Covenant Caswell

Deuteronomy 5:20 
The Tenth Commandment 
 
I. What Do You Want? 
1. Do you want to get a brief, emotionally touching, entertaining speech with humor? 
2. Few Christians think about what is really wrong with materialism. The real problem is covetousness. 
II. Do Not Covet 
A. The Meaning of Covetousness 
1. Covetousness: Nelson Rockefeller defined as “enough money”: “Just a little bit more.” 
2. When we covet we want a universe, including the church, that revolves around us. 
3. In authoritarianism you have to do what you’re told; in totalitarianism you have to like it. 
4. Simply wanting is not wrong (like in Buddhism). Our problem wanting the wrong things. 
5. We keep drinking the sea water and wondering why our thirst is never quenched. 
6. Augustine, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.” 
7. We look around and compare. Others have something nicer. We crave it. We’re dissatisfied. 
8. We resent the respect others get. So we try to sabotage it through our sarcasm and cynicism. 
9. The commandment doesn’t let us think that we can get by with God by just obeying outward rules. 
10. It shows us that our heart is full of all the things we scrupulously tried not to do. 
B. Covetousness Burns Down the Church (James 4:1-2) 
1. Our covetousness destroys our Christian community. Covetousness is inherently hostile. 
2. The covetous see the neighbor with the better things and wants the neighbor to not have them. 
3. Instead of rejoicing with those who rejoice, we envy their success. We resent them. 
4. The grateful are not covetous; they do not think they deserve the kindnesses done to them. 
5. If you to be a disciple, then you have to douse the flames of covetousness. 
6. Love the teaching of God’s Word. Like Jesus, desire the Word of God more than bread. 
III. What Do You Want? 
A. Things 
1. We think, if we can get what we want, we’ll be happy. But often we do not know what we want. 
2. A child with a birthday or Christmas wish list shows how naturally covetous we are. 
3. We teach, by practice, that getting things is what makes the day happy. We train kids to be covetous. 
4. We think, if only I could need, so I could buy, so I could – just for a moment – be happy. 
5. You show that in your heart you aren’t satisfied with God, that He’s not providing contentment. 
B. A Romantic Relationship 
1. Someone to adore and to adore you back, to finally cure loneliness. We become desperate. 
2. As desperate, we’re vulnerable when faced with crucial decisions, between the Lord and anyone. 
3. A phantom marriage makes us covet and be dissatisfied with the one we have. It’s a mirage. 
C. The Ideal Family 
1. You want a model family, living harmoniously; everyone dutifully doing their best. 
2. God becomes a small piece in your puzzle of a life. But you still wonder why you want more. 
D. Assurance, Righteousness 
1. You want the feeling of security that you’ll go to heaven because you kept the 10 commandments, 
2. You want to feel righteous, to feel that your life has been good; a sense of eternal safety. 
3. Legalism is a way of desiring righteousness without righteousness being a gift from God. 
4. You don’t want to admit, ‘Just as I am without one plea but that Thy blood was shed for me.’ 
E. To Be Wanted, To Be God 
1. Our problem is that we want to be the object of desire so we worship a god who serves us. 
2. We want to be the one for whom everything else exists. We want to be God. 
3. Covetousness is idolatry (Colossians 3:5). We covet control, being in charge, having the last word. 
4. Covetous religion is rebellious; it doesn’t like someone else telling us what we should do. 
5. We desire what we desire, like Eve in the garden; what looks good to us; what will boost us. 
6. We wanting to satisfy ourselves, because we just can’t believe that God Himself is satisfying. 
IV. We Have This Law to See Therein 
2. The Law is meant as a mirror to reveal our true desires, to show that we desire the wrong thing. 
3. It shows us that we might not know what we want but left to ourselves, we don’t want the Lord. 
4. We don’t want a totalitarian Lord who tells us to bring every thought captive to obey Him. 
5. In Romans 7 we’re told,“We have this law to see therein that we have not been free from sin.” 
6. We cannot please God without desire, without our desperately desiring Him. 
7. To obey this commandment, our worship must be passionate, our prayers intense, our service a joy. 
V. Invitation: We love Him because He first loved us. The commandment has come to show us how dead we really are. But Jesus Christ did not covet His own pleasure but gave Himself up for us. So we can be saved, have a new heart that likes God’s ways and loves Him. So, cry out, at the end of the Ten Commandments, “have mercy Lord.”

Deuteronomy 5:20
The Tenth Commandment

I. What Do You Want?
1. Do you want to get a brief, emotionally touching, entertaining speech with humor?
2. Few Christians think about what is really wrong with materialism. The real problem is covetousness. 
II. Do Not Covet
A. The Meaning of Covetousness
1. Covetousness: Nelson Rockefeller defined as “enough money”: “Just a little bit more.”
2. When we covet we want a universe, including the church, that revolves around us.
3. In authoritarianism you have to do what you’re told; in totalitarianism you have to like it.
4. Simply wanting is not wrong (like in Buddhism). Our problem wanting the wrong things.
5. We keep drinking the sea water and wondering why our thirst is never quenched.
6. Augustine, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.”
7. We look around and compare. Others have something nicer. We crave it. We’re dissatisfied. 
8. We resent the respect others get. So we try to sabotage it th

Deuteronomy 5:20, The Tenth Commandment

Deuteronomy 5:20 
The Ninth Commandment 
 
I. Do You Believe the Truth Is Good For You? 
A. The Story of Ergun Caner 
1. Caner claimed to have been a devout Muslim, trained to be a terrorist, from Turkey. 
2. His claims were lies. But those lies opened the doors for him to be a seminary president. 
3. Even after was exposed in 2010, he was made president of a Baptist college. 
4. He looked like he was going to get away with it when, in 2014, his son committed suicide. 
5. It is an fantasy that people will love truth and not tolerate lies. We should make it reality. 
B. Do Not Bear False Witness Against Your Neighbor 
1. Don’t commit perjury, like the “worthless men” who accused Naboth (1 Kings 21). 
2. Over and over again in the Bible, God is telling us to tell the truth. 
a. In Proverbs 6, the Lord hates a “lying tongue”, “a false witness who breathes out lies.” 
b. Revelation 21:8, “all liars” “will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur”. 
3. It forbids injustice. It doesn’t allow us to ignore the truth to get the result we want. 
II. Loving the Truth In a World That Doesn’t Believe the Truth Is Good For Us 
A. Taste and See What Is Good 
1. Put away “all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander” (1 Peter 2:1-3). 
2. We love the truth – especially the truth of God’s Word – just like a newborn baby loves milk. 
3. If you like lies, flattery, malicious gossip, etc., you don’t just have a bad habit. 
4. You need to really taste that the Lord is good. Once you do that, then you’ll love the truth. 
5. “Do not hate your brother in your heart. Rebuke your neighbor frankly so you will not share in his guilt.” (Leviticus 19:17.) Failing to rebuke him when he is in sin is to hate him. 
6. You can destroy someone’s spiritual health by giving them too much flattery. 
B. The Commandment Violated in the Omission 
1. We need candor. Not telling unpleasant but vital truths is not loving the truth. 
2. In Leviticus 5:1, refusing to give evidence is like giving false evidence. 
3. Like a doctor must sometimes tell people hard truths, we have to tell hard truths. 
4. Being a Christian does not mean always being positive and encouraging (Matthew 10:34-36). 
C. Love for the Truth: The Foundation of our Community 
1. It doesn’t allow us to ignore the truth to get the result we want. 
2. Our church must have at its center a belief that the Truth is good for us. 
3. The body is built up by “speaking the truth in love” (Ephesians 4). 
4. We grow up to be grounded and mature by having the truth spoken to us, in love. 
5. Real relationships depend on integrity. You can’t trust the two-faced person. 
D. Love Our Neighbor Enough to Tell Him the Truth 
1. Our refusal to tell people the truth keeps them from the opportunity to repent. 
2. Being a truthful community means we love the truth so we listen when corrected. 
3. Psychiatrist M. Scott Peck (The People of the Lie) says evil people avoid the truth. 
4. The most offensive thing to them is the light of truth exposing who they really are. 
5. Churches have become magnets for those who think they can say anything about anyone. 
6. The Lord Jesus said that Satan is “the father of lies” (John 8:44). He begets lies. 
7. We are all born liars. So we reveal our true parentage. 
E. If We Love the Truth, We’ll Give It to the World 
1. The world does not love the truth. A deceitful world is threatened by a life lived truthfully. 
2. The world killed the One who is “The Way, the Truth, and the life.” 
3. But we owe it to them anyway, especially our honesty in explaining the Christian message. 
4. Satan bore false witness against God. He snidely implied something slanderous about God. 
5. Our first parents believed that lie; and we believe that lie every time we disobey God. 
6. The hard truth is we disobey God because we have inherited the same nature distrust of God. 
7. We also owe the world a marvelous truth: the truth that there is hope, the gospel. 
III. Invitation: The Father took our idolatry, and murder, adultery, and thievery and placed them on the sinless Son; He took our mountain of lies and laid them on the Truth Himself; the Truth in the flesh paid for our lies. If we will but believe that, then we can start loving the Truth, and taste that the Lord is good.

Deuteronomy 5:20
The Ninth Commandment

I. Do You Believe the Truth Is Good For You?
A. The Story of Ergun Caner
1. Caner claimed to have been a devout Muslim, trained to be a terrorist, from Turkey.
2. His claims were lies. But those lies opened the doors for him to be a seminary president.
3. Even after was exposed in 2010, he was made president of a Baptist college.
4. He looked like he was going to get away with it when, in 2014, his son committed suicide.
5. It is an fantasy that people will love truth and not tolerate lies. We should make it reality.
B. Do Not Bear False Witness Against Your Neighbor
1. Don’t commit perjury, like the “worthless men” who accused Naboth (1 Kings 21).
2. Over and over again in the Bible, God is telling us to tell the truth.
a. In Proverbs 6, the Lord hates a “lying tongue”, “a false witness who breathes out lies.”
b. Revelation 21:8, “all liars” “will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur”.
3. It forbids injustice. It doesn’t allow us to ig

Deuteronomy 5:20, The Ninth Commandment

Deuteronomy 5:19 
The Eighth Commandment 
 
I. Don’t Steal 
1. John Winthrop said, “We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our [luxuries], for the supply of others’ necessities.” The first case of church discipline in Puritan New England was for profiteering. 
2. When we scratch below the surface we open a can of worms: Who’s to say what belongs someone? 
3. Is my house, my furniture, my vehicles, my money all ultimately mine, to do with as I please? 
4. Often this commandment is interpreted to support the right to private property. That’s only half-true. 
5. The commandment is first not about rights but about responsibilities. 
II. God Is the Owner, You’re the Steward 
A. The Heart of Stealing 
1. “You don’t own anything!” You are responsible for things. You’re a steward. 
2. God owns it all. Some of it He has distributed to you, either through your work or as a gift. 
3. Keeping too much change from a cashier is stealing. A shop-lifter is a thief, even if he’s poor. 
4. Living in an apartment without paying rent is stealing from the landlord. 
5. Stealing is the attempt to take something that God has not provided that we should have. 
6. The thief decides he knows best to whom something should belong. 
7. The thief is anyone who does not recognize God’s claim to everything. 
B. Stewardship 
1. If you forget you’re merely a steward, if you think you’re an owner, then you’re a thief. 
2. Cotton Mather said, “All that we have is but a loan from the Great God unto us.” 
3. Psalm 50:10-12, “every animal of the forest is mine,. . . the world is mine, and all that is in it.” 
4. We can steal our own things if we forget we are but stewards and start acting like we are owners. 
5. Because we are stewards, we have to take care of things. We have responsibilities to improve. 
6. The parable of the talents (Matthew 25:14-30) shows that God expects us to grow what He gave. 
7. We need to have these words ringing in our ears at all times, ‘Render account of your stewardship’. 
8. Lotteries and other forms of gambling are lousy ways to invest, poor stewardship. 
9. Laziness is a sin because it is squandering of our time, of our opportunities to be good stewards. 
III. The Commonwealth 
1. We are called to use our time and our jobs to add, not only to our wealth but to the “common wealth.” 
2. Don’t confuse love with indulgence. Stop stealing by giving to people in a way that really helps them. 
3. The Apostle Paul said that if someone will not work, then don’t let them eat (2 Thessalonians 3:10). 
4. We don’t do people favors if we don’t expect them to work and contribute, to pull their own weight. 
5. Israel was to leave some of their crops unharvested for the poor to take for themselves (Lev.19:9). 
IV. Stealing From God 
1. In Malachi 3 the people were stealing from God by not contributing to worship, to the ministry. 
2. If we can look at the cross and think we owe only a percentage, then we’ve not seen the cross rightly. 
3. Our church covenant says, give “cheerfully for the support of the ministry, the expenses of the church”, 
4. Acts 4:32, says that “no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own”. 
5. Ananias and Sapphira gave to the common pool, publicly, but not the full amount, lying to the church. 
6. The church is involved in your giving. You are accountable to the church. 
7. Giving is a major part of your discipleship, not private. The church is all about making disciples. 
8. If you can do something special (like go to Disney World) without stealing from God, then you may. 
9. No thief will inherit the Kingdom of God; every thief will go to hell (1 Corinthians 6:10). 
V. Invitation: Christ is used to being around thieves. He died hanging between two of them. And one of them believed. Because of the crucifixion of a Man just feet from him, he would not have to endure the wrath of heaven. Are you a thief? That one penny you kept as if it were your own, you stole from God. As a thief, if you are to be right with God, then you must repent, confess your sins, renounce your claim to own something. Let go of your claims to deserve, to own, to have rights. Come to Him and give — not just some spare change — give your whole life to Him as a living sacrifice.

