Latest / Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ) / "Old Testament Lessons for New Testament Christians" by Hiram Kemp

Transcript

"Old Testament Lessons for New Testament Christians" by Hiram Kemp · Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ)

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The man on the screen before you is known in church history
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as Marcion, and he was born near the end of the 1st century and lived
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midway through the 2nd century. Marcion's claim to fame, or you
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could say claim to shame, was he is the first, or at least one of
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the very earliest, men to be officially marked as a false teacher
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and a heretic in the early church. Marcion had a problem, and so he just
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made his own Bible. Marcion read the Bible, and the conclusion he came to is
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the God of the Old Testament is far too severe,
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far too harsh, far too judgmental and critical to be the God we read about
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in the New Testament. So Marcion, in his translation, he just took the Old Testament
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out. He took out much of the New Testament too, leaving the letters of Paul
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that he appreciated, only the Gospel of Luke, and much of
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the rest of the New Testament Marcion just felt like he could do without.
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The good news is the 2nd century church, the time in which Marcion
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lived, they strongly opposed him. They wrote and preached and taught contrary to
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the things that he said and opposed him and officially marked him as a false
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teacher. But his claim to fame in church history is he was a man who
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despised and abhorred the God as he found him in the Old Testament.
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And while a lot of people in the world today wouldn't define themselves as individuals
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that are Marcionites— I mean, many people don't even know his name— The
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idea of Marcionism, the practice of let's just get rid of
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the Old Testament and focus on the God of the New Testament, it's not altogether
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abolished or foreign. I mean, you probably have talked to people or heard people
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say before— I have in a church context— why are we even studying the Old
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Testament? We're New Testament Christians. Just let's stay in the New Testament.
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I was talking to somebody this week, and as we were discussing Bible things,
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this person was sharing with me their low view and disdain for
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the Old Testament. Hey, we're New Testament Christians. Love the New Testament, let's just focus
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there. Even that description, as well-meaning as it is, and I know what we mean
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when we say it, New Testament Christians, if we're not careful, can communicate
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something unhealthy or unbiblical about how we view the first 3/4
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of the Bible. I realize we're not under the Old Covenant.
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Romans 7:1-6 says that we're married to another,
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even Christ. Hebrews 9:15-18 talks about how Jesus's
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death ushers in a brand new covenant and we're no longer
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under the old. That which is old is fading away, Hebrews 8:13.
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And while it's true that we don't live under the Old Covenant, as Darrell read
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a moment ago, we can learn from it. Romans 15:4 says,
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whatever things were written before time were written for our learning, that we through
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patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope. We read the
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Old Testament and learn from the bad examples like Israel. In 1 Corinthians 10:6
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and in chapter 10 and verse 11 of 1 Corinthians, Paul says all these things
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happened to Israel for our purpose so that they might be an example. But we
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also read in Hebrews 11 in passages that are sometimes called the Hall of Fame
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of Faith about good examples that we're supposed to emulate. What I
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want to do tonight is very simple. You see it on the title on the
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screen, Old Testament Lessons for New Testament Christians. I just want us to march
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through, and I'm gonna go to the Old Testament, and what we're gonna do is
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look at some of the passages and some of the principles that have
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become virtuous to us, things that we revere and extol about God in the New
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Testament But what I'm hoping that we see as we study tonight is many
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of these ideas, as fundamental as they are in the New Testament, actually have their
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origin in the Old Testament. The goal at the end of this sermon is that
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we won't have any Marcionites in the building. We won't be able to spend a
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great deal of time on any of these. Some of these may merely just receive
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a mention, but what I hope we see is that it takes the whole Bible
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to make a whole Christian. And though we don't live under the Old Testament,
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we are spiritually impoverished to the degree that we neglect it. So quickly
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tonight, here are the lessons. Number 1, Old Testament lesson: God
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is our maker. In the first book, in the first chapter, on the first page—
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actually, in the first verse of the Bible— this Old Testament principle is communicated
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to us as Christians. Genesis 1:1 says, in the beginning God created the heavens
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and the earth. Not only is God our maker, but the first chapter of the
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Bible makes it clear that God is the maker of everybody and everything.
