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The official audio library of sermons preached at Kingstree Church in Sabina, Ohio.
Test what you hear. Test the books. Test the YouTube videos. Test what your friends say. Test what comes from the pulpits, including this one.
Christopher:Specifically this one, because this is your church. Test. Test what is taught. Don't just swallow it. Teaching that says it's Christian may not be of Christ.
Christopher:Teaching that says Christians don't suffer. Obedience leads to wealth. Faith means everything goes well. That repudiates the king on the cross.
Caleb:The following message was recorded at King's Tree Church. May the spirit use it to help you see, savor, and sing the beauty of God in the crucified and risen Jesus Christ. So
Christopher:we're returning today to first John. Pastor Sean last week took us, concluded his study, has been going for over a year through first Corinthians. That's that's a momentous event. But now we're returning back to first John. And if you recall, last time we were in this book, we concluded chapter three.
Christopher:And John ended chapter three by calling his hearers to an active abiding in Christ. That our abiding in Jesus is not just sitting there and saying, well, I hope I remain in Jesus. Our abiding in Jesus is an active abiding in him. It's receiving him as our life. That's our faith.
Christopher:Receiving him as our life and obeying him in love. This faith that leads to love, that's how we're abiding in him. And that's what John says, the the presence of that in your life, the presence of this abiding, this this believing in Christ that is bearing the fruit of love, the presence of that is an indicator that we are his. That we indeed belong to him. So that's that's what we were looking at last time.
Christopher:But at the very tail end of chapter three, John adds something that I didn't mention. He says this, and by this we know that he abides in us by the spirit whom he has given us. So we had this whole thing about abiding in Christ and how we know that we abide in him. We're we're trusting him. We're obeying him in love.
Christopher:Like, that's what we were focusing on. But then at the very end, John slides in the statement and says, and you know that he's in you by the spirit whom he's given you. So there's there's another affirmation. There's there's a a agreeing confirmation that we belong to Christ. Not just our faith and our love, but together with that, indivisible from that, the presence of the spirit in our lives.
Christopher:And you say, okay. Well, how do we how do we know the spirit? How do what does it mean that the spirit's in us? How can we discern the presence of the spirit? That's that's an a question Christians have asked for a long time.
Christopher:Do we discern his presence by tongues? The gift of tongues? Or by healings or miracles taking place? Do we discern his presence by a sense of confidence that I feel? A sense of assurance that this is true?
Christopher:How do we discern that the spirit is in us or communicating to us, with us? How do we make this how do we do that? And John brings up the spirit at the end of chapter three, and then the whole first section of chapter four, which we're gonna spend today and next week on, is talking about the spirit. So he brings up this issue, which was apparently there were a lot of questions about it even then, and then he takes the beginning of chapter four to discuss that issue. And central to his whole teaching that we're gonna be looking at is this question of discerning or telling the difference between the spirit of God and the spirit of the anti Christ or the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
Christopher:So the whole much of what John's talking about, the centerpiece of it is distinguishing between the truth and the lie. The spirit of God, the spirit of the age, the spirit of the antichrist, the spirit of Satan ultimately. So that is this that's important for us to decide. That's at the center and that's all the more necessary for us. Now ask yourself, how do we find?
Christopher:How do we discern between these things? How do we discern between the presence of the holy spirit versus the presence of a diabolical spirit? Especially when a diabolical spirit can be deceptive. It's the whole point. How do how do you let me make it personal.
Christopher:How do you make this call? How do I make this call? Is it just intuition? Well, I can just tell. I can tell.
Christopher:Maybe. Maybe not. Do we just listen for what seems to make sense? This this fits together? What I like to hear?
Christopher:What I just kind of naturally agree with? What makes me most comfortable? How what is your, criteria for discerning between these things? And we need some kind of objective standard. We need some kind of yardstick.
Christopher:Some kind of measuring stick to be able to discern, is this of God or is this of the enemy? Is this true or is this deceptive? Because if we don't have that objective standard, that test, then we're going to fall prey to whoever is most enthusiastic, whoever's most passionate, whoever's most sincere and authoritative. And as I was preparing this week, I read a quote that said, enthusiasm does not equate truth. So being enthusiastic, being passionate, being sincere doesn't mean something is true.
