:39:28.520 but it perverts and twists the truth of God

00:39:32.320 to say the very opposite of what God intended.

00:39:35.380 That's the church. 1.00

00:39:36.880 And then politically, the nation of Israel is conquered by foreigners 0.95

00:39:41.520 with an elite empire that hates them 0.94

00:39:45.860 and is selling them out every chance that they get. 1.00

00:39:49.280 And their own people, the worst of their own people, Israelites, are who? 0.98

00:39:56.760 The tax collectors who sell themselves out to Rome to further exploit their own people by excessive taxation. 0.97

00:40:07.100 Israel is a tax farm for Rome. 0.64

00:40:11.400 So it's in that scene, right? 0.83

00:40:14.620 Does that sound familiar to anyone?

00:40:15.940 You feel like, huh?

00:40:18.220 It's in that political, cultural, religious scene, framework,

00:40:23.280 that Jesus arrives and comes into his public ministry.

00:40:29.140 And then Jesus gets word at the beginning of our text, verse 12, the opening verse,

00:40:34.620 that John, his predecessor, who had come to pave the way of the Lord,

00:40:39.700 to preach repentance for the kingdom of God is at hand.

00:40:43.640 This John, John the Baptist, a relative of his, a precursor of Christ, had been arrested.

00:40:52.800 And Jesus' first instinct, his immediate reaction, we should move to the country.

00:41:00.800 We should get out of the city. 0.67

00:41:03.780 Jerusalem, not a good place to be. 1.00

00:41:07.340 We'll go to Galilee.

00:41:09.500 And I need to assemble a team.

00:41:11.280 Now, remember, Jesus isn't just thinking about the next three years, give or take, of his earthly ministry.

00:41:19.240 First and foremost, don't forget the disclaimers.

00:41:22.620 OK, don't don't do the 12 second, you know, clip.

00:41:27.680 The disclaimer, Jesus came as the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world.

00:41:32.080 Behold, you have prepared a body for me.

00:41:34.700 He came to die.

00:41:35.660 but he also came to give his life as a ransom for the many

00:41:42.180 to raise from the grave on the third day bodily resurrection

00:41:46.700 but then to also commission his apostles and disciples

00:41:51.620 to go out and to spread the gospel in what way?

00:41:55.900 The very way that he told them

00:41:57.600 like a mustard seed that would be planted

00:42:00.540 that would grow into a tree

00:42:02.020 that wouldn't just be hidden away in some remote corner of the earth,

00:42:06.160 but it would be an all-world-encompassing tree, a dominant tree.

00:42:10.940 It would fill the whole earth and cover it.

00:42:14.060 Or like a little leaven that would work through the whole batch of dough 0.71

00:42:18.320 and cause all of it to be permeated and rise with this gospel yeast.

00:42:25.600 Jesus came, in some sense we can say,

00:42:29.640 Jesus says, I tell you the truth,

00:42:31.740 that unless a seed goes into the ground, the earth, and dies.

00:42:36.760 When a seed is planted, it dies.

00:42:38.640 And out of it springs new life.

00:42:40.760 Unless a seed is planted and dies.

00:42:44.000 What is that likened to?

00:42:46.320 Going under the ground.

00:42:48.960 You have to dig a little hole and go under the ground

00:42:51.500 and then cover it up.

00:42:53.620 And it dies.

00:42:55.120 It's burial.

00:42:56.760 Jesus says unless a seed goes into the ground and dies, it cannot bear much fruit.

00:43:03.700 He's speaking of himself.

00:43:05.980 That he, in some sense we could argue what he says elsewhere about the mustard seed.

00:43:10.100 He is the mustard seed.

00:43:11.960 There's a sense in which the gospel is, but also Christ himself, the living word, the logos, the word of God.

00:43:17.940 He is the word incarnate.

00:43:19.700 He is the mustard seed.

00:43:21.020 and he did die and he was planted in the ground in the tomb under the ground and he did spring

00:43:26.940 forth those first shoots green shoots of life on the third day risen from the dead and his work

00:43:33.900 and his ministry didn't stop there but then he commissioned his apostles and everything that we

00:43:39.040 needed to know that was sufficient for us was inscripturated by the writing of the apostles

00:43:43.420 under the inspiration of the holy spirit and then that word of god for two thousand years now has

00:43:49.580 been spread to millions and millions of disciples of Jesus, and all of his promises are in fact

00:43:56.500 being fulfilled. But politically, culturally, and religiously, you have to know what time it is.