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The last verse in Genesis 1:31 says,
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God saw everything that He made, and behold, it was very good. The first
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chapter of the Bible displays that God is our Creator. You move over
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to the book of Psalms, and in poetic language, the psalmist speaks of God creating
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the world in a mature and full fashion merely with His words.
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Psalm 33:6, for example, the psalmist says, by the word
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of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the
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breath of His mouth. And then in verse 9 of Psalm 33,
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the psalmist says, He commanded and He— and it was done.
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He spoke and it stood firm. This fundamental idea of
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God as our Maker is an Old Testament principle that's relevant
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for New Testament Christians. Behold, how manifold are your works,
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and wisdom have you made them all! The earth is full of your creatures.
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Psalm 104:24. Now, when you fast forward
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to the New Testament, it becomes apparent that in the triune Godhead—
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Father, Son, and Holy Spirit— Christ is the primary agent through whom
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God created everything, according to John 1, Hebrews 1,
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and Colossians 1, but the first page of the Bible drives home this
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principle. And I think something as simple and fundamental as God is our Creator
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keeps coming up over and over again because as elementary as it may
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sound, it's easy for us to forget that God created us.
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We didn't create God. Know ye not that the Lord, he is God? It's he
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that made us and not we ourselves, Psalm 100:3. We're the work of his
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hands, Isaiah 64:8. And one Old Testament
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principle or lesson for New Testament Christians is God is our Maker.
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Mary Oliver, in her book on poems called Devotions, in the very first poem she
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talks about how great it is, it's a shame that people throughout
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the world today still are asking God for His identity papers. Oliver says it
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should be evident to everybody in the world that there is a God. And what
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she uses as an example, she says basically, can you imagine being the Queen
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of Sheba? And as she's on her way to see Solomon, she says,
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When she got close to the kingdom, did she have to say to anybody that
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was traveling in her caravan, is this the place? Oliver's point
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is it would have been evident as soon as you got near Solomon's kingdom with
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all of the gold and the riches and the trees and the animals that this
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couldn't be any place other than Solomon's kingdom. And her point
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is to a greater and equal degree, as far as God's concerned,
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how can you live in this world? And many people are confused about
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this. How can you live in this world and look around and say, how did
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this come about? Is this the place? First principle, God is
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our maker. Quickly, here's number 2, every person has value. Same chapter,
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Genesis 1:26-27, Moses says about humanity,
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then God said, let us make man in our image and in our likeness,
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and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of
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the air, over every animal that creeps upon the earth and everything that dwells upon
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the earth. Second lesson from the Old Testament for New Testament Christians,
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is God gives every person equal value.
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That means no matter who you are, if you exist as a human being,
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every person has value as an image bearer of the God who
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made us. In Genesis 5:1, Moses doubles down on
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this and he says, man is made in the likeness of God.
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But it's stronger than that. Moses places capital punishment as an eternal
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principle on anybody that would kill another human being. Moses says, if you
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as a human take another human's life, By man shall your blood be shed.
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And then here's his reason, Genesis 9:6, because man bears
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the image of God. And we today in 2026,
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in the 21st century, we kind of have a sort of arrogance about us.
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We look back on ancient times as being primitive and barbaric
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and as out of touch with the modern age. We've got our iPhones and we've
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got our smart cars that drive themselves, but history will judge
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us as barbaric on this point for how we have treated people
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made in the image of God. I mean, you can think about as recent as
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last week with Clancy. You can think about the pro-abortion movement.
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You can think about school shootings and a host of other tragedies
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that have happened in our world and how we've gone so far away
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from this idea that people are made in the image of God and
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God cares about how you treat his stuff. History will judge us
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harshly for how flippantly and easily we've just discarded with individuals
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that are made in the image of God. But this isn't just about the idea
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that you don't take life, though it is about that principle. It's about how you
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treat other image bearers. James 3:9, James would say,
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don't curse another person who is made in the image of God.
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Leviticus 19:16, Moses says, don't go up
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and down among God's people as a gossip or as a talebearer. Learn to love
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your neighbor just like you love yourself, Leviticus 19:18. Why?
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Because every person, has value. And this principle comes
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to us from the Old Testament. People sometimes say
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you shouldn't buy a brand new car because the moment you drive it off the
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lot, it what? It depreciates in value. It's sort of a depreciating investment.
