Well, good morning, brothers and sisters.
For those of you who don't know me, my name is Tyler.
! I'm one of the lay elders here, and it's a joy for me to bring you God's Word this morning.
So before we dive in, let's go to the Lord together for help.
Father in heaven, Lord, would you help us?
Open our eyes to see wondrous things in your Word.
Incline our hearts to fear your great name.
Give us understanding.
Father, take these few loaves of bread and multiply them.
And would we richly feast this morning on your Word by faith?
Help me to declare the glories of your great name.
We pray this in our great Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ's name. Amen.
Tombstone Tourism.
I wonder if you've ever heard of that.
Tombstone Tourism.
A friend recently explained that his wife is a Tombstone Tourist.
traveling and blogging about her adventures, visiting cemeteries.
And cemeteries are richly furnished with stories to tell, architecture to see, people to remember, family histories to learn.
Tombstone Tourism.
Now, you might be one, too, a Tombstone Tourist, if you've ever looked forward to visiting the Arlington National Cemetery.
You know, for many, this is not just a visit to a cemetery, but a walk through history.
To remember and honor the courage and sacrifice of fallen American soldiers.
Each grave tells a story.
And it's to remember the history of a nation.
Now, we've had recently weddings that we've rejoiced over here as a church.
But, you know, it's a good thing from time to time to walk through a graveyard.
It's good to be reminded of Moses' words.
To teach us to number our days.
To get a heart of wisdom.
To remember Solomon's words.
That it is better to go to the house of mourning than go into the house of feasting.
To remember the clock is ticking on all of our lives.
And to remind ourselves that there will come a day where that second date will be etched onto our tombstone after our birthday.
This morning, the chronicler will be our guide as we tour a graveyard.
And he's going to point to an epitaph of King Amaziah.
And the epitaph could read something like this.
Here lies a person who has lost nothing by being buried.
For he is just as good a man underground as he was above.
And how tragic would it be to leave a legacy of failure.
A legacy of a wasted life.
And the story of King Amaziah is a warning to all of us.
About the dangers of human pride.
And you could be so close, yet so far away.
So let's turn to page 350 in the Pew Bible.
And if you're not familiar with the Bible, the big numbers are the chapter numbers.
And the smaller numbers are the verse numbers.
So it will be helpful to you to turn your Bible open to page 350 as we look at this together.
And we'll look at this story in three scenes.
First, the rising storm.
Second, the downward spiral.
And third, the supreme sovereign.
So let's read the first 16 verses together as we see a life that quickly unravels.
Amaziah was 25 years old when he began to reign.
And he reigned 29 years in Jerusalem.
His mother's name was Jehoadin of Jerusalem.
And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.
Yet not with a whole heart.
And as soon as the royal power was firmly his,
he killed his servants who had struck down the king's father.
But he did not put their children to death according to what is written in the law in the book of Moses.
Where the Lord commanded,
Fathers shall not die because of their children,
nor children die because of their fathers.
But each one shall die for his own sin.
Then Amaziah assembled the men of Judah
and set them by fathers' houses
under commanders of thousands and of hundreds
for all Judah and Benjamin.
He mustered those 20 years old and upward
and found that there were 300,000 choice men
fit for war,
able to handle spear and shield.
He hired also 100,000 mighty men of valor from Israel
for 100 talents of silver.
But a man of God came to him and said,
O king,
do not let the army of Israel go with you,
for the Lord is not with Israel,
with all these Ephraimites.
But go, act, be strong for the battle.
Why should you suppose that God will cast you down
before the enemy?
For God has power to help
or to cast down.
And Amaziah said to the man of God,
But what shall we do about the 100 talents
that I have given to the army of Israel?
The man of God answered,
The Lord is able to give you much more than this.
Then Amaziah discharged the army
that had come to him from Ephraim
to go home again.
And they became very angry with Judah
and returned home in fierce anger.
But Amaziah took courage and let out his people
and went to the Valley of Salt
and struck down 10,000 men of Seir.
The men of Judah captured another 10,000 alive
and took them to the top of the rock
and threw them down from the top of the rock
and they were all dashed to pieces.
