Good morning. It is such a joy to see you and to be with you again. It's been a few months since I've had the privilege to worship with you, and so it is an honor to be back. I bring you greetings from First Baptist Church in Mustang, and I'm thankful to be able to spend this morning with you.
I am unexpectedly flying solo today; Marcy is unfortunately home sick and so she is sad not to be able to be here. She was afraid that I would not make it on my own. I'm not as dumb as I look, but I just play that way, but I think this is like my 35th time to be here to preach with you, and this is only the second time that she's not been able to be with me, and so she was afraid I would get lost, but I made it.
So, I'm sorry that she's not here, but she did say to me to pass on, she just sent me this text a minute ago. She said, "Please tell the church happy anniversary. The Lord has blessed us through your church, family, and ministry, and I wish I was at Trinity Bible Church eating donut holes right now." So that is from Marcy to you.
I do want to say happy anniversary on this eighth anniversary week. Just an amazing testimony to God's goodness. In His Providence, this is, I think, if my math is right, I think this is the seventh of your eight anniversaries I've had the privilege to be here to preach on that Sunday. Matt told me that I have been given the title of pastor of anniversary ministries. But I checked the bulletin, it doesn't say that. Maybe that was an empty promise. I was kind of excited about that. I had business cards made up and everything, but I guess I'll donate those.
I do want to let you know, though, from behalf of Marcy and from myself and from our church in Mustang that loves you and keeps up with you and cares for you, we do celebrate this anniversary with you. We celebrate the goodness of God, the kindness of God, and what a great year you had in 2025. How good was the Lord to you in 2025? And in 2026, such exciting things on the horizon. I can hardly wait for Marcy to drive me back down here in months to come and to see all that the Lord is doing.
Since I was here last with you a few months ago, my family celebrated our 25th anniversary at our church at First Baptist Mustang, and I just feel unbelievably overwhelmed. The Lord has allowed me to pastor that sweet flock for 25 years. On our 25th Sunday, our 25th anniversary Sunday, about a month ago, our church was very kind to us. Part of what I didn't know at the time, but we were singing all these hymns and songs on that day, and I got up to preach, and I said, I feel like I've just been at my funeral, because we've sung all my favorite songs all day.
Well, unbeknownst to me, I do have this may sound morbid to you, but this is what I do for a living, but I've got my funeral planned. You ought to come; it's going to be really, it's going to be great, but clear your day, it's going to take a while to get through the schedule. And the kind things Mark wants to say about me at my funeral I know will take most of the morning. So unbeknownst to me, my wife had looked at my funeral that I've got planned out and given those songs to our worship pastor. So, we literally were singing my funeral, which was odd.
But if that list gets lost, just sing what we sang this morning. I could sing those four hymns all day long. And what a great time of singing we had this morning. It has been an honor and a thrill to be here. And I do want you to know how much we love your church and love your elders. I am so thankful for Andrew and just so unbelievably grateful that the Lord has brought him to you and you to him. I love what the Lord is doing here. I will be with him next week in Los Angeles at Master's Seminary and look forward to being able to spend time with him as well.
Open your Bibles with me, if you would, please, to Luke 17. As we continue your study and walk through the gospel of Luke, we are going to look this morning at verses one through six. Just before I read this passage to you, let me remind you that the most important thing we can ever do as a church and as a congregation is to hear from the Lord. And the way that we do that is through knowing His Word. And the only reason you should listen to me this day or any day is if what I say is a fair explanation of what the Lord has already said. I am not here this morning as any authority unto myself. The only authority we have ultimately is the Lord as revealed to us in His Word. So may each of us humbly and with submissive hearts today turn to His Word to be instructed, to be taught, to be challenged, to be encouraged, and to worship.
Follow along if you would in Luke 17.
(Scripture reading) "And He said to His disciples, temptation to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come. It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin. Pay attention to yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in the day and turns to you seven times, saying, 'I repent,' you must forgive him." And the apostle said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." And the Lord said, "If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you."
Let's pray and ask for the Lord's help this morning.
