The Second Coming and Humility

[0:00] Let's bow our heads in prayer before we look at the Word. Let's pray. Father, we thank you, Father, that you call people out of every tribe and nation on the planet.

[0:15] We give you thanks and praise, even though we're just a small congregation, that today, Father, whether it's been in Australia, South Korea, whether it's been in Singapore, whether it's been Rwanda, Nigeria, Uganda, Argentina, London, England, Paris, France, Manhattan, or here.

[0:35] Father, your people gather on the Lord's Day to be in your presence, to come to the throne of grace, to receive grace from your hands, to pour out our hearts to you and respond in a worthy manner.

[0:49] And so, Father, we thank you that we are together, and we ask that the Holy Spirit would move with gentle power amongst us, that we might hear you speak deep into our hearts, knowing, Father, that your speaking into our hearts is deeply good for us and fits us for heaven and for a joyful life of following here.

[1:07] And we ask all these things in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Saviour. Amen. Please be seated. Amen. So, a couple of months ago, I was in one of my favourite coffee shops.

[1:20] I have several favourite coffee shops. And I was in one of my favourite coffee shops, and I was working on my sermon, actually. And there's this fellow who came in that I know slightly.

[1:33] He's a really nice guy, and he's a Christian. And he saw me working. His wife went up to order, and he saw me working. He came up, and he said, Hi, and he said, You working on your sermon?

[1:45] And I said, Yes. And he said to me, It's going to be easy to do. And I looked at him, because often I don't find the sermons easy to do. Like, my wife would tell you that it's not unusual that on a Friday, even on a Saturday, I will say something like, I could do an hour and a half lecture on this Bible text.

[2:02] I don't know how to make it into a sermon. And sometimes on a Monday when I look at the scripture text, I'll come home to Louise and say, I have no idea what on earth I'm going to say about this text. Anyway, so he said to me, It's going to be easy.

[2:15] And then he said, Why? Because Jesus says, My yoke is easy and my burden is light. And if you're doing what he wants you to do, it will be easy. He's a power of positive thinking type of guy.

[2:28] Had a big smile. Like he was sort of one of those, you know, used car salesman types. No, I'm just, that's being bad. He's a really, really nice guy. So I looked at him because, in fact, I wasn't having an easy time working on the sermon, which sort of means, if you think about it for a second, if you're not having an easy time, you're sinning somehow.

[2:46] I don't know, right? Because if you were really with Jesus, it should be easy. So I looked at him and said, How does that advice help people to combat the narcissism in their life?

[2:58] Where they think they're so wonderful, they can just write down a few thoughts. And I said, How does that advice that you give help people do hard things? Like, don't you think that advice just means they'll always turn away from doing a hard thing to do an easy thing?

[3:14] Now you know why I don't have more friends. So he just looked at me a bit funny, and he said, Well, I think I need to go up and help my wife with the order. And as he left, he smiled, but he muttered at me and said, I'm not going to give Bible verses to pastors anymore to encourage them.

[3:34] The Bible text that we're going to look at today, in fact, actually does help us to do hard things and deals with narcissism. It's a very helpful text for that at a very deep and abiding level.

[3:47] So let's have a look at it. And we're going back to preaching through the book of Mark. Last week, after our sort of Christmassy New Year's break, and last week we read Mark chapter 13, 1 to 27, and today we're going to look at Mark 13, 24 to 27.

[4:05] We're going to read, I mean, 24 to 37. We're going to read that little bit twice because it sort of explains, 24 to 27 explains that which goes before and that which comes after.

[4:15] It sort of needs to be read twice. And so the context is, just before this, if you're using these booklets, I'm back to these booklets. I forgot to bring it last Sunday. It's page 82, or you can look on screen.

[4:30] And the context of all of this is that Jesus was leaving the temple. He's in Jerusalem. And the temple at that time, the Jewish temple at that time, was one of the wonders of the ancient world.

[4:43] Even, you know, pagans would comment about how it was an unbelievable building. I think some of the stones were 67 feet long. I meant to actually pace off the stage, know if the stage is 67.