But the men of the army of Amaziah sent back,
not letting them go with him to battle,
raided the cities of Judah
from Samaria to Beth-horon
and struck down 3,000 people in them
and took much spoil.
After Amaziah came from striking down the Edomites,
he brought the gods of the men of Seir
and set them up as his gods
and worshiped them,
making offerings to them.
Therefore the Lord was angry with Amaziah
and sent to him a prophet who said to him,
Why have you sought the gods of a people
who did not deliver their people from your hands?
But as he was speaking,
the king said to him,
Have we made you a royal counselor?
Stop!
Why should you be struck down?
So the prophet stopped and said,
I know that God has determined to destroy you
because you have done this
and have not listened to my counsel.
This is God's word.
Well, the vast majority of the kings of Judah
were not good men.
Amaziah?
Well, he's no exception.
And verse 1 sets the stage for a rising storm.
Who was King Amaziah?
Well, he was the son and successor of King Joash.
Remember how the last chapter ended.
His father was murdered by a conspiracy.
And look down at verse 3.
The kingdom is now fully in his grasp.
The royal power is his.
He's now in charge.
In verses 1 to 4,
Amaziah avenges his father's death.
He executes judgment.
And his grievance would have been personal and emotional.
You killed my father.
Prepare to die.
Some of you got that reference.
Now, normal Near Eastern practice
would have been to completely annihilate
not only the threats,
but the threats of friends and family.
But Amaziah doesn't do that.
Notice his respect for the Mosaic law.
Verse 4.
But he did not put their children to death.
Why?
Because the law forbade it.
Quoted straight from the Mosaic law,
fathers shall not die because of their children,
nor children die because of their fathers.
But each one shall die for his own sin.
God's law protected against generational grievances.
The children are not to be put to death
because of the sins of their fathers.
And Amaziah is kept in check by the law of God
to the letter.
So far, so good.
Not so fast.
Notice verse 2.
At the very beginning,
the chronicler wants you to know something about Amaziah.
He did what was right,
meaning he walked in a straight path.
But here was the devastating assessment.
Not with a whole heart.
Verse 2 is a shadow that is cast over this entire chapter.
Half-heartedness.
And already you see the cracks in the foundation
which will lead to a great collapse.
A divided heart always leads to divided loyalties.
And his divided loyalty will lead to his downfall.
Now, brother and sister,
we understand that the tug of war
that exists within our own hearts,
we all have clay feet.
We understand this,
and we stumble in many ways.
We lack perfection,
and if we say we have no sin,
we are a liar,
and the truth is not in us.
This, in verse 2,
cannot mean sinless perfection.
David is said to have obeyed God with his whole heart.
But he certainly was not perfect.
So what's the difference?
Well, God draws near to the broken-hearted
and contrite in spirit.
A sincere heart is broken over their sin.
A divided heart remains a stone.
A divided heart is not poor in the spirit.
A divided heart is complacent.
For the true Christian,
sin has no happy home in our hearts.
A broken heart is a sweet perfume of flowers to God,
while a divided heart is a stench.
You see, the Lord is not pleased
by mere half-hearted actions.
Obedient actions that do not stem
from a desire to please God
actually is not obedience at all.
The greatest act of obedience
to give all you have to the poor,
to let your body be burned,
if it does not arise from love,
from a desire to please God,
they're but filthy rags.
They mean nothing.
God demands worship from the heart.
Now, many wonder why.
Why does God demand worship?
You know, He's not like a drill sergeant
arbitrarily barking orders.
Do this, do this, because I said so.
And God is not insecure,
craving compliments to boost His self-esteem.
No, there's another possibility.
Consider this.
His demand for worship
flows from His love for His creation.
And the best news is that there is no,
there is no conflict between
God's glory and your joy.
God's supreme regard for Himself
flows from the fact that He is infinitely worthy.
That's what you were created for,
to worship God.
Man's chief end is to glorify God
and enjoy Him forever.
To worship God is what you were created for.
And God demands that we serve Him
with a pure heart,
a whole heart,
complete loyalty.
And the Shema in Deuteronomy,
remember, Israel was to confess
not only that God is one,
but God, You are the only one.
