Latest / HBCWestminster / 1.26.20 Luke 3:7-20 Pastor Danny Gardner

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1.26.20 Luke 3:7-20 Pastor Danny Gardner · HBCWestminster

• 0:00
  Well, we're going to get into God's Word this morning. I'm going to be in Luke 3. In our text today is Luke 3, 7-20. Luke 3, 7-20. And if you are able to stand in honor of God's Word, I would ask you to do that now. I'm going to read it, then we'll pray and get into our study. Beginning in verse 7, it says, He said, therefore, to the crowds that came out to be baptized by Him, You brood of vipers.
• 0:31
  Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come, bear fruits in keeping with repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father. For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. The crowds asked him, What then shall we do? And he answered them, Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise.
• 1:02
  Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, Teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, Collect no more than you are authorized to do. Soldiers also asked him, And we, what shall we do? And he said to them, Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages. As the people were in expectation and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John whether he might be the Christ, John answered them all, saying, I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming.
• 1:30
  the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn. But the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. So with many other exhortations, he preached good news to the people. But Herod the Tetrarch, who had been reproved by him for Herodias, his brother's wife, and for all the evil things that Herod had done, added this to them all, that he locked up John in prison.
• 1:59
  And let's pray. Father God, we glorify your name because, Lord, you are majestic in all the earth. May we not be like those who disregard their own sin. May we not weep and wail publicly, all the while remaining unmoved in our inner man. May our sin break our hearts with godly sorrow. And may we lean on your son for forgiveness, and it's in his name we pray. Amen, church? Amen. You guys can be seated. Thank you.
• 2:36
  Well, you may have heard that recently one of our high school boys here at the church got a job down the street at Discount Tire Company. He's been working there the last couple of months. And here's a little known fact. I used to work at America's Tire Company, which is Discount Tire's archenemy. I spent...
• 2:55
  Many months, actually, during my college tenure, busting tires, fixing flats, all of that stuff. I was the guy with the safety goggles and the gloves who you drive your car into the bay. I was the guy jacking up cars and with the impact wrench rotating tires and doing all of that stuff. It was hard work. But I actually enjoyed it. And even today, when I go to get new tires, that smell of new tires is such a distinct smell, right? Old tires don't smell that way.
• 3:22
  But new tires have this very distinct smell and it's even nostalgic for me. I like the smell because it reminds me of a job that I enjoyed, but I didn't enjoy every aspect of the job. Our store, the one that I worked at, was located right off of the off-ramp.
• 3:39
  for the freeway in our town. And so it was frequent when people needed tires done or when they were having tire problems that they'd be zipping down the freeway doing whatever 75 miles an hour on a hot summer day. You guys know I grew up in the desert of California. And so those days oftentimes were well over a hundred degrees, sometimes even into the hundred and teens. So they've been driving on 114 degree day, 75 miles an hour on this hot asphalt.
• 4:06
  have tire problems, pull off the freeway, don't even stop, pull directly into the bay and then tell me I need new tires or I need my tire fixed or I've been having problems. Those tires were crazy hot, right? I mean, the cars are steaming hot and I'm the scrub who had to set his face down there, you know, and get down there inside of the wheel well and be working and whatever. It was hard. The worst part of it though.
• 4:33
  was when somebody had what was an undiagnosed slow leak. They couldn't figure it out. And you can buy this stuff. I'm assuming you can actually still buy it. In fact, the young man from our church said that he encounters this still frequently, busting tires today, 25 years later. There's this stuff you can buy called Fix-A-Flat. Fix-A-Flat is this canister of goop.
• 4:57
  It's pressurized. It's under compression. And so you hook this thing to your tire valve. You inflate your tire, then hook it to your tire valve. You blow all of this chemical compound goop inside of the tire, and it kind of seals it from the inside. It pressurizes in there. And so it will stop the leak. It doesn't fix the leak. It stops the leak. And so then you can drive to the tire company and tell the 17-year-old kid.