00:44:03.640 Remember, the sons of Issachar who are commended, because it says they knew the times, and we all

00:44:11.160 forget the second half, says the sons of Issachar who knew the times, and what Israel, and you and

00:44:17.760 I, church, we are Israel. They knew the times, the sons of Issachar, and they knew what Israel

00:44:25.520 ought to do. We need sons of Issachar today who know what time it is, and they also know what

00:44:33.140 Israel, that is the church, what Israel ought to do. And I think, again, I've prefaced, I've given

00:44:42.520 and every clarification that I can possibly think of.

00:44:46.240 I don't know if this would be applicable in the 1700s.

00:44:51.500 I don't know if this would be a good, you know,

00:44:56.540 a good sermon to be preached at Princeton, you know, in its inauguration.

00:45:04.840 You know, a couple hundred years, 250 years ago.

00:45:08.940 But I think it's good today. I think it's timely today.

00:45:12.520 this idea of okay sons of Issachar knowing the times and knowing what Israel ought to do

00:45:18.360 what time is it I think it's a very similar time to the scene that Jesus comes on that 0.74

00:45:24.920 if you're in the city they'll throw you in jail like John and it's a good time to temporarily

00:45:33.640 and tactfully not indefinitely we win and we don't just win in the 17th dimension I believe

00:45:41.240 by the grace of God,

00:45:42.320 we win up there

00:45:43.380 and we win down here.

00:45:45.340 Both.

00:45:46.200 We will win.

00:45:48.120 But the question is how?

00:45:49.960 What strategy should we

00:45:51.360 immediately deploy?

00:45:53.660 We can't afford to be 0.99

00:45:55.580 foolish ideologues. 1.00

00:45:59.440 We can't afford to just 1.00

00:46:01.320 Leroy Jenkins,

00:46:03.180 just to run in

00:46:04.480 with no plan

00:46:06.380 and just immediately get arrested

00:46:08.880 and thrown in jail.

00:46:11.240 But pragmatism, I understand.

00:46:15.460 We just got done over the last 30 years

00:46:17.740 as the Reformed Church collectively 0.75

00:46:20.400 demonizing pragmatism.

00:46:22.800 I get it.

00:46:24.160 But I think we threw out a few babies 0.52

00:46:27.120 with that bathwater.

00:46:28.920 I really do. 1.00

00:46:31.160 The whole assault from the Reformed Church 0.97

00:46:33.960 on pragmatism, 0.98

00:46:35.080 what it was supposed to be

00:46:36.300 was in the context

00:46:39.000 of the regular principle of worship

00:46:40.920 on the Lord's Day.

00:46:43.440 Yes, we despise pragmatism 1.00

00:46:46.300 when it comes to seeker-friendly 1.00

00:46:48.340 church services

00:46:49.660 with laser lights and fog machines

00:46:52.340 and 18-minute TED Talks

00:46:54.680 and a watered-down gospel

00:46:56.020 that's powerless to save.

00:46:57.960 Yes, in that sense,

00:46:59.380 we despise pragmatism.

00:47:02.000 But we should not, as Christians,

00:47:04.800 despise pragmatic strategies

00:47:07.320 across the board.

00:47:08.400 I only made it to church today by being pragmatic.

00:47:13.280 I remember directions.

00:47:15.220 I took certain turns.

00:47:17.360 I made sure there was gasoline in our minivan.

00:47:21.160 You can't not be pragmatic at all.

00:47:25.480 Say, well, let's just, no compromise.

00:47:28.980 No compromise.

00:47:30.280 Let's just be faithful. 1.00

00:47:32.600 They're murdering babies. 1.00

00:47:33.740 I hear you.

00:47:34.720 And I love your heart.

00:47:35.900 And I see the sentiment.

00:47:38.400 But let's be honest, if you really just want to be faithful and if you're not going to be if you really were to be consistent and despise pragmatism all the way, then you should be bombing abortion clinics. 0.97

00:47:51.520 Why aren't you coward? 0.92

00:47:54.180 Why are you compromising? 1.00

00:47:59.080 Because because at the end of the day, you're not an idiot. 0.99

00:48:04.540 Just like me and just like anybody else, you actually do have standards. 0.99

00:48:09.320 You actually are playing the long game.

00:48:11.500 You actually are pragmatic.

