Presenting Our Tithes & Offerings

March 3, 2024 in Bible - OT - Malachi, Giving, Meditations, Worship

Malachi 3:8–10 (NKJV) 

8“Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings. 9You are cursed with a curse, For you have robbed Me, Even this whole nation. 10Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My house, And try Me now in this,” Says the Lord of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough to receive it. 

Martin Luther once remarked that every Christian undergoes three conversions: the first of his mind, the second of his heart, and the third of his wallet. Of these three, it may well be that we find the conversion of our wallet to be the most difficult. Charles Spurgeon writes, “With some (Christians) the last part of their nature that ever gets sanctified is their pockets.”

Last week we began exploring various traditions that our elders have established to guide our corporate worship. As we continue in this vein, let us address our practice of presenting our tithes and offerings before the Lord. You may be unaware, but we have a box in the foyer where you can deposit your tithes and offerings. Each Sunday during worship we sing a song about giving. And, as we sing, the man who will be offering our prayer of thanksgiving brings that tithe and offering box to the front of the sanctuary. So why do we do this?

Consider just a few of the many reasons: first, presenting our tithes and offerings to the Lord in worship reminds us that God lays claim to our wallets. God is the owner of all we possess and appoints us as His stewards to manage all our wealth in a way that honors Him. And Malachi insists that one of the ways we honor Him is by giving Him a tithe, or ten percent, of our increase. Bring all the tithes into the storehouse. Alongside such tithes are offerings, free-will gifts above and beyond the tithe which can be the fruit of vows we have made, an expression of gratitude for the Lord’s generosity, or an effort to help others who are in need. Presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us of God’s claim on our wallets. 

Second, presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us that worship is not confined to Sundays. What are our tithes and offerings but tokens of the work that we have done throughout the week? They represent the fruit of our work – all of which is done to the glory of God. They remind us that there is no division between “secular” work and “sacred” work – all our work is sacred, performed in the presence of God to the glory of God. Presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us of this.

Finally, presenting our tithes and offerings to the Lord reminds us that we are only able to prosper by God’s hand. David prayed after collecting supplies for the construction of the Temple, “But who am I, and who are my people, That we should be able to offer so willingly as this? For all things come from You, And of Your own we have given You” (1 Chr 29:14). Did you catch that last phrase? “Of Your own we have given You” – it is God who gifts us with intelligence, with opportunity, with ingenuity, and with skill to get wealth. So we are to give Him thanks – and one way we do so is by giving Him a portion of the wealth He gives us. 

Presenting our tithes and offerings weekly reminds us, therefore, that God lays claim to our wallets, that all our work is to be done to the glory of the Lord, and that we are only able to prosper by His gracious gift. So as we bring our tithes and offerings to the Lord, how ought we to do so? The Apostle Paul reminds us to give “not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor 9:7). We are to give thankfully, freely, and cheerfully. We are to give, not because compelled to do so, but because we recognize God’s generosity to us. God has freely given to us, so let us give freely to Him and others. He has saved us from our sin; He has provided for our daily needs; hallelujah, what a Savior! 

Reminded that we are to present our tithes and offerings to the Lord generously and thankfully, let us confess that we often fail to give, that we close our fists to those in need and rob God of that which is His due. As you are able, let us kneel as we confess our sins to the Lord.

The Curse of God

March 20, 2022 in Bible - OT - Malachi, Meditations

Malachi 4:5–6 (NKJV)

5Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. 6And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.

When God created the world, He created it a realm of righteousness and peace – a place of blessing. Yet God warned our first parents that were they to reject His Word this good world would fall under a curse. This should have been no suprise. God Himself is the source of life and light. Hence, to turn away from Him is to sever ourselves from all that is good and right, from that which gives us blessing; even as an electric lamp depends for its light upon an electrical outlet, the world depends for blessing and joy upon the living God. Hence, to reject God and yet imagine that we can preserve peace and joy is foolish. The ultimate end of rebellion is always death and judgment.