The only one my heart desires.
To love You with everything inside of me.
A divided heart says,
I'll love You, God,
but isn't it okay if I also love Baal?
What's the big deal?
Verse 2 is the essence
of sin of idolatry.
See, sin is valuing things,
wanting things above God Himself.
Treating God like a vending machine.
God, I want what I want.
God, give me the family I want.
God, give me the job I want.
Give me the size church that I want.
Give me respect.
God is not our highest aim.
God is just a means to an end.
Frank, consider this a health check.
How is the health of your heart this morning?
Do you treat prayer like a ceremonial pitch
before a baseball game?
Something to do before getting to the main event?
Parroting words without a heart?
You know, coming to church is a habit?
Nothing more.
I mean, you love community, yes.
To a downward spiral.
Point number two, the downward spiral.
And there's three sub-points.
Amaziah's pride, one, leads to rash decisions.
Second, a rejection of God's Word.
And third, hitting rock bottom.
First, it's rash decisions in verses 5 to 13.
You get a section explaining what went wrong
with the Edomites.
First, just like David's sin,
he gathers together and numbers the people.
Whenever you see a king taking a sentence
to count his soldiers, it's always a bad sign.
Look at verse 5.
He counts and numbers 300 choice men.
And then he hires 100,000 mercenaries,
what the chronicler will call mighty men of valor.
Now, what is this telling us?
Well, notice he doesn't even consult the prophets
before he engages these mercenaries.
He doesn't consult the prophets
to see whether God is with him or not.
So rather than reliance on God,
he takes the matters into his own hands.
Rather than trusting God as a warrior,
a shield, and a help,
he makes the rash decision
by making an alliance with these mercenaries.
In verse 7, God in his mercy sends a messenger,
an unnamed prophet who says,
wait, wait, wait, wait, don't do it.
That is a bad idea.
The Lord is not with you in this army.
If you keep going, you're going to lose everything.
Verse 8, go, be strong for the battle.
Why should you suppose that God will cast you down
before the enemy?
For God has power to help or to cast down.
He's saying, do not be foolish.
Look to God as your source of strength.
He is a helper for those who trust in him.
Isn't that what we've seen so far in Chronicles?
Now, this exhortation is a good word for us.
It's a good word in a situation where you face uncertainty.
It's not literally fighting people with swords,
but maybe your situation feels frightening, daunting, scary.
Maybe it's a scary diagnosis.
Maybe it's uncertainty about your immigration status.
Maybe you recently lost a loved one
and you're facing an uncertain future.
An empty house where all your kids
have now moved away and you're alone.
Uncertainty about finding a job.
Maybe it's uncertainty of how you're going to get
through this sermon.
Be strong for the battle, brother and sister.
And he tells us why we can be strong.
God has the power to help.
The Hebrew word is ezer, helper.
God, you are my helper.
Now, not like elves, you know, Santa's helpers.
No, God is a warrior who fights for his people.
I lift up my eyes.
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the maker of heaven and earth.
God, you are my azer.
He has unbounded power to help his people.
He's a protector, a preserver, a provider for his people.
God helps those who call out to him.
And he has no rivals.
He can take a few farmers with pitchforks and shovels
and topple Egypt, the most powerful nation on earth.
Hasn't he demonstrated his power to his people already?
What is Amaziah's response to the exhortation of verse 9?
Is it, you're right.
How could I have been so stupid?
No, look down at verse 9.
He says, what about all the money I paid to the mercenaries?
A modern translation would be, bro, what about the bag?
100 talents of silver, that's $2 million.
For you accountants in here,
his main reference for obedience is his return on his investment.
About taking a loss on the balance sheet.
The question itself shows how half-hearted he is.
He never even considered that he offended God.
This is not repentance.
The question is, what are you willing to give up
for the sake of wholehearted devotion?
Would you give up $2 million for the sake of obedience to God's word?
What cost is too high?
What about your reputation?
Give up your money, your prestige, your popularity, pleasure.
What if the world started to call you intellectually benighted
and bigoted for following Christ?
Would you follow him even then?
To lose your status?
