Well, good morning. Looking forward to eating with you all later. It's a special day getting to go out and to see the property that God has given to us as a church, to be able to take some time to take note of the resources that are there, and to try and pivot as a church that we would all pray that the Lord would help us to exercise that stewardship.
Well, and I think that's particularly important in light of what we've been studying in Luke chapter 16. So, if you can open your Bibles to Luke chapter 16, please do so. This morning, we want to really study verses 10 through 18. But can I ask you to stand while you read? I'm not gonna read all of the parable of the steward, but I do want to read the summary of it there from verse eight. So, Luke chapter 16, reading from verse eight.
“The Lord commended the dishonest manager for his shrewdness. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the sons of light. And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous wealth, so that when it fails, they may receive you into the eternal dwellings. One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much. And one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things and ridiculed Him. And He said to them, you are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. And he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.”
Let's pray and ask that the Lord would give us wisdom.
[Prayer] Heavenly Father, we thank You that your Word is always true. We thank You that it is always instructive. We thank You that it is always good for us. And yet, Lord, sometimes whenever we read sections such as this, it's sometimes hard for us to see how it all fits together, and so we need insight. We need to be able to understand what the text says, but we also, Lord, need to be convicted by it and spurred to put these things into practice. So, Lord, You know what is wrong in our thinking. You know what is confused in our hearts. You know what is unpleasing to You in our action, and we pray that all of these things would be brought under the microscope of Scripture. And that by the power of the Holy Spirit, you would move us forward in our walk with yourself. So, we do ask that you would be busy amongst us, for we come in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, asking for help. Amen. [End]
Have a seat.
I think if any of us in this world were asked if we wanted to go to heaven, we would say yes. Nobody, if they were told that there are two alternatives after you die, heaven and hell, would choose to not go to the one that is good. That's an obvious, isn't it? That's something we don't have to think much about. And yet the whole point of that parable that we looked at last week, the parable of the shrewd, Jesus told us in verses 8 and 9 is that most Christians, unlike the people of this world, when the people of this world know what is coming, they pivot, and they act accordingly.
We know, Christian, what is coming. The Lord has not been ambiguous. The Lord has told us clearly what is coming, and yet the reality is most Christians live unaffected. They move in the act as if, well, every day is just the same. They don't act as if eternity is really settled, as if eternity is coming, as if it is an inevitable. For if we understood the significance of eternity and the certainty of eternity, and we thought about it each morning, it would have to shape the way that we live and act. And so, what Jesus primarily is pressing through this whole section is your readiness for eternity. Are you ready?
And at one level He addresses different groups in that. And what's confusing about the section we're going to study this morning is within that section he addresses two different groups. He at the beginning is addressing, do you remember what we noticed last week in verse one? He also said to His disciples, He is addressing those who are followers of Him. He's addressing those who have made a commitment to the things of God. He's addressing those who have made specifically a commitment to following Jesus. And to them He is urging, act in light of the coming eternity. Let the reality that eternity is set in stone shape the here and now. Shape the way you think and the way you act and the things you press towards here and now.
And what's going to happen, we'll see very quickly, in verse 14, we're introduced to another group, the Pharisees. who were lovers of money. And then verse 15 says, He said to them. So, there's another group that's going to get addressed. And this is a group that hold idols in their heart. This is a group that are religious somewhat, they think of religious things, they act religiously to some degree. But to them who primarily have another love that shapes them and that they live for, He's going to address their need also to be ready for eternity.
And so, here's my very first simple statement this morning. You need to be ready. Those two groups are representative of everybody who is here. You've either come to a religious service this morning with a pure heart or an unpure heart, but you're at a religious service. So somewhere in what we talk about this morning, you are reflected in the text, and there is a message specifically for you. And that message has something to do with your readiness for eternity.
So, we've already seen in the parable of the unrighteous steward, Jesus makes the point that your readiness for eternity is seen in your stewardship. What you do with the things you have here and now, your readiness for eternity is seen in your stewardship. And today we want to add two more things to that test. And here's the first one that we want to focus on in verses 10 to 13. Your readiness for eternity will be seen in the small things. Your readiness for eternity will be seen in the small things.