Yet our first parents listened to the lies of the devil and rebelled against God. Thus the entire creation became twisted and distorted, it came under judgment. Where once there was only blessing now curses touched all creation. And this had been the devil’s intention – to destroy all creation, to destroy that which God had designed and made, by bringing it like himself under God’s wrath and curse.

But God had other plans. God intended to reveal His glory by rescuing the world; He would not abandon it to the folly of our first parents or to the malevolence of the devil. And it it this intention that is announced in our text today. God promised to send Elijah to prepare the way for the Messiah’s arrival and to restore family harmony under Christ, Lest,” He declares, I come and strike the earth with a curse.” John the Baptizer was this Elijah. God sent John as the forerunner of His plan of salvation, His plan to rescue the entire creation from the curse of judgment.

So Jesus declared to Nicodemus. For God so loved the world – the kosmos, the creation which He had so lovingly and thoughtfully crafted – that He sent His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him may not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world but that the world through Him might be saved(Jn 3:16-17). God acted in Christ to rescue all creation from its bondage to decay, from the curse of death. 

So how did He accomplish this? He did this by making Jesus a curse for us. The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment; God could not just overlook our injustice. To uphold justice, rebellion must be judged in order to uphold justice. And so, wonder of wonders, the eternal Son of God took on human flesh and gave Himself over to death for us; He became a curse for us, bore the just judgment that was due to us for our rebellion. And then Jesus rose from the dead, broke the power of death, and reversed the curse that once enslaved all creation. He died and rose again lest the earth be struck with a curse; He died and rose again to reconcile all things to Himself in heaven and on earth.

So now what of you? The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. Either we face that judgment ourselves – the end of which will be condemnation and death – or we turn in faith to the Lord Jesus Christ, who bore God’s judgment for His people, and so receive the blessings of justification and life. As we enter into His presence this day, He commands us to seek refuge from judgment through Jesus lest we be struck with a curse. 

So reminded this morning that we can only escape the curse of judgment if we trust in Jesus who became a curse for us, let us confess our sins in Jesus’ Name, trusting that God will indeed forgive and bless all those who come to Him in faith. And as you are able, let us kneel as we confess our sins. We will have a time of silent confession followed by the corporate confession found in your bulletin.

Tithes and Offerings

December 5, 2021 in Bible - OT - Malachi, Giving, Meditations

Malachi 3:8, 10 

8“Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings… 10Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My house, And try Me now in this,” Says the Lord of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough to receive it. 

Recently, several people have asked how we collect tithes and offerings at Trinity Church. Apparently we aren’t doing a very good job of advertising! So for those who aren’t aware, we have a box labeled “Tithes and Offerings” that sits out in the foyer and in which you can put your giving – though you can also give online. Some of you may also be unaware that during our Lord’s Day worship, we bring these tithes and offerings forward as part of our worship. Each Sunday we sing a song of praise and thanksgiving for the Lord’s blessings while the man offering our prayer of thanksgiving brings the tithes and offerings forward and places them on the floor in front of the communion table. 

The reason we do this is that the Scriptures have much to say about wealth because true faith reveals itself in the way we handle our wealth. Consider three things the Scriptures teach us about wealth. First, they insist that wealth is a blessing and a gift from God. So in our text today, the Lord promises to pour out His blessing on those who honor Him with their wealth. And Solomon reminds us,“The blessing of the Lord makes one rich, and He adds no sorrow with it” (Pr 10:22). While others may strive to add sorrow to your wealth, God doesn’t. Abraham, Jacob, Job, David, Joseph of Arimethea, Philemon – all these were righteous men who were also wealthy. So Paul instructs Timothy, “Command those who are rich in this present age not to be haughty, nor to trust in uncertain riches but in the living God, who gives us richly all things to enjoy” (1 Tim 6:18). Wealth is a blessing and a gift from God.

Second, while wealth itself is not a problem, the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. So, in our text, the Israelites’ love of money made them guilty of robbing God. And in our Lord’s parable of the sower, the seed that is sown among thorns and choked out describes those who “hear the word, and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful” (Mk 4:19). Hence, Jesus warned that “it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God” (Mk 10:25). And Paul warned Timothy that “those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows” (1 Tim 6:9-10). The love of money is a dangerous snare.

