Night Church - 26 September 2021

[Music] dawn gotta make my mark before i'm gone i don't wanna die alone i don't wanna die alone i get mad when she go man was she home sad where she gone man was she home sadly when she gone [Music] me [Music] make it all come to life praying for a change in your life well maybe it's going to come tonight sun is setting in again three two one [Music] should have wrote them down in pain and maybe they'll come to life and maybe they'll come to life [Music] i'll go right back [Music] and maybe come to life they could finally come to life they could finally come to life [Music] you know how to find me they cannot define me so they crucify me that's the place where i leave come and purify me come and sanctify [Music] this is not about me god is still alive so [Music] i'm [Music] [Music] a loving father friend like no other you're everything [Music] [Music] like a river [Music] forever [Music] oh [Music] [Music] and i never worry when things get crazy cause i know you have a plan so my praise [Music] [Music] forever [Music] [Music] it belongs to [Music] it oh to me [Music] forever [Music] oh [Music] my everything belongs to me [Music] nobody nobody a welcome if you're a regular here at night church an extra special welcome if you are here uh if you are new or visiting for the first time yeah uh it's been a bit of a turning point this week it's felt uh a glimmer of hope or light at the end of the tunnel uh picnics galore oh boy oh boy it's been fantastic finally getting to see people it's been so long and uh i don't know it feels like 70 is very quickly approaching 80 is hot on its heels it feels like this week it's been a real week of hope uh something that stood out to me from our lockdown series though was that i had misplaced my hope because i was longing more for the end of lockdown than for jesus to return my hope was more in vaccination rates than in jesus who saves and that's a problem because the hope that we have in jesus is so much better jesus died that we might be forgiven jesus offers eternal life heaven with him for forever the hope that jesus offers is so much better and it is so much more certain than all the other hopes that we might have it's good to celebrate the end of lockdown the easing of restrictions but tonight we've gathered to fix our eyes on jesus who is our hope and we're gonna sing a song now in christ alone and the first line really helps us do that it says in christ alone my hope is found will you join us as we sing this song now [Music] in christ alone my hope is found he is my life my strength my song [Music] heights of love [Music] is [Music] in christ alone good to accomplish [Music] on him one thing here in the death of christ is [Music] is [Music] [Music] victory [Music] in victory [Music] [Music] this is [Music] ten is [Music] one of the things that i've enjoyed in lockdown is the extra time that i've had to read christian books and some of our other brothers and sisters from night church have felt the same way and they they have sent us in some videos uh sharing what they have read uh in these christian books and what they have learned hi night church this time i've been going through the book pursuit of holiness by jerry bridges while also looking at how to honor god with my finances in wednesday training pursuit of holiness really challenged me to think about holiness as an everyday thing as working at it like any other habit that i would not once a week but really disciplining myself so that i am desiring and i am spending time in god's word by myself in order to pursue holiness another takeaway is that in that pursuit that god has given us everything we need in order to pursue holiness in our everyday lives jerry bridges gives some really great examples for everyday life situations from uni students to businessmen and women to farmers to wives and mothers and fathers and two missionaries i really think this is a great read for any age so whether you've had it on your bookshelf for 20 years or you're looking for the next something in the next 20 percent off kurong sale i'd really suggest giving this a read particularly in lockdown wednesday training really gave me a good time of valuable fellowship and i really valued having input and discussing different themes each week with my group yeah it really encouraged me and gave me that sense of community even in the midst of lockdown in terms of how to honor god my finances i found it really valuable to think about how i can be honoring god in my finances even as a uni student and so i'd suggest that any uni student with a free wednesday afternoon should definitely check it out and have a great time thanks i've been reading a book by john owen called indwelling sin and god has been reminding me just how seriously i ought to take sin because of its power and its deceitfulness here's a sentence that stood out to me every act of sin is a fruit of being weary of god and that has reminded me that my sin doesn't just come out of the blue but that it's it springs from a wrong view of god and wrong feelings towards him so to be fighting my sin i need to be continually remembering just how awesome and beautiful and interesting god is it's great to hear from lauren and ben about what god has been teaching them particularly about sin that holiness is an everyday thing and not a one-off special and that sin is serious and what it tells us about our relationship with god is serious too and that's good because our sin it is serious the bible says that all of us have sinned all of us have rebelled against god we've chosen to live our own way instead of his good way and the consequence of that treason against god the bible says is death sin is serious my sin is serious and so is yours and when we get that when we understand that it helps us know and feel just how good it is that jesus died the death we deserved jesus deals with our sin and so tonight as a church we are going to