(Prayer) Our gracious Father, we thank You today for Your word and pray that You would instruct us, encourage us, Lord. In this new year, we pray that we would have a renewed heart to honor You, to obey You, to do what You've called us to do. We pray even this morning You would use our time in Your word to help us to do those things. We pray in Christ's name, amen. (End)
Well, a new year is upon us, and as with every new year, it is a natural time for us to consider our lives, to review things, to evaluate, and to measure. For some of you, it may be a time when you have made some New Year's goals or New Year's resolutions. Maybe it is a time for you to have made some plans of things you would like to accomplish this year. Maybe those have to do with business or reading through the Bible, or maybe they have to do with service in the church. Or maybe it is a time to, if you are close to retirement, think about whether you are on the right path to that and what changes or adjustments need to be made. Maybe it is about health and wanting to eat better and exercise more.
For parents, it can be a time for looking to see how your children have grown. If you're like me, we have, even though our sons are out of the house, married, and have their own children, we still have our growth wall in our pantry where we have marked our kids' height through the years. Once or twice a year, we would line them up against the wall and push their heads down because they were standing on their tiptoes, trying to cheat. We would then mark how much they had grown.
The interesting thing about that time, when your kids are young and growing, is that as you mark your children's growth against the wall, sometimes the child is thrilled to look back and see how much they have grown. Other times, they are disappointed they did not grow as much as they wanted to. Or, worst of all, perhaps the younger sibling has actually passed the older sibling, and then it is really disappointing.
But either way, when that time is done, whether you are happy with the results or not, there is something about looking at a definitive mark on the wall that shows here is how much you have grown. Or even if you do not like the results, at least you know exactly what the results are.
I grew up, I was always the shortest one, always the skinniest, scrawniest one, always the smallest one, and all my friends grew tall and I didn't, and all my friends grew strong and I didn't, and those marks on the wall were usually frustrating and disappointing, but at least it was something I could look at and know. And growth happens so slowly. Eventually, I grew a little bit, but it happens so slowly, it can be hard to know.
It is the same thing with playing sports. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, and losing really hurts. But at least at the end of the game, there is a scoreboard, and you can definitively know; we came up short. And even though you may be disappointed by it, at least you know the result.
Spiritually can be more difficult, can't it? We don't always know for sure where we are. Are we growing? Are we stagnant? Is there real evidence that what we are doing is making a difference? And part of that spiritual growth is that we ought to be growing in obedience and at the same time we ought to be decreasing our disobedience. There ought to be these marks of growth that we can see that we're becoming more like Christ and there ought to be marks of growth that we are sinning less.
But evaluating our own heart can be so hard sometimes. It seems like for believers, we can tend to vacillate back and forth. On some days, we feel like we're far better than we are, and we maybe look down on other people, thinking that they ought to be as spiritually mature as we are. And other days, we are so aware of our own sin and our own frailty of heart that we just feel like we're doing nothing of consequence.
Well, today's text, while at first glance may seem between the two paragraphs to be even a little disjointed, I think actually works together quite well, and I pray to serve to give us a sign that we can look at marks of spiritual maturity. This text today is going to spiritually put us up against the wall and allow us, I pray, to see some marks on the wall, something we can definitively look at, and we may be pleased with the results, or we may be disappointed with the results, but at least it will give us something that we can look at with clarity to see where we are growing, or perhaps where we need to grow.
And my aim today is not in any way to discourage you. If you do not see the signs of spiritual maturity and the marks of maturity that you wish you did, my hope is not that you would leave discouraged. My hope is that you would be encouraged to know that these are the things to focus on. These are the things to pray through. These are the things to ask the Holy Spirit to grant you help in these areas. So, returning now to our text here in Luke 17, three questions I want you to consider with me. Number one, am I growing in my fidelity? Am I growing in my fidelity? Fidelity is defined as faithfulness to a person, cause, or belief demonstrated by continuing loyalty and support. That is what fidelity means. It is faithfulness to a person, a cause, or belief, and it is demonstrated by continuing loyalty and support.