Look at verse 10. “One who is faithful in a very little is also faithful in much. And one who is dishonest in a very little is also dishonest in much. If then you have not been faithful in the unrighteous wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches?” Three times here in verses 10 and 11, we have something referred to, that relationship between the servant and the master. And if the servant is good with small things, that will affect the way the master responds to them. The master will trust them more. The master will entrust to them more going forward.
If you are trustworthy, you have gained trust. That's the point in the beginning of verse 10. If you're untrustworthy, you will not have trust. It's a very simple point there in the second half of verse 10. And then in verse 11, your stewardship of possessions that God has given to you here and now will shape what you have long-term in eternity.
You see the three pictures, they're very, very simple. Very, very obvious. You think of most homes, we all have, in different homes, different children with different personalities and different levels of trustworthiness. There are certain children that you could give a task to, and you have confidence it will be fulfilled. And there are other children that should you think to give them a task, you hover over them because apart from that, you don't trust that the task will be satisfied.
Well, that's a very obvious principle, and it's the same when it comes to the Almighty. If you are not trustworthy with the small things, with the little affairs that affect the day, how are you going to be trustworthy with big responsibilities? If you have a pattern of flippancy and untrustworthiness with the small calls that God makes on your life today, how are you going to stand when significant tests and significant trials come?
What matters is the small things. A pattern is formed here and now that will not change when big things come along. It's the old principle. If you're in school, if you study now, you'll be ready for the test. If you save money now, you'll be able to retire. If you...
Sarah, her family, many of them have had cancer, and so she has a particular mindset. She goes out for runs all the time. And when she comes back, I look at her and I think, what are you doing? You know, why would you do that to yourself? And she replies, “I've got to train now for the sickness that will come. Have a strong body now so that if something comes down the line, you're ready to fight it.” You get the idea.
We think this way all the way through life. But again, remember who Jesus is speaking to according to verse one. This is instruction for the disciples for followers. So primarily we're not talking about non-Christians in this verse, though there's principles that apply to the non-Christian too.
But here's the point. I don't want you, Christian, to brush this off. Jesus is saying to followers, what you do with small things now are important. How you act in the small details of life are significant. You're not going to squander the small and suddenly step up in the big. And if you really want to know if you're ready for eternity, the best way to determine that, if you want to know not just are you ready, I don't mean are you converted, but are you stewarding life well? Are you living now in a way that would cause Him to say, “well done good and faithful servant,” then?
Well, the way to work that out is how are you doing with the small things? How are you doing with the small everyday things? If you're a single man and you allow yourself the habit of watching pornography, you're never gonna change when you get married and be a man of commitment then. If you can't get the small right, you're not gonna get the big right. If you're a married individual, a married couple that are selfish with your time and everything is about you or even you as a couple, you're not gonna suddenly become other-focused when children come along. The small matters. If you're too shy to ever speak about the gospel in your neighborhood or to share the gospel in your workplace, you're never going to do it when the big opportunity comes. What you do with the small will be reflective of what you do with the big.
We said last week, chapter 16 points to the barometer primarily of money. Of what you do with your possessions, that's a way to test yourself and to think about how are you faithfully or not faithfully following God. And verse 12 stresses that very point. “And if you have not been faithful in that which is another's, who will give you that which is your own?” The simple point is what you have, your money, your possessions, they're not yours. Every good and perfect gift comes from above. They're from Him. If you're a follower of God, you need to recognize everything you have comes from Him. And ultimately, everything in this universe belongs to Him.
That phrase, that which is another's, it literally means that which is foreign to you. It's not yours to begin with. It's removed. It's foreign. It belongs elsewhere. In other words, it belongs, where you can understand in light of the parable of the stewardship, it belongs to God. And so, because it belongs to God, how you use it every day, how you use the things you have matters.
Most of us come with a spirit of entitlement to the things that we have. The money that we have, the homes that we have, the cars that we have, the possessions we have, they are mine, is the way we often think, even as followers of Jesus. We're so often entitled and think of these things as something we can do what we want with. And Jesus is saying very clearly to His followers, but it's not yours. That's the point. What you have is His. It's a stewardship.