• 5:20
  I've got a flat, you know, passenger side front. Okay, go to the passenger side front. I take it off, put it up on the machine that presses against the tire and unseats the bead from the rim, not knowing that the entire inside of it, although I've deflated it, the entire inside of it is under pressure. Boom. And these things, I mean, they blow up. And the inside of that stuff is this white, goopy.
• 5:48
  It's nasty, nasty stuff. The stuff explodes in your face. You got to scrape all of this stuff out of there to try to find the hole. It looks inflated. From the outside, you can't tell any difference. And in fact, I always appreciated the customers who would say, by the way, it's full of fix-a-flat. Okay, that's good to know. But don't be fooled. As soon as you crack it open, it's a nightmare. And may it never be true of the state of our hearts. May it never be true that they look inflated.
• 6:18
  That from the outside, they look totally fine, only to be cracked open and to be found a nightmare. We tell our kids to apologize when they mess up. But isn't it sometimes difficult to determine genuine sorries from the fake ones? You ever heard your kids say they're sorry, but you question like, are you really sorry? You don't seem sorry. I'm sorry, right? They go stomping off to their bedroom. Like, well, I know you said the words, but it seems fake. Have you ever wondered that? Fake sorrow?
• 6:49
  Have you ever been confronted with the possibility that your own sorrow, your own genuineness, your own devotion might actually be fake as well? Has that ever happened? Have you ever questioned the genuineness of your own salvation? That's a scary thing. I can remember very vividly as a younger man struggling with the genuineness of my heart before the Lord.
• 7:14
  I have these memories of listening to altar calls in my youth and actually thinking, Lord, you know my heart, right? The pastor's going on about gospel and salvation and you can come forward and receive Christ or pray right there in your seat. And I would think, you know, Lord, that I've asked for forgiveness and committed my life to you. I know that I have no need to be saved again.
• 7:37
  But just in case, I'll say it all again, right? Have you ever done that? Like just in case, Lord, if it was fake 10 years ago, it's not fake this time. Lord, I'll say it all again. You know that I love you. I've never doubted the goodness of God. Lord, never. I've never doubted the truth of the gospel and his saving grace. I've never doubted that. What I doubt at times is the genuineness of my own heart. How do I determine my own spiritual genuineness? And the answer is repentance.
• 8:08
  Repentance. This morning we're going to study the difference between true repentance and false repentance. We'll see that truth repentance can be determined by the fruit that is born and by the punishment that is endured. What our passage this morning is going to call fruit in keeping with repentance. Now it was John MacArthur who called repentance the highway to the heart and indeed that is what it is.
• 8:36
  The repentant heart is the one that God accepts and that is pleasing to him. And so let's go through our passage this morning. Notice first that genuine repentance does not avoid the punishment. Genuine repentance does not avoid the punishment. Look at verse seven. He, referring to John the Baptist, said therefore to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him. And at the height of his popularity, I mean, he was gathering massive, massive.
• 9:05
  crowds, hundreds, perhaps even into the thousands to come out and hear this man preach. And he said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him, you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the coming wrath or the wrath to come? As long as there have been competitions, there have been cheaters. That competition makes people do funny things, doesn't it? I've heard some people say that if you're not cheating, you're not trying.
• 9:37
  I myself, I disagree with that. I think there's a very clear line between athletic advantage and cheating. I would say if you cheated, kick them all out. None of them should be inducted into the Hall of Fame, but that's for a different sermon. Even in Major League Baseball, which has existed for well over 100 years, even in Major League Baseball, cheating is nothing new. Some of you guys may have read about or heard about the eight men from the Chicago White Sox who in 1919 took money, bribes,
• 10:08
  in order to throw, purposely throw, the World Series. The Chicago White Sox became known as the Black Sox that year. Here's the picture of the headline, right? Eight White Sox players, including the famous one that you've probably all heard of, Shoeless Joe Jackson, right? Those eight players were all given lifetime bans from baseball. Here's a picture of that team. There are all of the guys, the Black Sox of 1919. They were cheaters.