Ah, but friend, the prophet responds with a word
that has encouraged many a very saint.
In verse 9, the Lord is able to give you much more than this.
You'll gain much more if you obey God
than what it would have cost you otherwise.
Oh, this is a call in confidence in God's goodness.
Paul would say all these things are rubbish.
They're trash in comparison to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ.
These are nothing compared to God.
So, brother and sister, rest assured in this,
that losses that you suffer for the Lord's sake are not losses.
Even in this life, the Lord will give you much more than you will ever lose.
Of Jim Elliot, he is no fool to give what he cannot keep,
to gain what he cannot lose.
Friend, is God calling you to give up sin?
Much more will he give you.
So much more joy and delight.
He gives you himself.
Friend, are you facing rejection from friends and family
for your devotion to Christ?
He provides abundantly.
So much more.
He gives you himself.
He gives you the communion of saints.
Jesus, a new family across the world.
Jesus would say in Mark 10, verse 30,
anyone who leaves behind possessions or relationships for my sake
will receive a hundredfold return in this life
and eternal life in the world to come.
Now, if you can go back to the year 1980,
and you were given the opportunity to purchase shares in the startup Apple,
knowing what you know now,
a company that has returned more than 2,000 times
the original investments,
how much more, how much would you give away?
A dollar?
Ten?
A hundred dollars?
No, you'd give away everything.
How much more will Christ return for those who give their lives to him?
Now, at this point in verse 10,
Amaziah sends the soldiers off.
But again, his obedience is fool's gold.
Yes, he checks the box,
but it appears he is more out for immediate material gain
rather than a desire to please God.
And notice his rashness in hiring mercenaries causes a problem.
In verse 10,
The army was very angry.
Fierce anger.
Why?
Well, it seems this army had lost their opportunity for the real prophet.
The real prophet was plundering the people.
Their wages were nothing in comparison to the spoils of plundering the people.
If you look down at verse 13, that's exactly what they do.
Plundering and killing Amaziah's own people.
Amaziah's sin risked the lives of his people
due to the rashness of his decision.
You know, the effects of sin in our life are terrible.
Sin darkens our minds.
But, you know, sin doesn't just affect you.
Sin affects those around you.
Spouses.
Children.
Fellow church members.
Leaders, it affects the people whom God has put into your care.
Whom God has called you to protect.
Amaziah's people are reaping the consequences for his disobedience.
And meanwhile, look at the bloodthirsty treatment of the Edomites.
Verse 12.
These Edomites are thrown off the cliffs.
One commentator said this.
What they should have done is thrown their idols off the cliffs.
Because as we'll see, these become a snare.
So first were his rash decisions,
but the downward spiral continues by his rejection of God's word.
In verses 14 to 16,
he does something mind-blowingly stupid.
Lukewarmness always leads to false religion.
Look down.
A conquering king worships the idols of a defeated nation.
How stupid.
It was the Lord who gave him victory.
Yet he thinks these idols can help him?
This is like getting on a lightning rod in the middle of a thunderstorm,
cursing God to his face.
This shows how low sin drags us down.
It darkens our judgments.
You know, there is a way that seems right to a man,
but in the end, it leads to death.
You know, how often do we turn to other gods?
Though you and I know they make empty promises.
And they will ultimately fail us.
How often do we treat idols like our Messiah?
They'll protect you.
They'll save you.
They'll give you that feeling that you can't live without.
We know they make empty promises,
but we continue to go back.
You know, sin is actually really irrational.
Always.
You know what else is irrational?
Owning a wolf dog.
Have you heard about these animals?
A wolf dog?
These aren't huskies, which are great dogs.
Bulldogs are okay, too.
He who has ears, let him hear.
Wolf dogs are like 80% wolf.
And when these wolf dogs are young, they look cute.
So what do people do?
They'll adopt them as pets.
You know, people say they're misunderstood,
marginalized even by the prejudices and misinformation out there.
And so they bring the wolf dog into their home.
But then something happens.
Around two years old, these wolf dogs start to behave differently.
They start to behave as predators.
At two years old, these wolves begin to challenge their owner,
asserting their dominance in the house as the alpha.