I know there's a lot of people in this church that give generously to the church. You know, we're one of these churches that, you know, we very deliberately don't pass the plate around. We want people to be able to come and to sit in church and know that we don't want your money. That's not what we're after, and so we don't make a declaration to give, you know, or to give that way. We want your giving to be something that you do sacrificially unto the Lord. So, it's something that is an act of worship, very much so, but it's an act of worship that you do unto the Lord, and so whether you give online, whether you put something in the little box on the way out the door, that's between you and God. It's an act of worship to God.
But here's the point. Imagine somebody did put something in the box on the way out. And on Monday morning, whoever came in and organizes, you know, what is there, as they maybe take what is deposited and take it to the bank to make sure it's secure and looked after and everything else, imagine, as they head to the bank, they stop, first of all, and use that money to buy themselves, you know, a coffee and a donut. Well, if that was found out, we would all be rightly furious, because the money's not theirs. The money is, well, at one level the church's, but ultimately God's. It's been given for a particular purpose, and we would think it's scandalous for the money to be used in such selfish ways. And yet what Jesus is saying is, your money is not yours. Your possessions are not yours. They are first and foremost His. And so, we've got to think of everything we have in light of that. It is God's, and He has expectations of how we use all the good gifts that He has given to us.
Look at verse 13. The point is summarized there. “No servant can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” “You cannot serve God and money.” The test of who you work for or what you work for can be seen, we're being told, in your heart towards the things you have or to narrow it down, your heart towards your money. Does the money and the pursuit of it, does your possessions and the pursuit of them, does that shape everything? Or does your knowledge of God control you? Your ultimate allegiance cannot be divided. That's the point of verse 13. There's no such thing as being able to do both. To be able to have a love, ultimately, of both. Only one can come out on top. Only one can sit on the throne of your heart. There's not a big enough throne for two. Only one can sit there in the human heart.
And money is that great hypnotizer. The pursuit of things here and now, of material wealth, has the temptation to hypnotize the individual and to pull them into some sort of trance-like stupor that stunts their progress in the faith, to move them into a zombie-like state where that's all that they think about. And it's an important thing to recognize what ultimately guides a heart. Not simply because God cares about what you do with your possessions, but because God is a jealous God. And if He is not number one in your heart, He will not allow another to sit there. What is the greatest love of your heart this morning?
Now again, we said last week, wealth, the good things God gives to us, God gives to us out of His goodness. They're not evil by themselves, but that love, that obsession with these things, that is wicked. It's wicked because it supplants that throne that only the Almighty should be sitting upon. So, what love sits on the throne of your heart this morning?
Your readiness for eternity will be seen in your stewardship, it'll be seen in the small things, and it'll be seen in the approval that you seek. The approval you seek. We're really building off the last point here as we continue through the text, and the idea is whose approval do you seek? Whose approval are you living for? In light of that coming day, that day of reckoning, whose approval, whose verdict is guiding the here and now?
You see that in verse 14 to 18. Let me read that section again in its entirety.
“The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things and they ridiculed him. And He said to them, “you are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your heart. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.””
Notice again the context at the beginning of verse 14. Who is He now addressing? The Pharisees. The Pharisees. They were a people who had developed a way of thinking, really adopted a way of thinking that was prevalent within Judaism of that day, and kind of heightened it. And their way of thinking was this. They saw money as a sign that God's favor was upon you. So, if God liked you, you had money. If God didn't like you, you didn't have money. And so, it became very easy to work out who were the good ones in God's sight and who were the bad ones. And those bad ones, those who didn't have money, were snubbed by these same Pharisees.
And what's amazing is, think about who's speaking here. It's Jesus, the one who didn't even have somewhere to lay his head. And so, there's an atmosphere, there's a suspicion, there's a dismissal before the thing ever begins. And so immediately, in contrast to the message of Jesus about stewardship, about verse 9, investing your money in others for the sake of the kingdom, of verse 10, being faithful with the small things, these men are now defined as lovers of money. In their heart they loved, and they idolized their wealth. If you could see into their hearts the way God could see into their heart, you would know that their primary affection sat with their money, with their wealth. And Jesus is able to see the heart of every man. He knows what drives them. He knows if they're obsessed with God or they're obsessed with their bank account.