So, when I ask you, are you growing in your fidelity to Christ? Are you growing in your loyalty to Christ, your faithfulness to Christ? That includes your beliefs, your words, your actions, and your attitudes. Do you see evidence that you are maturing in your loyalty to Christ, in your faithfulness to Him?
Verse 1. "And He said to His disciples, 'Temptations to sin are sure to come.'" And the Pharisees and the disciples had been listening to Jesus as we go from the end of chapter 16 to chapter 17. He turns His attention to speak to His disciples, and He says to them, "Temptations to sin are sure to come." Be on guard. Temptation to sin is all around you. You know that. You do not need me to convince you of that. We understand that. People will sin, and people will try to get other people to stumble. The world will try desperately to get you to trip over their stumbling blocks. They will try to tempt you to sin with your thoughts and your beliefs, your reactions, and your expectations.
In fact, in Acts 20, we find Paul's final words of exhortation to the elders at Ephesus. Listen to what Paul says in Acts 20, verse 29: "I know that after my departure, fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things to draw away the disciples after them." Temptation to sin will be all around you. And it would be great if you could say, "You know what, I belong to a good, faithful, biblical church, and I've got Christian brothers and sisters that I spend time with, and if I spend enough time with my church, and with my family, and with other believers, that will remove me from all temptation to sin." But the reality is far different from that.
Temptation will stay with us. We have to always be on guard. You'll never reach a place where you have to stop being on guard to be obedient, to be faithful. As Paul told the Ephesian elders, even within the church, you've got to be careful because there are always people trying to get into the church who would even dare to lead people astray. But look at the rest of the verse: "Woe to the one through whom they come." I don't want to be overly dramatic, but I also want to be faithful to what the text says here. It's a dangerous thing to be a person who leads someone else to sin. And if there's a part of your life that takes lightly leading people to sin, leading people to disobey the Lord, leading people to make light of the things of God, hear clearly the words that are spoken here.
While temptation to sin is sure to be there, woe to the one through whom they come. This is a solemn warning about the influence we all carry with us. Now listen carefully to me, friends, because my temptation is the same as yours. When we hear these kinds of warnings about people who lead others astray, when we hear these warnings about how dangerous it is to be the one who leads someone else to sin, it is so easy to let your mind go to some celebrity who mocks the things of God. We see a singer or an athlete or a movie star, and they have this platform with millions of people who look up to them, say things that are untrue, and they say things that mock the Bible, and they lead people down the path of sin. And it is so easy for us to look at their influence and think, well, I would not want to be them. I would not want to be them and stand before the Lord.
But my friends, I need you to remember today that every single one of us carries more influence than we ever realize. Every one of us. If you are married, your actions, your attitudes, your words are the biggest influence on your spouse. You are just a constant source of influence on your spouse. If you have children, moms and dads, you are the constant influence on your children. And as you come to church, single adults, the people that you interact with at church, the people you interact with at work on a daily basis; you are a continual influence upon them.
And it is so tempting to want to talk about influence that other people have while missing the reality that every single one of us with our lives, with our words, with our obedience, or with our disobedience, always have influence on people who are close to us. And so, this is a solemn warning He gives. Woe to the one through whom these temptations come.
Verse two, “He says, “it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin.”” The Lord says it would be better to have a millstone hung around your neck and be thrown into the water than it would to be the person who has purposely caused these little ones to sin.
This millstone of a donkey is a very heavy thing, maybe as much as a couple of hundred pounds. It was an apparatus that required an animal to turn it, not just the hands of a person. Large round stone would be used for grinding grain. much too heavy for a single person to lift. And the clear implication is if you have this heavy weight around your neck, and you're thrown into the sea; the clear implication is that you would certainly drown. And the warning says better to have certain death than to be someone who leads other people astray.
I want to encourage you Trinity Bible Church; the way the Lord measures significance is far different from the world. Influence for Christ is of infinite value, and luring people to sin is far more dreadful than you can possibly imagine.