[4:56] Imagine a stone, basically the length of the stage, I don't know if that's 67 feet, and like 10 feet higher than me and like 12 feet, how did they move things like that to build a building?

[5:07] It was remarkable, and it was white and gold, and it was beautiful. And so they're leaving the temple, and they just express, like just, you know, Jewish pride, and just the awe we all feel at buildings, and says, you know, Jesus isn't this the most spectacular building.

[5:22] And Jesus makes a bit of a casual remark, and says, you know, not one stone of this building will be standing on its own. The time will come when this building will be completely destroyed. So later on, and that's the context, they're now on the Mount of Olives.

[5:38] If you've ever been to the Holy Land, if you're on the correct side of the Mount of Olives, you have a very good view of the city of Jerusalem. You have a very good view of the temple.

[5:49] Now the dome of the mosque went back in the temple. And so four of the disciples come. Jesus is there with his disciples, and they ask him two questions. When's it going to happen?

[6:00] And what will be the signs that it's going to happen? And last week, we looked at that, how Jesus began to answer it. And most of his answer was that there will be non-signs, that life is going to be very difficult, that there's going to be a movement in his name.

[6:15] It's going to be very difficult, but the Holy Spirit will still be in action, and the good news of him will go to the ends of the earth. And he also mentioned the abomination that causes desolation in a time of particular tribulation.

[6:27] And now here is where the story continues. Verse 24. This is Jesus still answering those original two questions. When's it going to happen, and what are the signs? And here's how he continues to answer.

[6:39] But in those days, verse 24. But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heaven will be shaken.

[6:57] And then they will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory, and then he will send out the angels and gather his elect from the four winds from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.

[7:13] Now, many people, when they hear that, go, whoa, George, stars can't fall from heaven. Like, doesn't Jesus know any science?

[7:27] Like, why should we trust a man who doesn't even know elementary science? He just knows the science of that day. Because if he knew the science of today, we might think of some reason why the moon could be dark, you know, the sun could be darkened and the moon would be darkened, you know, maybe clouds or something like that, but the stars don't fall from heaven.

[7:46] And that's aside from the fact, George, you said this is going to be a help against narcissism. Like, it says right there that Jesus is going to gather up his elect.

[7:57] What could be more encouraging of narcissism than calling Christians, like, you think you're the elect? Like, that's like narcissism 100. Like, I'm the elect. No.

[8:07] Like, George, what's going on there? And we can be a little bit uneasy with it. And the direction that many Christians take, well, first of all, they don't even want to think about the second coming of Christ because it's, as we talked about last week a little bit, it's kooky to the modern world.

[8:25] It's kooky. And so we get a little bit uncomfortable talking about it. And, but the other thing is, is that often people end up saying, well, it's sort of, you know, part like a metaphor, it's some analogies, and, you know, the stars from, it's all, okay, so I just want to say a couple of things about this to help us to press in to hear Jesus' words because they're, they're very, very, very, very helpful and profound and they're really worth memorizing and meditating upon on a regular basis.

[8:55] The first of all thing is, is that Jesus intended the heart of this text to be taken literally. I believe, as all faithful Christians, that there will come a time when Jesus will publicly return in power and glory.

[9:12] It will be a universal event. Everybody will know that he's come and he will come and he will gather his elect and I'm not embarrassed about that or ashamed about it. I believe it because I believe and trust Jesus.

[9:25] Now, the second thing is, even when I say that it's believed, we can believe it literally, we need to sort of have a bit of a, by the way, I'm going to talk about the elect bit later, okay, but not right.

[9:36] In fact, if by the end of the sermon and I haven't talked about the elect again, start waving at me and I'll say something about the elect. In terms of taking it literally, the big mistake that we make is to misunderstand the Bible.

[9:50] The Bible never uses scientific language. It uses observational language. And that means, in a sense, the Bible can never be contradicted or wrong.

[10:02] It is always true at an unscientific, just observational level that the sun rises every morning. That's just observationally true.

[10:14] And the Bible never ties what Jesus says to the current scientific, like it's not as if that there's a little footnote that goes here and then underneath the footnote you get in a sense the Wikipedia page of how they would have understood what was going on in the heavens in those days.