Remember, He already told us something about these Pharisees back in chapter 11, verse 39. It says, “And the Lord said to them, “Now you Pharisees cleanse the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness.”” He knew the greedy obsession of their hearts. And here's another passage that reinforces that. Dale Ralph Davis says about this particular section of Scripture, very simply, “He knows what you tend to cuddle.” This is the thing. You may deceive me. You can easily deceive the elders. You can deceive every other individual in the church, but the Lord knows what you tend to cuddle. He knows the thing that you think about going to sleep. He knows the thing that drives you through the morning. He knows the thing that you think about while you sip that morning coffee. He knows what your ambition ultimately is.
And because of their response to Jesus' message, these lovers of money, the only way they could respond is recorded there in verse 14, with ridicule. Do you remember back in chapter 15, verse 2, they responded with grumbling? It's become a lot louder now, one chapter later. Do you see that? What started out as a grumble is now an outspoken ridicule. It's now outspoken mockery. And so often that is the pattern, that is the progress that is being made. As Jesus presses into their heart, as Jesus pokes His finger where nobody wants to be poked at the sin that we're obsessed with, their response is out and out ridicule. If you ever notice that, whenever you really get to where the person is wrong, the sin that sits in the heart, there's a defensive outburst that takes place. That's what's going on here. Jesus is poking where they don't want to be poked. And so, they respond, because they love money, with a dismissal, a verbal, outspoken dismissal of the Lord.
Truth-tellers always draw criticism. There's no such thing as a faithful herald of the Word who does not draw criticism from some. Now, we are to strive to be at peace with all men, so I'm not telling you to go out and pick fights today. We are all to be, as far as we can control it, at peace with all men, but the reality is, as we do proclaim truth, we will inevitably offend some. And the reason is what we see here, because our message pokes at the idols of the heart. You know, heart surgery's not a small thing, is it? You know, if you had to go through some heart surgery, you would expect to be on painkillers for a while. It's not gentle. And there is a spiritual heart surgery that goes with the gospel. Sin needs to be confronted. There's a poking that is part of this. And it hurts whenever the idols of the heart are highlighted, and the ridicule, the response, the aggression often bubbles up accordingly.
The ways these Pharisees loved their money, it manifested itself clearly. Look at verse 15. “And He said to them, "'You are those who justify yourselves before men.'" They loved their money, but they also, in that, loved their position with others. And they worked hard to cover up the love of money. They worked hard to actually make it an acceptable thing. The great temptation of a lover of money is pure approval over the divine approval. They know God is not going to be happy with them, and so what they spend their energy doing is seeking the approval of others. And they think that because others are content with them, because others are happy with them, because others will sit beside them in church, because others agree with them, that everything's okay.
That word justify simply means to make oneself look upright, to give the impression everything's okay, everything's good. And that's what every false religion does. It cares that others will think that we're okay. We're on the good team. We are right. It fosters a system that bends the law to make us look better. It'll twist the things that are awkward to make it look like we're doing okay, rather than consider the God, that our sin is ultimately offensive too. It's a mindset primarily concerned with outward appearance. And so often it does that, it achieves that winning everybody over by ridicule, as we see here.
You see that same mindset a couple of chapters later, chapter 18, verse 9. Jesus tells another parable, it says, “to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others with contempt.” That's the spirit, we're getting that here. And the greatest problem with that broken approach to religion is that looks to justify yourself before others is revealed in the rest of the verse. Look at the rest of verse 15. “And He said to them, “you are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your heart. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.””
God knows your heart. God knows what's driving you. Again, you can deceive everybody else, but he ultimately knows. And He smells it when it's rotten. The Lord has a precise nose. The Lord has a nose that is sharper than the best chef in this world. And He can smell a rotten egg. That word abomination, it actually came from that idea of smelling something offensive. It has that idea built into it. And it was used in the Greek version of the Old Testament to translate the Hebrew word that really spoke of that offense that was brought to God when idols were sacrifices too. The smell of that aroma of something sacrificed to an idol brought this guttural reaction to the nose of our Lord.