Third, the Scriptures teach that a central way we affirm that wealth is a gift from God and that the love of it is a dangerous snare is by being open-handed with our wealth. Such generosity reveals itself in tithes and offerings. First, tithes. Our tithe is ten percent of our increase in wealth that we return to the Lord as tribute. The tithe affirms that God has given us our wealth and that all we have belongs to Him. “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse,” God commands through Malachi. Bring your tithe into the very house of God, the church of God. Why? To testify that God is your Lord and that He has given you your vocational work as your divine calling. The tithe testifies that your daily labor is not a distraction from God’s service but one of the principal ways that you serve Him. The tithe is part of your worship of God and reveals that you live for love of Him not for love of money.

Above and beyond these tithes are offerings – gifts of generosity that we offer to those in need, to worthy institutions, to family and friends. The righteous man is known for His generosity. As Psalm 112 attests:

1Praise the Lord! Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, Who delights greatly in His commandments. 2His descendants will be mighty on earth; The generation of the upright will be blessed. 3Wealth and riches will be in his house, And his righteousness endures forever. 4Unto the upright there arises light in the darkness; He is gracious, and full of compassion, and righteous. 5A good man deals graciously and lends; He will guide his affairs with discretion. (Ps 112:1–5)

A good man deals graciously and lends; he is gracious and full of compassion. So what of you? Have you given thanks for the wealth you have received? Have you been careful to shun the love of money? And have you been open-handed with your wealth – faithfully giving your tithes to the Lord and regularly looking for opportunities to bless others with your wealth? Reminded that God has given us richly all things to enjoy and to share, let us confess that we often fail to pay tribute to God with our tithes, that we are often close-fisted rather than open-handed with our wealth, and that our hearts are often tempted by the deceitfulness of riches. And, as you are able, let us kneel together as we confess our sins to the Lord. We will have a time of silent confession followed by the corporate confession found in your bulletin.

God’s Grace through Parents

October 4, 2020 in Baptism, Bible - NT - Acts, Bible - OT - Malachi, Children, Covenantal Living, Discipline, Marriage, Meditations, Parents, Ten Commandments

Acts 16:31–34 (NKJV)

31 So [Paul and Silas] said [to the jailer], “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.” 32 Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. 33 And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their stripes. And immediately he and all his family were baptized. 34 Now when he had brought them into his house, he set food before them; and he rejoiced, having believed in God with all his household.

Later in the service I have the privilege of baptizing ——–. Their baptisms are reminders that Jesus works not just with individuals but with whole families. When He saves us, His salvation transforms our individual lives and our homes. Jesus’ salvation years ago of ——-, their parents, has radically transformed their home and the lives of their children.

This is no surprise. Malachi promised that one of the chief fruits of the Messiah’s coming would be a renewal of family life, particularly a restoration of fatherhood. “He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers” (Mal 4:6). It is Jesus’ transformative work in families that is on display in the life of the Philippian jailer in our text today. After the jailer heard the Word of the Lord preached by Paul and Silas he believed in the Lord, acknowledged Jesus to be Lord of all, and so was baptized with “all his family.” Jesus began His transformative work in this home.

Because the Gospel is not just for individuals but for families, the Scriptures are filled with promises and commands for both parents and children. The Lord includes both parents and children in His kingdom and is often pleased to use the discipleship of parents to bring children to faith. “Train up a child in the way he should go,” Proverbs 22:6 declares, “And when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

During the reign of Marcus Aurelius, the famous Stoic emperor of Rome, a famous Christian teacher named Justin was arrested along with a number of his students. They were interrogated for their faith and told that they must renounce Christ if they were to preserve their lives. Justin and his companions refused – and so Justin the Philosopher is more commonly known as Justin Martyr. The account of their martyrdom testifies of the power of parental discipleship:

The Roman prefect Rusticus said, “To come to the point then, are you a Christian?” Justin said, “Yes, I am a Christian.” The prefect said to Chariton, “Are you also a Christian?” Chariton replied, “I am a Christian by God’s command.” The prefect then asked another, “What do you say, Charito?” Charito said, “I am a Christian by God’s gift.” “And what are you, Eulpistus?” Eulpistus, a slave of Caesar, answered, “I also am a Christian, freed by Christ, and share by the grace of Christ in the same hope.” The prefect said to Hierax, “Are you also a Christian?” Hierax said, “Yes, I am a Christian, for I worship and adore the same God.” The prefect Rusticus asked them all, “Did Justin make you Christians?” Hierax replied, “I was, and shall ever be, a Christian.” A man called Paeon stood up and said, “I also am a Christian.” The prefect said, “Who taught you?” Paeon replied, “I received from my parents this good confession.” Eulpistus agreed, “I listened indeed gladly to the teaching of Justin, but I too received Christianity from my parents.”

——— stand in this good company – the company of those children whose lives have been transformed by the grace of God through the witness of their parents.

So what does this mean for us? Parents, it means that your children are not your own. They belong, body and soul, to the Lord Jesus, and have been entrusted by Him to your care. So you are called, in Paul’s words, “to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Eph 6:4). Children, it means that you are not your own but that you belong, body and soul, to your faithful Savior, Jesus Christ. So you are called, with your parents, to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength,” (Dt 6:5) and you are called, in the words of the 5th commandment, to “honor your father and mother that it may go well with you and you may live long on the earth” (Ex 20:12).

And so reminded this morning that God deals not just with individuals but also with families, let us confess that we have often neglected our responsibilities as parents and children alike – we parents have neglected to love and train our children as we ought and we children have neglected to love and honor our parents as we ought. And as you are able, let us kneel together before the Lord as we confess our sins. We will have a time of silent confession followed by the corporate confession found in your bulletin.

The Need for Converted Wallets

February 19, 2017 in Bible - NT - 2 Corinthians, Bible - OT - 1 Chronicles, Bible - OT - Ecclesiastes, Bible - OT - Malachi, Giving, Meditations, Quotations
Malachi 3:8–10 (NKJV)
8 “Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings. 9 You are cursed with a curse, For you have robbed Me, Even this whole nation. 10 Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, That there may be food in My house, And try Me now in this,” Says the LORD of hosts, “If I will not open for you the windows of heaven And pour out for you such blessing That there will not be room enough to receive it.
Martin Luther once remarked that every Christian undergoes three conversions: the first of his mind, the second of his heart, and the third of his wallet. Of these three, it may well be that we find the conversion of the wallet to be the most difficult. Charles Spurgeon writes, “With some (Christians) the last part of their nature that ever gets sanctified is their pockets.”
In the last few weeks we have explored various traditions that our elders have established to guide our corporate worship. As we continue in this vein, let us address our practice of presenting our tithes and offerings before the Lord. Each week we sing a song about giving as we bring our tithes and offerings to the front of the sanctuary. Why do we do this?
Consider just a few of the many reasons: first, presenting our tithes and offerings to the Lord in worship reminds us that God lays claim to our wallets. God is the owner of all we possess and appoints us as His stewards to manage all our wealth in a way that honors Him. And Malachi insists that one of the ways we honor Him is by giving Him a tithe, or ten percent, of our increase. Bring all the tithes into the storehouse. Alongside such tithes are offerings, free-will gifts above and beyond the tithe which can be the fruit of vows we have made, an expression of gratitude for the Lord’s generosity, or an effort to help others who are in need. Presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us of God’s claim on our wallets.
Second, presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us that worship is not confined to Sundays. What are our tithes and offerings but a token of the work that we have done throughout the week? The tithes represent the fruit of our work – all of which is done to the glory of God. There is no division between “secular” work and “sacred” work – all our work is sacred, performed in the presence of God to the glory of God. Presenting our tithes and offerings reminds us of this.
Finally, presenting our tithes and offerings to the Lord reminds us that all we are able to achieve in our employments is a gift from God. As David prayed after collecting supplies for the construction of the Temple, “But who am I, and who are my people, That we should be able to offer so willingly as this? For all things come from You, And of Your own we have given You” (1 Chr 29:14). Of Your own we have given You – it is God who gifts us with intelligence, with opportunity, with ingenuity, and with skill to get wealth. So we are to give Him thanks – and one way we do so is by giving Him a portion of the wealth He gives us.
Presenting our tithes and offerings weekly reminds us, therefore, that God lays claim to our wallets, that all our work is to be done to the glory of the Lord, and that all we are able to achieve is a gift from Him. But it is not enough to know whywe do this; it is also important to consider how we are to do it.
So how are we to bring our tithes and offerings to the Lord? The other Scriptures we sing as we present our tithes give us sound counsel. First, Ecclesiastes 11:1-2 urges us to give generously. “Cast your bread upon the waters,” it says, “…give a portion to seven and also to eight.” These words counsel us to spread our wealth abroad. In Jesus’ words, we are to make friends by means of unrighteous mammon that we may be received into the heavenly dwellings. The tithes and offerings presented here are to reflect a pattern of generosity that characterizes the entirety of our lives. Like the Good Samaritan, we are to help those who are in need. We are to give generously.
Second, Paul urges us in 2 Corinthians 9:7 to give “not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loves a cheerful giver.” Even as God has freely given to us, He wants us to freely give to others. We are to give, not because compelled to do so, but because we recognize God’s generosity to us. He has saved us from our sin; He has provided for our daily needs; hallelujah, what a Savior!