Deuteronomy 5:19
The Eighth Commandment

I. Don’t Steal
1. John Winthrop said, “We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our [luxuries], for the supply of others’ necessities.” The first case of church discipline in Puritan New England was for profiteering. 
2. When we scratch below the surface we open a can of worms: Who’s to say what belongs someone?
3. Is my house, my furniture, my vehicles, my money all ultimately mine, to do with as I please?
4. Often this commandment is interpreted to support the right to private property. That’s only half-true.
5. The commandment is first not about rights but about responsibilities.
II. God Is the Owner, You’re the Steward
A. The Heart of Stealing
1. “You don’t own anything!” You are responsible for things. You’re a steward.
2. God owns it all. Some of it He has distributed to you, either through your work or as a gift.
3. Keeping too much change from a cashier is stealing. A shop-lifter is a thief, even if he’s poor.
4. Living in an apartment

Deuteronomy 5:19, The Eighth Commandment

Deuteronomy 5:18 
The Seventh Commandment 
 
I. Sex and Discipleship 
1. A Puritan church had a lady member who brought to the church her husband for not having enough sex. 
2. If there were more real, Biblical disciples in our society, there would be more sex. 
3. The Biblical prescription is that a couple has sex whenever either spouse needs. 
II. The Commandment 
1. The seventh commandment does not say “No sex.” It focuses on the illegitimate sex, the adultery. 
2. Sex is created by God before there was sin. If there had been no sin, there would still have been sex. 
3. “The two shall become one flesh” (1 Corinthians 6:16) refers to a uniting of a couple during sex. 
III. For the Glory of God 
1. “Whether we eat or drink, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor 10:31), especially with marriage. 
2. Get married to glorify God in our marriage, that she will help me serve the Lord, etc. 
3. In 1 Corinthians 7:2-5 the Apostle instructs couples not to deprive each other of sex. 
4. The Biblical way is that I am in this marriage to help my spouse serve God. 
5. Satisfying them decreases their vulnerability to sin; it helps them obey the Lord. It’s all about God. 
6. The husband and wife have a higher commitment than their marriage that even motivates their sex. 
7. Some people put all their hopes for happiness in their spouse and that’s too much for any of us to bear. 
8. If we make an idol out of our spouse, in the end we cannot help but be disillusioned. 
9. If we love our husband or wife as a way of loving God, then we will have a happier marriage. 
IV. Adultery 
A. A Breach of the Marital Covenant 
1. Adultery is an attempt to enjoy the pleasure of a covenant without the responsibility of the covenant. 
2. The Lord Jesus tells us (Matthew 5) that a legalistic approach can still be just as adulterous. 
3. Don’t expect credit from God if you have all the drive to be an adulterer but lack the opportunity. 
4. The legalistic approach thinks this command is all about lines, keeping in borders. 
5. The smug religious person thinks he or she hasn’t crossed the line but they are burning with the lust. 
B. Sin 
1. Jesus said if you could eliminate sin by cutting off your hand, it would be worth it. 
2. But, sin is not in your hand or your eye. It’s in your heart; it infects every part of your soul. 
3. Many people feel that sex is dirty. Greco-Roman culture, with Platonic philosophy taught so. 
4. Puritans had a healthy view of sex and a Biblical view of sin. Sin is being selfish, willful. 
5. If it’s your view that it is the sex that makes something sinful, you didn’t get that from the Bible. 
6. In 1 Corinthians 5, the sexually immoral are compared to the greedy, idolaters, revilers, etc. 
7. It was lack of repentance, obstinacy, stubbornly remaining in sin that brought about discipline. 
C. Adultery for the Single 
1. Sex consummates your marriage. 1 Corinthians 6 talks about becoming “one flesh” to a prostitute. 
2. Only have sex with the one with whom you have thoughtfully entered into a covenant. 
3. Though sex is holy, it should be kept private. Being sexually provocative is only for marriage. 
4. For an attractive young person to use his or her body to allure and manipulate others is selfish. 
D. Sex Soaked Culture 
1. Pornography is about stoking lust, lighting a fire your spouse should be lighting and satisfying. 
2. The sexually immoral will not inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9). They will go to hell. 
3. If lust is chasing you, pursue holiness. Sometimes being chased is the incentive to run faster. 
4. We live in a sex soaked culture. Advertisers and Hollywood has discovered that “sex sells.” 
5. They make it seem normal to be promiscuous, immodest, and focused on the “sexy body.” 
6. Jesus calls to take up our cross, deny physical desires’ claim to rule us. Seek first God’s rule. 
V. Invitation: Adultery is breaking a covenant because you want the pleasure that belongs to another; you don’t want any rule over you, no covenant restraining you. If we have been born again, we have new hearts that seek to live under God’s rule, in His Kingdom, then He’s written a new covenant on our hearts. We’ll stop being adulterers when we so long to be made right we are willing to chop off our hands or scoop our eyes but we know that’s not where the trouble lies. The trouble lies in our self-centered hearts, which now He has made new, born again, with a new covenant written on it. Stop, turn around, and really believe in Him now.

Deuteronomy 5:18
The Seventh Commandment

I. Sex and Discipleship
1. A Puritan church had a lady member who brought to the church her husband for not having enough sex.
2. If there were more real, Biblical disciples in our society, there would be more sex.
3. The Biblical prescription is that a couple has sex whenever either spouse needs.
II. The Commandment
1. The seventh commandment does not say “No sex.” It focuses on the illegitimate sex, the adultery.
2. Sex is created by God before there was sin. If there had been no sin, there would still have been sex.
3. “The two shall become one flesh” (1 Corinthians 6:16) refers to a uniting of a couple during sex. 
III. For the Glory of God
1. “Whether we eat or drink, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor 10:31), especially with marriage.
2. Get married to glorify God in our marriage, that she will help me serve the Lord, etc.
3. In 1 Corinthians 7:2-5 the Apostle instructs couples not to deprive each other of sex.
4. The Biblical way is 

Deuteronomy 5:18, The Seventh Commandment

Deuteronomy 5:17 
The Sixth Commandment 
 
I. Men With Chests 
1. Sergeants Shughart and Gordon asked to be dropped into Mogadishu, Somalia to protect their friend. 
2. They were not “men without chests.” The pilot was saved alive but they were killed. 
3. Jesus said, There is no greater love than a man lay down his life for his friends. 
II. The Commandment’s Bias 
1. The only controversy is whether it prohibits all killing or only murder. Murder is unjust, illegal killing. 
2. The message of the whole Bible includes the death penalty and invading the Promised Land. 
3. In Deuteronomy 4:42 the same word is used of the one “who kills his neighbor unintentionally.” 
4. God’s general rule, before we get into the details of capital punishment, etc., is “No killing.” 
5. The broad command shows us where God’s bias lies; the fundamental guiding principles. 
6. This commandment is broad: No killing. The exceptions prove the rule. 
III. The Commandment’s Meaning 
A. More Than Just the Exclusion of Violence 
1. It means that I be willing to sacrifice my prize ox (or dog) to protect someone’s life. 
2. When our luxuries are more important than others’ essentials, we wish they’d die. 
3. A trick is to make the command only apply to some human beings, usually the ones like me. 
4. In our day, people are saying we should be able to do it based on age or disability. 
5. If you are very old and suffering dementia, many want to say you should be “out” and euthanatized. 
6. If you are very young – still in the womb – you have no rights (they say). The fetus is killed. 
7. The fetus is alive. It’s human. Therefore, it is human life. The sixth commandment covers it. 
8. Downs Syndrome is not a “Reason for Abortion.” That should be a passionate conviction. 
B. Anger 
1. Anger, as we usually experience it, is a sinful thing. We are often angry because we feel insulted. 
2. Maybe the only reason we’re not acting on our murder is because we’re afraid of being caught. 
3. Why should God excuse someone for murder if they were too lazy to do what they wanted to do? 
4. If God only punished those who acted on their anger, then He’d be rewarding hypocrites. 
5. People should not be utterly drained of all anger. We are to be angry when innocent life is crushed. 
6. We are to be what C. S. Lewis called men “with chests,” a passion for things larger than ourselves. 
7. C. S. Lewis (in The Abolition of Man): this culture has a defect of “fertile and generous emotion.” 
8. “We make men without chests . . . We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.” 
9. That thing within us that should make us passionate for life and honor has shrunk. 
10. We disobey this command when we have one kind of anger and when we do not have another kind. 
C. Sometimes We Have to Kill to Save Life 
1. The bias is against killing but sometimes some have to be killed to save others. 
2. In World War 2, the allies had to kill a lot of Germans in order to liberate Germans. 
3. We brought all these horrible things into this world through our sins. Then we blame God. 
D. Anger at God 
1. The crucifixion shows what self-willed people will do to God when He comes in human flesh. 
2. The opposite of murder is submission, meekness, a willingness to lay down one’s life for others. 
3. The opposite of the murderer is Jesus. The people chose a murderer (Barabbas) over Life Himself. 
4. Abel found grace in the eyes of the Lord and Cain hated and killed him for it. 
5. Do you hate your life? Suicide is self-murder and no more right than any other murder. 
6. Hand over your resentments, your anger, your hatreds, to God. Submit to His rule over you. 
IV. Invitation: Christ gave His life in exchange for a murderer. He gave Himself in exchange for you. He knew you were a murderer. He even knew that in your resentments, you would murder Him too. But He submitted. Now, won’t you submit to Him and let Him change your heart?