take our sin seriously we are going to come to god and confess it trusting that jesus died and that his death is sufficient to deal with our sin we're going to spend 30 seconds or so confessing our sin to god on our own in the quietness of our heart naming our sin to him and then we're going to pray a prayer of confession from psalm 51 together and i'm going to bring us back to do that so will you join us as we pray to god and confess our sin let's do that now uh we are now going to continue confessing our sin and we're going to do that together as we pray through psalm 51 and the word should pop up on the bottom of the screen now and i want to invite you to join us as we pray this prayer together have mercy on me oh according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin for i know my transgressions and my sin is always before me against you you only have i sinned and done what is evil in your sight so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge surely i was sinful at birth sinful from the time and i will be clean wash me and i will be whiter than snow let me hear joy and gladness let the bones you have crushed rejoice hide your face from my sins and bless you create in me a pure heart oh god and renew a steadfast spirit within me friends 1 john 1 verse 8 to 9 tell us that if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us but if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness that's just such a wonderful truth isn't it the forgiveness that we have in jesus friends we have a few pieces of family news to let you know about now uh the first one is to say thank you to all of you who have filled out your service forms from last week it was fantastic thinking through how can we serve god gladly he has done so much for us he has loved us so immensely and it is a wonderful privilege we have to serve him if you haven't filled one of those out it is not too late there's still an opportunity for you to get in you can find a link to that in your emails and if that is too difficult if you've got thousands of emails don't worry write that on your connect card later and we will get in touch and speaking of serving we have a video about mts recruit [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] great so yes mts recruit what an exciting opportunity we have here at church uh to for everyone to consider how can we serve god with our whole lives as we consider whether or not a full-time paid ministry might be right for us that's going to be this weekend on the 1st to the 3rd of october over online format and yeah i i went to mts recruit last year and with lots of other people from night church and we had such a great time it was a really great weekend of thinking about what serving god with our whole lives means for everyone not just people in paid ministry and we'd love to see you online this year so if you're keen you haven't registered yet pop onto the simples website um on the front page you'll see an mtx recruit button click on that and you can register sai she has put together a little video he's got something really exciting coming up this week he's keen for us to be praying for him and so i'm going to pass you over to psy to let you know what's happening hi night church just wanted to update you i would love some support i've had a kind of bizarre but lovely gospel opportunity come up and that is that um in well very soon i'm going on television a bit strange um but there's a show called sbs insight and a couple of months ago they asked me to come on to speak on the topic of celibacy and so i've done all the recording and filming for the show and it's airing uh this coming tuesday at 8 30 p.m on sbs um and it was a really great opportunity to be able to get the gospel out there through a bit of a lens of celibacy and be able to i guess share the mission of jesus but but through that lens and so there are three main things i'd love you to be doing to be able to support me firstly i would love you to be forgiving of me as you can imagine there's a lot of pressure recording something on television it's much what you would expect it to be lots of cameras lots of people wandering around you and they're condensing two and a half hours of discussion which we had into 45 minutes so please be forgiving i i try to put a gospel lens on things but i might not nail it all the time and also even if i do you know say something really profound that's got a great gospel kind of lens they might just choose to edit it out um so yeah pl i'd love you to just be understanding of that would be really really helpful and on that point the second thing you can be doing is definitely praying like i said they're editing down a whole bunch of content and so pray that in the editing process that would actually be favorable to the times when i do point things towards jesus and thirdly um i'd love you to be watching it uh get along watch it on tuesday 8 30 on sbs that would be a great way to support me i should just warn you to say that it does talk through quite a lot of deep themes because we're talking a lot about sex and so sexual trauma and that kind of stuff comes up and so just be aware of that and be aware too that the format of the show means that we're all sharing our individual stories but there's not actually a lot of room for discussion between the stories and so yeah be praying and be i guess hoping that my story would beat the others not because i'm better but because my story involves jesus and jesus is better than any other story someone could have so yeah i would love you to be forgiving be praying and if you're able to watch it and maybe invite someone to watch it with you thanks heaps tonight church uh that is just such an awesome opportunity um size asked for us to pray and so we're gonna do that right now will you join me as we pray to god father we thank you for the opportunity you've provided psy to go on television and share the gospel through the lens