Christopher:You can have a very passionate, enthusiastic, sincere, winsome person who's speaking something that's a lie. And especially in this day and age where we've got social media and influencing and we just kind of go by how we're feeling, kind of the vibe of things, someone who is passionate, sincere, genuine is going to get a lot of credibility. And it'd be very easy to say, well, they must be telling the truth. So we need to have an objective standard to discern between these things and say, is it true or isn't it? And of course, there's always gonna be difficulty here.
Christopher:You get down into the roots. There's always going to be wisdom that needs to be applied. But what John gives us in today's passage is that objective standard that we can use and test. Is this of God or is it not? It's an objective standard that gets us to it lops off a lot of the questions.
Christopher:There still may be minutiae to deal with down in the roots for specific situations, but what we're looking at today lops off a lot of the questions and clarifies, is this the spirit of God or is it not? Okay. Let's look at the text. It comes in John first John chapter four verses one through three. John says this, beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God.
Christopher:For many false prophets interesting he doesn't say many false spirits. He says many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the spirit of God. Here it is. Here's the test.
Christopher:Every spirit that confesses Jesus that Jesus has come in the flesh or more accurately, every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ having come in the flesh is from God. And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist which you have heard was coming and now is in the world already. So that's our text. We need the grace of the Lord to help us understand this and apply it.
Christopher:Let me pray for us and we'll look at it together. Father apart from you, apart from your spirit, we are helpless. We are lost in the darkness, and all our efforts can can do nothing but build towers of mud that melt down to nothing. We have no capacity for lasting good in ourselves and we need the gracious presence and working of your spirit. And father that's true of me right now, seeking to unfold these things to your people.
Christopher:I pray for the grace of your Holy Spirit to be upon me not for my sake but because of Christ and for the sake of his name and for the good of those whom you've gathered here, good of those who will hear these things. Father, may the spirit anoint this moment to the making much of Christ and to the serving of your church. And would you give us wisdom, give us grace command here father to to learn to discern between your own spirit and the spirit of the enemy. That we wouldn't be those who are swayed and and taken off like sheep to the slaughter, but we would be those who are alert and awake and know the voice of our shepherd and follow him to the end. Father give us grace and may today be a means to that end.
Christopher:I ask, we ask in Jesus name. Amen. So one thing just to start with here for clarity's sake. John says, don't believe every spirit but test the spirits. Plural.
Christopher:And that could be a little confusing. Is he saying there's lots of spirits, lots of good spirits, lots of bad spirits, and we have to kind of tell between them. There there's a sense of course in which angels are good and demons are bad, and so there's multiple true and false spirits. That's but that doesn't seem to be what he's talking about here, and you can see that because look in verse two. He says, by this you would know the spirit of God.
Christopher:So there's one spirit of truth, the spirit of God. And then down in verse three, it says, every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This, not these, this is the spirit of the antichrist. So John is working with the concept of there's one spirit of God, There's one spirit of deception. One spirit of the antichrist.
Christopher:So why is he talking about testing many different spirits? And what it seems to me, and and this I read this in the commentaries. It seems to make sense especially with what he's doing in his context here. That the idea is there's one spirit of God, one spirit of the antichrist, but there's many expressions of these one these single spirits. There's many spiritual teachers who are claiming to teach from the spirit of God, who are claiming to bring the truth, and we need to discern between them.
Christopher:Discern between the many expressions of the spirit. Many teachers, many pastors, many people proclaiming that they have the truth. There's lots of them coming at us. Discern between them and find which are coming from the one spirit of God, which are coming from the one spirit of error. That seems to be where this plurality comes into play here.
Christopher:So what John is calling us to is he's saying to his audience, who remember they're facing false teaching right now in their congregation. And by extension he's saying to us, do not just receive someone who comes to you saying they're speaking by the spirit of God. Don't just receive that. Somebody comes and says, God told me I have to tell you something. God put this on my heart.