00:48:13.160 You actually realize that you have a wife and children

00:48:15.440 that you need to feed and you need a job.

00:48:17.540 You can't be thrown in prison.

00:48:19.180 And that's not the way, ultimately, to win in the long run.

00:48:24.380 Everyone's pragmatic, is my point.

00:48:27.020 The question is when and how.

00:48:29.240 When and how and where.

00:48:32.000 And I think we need to be honest about that.

00:48:35.200 We need to be honest that idealism is not a strength.

00:48:40.920 It's not an advantage.

00:48:43.100 And to be exclusively pragmatic at the cost of any and every ideal,

00:48:48.780 that is, any and every principle,

00:48:50.320 then, yeah, of course, that's sinful also.

00:48:54.720 But we need to be wise, innocent as doves,

00:48:57.840 but also as cunning as serpents.

00:49:02.020 There is such a category,

00:49:04.220 such a thing as a temporary, tactful retreat.

00:49:09.200 Jesus, in other words,

00:49:10.580 all this building to this point,

00:49:12.440 Jesus did not sin by hearing,

00:49:15.760 John was arrested, 0.91

00:49:17.100 I should get out of Jerusalem.

00:49:19.560 That was not a sin.

00:49:22.280 It's not a sin that we have families in our church

00:49:24.900 who decide, yeah, we're leaving Canada.

00:49:28.200 It is not a sin that we have families in our church

00:49:30.700 is that, yeah, California probably isn't the wisest place to be.

00:49:35.400 It's not a sin that Andrew Isker is leaving his hometown

00:49:39.040 and his home church where he grew up

00:49:41.440 and then became the pastor as a young adult.

00:49:44.920 I mean, it's hard. It's gut-wrenching.

00:49:46.960 These are people that he loves,

00:49:48.080 and he's trying in his defense to bring as many of them

00:49:50.480 as will come with them as possible.

00:49:52.560 But they're leaving, and they're moving to Tennessee.

00:49:55.920 And they're doing so because, in part,

00:49:58.600 his oldest son

00:50:00.760 has severe autism

00:50:02.640 very severe

00:50:04.620 and right now there is

00:50:08.820 a targeted attack

00:50:10.400 on children with special needs

00:50:12.820 that they would be

00:50:14.500 deceived and perverted

00:50:17.160 against their parents

00:50:20.000 convinced

00:50:21.140 that somehow God made a mistake

00:50:24.080 and I won't be more detailed than that

00:50:26.220 you know what I mean

00:50:27.600 You're in the wrong body, that kind of thing.

00:50:30.140 And then they are taken if their parents disagree.

00:50:34.980 They are taken.

00:50:36.100 There are stories right now, right now, because of Tim Walz.

00:50:41.680 Tim Walz, the running mate of Kamala Harris, that's the governor of Andrew Isker State.

00:50:47.600 That's his governor.

00:50:49.980 And kids, just like Andrew's firstborn child, who he named Boniface, 0.95

00:50:57.620 Kids like him are being taken from Christian parents.

00:51:01.600 And they don't know about it.

00:51:04.440 And so Andrew Isker is compromising and sinning.

00:51:08.280 Giving up.

00:51:10.740 He's quitting. 1.00

00:51:12.540 No, he's just not being an idiot. 1.00

00:51:16.460 The title of the sermon today could just as easily be, 1.00

00:51:19.600 Jesus preached to men and wasn't an idiot. 0.99

00:51:24.280 You're allowed to be wise. 0.98

00:51:26.940 And there is a certain point, and there's a fine line here,

00:51:30.960 but there's a certain point where wisdom becomes a euphemism for fear.

00:51:34.960 That is true.

00:51:36.980 Right?

00:51:37.220 Peter could probably make a bunch of arguments from wisdom

00:51:41.420 about why it's not wise to get out of a boat

00:51:45.800 and try to walk on water in the middle of a storm.

00:51:49.880 But in that context, all of his wisdom arguments

00:51:54.000 would actually be fear.

00:51:55.860 because being on the water

00:51:58.380 when Jesus is on the water

00:52:00.680 and gives the command

00:52:01.780 is the safest and wisest place to be.

00:52:06.460 So it's all about the context.

00:52:08.800 It's about knowing the times.

00:52:12.460 You know, what day, what time,

00:52:14.680 and what place in God's providence

00:52:16.420 has He placed us?