• 10:36
  You guys who are old enough to remember baseball in the 1990s will remember the PED era, the steroid era, right? Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa, the famous one, Barry Bonds, right? Just juicing beyond control. Human growth hormone. I mean, these crazy things they were putting into their bodies to make it so that they could hit home runs. Fly balls are becoming home runs. And you guys, it worked.
• 11:00
  It worked. Those men are paying the consequence now, I think, physically and other things. But man, it worked. All three of them broke what was to that point about a 40 or so year home run record, single season record. Barry Bonds ended up setting the record at well over 70 home runs. The previous home run record, he had 74. The previous was 61. I mean, he blew it out of the water. Barry Bonds later went on to set the career home run record, had been held by Hank Aaron.
• 11:28
  Before him, Babe Ruth. But then he set it at 756 career home runs, which is incredible. 756 home runs. If you guys can remember, if you guys were baseball fans 20 years ago, you'll remember this. There was a guy in the outfield who caught that ball. He caught the home run ball, the last one, the famous one, 756. It's a record that'll never be broken. It will never be broken because...
• 11:54
  Now they know how to test for steroids, okay? But it'll never be broken. 756, he caught the ball. All kinds of people were offering him money for it, hundreds of thousands of dollars. He refused. He said, no, I'm not interested in the money. Instead, he said, I want the fans to choose what happens to the ball. He hated the fact that Barry Bonds broke the record by cheating. And so he said, I will give the fans a choice. And he put out an online survey. You got three options. Whatever popular vote decides is what I'll do.
• 12:22
  He says, number one, donate it to the Hall of Fame. Just give it to them. Number two, permanently fix an asterisk on the ball so that everybody knows that asterisk means, yeah, he broke the record, but he cheated. Or third, I will pay to have it blasted into outer space. Here's the one that won. There it is. The actual ball, 756, it's got the asterisk. Do you see that?
• 12:50
  Permanently. He cut that thing out, and then he donated it to the Hall of Fame. If you want to see it, you can. It's on display in the museum, permanently fixed with this asterisk. They cheated. Most recently in the news, the Houston Astros have been accused of cop cheating, right? And the Houston Astros, here's their logo and emblem. You know, they were stealing signs. They were doing all the things which were clearly against the rules. And so here's what somebody has come up with, what I like now for their new logo, I hope.
• 13:19
  I hope that they'll adopt that. But listen, why go into all of this? Here's what is driving me crazy about the current cheating scandal, okay? The difficulty for me in all of this is not that people cheated. I know that there are dishonest people. The difficulty for me is that when they get caught, they won't just admit that they made a mistake.
• 13:45
  If you watch right now, current Astros players, if you listen to them give interviews, soundbites, clips, and all of that, every statement they make is positioning. It's guarding. It's covering their rear ends. And I just think, you know what? You blew it. Just admit that you blew it. Apologize. You know how much respect I would have for one of those young men for saying, I cheated. I'm so sorry.
• 14:07
  I'm sorry that I disappointed our fans. I'm sorry that I disappointed our franchise. I'm sorry that I got people fired, and there were. I lost people's jobs. I'm sorry that I was an embarrassment to the game. I'm sorry. I'll take my punishment. We'll move on. In fact, I think that accepting the punishment is actually one of the signs of true repentance, right? Posturing, guarding, protecting is not.
• 14:36
  Are you sorry over what you did? I don't think so. How do you know? Because you've never actually apologized for it. You never actually said that you were sorry. You never actually even admitted to any wrongdoing. One of the signs of genuine repentance is recognizing the mistake and receiving the consequences. Listen to 2 Corinthians 7 and verse 10, and I would encourage you guys even to memorize this one. 2 Corinthians 7, 10, underline it in your Bibles. Listen to what it says.
• 15:06
  For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. In other words, God's word says there are two types of sorry, two types of grief. Godly grief ends in repentance and life. Worldly grief produces death. You can be fake sorry, is what he says.