Christopher:This is from the Lord. That that I'm not saying those people wrong. I'm just saying don't receive it as if it's okay. That's gotta be true. Test.
Christopher:Test the spirits. Everyone who says, I've got the truth. I've got the answers. I'm speaking for God. Okay.
Christopher:John says, test them. Test every expression of the spirit to see if it is the spirit of God or if it's the spirit of the enemy. Now before we look at the test itself, that's gonna be the main section. What is the test? But before we go into that, I want to emphasize for you that the main command here that John is giving us in these first three verses is that command to test.
Christopher:That's what he cares about. That's what he's concerned about. If you lay out the logic of John's thinking here, the center of it is test. Test the spirits. Do not believe every spirit.
Christopher:Do not believe everyone who comes to you saying they're speaking by the spirit. Test the spirits. That's the central command. If you take something away from today, take that away. We need to be discerning of what we receive as coming from God or not.
Christopher:Think about it. You do this with emails. Right? I hope. You do this with emails.
Christopher:You get an email that says it's from your bank and you say, okay, great. Let me make sure it's from my bank. Let me just look at the email address, make sure it's from my bank. Well, what if the email says it's from your bank and it says something you really were hoping to hear like a $100,000 has just been deposited into your account. Just share your account number here and we'll make sure you get it.
Christopher:And you might say, well, that's exactly what I wanted to hear. And it might be easy to say, maybe I'll believe that. Test it. Test that email. Test the email.
Christopher:And if we do that with emails, if we don't just swallow every email sent to us, how much more ought we to do that with teaching that we receive? With somebody who says, I'm telling you the truth. I'm telling you how to live. I'm telling you what priorities to have. I'm telling you what to be afraid of.
Christopher:And I'm telling you what to hope in. How much more ought we to test those statements and say wait wait wait. Is this coming from God or is this coming from the spirit of the antichrist? The spirit of the world around us. Which where is this coming from?
Christopher:So how much more? We need to be alert. Pastor Sean last week, that was the emphasis. Be alert. Be awake.
Christopher:Don't just float around and receive. And that's the same idea here. So if you were pricked by it last week, the Lord's giving it to you again this week. And and you say, well, you're saying you're talking for the Lord. It's just here in the text.
Christopher:Okay? It's just here in the text. Again, we're called test. Don't just swallow. Don't just take.
Christopher:Be alert. Be awake. Be on guard. Don't be moved by the voice that speaks with the greatest enthusiasm or authority or promise. Test the spirits.
Christopher:Okay. Hopefully that's clear. Now we want to ask, how do I do that? What is this test of the spirits? Is there like a litmus test I can do to see if it's from God or not?
Christopher:Is there a way? Well, yes. Yeah. And that's what we have in the text today. So you test an email one way, one good way.
Christopher:Look at the email address. Is it from your bank? Or is it, you know, usbank@3378goodnews.com or something? And you say that doesn't that doesn't look right. So test.
Christopher:You test an email by looking at its email address. You test a spirit by what it says about Jesus. That's how you test a spirit. What does it say about Jesus? Look again at chapter four, specifically verses two and three.
Christopher:By this you know the spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. Every spirit that does not confess Jesus, meaning does not confess him that way, is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard was coming and now is in the world already. So you test an email by looking at its email address.
Christopher:You test a spirit by saying, what does it say about Jesus? What is it saying about Jesus Christ? So what is the test? Right here. Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.
Christopher:That the spirit of God will be saying, will be confessing, will be proclaiming, Jesus Christ come in the flesh. And the spirit of the world will say anything else, but not that. Jesus Christ come in the flesh. Now when you hear Jesus Christ come in the flesh, might think that's just a simple statement of, not that it's simple, the incarnation. You know, God becoming man.
Christopher:Certainly that's true here, but listen to what it says. Wouldn't you expect if this was just the statement God became man, wouldn't you expect it to say the son has come in the flesh? Why does it say Jesus has come in the flesh? You know, we say the son of God is eternal and he comes into the into time and space as the man Jesus Christ, the God man. The son of God is uncreated, and Jesus Christ is the God man born within time who dies and rises.