00:52:18.220 And for what purpose?

00:52:19.860 And what's the strategy moving forward?

00:52:21.820 And how can we have ideals and principles

00:52:24.360 with zero compromise and yet ideals without being ideologues and pragmatic and all the

00:52:33.480 practical strategies that we can possibly employ but without being exclusively pragmatic at the

00:52:39.760 cost of any principles in other words following jesus in all times in all places but especially

00:52:46.580 in our time, in our place, it's not easy. It's not as simple as we would like to make

00:52:54.240 it. It requires wisdom. It requires thought. And little poignant, one-liner Jesus-Juke

00:53:06.660 statements. You know what the Jesus-Juke is? In case you haven't come across it, you

00:53:12.540 have. That's kind of, I think, a helpful title for it. The Jesus Duke is 20,000 Haitians in

00:53:20.540 Springfield, Ohio. Well, God's so merciful. The Great Commission is coming to us. That's a Jesus 1.00

00:53:27.260 Duke. That's saying, well, just preach the gospel, right? That if you apply that consistently, it's

00:53:33.020 like there's an intruder breaking down our front door in the middle of the night and preach the

00:53:36.880 gospel. No. Grab your gun. You can preach as you shoot them. That's fine. You know, as long as it

00:53:47.780 doesn't distract you from your aim. But no, that's, that again is, is the common denominator that I'm

00:53:54.640 noticing right now in the evangelical church is a complete forsaking of nature. Everything's

00:54:00.180 spiritualized. Everything's steamrolled. Everything is oversimplified, overgeneralized.

00:54:06.920 Everything is a 17th dimension, eternal application. 0.99

00:54:12.780 Our Christian forefathers would be rolling in their graves. Our Christian forefathers,

00:54:21.280 they recognized nature. They recognized natural law. They recognized the created order that God

00:54:30.140 had a way that he designed the world and that it was good. They didn't go against the grain of

00:54:35.560 nature. They applied the gospel and theology with nature and they were blessed for it. Part of the

00:54:42.840 reason that we are being cursed and under God's judgment is we have rebelled against God in part

00:54:49.780 by rebelling against his natural order and what he has made.

00:54:53.820 gender or sex

00:54:58.240 something that God made 0.89

00:55:00.220 male and female 0.99

00:55:01.300 he made

00:55:02.220 nations and borders

00:55:05.660 something that God institutes

00:55:07.980 the book of Acts says that he sets their times

00:55:10.180 and their borders

00:55:11.840 God made this

00:55:13.660 these are natural things

00:55:16.380 a part of God's order

00:55:17.580 we do well to work within

00:55:19.880 the bounds of nature

00:55:21.620 and not against the bounds of nature.

00:55:26.260 So Jesus was a preacher.

00:55:27.740 I'm going to go quick now through all these things.

00:55:30.660 Matthew Henry, he says this.

00:55:32.260 He was a preacher.

00:55:33.220 The subject which Christ dwelt upon now in his preaching

00:55:36.260 and it was indeed the sum and substance of all his preaching

00:55:40.000 was the very same that John the Baptist,

00:55:43.040 preceding Christ, also preached on.

00:55:45.640 Which is what?

00:55:46.520 We saw it in Matthew 3, verse 2.

00:55:48.860 repent for the kingdom of heaven is here it's at hand that's the same thing that Jesus is now

00:55:56.020 preaching in Galilee in the countryside he's preaching the same message it's verse 17 of our

00:56:01.640 text from that time Jesus began to preach saying repent for the kingdom of God is at hand the

00:56:08.900 kingdom of God is near Matthew Henry says the gospel is the same the same in its substance

00:56:15.840 Its application may differ, but its substance, its message is the same under various dispensations, meaning whether it's the 1700s or the first century or wherever you are, whenever you are, the gospel is the same.

00:56:31.160 Matthew Henry furthermore goes on and says that the gospel is a gospel of repentance.

00:56:37.920 This he preached.

00:56:39.280 Jesus preached as gospel.

00:56:41.660 Repent. 0.96

00:56:42.860 Note the doctrine of repentance is right gospel doctrine.

00:56:46.400 The sweet and gracious Jesus, whose lips drop as a honeycomb, he preached repentance.

00:56:53.560 Why? For it is an unspeakable privilege that room is left for repentance.

00:57:00.060 One of the things that I remember I realized years ago, I remember talking with a friend and we were arguing about sin.