Deuteronomy 5:17
The Sixth Commandment

I. Men With Chests
1. Sergeants Shughart and Gordon asked to be dropped into Mogadishu, Somalia to protect their friend.
2. They were not “men without chests.” The pilot was saved alive but they were killed.
3. Jesus said, There is no greater love than a man lay down his life for his friends.
II. The Commandment’s Bias
1. The only controversy is whether it prohibits all killing or only murder. Murder is unjust, illegal killing.
2. The message of the whole Bible includes the death penalty and invading the Promised Land.
3. In Deuteronomy 4:42 the same word is used of the one “who kills his neighbor unintentionally.”
4. God’s general rule, before we get into the details of capital punishment, etc., is “No killing.”
5. The broad command shows us where God’s bias lies; the fundamental guiding principles.
6. This commandment is broad: No killing. The exceptions prove the rule.
III. The Commandment’s Meaning
A. More Than Just the Exclusion of Violence


Deuteronomy 5:17, The Sixth Commandment

The Fifth Commandment 
Deuteronomy 5:16, 21:18-21 
 
I. Our Experience of Our Parents Effects How We See God 
A. Psychotherapy 
1. A girl was diagnosed with “reactive-detachment disorder” so was put through “rebirthing” therapy. 
2. The therapists squeezed too hard, crushing her to death. Such are human attempts to birth again. 
3. We can see our parents in light of God, rather than make a god in the image of our parents. 
4. Sigmund Freud taught that we are in a constant struggle with our parents (the Oedipus complex). 
5. For many people, their experience of their parents effects how we feel toward God. 
6. Children of indulgent parents don’t understand discipline or discipleship or the church. 
7. Our experience of God changes our view of our parents. 
B. Honor 
1. In Chinese culture, children are expected to grow up to take care of their parents. 
2. In American culture, this commandment is treated as something trivial. Nice but not significant. 
3. The word “honor” comes from the Hebrew word “kabod”, meaning heavy. Treat with gravity. 
4. The commands to execute disobedient children came from God. The Lord Jesus repeated them. 
5. In 1 Corinthians 5:13, disrespecting parents is like sexual immorality, greed, insulting scoffing, etc. 
II. Restraint 
A. Restraint On Self-Centeredness 
1. Sin is willfulness, the insistence that I will do what I will do; my appetites, my ego, will rule. 
2. We’re told to honor someone else, altogether out of our control, who will require sacrifice from us. 
3. The command restrains our tendency to only love people of our choosing, for our own purposes. 
B. Parents Are Restraints on Children’s Selfishness 
1. Our egotism must be restrained. This commandment reaches in to the nitty-gritty of our daily lives. 
2. We are tempted to view our aged parents as burdens that drain away our hard earned cash. 
3. God reaches into our selfishness, stands before the tank of our individualism, and says, “Honor.” 
III. Relationships 
1. This commandment is the bedrock of our relationships. If we cannot relate honorably with our parents who cared for us when we were helpless, how can we relate well with others? We can’t. 
2. The command doesn’t mean denying the problems that existed. Be thankful for what you can. 
3. God starts with the parent-child relationship because this is where authority begins. 
4. You can’t earn the respect of disrespectful people. You can’t earn the trust of distrusting people. 
5. How we treat the first authority we come across (our parents), shows how we feel about The Authority. 
IV. Reliance 
1. People today hate to admit to being reliant. This command to remind us of our reliance. 
2. To keep this command you must reject the lie of individual independence, that you’re self-sustaining. 
3. Your parents were the instruments in God’s hands to bring you into this world and preserve you. 
V. Reward 
A. The First Commandment With a Promise 
1. This command comes with a promise that it may go well with us, that we’ll live. 
2. God will reward us personally for sacrificial care of our parents, either now or later. 
3. Those who build a society in which old age is honored can expect to enjoy that place themselves. 
B. Jesus Fulfilled the Promise of the Fifth Commandment 
1. Luke 2:51 tells us Jesus was submissive to his sinful, merely human parents. 
2. Attending to the needs of His mother was so important, it’s one of the things He did on the cross. 
3. He came out of death, alive. In the resurrection, the promise of the fifth commandment is fulfilled. 
VI. Invitation: Even the best parents cannot but help to fail. They will disappoint us. If we are building our impressions about who God is based on our parents, we will have a dishonoring view of God. Trapped in that old cage of only knowing God through the image of your parents, you can’t honor parents who were disappointing. We need to be born again. We must encounter the real, living God. We must be transformed by Him and get to know Him as He really is. When we have tasted that He is good, it makes it possible for us to see that every good thing we received from our parents was a gift from God through our parents. You need a change of heart. You need to be born again.

The Fifth Commandment
Deuteronomy 5:16, 21:18-21

I. Our Experience of Our Parents Effects How We See God
A. Psychotherapy
1. A girl was diagnosed with “reactive-detachment disorder” so was put through “rebirthing” therapy.
2. The therapists squeezed too hard, crushing her to death. Such are human attempts to birth again.
3. We can see our parents in light of God, rather than make a god in the image of our parents.
4. Sigmund Freud taught that we are in a constant struggle with our parents (the Oedipus complex).
5. For many people, their experience of their parents effects how we feel toward God.
6. Children of indulgent parents don’t understand discipline or discipleship or the church.
7. Our experience of God changes our view of our parents.
B. Honor
1. In Chinese culture, children are expected to grow up to take care of their parents.
2. In American culture, this commandment is treated as something trivial. Nice but not significant.
3. The word “honor” comes from the Hebrew word “ka

The Fifth Commandment, Deuteronomy 5:16, 21:18-21

Deuteronomy 5:12-15 
The Fourth Commandment 
 
I. “Arbeit Macht Frei” (German for “Work Makes Free”) 
1. “Work makes free,” was the promise, emblazoned in iron over the gate of an institution 70 years ago. 
2. In anything we do, from athletics to academics to marriage to careers, the secret to success is hard work. 
3. That institution promising freedom for work, was Auschwitz. Sometimes the promise is a lie. 
II. God Wants Worshippers, Not Workers 
A. People Don’t Naturally Rest 
1. God doesn’t want workers but worshippers, people who trust Him and rest. 
2. People do not keep the Sabbath because they can’t. Their faith finds no resting place. 
3. They just can’t rest. There is no peace, no rest for the wicked (Isaiah 48:22). 
B. Observe 
1. Do it. “Keep it holy,” separate from the normal, daily pattern. 
2. “To the Lord” (5:14). It’s not just a day off. We serve the Lord by not doing any work. 
3. We were slaves to sin. Our work didn’t gain our freedom. God did. Redemption is the reason. 
4. Remember, (5:15) it’s not work that makes you free. It’s grace that makes free. 
5. In the OT, they worked toward the Sabbath. We look back, we work from our Sabbath. 
C. The Most Disputed Commandment 
1. Many today claim it is not for us; that it was just for Israel. It’s not repeated in the New Testament. 
2. Yet it applies even to “the sojourner (i.e. foreigner) who is within your gates” (5:14). 
3. Salvation doesn’t free us from the commandment. It frees us for rest. 
4. Now that we don’t have to be incessant workers, we can be worshippers. 
5. Legalists make Sabbath observance a work that promises work makes free. 
6. Don't keep the Sabbath because you have to. That is work that won’t set you free. 
7. God is looking for worshippers, not workers. You worship Him when you take His light yoke. 
8. He will give you rest. It’s not work that makes free. It’s the Lord of the Sabbath. 
9. Our coming to church does not make us worshippers. Only God can truly make us worshippers. 
10. We make a declaration in the way we worship. We simply sit and listen, taking in the Word. 
11. “Six days you shall do all your work.” So every legitimate job can be done as service to God. 
12. If we are a worshipper, we worship Him by resting in His presence, with His people. 
13. “Strive to enter that rest,” by remembering that you’re not just a worker but a worshipper. 
14. Assembling together is one way of striving to enter God’s rest (Hebrews 10:25). 
15. In Sabbath keeping, we celebrate being a community that has been redeemed. 
16. If in church, you are not worshipping, you are working. And you are breaking the commandment. 
III. Four Rs to Keep the Sabbath 
A. Rest 
1. Practically we need to discipline ourselves to rest. Sometimes it takes discipline not to work. 
2. Our restaurant workers have an admirable work ethic. But you have a need to rest. 
3. Put your hope in the Lord, not in uncertain riches and show that by resting from money-making. 
4. We keep the Sabbath by trusting in the Lord, that He is able to sustain us so we don’t have to work. 
B. Remember 
1. Remember, you were a slave. Work wasn’t setting you free. Slaves never earn anything. 
2. We keep the Sabbath by “remembering” what Christ has done for you to win your salvation 
C. Relish: “call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the Lord honorable. . .”. (Isaiah 58:13) 
D. Revere 
1. In keeping the Sabbath we show that our time is not our own. We have a temple in time. 
2. In that sacred temple in time we show that our lives are about more than being productive or fun. 
3. We are worshippers and so we stop for the temple in time and revere Him who set us free. 
IV. Invitation: This command comes, really, as an invitation to worship, an invitation to Christ. God actively prevents people from enjoying true rest until they believe. Until they’re worshippers (Hebrews 4:3-5). We still have “fightings and fears within, without” because, as another hymn puts it, our faith hasn’t yet found a resting place. Until we cast ourselves unreservedly into the arms of the Lord, we cannot have rest. Come, all who are weary and heavy laden; come those of you who are tired of striving. Strive to enter that rest. Come to Him. Be a worshipper, not a worker. He will give you rest.

Deuteronomy 5:12-15
The Fourth Commandment

I. “Arbeit Macht Frei” (German for “Work Makes Free”)
1. “Work makes free,” was the promise, emblazoned in iron over the gate of an institution 70 years ago.
2. In anything we do, from athletics to academics to marriage to careers, the secret to success is hard work.
3. That institution promising freedom for work, was Auschwitz. Sometimes the promise is a lie.
II. God Wants Worshippers, Not Workers
A. People Don’t Naturally Rest
1. God doesn’t want workers but worshippers, people who trust Him and rest.
2. People do not keep the Sabbath because they can’t. Their faith finds no resting place.
3. They just can’t rest. There is no peace, no rest for the wicked (Isaiah 48:22).
B. Observe
1. Do it. “Keep it holy,” separate from the normal, daily pattern.
2. “To the Lord” (5:14). It’s not just a day off. We serve the Lord by not doing any work.
3. We were slaves to sin. Our work didn’t gain our freedom. God did. Redemption is the reason.
4. Remembe

Deuteronomy 5:12-15, The Fourth Commandment

The Third Commandment 
Deuteronomy 5:11 
 
I. Freedom of Speech 
1. Even with freedom of speech, there are some words we’re not supposed to say, we can be sued, etc. 
2. The highest, most valuable thing is not the freedom to speak our mind, it is the glory of God. 
3. If we outlawed blasphemy, they’d still be blaspheming God in their hearts – and God would know it. 
4. The commandments are for those who seek to live under the God’s rule. 
II. What’s In a Name? 
1. Shakespeare’s Romeo said, “What’s in a name? A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.” 
2. “There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12) 
3. The sons of Sceva, were attacked by demons for using the name “Jesus” as a magic word (Acts 19:14). 
4. Names of people often reveal the values of the culture they’re in. Mary’s Chinese name is Hwee Ai. 
5. Ancient people believed that by naming a thing one had power over it. Adam named the animals. 
6. The Jehovah’s Witnesses think they have special insight of God’s name but they get it wrong. 
7. This commandment directs the mouth and tongue to God, because out of the heart, the mouth speaks. 
III. What Is True Profanity? 
1. Third Commandment exists to tell us what kinds of words are really profane. 
2. To profane is to take something that is special and holy, and treat it as something common, cheap. 
3. Using Christian language, references to God, to Christ, to salvation, to wrap up a lie is true profanity. 
4. It’s about why we shouldn’t speak of God as light things for our purposes. 
5. We can become so familiar with God’s name, we no longer have a fear of using these terms wrongly. 
6. Using God’s name without a sense of reverent fear of Him, is highly offensive, more than “cuss” words. 
IV. Taking His Name in Vain 
1. We take His name in vain when we ascribe the Name of God to any other God than the Trinity. 
2. Out of the heart, the mouth speaks. Our words show how seriously we take the Lord. 
3. Literally translated as, ‘You shall not lift up the name of the Lord your God to emptiness.’ 
4. Whenever we say that some teaching, some leading is “of God.” It better be. 
5. We obey it when we so feel the gravity of His Word that we obey it even when it is uncomfortable. 
6. Blasphemy is using the name of God for our own purposes, like sowing “Gott mit uns” onto uniforms. 
7. We blaspheme when we use the Name of God without real fear of Him, as though He is our pet. 
8. We take God’s name in vain when we use it like frosting on our cake, making God part of our lies. 
9. We should be people of such honestly, that we don’t have to take vows to mean what we say (Mt. 5:37). 
10. Not using the Lord’s name in vain means using it like we mean it, to feel the weight of it. 
11. We need to feel as personally about His name as He does. We should feel the indignation that God feels. 
12. In Leviticus 24, a young man used God’s name blasphemously and was executed for it. 
13. Those who heard him were to feel him before they killed him to learn not to use God’s name lightly. 
14. As we grow to be more like God, we should grow to be more offended by treating His name lightly. 
V. Out of the Heart, the Mouth Speaks 
1. God tells me what I can and cannot say. Even what I can and cannot think. God is the ultimate Ruler. 
2. The government might hold us guiltless if we misuse God’s name. But God will not. 
3. Why is He such a totalitarian that He puts in the ten commandments about how we should talk? 
4. Because out of our heart, our mouth speaks. If we use the Lord’s name in vain, we hold Him to be light. 
5. If we take His name lightly, in our words, it’s because we take Him lightly in our hearts. 
6. The third commandment shows us the hollowness of our hearts, that we don’t reverence Him as Lord. 
VI. Invitation: The good news is that He has given us His name not so He can hold it against us when we use it wrongly but so that we can call to Him for salvation. “Everyone who calls on the Name of the Lord shall be saved”, saved from sin and death, set free. If you want to be truly free, call on His name right now.