of celibacy we ask that the good news of jesus would be broadcasted across this nation and that as all the stories are shared that your spirit would convict hearts of the truth of the gospel that they might see jesus and be saved and we pray this in his name amen if you do have time if that's something you can do be great to tune in to insight and watch that yeah be a good night the last piece of family news to let you know about is an update from raj and so we're going to pass you over to his very capable hands hi some pauls it's raj here as you can see i'm out and about today recording this video as i do so in this park around me there's all kinds of wonderful signs that life is beginning to re-emerge it's not clear of a path between exactly here and there but we can see light coming at the end of a tunnel recently in our lockdown life series one of the things we looked at was one john chapter four and that was just a wonderful time to look about the nature of love for our brothers and sisters in christ and we saw the nature of that love very much starts with the foundation of jesus he gave himself sacrificially to us that is the very definition of love and the exhortation to each one of us who love jesus is now also to love one another and as we contemplate our city and our country um starting to come out of covert it's time for us as a church to turn our mind to the issues around returning to in-person church and i just want to say once again i'm so aware that there's so many complex issues going on in our society and in our lives across our diverse church community there are no doubt a variety of views even about vaccinations there are people losing their jobs there are people struggling with mental health there are people who are struggling with isolation there are all kinds of struggles going on and i and the staff team and others we've been thinking about how is it that we can best love one another at this time and in particular how is it we can love one another as we contemplate returning to win person church and so what we want to start doing and we're going to launch this right now is to ask everyone across and paul's to participate in a survey we're very keen to hear how you're going and what you think about these issues we want to work together we want to think deeply and prayerfully about what it means to love one another at this time there's a number of people saying around the place actually that the hardest part of covet is yet to come and that is all about how our society returns to whatever normal is going to look like and i just want to encourage us now is a wonderful time for us to remember that god is sovereign over all things and the most important thing he has already accomplished by sending jesus to die and rise again from the dead nothing can change that and what we need to do now what we want to do now is to think about how we can best love one another as we return to in-person church over the next little while there's so many complexities involved not just even about how the the diversity of feelings of people but also about the restrictions and what they're going to look like there's a whole bunch of uncertainties we're trying to navigate but a really important thing we want to navigate in that is loving one another and so would you please take a moment we're going to put up a qr code and provide other links in different ways and we just want to hear from everyone across some pauls what you think about these issues because that's going to help us prayerfully think about how we can love one another as we return to in-person church and so please just take a few moments to do that and please pray for us pray for the leadership of our church as we seek to navigate these issues as best we can thank you the ministry team wants to make a wise and loving decision about when to invite you back to this building to do church with all of us exciting it's exciting stuff although we don't want to make that decision in a vacuum they want to hear from you i said please do take some time to fill out that survey it took me a minute this morning it's super quick uh we really do want to hear from you as they make that decision going forward our church now it's time for us to come to a time of prayer and reading god's word in the bible how wonderful is it that we have a god who loves to hear us pour our hearts out to him in prayer and a god who speaks to us in his word in the bible so quick go grab your bible grab your hard copy bible open it up to matthew 14 verses 1 to 12. and first charlotte is going to pray on behalf of us and then kylie is going to be reading the passage for us hi night church my name is charlotte and i have the privilege of leading us in prayer tonight please pray with me praise be to you the god and father of our lord jesus christ in your great mercy you have given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of jesus christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish spoil or fade in all these we greatly rejoice though now for a little while we may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials lord we thank you for the easing of restrictions across sydney and the freedom that the vaccine has offered us we pray for pastors across our state as they think about reopening churches with potential vaccine passport restrictions give them wisdom to know how to serve everyone with love and grace while also following your word to obey the law we continue to pray for afghanistan as life settles under the new regime we pray especially for our brothers and sisters for whom being a christian is more dangerous that they would continue to know your love for them and find rest in you we pray for aid workers that they will be able to find safe entry into the country and be able to get assistance to the people that need it most we bring before you our sister chloe wolfson one of our overseas missionaries thank you for her smooth return