Christopher:But this says Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. There's a lot of implication we could draw out of that that's awesome to consider, but I wanna draw your attention to a few points today. And if you remember, when we started this series, I pointed out that John has a specific way of talking. Whenever you're coming to scripture, it matters who are you reading. Because Matthew's statement may not be the same as John's.
Christopher:Paul's faith has a different emphasis than James's faith. When Paul talks about faith, it means he emphasizes things a little different than James. And if you just try to slam the two together, you'll see what seems to be inconsistencies. So too with John. When John says things like Christ comes flesh, he means something that might be different than what we're thinking.
Christopher:And we learn what he means by looking at what he's written, by his gospel, and all these other things. So I want to take a moment with you to really dig into what does the spirit of God confess. And I want to look at it through John's lens, through how John means Christ, come, and flesh, because he means something for each of those that might be a little different than we're expecting. And I'm gonna give you a warning here. I know it's family Sunday.
Christopher:I know it's a little bit more fidgety perhaps, And and this is going to be a little bit, not super, but a little bit more complex than I would normally go. But it's because I want us to see what John's saying here. So stick with me as we dig into this, and I'll give us a summary to wrap it up when we're done with this section. But I want us to see what is the confession that the spirit of God makes. Here it is.
Christopher:Jesus Christ having come in the flesh. The first part there. Jesus Christ. Now your translation probably says the spirit of God confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. The that is not there in Greek.
Christopher:It's just Christ. The spirit confesses Jesus Christ. Why does that matter? Simply because what's being said is not. The spirit confesses some facts.
Christopher:He confesses some facts about Jesus. The spirit confesses Jesus. So the the the confession we're looking for is not a bunch of what's about someone, but it is someone. It's a who. The spirit confesses Christ himself.
Christopher:And you could stack up all the doctrinal what you want, but it won't get to the who of Christ. So our confession, the spirit's confession and our confession can't simply be, I believe that's dot dot dot dot dot dot, but ultimately, I believe this person. Christ is the one the spirit confesses. Christ, you could say, is our creed, what we believe. And yet, sometimes people say that and they mean, and so I don't need a creed.
Christopher:So I don't need doctrine. No. No. Christ is who we confess, but we confess something specific about him, and that's why creeds are important, are critical. And here you see that.
Christopher:The spirit confesses what? Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. That word Christ is critical. It's not just the last name of Jesus.
Christopher:Christ here means the anointed one, the Messiah, the promised king. So the Holy Spirit confesses Jesus as the king, the consummation of all of Israel's hopes, the coming together of all the longings of God's people. The spirit says, Jesus is that. Jesus is that. But even more, because in scripture, and John picks up on this, the coming human king, the Messiah, begins to be woven together with the coming divine king, Yahweh.
Christopher:And we see these two come together such that in the prophets, it's a single bright point. The coming of the king, the coming of the Messiah, and the dawning of Yahweh, they become one moment. And John is drawing on that richness when he calls Jesus Christ. So at the end of John's gospel, we get this confession from from Thomas where Thomas stands before Jesus in John John twenty twenty eight. And he says this, my Lord having seen his wounds, my Lord, which means Yahweh in this context, my Lord and my God.
Christopher:And Jesus says to him, have you believed? Because you've seen me blessed are those who believe, namely who believe what you just said and have not seen me. So the faith here is calling Jesus Yahweh and God. Lord and God. And then John summarizes that a few verses later and he says, I've written everything in this book so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God.
Christopher:So Thomas says Yahweh God, and John says Christ, son of God. These two are parallel. These are parallel confessions. So when John's talking about Christ, he means a divine figure. He means Yahweh come as king.
Christopher:And you see this kind of fusing in Zechariah. Let me read for you this passage because it's gonna lead right into the next thing we have to say. In Zechariah chapter nine, the Lord Yahweh is saying this, then I will encamp at my house as a guard so that none shall march to and fro. No oppressor shall again march over them. For now I see with my own eyes.