• 15:32
  Same text goes on to say, for see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you. What eagerness to clear yourselves. What indignation. What fear. What longing. What zeal. What punishment. He actually says, what punishment. Those of you who have been genuinely sorry for a wrongdoing will recall the feeling you had in that moment. You broke the rules. You sinned. You did whatever. You got caught. You were genuinely repentant in that moment. No punishment felt too severe.
• 16:04
  In fact, I can recall times where I even longed for punishment. I longed for it because my heart was broken over my sin. And what we see in our text this morning in verse 7 is that there were those in the crowds who were watching John who were actually seeking to avoid the coming wrath.
• 16:28
  They had no genuine desire to be made right with God. They only wanted to avoid his punishment, his judgment. And church, listen, God detests, he detests mere formalism. He dislikes vehemently any attempt to earn his approval using mere outward displays of piety. He sees through the fake apologies. He sees through it. Scripture says that man may be impressed, but the Lord looks at the heart.
• 16:58
  And may it never be said of Highlanders that we would be putting on a show, right? That's not the Christianity we're interested in, amen? The fake, forced smiles, that's not it. May our love be sincere. May our worship be genuine. May our study of God's word lead to obedience. May we not be like the people in James who looked at themselves in the mirror and then went away and immediately forgot what we looked like.
• 17:28
  May we not be the people who merely hear the word, but may we do it also. Notice he continues in verse eight. He actually anticipates their argument. He says in verse eight, bear fruit in keeping with repentance and do not begin to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father. So you can imagine them saying, wait, who are you to tell us we're not right with God? We are after all sons and daughters of Abraham. We are the chosen people of God. You can't tell us that we're not right with God.
• 17:55
  Another equally wicked man said in Luke 17, and you may recall the parable Jesus told of the Pharisee and the tax collector. This man, the Pharisee, proudly going to the temple to pray, proudly standing in the presence of God and bragging about himself to the Lord, saying, I fast twice a week. I give a tenth of all I get. Certainly I am accepted. Modern vernacular might say, well, I grew up in the church. I hear people say that a lot. I give to charity.
• 18:24
  I volunteer at the Denver Rescue Mission. Therefore, I must be a good person. How can you tell me I'm not right with the Lord? Well, look what he says. Continue in verse 8. For I tell you, God is able to from these stones raise up children for Abraham. He came from Abraham. Neat. God does what he wants. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. And John warns us not to rest.
• 18:53
  on our heritage. Just because our parents may have been believers and raised us in the church, just because their parents were believers and raised them to the church doesn't automatically mean that you know the Lord, he says. Don't rest on your upbringing and don't rest even on your good deeds to deal with your sin. None of them work. They're like fix-a-flat. They look good on the outside, but on the inside, they're a nightmare.
• 19:20
  That's first. Genuine repentance does not avoid the punishment. Notice also genuine repentance bears fruit. Look at verse 10. And the crowds asked him, then what shall we do? And he answered them, whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none. Whoever has food is to do likewise. Now the positive side of admitting our error is the producing of spiritual fruit in keeping with that repentance. And here's what John does. He gives several examples of repentant fruit.
• 19:50
  based on the specific tendency of each of these groups. And so he starts in verse 11 with the wealthy, right? These people have more clothes than they need. They have more food than they need. And what does he tell the wealthy to do? He says, be generous toward those who have less than you. What is genuine fruit in keeping with repentance? He says, be generous with those who have less than you. Now, what about verse 12? What about to the tax collectors? Look at verse 12.
• 20:20
  Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, teacher, what shall we do? And he said to them, collect no more than you are authorized to do. It had become a common practice in first century Israel. And I imagine other eras as well. But first century Israel were tax collectors authorized by the Roman government would collect their taxes on behalf of Rome, but then actually collect more than was necessary and keeping the rest.
• 20:50
  That was a standard thing. This is why tax collectors were so hated in Israel. You may recall a time where Jesus ran into a tax collector. Do you remember this? There was some guy, as Jesus was teaching, this little short guy, a wee little man, who climbed up in a tree to hear him preach, right? What was his name?