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And maybe that's true about cars. It's not true about people.
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God shows throughout the pages of Scripture that every life has value,
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even when people are elderly, Proverbs 17:5, even if they're
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physically handicapped or or have physical limitations,
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Leviticus 19:14. Even people with mental
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health issues, Psalm 34:18.
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Even if they're individuals that are poor, Proverbs 17:5.
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Even if they're individuals that don't have all the resources that we have,
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everybody all the time has all the rights and values that God
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has placed on them. And an Old Testament lesson for New Testament Christians is everybody
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we encounter on a daily basis has value, and God cares how we treat people.
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And he's going to judge us accordingly based on how we pass or fail that
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test. But quickly, here's number 3: God wants all nations to know him.
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Sometimes a person's studying the Old Testament and they say, what happened to the Gentiles
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in the Old Testament? I mean, if a person wasn't an Israelite under the Law
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of Moses, did all the Gentiles in the Old Testament just automatically
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go to hell? Were they automatically condemned in judgment? But a careful reading
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of the Old Testament sheds light on things we read in the New.
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So, when you hear Jesus say in the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19,
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Go and disciple the nations. That's not a new idea, it's an Old Testament idea.
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Yes, Israel had a unique and special relationship with God.
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God gave them the law, his commandments, his statutes, and he
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didn't give that to any other nation, Psalm 147:19-20. But God
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cared deeply about the surrounding nations throughout the world. He had standards for
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them and he had great care for them. Think about the book of Jonah.
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God tells Jonah, go to the city of Nineveh and preach the preaching I
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command you to preach, Jonah 1:2. Jonah goes there reluctantly after
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some chastisement by God. He preaches to the people of Nineveh. They repent,
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and when they repent, guess what God does in Jonah 3:10?
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God says he relents against the disaster and he forgives them. You know why?
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Because God has always loved and cared and
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desired that all nations come to know him. And anybody
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in any nation who does what's pleasing to God is acceptable with him,
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Acts 10:34-35. And you can just mark the times throughout
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the Old Testament that God is hinting at this idea. It's my desire that all
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people in all nations come around my throne. It's seen in the example of a
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person like Rahab in Joshua 2:9-11. It's seen with the Moabitess
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like Ruth being shown to be more righteous than anybody else in the time of
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the Judges when everybody else is doing exactly what they want and what's right in
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their own eyes, Ruth 1:16-17. It's seen with Naaman being more
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righteous and faithful than Gehazi. In 2 Kings chapter 5.
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God wants all nations to come and know Him. And so, as we join Him
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in the Great Commission and spreading the gospel throughout the world,
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that's not a New Testament concept, it's an Old Testament one.
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Israel had the responsibility of being a light to the nations,
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Isaiah 49:6, and they failed. But it's
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our opportunity to shine in this regard. An Old Testament principle for New Testament
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Christians is that God wants all people in every nation
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To come to know him, to submit to his will, and to come under the
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banner of salvation that's found in Jesus Christ. But quickly, here's number
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4: suffering is inevitable. The Old
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Testament goes to great pains to show us this lesson in scripture because
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it takes the most righteous man in the world and makes him go through the
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harshest suffering that anybody in the world at that time had ever experienced. I mean,
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the first chapter of Job, Job 1:1, the narrator says Job's good
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and upright, He fears God and turns away from evil. And then God himself
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doubles down on this in Job chapter 1 and verse 8, and he says,
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there's nobody else like Job in all the world, and you're familiar with how great
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and how terrible Job's suffering was. And maybe we could spend a lot of time
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talking about why that happened to Job to begin with, or maybe we could talk
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about Job's response and the things that Job said, the faith-building lessons that were
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his, or how his wife responded to the suffering. And we spent a great
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deal of time doing that, but maybe in the midst of all of that,
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It misses the point. The Old Testament is trying to teach Christians this lesson:
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suffering is inevitable and nobody gets out of this life without it.
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And the longer I live, here's what I find out: everybody in the world is
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good with this point until we start suffering. But the Bible's teaching
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us as early as the Old Testament, suffering in this world is inevitable.