[10:30] In some ways, a star was just certain types of lights that were in the sky. And there would, of course, have been different theories about what they were and what they meant and what they were represented by. But it's just simple observational language.

[10:41] What I'm saying is it's actually seen more profound than scientific language. If we were to look at the current Wikipedia page on stars and we were to take a screenshot of it and then if Jesus tarries and doesn't come back we show our great-grandchild that and let's say our great-grandchild has become an astronomer an astrophysicist, they would probably look at that Wikipedia page and they'd laugh.

[11:08] They'd laugh because science is developed over time and with the development of science over time there'd be all sorts of things we say about stars now that are just wrong. I mean, there are bits and pieces that are right and other things that are just wrong because science marches on.

[11:21] But the fact that there's stars that you can see are just an observational truth which is always true. And so what I think is happening here is this and this is my great confidence. If when Jesus returns he gives to his people a copy of the book of Mark and he says look at verses 24 to 27 and we'll look at what happened and you know what we'll say?

[11:47] We'll say he nailed it. Like, he nailed it. Like, that's exactly what we see. That's exactly what we see. Now, there's another thing in here which I won't have time to go into but it's part of the great truth of this text.

[12:02] I talked about it a little bit last week and I talked about how what the Bible says and by the way I forgot to mention the sermon last week. Those of you who saw the sermon or heard the sermon if you saw the little diagram I did that had I think some pink in it I got that originally from Tim Keller who got it from some Dutch theologian who wrote 150 years ago.

[12:24] I didn't come up with that diagram myself. That came from Keller who got it from a Dutch theologian of 150 years ago. But one of the things to understand is we have the way the world works right now which is not the way the world was intended to be and there's evil and dissolution that happens in the world and what happens with the resurrection of Jesus is in a sense the resurrection of Jesus is the life of the world to come now coming into our created order.

[12:52] Our disordered order. And we live in a time when in a sense the current world order continues to exist but at the same time hidden is this resurrection life which goes on.

[13:06] And this resurrection life is basically seen in human beings. When I gave my life to Christ when Christ took me as his own he actually comes and lives within me.

[13:18] My sins are forgiven. My shame is put away. I am clothed with the righteousness and accomplishments of Christ but another thing that happens is the actual life of Christ enters into me which is why the moment of my death if Jesus tarries is also the moment of my awakening.

[13:39] And that resurrection life in me cannot be destroyed. And in a sense then what you see is we live in this in-between time where there's things of the world to come. There's the work of the Holy Spirit.

[13:50] There's answered all these things that are in a sense part of the life of the world to come that are currently in the middle of this current life and what we see here described in verses 24 to 27 is that moment where the resurrection life overwhelms this order with the coming of Christ.

[14:10] Another way to understand it would be this. You make bridges and bridges are designed in a particular way and they're all tethered. I mean hopefully they're tethered to solid bedrock and some of you you've seen pictures YouTube videos and new videos of when there's a flood and the waters all of a sudden lift the bridge from its moorings and it floats away and that's what's going to happen with the stars.

[14:35] The flood of the resurrection life enters into this world order and stars and the moon and the sun are unmoored from this order because of a new order that's come in and that's what the Bible is teaching and that I believe.

[14:53] But some of you might say George I've been watching some TikTok videos and I've been looking at YouTube and I've watched some YouTube videos by people who've deconverted and ex-evangelicals and George you know what the thing is that you're really hiding or misrepresenting?

[15:13] The fact of the matter is okay so you sort of understand you explain that scientific bit okay but the fact of the matter is Jesus got it wrong. Like that's the truth that Christians hide that Jesus got it wrong.

[15:28] Well let's it's a very very common thing if you're familiar with some of those YouTube videos and from the YouTube videos TikToks where very serious people give you a stern lecture and talking to it looks like Greta Thunberg only less smiley as they give you a very serious talking to about how you're wrong.

[15:46] So let's look at the text the text that they would use to say that Jesus is wrong. Continue reading at verse 28. I better get the right chapter otherwise I'll read the wrong verses.

[15:59] Mark 13 verse 28. From the fig tree learn its lesson. As soon as its branch becomes tender and puts out its leaves you know that summer is near.