Those of you who teach Children's Sunday School, those of you who serve in the nursery, those of you who are meeting with people to disciple them one-on-one, as you influence young people to know the truth, to love the truth, and to glorify Christ, what you are doing is so valuable that it may seem to you a small thing. It may seem to you that you are just taking care of children for an hour, and you are just teaching little ones occasionally, and you are just spending an hour a week with someone discipling them. But the influence we carry in the scripture is so significant that the text says it would be better to be drowned in the sea than to lead somebody astray.
That speaks of how significant heaven considers our influence. So, I recognize that for most people, when they want to put their marks on the wall of growth, as children, it's about how tall they get. As adults, it becomes about money that's saved, or investments that are made, or retirement that's planned for, or health issues, and those things are all well and good. But please understand, if you want to live a life of significance, it starts right where you live, by influencing people for Christ. And if to you that feels like too small of a thing in your life, you need to see the very words of Scripture. How you live and how you influence is so significant to the Lord.
I remember it's been a few years ago now, but a church was having a hard time getting adults to volunteer to teach children in youth Sunday school. And so, this church had called me and asked if I would come in and meet with their church. And they said, "We just want you to come in and encourage our people. We've got people who are nervous to teach. They're too intimidated by it. And we just want you to come in and just help encourage everybody that anybody can do this and they ought not to be afraid to teach Sunday school.”
And I told them, I said, "I will come, but let me tell you what I'm going to say, because you may want to withdraw the invitation." And they said, "Well, what are you going to say?" And I said, I'm going to tell your people that however nervous they are about teaching because of influence, it's 100 times more significant than they think it is. And anybody who thinks it's a big deal to be a teacher and they're nervous about the accountability, they ought to be a hundred times more aware of the significance of it. This is no small thing.
As a pastor, I don't get anxious about the person who says teaching someone the Bible, influencing them for Christ, seems really, really heavy. I don't want to lighten that at all because it is really heavy. Now, let me be clear. To say, "I won't obey the Lord and I don't care about the other generations. I don't want to teach people. I'll just opt out of it." That is in itself can be a heart of disobedience that has its own consequences too.
But when a church called me and said, "Would you come help people lighten the load of how important they think teaching is?" I said, "I will speak to them, but that is not my message. My message is gonna to be, you ought to take it more seriously than you even think that you do. Because you cannot read Luke 17 and come away with anything other than the influence we have on others for Christ really matters to the Lord.”
And for every one of you who is teaching children, and serving in the nursery, and teaching young people, and discipling new believers, can I just tell you that work is significant. It matters. The world may not think it is a big deal. You may not think it is a big deal. Maybe others in the church do not always see it as a big deal. Listen, when you invest your time and your life to influence people for Christ, you are doing the most significant thing you can possibly do.
Moms and dads, when you are gathering your children with you at night, and you are reading Scripture with them, and singing hymns with your children, and praying over your children, that work right there that you're doing is so meaningful. And I don't know if this will encourage or discourage you, but if for you, family devotion time sometimes feels like a circus, I'll just tell you, it was for me too. As a dad, we would gather our family together, and we would do family devotion. Our kids were growing up, and there would be some evenings and I felt like I was on fire, giving my kids this amazing teaching and just I'm convinced they must be sitting there thinking, "God, how good you've been to give me such a wise father." Only to look over to my youngest son, who would have his head under the couch cushion and his feet sticking up. And my son is over there taking a picture with his phone. I'm like, "What's going on?" I'd look at Marcy and Marcy's like, "Enough, let us go, let us go." Like, it doesn't always go perfectly well.
If for you teaching your children sometimes feels laborious and sometimes feels non-heroic, listen, just the faithful influence of teaching the Word, praying the Word, singing the Word, living the Word, it's all about growing in your fidelity, your faithfulness to the Lord and influencing people to know and love Christ.
He says, back to verse two again, "better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin." Mark 9:42 speaks of these little ones who believe in Me. I think it's fair in the text to take this as speaking about little children for sure, but also about those who are new in their faith or young in their faith, which means for those of you who are discipling new believers, they may not be little ones in stature, but they are young ones in the faith.
For those of you who are sharing the gospel and doing the work of evangelism, for those of you who are meeting one-on-one with new believers and teaching them the elementary principles of the faith, it may feel to you as if you are just doing small things or entry-level things. You are doing significant work for the Kingdom.