home to spain and for the slow start to work we praise you for how her church are now able to meet worship and pray together what a joy to see you still at work in our world despite the unusual circumstances we pray for chloe as she said as she attends a conference this week with others who are working with immigrants across europe most of whom are muslim we pray for divine connections that all who attend would be encouraged and challenged by others by learning about other ministries and how you are at work we also pray that partnerships will be formed to strengthen gospel work and the development of the ministry in rocketer lord we continue to pray that you would send more workers into the harvest there as well we give thanks for the launch of the kids club in the vicar church and that the outreach to the moroccan families in the area we pray that lots of families would be open to coming and hearing your word and that you would deepen relationships and use what is shared to call them to you we thank you for kate's arrival from ireland we pray for her transition and adaption particularly as she establishes new routines and relationships we pray for chloe as she supports her and begins to establish her team we pray for new friendships for both kate and chloe in the town and for opportunities to share life and jesus with spaniards and immigrants in rocketer finally we pray for maria who has been exploring jesus for the last year and is grappling with faith we thank you that during her grandfather's illness and passing she has been relying on you through prayer growing in her confidence in your care we pray that as she processes and grieves she would understand the depth of your love and compassion for her we pray all these things in your son's name amen hello knight church my name is john tate this bible reading comes from the gospel of saint matthew chapter 14 starting at verse 1. at that time herod the tetrarch heard the reports about jesus and he said to his attendants this is john the baptist he has risen from the dead that is why miraculous powers are at work in him now herod had arrested john and bound him and put him in prison because of herodias his brother philip's wife for john had been saying to him it is not lawful for you to have her herod wanted to kill john but he was afraid of the people because they considered john a prophet on herod's birthday the daughter of herodias danced for the guests and pleased herod so much that he promised with an oath to give her whatever she asked prompted by her mother she said give me here on a platter the head of john the baptist the king was distressed but because of his oaths and his dinner guests he ordered that her request be granted and had john beheaded in the prison his head was brought in on a platter and given to the girl who carried it to her mother john's disciples came and took his body and buried it then they went and told jesus g'day everyone my name is mike and i'm james it's great to be here it is and james i'm excited to be preaching with you today this is a real joy for me uh before we dive into matthew 14 uh tell us a little bit about life in lockdown for you brother yeah well i've been at home spending a lot of time with viv we got through another term of youth ministry well done and you know there's been a lot of joys there's been a lot of hardships and disappointments lost opportunities but i'm really thankful for what has happened with a lot of people continuing to connect well done i'm really thankful for this opportunity to get into matthew 14 with you but but how are you going mike yeah i had a pretty good week uh the rest of the family is on holiday school holiday so it's nice for them the weather bins has been good and i've been out for a few runs and i've read through all of matthew's gospel this week in preparation for today so i'm excited about that yes yes now where have we been mike over the last few years in matthew years yeah look we thought we'd take you uh down a trip of memory lane uh to all the past series uh so we've been looking at matthew for like five or so years now uh so the first series we had matthew one to four was have you seen the king do you remember this graphic james i do i do and then we did uh seek first the kingdom matthew 5 to 7 the sermon on the mount we did kingdoms collide matthew 8 to 11 and then last year we started kind of this final series death and glory uh last year just after lockdown yeah yeah in november yeah okay um so uh can you bring us up to speed particularly on this last series yes indeed you know in matthew chapter 12 we we hit a bit of a turning point in matthew's gospel jesus has an interaction with the pharisees on a sabbath day and it doesn't go particularly well from the perspective of the pharisees and in matthew chapter 12 verse 14 it says that from that point on the pharisees began to plot how they might kill jesus and so from matthew 12 all the way through to where we are right now the death of jesus the the plotting of his death looms large like a shadow over every passage every section and jesus is on his way to his death yeah right and in addition to that though not only is he's on his way to his death but he's actually on his way to his glory it's one of those crazy uh right side up things as raj might say um about jesus's death that not only is it a great moment of darkness but it's actually his moment of triumph and we're going to see that as we continue in matthew's gospel so we're in matthew 14 today and this is a horrific story i mean i can remember as a kid in a in a kid's bible illustrated i can still kind of picture the image the drawing of john the baptist's head on a platter and i remember his eyes kind of looking up as if to say what in the world just happened to me i mean this is a strange story and as we started to dig into this james we were asking questions like what in the world is this story even doing in the bible what does