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What does Jesus say in John 16:33? I've spoken
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these words to you that in me you might have peace. In the world you
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will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I've overcome
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the world. Suffering is inevitable. No matter how righteous you are,
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no matter how much you read the Bible, you're going to suffer. Now, Christian suffering
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is redemptive, meaning it doesn't have to ruin us. God can take it and make
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something glorious and good with it. But if we live in this life, we'll suffer.
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I think it's safe to say that in this auditorium, there probably isn't
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anybody here that's at least 5 years old that doesn't have some
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sort of physical scrape or scar on their body. You know why that's the case?
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Like, nobody gets out of this whole life and says— I know some people who've
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never spent a night in a hospital in their entire life. I don't know anybody
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of appreciable age that doesn't have one scar, one scab on their whole body.
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You know why? Because you can't get out of this life without scars,
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and that's true physically, but it's true spiritually as well.
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If you live in this world, suffering, it's inevitable.
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C.S. Lewis knew a great deal about suffering, and he wrote and talked about it
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a great deal, And here's what he said once. He wrote this about suffering.
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He says, I know now, Lord, why you utter no answer.
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You yourself are the answer. Sometimes we're going through hardship and difficulty,
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and we might be saying to ourselves, why me? I'm reading the Bible. I'm praying.
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I'm attending church services. I'm being as faithful as I possibly could
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be. Of all the people in the world that are going through this difficulty and
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this hardship, why is it happening to me? And a part of the reason why
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is because we're humans, and as long as you live in this world,
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Spirituality will shield you from ultimate destruction in eternity,
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but not from physical hardship and calamity because it's a part of what it
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means to be a human being. Here's number 5: prayer
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is invaluable. The Old Testament teaches that prayer is invaluable.
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Now, I'm not going to paint Old Testament saints as picture-perfect people,
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but here's what I will say: you really can't read the Old Testament without walking
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away with this principle and this point that prayer is invaluable.
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David says, evening morning and at noon will I pray and cry
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aloud, and God will hear my voice. Psalm 55:17.
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In 1 Samuel 1:9-18, Hannah poured out her heart
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in prayer to God as she was without child and wanting God to intervene,
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and eventually he did. But one of the principles you learn from
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the Old Testament is it's both silly and unrealistic to
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try to get through this life without praying to God. Jeremiah 33:3,
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God says to the people through the prophet, call on me and I will answer
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you. And show you great and mighty things which you do not know.
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This quarter in the 20s and 30s class on Sunday morning,
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Barrett and Grant are teaching the book of Psalms. I wasn't in that class,
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I'm in this one co-teaching with Neil, but I went back and watched some of
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the class from last week and Barrett was teaching and at the beginning of the
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class I remember him saying basically the older he gets the more
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he appreciates the book of Psalms. And if you read the book of Psalms,
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you know why that's the case. Because the book of Psalms not only contains David's
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prayers, but it teaches you how to pray. I had a professor one time
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talking about the book of Psalms and how the psalmist is often angry and frustrated,
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and then he praises and rejoices. And this professor said, you read the book
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of Psalms and then listen to some of our prayers. And he says, maybe the
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reason we don't often pray like that— because
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God isn't as real to us. And it's a convicting and challenging
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thing to see. We don't normally have that transparency with God, but the
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Old Testament teaches us that prayer is invaluable. It's what Paul
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means in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 when he says, pray incessantly.
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Pour out your heart to God. He's a refuge for us, Psalm 62:8.
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Where do we learn that? We learn that in the Old Testament.
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And I think you could say, if you read Genesis through Malachi, I don't know
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why this is the case. I just think it's an observation. For whatever reason,
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it seems like people in the Old Testament prayed a
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lot more than we do. As I was preparing for this lesson, I just thought
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about prayer from the New Testament perspective. We can approach God as our Father,
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Galatians 4:6. We pray directly through the name
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and person of Jesus Christ, John 14:14. The Holy
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Spirit will come alongside us and help us when we don't have the words to
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pray, Romans 8:26-27. And when you put all of that together,
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nobody in this room can say tonight, I'm praying as much as I should.