The Third Commandment
Deuteronomy 5:11

I. Freedom of Speech
1. Even with freedom of speech, there are some words we’re not supposed to say, we can be sued, etc.
2. The highest, most valuable thing is not the freedom to speak our mind, it is the glory of God.
3. If we outlawed blasphemy, they’d still be blaspheming God in their hearts – and God would know it.
4. The commandments are for those who seek to live under the God’s rule.
II. What’s In a Name?
1. Shakespeare’s Romeo said, “What’s in a name? A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.”
2. “There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12)
3. The sons of Sceva, were attacked by demons for using the name “Jesus” as a magic word (Acts 19:14).
4. Names of people often reveal the values of the culture they’re in. Mary’s Chinese name is Hwee Ai.
5. Ancient people believed that by naming a thing one had power over it. Adam named the animals.
6. The Jehovah’s Witnesses think they have spe

The Third Commandment, Deuteronomy 5:11

Deuteronomy 5:8-10 
The Second Commandment 
 
I. People Forget What Something Is For 
1. A Bible college library in Ethiopia closed the library to preserve the books. What’s a library for? 
2. What is the church for? Those inside, those outside or God above? 
3. Some have an “as you like it” attitude. Whatever suits your tastes: traditional or contemporary. 
4. People think that worship is “of the people”, “by the people,” and “for the people”. 
5. There's a third option: looking up to the God up there. There’s an audience of One we should attend to. 
6. In the second commandment God demands that all worship be done as He directs. 
II. What Is Worship For? 
A. Not For Yourself 
1. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image.” Notice that, “for yourself.” 
2. People make aids in worship which we think are good but are not really about worshipping God. 
3. If it’s “for us” it’s about us. They express who we are, what we want, and our desire to control God. 
4. Worship that comes from us, a product of our imagination, for our purposes, is not real worship. 
5. Worship is not for us. It’s for God. And for it to be real, it has be done God’s way. 
6. Idols stand for the way of life of the people who worship them. It was of, by, and for the people. 
B. Worship Of, By and For the Lord 
1. His worship is not merely an expression of culture. It is of the Lord, by the Lord, and for the Lord. 
2. In Exodus 32, Aaron made a golden calf and declared it “the LORD” (Yahweh). 
3. Aaron made an image of God. It was a violation, not of the first, but of the second commandment. 
4. The Eastern Orthodox draws people to accept “icons” because people aren’t careful to avoid images. 
5. The Lord Jesus said, “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” 
6. To those who don’t make worship for themselves, God commits that they get something out of it. 
7. Images in worship diminish, insult God’s glory. They’re for us. Not for God. 
C. Notice the Specificity 
1. The command is not ‘Do not commit idolatry,’ leaving it up to us to decide what makes for idolatry. 
2. Two elements are required: an image and bowing down. 
3. It’s not wrong to have images, art, family pictures, decorations, etc, not if you don’t bow to them. 
4. It’s not photos of passed family members that is wrong but joss sticks, prayers, hell money, etc. 
5. What is prohibited is exactly described, not left up to us to decide whether what is idolatry. 
6. Idolatry arises from an exchange of the truth for a lie; out of suppression of the truth (Romans 1). 
7. People lie that they don’t serve the money god; they’ve just got bills to pay, a family to support, etc. 
8. We always lie to protect our idols. How much more likely we are to lie about our (non-literal) idols. 
III. Why Does God Take Worship So Seriously? 
A. Jealous 
1. “For — because — I the LORD your God am a jealous God.” He wants no rival to our affections. 
2. We love other people or things because we see in them something of the goodness and glory of God. 
3. The Lord is determined not simply to be our highest god but our only one. 
4. The Hebrew word for “jealous” denotes an intense emotional reaction to any affront to God’s glory. 
5. Boredom, with God, with His Word, is an insult to His passion for worship. 
6. God equates violating this commandment with hating him. Failure to worship right is to hate Him. 
7. God will bring the consequences of our failure to worship on the heads of our descendants. 
8. We all sacrifice our children to some god or another. We have our children suffer for our values. 
9. We’ll either teach our children to love the Lord, as far as we can, or we’ll teach them to hate Him. 
B. Steadfast Love (Hesed) 
1. He also shows steadfast love – devoted, committed, loyal love – to those who love Him. 
2. People with God’s passion for worship, who love the Lord, those the Lord loves loyally. 
3. If we love the Lord, it will show in our keeping His commandments. Love and (not “or”) keep. 
4. The Lord Jesus said, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching” (John 14:23). 
IV. Invitation: Those who love God, keep His commands, sacrifice their children to Him, teach their children in word and deeds that God is worth serving, worth passion and interest and attention. And so God blesses them. He blesses their children to the thousandth generation. He is over-flowing in His exuberant desire to do good to those who see that God is worth glorifying. Do you see that?

Deuteronomy 5:8-10
The Second Commandment

I. People Forget What Something Is For
1. A Bible college library in Ethiopia closed the library to preserve the books. What’s a library for?
2. What is the church for? Those inside, those outside or God above?
3. Some have an “as you like it” attitude. Whatever suits your tastes:  traditional or contemporary.
4. People think that worship is “of the people”, “by the people,” and “for the people”.
5. There's a third option: looking up to the God up there. There’s an audience of One we should attend to.
6. In the second commandment God demands that all worship be done as He directs.
II. What Is Worship For?
A. Not For Yourself
1. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image.” Notice that, “for yourself.”
2. People make aids in worship which we think are good but are not really about worshipping God.
3. If it’s “for us” it’s about us. They express who we are, what we want, and our desire to control God.
4. Worship that comes from us, a product

Deuteronomy 5:8-10, The Second Commandment

Deuteronomy 4:44-5:7 
The First Commandment 
 
I. The Single, Simple Principle 
1. Andy Stanley, pastor of a mega-church, said, “You shall not obey the Ten Commandments.” 
2. A lot of Christians fuzzily think that, “Christ is the end of the law” (Romans 10:14) means that it’s over. 
3. People have, at their core, a single, simple principle, a commitment, even if they are inconsistent. 
4. Some are committed to hedonism, or money, or ego (pride), or family. 
5. Familism is the central Chinese faith that the other three religions revolve around. 
6. But many people are inconsistent. They’re really about family but they’ll spare time for religion. 
7. Deep down, what is the bed-rock of your heart? The first commandment is the foundation. 
II. Who Is It For? 
A. Is it For Everyone or Israel? 
1. These are expressions of God’s will on how to live. But here the audience is a specific group: Israel. 
2. But in Galatians 6, etc, in the New Testament we see that Christians are the true “Israel of God.” 
B. Covenant 
1. There were parts of a covenant, like treaties that a Great King would make with a small nation. 
a. a pre-amble (introducing the parties), the stipulations, witnesses, blessings and curses. 
b. In 4:13, the Ten Commandments are the stipulations (the requirements) of the covenant. 
c. The preamble. Who is the One making the covenant and who are the people it is for? (5:6) 
2. The new covenant we are in is the fulfillment — not the cancellation — of the Sinai covenant. 
3. Jesus said that whoever “relaxes” the commandments will be least in the kingdom (Mt. 5:20). 
C. Is it For Everyone or No One? 
1. They’re first made for us, if we worship Him with reverence; if we’re in a covenant with Him. 
2. The elaborate reintroduction (4:44-5:5), recapitulating how Deuteronomy began back in 1:1-5. 
3. If you’re not God’s, then keeping them might give you a better life but won’t keep you out of hell. 
4. There are no laws you can obey to please God and earn something from Him. 
5. Keeping the other commands, without the first commitment, just makes you an inconsistent sinner. 
6. If you “unhitch” the law from the gospel, you have no way of seeing that you need the gospel. 
7. “We have this law to see therein that we have not been free of sin.” 
8. The commandments show us not that we are potentially righteous but that we are presently sinners. 
III. What Does It Tell Us To Do? 
1. The commands show us how to please Him. God’s true people desperately want to obey Him. 
2. Obedience to God’s commands is the way we live for God, out of love, as saved people. 
3. God led them out of slavery and into worship. If you are saved, He’s done the same with you. 
4. Our exodus is an exchange of masters, the false for the true. The true master tells us to serve no other. 
IV. How Is It Obeyed? 
1. “That to which your heart clings and entrusts itself is, I say, really your god.” (Martin Luther) 
2. It could be sports or exercise or food or money or romance or family. 
3. The Lord Jesus meant what He said that if anyone was to follow Him he must “hate” his own family. 
4. If you can’t do that, then you can’t be in covenant with Him. You might as well not try to obey any. 
5. The Chinese called Christianity the “ancestor-denying” because the supremacy of the family is broken. 
6. If the first day of Chinese New Year falls on a Sunday, Christians first go to church. 
7. The one with the solid foundation does not love his family or wife or husband less. He loves God more. 
8. If you are a believer, they are for you. If you’re not a believer, they show you that. 
V. Invitation: If you really want Him to be the Lord your God, then, offer your life to Him now, your whole life, to be in a committed relationship with Him, a covenant. If He’s the god you want, then follow Him out of bondage to sin now, for worship.

Deuteronomy 4:44-5:7
The First Commandment

I. The Single, Simple Principle
1. Andy Stanley, pastor of a mega-church, said, “You shall not obey the Ten Commandments.”
2. A lot of Christians fuzzily think that, “Christ is the end of the law” (Romans 10:14) means that it’s over.
3. People have, at their core, a single, simple principle, a commitment, even if they are inconsistent.
4. Some are committed to hedonism, or money, or ego (pride), or family.
5. Familism is the central Chinese faith that the other three religions revolve around.
6. But many people are inconsistent. They’re really about family but they’ll spare time for religion.
7. Deep down, what is the bed-rock of your heart? The first commandment is the foundation.
II. Who Is It For? 
A. Is it For Everyone or Israel?
1. These are expressions of God’s will on how to live. But here the audience is a specific group: Israel.
2. But in Galatians 6, etc, in the New Testament we see that Christians are the true “Israel of God.”
B. C