Christopher:Rejoice greatly, o daughter of Zion. Shout aloud, o daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, your king is coming. So now in that context, Yahweh has just said, I'm going to come to my sanctuary and guard it. And then the next thing we see is, rejoice.
Christopher:Your king is coming. And you think, okay. This is the coming of Yahweh. Right? Next line.
Christopher:Your king is coming, righteous and having salvation, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. And he shall speak peace to the nations and his rule shall be from sea to sea and from the river to the ends of the earth. So what I want you to see there is that, and this is other places in the Old Testament, the coming of Yahweh as king is brought together with the coming of the Messiah so that it's one coming, one individual. So when John says the spirit confesses Jesus Christ, it means the spirit confesses Jesus as the divine king. Not just as a king in David's line, but as the divine king, as the one who was coming, as the Lord himself present in our midst.
Christopher:That's the first thing. This is a high confession. This is a high confession. The second thing, the spirit confesses Jesus Christ having come in the flesh. Having come.
Christopher:Now again, you might say having come. Right. Like, you know, he he came as a baby in Bethlehem. But when John again, you can check this out. This is this is how John uses this language.
Christopher:When John says come, he's drawing on the Old Testament understanding of this word, specifically this idea of the coming of Yahweh. So the prophets would talk about Yahweh will come. Our God will come. Our king will come. And what they meant was not he's gonna move from that place to this place.
Christopher:He's gonna move from the east to the west. He's gonna, you know, spatially walk around. What they meant is he's going to arrive in judgment and salvation. He's going to dawn like the sun. He's going to break in like life.
Christopher:He's going to arrive and change. The coming of Yahweh is is the bringing to pass of his kingdom. The breaking in of his kingdom. And that's the kind of coming that John is talking about here. So Isaiah Isaiah 40.
Christopher:This is an awesome awesome passage to look at. This is also where we get the term gospel from. The good news in this passage is where we the New Testament gets the term gospel. Isaiah 49 through 11 says this. Listen for the coming language.
Christopher:Go up on a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good news. Lift up your voice with strength, Jerusalem, herald of good news, herald of the gospel. Lift up your voices. Say to the cities of Judah, behold your God. Behold the Lord God comes with might and his arm rules for him.
Christopher:Behold his reward is with him and his recompense before him. He will tend his flock like a shepherd. He will gather the lambs in his arms. He will carry them in his bosom and gently lead those who are with young. This is the coming.
Christopher:The coming of the Lord. And when John, for the sake of time I won't read this, but you can look at the triumphal entry in John's gospel, John chapter 12 verses 13 through 15. At that triumphal entry, John is drawing upon this same teaching from the Old Testament to say the coming of Yahweh, the coming of the king, the coming of the promised one, that's happening in Jesus Christ, in his arrival. So Jesus to say, to confess Jesus Christ having come is not merely to say a baby was born in Bethlehem who is the God man, which is awesome, but it's to say the divine king has arrived. The divine king is here.
Christopher:The promise of Yahweh that that the whole old testament is is trembling with, that's broken in and happened with Jesus Christ. So to say Jesus has come is not like saying, my friends have come over to the house and we're gonna hang out and spend some time together. It's like saying the harvest has come. Something that bears with it all these implications. The harvest has come.
Christopher:The the fields are being gathered in. The time is changing. Significant things are taking place. That's what the coming of Jesus means. So when the spirit confesses Jesus having come, it's not merely that he's born as a man, though that's absolutely true, but it's more so that Yahweh's saving, judging, end time presence has broken in.
Christopher:Has broken in. And just for a point, the fact that this is has come has this idea of it happened and it's continuing. So the resurrection is in view here. It happened and he still lives. He still continues.
Christopher:The kingdom is still in force continuing on. And that leads us into the last part here of this confession. Jesus Christ, the divine king. Having come his kingdom breaking in. In the flesh.
Christopher:In the flesh. In the flesh. When John uses the term flesh, he has in mind not just the incarnation, though again, yes, but he has in mind the consummation of the incarnation. Where the incarnation is going? The cross.