00:57:12.100 Whether or not something was inherent, like some inherent character traits, like just nature.

00:57:19.500 I'm just born with this or whether or not it was like, no, this maybe you have a propensity towards this.

00:57:24.780 But but but it really is sin. It's conscious and willful and immoral and wrong.

00:57:32.020 And I remember going back and forth and back and forth and then eventually coming to the conclusion.

00:57:36.600 And I know it sounds ironic, but it's true that there's a hopefulness.

00:57:40.780 sounds funny, but there's a hopefulness

00:57:43.320 with sin. Do you know

00:57:45.100 why? Because sin

00:57:47.140 can be changed. Sin

00:57:49.340 can be repented of.

00:57:52.160 Right? If it's

00:57:53.480 something that's not sin and it really

00:57:55.300 is just ingrained in nature, then it can't

00:57:57.380 be changed.

00:57:59.320 A lot of times, well, this is just the way

00:58:01.220 I am. This is just my personality.

00:58:03.320 This is the way God made me.

00:58:06.380 No. 0.70

00:58:07.740 No, you're just immoral. 0.99

00:58:10.780 You're sinful. 0.99

00:58:13.040 And that's good news.

00:58:14.700 How's that good news?

00:58:15.980 Because sin can change.

00:58:19.480 And so Jesus isn't berating people.

00:58:21.820 When Jesus is going around preaching the same message that John the Baptist preached,

00:58:25.980 a message of repentance, notice that this was good news.

00:58:31.700 It wasn't good news plus repentance.

00:58:35.060 The good news included repentance.

00:58:38.060 How is repentance good news?

00:58:39.720 because hope, the very essence of hope,

00:58:43.300 you could almost define hope as this.

00:58:46.480 Hope is the potential that change can happen.

00:58:51.440 That's what hope is.

00:58:52.840 Hope is the idea, it's the belief.

00:58:55.840 It's the belief that circumstances,

00:58:58.860 that our person, that our environment,

00:59:00.840 that the world, that whatever it is

00:59:02.460 that right now feels so hopeless,

00:59:05.220 that these things, by the grace of God,

00:59:07.420 don't always have to be.

00:59:09.100 that these things can change.

00:59:12.140 And that's what repentance is.

00:59:13.740 The message, the sermon of repentance

00:59:15.560 is a sermon that says,

00:59:17.420 repent, change.

00:59:20.440 But what's implied in that very sermon is this.

00:59:23.820 Change with God is possible.

00:59:26.920 That with man, these things are impossible,

00:59:28.800 but all things are possible with God.

00:59:31.000 Your problem is not just Rome

00:59:33.140 and your problem is not just 0.99

00:59:34.720 the corrupt religious system around.

00:59:36.740 Your deepest problem is your sin, and that can change.

00:59:42.220 Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.

00:59:46.140 Jesus preached the gospel, and his gospel was a gospel of repentance.

00:59:52.080 And this wasn't against that which is hopeful, that which is rightly called good news,

00:59:57.900 but it was the very essence of good news.

01:00:00.820 It is a privilege that room is left for repentance.

01:00:04.240 So that's Jesus preaching ministry.

01:00:05.980 He begins it in Galilee, the countryside. 0.79

01:00:09.280 He intentionally flees from Jerusalem.

01:00:11.320 But remember, later on, he goes back. 0.59

01:00:15.180 It is okay to temporarily and tactfully, for a time,

01:00:18.700 retreat from large captured cities that hate God,

01:00:23.840 that hate Christianity, and that hate his people.

01:00:27.660 There is a principle there, a timely, perhaps not timeless,

01:00:31.800 but a timely principle that we should consider.

01:00:35.160 Lastly, in the calling of his disciples, I've already said it, but going a little bit more detail now here at the very end.

01:00:42.560 Jesus calls hard men, hard men.

01:00:47.960 Matthew Henry says it like this.

01:00:49.520 Here on the banks of the sea, Christ was walking to call his disciples, not in Herod's court, for a few mighty and noble were called and not to Jerusalem among the chief priest and the elders.

01:01:04.540 But rather, Jesus goes to the Sea of Galilee.

01:01:09.060 Jesus is assembling a team.

01:01:12.620 And where does he think to headhunt for his team?

01:01:16.120 He says, I should go to the country.

01:01:19.220 I need to get blue-collar men.

01:01:22.160 Men who have not been corrupted by all the perversion of the day.