[16:11] So also when you see these things taking place you know that he is near at the very gates. Truly I say to you this generation will not pass away until these things take place.

[16:23] And the TikTok person has their mic drop moment stand like this and I'm supposed to curl up in tears because I've just been massively refuted.

[16:38] Well we don't have to do that. like many things in the New Testament and Bible in general the solution is usually if you read the context.

[16:50] If you read the context. Now just as an aside if you go to something like the English Standard Version Study Bible they'll very quickly outline five different ways that people understand and explain this verse.

[17:01] But I'll give you a very simple commonsensical answer as to how to explain understand this verse. And it all comes from the context. And the context is this. First of all remember that it's very significant that these things that Jesus is saying are probably taking place either Thursday morning or Thursday early after Thursday like before lunch or sometime on the Wednesday.

[17:27] And on Thursday night Jesus will be captured by the Romans and on Friday he's going to die. Like that's the context of these statements by Jesus.

[17:39] It's very interesting that it's not as if Jesus says these things like in his like you know his ministry began at around the three year mark and it's not as if he says these things at first at the three year mark and then he sort of hopes that people forget about this sort of foolish you know thing.

[17:56] Like our Muslim friends get around the mistake that the many many many mistakes that that are in the Quran by saying that the later revelations clarify the the things which are not correct in the beginning.

[18:11] And it's but it's not like Jesus is doing something like that and he actually puts it right right before he dies. And and and so one of the things you need to ask yourself is why do we remember his words?

[18:25] Like he's not like Muhammad who launched a successful military campaign that changed the geopolitical structure of the Middle East and then eventually large parts of the world.

[18:38] He's not powerful. He the obscurity of him like why is it we remember his words? And the only reason that we remember his words is because he said and this is yet another time where he says he's going to die and he's going to rise from the dead.

[18:53] And the only reason to remember his words is because the grave was empty. His enemies and his doubters could never find the body. his grave was empty and he appeared alive.

[19:06] It's only because of the resurrection that we still remember these words. And and because of that it means that we should look a little bit more carefully always when we see things like this that supposedly are just so easily said to be wrong.

[19:23] And the answer as I said comes in the in the second aspect of the context and that's this when Jesus answers the original question right the stones when are they going to fall when are they all going to be knocked out when's this going to happen and if you look then I think it's from verse 5 right through verse 37 Jesus is sort of answering that question and he also is answering other questions that would follow if they thought about it like how is how is life going to continue on if the temple is gone like how how will how can there be any hope if the temple is gone and if Jesus if you die how can there be any hope like what on earth does that ever mean so Jesus is in a sense answering several questions at the same time as he gives his answer and it's just as if if you've ever been out in the west coast and maybe if you've taken a bit of a boat or something like that and you look at the mountain ranges off you know on in BC and if you look at the mountains it might look like there's only one mountain range but if you actually were to go into a helicopter you'd realize that what you're seeing are two or three mountain ranges that just look like one from your point of view and so what

[20:33] Jesus is doing is he's answering a double question with one single word he's referring to two of this generations on one hand his first prophecy is spectacularly correct Jesus died according to how you sort of figure out a couple of things he either died in early April of the year 30 or early April of the year 33 that would be agreed to by scholars and the destruction of Jerusalem was in the year 70 Jerusalem was destroyed and the temple was destroyed in the year 70 and in Jewish tradition 40 years is a generation 40 years or less and so Jesus was correct this generation will not pass away before that original question is answered and he's also looking down the road after the tribulation and he's saying that once those first things start to happen it's going to happen relatively quickly and that that it's not going to be as if when these things happen the abomination that causes desolation the tribulation then you're going to have to wait another no no no once that starts to happen it's going to happen everybody in that generation he's answering two questions with one phrase that's a very very simple way to understand it it's a double answer now the next little bit helps to explain why it is that I would want to press in to think through the answer to the questions before quickly dismissing things and just before