it teach us about jesus what's it got to do with his death and resurrection and what's it gonna do with us today yeah that's right that's right but i think one of the amazing things is well one to to be reminded that you know all scripture is good and useful and helpful in fact as we dug into this passage what we're confronted it with what we saw is that we're going to see a lot about who it is that jesus is we're going to see the nature of power and authority as jesus uses it we're going to see the place of truth in the public square and speaking truth to authority and so i think that both of us have been quite struck by what we found in this passage and we hope to share it with you and hope to encourage you with it as well so friends let's dive into the passage i hope you've got your bibles there we're going to start at verse 1 and our little heading is herod's confusion so let's set the scene verse 1. at that time herod the tetrarch heard the reports about jesus okay we need to pause there don't we now we've got a herod now there's a few herods floating around in the gospels you might remember king herod at the beginning of matthew's gospel kind of around the christmas story remember baby jesus born wise men tell herod he tries to kill jesus ends up killing all the babies boys it's a horrible story that's not this herod but it's one of his sons and he is a tetrarch which means he's not a kind of a capital king capital k king but he is a ruler of the province a a quarter of the province and he's heard about jesus he's heard reports now he's probably heard things like what we've read in matthew 1 2 13. he's probably heard about how jesus calmed the wind and the waves the storm he's probably heard that jesus healed the sick and those who were demon-possessed he's probably heard even of jesus raising the dead and he's kind of got this question who is this jesus what do i what do i do with him how do i make sense of all the reports that i've heard yeah that's right matthew goes on in verse 2 and he says that and he said to his attendants this is john the baptist he has risen from the dead that is why miraculous powers are at work in him that's weird now that's a bit yeah that's right that's that is a bit weird isn't it because we know very clearly john the baptist jesus they're very different people yeah right and and they're separate characters they're separate individuals and yet herod here hears the reports of jesus and mistakes him for john the baptist now now why would he be doing that well it turns out that herod is a leader who is feeling a bit of insecurity right herod is a leader who has had something happen and you know up until this point we we haven't known yet that john the baptist is dead this is news isn't it this is news for us that's right but it turns out that herod well his conscience is troubling him something has happened and so he hears these reports about jesus and he thinks this is john the baptist raised from the dead it's a strange thought but to try and understand why it is that he might be feeling this way why he might be thinking this we're gonna have to to to go through a bit of a flashback and see what happens rewind rewind the flashback music lovely yeah very nice that's it that's it so that brings us to point two friends herod's conundrum so john the baptist what's the deal well hopefully you know the name john the baptist hopefully you're aware of him in matthew's gospel but good for us to say just here that well he was kind of a big deal i mean if you ask someone today you know who do you think jesus is they probably wouldn't say john the baptist raised from the dead but back in that day john was a big deal i mean lots of people knew about him lots of people came to to see him to hear of him to follow him and he was kind of like the ancient near eastern influencer if you like tic tac youtube before all of that there you go but perhaps most importantly for us is to recognize that really he was the last of the great old testament prophets yes indeed and you see john the baptist wasn't afraid to speak truth to power and in fact there was something that he was saying he was saying to herod in verse 4 it is not lawful for you to have her now what's he talking about here you see in verse 3 we're told that herod had taken his brother philip's wife and her name is herodias that's kind of confusing too herod herod yeah that's right that's right similar names there but herod had done something that under jewish law he shouldn't do he should not be taking his brother's wife and so john the baptist isn't afraid to say you're doing the wrong thing you're doing what is not lawful but you see even to the roman people of the time we know from outside the bible that this caused a huge political stir as well herod taking his brother's wife ends up leading to a war and ends up leading to them eventually being exiled and taken out of power and you can read about that outside of the bible so you see what herod has done isn't right under roman culture but it's certainly not right under what god deems as lawful and john the baptist isn't afraid to say it directly to power and i mean this is a clear pattern in scripture isn't it that to speak up for the truth well it's not always going to be popular john stands in a long line of prophets who challenge the authority of his day and it cost him his life that's right that's right now you know at this stage what john is saying you know a lot of other people are saying but herod and herodias would have been very very happy to try to get rid of him there's just one problem he's an influencer all right let's he's a celebrity he's well known right the people like him yeah and so what is herod gotta do what's he meant to do he would have been very happy to to get rid of this man who is threatening his status threatening his authority speaking openly against him but he's got the people to deal with and so he's in a bit of a conundrum