• 21:11
  Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus, the wee little man, right? And he comes down, he's confronted with Jesus. Jesus says, I'm going to your house today. At the end of dinner, Zacchaeus is broken, right? Genuinely repentant over his sin. And what does he do? What does he say? I'll give it all back. All of the stuff that I stole, and it was stealing. All of the stuff that I stole, I give it all back. Fruit in keeping.
• 21:40
  With repentance to the tax collector, be willing, he says, to receive less than your due. Consider the needs of others before yourselves. Continues verse 14. What about the soldiers? Soldiers also asked him, and we, what shall we do? And he said to them, do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation. Be content with your wages to those in authority, to those in a position of power and strength. He says, be honest.
• 22:09
  Don't exploit your power for ill-gotten gain. What I love about each of these three examples is that none of these fruits in keeping with repentance actually benefits the bearer of those fruits in any way, right? It's giving, it's not taking more. He says, do you wanna know if your heart is genuinely changed by the Lord? Has it changed the way you lived your life? Are you still looking out for number one or are you considering the needs of others? Listen to Philippians chapter two.
• 22:40
  Beginning in verse 3, it says, Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. And have this mind among yourselves, that mind looking to the interests of others, which is yours in Christ Jesus. Second, genuine repentance bears fruit. Notice third, look at verse 15. Genuine repentance can only be found in Jesus.
• 23:11
  I love verse 15. It's maybe my favorite verse in the text. It says, as the people were in expectation and all were questioning in their hearts concerning John, whether he might be the Christ. Now one test I think of positive and effective preaching is that it sets men's and women's minds to thinking and their hearts to burning. I often will ask myself, do I feel like that was an effective sermon? I feel like one of the...
• 23:39
  the ways that I can measure the effectiveness of my preaching is, does it cause my people's minds to think and their hearts to stir? That's effective preaching. A couple of men were walking on the road to Emmaus with Jesus after he had resurrected. At the end of that whole conversation, one turns to the other and says, we're not our hearts burning within us. We're not our hearts burning within us. Good preaching causes holy heartburn.
• 24:10
  Right? We're not our hearts burning within us. They were stirred. I love churches and pastors who invite questions. I think for too long have churches of the past scoffed at the inquirer, saying simply that they lacked faith. As if faith were the opposite of doubt. If you have faith, you cannot have doubt. And I don't think that to be the case. Faith does not equal ignorance. It doesn't. Rather, faith
• 24:43
  is the gift given to those who think their way to the Lord. Listen to 2 Timothy 2 and verse 7. This is in the Bible. 2 Timothy 2, 7. Think over what I say. Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything. If you want to know what I'm talking about, if you want to understand what I'm talking about, Paul says, think. Think about it. Think over what I say.
• 25:10
  Scripture commands us to honor the Lord with our minds, heart, mind, soul, and strength. With our minds, our minds are to be renewed, Romans chapter 12. Yeah, Romans 12, yeah. Romans chapter 12 says, our minds are to be renewed and transformed. John Piper says it this way, the divine promise is not made to all, it is made to those who think. J.C. Ryle, perhaps my favorite quotable person, has said this, and I've quoted this.
• 25:37
  phrase often. This will not be the last time I do. It's one of my favorites. J.C. Ryle says, want of thought or lack of thought is why thousands of souls are cast away forever. So in other words, he says, I believe that hell is filled with people who just never thought about it. You're going to talk to your neighbor, you know, what do you think happens after you die? What do you think about sin? What do you think about God? What do you think about creation? How do you think we got here? What happens after we're all gone? Were we made with a purpose? Are we loved? Did we come from monkeys?
