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“Peace and assurance come from a personal knowledge of the God who rules the times and the seasons. Church: if we have an inordinate desire to know how everything is going to fit together in what the bible is not clear about, then we need to come back to a knowledge of our personal Saviour. Because it is trust in Him that will give us the peace and hope and joy of the Christian life. Not that its wrong to nerd out a little bit and figure out what this might mean — but what will ultimately give us peace is the God of peace.”
“May we all join with Paul his prayer in Colossians 1:29: ‘For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.’… And so church: May we each be equipped to walk in such a way that we would be considered worthy of the kingdom of God. May we each desire to experience the presence of the Lord and the glory of his might. May we be strengthened for steadfastness with the knowledge that God’s enemies will be afflicted with eternal destruction, away from all that is God’s goodness. May God make you worthy of his calling and fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power, so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.”
“Jesus was brought before the greatest legal system the world had known. Between the Greeks and then the Romans, judicial propriety and order of law and the elevation of courts and trials and legal process - all of it - had reached a zenith in Jesus day. Church we are to see that the Jewish Sanhedrin was a kangaroo court; totally unjust, and corrupt; they had already decided to kill Jesus before they began. But, but, in being handed over to the Romans, Jesus was tried by a people that perfected the legal system!
And I know at this point you’re all like ‘stop talking Leighton - You’re talking crazy. Jesus was crucified as an innocent man - they knew nothing of justice.’ And you're right. Except I haven’t used the word justice yet regarding the Romans - I’ve only said they perfected the legal system. So what am I saying…In being handed over to the Romans, a people that refined the legal trial — the life, words and actions of Jesus of Nazareth were put on trial and found to be spotless. Jesus Christ was pronounced Innocent by both the presiding governor Pontious Pilate and the local king Herod Antipas. Can you see, that in ever so brief a moment, humanity’s highest court tried Jesus and found him guilt free, innocent, pure…Now what they did with that verdict is terrible, unjust, indefensible.”
“Silence is power….Jesus stood before the leaders of his race, and owed them nothing, he held their destiny, they did not hold his, and he would not answer to their deceit. The high priest was running out of ideas, so in Matthew’s version of these events, he tells us that his last ditch effort was to invoke the name of the Lord.
And Jesus finally speaks, not because this wicked man cornered him into doing it, but in submission and reverence to God the Father. And of course his response is shocking….Now ‘I am’ would have been enough to convict, only God can say he is ‘I am’ or ‘Yahweh, The I am who I am,’ but here, Jesus unashamedly pronounces it as his name…Jesus is silent, and silent, and silent but when he finally speaks, he basically tells them, ‘You may judge me now, but I am God and will judge all mankind someday soon.’ And they all just go nuts.”
“That God calls here is in the present tense, stressing that God does not merely call Christians once and then leave them on their own. Instead He continues to call the followers of Christ to salvation. But it is important to note that the life of faith is not a striving for more. Rather, it is living more fully in what has already been given, knowing that even efforts to live more appropriately as saints depend upon God who sanctifies. The morality of the Bible is always ‘be who you are’, as we are called to daily work out the reality of our salvation.”
“There is no biblical evidence at all for the cessation of prophecy. A fact that has not gone unnoticed by modern biblical scholars. Instead of a biblical basis, many today base their beliefs about modern prophesy on the problematic history of prophesy — its abuse — and arrive at a sort of practical cessationism. Let me remind you, and remind myself this morning, that we are to believe what the Bible says, and not what we think it says. When we look at the NT scriptures and say ‘that is not for today’, we play a very dangerous game…We should recognize that prophesy has always been problematic from the very beginning. Later it was a massive issue in the church or Corinth, but even here in the earliest of Paul’s letters, there is evidence that false prophecy was already taking place in the church. And the apostolic instruction is not some practical application of human wisdom, but a consistent divine command of not to forbid or despise prophesy…”
“Now, let me begin by giving praise to God, that his expressed will, the moral requirements to which he calls his people, is as wonderful as rejoicing, thanksgiving, and intimate communication, trusting in the goodness of God towards us in both plan and action. These are commands which reflect the amazing position of grace in which God has placed us through the finished work of Christ Jesus. It is like if someone rich and powerful gave you a credit card with no limit, on the one condition that you enjoy yourself and call on them if you run into any trouble. And that extreme example doesn’t even begin to compare to the joyous position we have in Christ. What God commands is always aligned with your greatest joy and fulfillment, and all of what God forbids is of letting ourselves be sidetracked by seeking contentment in lesser joys.”
“Finally, Gethsemane proves, it proves — that Christ crucified is the only way to God. Christian, it does not get any clearer than this: When Jesus prayed: ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.’ (Mark 14:36) Jesus asked The One, of whom all things are possible, if there was any other way to unite sinners back to God other than through the cross, and we see that God answered him: ‘No, this is the only way.’ Therefore we can be sure, Jesus is the way the truth and the life no one can come to the Father except through him (John 14:6). So, it is only by the blood of Jesus that the utterly impossible can happen - that unholy man can stand in the presence of all holy God and remain.”
“If God himself sets the example for our behavior, it is also God’s mercy towards us that motivates and empowers our reciprocation. In the cross of Christ, God carried out the greatest act of mercy towards the undeserving, and at the same time executed severe and uncompromising justice upon the sins of humanity. Now you might ask: How can I reciprocate the mercy of God? Which is a good question, since Christ will never be in need of your kindness, gentleness, patience, and especially not your mercy. But Jesus regularly directly linked the treatment of his body, the church, with the way that we are treating him : ‘...as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ (Matthew 25:40)
The way we treat the image bearers of Christ — no matter how poorly they reflect that image at times — is literally how we are treating the one who gave his life for us.”