And at that point, the owners realize
they've invited a vicious predator to live inside their house.
You don't own the wolf.
The wolf owns you.
Many are maimed and killed by their wolf dogs.
Friend, isn't that how sin works?
Our desires are wolves so often clothed in sheep's clothing.
And sometimes we wrongly think sin is a domesticated pet that we can control.
But in Romans 6, Paul writes that sin is a slave master seeking to enslave you.
As John Owen said, be killing sin or sin will be killing you.
And sin provokes God's anger in verse 15.
A man of God approaches him.
Verse 15, why have you sought these gods out?
They never gave you the victory.
Now, Amaziah does something even more irrational.
What does he do?
He scoffs and mocks God's messenger.
He says, who made you a royal counselor?
The answer is God.
He is now standing in judgment above God's word.
And standing above in judgment of God's word
is the clear sign of God's judgment over you.
The prophet responds, I know that God has determined to destroy you
because you have done this and have not listened to my counsel.
Now, teenagers, your parents are not perfect.
They're not authoritative like the word of God.
But when they bring the word of God to you, listen to them.
The path to apostasy is paved by apathy toward God's word.
Listen to your parents when they bring you the word.
After rejecting God's word, pride now leads him to hit rock bottom.
Let's pick up the story in verse 17.
Then Amaziah, king of Judah, took counsel
and sent Joash, the son of Jehoiaz, son of Jehu, king of Israel, saying,
Come, let us look one another in the face.
And Joash, the king of Israel, sent word to Amaziah, king of Judah,
a thistle on Lebanon, sent to a cedar on Lebanon, saying,
Give your daughter to my son for a wife.
And a wild beast of Lebanon passed by and trampled down the thistle.
You say, See, I have struck down Edom,
and your heart has lifted you up in boastfulness.
But now stay at home.
Why should you provoke trouble so that you fall,
you and Judah with you?
But Amaziah would not listen,
for it was of God,
in order that he might give them into the hand of their enemies,
because they had sought the gods of Edom.
So Joash, king of Israel, went up,
and he and Amaziah, king of Judah,
faced one another in battle at Beth Shemesh,
which belonged to Judah.
And Judah was defeated by Israel,
and every man fled to his home.
And Joash, king of Israel,
captured Amaziah, king of Judah,
the son of Joash, son of Ahaziah,
at Beth Shemesh,
and brought him to Jerusalem
and broke down the wall of Jerusalem
for 400 cubits,
from the Ephraim gate to the corner gate.
And he seized all the gold and silver
and all the vessels that were found
in the house of God
in the care of Obed-Edom.
He seized also the treasuries of the king's house
and also hostages.
He returned to Samaria.
Amaziah, the son of Joash, king of Judah,
lived 15 years after the death of Joash,
the son of Jehoaz, king of Israel.
Now the rest of the deeds of Amaziah
from first to last,
are they not written in the book
of the kings of Judah in Israel?
From the time when he turned away from the Lord,
they made a conspiracy against him in Jerusalem.
And he fled to Lachish.
But they sent after him to Lachish
and put him to death there.
And they brought him upon horses,
and he was buried with his fathers
in the city of David.
Pride leads him to hit rock bottom.
By verse 17, Amaziah says to the northern kingdom,
let us look one another in the face.
In other words, he's saying, let's face off.
See you at noon on the playground.
And at this point, he thinks he is it.
He's the boss.
He's a pretty big deal.
He's the next Alexander the Great,
conquering the world.
But in response,
what does the king of Israel say to him?
Well, he begins to wax poetically.
What's with the marriage metaphor?
I think Joash is saying,
I know you're trying to get the upper hand,
but here's what's about to happen.
The small thistle is about to be trampled down.
He's saying, Amaziah, stay at home.
Don't embarrass yourself.
When you come over here,
you'll find out we're not like the Edomites.
You're a big shot on the playground,
but you're about to step into the ring
with Mike Tyson.
Stay at home.
Don't embarrass yourself.
What happens?
Well, pride comes before the fall.
Literally, Amaziah does not listen.
Verse 21, he goes up.
By verse 22, he is trampled down.
End of verse 23,
the wall of the city is exposed.