[22:04] I read these this very very important next verse next verse verse 31 and I'll read I think maybe 32 just shortly after that but it's this we're if you're watching online you might not know that we're sort of a more inner city we meet in the inner city and we come from all over we're both a church where people can walk here and we're also a church that people drive from all over to come here but if you come downtown to Ottawa one of the things that you see are street people and so this past Monday I was in one of my favorite coffee shops and I'm sitting there actually trying to get some of my emails caught up on some of you know I'm very slow I can be very slow at responding to emails I'm trying to get caught up on my emails in my favorite coffee shop a homeless man enters and he's talking to himself muttering to himself sometimes just quiet under his breath and sometimes quite loud as if he's talking to another person and he's all disheveled and he's dirty and he has piles of layers of clothing and he has several bags and he gets a free glass of water from the coffee shop and then he goes and sort of takes up a corner of the coffee shop talking away to himself and occasionally he'd start to walk around now I have to confess I'm not a brave person but he would often stand behind me and talk and I have to confess it made me a bit nervous but you know if Andrew or

[23:32] Shershear stood behind me I wouldn't like feel nervous maybe I should I don't know but I wouldn't I don't feel nervous and I want to extend to street people the dignity of being human beings and not treat them as if they're like terrible so I didn't look I inwardly I'm a bit nervous why is this guy muttering to himself saying who knows what's standing directly behind me eventually he came and stood right in front of me got within this this close to me and started to speak to me and his eyes would be both very direct and then dart off and dart off and then very direct and dart off and dart off and look at me directly saying gibberish just saying gibberish and in fact he was so in my face that the manager got up and had a word with him about the whole thing now keep this image in mind those of us who come here know we're very familiar with street people like this and listen to the very next thing Jesus has just said verse 30 truly I say to you this generation will not pass away until all these things take place and then listen this is the thing that should get people bothered is this verse heaven and earth will pass away verse 31 heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away

[24:46] I'll say it again heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away now let's be frank in any context other than one this is the talk of a mentally ill man this is exactly the sort of thing that you would expect that street person to say I have had street people say to me as they sit there in all their stench that if I knew who they really were I would fall down and worship them I'm not making that up I've had that I've had people tell me with a very solemn straight face because they believe it to the depths of whatever their depths are and to say that my words heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away on any account other than one it is the sound of a crazy person now see here's the thing by and large the Christian faith hasn't been rejected in our culture because people have engaged in a serious intellectual search and looked at

[26:05] Christianity very deeply I don't mean to offend but generally speaking people have been involved in a serious intellectual search and then rejected it because there's far better answers to the different riddles and puzzles that it poses I mean the fact is whether it's somebody like a Bart Ehrman who's a skeptic and he would be a person who's a bit different obviously because of his background he has studied these things but there's never been an adequate explanation other than the Christian one as to why on earth anybody even knows who Jesus is hundreds of thousands of people died by crucifixion hundreds of thousands of them why is it that anybody remembers Jesus' words how is there a better explanation for that than the fact that the grave was he died on a cross the grave is empty he appeared alive like what's a better explanation of it than that there isn't one and what's a better explanation of it the fact that we do have a good historical record of Jesus even

[27:13] Bart Ehrman that great skeptic would say that in fact there is lots that we know about Jesus that he's in fact one of the best known figures in the ancient world and how is it that Jesus can say something like this and the fact the matter is these men who recorded this they'd spent three years with Jesus mental illness existed back in those days there's even if you go back there's a very interesting story about King David it's when he'd been fleeing from Saul if you're outside you're not familiar if you're watching this as a seeker it's a story in what our Jewish friends call the Old Testament it's a story about King David that he was fleeing and so he spent some time in a pagan nation and he started to understand that the pagan king and his court were maybe going to kill him and so to get out of the problem he pretended he was insane and so there's this very interesting line where the king says don't I have enough crazy people in my country why do I need another one kick them out of here and so

[28:18] David was able to live to another day so they had mentally ill people and we all know what mentally ill people are like like we all know them why is it that these three these men spent three years with Jesus and never once did mental illness come into their mind and how is it that we can read these words and there's nothing about the words of Jesus that suggest mental illness and the only other option would be that he lies but there's no reason to think like why would he lie about that like there's no reason to think he's lying the only explanation the only explanation for his words are that he's God that he's God he's not crazy and it's this statement by Jesus that grounds the Christians confidence in the New Testament sort of beyond the purpose of this sermon but this promise this solemn promise by God the son of God that his words who he is his words his work his mission his promises that they would be remembered that that's that they would not pass away that's what grounds our confidence in the New