Turn in your Bibles to Isaiah, Isaiah, whatever one of those, the book that comes before Jeremiah, chapter 44. And look at verse 19, Isaiah 44, verse 19. We'll get there. Look at what it says. “No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, half of it I burned in the fire. I also baked bread on its coals. I roasted meat and have eaten. and shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?”
Speaking about idols, and it's speaking about sacrifices to those idols, and the great statement you need to notice is our word, and I shall make the rest of it an abomination. The aroma of the idols is grossly offensive to God.
Turn over to chapter 66 in that same book that I can't pronounce. Verse three, Isaiah 66 verse three. We see the same idea. 66 verse three. “He who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a man. He who sacrifices a lamb like one who breaks a dog's neck. He who presents a grain offering like one who offers pigs blood.” Do you see the idea? All these acts of sacrifice are as grotesque, as offensive, as much a clear evil in the eyes of the Jews as possible.
“He who makes a memorial offering of frankincense like one who blesses an idol. These have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their abominations.” There's the Lord's verdict again. This act of idol sacrifice is grossly offensive to God.
That last one, turn to Deuteronomy chapter 7. There's lots of other places we could go, but Deuteronomy chapter 7, for one more example. Deuteronomy chapter 7, look at verse 25 and 26. Here Old Testament Israel, before they even enter into the Promised Land, before all of the idolatry that marks the book of Kings and Chronicles comes, we read, when the law was given—Deuteronomy 7, verse 25—"the carved images of their gods you shall burn with fire. You shall not covet the silver or the gold that is on them, or take it for yourselves, lest you be ensnared by it. for it," the things connected with these idols, “is an abomination to the Lord your God. And you shall not bring an abominable thing into your house and become devoted to destruction like it. You shall utterly detest it and abhor it, for it is devoted to destruction.”
Now, come back to Luke chapter 16. This word abomination, that offensive smell to the Lord so often associated with idolatry. What is the idol in Luke 16? What have we seen as the idol of Luke 16? Your money, your possessions. That idol that sits in the heart of many over and above other things, what is it to God? An abomination. A gross abomination that He destroyed many for in the Old Testament.
We think so often of big sins and little sins, don't we? And if we were to put love of money in a category, we most often would put it in the little sin category. But look at the language Jesus is using here in Luke 16. The self-righteous heart is an idol. That that heart obsessed with possessions is idolatrous. And it is an abomination to God. The smell of that heart goes up to his nostrils and demands his judgment. It's no small thing. That's the principle. It's hard to imagine stronger language being used here, so don't minimize it in your head. Don't think that there are other gross sins, but that struggle with money, that's just common to us all, so it doesn't matter that much.
No, Jesus doesn't let us away with that. It is an abomination. The Lord's nostrils are offended by the idolatry of your heart. God insists on acting and the scary thing is, in the Old Testament, and even here, the language that's being used is of everything being tossed out. Now, I know you're all very clean. You know that kind of not-biblical verse that Christians talk about, you know, cleanliness is next to godliness? Well, sometimes it has been known in the Curry house that offensive things grow in the fridge. Do you know that Tupperware that the leftovers are put in and it somehow slips into the back of the fridge and it creates its own ecosystem over time? And eventually, a moment comes whenever we do the clean, the deep clean, and we realize, how long was that even there? And it comes out. And there is a moment where a debate takes place in the mind. “Do I wash it or do I toss it?” And what normally happens is it's determined whenever we break the seal and we lift up the lid, and the nauseating smell hits. If that smell is as bad as it looks, most often it gets tossed. If it's not too bad, you know, bend and wash. But there is a point of, it seems irredeemable, or it's going to cause me to gag far too much that it just needs to go.
The Lord is saying there is a point where the idolatry is so much, the container just needs to be tossed. Friends, that love of money is no small thing. It is an abomination to the Lord. Unless you rid that idol that sits in the heart, that itself is devoted to destruction, you too will be destroyed.