And I want you to be encouraged, every one of you to be encouraged to see the mark of growth on the wall, so to speak. If you can look at this text and say that you are devoting your life to trying to influence people to know and love the truth of God's Word. You do not need a title for it. You do not have to get a paycheck for it. You do not have to be well known for it. You do not have to be applauded for it. Heaven sees and heaven knows every person who uses their life to influence people for the cause of Christ. And it matters to the Lord. Make sure it matters to you.
Mark 9:41 speaks of rewards for common acts of love done in the name of Christ. Mark 9:42 speaks against any common act of trying to lead other people astray. So let us take both sides of this. This is both a great warning against leading people to sin and a great commendation for all who in any way are striving to influence people for Christ.
And there are many ways you could think of that and apply that. Maybe one of them that ought to be said are for those of you who are raising young children. The life of raising young children can feel so monotonous: feeding, cleaning, laundry, getting ready for bed, bath time, picking up toys. It is fun; it is enjoyable. But every once in a while, I know it can start to just feel as if I am doing the same thing day after day after day.
Let me tell you this: you will do nothing more significant in your entire life than influence your own family to love Christ. You will never do anything more significant than that.
And for those in our congregation who are single adults, you do not have to be married to have influence. You do not have to have children to have influence. Anytime you are influencing other people to know God, to love God, and to honor God, you are doing the most significant thing your life can do.
And for every believer in this room. When people that you live nearby or that you work with, when they see your faithfulness, when they see your fidelity to the things of God, they have right in front of them a faithful example of godliness and holiness. There is no greater gift you could give to this world than to be a faithful example of one who loves the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't think that your marks of maturity against the spiritual wall have to be things this world affirms. They just have to be things heaven calls for. Make sure you are growing in your fidelity to Christ.
Here is a second mark on the wall, verses three and four, the second question: Am I growing in my forgiveness?
Verse three, "Pay attention to yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him." Am I growing in my forgiveness? But it starts, "Pay attention to yourself." This is an important warning for yourself. You have to make sure your heart is right with the Lord if you are going to help other people.
You have probably heard this explanation used a thousand different times, but if you are on an airplane, what are the instructions you don't pay attention to always tell you to do? If there is a problem, always put the mask on yourself first. Why? Because if you cannot breathe, you cannot help other people to breathe.
Pay attention to yourself. Make sure you are walking with the Lord. You cannot lead your children to love Christ if you do not love Christ. You cannot lead those whom you are discipling to love Christ if you do not love Christ. Pay attention to yourself. Make sure that you are doing the things that you are asking other people to do.
Those of you who lead Bible studies, preach sermons, or teach in any other place, pay attention to yourselves. The goal of the teacher is not just to say things that are true, but to say things that are true and then be an example of what that truth looks like. This is the hardest part of teaching.
The truth of the matter is, time spent in the Word—reading, praying, studying, writing, and editing sermons—may take a lot of time. That is not the hard part. The hard part is to preach the Word and then to be a faithful, living example of all those things that you preach. That is the hard part. Pay attention to yourselves.
Then he speaks of our forgiveness. If your brother sins, rebuke him. If he repents, forgive him. The question that needs to be asked is, do you care about the spiritual condition of others? Do you care enough to confront your brother in sin? There is only so much you can do at this point, isn't there? You cannot repent for someone else. You cannot change their heart. That is not your job. But if your brother sins, rebuke him. How he responds to it is on him. But I'll tell you what is on us: to love our brothers and sisters enough not to let them continue in sin. It speaks of it here, Galatians 6:1: "You who are spiritual, if you see a brother caught in a trespass, go to him with gentleness." This is our responsibility: to love people enough, to care for people enough, not to let them just run away in their sin. The truth of the matter is, it is far easier to watch someone's sin and just say, "What are they doing?" than it is to love them enough to go to them and confront them in their sin. But that is what true love is.