Deuteronomy 4:44-5:7, The First Commandment

Deuteronomy 4:1-43 
The Senses Census 
 
I. Deafness and Blindness 
1. If you had to be deaf or blind, which would you choose? Be without sight or sound? 
2. The worst would be to lose both hearing and seeing, like Helen Keller. She became deaf and blind. 
3. Ann Sullivan was called “The Miracle worker” for breaking through to her. 
4. Another handicap is thinking reality is only what you can see, not knowing who to listen to. 
II. The Commandments (4:1-14) 
A. Listen and Do (4:1-8) 
1. You do God’s Word “that you may live.” You must “keep” it all (like Matthew 18:16-18). 
2. Don’t add to the Word your favorite prohibition or take from the Word, even when it’s convenient. 
3. They saw, with their own eyes, what the Lord did at Baal-peor. He “destroyed” those who sinned. 
4. We’re commanded to see that we’ve been taught statutes and rules “that you should do them.” 
5. The Lord Jesus commissioned us to go and make disciples teaching them to do everything. 
6. Now that God has done, you need to do. Salvation comes first and then God gives us His statutes. 
7. When we put the Word into practice, people will be impressed. They see God is among us. 
8. We maybe the only Bible some people read. They’ll see that we have something “righteous.” 
B. Keep Your Soul Diligently (4:9-14) 
1. If you want to be a disciple of Jesus, take care to keep your soul diligently. Apply yourself. 
2. Teach God’s Word to your children so they learn to fear the Lord and pass it on to their children. 
III. The Consuming Fire (4:15-24) 
1. Because He’s made a covenant with us with stipulations watch yourselves very carefully. 
2. Remember that “you saw no form.” People have an urge to reduce God to an image. 
3. The early church strictly prohibited icons but by the year 787, they were accepted. Be careful. 
4. Be careful about the idolatry of covetousness, of living for wealth and the idol of the family. 
5. Beware, the Lord is jealous for the affections of the people He’s saved. 
6. He’s brought us out of bondage to sin, from the iron furnace of His eternal wrath. 
7. In the cross we also see God’s wrath in the Father punishing the Son because of our sins. 
8. What kind of God do you see, by His works? He even punishes Moses. Here’s the conclusion. 
9. What you can see about God from what He has done: “the Lord your God is a consuming fire.” 
10. If the God you see, in your mind is not a consuming fire; a holy God then you’re blind. 
IV. The Covenant (4:25-31) 
1. Covenants bind us to Him, or Him to us. If we act corrupting by serving an idol we break the covenant. 
2. Covenants had typical parts: witnesses, stipulations, penalties for breaking them. 
3. The Lord is the Great King and Israel is the nation He is covenanting with. Now we are His holy nation. 
4. If they break it, they will not live long; they will be scattered and left few in number. 
5. But that tribulation (trouble) will result in them seeking the Lord and being found by Him. 
6. The Lord Jesus gave us a new covenant. That’s what we remember in the Lord’s Supper. 
7. Tribulation causes them to seek the Lord and so He finds His sheep. His sheep hear voice. 
8. The Lord has made a covenant to save His people because “the Lord your God is a merciful God.” 
V. The Consideration (4:32-43) 
1. Review what the Lord has done in the past. “Ask,” about what God has done. 
2. He might be invisible but what He does is visible. He shows us who He is so that we can see it. 
3. The Word of God came from heaven and became flesh and dwelt among us. 
4. He chose Israel first and then brought them out of Egypt. He chose us first. 
5. Consider that you must not just be a spectator of God’s actions or a hearer. You must “keep” His Word. 
6. Israel was supposed to have select cities that were refuges if someone accidentally killed someone. 
7. So the three cities of refuge are proof that Israel has already begun to enter the Promised Land. 
8. We have victories now because we’re in the Promised Land and others can see it. 
VI. Invitation: Life comes from God’s Word. The Word became flesh so that we could see Him. We could see that He was full of grace and truth, both a consuming fire and gracious, loving us, making a covenant with us before we ever lived. He is the miracle worker who reveals Himself to us deaf and blind sinners. If you want to see what God is like look at the Word, the Son. And if, having seen Him and heard Him, you believe Him, observe everything that He’s commanded. Be His disciple and follow Him into the Promised Land.

Deuteronomy 4:1-43
The Senses Census

I. Deafness and Blindness
1. If you had to be deaf or blind, which would you choose? Be without sight or sound?
2. The worst would be to lose both hearing and seeing, like Helen Keller. She became deaf and blind.
3. Ann Sullivan was called “The Miracle worker” for breaking through to her.
4. Another handicap is thinking reality is only what you can see, not knowing who to listen to.
II. The Commandments (4:1-14)
A. Listen and Do (4:1-8)
1. You do God’s Word “that you may live.” You must “keep” it all (like Matthew 18:16-18).
2. Don’t add to the Word your favorite prohibition or take from the Word, even when it’s convenient.
3. They saw, with their own eyes, what the Lord did at Baal-peor. He “destroyed” those who sinned. 
4. We’re commanded to see that we’ve been taught statutes and rules “that you should do them.”
5. The Lord Jesus commissioned us to go and make disciples teaching them to do everything.
6. Now that God has done, you need to do. Sa

Deuteronomy 4:1-43, The Senses Census

Deuteronomy 2:26-3:29 
Tired of Waiting? 
 
I. Do You Hate to Wait? 
1. People get appetizers so they can eat right away. You don’t go to a restaurant to wait; but to eat. 
2. Sometimes, though, you have to learn to wait. Wait for the right spouse. Wait to save your money. 
3. Good things come to those who wait. But there’s something in us that wants at least some things now. 
4. George Orwell’s book Animal Farm scorned communism and religion. The bird symbolized the church. 
5. The bird was singing about “sugar candy mountain.” Good animals will go there later. 
6. Both Orwell and Marx thought religion was a scam; a way to get people to stay in line now. 
7. But the Christian life is not only about a promise for the future. There is a promised land now. 
II. The Purpose (2:26-37) 
A. For What Purpose Do People Resist the Lord? 
1. By taking possession of the land of Sihon, they were beginning to take the Promised Land. 
2. Moses sends messengers to Sihon with “words of peace.” Why offer him a way out? 
3. The purpose is to show the justice of God. Sinners hate God. So they deserve God’s punishment. 
4. “Sihon would not let us pass by him.” Sinners don’t trust God. They had their purposes. 
B. What Was the Purpose of Their Purposes? 
1. Ultimately “the Lord your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate.” 
2. Unless the Holy Spirit accompanies His convicting with grace, people become hard hearted. 
3. Seared conscience: people cut to the heart who don’t repent are covered over with thick scar tissue. 
4. The Lord gave Sihon an obstinate heart so that he would stubbornly not listen to the offers of peace. 
5. The Lord’s purpose behind all this was to give Sihon and all his land to Israel. 
6. Sihon’s heart is obstinate to give Israel the Promised Land, glorifying God by saving His people. 
7. This was the holy war, at least in part, that they were to practice when taking the Promised Land. 
III. The Prefigurement (3:1-11) 
1. The kingdom of Bashan prefigures the taking of the Promised Land. The king of Bashan was colossal. 
2. He’s like the giants they are going to face in the Promised Land, that frightened the majority of spies. 
3. Though their cities were fortified with high walls and gates and bars, the Lord gave it to them anyway. 
IV. The Portion (3:12-17) 
1. Unexpectedly, they find themselves in the Promised Land, now, already. 
2. The Lord’s exceeding great and precious promises are the Promised Land. Some are now. 
3. If we believe so that we have hope of blessings not yet, then we are now, partly, in the Promised Land. 
4. Moses distributes this portion of the Promised Land to two and a half tribes. 
5. There’s nothing wrong with Israel getting some of the Land now. They asked for it (Numbers 21). 
6. The desire you have to attempt great things for God, may be the sign that is what God wants you to do. 
V. The Partnership (3:18-22) 
1. They don’t rest until all of them have all of the land. They are unified; they are partners. 
2. The idea of membership in a church that has rightful expectations from you is foreign today. 
3. It’s about a new nation, a united body, being saved together, partners. 
4. Joshua is Yeshua in Hebrew, Yesous in Greek, Jesus in English. 
5. Jesus will not let any enemy prevail over the church. He will lead it safely to the Promised Land. 
VI. The Preview (3:23-29) 
1. Having gotten an appetizer of the Promised Land, Moses’ appetite for it is even stronger. 
2. “You have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand.” 
3. Sometimes you have to wait. ‘Please let me cross over . . . but the Lord was cross with me.’ 
4. He was the most meek man but he lost his temper at them because they were so obstinate. 
5. It’s Joshua (Yeshua) who takes God’s people to the Promised Land. He’s the head of the people. 
6. Righteousness, peace, and joy are now ours. Jesus has already led us into that Promised Land. 
VII. Invitation: He can lead you in triumph over sins now but to be finally rid of them all, you’ll have to wait until He puts all His enemies under His feet. Sure, He can heal you now. But one day He’ll say, ‘Enough healing for now; you’ll get the rest later.’ But look at what the Lord has already done: the resurrection of Jesus, Lift up your heads and know, that He who has already begun a good work in you, He who has already triumphed, now, over enemies, will surely completely bring you to the Promised Land.

Deuteronomy 2:26-3:29
Tired of Waiting?

I. Do You Hate to Wait?
1. People get appetizers so they can eat right away. You don’t go to a restaurant to wait; but to eat.
2. Sometimes, though, you have to learn to wait. Wait for the right spouse. Wait to save your money.
3. Good things come to those who wait. But there’s something in us that wants at least some things now.
4. George Orwell’s book Animal Farm scorned communism and religion. The bird symbolized the church.
5. The bird was singing about “sugar candy mountain.” Good animals will go there later.
6. Both Orwell and Marx thought religion was a scam; a way to get people to stay in line now.
7. But the Christian life is not only about a promise for the future. There is a promised land now.
II. The Purpose (2:26-37)
A. For What Purpose Do People Resist the Lord?
1. By taking possession of the land of Sihon, they were beginning to take the Promised Land.
2. Moses sends messengers to Sihon with “words of peace.” Why offer him a way o

Deuteronomy 2:26-3:29, Tired of Waiting?

Deuteronomy 2:1-25 
Yahweh Sans Frontiers 
 
I. Where Are the Lord’s Borders? 
1. Everybody needs to know their boundaries. They need to know what belongs to them, what doesn’t. 
2. We assume God has boundaries, that there are some things God isn’t concerned with, like sports. 
3. Is business none of God’s business? He will want to teach us to set our hearts on things above. 
4. Some Chinese who practice Chinese religion in China, go to church in America, looking Christian. 
5. If you went back to China, would you go back to being one of the people of the three religions? 
6. But the Lord is not our national god, as though we’re Christians because we’re in His boundaries. 
7. There are no boundaries behind which you can confine the true God. He is the God without boundaries. 
II. The Edomites (2:1-8) 
A. The Lord Is the God of the Edomites 
1. Whether they know it or not, the Lord gave the Edomites (Esau) their land. 
2. Don’t provoke them, “don’t contend with them, for I will not give you any of their land . . .” 
3. The key word is “I”. The Lord speaking, They have that territory because the Lord gave it to them. 
4. But they were not God’s chosen people. They were still under the Lord’s control. 
B. The Lord is the God of Unbelieving Nations Too 
1. When you pass through their land everything is theirs; so you have to pay. 
2. The Lord is the King of all nations. Their boundaries and resources are given to them by the Lord. 
3. He is the God of China too. Their people, gold or farmland or Yangtze River are given by the Lord. 
4. Here we see that God’s provision for His people is supposed to make them free to spend and give. 
5. Edom could put up a no trespassing sign on their boundaries. The Lord had given them that right. 
III. The Moabites (2:9-12) 
A. The Lord Is the God of the Moabites 
1. Moab is off limits too. The Israelites were not marauding nomadic barbarians. 
2. They are off limits not because God is not just the God of Israel. He gave them the land of Ar. 
3. It doesn’t matter if the religion of Moab was the Chemosh worship. The Lord gave them their land. 
4. It doesn’t matter if the Chinese Communist Party declares its commitment to atheistic materialism. 
5. The Lord has given China to the Chinese, whether they know it or not. 
6. The Lord is (in French) “Yahweh sans frontiers,” the Lord without borders. 
B. History of Moab (and Edom) 
1. The kingdom of “Emim” had possessed the land of Moab. They were giants too, like the Anakim, 
2. The Moabites came against people as gigantic and formidable. The Lord still gave them that land. 
3. It was all under His control. The Lord is not just the tribal deity of Israel, confined to Canaan. 
IV. The Not Israelites (2:13-15) 
A. They Cross a New Boundary: Zered 
1. They cross a physical boundary and a generation gap. The unbelieving generation passes away. 
2. Some people think God is the God of old age and childhood, but not of youth or middle age. 
3. Just as the Lord is the God of all nations, He is also the God of all stages of life. 
B. Not All Who Are of Israel Are of Israel (Romans 9:6) 
1. To be a true Israelite is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit; faith in the true God (Romans 2:29). 
2. If all one has is the physical descent from Israel, they’re not in the Spirit, part of the true Israel. 
3. The rest are Not Israel, ‘Not My People’ Hosea called them. 
4. Not Israel died off because the Lord was against them. The Lord was behind it all. 
5. Some believe ‘Jesus is good for you. But He’s not for me.’ But He’s the Lord of everyone. 
V. The Ammonites (2:16-23) 
A. The Lord Is the God of the Ammonites 
1. No trespassing, Israel. Ammon is not yours; you don’t have the right to take it. God gave them land. 
2. They don’t know that; they don’t recognize it; they don’t praise Him for it. But it’s true any way. 
3. Even their history is His story, the actions of the Lord in all the events of the earth. 
4. Christians say ‘there is only one God and He is universally true.’ It is all the Lord’s doing. 
B. If God Did That for Them . . . 
1. If the Lord can give the giant Rephaim to the Ammonites, He can give the giants to you. 
2. If He can give to unbelieving, immoral people, the secrets to success, He can give them to you. 
3. He’s more interested in setting your mind on things above, weaning your affections off of luxuries. 
4. Stop being distracted by the paltry things of this world. Overcome the enemies. 
VI. Invitation: Rise Up! 
Now, all your enemies will tremble because you can overcome them. He’ll do it for you. There is not one square inch of the world, of your business, not one second of your life, of your work or sports; not one cent of your money, one thought of your mind, not one breath that you take that God does not say, ‘That is Mine.’ Rise up and follow the Lord without borders.