• 26:08
  And they'll say something like, I don't know. I never really thought about it. And that's exactly what J.C. Rowell is talking about. Think, think, turn that on, turn on your brains. Think that I love that John's preaching caused the people to think. Here they are in expectation, verse 15, questioning in their hearts. And what does he do? He begins, as they're thinking about those questions, he begins to explain to them about the Savior. Look at verse 16. John answered them all saying,
• 26:36
  I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. In other words, somebody is coming who is far greater than I am. I'm not even worthy to tie his shoelaces. I baptize with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. When we receive the Lord Jesus as Savior, the Bible says that the Holy Spirit comes into us. We are baptized by the Spirit. And this actually says baptized by fire. Now there's...
• 27:05
  There are some differing opinions about what the fire represents. The fire could refer to the tongues of fire as in Acts 2. Speaking in tongues, it could refer to suffering. Don't be surprised at the fiery trials that you endure, 1 Peter 4 says. I think it's the third kind of fire. I think this is probably a sanctifying or refining fire. Given the context, don't just say you're sorry.
• 27:32
  bear fruit in keeping with repentance, right? Let the dross, the sin of your life be burned away so that what remains is glorifying to God. And so he says, he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire, he will sanctify you. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor, to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire. The fake stuff, the stuff that is no good, he says, ain't getting through.
• 28:00
  Genuine repentance only can be found in Jesus. And notice, last. Genuine repentance may be very unpopular. Verse 18, so with many other exhortations, he preached good news to the people. But Herod the Tetrarch, now we talked last week about Herod, right? This is Herod.
• 28:21
  This is the Herod that passed Jesus back and forth with Pilate. This is that Herod, the one who eventually beheaded John the Baptist. Herod the Tetrarch, who had been reproved by John for Herodias, his brother's wife. That brother is Philip the Tetrarch. We talked about him last week. Herod had stolen his brother Philip's wife and taken her as his own. John the Baptist confronted that sin, told him it was sin, and called him to repentance.
• 28:51
  but he did not repent. It says all the evil things that Herod had done, John the Baptist preached against, he added this to them all and he locked up John in prison, eventually removing his head. Now this is baffling to me. I don't understand this. The godly repentance produces eternal life, amen? Godly repentance brings new life and joy, right? Godly repentance produces vision and purpose.
• 29:24
  And hope, godly repentance, brings peace between us and our Creator. All of those things are true. Why then? In fact, John Piper actually called the gospel the most shareable message in the world. This should be the most shareable message on earth. This is great news. Why then do we hesitate to share it? Why do we hesitate to share the most shareable message in the world? And the reality is because of stuff like this. Like, Pastor Danny, you don't know my family.
• 29:56
  You don't know my neighbor? You've not met that? You don't know the guy that I share a cubicle with? He will have me imprisoned and beheaded. This is accurate, right? The most shareable message in the world. It's oftentimes very unpopular. As good as the gospel is, the gospel is most often rejected. Why is that? I'll give you the reason. Our world is so depraved.
• 30:25
  So far from God, so blind to their own sin that they can't even see the solution to their own problem. They're so blind to it that they don't actually realize the good news is good news. They can't see that the only way to fix their flat tire is with the Savior. No other solution will work. Heritage?
• 30:54
  Works, good works can be piled up. They make you look really good. All they are is fix-a-flat. May the Lord, when he cracks open our hearts, find them to be genuinely broken and contrite over our sins. If, brothers and sisters, if you're walking in sin, even now, even now you're feeling convicted, rather than walking in forgiveness and joy, I would encourage you, repent. Don't seek to avoid sin's consequences. Sin has consequences. Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.
• 31:27
  May we not seek to fill our hearts with solutions that will only make us look good to others, but have no hope of actually working. Amen. God, thank you for your word and thank you for worship. Thank you for these people. God, I pray that you would be honored and blessed every time we open your word, every time we gather together. God, I pray that we would be a people marked by repentance. Lord, we are not perfect. We seek for perfection. Lord, we desire holiness. We're also tempted. We fail.
• 31:58
  There are trappings in our lives that are difficult to kill. And God, when we fail, I pray that we will be quick, quick to repent and to bear fruit in keeping with that repentance. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.