Look at verse 15 again. “And He said to them, “you are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God.” The issue is men are fickle. And what's acceptable to them is always changing. That's what the Pharisees did. Everybody knows that a love of money can cause terrible things to happen. It can be dangerous. We all get that. But these Pharisees, who no doubt also at one level in their society got it, they'd made so many qualifications and exceptions to justify themselves. And what was acceptable, what was deemed appropriate, was always moving. And the reason is because that's the way the world works. What is deemed good is always shifting.
That's why we have fashion trends. I don't understand fashion, evidently. You know me long enough to know that. If I ever look well-dressed, it's because somebody else dressed me, okay? But you know, fashions, there's an amazing thing happening at the moment. Why did the 90s come back? Like, it just comes round, and you see these things passing. And do you know what? In five more years, something else will come back. That's just what goes. It's always moving and shifting, because that's the way people are.
And you see it in politics, too. Do you know, when I was at school, there were certain things that we used to talk about in the classroom, certain what was called ethical issues. You know, how much should we accept certain things? Should homosexual marriage be allowed? That was the type of things that were debated. And in that context, people, you know, would say, to kind of defend a more conservative position, well, if you allow that, what else will be allowed? That was one of the arguments that were used. Then we'll have, you know, trans marriage, and we'll have all these other things, and we'll have adoption, children brought up in homes with only one sex. It just seems so crazy. And everybody would say, don't be extreme. And then a few years later, and that's normative.
And our society, politics is always moving and shifting, always changing. And you see it in popular theology too. There's a church in Dallas that's been in the news because it was a church that at one stage, we can assume, proclaimed a conservative position on marriage that was to be a lifelong union between a man and a woman and now are painting rainbows on their doorsteps to welcome people in. Things change, and not for the better. Things move and shift whenever they're left to the control of men and women. We always move, we always change, but do you know who doesn't change? God. And His standards don't change.
So, if verse 15 is stressing the always-in-flux idea of these Pharisees, because they're seeking the approval of men, which always shifts, look at verse 16 to see something that is set in stone. “The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces its way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void.”
What we're being told here in verse 16 is there are some things that do change historically. They progress. For example, verse 16, there were the law and the prophets, and they told us something until John, but since then the good news of the kingdom of God is preached. Since then, there is a greater revelation, a fuller revelation. More of the story is understood. We have Jesus now proclaiming the good news, that reality that the law and the prophets leaned towards, spoke of that was coming. Now He has come. So, there is things that move forward. That's the point in verse 16. There are things that are progressed—that little phrase at the end—"and everyone forces its way into it.” It can be translated, “everyone is forcefully urged into it,” and I think that's probably a better translation. The idea is we have good news now, and everyone is urged to respond to it. Everyone is compelled and pleaded with to act. That idea forcefully is in the language, but it's to press. It would be the idea of me coming to an individual and pressing them to respond, begging them to act, to see their sin, to repent of that sin, to put their trust in Jesus. That appeal, that press, that's what's being spoken of.
And so, what's being said in verse 16 is, the law and the prophets, we had them that showed our sin, that exposed our fallen nature, and now we have the fullest good news. That's why, Luke 15 verse 1, sinners are drawing near and being changed. They are forcefully urged to respond, because there is a good news story now. There is a way into the kingdom now and it's through the Lord Jesus Christ. So, verse 16 is saying, look, there are things that progress in salvation history. What an amazing thing that Jesus can say that He is here, that sinners can be saved. What an amazing thing that He doesn't just say, as John had to say, you are guilty and need to repent. He is able to say, I am the way that you can be forgiven. That's an amazing progress in salvation history.
But then verse 17 says, while that is true that some things progress, it is also true that some things never change. The things of God, the standards of God never change. Verse 17, “it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void.” The fact that in salvation we have freedom from sin does not mean that we have freedom to sin. That's the principle there. That idea, one dot or one jot off the law, it means a stroke. Yeah, it's not the same because we're talking about, you know, an ancient language, but if you think of our English text, there is a simple difference between an L and a T, and it's a little line, at least in cursive. A little line. And that line is significant because it does matter. The word changes if the spelling changes. It does matter, but it's small. It's small but significant. It's small, but it's important.