Deuteronomy 2:1-25
Yahweh Sans Frontiers

I. Where Are the Lord’s Borders?
1. Everybody needs to know their boundaries. They need to know what belongs to them, what doesn’t.
2. We assume God has boundaries,  that there are some things God isn’t concerned with, like sports.
3. Is business none of God’s business? He will want to teach us to set our hearts on things above.
4. Some Chinese who practice Chinese religion in China, go to church in America, looking Christian.
5. If you went back to China, would you go back to being one of the people of the three religions?
6. But the Lord is not our national god, as though we’re Christians because we’re in His boundaries.
7. There are no boundaries behind which you can confine the true God. He is the God without boundaries.
II. The Edomites (2:1-8)
A. The Lord Is the God of the Edomites
1. Whether they know it or not, the Lord gave the Edomites (Esau) their land.
2. Don’t provoke them, “don’t contend with them, for I will not give you any of t

Deuteronomy 2:1-25, Yahweh Sans Frontiers

1 Timothy 5:17-19 
Your Pastor and You 
 
I. Muscle Memory 
1. Learning the flip-turn in swimming is hard if you've been swimming for years, turning normally. 
2. When we do something regularly our brain has engraved on it that way, “muscle memory”. 
3. When there is something we’ve been doing all our lives, like church, we think we know how to do it. 
4. One day, the church will have to go through a process of choosing a new pastor. 
II. Do We Really Need a Pastor? (1 Timothy 5:17-18) 
1. Aren’t we all priests to God? Yes, but a pastor is not a priest. 
2. Is the “pastor” a later development in the history of the church; a tradition that evolved? 
3. Among elders who rule well is another group than the elders, who “labor in preaching and teaching.” 
4. “Work” suggests that it was full-time work. "Laborer deserves his wage," shows that they are paid. 
III. What Does the Pastor Do? 
A. The Pastor’s Charge: Proclaim the Word (2 Timothy 4:1-2) 
1. In good times and bad times. Have endurance, keep going even when it’s hard. 
2. “Reprove, rebuke, and exhort”: reprove is to correct; to “rebuke” is a sharper form of correction, to call to repentance; “exhort” is positive and encouraging; to come alongside someone to help them. 
3. Do this not only a patient tone but patiently keep doing it, with “long-suffering”. 
4. What are the chances that some people are going to be offended by a pastor who does that? 
B. The Pastor’s Authority (Titus 2:15) 
1. “Declare these things.” Some of the ministry can be delegated. 
2. Speak, exhort, and correct with “all authority,” literally “by command.” 
3. How do you not “let anyone disregard you”? Do not allow yourself to be looked down on. 
C. Jesus the Servant Leader (1 Peter 2:25) 
1. Jesus is “the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.” The word “shepherd” also means “pastor.” 
2. When Peter disregarded His prediction of the cross, Jesus called him “Satan.” 
3. Jesus rebuked His disciples and taught with all authority, with a commanding presence. 
4. The idea that “servant leadership” means the pastor must accept being blamed unjustly is wrong. 
IV. Problems With the Reflex to Blame the Pastor 
A. It Is Nonsensical 
1. Why would the pastor do something that would purposefully drive people away from the church? 
2. Do you understand that the pastor is the one who most wants people not to be upset and leave? 
B. It Is Unbiblical 
1. 1 Timothy 5:19: Do not “admit” or receive or entertain; give it no weight; don’t consider it. 
2. Don’t accept an accusation against an elder unless there are two or three witnesses to corroborate it. 
C. It Is Divisive 
1. Some people won’t reflexively go along with it. Some Christians aren’t going to put up with it. 
2. We’re a cross-cultural church. People from other cultures haven’t learned the same reflex. 
3. So they challenge our assumptions, our reflexive reactions, why we jump to the conclusions we do. 
4. “That’s the way they are.” People in the white culture don’t keep their commitments. 
5. Lee Kuan Yew: ‘white men might marry you quickly, they will also divorce you quickly.’ 
6. Joke: In the Chinese church they call the pastor’s wife “Mrs Pastor”; in the black church they call her “First Lady”; in the white church they call her to tell her the bathroom is dirty! 
D. It Is Discouraging 
1. If something has gone wrong in the church, the pastor feels it the most. 
2. When something has gone wrong in the church is the worst time to start blaming him. 
V. Invitation: 
1. It’s God’s design that churches have pastors. Pastors are imperfect men, sinners like anyone else. But it is through them that THE Pastor and overseer of our souls, the Lord Jesus, shepherds us. 
2. In 1 Peter 2, Christ suffered for us. He suffered all the beatings, the betrayals, the lashings, the thorns in the scalp, all the rejection and scorn and mockery we looked at over the last few weeks. He gave us an example that we might have to follow Him into suffering. 
3. He also did it to do for us what we cannot follow Him into, to purchase our salvation. “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” That’s how He was our servant, our suffering servant, and by that He found us straying sheep, and became the perfect Pastor of our souls. You’re the formerly straying sheep. He’s the shepherd, the pastor.

1 Timothy 5:17-19
Your Pastor and You

I. Muscle Memory
1. Learning the flip-turn in swimming is hard if you've been swimming for years, turning normally.
2. When we do something regularly our brain has engraved on it that way, “muscle memory”.
3. When there is something we’ve been doing all our lives, like church, we think we know how to do it.
4. One day, the church will have to go through a process of choosing a new pastor.
II. Do We Really Need a Pastor? (1 Timothy 5:17-18)
1. Aren’t we all priests to God? Yes, but a pastor is not a priest.
2. Is the “pastor” a later development in the history of the church; a tradition that evolved?
3. Among elders who rule well is another group than the elders, who “labor in preaching and teaching.”
4. “Work” suggests that it was full-time work. "Laborer deserves his wage," shows that they are paid.
III. What Does the Pastor Do?
A. The Pastor’s Charge: Proclaim the Word (2 Timothy 4:1-2)
1. In good times and bad times. Have endurance, keep going 

The Role of the Pastor, 1 Timothy 5:17-19, 2 Timothy 4:1-2, Titus 2:15

Mark 14:1-11 
What Is Jesus For? 
 
I. Rational Cost-Benefit Analysis 
1. If you’re a rational calculator of everything by cost-benefit analysis, then you reasoned this is for you. 
2. Top athletes center their whole lives, to help them be a better basketball player, athlete. 
3. A good business person is ruthless about asking whether anything really helps the business. 
4. What do you think makes you happy? That’s what you’re for. What is Jesus for? 
II. The Plot (14:1-2) 
1. The people would be shocked if they knew their leaders were conspiring against the Messiah. 
2. Many religious leaders are not for what Jesus is for. They’re for their pensions, themselves. 
3. They are seeking to arrest Him “by stealth,” because He had a protective popularity. 
4. Acts 4:28 says ultimately they did what God’s plan and hand had predestined to take place. 
III. The Pouring Out (14:3) 
1. Simon the leper was probably healed by Jesus and the dinner is to celebrate that gracious healing. 
2. She has an alabaster flask, very ornate, like fine china. The only way to pour it out is by breaking it. 
3. It is for something special, a once in a life-time pouring out. Now she knows what it’s for. 
4. She broke it and then poured it all out over Jesus’ head, trickling down his body. 
5. It was a “very costly”, “pure nard”, probably imported from India; worth a year’s wage, about $30,000. 
6. Calculate, according to what’s valuable to you, is that a rational use of that capital? 
IV. The Protest (14:4-5) 
1. His friends and disciples there’s criticism of this. They were indignant. They thought it was wasted. 
2. They scolded her because they thought it could have been used for the poor, not for Jesus. 
3. Foremost, Jesus is for Himself, for God, and He is God, that’s why He isn’t selfish. 
4. There’s no more worthwhile thing anyone could have done than pour it all out over Jesus. 
5. There’s nothing more valuable that you could ever do with your life than pour it out for Jesus. 
6. Many people think Jesus is for their family, their marriage, their wealth, making Israel great again. 
V. The Purpose (14:6-8) 
A. His Purpose Is to Make Disciples 
1. His purpose is His purpose, not ours. So He challenges us that to be for him. 
2. If we love our marriages more than obeying Jesus, we can’t be His disciple. 
3. A wife can still have the “gentile and quiet spirit,” “respectful,” and say “no” to her husband’s sin. 
4. If a husband is following his wife into sin, following her at all is sin. 
5. When you’re for Jesus, you can be submissive and strong, not just a tactic to have a happy marriage. 
6. A husband can be the leader in the family but not selfish because the leadership is for Jesus. 
7. She suffered the disapproval of the protestors. It surprises us when Jesus’ friends scold us. 
8. Whose disapproval is it that tempts you to pull back from pouring out all to Jesus? 
9. John Bunyan wrote: “I’ll fear not what men say, I’ll labor night and day to be a pilgrim.” 
10. Jesus said, “She has done a beautiful thing to Me” (14:6). Sometimes that’ll be the only comfort. 
B. His Purpose Is to be the Propitiation for Our Sins 
1. Jesus is for the poor. But what do the poor need the most? Not relief from poverty. 
2. We need our poverty of righteousness, our bankruptcy before God, relieved. 
3. Propitiation is the appeasing sacrifice, when God’s just anger at our sins was paid for by Son. 
4. Propitiation was the purpose of His death. This woman prepared Him for His purpose. 
VI. The Proclamation (14:9) 
1. With every retelling of what Jesus did, we’re told that He is worth our pouring out everything for. 
2. Jesus sees that there will be an interim when the gospel is proclaimed. 
3. The gospel must be proclaimed in the “whole world” first. That’s what Jesus is for now. 
4. That’s why we have Gym, Jr and Gym, to do what Jesus is for. 
VII. The Plot, continued (14:10-11) 
1. Judas was one of those grumbling at the “waste” of pouring out all that expensive ointment on Jesus. 
2. It finally dawns on Judas that Jesus is for Himself and that He demands we pour out our lives for Him. 
3. The chief priests promise money. Money is the one thing that always says it’s for us. 
4. Countless people today choose the money (or the wife or husband or reputation) over Jesus. 
VIII. Invitation: But if you want your life to be a beautiful thing, pour it out for Jesus, like John Bunyan, or William Carey. Jesus says about them, they’ve done a beautiful thing, being broken, pouring out their lives, for Him. After all, Jesus Himself was broken, pouring out His life so that we who were poor, could have the riches of His righteousness. He was for us so that we could be for Him. Is that Who you’re for?

Mark 14:1-11
What Is Jesus For?

I. Rational Cost-Benefit Analysis
1. If you’re a rational calculator of everything by cost-benefit analysis, then you reasoned this is for you.
2. Top athletes center their whole lives, to help them be a better basketball player, athlete.
3. A good business person is ruthless about asking whether anything really helps the business.
4. What do you think makes you happy? That’s what you’re for. What is Jesus for?
II. The Plot (14:1-2)
1. The people would be shocked if they knew their leaders were conspiring against the Messiah.
2. Many religious leaders are not for what Jesus is for. They’re for their pensions, themselves.
3. They are seeking to arrest Him “by stealth,” because He had a protective popularity.
4. Acts 4:28 says ultimately they did what God’s plan and hand had predestined to take place.
III. The Pouring Out (14:3)
1. Simon the leper was probably healed by Jesus and the dinner is to celebrate that gracious healing.
2. She has an alabaster fl

Mark 14:1-11, What Is Jesus For?

Luke 17:20-37 
When Is It Over? 
 