[29:22] Testament is that witness to the ministry and mission and intention and purposes of Jesus but some people ask okay George you went in like unexpected directions okay but here's the here's the problem like remember you just explained how to understand verse 30 you know this generation will not pass away like if it's actually God's word if it's actually God speaking why is it that it's so hard to interpret verse 30 like why is it that people get that wrong if it's actually God who's speaking why aren't these words like sort of simple and easy to understand well that's a very good question and I need to watch my time and I'm going to answer it by actually making it harder first and when I make it harder first it's easier to understand the answer to the question look at verse 32 but concerning that day or that hour no one knows not even the angels in heaven nor the son but only the father what how could by the way here this is a profound claim by Jesus of divinity he refers to himself as the son of God the son of the father but how could it be that his words will not pass away that he's God and he doesn't know something so the answer is the most important

[31:12] Christian virtue and the answer comes down to humility I told a gay friend once when he said asked me he wasn't trying to get me in trouble he was sort of laughing he said why don't you celebrate gay pride day and I caught him by surprise by saying well pride is considered a sin why would I walk in a sin day he was expecting me to say something about gay it caught him by surprise when I talked about pride I said the great Christian virtue is humility I said so I don't know maybe if you called it gay humility day maybe I don't know it would be different and conversation moved on because he was just joshing with me trying to pull my chain the answer is humility this great Christian virtue that the gospel forms in us that there's stories like this format us in a different way that it draws us to and grounds and pushes us towards see the fact the matter is is that when Jesus says and he also says in other places that in a sense when you read the Old

[32:13] Testament you hear God speaking and in a sense he's looking down a few years and saying when you read the New Testament you're hearing me speaking you're hearing God speaking just because those words are inspired doesn't mean my mind is perfect and inspired in fact it should tell me the opposite it should tell me that I have to constantly be humble before God's word that I have to bow to it that this promise of Jesus about his word is not a promise about my mind but a promise about his word and that I have to humble myself before the word and humble myself means that I will come to realize that I wasn't right at different times I got some of the interpretations wrong you see if it is from in fact if you think about it for a second if it actually is God speaking and it never says hard things or never gives things which are hard to understand then why should we really actually believe that it's from God or is that just like a fantasy like why is it that it comes from God therefore it has to be easy to understand like that doesn't make any sense that's all part of our desire to make ourselves like God's but to actually hear the real true living

[33:35] God who's created and sustained all things and to realize that you're coming and to hear his word that should humble me and humble you and the other thing is and this is so completely and utterly counterintuitive because if I was God I'd want you to know and frankly I'd like a little bit more respect and I'd like a little bit more deference and I'd like a few more toys and that's what it would be like if I was even a demigod or a semi-God what puzzles us is the humble God it goes against everything within us on one level to think that God might humble himself for us and so the answer is very simple in coming to earth God the son of God remained in his full nature as God but he set aside his appearance and all sorts of things and as we see in his earthly life he was content to know what his father revealed to him he was content to depend upon his father and I should learn to be content to trust him too I need to learn to be content to trust him and what he reveals to me what he doesn't reveal to me and in fact actually if you think about it for a second this also explains a little bit about the elect and what's going on here with the text what

[35:20] Jesus by Jesus yet again in two different ways within just a few words revealing that he is God that he is the son that he is saying that doing something only God can do that his words would never pass away and so what that means whether it's Wednesday afternoon or early Thursday morning and he's going to die on the cross on Friday that means God dies on that cross God dies on that cross and this is very very humbling you see the fact the matter is if God needs to die in my place for me to be right with God that means that I am in vastly worse mess than I could possibly imagine that my doom is deeper my lostness is higher and more thorough and more extensive and more deeply more deep than I can possibly imagine in a sense it's almost as if apart from the gospel when you have those three o'clock in the morning and four o'clock in the morning times when you have those days that you can hardly get out of bed because you're so depressed and you have that voice in your ear telling you you are a bad person you are a stupid person you are a failure you are you are a constant disaster and you have that voice speaking in your ears and if you're in