Now the people are exposed and defenseless.
The king is taken captive.
Treasury is seized.
Hostages taken.
The king is assassinated.
In verse 27.
Amaziah thought these idols
were a good deal,
but sin hides the price tag.
Look what he had to pay
rather than listening to God's word in obedience.
Point number two is the rising,
point one is the rising storm.
Point number two,
the downward spiral.
Point number three,
the supreme sovereign.
Now verse 20,
we are essentially taking,
if you will,
behind the scenes
of what is happening here.
Joash attempted to talk Amaziah
out of such a fight,
but we are told very clearly
in verse 20
that Amaziah would not listen.
He gives a reason.
Why?
For it was from God
that he might deliver them
into the hand of Joash.
This is Pharaoh 2.0.
The king of Judah
has become a Pharaoh
that God will now destroy.
Remember,
God can help
or he can cast down,
and God has now chosen
to cast down.
If you were to ask Amaziah
the question,
whose idea was it
to reject the prophet's warning?
He would say,
it's my idea.
No one controls me.
But look at verse 20 again.
It was of God.
Amaziah did not listen
because God
had determined it to be so.
It's mysterious, isn't it?
Human responsibility
and divine sovereignty.
Now some people think
human history
is all about human.
destiny determined
by our decisions.
But the chronicler
rejects any human-centered
view of history.
This is a God
who lifts up kings
and brings them down.
Proverbs 21,
the king's heart
is a stream of water
in the hand of the Lord.
He turns it
wherever he will.
He exercises sovereignty
over nations.
And has God
stopped being sovereign
since the time
of the chronicler?
friend, God governs
governance.
He is infinitely supreme,
always in control.
He is powerful
over Israel's prophets
and priests and kings.
He is powerful
over current presidents.
He is powerful
over planets.
Psalm 2,
the rulers rage,
the people plot in vain.
And what does God do?
Is he pacing back and forth
in his heavenly throne room
wondering what he's going to do?
No.
God sits in heavens
and laughs
and he does all
that he pleases.
See, the most cataclysmic event
is like a butterfly
landing on Mount Everest.
God is immovable.
Do you think the creature
can limit the creator's
sovereign power?
That is not the story
you see in Chronicles.
And if we go behind
the curtain,
not only with Amaziah,
but all of human history,
will we not expect
to find the same truth?
It was of God.
Now, for all you news junkies
out in here,
I know there are some of you.
Stop.
But I don't know how you do it.
But if you can't,
here's a piece of advice
that Amanda gave.
Every time you read an article,
at the end of each headline,
write,
it was of God.
And surely it must be so.
There's only two alternatives.
Either God must reign
or he must be ruled.
And the emphatic witness
of the scripture
is that God is reigning.
You know, the cancer
in Amaziah's heart
disguised itself
and it's spread
like a predator.
And this church
is a hospital.
And there's honesty
at a hospital.
And the truth
must be told.
Because you see,
the sad story of us
is we are naturally
like Amaziah.
Half-hearted obedience
means nothing to God.
We are apathetic
to God
and his word.
We don't,
we cannot reach up to God.
We're like the paralyzed
man on the side
of the road.
We can do nothing.
But the good news,
my friends,
is that God
has reached down to us.
God hasn't just
sent us a prophet.
He has sent us
his own son.
And this is the message
of the gospel.
You see,
God made you
to bear his image.
And because of that,
he has authority over you.
He demands
full worship
in your heart.
And he is good
and he must
punish sin.
He will not brush
your sin under the rug.
And by nature,
we rebel.
By nature,
we are God-ignoring
and God-belittling.
By nature,
we deserve God's
wrath.
Friend,
do not be deceived.
Outside of Christ,
you do stand
under God's judgment.
God can help
or he can cast
down.
And the good news
is this,
God is a helper
to those who call
out to him.
Because even though
he is surrounded
by idolaters,
his heart is filled
with steadfast love.
We are filled
with hatred,
his heart
filled with mercy.
And God sovereignly
works out his plan
by sending his son.
Fully God
and fully man.
And unlike Amaziah,
he was the perfectly
righteous king.