So reminded of why we present our tithes and offerings to the Lord and howwe are to do it, let us confess that Luther was right – our wallets do stand in need of conversion. Let us confess that we are often stingy, and often give only grudgingly. And, as we confess, let us kneel as we are able and seek the Lord’s forgiveness. We will have a time of silent confession followed by the corporate confession found in your bulletin.

Rescuing Creation

January 7, 2013 in Bible - OT - Malachi, Eschatology, Meditations, Postmillennialism

Malachi 4:5–6 (NKJV)
5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. 6 And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.
When God created the world, He created it a realm of righteousness and peace – a place of blessing. When human beings rebelled against Him, however, the entire creation became twisted and distorted, it came under judgment. Where once there was only blessing now curses touched the animate and inanimate creation.
This was no surpise. After all, God Himself had announced that were our first parents to reject His Word they would surely come under His judgment. Further, since God Himself is the source of righteousness and peace, to turn away from Him is to sever ourselves from all that is good and right, from that which gives us blessing; even as a lamp depends for its light upon the electrical outlet, we depend for blessing and joy upon the living God. To reject God and imagine that we could preserve righteousness, peace, and joy is foolish – yet this was the sin of our first parents – and it is a sin repeated by countless millions of human beings to this day.
The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. Satan’s intention in tempting the man and the woman was to destroy all creation, to destroy that which God had designed and made, by bringing it like himself under God’s wrath and curse. Human beings became his tools, his instruments, to accomplish this objective.
But God had other plans. God intended to rescue the world not abandon it to the folly of our first parents or to the malevolence of the Evil One. He would rescue His creation. And it it this intention that is celebrated every Epiphany Sunday when Jesus was revealed to foreign kings, to the magi. It is also this intention that is announced one final time in the closing verses of the Old Covenant:
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.
Uniformly the NT interprets the promise of Elijah’s arrival to refer to John the Baptizer. He is Elijah who was to come before the arrival of the Messiah; he was the one commissioned to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to the fathers – a worthy theme for discussion in and of itself. But I’d like you to note the reason God gives for sending John. Why send John to restore family relationships and bring people back to the Lord? “Lest,” the Lord declares, “I come and strike the earth with a curse.”God sent John as the forerunner of His plan of salvation, His plan to rescue the entire creation from the bondage in which it was trapped.
And this is precisely what Jesus declares to us. “For God so loved the world, the kosmos, the creation which He had so lovingly and painstakingly crafted, that He sent His only Son that whosoever believes in Him may not perish but have eternal life…He did not send the Son into the world to judge the world but that the world might be saved through Him.” God acted in Christ to rescue the creation from its bondage to decay. And how did He accomplish this?
Remember that the ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. In justice our rebellion must be judged. And so, wonder of wonders, the eternal Son of God took on human flesh by being born of the Virgin Mary, he lived among us, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He bore the judgment that was due to us because we had rebelled against Him. And what’s more, God raised Jesus from the dead. In this way, He broke the power of death, reversing the curse that once enslaved all creation. He came lest the earth be struck with a curse; he came to rescue all creation.
So what of you? The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. Either we face that judgment ourselves – the end of which will be our condemnation – or we turn in faith to the Lord Jesus Christ, who bore the judgment for all His people, and so receive blessing from the Lord in Him. None of us can face the Lord in ourselves; we have all rebelled against Him. And so, as we enter into His presence this day, He commands us to seek refuge from judgment through Jesus. Reminded of our need for a Savior, let us kneel and confess our sins to the Lord.