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Johnny Ramsey used to say, when we get to the end of our lives,
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I believe none— every one of us will stand before God realizing all that
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he is and all that he wanted to do for us and say nobody's ever
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gotten all that he could have from God, because nobody is praying as much as
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they could or maybe as much as we should. But here's an Old Testament
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lesson for New Testament Christians: prayer is invaluable, and it's at our
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disposal to use it to communicate with our Heavenly Father as we sojourn on
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earth. Here's number 6: God does not take disobedience lightly.
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This is an Old Testament principle for New Testament Christians.
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God never takes disobedience lightly. Nadab and Abihu
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were sons of Aaron. They were going to be these Levitical priests. Their father was
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the high priest. And you remember Leviticus 10:1-3, they offered
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up strange fire to God, which he did not command them, and God responded with
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fire of his own. And then think about Uzzah during the time of David in
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2 Samuel 6. Uzzah saw that these oxen stumbled and
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the Ark of the Covenant was about to fall. He reaches out with his hand
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to steady the Ark, violating God's hands-off policy concerning
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the Ark of the Covenant, and he's immediately struck dead.
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God teaches constantly throughout the Old Testament that He
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doesn't take disobedience lightly. And you could add to this list,
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not just Nadab and Abihu, and not just Uzzah, but Achan
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in Joshua chapter 7, Mrs. Lot in Genesis chapter 19,
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Korah, Dathan, and Abiram in Numbers chapter 16,
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the ground opened up and swallowed them and a whole generation of Israelites for
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their defiance and their disobedience. Because it's a principle that we need to appreciate.
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God doesn't take disobedience lightly. And in every one of these instances, there's one
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thing in common. God was always doing something new. At the time
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of Moses in Leviticus 10, ushering in the Mosaic dispensation
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and covenant, Nadab and Abihu do their own thing and God strikes them
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dead with fire of his own. Uzzah, Saul's no longer king, now David's the
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new king. The oxen stumbles, he touches the ark, and God allows him to die
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immediately. You can think about the New Testament, Ananias and Sapphira, Acts chapter 5,
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1 through 11. What do all of these things have in common? They have this
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one thing in common. It was always during a time of transition, and God
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was saying, this is a new regime, but I'm the same God.
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And as serious as I was about obedience back then,
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I'm equally as serious now. I think some people
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today, they sometimes will make innovations of their own, violate God's commands and
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God's Word, and respond with something along these lines: I don't see what's the big
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what. I don't see what's the big deal. Obviously you don't,
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but God does, and he's going to hold us accountable if we just
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flippantly violate his Word. Listen,
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I believe that unbiblical binding of certain people's rituals
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and customs and even strictness It's unbiblical. It's distasteful to God
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to be stricter than God is. But I think we do need to appreciate this
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principle from Scripture. The God of the Bible is a lot of things,
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but He is not casual. And I don't know if you've picked up on this,
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but in and around Christendom, there is a sort of casual aura that
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maybe we've just picked up and we think we can waltz in and out of
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God's presence and it really doesn't matter. I mean, don't take God too seriously.
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I mean, that's the God of the Old Testament. God wouldn't do anything like that
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now. Listen to Psalm 89:7, God is greatly to
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be feared in the assembly of the saints and to be held in reverence by
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all of them that are about him. God's just as serious now
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as he was then. In fact, biblically, you could make the case that it's
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more so now. In Hebrews 10:26 down through verse 31,
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the Hebrew writer says, those that disobeyed under Moses' covenant
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died without retribution under 2 or 3 witnesses. How much more will those of
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us that live under the new covenant perish if we disobey and overrun the blood
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of Christ by which we were sanctified. The Old Testament teaches
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this principle. God doesn't take disobedience lightly,
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especially in worship context. We shouldn't just be so casual. You know what?
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I'm in worship, I'm worshiping God, but I'm here on earth. God's in heaven.
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I'll just send a text in the assembly. I just let my mind drift and
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daydream. I'm not going to take God too serious. And the Old Testament shows us
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through these examples and others God's dead serious about
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submission and obedience to him. This does not mean that God's looking for reasons to
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condemn us. He's not. John 3:17 says that Christ
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came into the world not to condemn us, but that the world through him might
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be saved. But it does mean this: if we are going to be saved,
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we've got to be as serious about God as he is about us.