I. When Will the Ordeal Be Over? 
1. Ever been through an ordeal, like a medical procedure, and wonder, ‘when will this be over?’ 
2. Depressed people wish life would be over. Life for them is over, they think. 
3. When is this world over, the “present evil age” (Galatians 1:4), where might makes right? 
II. Now (17:20-21) 
A. The Kingdom in Your Midst 
1. The Pharisees ask Him when God’s rule would come. They expected an uprising, an empire. 
2. “The Kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed,” like symptoms of a disease. 
3. People want signs so they can get ready. Jesus says the Kingdom will have no sign. 
4. It won’t be here or there. Because, Look!, “the Kingdom of God is in the midst of you.” 
5. The rule of God is not within them (the Pharisees). It’s here, now, in the middle of you. 
6. They’ve come to the King and asked Him when the King is coming. He’s in their midst. 
7. Jesus healed leprosy to show that His rule was on earth. So, the Kingdom of God has come. 
B. Why Isn’t it Over? 
1. They thought when the Kingdom comes, the world ends. But they thought wrong. 
2. Jesus explained in His parables that His Kingdom is different than they thought. 
a. Like a mustard seed and yeast, it starts small, not an overwhelming invasion. 
b. Like a great treasure, it’s worth selling all you have but many reject it. 
c. It’s now on earth, like a field planted with good wheat but also with weeds, together. 
3. King Jesus tells us the Kingdom has come, with Him. The focus is Jesus. 
III. Not Yet (17:22-37) 
A. Interim (17:22-25) 
1. “The days are coming when you will desire”, between His first coming and the end. 
2. The “Son of Man” refers to Daniel 7:13f, where Daniel sees one “like a son of man.” 
3. There’s a time when we’ll crave those days to come, but they’ll be not yet. 
4. There’s a time in between Jesus first on earth and the end. We’re in that interim. 
5. Jesus prepared His people for the time between His bringing the Kingdom and the end. 
6. People will say, in verse 23, “‘Look there!’ or ‘Look here!’” It’s fake news. 
7. His coming is like lightning, obvious, public, undeniable. It’s not isolated or hidden. 
8. If you can deny that He’s come, then He hasn’t. ‘No one will foresee it but all will see it.’ 
9. First, He must suffer the cross. It’s what happens when the Kingdom meets this evil age. 
B. End (17:26-37) 
1. Like Noah’s and Lot’s days, people were going about their routines. Suddenly destruction. 
2. The day Christ returns and the world faces judgment will come suddenly, without warning. 
3. So, if you’re not ready when it comes, it’s too late to get ready. It’s too urgent to go back. 
4. People will not have years to get ready once these events start. 
5. “Remember Lot’s wife.” “She looked, she longed, she lingered and she died.” (Spurgeon) 
6. Instead of being like Lot’s wife, don’t be so attached to what is in your house, your life. 
7. Your life is in the One who is coming so you can easily lose what this world gave you. 
8. Be ready for separation from those closest to you. This sudden judgment brings separation. 
9. Judgment is individual. You will be judged for your own faith or longing for the world. 
10. Some will be taken to an obvious, public place. Some will be condemned, some saved. 
11. The December 26, 2004 earthquake followed by a tsunami killed about 250,000 people. 
12. After an interim, the tsunami wiped out entire towns, hitting Thailand, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, etc. 
13. The world thinks life will go on. But Christ will come and sweep the world away. 
14. Some will be saved. He has His Noahs and Lots, His people who love Him, long for His return. 
IV. Invitation: Is that where your heart is set on Jesus, detached from this world and all the stuff it has, and focused on Jesus and His rule in your life? Are you done with this world? Is it over for you, even while you’re still in it? If not, yet, then now is the time to get ready.

Luke 17:20-37
When Is It Over?

I. When Will the Ordeal Be Over?
1. Ever been through an ordeal, like a medical procedure, and wonder, ‘when will this be over?’
2. Depressed people wish life would be over. Life for them is over, they think.
3. When is this world over, the “present evil age” (Galatians 1:4), where might makes right?
II. Now (17:20-21)
A. The Kingdom in Your Midst
1. The Pharisees ask Him when God’s rule would come. They expected an uprising, an empire.
2. “The Kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed,” like symptoms of a disease.
3. People want signs so they can get ready. Jesus says the Kingdom will have no sign.
4. It won’t be here or there. Because, Look!, “the Kingdom of God is in the midst of you.”
5. The rule of God is not within them (the Pharisees). It’s here, now, in the middle of you.
6. They’ve come to the King and asked Him when the King is coming. He’s in their midst.
7. Jesus healed leprosy to show that His rule was on earth. So, the Kingdom 

Luke 17:20-37, When Is It Over?

Isaiah 10:5-34 
The King of Kings 
 
I. Celebrating Great Events in History 
1. Christmas, like Easter, celebrates an historical event that occurred over 2,000 years ago. 
2. It’s a major historical event that changed the course of world history. 
3. But we don’t celebrate Constantine, Charles Martel, Zheng He (郑和), or even Martin Luther. 
4. What happened on Christmas is the reason all those other things happened. 
II. The Instrument (10:5-12) 
A. The Rod of God’s Anger 
1. “Woe” to Assyria, God’s instrument to inflict His anger, the Lord’s “fury” (10:6). 
2. God sends them against a godless nation. Being religious and being godly are different. 
3. The Lord “commands” (or commissions) Assyria to take spoil and kill. 
4. How could God command them to do what He commands all people not to do? 
B. The King’s Decree 
1. God is the King and the King is law. If He decides to confiscate and punish, He can. It’s just. 
2. If He decides that you deserve to die for your crimes, He has instruments to carry it out. 
3. Sometimes those instruments, are breaking God’s commands, His “will of command.” 
4. God as the Judge, can confiscate their property, can sentence them to death. 
5. But, from the Assyrian point of view, they were just acting on their greed and cruelty (10:7). 
6. God used their greed and bloodlust; their sinful intentions to implement His right intentions. 
7. The Lord is the King issuing His decree and sending His agents to bring it to pass. 
8. The Assyrians are not excused from breaking God’s will of command because they are doing His will of decree. ‘You did it because you’re greedy and bloodthirsty.’ 
9. The Lord is the divine Rider on history, like a horseman controlling a horse. 
III. The Arrogant (10:13-19) 
A. They Think They Are the Masters of Their Own Fate 
1. The arrogant think that what God enabled them to do, they did on their own. 
2. God says “He will punish the speech of the arrogant heart of the king of Assyria.” He did. 
3. Sennacherib, king of Assyria, called “king of kings”, defeated and murdered by his own sons. 
4. Historian Herodotus wrote that the Assyrian army was killed by plague. Biological warfare! 
5. He boasts of His strength. He brags about how easy it was like taking eggs from a nest. 
B. Our Choices Are God’s Instruments 
1. In salvation, did we do it? Is the crucial difference our right decisions, our spiritual strength? 
2. We make decisions. We choose to believe; we choose to live for the Lord. But why? 
3. C. H. Spurgeon, “God was at the bottom of it all, and that He was the Author of my faith.” 
C. The Arrogant Person Glorifies Himself 
1. God sends a wasting disease among his “stout warriors”. He burns burn all Assyria’s “glory”. 
2. Percy Shelley’s Ozymandias: “Nothing beside remains, Round the decay / Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare. The lone and level sands stretch far away.” 
3. In 2008 Mummer Gaddafi claimed to be the “king of kings”. Three years later, he was killed. 
4. The real King of kings always, sooner or later, intervenes and humbles them. 
IV. The Remnant (10:20-23) 
1. God will preserve His people. They will “no more lean on him who struck them.” 
2. They’ll lean on the Lord. “In truth”, sincerely, not fakery, like the “godless” religious people. 
3. “A remnant will return”, repent (Isaiah’s first son). They will return to “the mighty God.” 
4. The Father not only gave us the Mighty God, He gave us to the Mighty God, to Jesus, the Son. 
5. John 6:44, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent me draws Him.” Happening now. 
6. “Destruction is decreed” for Israel. The result will be an “overflowing with righteousness.” 
V. The Judgement (10:24-34) 
1. He is, right now, saving a remnant and putting an end to the arrogant. 
2. The remnant don’t have to be afraid of the instruments of God’s anger. 
3. “In a little while”, the Lord will wield a whip, another weapon, against those weapons. 
4. They’ll look threatening for a short while, but God will judge them. 
5. His people, who lean on Him, will hear that His anger has come to an end. 
6. The things that burdened you here, will be lifted off. They’re under His control. 
7. The Assyrians are coming closer, city after city, land-mark after land-mark, closer to Jerusalem. 
8. The emperors, the self-proclaimed “kings of kings”, the god of this world, is cut down. 
VI. Invitation: God has used a lot of instruments to steer history. But at it was God Himself, Immanuel, given to us, once for all, so that now the Father could give us to Him, the Mighty God. That’s what He’s doing now, through all His instruments, even if the enemy stands right outside shaking His fist. We don’t have to be afraid. He’s the Mighty God. His throne is forever and ever. He’s promised us, as close as the enemies may come, He will cut them down and raise us up, with Christ, on the last day.

Isaiah 10:5-34
The King of Kings

I. Celebrating Great Events in History
1. Christmas, like Easter, celebrates an historical event that occurred over 2,000 years ago. 
2. It’s a major historical event that changed the course of world history.
3. But we don’t celebrate Constantine, Charles Martel, Zheng He (郑和), or even Martin Luther.
4. What happened on Christmas is the reason all those other things happened.
II. The Instrument (10:5-12)
A. The Rod of God’s Anger
1. “Woe” to Assyria, God’s instrument to inflict His anger, the Lord’s “fury” (10:6).
2. God sends them against a godless nation. Being religious and being godly are different.
3. The Lord “commands” (or commissions) Assyria to take spoil and kill.
4. How could God command them to do what He commands all people not to do?
B. The King’s Decree
1. God is the King and the King is law. If He decides to confiscate and punish, He can. It’s just.
2. If He decides that you deserve to die for your crimes, He has instruments to carry it

Isaiah 10:5-34, The King of Kings

Isaiah 9:1-10:4 
Pardon the Interruption 
 
I. Need a Break? 
1. Sometimes interruptions are rude so a polite person will say, “Pardon the interruption.” 
2. Part of the appeal of Christmas is that it’s a break in the normal routine, the daily grind. 
3. By December 26 we’re looking forward to a break from Christmas. 
4. In the movie “Stalag 17”. American prisoners of war get a break for Christmas, and break-out. 
II. The Interruption (9:1-7) 
A. The Decree 
1. Chapter 8 was a gloomy, filled with predictions of afflictions, misery, flood of distresses, etc. 
2. Galilee, is suffering degradation, now occupied by the Gentiles; they are walking in darkness. 
3. Now they “have seen” (as if already done) “great light”. They are already made “glorious”. 
4. This isn’t just a prediction. This is a decree of the Lord for whom history is “his story.” 
5. The decree was issued in eternity past. What it declares can be spoken of as already done. 
6. The Messiah who fulfills this promise, has broken the yoke of our former bondage. 
7. The Son set us free and “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36). 
B. The Son 
1. King Ahaz, of Judah, burned his own son in the fire as a human sacrifice. 
2. “according to the despicable practices of the nations . . .” (2 Kings 16:3) 
3. The Son is “given.” He’s not earned. That’s the basis of our relationship with the Lord. 
4. The Son we are given is the Son who has the “government on His shoulder”. 
5. He is a “Wonderful Counselor”, unlike counselors the people were chasing after. 
a. They got counsel from necromancers, the dead. Today, people seek astrology. 
b. People are turning to superstitions based on ignorance of the cosmos, instead of the Lord. 
6. He’s also the Mighty God, not just a man, like people impressed by the world. 
7. The Son will be the “Everlasting Father” who gives Himself for His children, unlike Ahaz. 
8. He is the Prince of Peace who brings restoration, tranquility, and reconciliation with God. 
9. He interrupted the gloomy, dark record of history with on that first Christmas. 
10. Sadly, for some, for the unrepentant it’s back to the grind of judgment. 
III. The Determination (9:8-10:4) 
A. The Arrogant (9:8-12) 
1. The Lord has sent (past) a “word” (9:8), a decree, that “will fall” (future). 
2. It fell on them when the Assyrians destroyed the Northern Kingdom of Israel in 721 BC. 
3. Rather than being humbled by judgment, they are arrogant, defiant. 
4. They relied on Syria (King Rezin). The Lord is stirring up his enemies, on all sides. 
5. What they trusted in, in place of the Lord, is destroyed by the Lord’s decree 
6. He stretches out His hand. A signal of a military commander to attack. 
7. There is no break from the punishment the Lord is ordering for them to experience. 
B. The Godless (9:13-17) 
1. Despite the punishment, the godless still don’t repent, turn to the Lord. 
2. The Lord says He is cutting off the head (the leaders) and the tail (the followers. 
3. The tails are the prophets who are being wagged by the dog of public opinion. 
4. So, He lets the young men die in battle, the homeless freeze; people die of AIDS. 
5. For all this unrelenting judgment, He is still furious. He is still signaling attack 
C. The Wicked (9:18-21) 
1. Wickedness burns like those massive wild-fires consuming parts of California in the week. 
2. Because of God’s anger at their sins, the “land is scorched”. Because of God’s wrath. 
3. He’s letting them have it to the full; He’s giving them over to it (as in Romans 1:18ff). 
4. They devour each other because they use each other for themselves. 
5. The diseases, the loneliness, superficial relationships, becomes its own punishment. 
D. The Unjust (10:1-4) 
1. “Woe to [kings, judges, law-makers] who decree iniquitous decrees”, depriving of justice. 
2. The unborn are our prey; sacrificed because they can’t offer any politician a benefit. 
3. The order continues, God is determined to forever, attack, punish, charge. 
IV. Invitation: God could pour out His righteous anger on us for billions of years and still say, “His anger has not turned away.” Yet, that’s not what He’s zealous to do. He’s zealous to give us a Son. The Son was given because God’s anger is rightly never turned away from sin. He determined, by decree, to give us His Son. And His hand was stretched out, on a cross, so that we could have a break from that eternal wrath so that our punishment could be interrupted, eternally, by pardon.