Why did Jesus come?

January 2, 2012 in Bible - OT - Malachi, King Jesus, Meditations

Malachi 4:5–6 (NKJV)
5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. 6 And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.
When God created the world, He created it a realm of righteousness and peace – a place of blessing. When human beings rebelled against Him, however, the entire creation became twisted and distorted, it came under judgment. Where once there was only blessing now curses touched the animate and inanimate creation.
This was no surpise. After all, God Himself had announced that were our first parents to reject His Word they would surely come under His judgment. Further, since God Himself is the source of righteousness and peace, to turn away from Him is to sever ourselves from all that is good and right, from that which gives us blessing; even as a lamp depends for its light upon the electrical outlet, we depend for blessing and joy upon the living God. To reject God and imagine that we could preserve righteousness, peace, and joy is foolish – yet this was the sin of our first parents – and it is a sin repeated by countless millions of human beings to this day.
The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. Satan’s intention in tempting the man and the woman was to destroy all creation, to destroy that which God had designed and made, by bringing it like himself under God’s wrath and curse. Human beings became his tools, his instruments, to accomplish this objective.
But God had other plans. God intended to rescue the world not abandon it to the folly of our first parents or to the malevolence of the Evil One. He would rescue His creation. And it it this intention that is celebrated every Epiphany Sunday when Jesus was revealed to foreign kings, to the magi. It is also this intention that is announced one final time in the closing verses of the Old Covenant:
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.
Uniformly the NT interprets the promise of Elijah’s arrival to refer to John the Baptizer. He is Elijah who was to come before the arrival of the Messiah; he was the one commissioned to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the hearts of the children to the fathers – a worthy theme for discussion in and of itself. But I’d like you to note the reason God gives for sending John. Why send John to restore family relationships and bring people back to the Lord? “Lest,” the Lord declares, “I come and strike the earth with a curse.”God sent John as the forerunner of His plan of salvation, His plan to rescue the entire creation from the bondage in which it was trapped.
And this is precisely what Jesus declares to us. “For God so loved the world, the kosmos, the creation which He had so lovingly and painstakingly crafted, that He sent His only Son that whosoever believes in Him may not perish but have eternal life…He did not send the Son into the world to judge the world but that the world might be saved through Him.”God acted in Christ to rescue the creation from its bondage to decay. And how did He accomplish this?
Remember that the ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. In justice our rebellion must be judged. And so, wonder of wonders, the eternal Son of God took on human flesh by being born of the Virgin Mary, he lived among us, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He bore the judgment that was due to us because we had rebelled against Him. And what’s more, God raised Jesus from the dead. In this way, He broke the power of death, reversing the curse that once enslaved all creation. He came lest the earth be struck with a curse; he came to rescue all creation.
So what of you? The ultimate end of rebellion is always judgment. Either we face that judgment ourselves – the end of which will be our condemnation – or we turn in faith to the Lord Jesus Christ, who bore the judgment for all His people, and so receive blessing from the Lord in Him. None of us can face the Lord in ourselves; we have all rebelled against Him. And so, as we enter into His presence this day, He commands us to seek refuge from judgment through Jesus. Reminded of our need for a Savior, let us kneel and confess our sins to the Lord.