And what we're being told in verse 17 is nothing that even we would deem small, that is a standard of God, disappears. God always is the same. God's standard is consistent, that the law is not movable to suit you. The law is not like the fashion trends that move and shift and come back round again. Consistently, the law says you are guilty, and you can't explain your way out of it. The Pharisees could appeal to other men and talk them around, but before God, you cannot talk your way around. You're guilty.
And to illustrate that point, Jesus speaks of one aspect of the law in verse 18. It's an example. It's an illustration. Let me tell you one thing, Pharisees, that you mess about with that the Lord says never changes. “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman, divorced from her husband, commits adultery.“
Throughout history, people have treated marriages cheaply, but not the Lord. The Lord's standard is clear. In Jesus' day, the Pharisees were having debates. There was a big division amongst the Pharisees. You think of them as such a unified force, but they were debating everything because they wanted to get the approval of men. And there was a group that said, look, guys, you can divorce for any reason. If your wife burned We have documents actually say this. If your wife burns your meal, you can write a script and get rid of her. And there were others that were saying, you know, the more noble Pharisees, that's too extreme, only for adultery. But you see the way they were debating and talking, and ultimately they were trying to justify their own position.
Jesus says, look, that's a law you guys are talking about all the time. But God's perspective on it has never changed. There are circumstances the Bible speaks of where divorce is permitted. But when the Bible speaks of those circumstances, it says it is provided because of the hardness of man's hearts, or we could say the sinfulness of man's hearts. In other words, it's permitted not for good things. It's permitted because people are that broken. It's permitted because sin is that destructive.
And so often what happens in a marriage that breaks down is both parties or one party sinfully oppresses the other and shatters the marriage. We make a promise to forsake all others and to commit only unto one another, and yet wicked sinful behavior that dishonors the Lord ruins that which the Lord has made good. And the point of verse 18 is, while the Bible may allow divorce, it's not because God approves of divorce. It's because God knows how bad the heart is.
So, you see the point, Pharisees, you're trying to see what you can get away with. Whereas God is saying, God is consistent. His standard is clear. Obedience to God is really a simple thing. You know what God expects of you. For He never changes. The ways of men, the standards of men always in flux, but the ways of God never change. Not one dot will be taken away. Not one stroke of the pen will be changed. And the issue ultimately, therefore, is you just don't want to do it. Isn't that what the issue is? It's not because we can't work out what God expects of us; you just don't want to do it. You want to simply live comforting yourself and having other people happy with you, and you'll water down, you'll adapt, you'll twist and shift in order to keep them on board, but the God who never changes, you don't really care what He thinks. You're living in rebellion against Him.
And yet a day of reckoning is coming. A day is coming where every deed and motive of the heart will be laid out and examined. And how you live, and even more importantly, who you live for or what you live for, it will be exposed. If you've been controlled by the opinion of others and are a lover of anything else but the Lord, like these Pharisees, that will be laid out and made known to all eventually.
And yet there is hope, isn't there? Even in these condemning verses, exposing verses. And it's that hope that we refer to there in verse 16, that there is good news, that there is good news. There is an appeal, a forceful appeal for you to repent, to see the sin that is in you, and to acknowledge it before the Almighty you have sinned against and to appeal to Him for forgiveness, knowing that He is faithful and just and willing to forgive all who come to Him, trusting in Christ.
Let's pray and ask that the Lord would help us to understand our own heart and need before Him this morning.
[Prayer] Heavenly Father, we thank You that Your Word is clear, and You know us better than we know ourselves. We thank You for the way this particular text exposes the idolatry of our hearts. And we ask, Lord, for the grace not just to see in passing what the Bible says, but to hear that heavenly verdict of our need, and that where we are dependent on self, where there is another master that rules our heart, we pray, Lord, that You would give us the grace to call upon You while You may be found and to seek forgiveness.
Lord, help us who are followers of You to be faithful with the little things, knowing that apart from fostering that discipline of being faithful with the small, we will never stand when it matters. And Lord, move us, move us forward. That we may be holy and pleasing unto our Savior, Jesus Christ, living as living sacrifices for Him. For it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. [End]