01:01:30.060 Men who need to learn.

01:01:32.040 They were unlearned men.

01:01:33.080 And that doesn't, Jesus, notice, you don't, again, eisegesis is not good.

01:01:37.680 We don't want to say Jesus preferred unlearned men. 0.52

01:01:40.600 And after three years with Jesus, Jesus intentionally made sure that they were still unlearned men.

01:01:46.300 No.

01:01:47.280 Now that would be twisting the text.

01:01:50.420 No, these men who were unlearned became, they became learned men.

01:01:58.600 Jesus discipled them.

01:02:00.500 He taught them for three years.

01:02:04.480 These men attended the greatest seminary the earth has ever held,

01:02:09.040 with the greatest professor, the greatest teacher, known to man,

01:02:14.740 the second member of the Trinity, the Son of God himself.

01:02:19.300 So Jesus went to find men, not to find men who were non-academic and who would never be academic,

01:02:27.520 but to find men who could be taught.

01:02:30.960 He wasn't trying to find men who were never taught

01:02:33.100 so that they would stay that way.

01:02:34.820 He was trying men who up to that point had not been taught

01:02:38.020 so that they would only have to do half the work.

01:02:41.400 Do you know what I mean by that, half the work?

01:02:44.240 For intellectuals today,

01:02:46.160 because all of our institutions have been captured,

01:02:49.480 to teach them, you have to do twice the work.

01:02:52.640 They have to learn, but first they have to unlearn.

01:02:55.840 The disciples didn't have to unlearn.

01:02:58.660 They just had to learn.

01:03:01.640 And so that's part of the reason why Jesus chooses them.

01:03:05.500 He chooses these men.

01:03:07.920 Galilee was a remote part of the nation. 0.60

01:03:09.920 The inhabitants were less cultivated and refined.

01:03:12.520 Their very language was broad and uncouth to the curious.

01:03:16.960 Their speech betrayed them.

01:03:18.380 These guys were rough around the edges.

01:03:21.760 These guys, they used some words.

01:03:25.060 That's probably they didn't use after being with Jesus.

01:03:29.600 But initially, these guys were rough around the edges.

01:03:33.640 These were hard men.

01:03:35.480 Going a little bit more detail here.

01:03:38.080 Four characteristics of these first four men that Jesus chooses.

01:03:42.880 He chooses sets of two brothers.

01:03:46.380 They were poor.

01:03:48.260 They were unlearned, as we've just discussed.

01:03:50.900 But they were also men of industry, business.

01:03:54.380 They had jobs. They weren't unemployed.

01:03:58.400 And they knew how to deal with hardships.

01:04:02.020 As I said earlier, it's not just hard work, fishing, but it's perilous work, dangerous.

01:04:07.560 So they were poor.

01:04:08.960 If they had estates or any considerable stock in trade, Matthew Henry says,

01:04:13.680 then they would not have made fishing their trade.

01:04:17.800 Fishing was not something that you would do if you were rich.

01:04:23.000 these are not recreational fishing guys

01:04:27.260 it's not that Jesus finds them fishing

01:04:29.020 and Jesus just happened to catch them on holiday

01:04:32.020 on vacation

01:04:33.200 no, this is their livelihood

01:04:35.680 and it's a livelihood that you would not choose

01:04:38.460 if you were a person of means

01:04:40.480 they were not, they were poor

01:04:42.760 second, they were unlearned men

01:04:44.880 not bred up on books or literature

01:04:47.400 as Moses was

01:04:48.800 they were not conversant

01:04:51.200 with all the learning of the Egyptians

01:04:53.920 Yet, this will not justify,

01:04:56.000 I like that Matthew Henry adds this,

01:04:58.240 it will not justify the bold intrusion 0.98

01:05:00.980 of ignorant and unqualified men 0.98

01:05:03.480 into the work of ministry. 0.99

01:05:06.240 That's a good qualifier.

01:05:07.720 That's why I've spent so much time laboring.

01:05:10.620 If you have not been professionally trained

01:05:14.920 by modern seminaries today,

01:05:17.580 praise God.

01:05:20.020 But if you use that as an excuse

01:05:22.120 to not ever learn at all, 1.00

01:05:24.520 then you're a fool. 1.00

01:05:26.620 You're a fool. 1.00

01:05:28.940 The fact that Jesus chose unlearned men 1.00

01:05:31.900 is not, it should not be preached

01:05:35.280 or interpreted in such a way to say

01:05:37.360 Jesus prefers people who don't read.