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Here's number 7: God is sovereign over nations and
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rulers. You might say one of the first people to find this out
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in the Bible was Pharaoh through the 10 plagues. You remember that? Exodus 12:12,
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God says, I'll pass through the land of Egypt this night, and I'll strike all
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the firstborn in the land of Egypt. Against both man and beast, and against all
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the gods of Egypt, I'll execute judgment. I am the Lord. Pharaoh learned
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in those plagues that God's sovereign over nations and rulers, and that Pharaoh, though he
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thought that he was in charge of the world because Egypt was a world empire
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at the time, he really wasn't. God was. But when you get to the book
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of Daniel, this lesson becomes emphatic. Daniel says several times throughout
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this book, Daniel 4:17, Daniel 4:25, you'll find this
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statement: God rules in the kingdoms of men. And then in Daniel 4:35,
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Daniel says God does according to His will, and nobody can say to
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God, God, what are you doing? An Old Testament principle that New Testament
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Christians need to learn is God is sovereign over nations,
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and the ruler of those nations. And when you get to the New Testament,
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it seems like the first Christians, they understood this.
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Romans 13:1-4, Paul would say something like,
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submit yourselves to rulers and obey them, and do so
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because these individuals are the ministers and the servants of God. 1 Peter
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2:13-17, Peter says, obey every
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ordinance and every law for the Lord's sake. 1 Peter 2:13-17.
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Paul converted those prison guards in Caesar's household, Philippians 4:22.
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But let me ask you a question. What kind of rulers were in the world
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in the days of early Christianity? Good or bad? Just do this or this.
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What kind? Good or bad? You say bad. Now, here's another question. What did Paul
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think about those rulers? I mean, what was Paul's opinion of Nero
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Caesar? Or better yet, what was Paul's opinion of any of the Caesars?
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You don't really know because Paul never expresses his opinion. And I
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guess Paul never says anything about his personal feelings about Nero or any
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of the Caesars because at the heart of it, it wouldn't really change his responsibility
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or his response to those leaders because as God's servant, he had
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the responsibility to obey it, to submit, and to trust.
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It was Paul who says in Acts 23:5— by the way,
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in that passage he's quoting the Old Testament, Exodus 22:28—
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you will not speak evil of the ruler of God's people.
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I don't know what you think about Donald Trump. You love him?
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You like him? Listen, here's the thing. I was just joking. I don't care what
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you think about Donald Trump. It doesn't matter whether you love him or like him,
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hate him or despise him, adore him. Here's the point. Your response
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as a Christian, a member and a citizen of God's kingdom,
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shouldn't change whether you have favor for him or disdain.
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Listen to Titus 3:2. In this context, talking about our
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relationship to rulers, that you speak evil of no man. You can't
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do it and not be God's person. Here's one of the marks of spiritual maturity,
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that we develop so much confidence in God that people that
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are around us can't really figure out if we're for or against a certain
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ruler because we act the same no matter what. Now, we may be for and
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against various things and policies, but whether or not we're for or against
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a person shouldn't be able to be determined because whether we love them like
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them, disdain them, or despise them, 1 Timothy 2:1-3 says here's your response
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no matter what. You submit and obey the laws of the land, Romans 13:1-7.
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You pray for your rulers, 1 Timothy 2:1-3.
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And you never, and I mean never, you can't say anything against
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one of God's rulers. How many times does David in the Old Testament say— they
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say, David, there's Saul, you've got him right here within your grasp. And he says,
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I will not stretch out my hand and touch the Lord's anointed. And you might
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be saying, yeah, but that was a monarchy. That was Israel, and God selected their
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kings. Every ruler that reigns over any country does
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so only by God's permission. And we say, well, that's the Old Testament.
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New Testament Christians, we need to learn this lesson.
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I was at the gym one time, and I was in Lakeland, Florida, and there
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was a guy there working out from a different country, and we were talking about
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the differences that he experienced here versus in his home country.
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Here's the thing that stood out to him. He says, I've never been around people.
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We weren't talking religion or faith. He says, in this country, I've never been
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around people. It's not like this back home that speak so openly and flippantly
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against their rulers. He says, it's a capital offense. It's criminal in the way— in
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where I'm from, the country where I sprung from. And I love free speech and
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all of that's great, but are Christians any different? Is there a distinction among us?