Now, here's where it gets really difficult. If you've been in ministry for a long time, you've experienced this. Someone sins, someone is straying, someone is rebelling, and you go to them in love and confront them with the heart of restoration, and they don't care, they run away, they burn that bridge. They turn on you. I've been through it. All church leaders have been through this. It's extremely painful. And the next time when someone is in your life, in the church, or someone that you know is straying from the Lord, and you know you ought to go to them, and you ought to confront them with grace and with gentleness, but also with clarity, it's hard because you know that every time you do that, it's always a risk that they may continue to turn away, they may continue to rebel, and they may turn against you. The question comes down to this: Am I more interested in faithfulness to the Lord or am I more interested in what's convenient for me?
One of the marks of maturity is that the way you make decisions would not be influenced by what's convenient for you but only what would be honoring to Christ. Put yourself up against a spiritual wall and see: have you grown in that? Do you find yourself increasingly making decisions by what is easiest for you, what is most convenient for you, or do you find yourself saying that even though it's difficult, I will consider only what would be obedient to the Lord?
We grow in our fidelity, and we show that by growing in our forgiveness. Look at verse four: If he sins against you seven times in the day and turns to you seven times saying, "I repent," you must forgive him. This is not about a number. This is about an example that we are to have a heart of forgiveness. We need to have an increasing heart of forgiveness.
This year, my wife and I will celebrate 30 years of being married. It has been a wonderful three decades. I cannot imagine my life with anybody else. Marcy has been such an incredible, constant encouragement and just a source of strength for me. I am thankful that the Lord would be so kind to give me such a gracious wife.
If we were to talk to you, if we were both here and we were just kind of having fun and laughing and joking, if you said to one of us or both at the same time, "What's the secret to being joyfully married for 30 years?" We would both say, "Because we are so easy to live with." And then we would both smile and laugh. Then we'd say, "Well, it's because I'm so quick to forgive you." And she would say it back to me.
The truth of the matter is you cannot be joyfully married for three minutes, much less 30 years, unless you both have a heart that's seeking to be gracious and to forgive, not holding on to grievances and grudges but striving to say that because Christ has forgiven me, I want to be quick to forgive you.
Now, I'm not a robot; I'm a human being, and I wish I was better at this. The older I get, the more I hope that this is increasingly true, but I'm not a finished product here by any means. But I do desire to be someone who is quick to forgive. And one of the reasons why we want to do that is because the Lord has told us that a heart of forgiveness is a mark of maturity in His people.
1 Peter 4:8: "Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins." Of course, if you are reading the Gospel of Luke in one setting, fresh on your mind would be just two chapters ago, you were just recently in Luke 15. Then if you were just reading this entire gospel in one setting, when you come to Luke 17, right in your mind would be the story of the prodigal son, this picture of forgiveness. But also in the prodigal son, we have an example of bitterness, don't we?
And I want to call on you today, with the grace and help of the Lord Jesus, to have a heart of forgiveness. Am I growing in my fidelity? Am I growing in my forgiveness? You know what is interesting? If you read the Bible in a year, I commend that to you. If you were able to complete that last year, that is a wonderful thing. A couple of years ago, I endeavored to set out a daily teaching through "Read the Bible," so I was leading our church through that. And so, I had committed every single day of our readings to do about a 15-minute teaching that went with that day's reading. And I told my wife at the start of the year what I was going to do, and Marcy said, "You're going to do a 15-minute video every single day?" And I said, "How hard can that be?" By about January 6th, I said, "Marcy, how many days are left in this year?" It is a far bigger challenge than I ever imagined. By God's grace, I made it through there, and some men at our church turned that into a podcast that now is available for people to find and listen to. As you do your daily reading of the Bible, you can listen to me try to explain and give some application for each day.
When I got to the end of that project, which was in 2024, I had finished reading through the Bible, I had finished teaching through the Bible, and I had taught every day that year through every passage that we had read, the whole Scripture. And in one sense, that was great progress. But I was increasingly aware as I was making our way through that project that it cannot just be, "Am I reading all these pages, and am I explaining all these words?" There is an element of this, most importantly, and it is the third question I want to bring to you: "Am I growing in my faith?" Am I growing in my faith?