Christopher:When John speaks of flesh, the cross is always in view. And you can see that just theologically because consider what flesh does the word become? What flesh does our God take to himself? Our flesh. Our flesh.
Christopher:Our human nature. Our plight. And what is our flesh? What is your flesh? What is my flesh?
Christopher:It's mortal. We're going to be in this flesh is to be aimed at death. Why? Because of sin. We are we are a sin cursed, death doomed race.
Christopher:And even as those redeemed are flesh, our human nature, it is grave word. It is going to die. And so when God says, I'm going to make myself one flesh with that bride. You ever think about why the term one flesh is so important? Why the one flesh union of Adam and Eve of man and woman is so critical?
Christopher:Because God will become one flesh with a damned people in love, and he will bind them to himself. And that means the flesh he takes on is flesh that is going to die, is flesh that is going to be laid in the grave, is flesh that is going to be crushed for sin. And so he proves proves to all the cosmos, I have become flesh. Not merely when he's born, but when he dies. When he dies, that's the seal.
Christopher:Because, you know, the watching angels could have said, right. Right. But he well, just wait. He's not good. He's not gonna take it all to the end.
Christopher:Right? He's gonna come out of there before before he gets to the end. Just wait. And if that had happened, it would not have been true flesh. But he rides it to the end.
Christopher:He takes it to the cross. And when Jesus cries out on the cross and breathes out his spirit and his side is pierced, all the cosmos is silenced and knows for sure God has become flesh. He has become flesh. And we know my savior has become flesh. And so when John says he comes in the flesh, he has in mind the cross, his death, his crucifixion.
Christopher:We'll see that again in a few weeks. First John five six that says, this is the one who came by water and by blood. Remember what pours from Jesus' side at his death? Blood and water. And so the coming of Christ is a coming that takes place specifically, primarily, uniquely, decisively in the moment of his death.
Christopher:And of course we can only say that because he's risen. These two are indivisible. So that was the complexity. Thank you for sticking with me. But I want us to see what's going on here.
Christopher:It's not as simple as somebody being able to say a divine entity has become a human. Or sure, God has become man and just leave those things undefined. What John's saying here, we take this with a Johannine lens, he's saying the spirit of God confesses the crucified Jesus who is risen as the divine king through whose death the rule of Yahweh God has broken in, has happened. That's what the spirit confesses. The spirit confesses the crucified one who is risen is Lord and God and king, and his reign has happened and is happening from his cross.
Christopher:He achieves it in his death. If someone is speaking by the spirit of God, that Christ that Christ will be exalted, be cherished, will be trusted, will be obeyed, will be the center. Now people are gonna have their different emphases, but that Christ is gonna be the center if the spirit of God is at work. And that matters. This really does matter.
Christopher:You might say, okay. Lots of little theological minutiae here. Very interesting maybe if you're into that things, but but you're a pastor and I'm I'm just an everyday Christian who's not into like super specific theological thoughts. And all I would say is this one we can't we can't be fluffy on this. We can't be unspecific on this.
Christopher:This matters because John tells us it matters. Think about building your house. Its foundation is six inches off, and you say, well, six inches. That's not that big. I'm I'm not a big builder guy.
Christopher:You know? I I don't care too much. I just want a house. So six inches, that's fine. Let's build it.
Christopher:Okay? Well, what's going to come from that? Six inches off, after a little while, cracks start to appear in the walls, and you think, well, I didn't see that one coming. The roof starts to sag a little bit, and guess what? Now water gets in, and it goes into the basement.
Christopher:And guess what? It goes to one side and starts pooling there and eating away at a foundation in one side. You didn't see that coming. You didn't know that it was gonna eat away at the eastern foundation of the whole house, but it's happening. I'm sorry, Sean.
Christopher:He doesn't like to think about these things. Stress is put on the pipes in your walls. The gas pipes snap. The whole house can collapse to the ground. Because why?
Christopher:Well, your foundation was just off a little bit. Okay. We see that in our homes. Same thing here. We don't have the wisdom to be able to say, well, it's okay if I'm just a little off in the foundation of my theological standing.