He obeyed God
not with a half heart
or divided heart.
He obeyed God
with his entire heart.
And he came down
and lived the perfect
life of obedience
that we should have lived.
But despite never sinning,
he goes to a cross.
And isn't the cross
the greatest mystery
of divine sovereignty
and human responsibility?
After all,
who sent Christ
to the cross?
Jesus was carried away,
maybe against his will,
to be tortured,
to be killed,
to be crucified.
And humanly speaking,
didn't Judas
send Christ to the cross?
Humanly speaking,
wasn't it the chief priests,
the scribes,
and the Pharisees,
plotting and scheming
to publicly shame
and execute this Jesus?
Humanly speaking,
didn't Pontius Pilate
and Herod
send him to the cross?
Humanly speaking,
didn't the people
who yelled,
crucify him,
didn't they send him
to the cross?
Friends,
higher above them all,
it was of God.
Who sent Christ
to the cross?
The Father sent him
in his great love.
Sends him to die.
Why?
So he could be
our substitute,
bearing God's
white-hot wrath
against sin
for all who had returned
from their sin
and put their trust
in Christ alone.
And on the third day,
Jesus rose from the dead.
And now Jesus stands
and says,
there are two possibilities.
Either I will be your help
or I will cast you down
in judgment.
And that hope
is held out to you today.
He promises
that he will remove
your heart of stone
and give you
a new heart of flesh.
He will give you
a new heart
by his Holy Spirit.
Friend,
if you are here
and you are not a Christian,
consider this chapter.
Consider what it means
for our lives.
You know,
in our proud hearts,
people tend to think
better of themselves
than what God thinks
of them.
You know,
and we tend to think
that Christianity
is an unnatural way
to live.
We've got it backwards.
You see,
Jesus lived
the most natural life.
He never bowed down
before idols.
You and I
and our sin
are the abnormal ones.
See,
we are slowly dying,
hopeless,
on our knees,
bowing before idols.
Treating career
and cars
and cash
as our functional gods.
We are on our knees,
bowing before idols
and this one comes
to offer us life,
water to the thirsty soul
and what do we do?
We belittle him.
Our entire life
is backwards
when we reject Christ.
God destroys
the wisdom of this world.
There are only
two possibilities.
He will help
or he will cast down.
Friend,
do not be deceived.
Your sin blinds you
to who Jesus is.
Friend,
don't be blind to Jesus.
Don't be like Amaziah,
so close
yet so far away.
Look at Jesus.
Look at his works.
Look at his miracles.
Look at his words.
Look at his deeds.
Look at his actions.
Look at him being raised
from the dead
in history.
The very thing
God has been making clear
since the dawn
of creation.
He has been saying
all along,
look for this one.
Don't be blind
to Jesus.
what happens
when you go to Christ.
Immediate forgiveness.
I'll repeat that.
Immediate forgiveness
and intimate fellowship.
True grace
reaches the bottom
of your heart
and God can take
your ruined life
and make something
brand new.
Oh, but friend,
if you are here
and you're a Christian,
Jesus Christ is the same
yesterday,
today,
and tomorrow.
He is your Azir.
And if he is sovereign
to cast down,
do you not see
that he is sovereign
to be your helper?
He is your sovereign helper,
the maker of heaven
and earth.
He neither sleeps
nor slumbers.
Rest in everything
that he has done for you.
That is a pillow
to lay your head on
at night.
And we have no reason
to boast in ourselves.
It's all of grace.
It's all of God.
All to his glory.
Today he says
the same to you.
I will be your help.
And I will never fail you.
And to close,
during an interview
of the late Christian scholar
Carl F. Henry,
who at the time
was in his 70s,
was asked
how he managed
to remain so humble
for so many decades.
Dr. Henry replied,
how can anyone
be arrogant
when he stands
beside the cross?
Amen.
Let's pray, friends.
Father in heaven,
we pray that we would
stand at the foot
of the cross.
and Father,
we would boast
only in the cross.
Father,
we pray that
Christ would be a magnet
drawing all people
to himself.
And Lord,
that you would get
all glory and honor
and that we would serve you
with our whole hearts.
Pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.