01:05:40.560 No.

01:05:42.460 No.

01:05:44.180 Read.

01:05:45.420 Study.

01:05:47.000 Learn. 0.99

01:05:48.460 But also be like the sons of Issachar

01:05:50.660 and know the times.

01:05:52.120 And if you're living in a time where all of academia,

01:05:55.320 including evangelical academia and all the seminaries

01:05:59.040 have been captured,

01:06:00.960 where the professors right now are teaching, you know,

01:06:04.480 seven-point lessons of why we need more immigrants from Haiti, 0.99

01:06:09.520 then, yeah, you shouldn't go to seminary 1.00

01:06:11.660 if that's the times you're living in.

01:06:14.140 But you should learn.

01:06:16.860 You should learn.

01:06:18.700 You should read from better men, older men.

01:06:22.120 men who taught things well.

01:06:25.340 Number three, they're not just poor and unlearned,

01:06:28.020 but they were men of business, Matthew Henry says.

01:06:31.360 They were working men who had been bred up to labor.

01:06:36.600 Note, diligence in an honest calling is pleasing to Christ

01:06:40.520 and no hindrance to a holy life.

01:06:43.960 I'm just trying to keep my options open.

01:06:45.980 I feel like the Lord might be calling me to ministry,

01:06:49.840 You know, so I don't want to get a full-time job.

01:06:52.700 I don't want to be too busy.

01:06:54.780 I want to be ready and willing

01:06:56.440 so that if Jesus comes like he did to the disciples

01:06:58.900 and he calls me, I'm ready to follow him. 0.92

01:07:02.720 Well, that's not the men that he called.

01:07:05.560 Jesus didn't call men on the unemployment line.

01:07:09.620 Jesus did not come and call men on welfare.

01:07:14.980 Jesus came and called men with full-time jobs

01:07:18.880 And guess what?

01:07:19.960 If Jesus calls you, you can always leave.

01:07:23.560 They dropped their nets and followed him. 1.00

01:07:25.840 Especially the sons of Zebedee.

01:07:27.360 It says they weren't just fishing at that moment.

01:07:29.220 They were mending their nets.

01:07:30.820 That's a good time to call someone who's fishing.

01:07:34.180 That's the equivalent of like, I just got hung.

01:07:37.200 Or I have a massive bird's nest in my reel.

01:07:40.040 And Jesus comes and says, drop your pole.

01:07:42.280 And it's like, praise God. 1.00

01:07:45.460 That is fantastic.

01:07:46.540 That's good news.

01:07:47.300 That's the gospel.

01:07:48.040 right there. That's good news. Come and follow me. Somebody else can untangle the line. But the

01:07:53.780 point is, these men had something to drop. They weren't just sitting under, you know, just just

01:08:00.560 sitting in the courtyard and and just doing nothing and receiving unemployment and a free

01:08:06.060 handout. They were men of business. Diligence and an honest trade is basically what Henry is saying

01:08:12.020 is pleasing to Christ and it will not hinder you to a holy life.

01:08:16.840 If anything, it's even further,

01:08:20.220 idle people lie more open to the temptations of Satan

01:08:25.020 than to the calls of God.

01:08:28.180 It's the person who is busy, who is busy with work.

01:08:32.920 That person is more insulated to the temptation and wiles of the devil

01:08:37.060 and more suitable for the callings of God than the person who is idle.

01:08:42.020 Lastly, number four, they were men who were accustomed to hardships, hazards.

01:08:47.660 The fisher's trade, more than any other, is laborious and perilous.

01:08:52.580 Fishermen must be often wet and cold.

01:08:55.640 They must watch and wait and toil and often in perils by waters.

01:09:00.240 Note, those who have learned to bear hardships and run hazards

01:09:04.060 are best prepared for the fellowship and discipleship of Jesus Christ.

01:09:08.980 Good soldiers of Christ must endure hardness.

01:09:14.000 Jesus called poor men, unlearned men,

01:09:19.240 employed hardworking men,

01:09:21.840 and men who were familiar with danger

01:09:25.140 and were not men who would easily blush

01:09:29.560 or shy away from hazards and perils.

01:09:34.120 That's the kind of men that Jesus called.

01:09:36.660 And he found these men not in Jerusalem.