Christopher:Doesn't really matter. Well, we can't see what would come from that. We can't see all the scenarios that could spin out of that. Just consider. What will it do to my experience of suffering if I'm not confessing Jesus' sufferings as the in breaking of the kingdom of God and the victory of God over this world?
Christopher:What's it do then? I'm suffering and I can't handle it. I think it's wrong. I think something's broken. I think God's angry at me.
Christopher:Why? Am I confessing this Christ or a different Christ? What does it do to our vision of God if we don't know him as king on the cross? If we only know him as king in glory and praise and power, then what about when I'm on a cross? What about when I'm suffering?
Christopher:What's it do then to my vision of God in that moment? What's it do to our hope for the future if we don't confess that God has come in Christ? That the kingdom has come in Christ, that the victory is won in Christ? If I'm not confessing that, what's it do to my hope? What cracks start to splinter through my hope if I don't have this confession?
Christopher:What's it do to my relationships with others if I don't confess that God has triumphed over this world in love from the cross? If I don't see that as his triumph, what's it do to my relationships that are tense and angry and frustrating when I'm when I'm tempted to act lovelessly? What's it do to our relationship with our own body and our own weaknesses and our own death if we don't confess that Jesus took a body, took this same mortal flesh, and made it in its weakness, made it the means for God's saving work in the world. That he took it to death and through death to resurrection. If I'm not confessing that, what am I going to do with my weakness, with my body, with my brokenness, with my death?
Christopher:So this confession matters and it's above our pay grade to say, it's not important. It's not important. If the spirit says it's important because it's in the text of scripture, we ought to take it seriously. And so if a teacher comes to us, a philosophy is given to us, a worldview is impressed upon us that does not confess this Christ, the divine king who in whom the kingdom of Yahweh has happened specifically through his cross. If I'm not if someone is not confessing that, then we turn from it.
Christopher:We turn from it because it's not of the spirit of God. Okay. In closing now, wrapping things up. How? How do we do this?
Christopher:How do we do this? Well, one simple way is ask them to say it. You've got a teacher. You've got a teaching. You've got a pastor.
Christopher:Do they confess this? There are many who don't. There are many who would deny the trinity, deny the divinity of Christ, deny humanity of Christ, deny his actual death, his physical resurrection. I mean, this is just basic stuff, but there are many who don't confess those things and we need to not listen to it. We need to not listen to it.
Christopher:If someone cannot affirm this, Jesus is Yahweh God in the flesh, his kingdom is broken into the world through his death and resurrection, then that teaching is of the enemy. Now we don't have a lot of time and this is delicate, but I want to say this for your guarding. We love our Mormon neighbors, our friends, especially now as they're been facing suffering these last few weeks. But I want to speak as clearly as I can. Mormonism is not Christianity.
Christopher:And the Jesus Christ proclaimed by Mormonism is not this Christ. And so there's just a lot of that I I highlight that one because in our culture right now, there's a lot of kind Mormons making influences in the world. And as Christians, we need to love them, but be discerning. That is not a Christian denomination. They don't share the same Christ as we do.
Christopher:They don't share this Christ. They're not speaking from the spirit of God. So be on guard. And there's many other many other places. I highlight that just because of the specific influence that they have.
Christopher:But a parrot can say this confession. Or more dangerously, chat GPT can say this confession. What about the life? What about the fruit? That's where we test it too.
Christopher:So don't just say, do you confess this when when someone comes to you? Also look at the fruit of the teaching. Look at the fruit of the ministry. Is this person do this person's actions align with the divine kingship of God in Christ? Does this teaching conform to Christ?
Christopher:Is the fruit of this particular teaching glory to this Christ we find here? Does it bring about lives conformed to this Christ? Souls satisfied in this Christ? These are questions for us to be asking prayerfully together. Don't try to do it by yourself.
Christopher:It's the sheep that walks out on its own that gets swept away and says, these wolves are really good. They really got some good things to say. Stay in the flock, in the congregation. We do this together. Now, very briefly, this is to be applied in the church and outside of the church.