[36:41] Christ you can take this text and say you don't know anything I'm vastly worse than anything you say I'm vastly worse because my situation was so desperate that it could only be fixed by God the son of God dying in my place and why is this good news because of the other thing that says is that if love himself died in my place that not only means that my situation is vastly worse than I have ever imagined and it also means that I am loved more deeply more extensively more thoroughly than I can ever possibly imagine on this side of the grave that love himself would die for the unlovely me that love himself died for the loveless that loved and lovely I might be that you might be I am vastly more loved in Christ and what does that term the elect mean all that means is chosen you know what it means that Jesus chose me before I chose him and so when you see that word can you say to yourself you know George all my life I've been always rejected I don't get the promotions I don't get the romance I haven't had the kids I wanted I don't I don't have the job I don't have the money I've always been rejected I've always I've always been a failure my coaches said that my parents have said that my siblings have said that my friends joke about it and and I and and and and George how on earth how could

[38:33] God God couldn't love me how could does he know does he know the the things in my life that I've done that are wrong the things I should have done to help others and I didn't I didn't I didn't do them and does he does he he know does he know those things in me that I want to keep unbelievably hidden and and and and this wonderful profound word elect says yes he does yes he does in fact you're worse than you think and you're more loved than you never possibly imagine love himself died for the unlovely and loveless you that loved and lovely you might be and all you can do is it it that is a term that means that you are profoundly humbled because all you can do is receive him choosing you just in closing I watch my time see this grounds us doing things sometimes the things we do are easy we're always to do everything in light of the fact that Jesus is going to return and we don't know when so I was talking about last week it might be that for all we know the tribulation is happening right now to believers in in Korea and Iran and we just don't recognize it and and I you know we just Jesus can return at any time and and maybe we've missed it but we can return at any time but you know when the gospel grounds you when you know that the destiny is that he he will see you and he will make you know that you've been loved and you will be loved for all eternity and that he's made you lovely and it's his work not yours and nothing can stop that and nothing can frustrate that and it's his gift to you that you just received by grace and he walks with you every day love walks with you hope walks with you and gives you a hope of love and you are vastly worse and vastly more loved it gives you the power to to face those things in your conscience that you are afraid of and face your shames and your fears as the gospel becomes more real to real to it it grounds you in a humility and a dependence upon him and a gratitude and thankfulness in him and it grounds you to to do simple things and and daily things like care for children and also maybe hard things like stand up to a tyrant or bear witness in a in a form that will cause you to be abused and ignored it it grounds you to do hard things and easy things without making you a narcissist but to make you humble invite you to stand just want to say if you're here or if you're watching online if you feel and you've never given your your life to christ the christian life begins when you you hear the gospel and you say i wish that was true for me and if you're saying right now i wish that was true for me it means that he's chosen you if you feel at all a bit of a pressure or longing for that it means that he's chosen you it's him knocking at your door right now and all i want to say is stop listening to me and just say jesus i open the door please come in thank you that you chose me be my savior in your lord and he will not turn you away you will be his his forever if you take that step let us know not because we want to boast or anything but if you're in ottawa we'd love to connect you you need to walk with others as you walk with the one who's making you loved and lovely and if you live in another city let us know and we'll try to connect you to a good church but stop listening to me and turn to him and ask him to do what he wants which is to come into you and make you loved and lovely let's bow our heads in prayer father thank you so much for the gospel father you know how hard it is for us to for it to be real to our hearts and we ask that your word would speak into our hearts in the depths of who we are that it would have a just a bigger hold of our imagination and our memory and our feelings and our hopes and our and our thinking and our longing that it will become more real to us we ask that your holy spirit would do that we thank you father that jesus died for us unloved and love and and and not lovely and that he died so that loved and lovely we will be and that that is the end of our story in christ we thank and ask all these things in the name of jesus your son and our savior amen story of jesus your chemo Bless & Wash your highly ay RNA main fire ship and people go go go