Here's the danger. If you ever read through the Bible in a year, and I commend that to you. I do not want to discourage you from that. Here's the hard thing. You have boxes to check, and every single day you can check that you have finished that reading, and that is a good thing. Daily time in the Word is good. But there is not a box to check on that plan: am I growing in my faith? And I just want to put in front of you, not to read the Bible less, but to ask yourself more, is my faith growing? As you are reading the Word, as you are coming to church, as you are listening to sermons, as you are listening to faithful people teach podcasts, or whatever it may be, is my faith growing?
Let me show you where I get this. Verse five, the apostle said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." Now, at first reading, it seems like a bit of a disruption. The Lord had said to them, "don't tempt people to sin. Have a heart of forgiveness." And the very next thing that is uttered in response to that is the disciples saying, "Increase our faith." We need more faith. What is the connection? Well, the connection is that if you are going to be obedient to the things of God in context, namely, that you would be a faithful example and that you would have a heart of forgiveness, those things will not happen without increasing faith. It takes faith to truly be obedient to the things of God. So, we come to church and we sing about the faithfulness of God, and we mean it, we really do. But then trials come into our lives, and sometimes we wonder, "God, are you really enough?" This makes me think of the story in the Gospel of Mark where you have the father with his son, and his son is demon-possessed. What does the father say to Jesus? "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief." Lord, I believe, I really do, but would you help the part of me that is slow to believe? These are the apostles, and back to Luke 17, "Increase our faith." We have faith, but increase it, or the father in Mark 9, "I believe, but help the parts of me that are slow to believe."
And I just want to encourage you today to consider this question with me: Do you see your faith growing? Are you more trusting in the promises of the Lord today than you were a year ago? Maybe you trust the Lord; you really do, and yet you find yourself often gripped by fear. You believe the Lord is sovereign; you really do, but then when it comes to your career or your family, you get anxious. You trust the Lord is wise; you really do, but when you consider his plan or his timing, sometimes it gets scary. You read your Bible and you really do believe; you really do, and then when difficulty comes into your family or disease comes into your body, sometimes you get a little bit shaky.
Well, let your response be like the man: "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief." Or like the apostles: "Would you increase our faith?" Praise the Lord that our salvation is not based on the strength of our faith, but the object of our faith.
The Lord said, "If you had faith like a grain of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you." And here's the connection. If you're going to be a positive influence for Christ, verse one, verse two, if you're going to be quick to forgive those who hurt you, verse three and four, you're going to have to be someone that has ever-increasing faith because to forgive someone takes a lot of faith. If someone has hurt you and you are to forgive them, release them, and set them free, that's risky. And if you're going to spend time discipling someone and training them, that's risky because if you've not had the situation in your life where you've invested hours and maybe even years into someone's life only to watch them rebel and run away, if you've not been through that, that day's coming. And it hurts.
Twenty-five years in my church in Mustang, I am the most grateful pastor you will ever meet. I feel like the most fortunate, most blessed man in the world to get to serve the church I serve. My wife and I are amazed at God's goodness to allow us to be with these dear people. But I promise you, after twenty-five years in one place, I have lots of heartache that still exists from people that I have taught and trained and discipled and preached to that all of a sudden were gone. And it hurts. And you feel that. And you feel that when you share the gospel with your unbelieving father and he mocks you. And you feel that when you share the gospel with your unbelieving child and they rebel against you. And you feel that when you teach youth Sunday school to the church and someone you have prayed for continues to disbelieve and to act out in rebellious ways.
Those realities hurt, which is why it takes such genuine faith to persevere. Increase our faith. If we are going to be living with fidelity to the Lord and we are going to be living with a forgiving heart, we are going to have to be people that are growing in our faith.
He says, "You could say to this mulberry tree, "Be uprooted and planted in the sea."” The mulberry tree was considered the most firmly rooted tree in that part of the world. It cannot be uprooted; it cannot be moved, only God could do that. And so, in context, what Jesus is saying here is you have got to believe that God can do for you and through you what you could never do on your own. And what is the subject? Forgiveness. Forgiveness takes faith. Christian influence takes faith. Fidelity takes faith. So, ask yourself this morning, are you growing in your fidelity to Christ? Increasingly loyal? Increasingly trusting? Are you growing in your forgiveness of other people? If you are married, start there. If you are single, start with those closest to your life. Are you quick to forgive?