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There should be. And we learned this lesson in the Old
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Testament. Here's number 8, God will forgive anyone
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and anything. Old Testament principle for New Testament Christians.
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We learn about some heinous activity and highly sinful things that people
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did in the Old Testament. I think you struggle to find a person worse than
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Manasseh in the Old Testament. I mean, 2 Chronicles 33 says that he not only
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rebelled and practiced idolatry, but he made children pass through
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the fire in child sacrifice. 2 Chronicles 33 says in verse 12 and verse 13
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specifically, when God had him carried off into captivity, They put
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hooks into his nose and drug him out of the country in captivity. When Manasseh
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repented and changed and reformed his ways, God forgave
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him and brought him back to the land in safety and in peace. Why is
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that in the Bible? I think you know why it's in the Bible.
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So that we learn about Manasseh, about ourselves, and about anybody else we ever encounter.
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God can and will forgive anyone and anything. People that
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are familiar with this passage aren't surprised when they get to the New Testament and
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see God making a man like Saul of Tarsus, who was once an enemy,
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an ally. Paul says, I was a blasphemer, persecutor,
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a violent aggressor, but I obtained mercy because Christ Jesus came
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into the world to save sinners, of whom I'm chief, 1 Timothy 1:13-15.
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But here's the thing, that's not anything new. God's always been
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doing that. He'll forgive anybody of anything
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if we come to him. In fact, I think you could make the case that
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the strongest verses in the Bible on forgiveness are found
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not in the New Testament, though there are a great many there, they're in the
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Old Testament. Though your sins be as scarlet, I'll make them as white
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as snow if you're willing and obedient, Isaiah 1:19-20. As far as
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the east is from the west, that's how far God's removed our transgressions
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from us, Psalm 103:12-13. I've cast
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your sins, God says, behind my back, Isaiah 38:6. Verse 17.
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I've drowned your sins in the depths of the sea, Micah 7:18-19.
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When Jesus came to this earth, it wasn't to convince God to forgive
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us. It's because God was already determined to do so.
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This is my blood, he says, which is shed for many for the forgiveness
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of sins, Matthew 26:28. Where do you learn that? That God has
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this heart towards sinners, that he's drawn to the backslider
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and wants to woo us and win us back to himself.
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You learn it in the Old Testament. Number 9,
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God's providence is greater than our plans. You already know this
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about Joseph and his life, and at the end Joseph says,
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you meant it for evil, but God meant it for good, to save many people
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alive as it is this day. And maybe you think about providence in the story
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of Esther. Esther chapter 4 and verse 14, she and her cousin Mordecai having this
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back and forth about whether or not she should go into the king's presence.
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And Mordecai eventually says, Esther, maybe you've come to the kingdom for
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such a time as this. The providence of God is greater than our plans,
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and we learn this in the Old Testament. But here's the thing about
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providence. We sometimes talk about providence this way: something good happens in our life,
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we look back and we say, oh, now I know why I moved here.
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Oh, I get it now. Now I know why I got this job.
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Now I know why our paths crossed. And we say, and rightfully so and true,
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Oh, that was providence. That's true, but here's the part we miss.
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Providence doesn't kick in. Everything's providence. It always
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has been. From the moment you took your first breath, the providence
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of God has been working in your life, however unseen and unacknowledged,
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literally to woo you back to God himself. Everything's providence.
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We see some of it in hindsight, but our lives are filled with it.
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Listen to David in Psalm 23:6, surely goodness
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and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. David saw goodness
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and mercy literally chasing him down throughout his life. He couldn't escape it.
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He couldn't get away from it because God's providence is
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greater than our plans. We sort of— we have a phrase in American
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culture and English-speaking world when people have hardship, this too will pass.
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And what we normally mean is, look, if you could just hang in there,
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I know you're in a storm, but if you could just hang in,
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eventually this is going to turn out for your good.
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Hebrew people had a proverb. This isn't in the Bible, but Hebrew people said
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this all the time. In Hebrew it's, Gam zu litovah.