Christopher:False teaching in the church. Test what you hear. Test the books. Test the YouTube videos. Test what your friends say.
Christopher:Test what comes from the pulpits, including this one. Specifically this one, because this is your church. Test. Test what is taught. Don't just swallow it.
Christopher:So teaching that says it's Christian may not be of Christ. Teaching that says Christians don't suffer. Obedience leads to wealth. Faith means everything goes well. That repudiates the king on the cross.
Christopher:Teaching that says sin is not a big deal repudiates the death of God for sin. Teaching that would deny the goodness of the body, want to get away from the body, get out of the body, leave the body behind, or that denies that how we are born is a loving thus saith the Lord spoken in our own flesh, and would seek to change that, that's teaching that denies that Jesus Christ has come in this very flesh and and made it his own and declared it to be good. We could go so much deeper. Come to HomeGroup and we can talk about more of this, But let me move on to say this. We also ought to do this with the teaching that we receive in the world around us.
Christopher:Not just in the church. Test it in the church. If a teacher or claims to be from the spirit of God and does not confess this Christ, okay. Avoid. But then in the culture around us, does the teaching of the elites in Silicon Valley flow from and to this Christ?
Christopher:Then let us not swallow their doctrine as truth. Notice that I assume the answer is no. Does the worldview of the politicians around us flow to and from this Christ? Anybody can say Jesus. Does it flow from this Christ and to this Christ?
Christopher:If not, let us not hang our hopes upon them. Do the priorities of the social media algorithm or influencers flow from this Christ and to this Christ? If not, let us not be shaped by them. So much to say there. Oh, sermon there.
Christopher:Do the values of this Netflix show or this television ad or this band flow to and from this Christ? Then let us not be shaped by them. Every worldview, every mindset, every value system has a spirit behind it. I'm not saying demons everywhere. I'm saying it either comes from the antichrist or from Christ.
Christopher:So let us test them. And that doesn't mean we have to leave the world, but it does mean we have to be discerning about what we swallow and what we spit out. Now let me leave you with this. Because you could say, wow, my head's spinning and how do I do this? If I'm not a theologian, am I able to really be discerning?
Christopher:And let me simply put it this way. The best way to tell a counterfeit bill from a true one is not to memorize all the minutiae of what makes a counterfeit bill wrong, but just know the true bill really well. Know it so well that when you see a counterfeit you say, you know, something's off. This isn't right. This is not this.
Christopher:It's not this. So too, we must know the simplest way to do this is just know Jesus Christ as the apostles proclaim him. Know know know this Christ. Know your Lord and your God and your king in the man who is crucified, and rises again. Know him in this book.
Christopher:Know him in prayer. Know him in the teaching of the church through the millennia. The good strong central teaching of the church. Know him, This is critical with each other among faithful believers. Know this Christ.
Christopher:Breathe this Christ. Eat this Christ. Drink this Christ so that we might know which spirit denies him and which spirit confesses him. Let me pray for us. Father, we used the term earlier that something is above our pay grade and this certainly is.
Christopher:To be discerning in this way father is not in us. Our hearts are bent away from you. And so the only way we will be able to discern the presence of the true spirit is by the working of the true spirit to show us Christ, to turn us to Christ, to lift up this Christ. Father, Jesus is our light. This Jesus that we meet in this word, he's everything.
Christopher:And I and I pray that we would know him as a community right here, King's Tree Church, that we would know the crucified and risen king proclaimed by the apostles. Keep us in him. Bind us to him. Rivet us to him. So that when a spirit comes, when a teacher comes, when an influence comes that is not from him, we would run from it like sheep from a false shepherd.
Christopher:Guard this flock and guard me and the other elders as shepherds. Guard us. Keep us in this Christ, we pray. And may we point to him with our living and our dying breath. We praise it father, and we pray it in Jesus name.
Christopher:Amen.
Caleb:Thank you for listening to this message from King's Tree Church in Sabina, Ohio. To see more of the beauty of God and the crucified and risen Jesus Christ, come worship with us on Sundays at 10AM or visit our website at kingstreechurch.org.