Isaiah 9:1-10:4
Pardon the Interruption

I. Need a Break?
1. Sometimes interruptions are rude so a polite person will say, “Pardon the interruption.”
2. Part of the appeal of Christmas is that it’s a break in the normal routine, the daily grind.
3. By December 26 we’re looking forward to a break from Christmas.
4. In the movie “Stalag 17”. American prisoners of war get a break for Christmas, and break-out.
II. The Interruption (9:1-7)
A. The Decree
1. Chapter 8 was a gloomy, filled with predictions of afflictions, misery, flood of distresses, etc.
2. Galilee, is suffering degradation, now occupied by the Gentiles; they are walking in darkness.
3. Now they “have seen” (as if already done) “great light”. They are already made “glorious”.
4. This isn’t just a prediction. This is a decree of the Lord for whom history is “his story.”
5. The decree was issued in eternity past. What it declares can be spoken of as already done.
6. The Messiah who fulfills this promise, has broken the yoke of 

Isaiah 9:1-10:4, Pardon the Interruption

Isaiah 9:1-7 
The Tipping Point 
 
I. How Does Change Come? 
1. “Black Friday” is now eclipsing Thanksgiving itself. How did that come about? 
2. Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference: “The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips and spreads like wildfire. . . A single act of courage is often the tipping point for extraordinary change.” 
3. Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol was the tipping point to make Christmas a holiday again. 
4. Dicken’s generous, joyous Christmas is different than the materialistic holiday we now have. 
II. The Contrasts (9:1-3) 
A. The Former Times 
1. There was rage, hunger, distress, darkness, anguish, gloom. They have a gloomy future. 
2. “But”, here’s the contrast. On the one hand, there is gloom. But God . . . 
3. “In the former times”, in the past, previously, they tasted “contempt”; degradation. 
4. The Assyrians invaded and occupied Galilee, the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali. 
5. When God’s people today live like the world, they get contempt, degraded with the world. 
B. The Latter Times 
1. The tipping point is that dramatic moment when little causes finally tips you over. 
2. “In the latter times”, “the last days”, the times the Lord is bringing, after the tipping point. 
3. In the “latter times”, which are to come, which are future, He “has made” (past tense). 
4. Because, it is as good as done, it is so certain, it can be spoken of as if already done. 
5. While still oppressed, it was declared that the Lord “has made glorious” Galilee. 
6. While we still struggle with sin, God has already declared that we have been “glorified”. 
7. Before they were few. Now God has “multiplied” (past tense) the nation, the people of God. 
8. They had distress, now joy. The contrast is between gloom and gladness. 
9. Jesus rejoiced that the Father revealed the Kingdom to His “little children” (Luke 10:21). 
10. The contrast, from darkness to light, from distress to joy, from gloom to glory. 
III. The Causes (9:4-6) 
A. Freedom (9:4) 
1. Because the “yoke of his burden”, the oppression, their scepter, has been broken. 
2. The tipping point came when the Lord set His people free from our enemies, like Gideon. 
3. Jesus reported that Satan had fallen, the strong man had been bound. We’ve been set free. 
B. Fire (9:5) 
1. The fire of God’s judgment has consumed all the military hardware of their enemies. 
2. God’s judgment will devour everything used against God’s people: the world, the flesh, etc. 
3. Luke 12:49, “I came to cast fire on the earth.” That’s the fire that Jesus kindled at the cross. 
C. Four Names (9:6) 
1. “To us”. To you? “A child is born; to us a Son is given.” This Son is born to rule. 
2. This Son will be called names you’d never call anyone in Isaiah’s near-term, any mere man. 
3. Wonderful Counselor: A wonder of a counselor. 
a. “Wonder” is almost always used of the Lord; it’s like supernatural, makes you amazed. 
b. He speaks with authority, not like other teachers, because He is the authority. 
4. “Mighty God”: The Son who is born literally is Immanuel, the Mighty God with us. 
5. “The Everlasting Father”: a king who relates to His subjects like a father. 
a. Everlasting one, not one who abandons us or dies. He lasts forever. 
b. There’s only one way to be an “everlasting Father”: being Immanuel, God with us. 
6. “The Prince of Peace”: the One who administers all the benefits of peace, restoring all things. 
a. Jesus says, from the throne, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5). 
b. “He must reign until He puts all His enemies under His feet.” (1 Corinthians 15:25) 
c. The peace making, perfection restoring, enemy subjugating work is going on right now. 
7. The tipping point is reached because the Son has the government on His shoulders. 
IV. The Consequences (9:7) 
A. The Effects 
1. The causes will bring the effect of an “increase of His government and of peace.” 
2. More people are now at peace with God and so more at peace with their neighbors. 
3. Justice and righteousness are being restored because Jesus reigns in the hearts of His people. 
4. The Prince of Peace’s government has been increasing and that will continue forever. 
B. The Reason It is Certain 
1. “The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.” God is passionately committed to this. 
2. The Mighty God resolved zealously, eagerly, passionately to save the remnant. 
3. He is making all things new and at peace. He is zealous to do that for us. 
V. Invitation: Make sure you are among the “us” for whom the child was born. Are you one of the “us” to whom the Son was given? Seek first His government. It’s on His shoulders. Let your zeal be for it to increase in your life.

Isaiah 9:1-7
The Tipping Point

I. How Does Change Come?
1. “Black Friday” is now eclipsing Thanksgiving itself. How did that come about?
2. Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference: “The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips and spreads like wildfire. . . A single act of courage is often the tipping point for extraordinary change.”
3. Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol was the tipping point to make Christmas a holiday again.
4. Dicken’s generous, joyous Christmas is different than the materialistic holiday we now have.
II. The Contrasts (9:1-3)
A. The Former Times
1. There was rage, hunger, distress, darkness, anguish, gloom. They have a gloomy future.
2. “But”, here’s the contrast. On the one hand, there is gloom. But God  . . .
3. “In the former times”, in the past, previously, they tasted “contempt”; degradation.
4. The Assyrians invaded and occupied Galilee, the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali.
5. Wh

Isaiah 9:1-7, The Tipping Point

Isaiah 5:8-30 
Woes and Therefores 
 
I. Modern Hymns Compared to the Psalms 
1. Of 150 psalms about 27 are “judgment” psalms, about one out of six, but no hymns on judgement. 
2. If we only sang psalms, we would sing about God’s judgment two out of every three services. 
3. If we only follow the songs of the last 100 years or so, we will never sing about God’s judgment. 
4. Soft words create hard people; hard words create soft people. 
5. “Woe” is for mourning; “therefore” is for consequences. 
II. Woe on the Materialists (5:8) 
1. Woe to those who live their life only for what they can own, only for money or property or things. 
2. The perfect man, the Lord Jesus said that as a man, He was intended for much more: the Word of God. 
3. Human beings are not designed to live just for appeasing the bodily appetites. 
III. Woe to the Party Animals (5:11-12) 
1. They rise early, chase after liquor; they stay up late, getting drunk, hanging out in the bars. 
2. They’ve always got to have their tunes but cannot spare the time to consider God’s ways. 
3. Two problems: (1) they have no self-control and (2) they lack an appetite for God. 
4. There’s an appetite for candy or basketball but not God. Some churches appear bored with God. 
IV. Therefore They Are Exiled (5:13) 
1. Because we call ourselves by His Name, God will take action against us. 
2. They only cared about land grabbing, so God brings foreign forces to drag them away from all the land. 
3. “For lack of knowledge”: the source of all our calamities is that we’re not taught by the word of God. 
4. Therefore, because of the sin, He intervenes to discipline and punish us. 
5. Because we wouldn’t listen to God, death itself will enlarge its appetite for us (5:14). 
6. If we will not glorify Him, by living righteously, He will glorify Himself by treating us as we deserve. 
V. Woe to the Scoffers (5:18-19) 
1. You can tell that they are harnessed to sin by their scoffing. They are derisive, daring God to do it. 
2. They’re teasing God. They’ve heard it all before but they didn’t repent and nothing happened. 
3. The Apostle Paul told the Corinthians that because they came to the Lord’s Supper in a self-indulgent and inconsiderate way that some of them were sick and some had even died (1 Cor. 11:29-30). 
4. Paul wrote that if we first judge ourselves, we will not come under judgement (1 Cor. 11:31). 
VI. Woe to the Moral Relativists (5:20) 
1. They call what is really bitter “sweet” and they think that just because they call it that, it makes it so. 
2. Instead of submitting themselves to God’s standard, they’ll make their ways the standard. 
VII. Woe to the Self-Righteous (5:21) 
1. Woe to the self-righteous who think they have the Christian life figured out, who’s self-important. 
2. They can hear sermon after sermon, but it does no good because they are so wise in their own eyes. 
VIII. Woe to the Up-Side Down (5:22) 
1. They think it’s heroic to win drinking games; succumbing to that temptation is considered valiant. 
2. It’s winning to cheat the poor; to bribe a judge. As long as you win, you’re a hero. 
3. We acquit the guilty because when we want to do something wrong, we don’t want to be criticized. 
IX. Therefore the Anger of the Lord Is Kindled (5:25-30) 
1. The anger of the Lord is kindled like a fire. So He stretches out His hand and strikes them down. 
2. He’s still not done. “For all this, His anger has not turned away, and His hand is stretched out still.” 
3. The vicious people the Lord is bringing on them are ferocious, like an irresistible predator. 
X. Invitation: Six woes in chapter 5. Isaiah pronounces the seventh woe in the next chapter when he sees the Lord in all His splendor and hears the angels shouting “holy, holy, holy”. He declares “woe is me!” When we really get a glimpse of the holiness of God, we know that a “therefore” is coming. But the good news of the gospel shocks us with a different “therefore”: “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1). In the gospel there is a new “therefore” for all who by faith cling to the Lord Jesus Christ. The Father sent His Son to take our woes and, especially, our therefores; so that we could have a different “therefore”: the therefore of life, in the gospel. To get that “therefore” begin by saying, “Woe is me.”

Isaiah 5:8-30
Woes and Therefores

I. Modern Hymns Compared to the Psalms
1. Of 150 psalms about 27 are “judgment” psalms, about one out of six, but no hymns on judgement. 
2. If we only sang psalms, we would sing about God’s judgment two out of every three services.
3. If we only follow the songs of the last 100 years or so, we will never sing about God’s judgment.
4. Soft words create hard people; hard words create soft people.
5. “Woe” is for mourning; “therefore” is for consequences.
II. Woe on the Materialists (5:8)
1. Woe to those who live their life only for what they can own, only for money or property or things.
2. The perfect man, the Lord Jesus said that as a man, He was intended for much more: the Word of God.
3. Human beings are not designed to live just for appeasing the bodily appetites.
III. Woe to the Party Animals (5:11-12)
1. They rise early, chase after liquor; they stay up late, getting drunk, hanging out in the bars.
2. They’ve always got to have their tunes but c

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