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Gam zu litovah. And it means this: this too is
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for the good. See, there's a difference between those 2 statements. This too shall
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pass. No, they're saying, listen, I don't have to rush out of my hardships and
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difficulty. I'm not necessarily glad that they're here, but they believe that
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this too was going to be for the good. It sounds a lot
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like something in the New Testament. Romans 8:28, all things work
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together for what? Where did we learn that? That's an Old Testament principle. Sometimes we
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look at our lives and we say, you know what? I would have never planned
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that my life would go this way. But here's the question: who made you the
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planner? God's not waiting for us to plan out our lives and chart it the
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way that we want to. An Old Testament lesson we learn is that God's
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providence is way better than our plans. If we could have drawn up
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our lives ourselves, we would have never planned them the way God did, and God's
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not allowing us to do so. He's the Great Architect. He's the one that's moving
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the pieces. And people like Joseph and Esther and Jacob,
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they show us this. And when you get to the New Testament, surely as Jesus
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is hanging on the cross on that Friday night, if you're a disciple and you're
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at the foot of the cross, you've got to be thinking, this is the worst
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thing in the history of the world. He's not just an innocent man. He's the
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only perfect man who's ever lived. And if you were an Israelite, if you
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were a Jewish person, and if you knew what you knew from the Old Testament,
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maybe you could stand there in hindsight 3 days later,
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stand under that same cross and say, Gam zu litovah.
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This too was ultimately for good.
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Here's the last thing tonight, number 10.
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Better days are coming. It's an Old Testament principle for
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New Testament Christians. The whole Old Testament is looking forward.
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It's looking forward to the time of Jesus coming and the time of the Messiah.
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Isaiah chapter 2:1-4 looks forward to this idea of one day There's
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a new covenant coming in, and all nations are going to press into that new
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kingdom. Old Testament saints lived with a sort of expectation
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that, hey, life is not as good as it can get. It's going to get
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better when Jesus comes. We live in that
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new covenant age that they were looking forward to. Isaiah says that the day would
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come when all nations would flow into the house of the Lord, and many people
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would go and say, come, let us go up to the house of the Lord,
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to the house of the God of Jacob, and he'll teach us his ways.
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Old Testament people sat on the edge of their seats waiting for the Messiah to
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come, and they thought, when this happens, this will literally be the best days
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of our lives. I don't know how your life's going, but if it's going good,
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I want you to be a little bit unsettled here. I want this to continue
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to be a little pebble in your shoe. This is not your forever life in
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your forever home. Better days are coming.
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If life's a little uncomfortable for you right now, or just downright bad and rocky,
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You're a Christian. And an Old Testament principle is to remember better
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days really are coming. There remains a rest for the people of God, Hebrews 4:9.
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We look for new heavens and a new earth, 2 Peter 3:13.
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Jesus says, if I go away, I will come again and receive
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you unto myself, John 14:1-6. We can get so comfortable here that we forget this
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really is not the end. It's a preface for all of God's goodness that is
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to come. And we learn this lesson of being expectant,
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looking forward to better days. We learn it in the Old Testament.
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I told you tonight I wanted us to end this lesson and not be
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Marcionites. Marcion had a problem with the Bible, and so he edited his
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copy and he just said, you know what, these are the parts I don't like,
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I'll take it out. We don't live under the Old Testament,
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but we shouldn't want to live without it. I read from a skeptic, a former
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skeptic this week, And this is what she said about the Bible. I used to
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believe that the Bible was full of contradictions and that it had been corrupted by
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men. And then I finally read it and found out it wasn't, but I
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was. And that's the heart of it all. At the end of the day,
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the problem's not with the Bible, with the Old Testament or with the New.
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The problem's with us. And as we study and read the Old Testament,
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it's written for our learning that we, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures,
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might have hope. Hope in Jesus who came and died for our sins and was
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raised for our justification, Romans 4:25. And tonight,
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if you need to lay hold on the hope that Old Testament saints longed for,
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prayed for, and expected, we'd be happy to assist you in doing so. If you
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believe Jesus is the Son of God and you're ready to turn away from sin,
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we'll baptize you into Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and all
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the Old Testament passages that we referenced about God's willingness to forgive will
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immediately and forever be true about you. If you've done that in the
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past and you need to be restored, if we can pray with you or pray
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for you, we'd be happy to do so. Chase is gonna lead us in a
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song of invitation. Come now as together we stand and as we sing.