01:09:40.440 He did not find these men in the house of Herod.

01:09:44.900 These were not men of credentials and they were not men of the urban city.

01:09:50.780 They were men of the country, men who were faithful, men who were hardworking and ready to receive the call of Jesus.

01:10:00.160 That may not be a timeless principle.

01:10:02.240 It was a time when Princeton and Harvard were good places to be.

01:10:07.640 But that time has long been passed.

01:10:10.500 And I think that right now the lay of the land is similar to the landscape in the day of Jesus.

01:10:17.060 Politically, we've been captured by elites who have sold us out.

01:10:22.800 They do not love the native, heritage, American people. 1.00

01:10:27.660 They prefer foreigners. 1.00

01:10:29.620 It is by design. 1.00

01:10:30.900 they want us to be conquered and destroyed. 0.68

01:10:35.140 And in the evangelical scene,

01:10:38.160 the level of the church, culture, and religion,

01:10:41.240 you have a Christianity 1.00

01:10:43.340 that is virtually unrecognizable

01:10:46.300 to the Christianity that Jesus taught.

01:10:49.640 Where everything is spiritualized,

01:10:52.560 nature has been fully forsaken,

01:10:56.060 every principle of the Bible

01:10:57.720 has been turned into somehow 0.86

01:10:59.660 another tool for turning America

01:11:03.220 into a communist nation faster.

01:11:06.500 What did Jesus teach? 0.99

01:11:07.980 More immigration. 0.99

01:11:09.520 Really? 1.00

01:11:10.980 What did Jesus teach?

01:11:13.600 Socialism.

01:11:14.440 Really?

01:11:15.980 What did Jesus teach? 1.00

01:11:18.200 Feminism. 1.00

01:11:18.940 Really? 1.00

01:11:20.480 At every level,

01:11:22.640 every principle of scripture

01:11:24.200 has basically,

01:11:26.460 by evangelicals,

01:11:28.580 by pastors,

01:11:29.660 been twisted to such a degree it's unrecognizable.

01:11:33.780 You can basically read the latest book by Russell Moore

01:11:36.980 and then read just the policies of Kamala Harris

01:11:41.760 and lo and behold, what a coincidence.

01:11:43.700 One and the same.

01:11:45.520 One and the same.

01:11:47.320 That's where we're at.

01:11:49.000 And in that cultural, political moment,

01:11:52.720 yeah, I think you do well to get out of the city.

01:11:54.720 You do well to be unlearned in the academic professional sense, but still disciplined and reading.

01:12:02.020 You do well to be employed and hardworking, but maybe not rich and well off like the elites.

01:12:09.420 You do well to be familiarized with danger and peril and challenge, to be a hard man who doesn't blush with difficulty.

01:12:17.040 you do well to be that kind of person and to be in a rural place that kind of place

01:12:27.460 ready to be faithful day in and day out receiving the call of Jesus but remember the end of the 0.72

01:12:33.920 story if we look at human history if we look at church history Jesus goes he picks rural men

01:12:39.940 But within just a few hundred years, all the capital cities are taken.

01:12:45.920 They're eventually Christianized. 0.81

01:12:48.400 Christianity doesn't stay rule.

01:12:50.440 It starts rule, but eventually the yeast works through the whole batch of dough.

01:12:55.260 The mustard seed grows.

01:12:56.860 And eventually the cities become beacons of light of Christendom.

01:13:02.380 And that light shines bright for centuries, arguably well over a thousand years.

01:13:09.560 Because of rebellion and apostasy, that light has faded and we have been on a decline.

01:13:15.480 The West has been declining for quite a while now. 0.94

01:13:20.220 And so perhaps it's time to start back over in the countryside.

01:13:25.460 And eventually, as we build new institutions, as we raise up new faithful men,

01:13:32.780 and as cities continue to capitulate and collapse,

01:13:36.580 Eventually, the goal is that we would go back in

01:13:38.640 and we would take what the enemy has stolen

01:13:41.460 and that the knowledge of the glory of God

01:13:44.100 really would fill the whole earth

01:13:46.080 as the waters cover the sea.

01:13:48.160 Father, bless your word to your people.

01:13:49.900 We pray that it would bring you glory.

01:13:51.820 Give us the strength to carry it out.

01:13:53.500 In Jesus' name, amen.

The NXR Podcast - September 15, 2024

THE SERMON - Jesus Chooses Blue-Collar Men

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