See, the hard thing in a marriage is this: you might say, "My wife asked me to forgive her, but if I forgive her and set her free and release her from this, couldn't she hurt me again? If I forgive her, I can't bring that back up next week. Isn't that going to cost me some ammunition?" See, it takes faith to say that living by God's will and God's design is best for me. Because the fleshly part of us wants to hold on to things for ourselves. Forgiveness is about letting go. It takes faith to let go, which is why it makes perfect sense that the apostles would respond to those commands by saying, "Increase our faith."
So, this morning as you look at the spiritual growth chart, what do you see? Are you growing in your fidelity? Are you growing in your forgiveness? Are you growing in your faithfulness?
As we close, I just want to try to encourage you as a friend. The last thing I want to do is drive down here and discourage you. If you need to be convicted by the Holy Spirit, so be it. If you need to be confronted by His Word, so be it. But my role as a pastor is not to leave you discouraged, but rather, in Christ and through His word and grace, I pray to encourage you.
So, suppose with me that you looked at your life in an honest way this morning and you were to say, "You know what, I find myself being more bitter, not more forgiving. I find myself being more double-minded, not increasingly faithful." If that's you this morning, I have no desire to have you just leave today feeling discouraged. I want you to leave today looking at the growth chart, so to speak, and to say, "What do I need to do to see improvement?"
Well, here is the reality. Things that are healthy grow. So, do not make this overly complicated. If you are not growing spiritually as you wish, you should just focus on things that make a person spiritually healthy. And the first of the year is the perfect time to do that. There are no tricks. There are no secrets. I do not know something that you have never heard before to tell you. Let me just remind you of what makes a person spiritually healthy: time in the Word, confessing your sin, praying for others, gathering with God's people, using your spiritual gifts, and living daily for His glory. Those are the things that make us spiritually healthy, and spiritually healthy people grow in their maturity.
So, if you look at your life today and if you were to say, "Michael, if I am being honest with you, I do not see a lot of growth. I do not see a lot of marks of maturity, and I do not feel good about where I am right now. Can I just encourage you to say that the Lord is kind and gracious to His people, that the Lord Himself is quick to forgive? And I would encourage you to repent of your sin and begin today doing the simple things you know to do to help your soul be healthy.
If you are a single person, I want to encourage you to turn to the Lord with faith and repentance and ask Him to use your life in the most powerful, effective way this year that it can be. If you are a married person, I would encourage you to start with your family and your marriage to make sure that you are influencing your spouse for the cause of Christ. If you have children, I want to encourage you to start right there with your children and to make sure that you are leading them to know and love the Lord. If you serve in this church, you work in the nursery, you serve children or teenagers, or however it may be that you serve in any ministry, just pray for faithfulness in your life and that you would be a positive influence for Christ on the people you serve.
And what you will find is that as your faith grows, your joy in the things of Christ increases. The more joy you have in your walk with the Lord, the more you will delight to do His will. The more you do His will, the more you will see that the pleasure of heaven is enough to satisfy. My prayer and hope for you in this new year is that you would find the joy of Christ to be sufficient for your every need.
(Prayer) Lord, we are grateful for Your Word this morning. It teaches us, it convicts us, it helps us, it reproves us, but Lord, it gives us hope. It gives us hope to know that You are always at work in our lives through Your Word and the work of Your Spirit.
Lord, I pray that where we see signs of growth and evidences of maturing, we would not become prideful of that, but use those evidences and those marks as a reason to give You praise. I pray, Lord, for others who may feel discouraged that they do not see themselves growing as they wish they were growing, that even this morning could be a time of refreshing for them, a time of repenting, a time of refocusing on what matters most, that all of it would be about Your people loving You enough to say, "I just want to be pleasing in Your eyes.
We pray that You would help us in that way. In Christ's name, amen. (End)