there so what happens well have a look at verse six herod has a birthday happy birthday herod and his stepdaughter possibly even his niece dances for him and in his lustful enthusiasm he foolishly promises this dancing daughter almost anything a blank check whatever you like whatever you ask for up to half my kingdom it's yours what would you ask for but perhaps more importantly what was he thinking i mean is he out of his mind was he rolling drunk what is the story with this terrible terrible promise now herodias is waiting in the wings and she whispers in her daughter's ear ask for john's head on a platter she asks for the unthinkable seizing the opportunity afforded to her and it is as gruesome as it is vindictive it's almost like a modern political ploy where you know there's all these people and you're trying to make a show and and so herod he ends up getting caught he's he's stuck he's caught in his words and you know as verse nine tells us he's distressed but because of his oaths and his dinner guests he orders that her request be granted you see herod needs to save face he needs to keep up an appearance he's he said something there are guests here he needs to follow through and so rather than do the right thing he has john put to death in order to save his own reputation in order to in order to save his own status he puts this man to death even without a trial and so now we know what happened to poor john the baptist and now we know why herod is so afraid and thinks that jesus might be john the baptist raised from the dead to exact revenge against herod and this awful story ends in verse 12 where john's disciples come and take the body and bury it and then kind of interestingly then they tell jesus about it hmm it's a horrible story james yeah yeah and we're perhaps still left with the questions what are these what's this story doing here what does it teach us about jesus how does it speak to us today james can you help us yeah and i think that there's a number of things that we can get from this passage you see there is a parallel that we're seeing here between john and jesus because in this passage john foreshadows jesus you see in verse 1 of the passage it says at that time which links us back to the previous chapter see the context of matthew telling us these series of events is actually the end of matthew chapter 13 and at the end of matthew chapter 13 verse 57 jesus says to them a prophet is not without honor except in his own town and in his own home see jesus is saying that prophets are without honor prophets who speak truth god's truth to the people and you see the parallel here you see john the baptist is a great prophet but jesus is the greater prophet john isn't afraid to speak truth to power regardless of what ends up happening to him jesus is the truth who speaks the truth and he's here to reveal the truth john is a prophet who is killed for telling the truth jesus is the prophet who will be killed for being the truth john is killed at the hands of a ruler who for the sake of maintaining his authority would rather please the crowd and so ends up dead jesus is the great prophet who at the hands of a ruler pontius pilate who would rather keep his authority and please the crowd ends up dying but there's also another difference because you see while herod thinks that john is a prophet who is raised from the dead jesus really is the great prophet who really was raised from the dead and so we just see so many parallels here between john and jesus and with death looming over this whole section it's just showing us how much greater of a prophet jesus is that's really helpful isn't it john foreshadows jesus i take it it's not it's not the main reason but but another reason perhaps a lesser reason why this story is here is actually to inspire us i take it john in his boldness in his courage to speak up for the truth primarily foreshadows jesus but i i take it it's also to be an encouragement to us to keep speaking up the truth john like all the old testament prophets like god's people throughout time when they've spoken up for the truth it doesn't always end well it can be really hard it can be costly and and we know that today don't we when we know that it's becoming increasingly unpopular to speak the truth to speak up for what god says is true and right and i struggle with this and most of us do and i take it john here is supposed to inspire us to do the right thing to to challenge authorities whether it's whether it's in the church religious leaders as john does earlier in matthew's gospel or political leaders like here in matthew 14 that we should speak up that we should challenge where we think the truth needs to be spoken in a world full of lies and so i take it there's an encouragement to be inspired by joining tech keep speaking up ultimately with god's power by god's spirit but to keep speaking the truth that's really helpful mike but in addition to the prophet analogy there's something else we see here because herod's a king and jesus is a king and so i mean that's where the similarities end really because there's there's a contrast here that is so clear as we look at this passage and as we compare the kingship of herod and the kingship of jesus yeah so let's uh look at one of the ways that they are contrasted now think about it king herod is a king who binds and imprisons to maintain his power whereas jesus is a king who uses his power to liberate to release to free jesus says some wonderful words he says that he comes to bring freedom to the prisoner recovery of sight to the blind set the oppressed free jesus says come to me all you who are wearied and burdened and i will give you rest rest for your soul jesus comes to bring life and life to the full that's what jesus came to do back then that's what jesus still offers us today freedom release liberty from whatever is enslaving us whatever is binding us whatever is pulling us down whether that's guilt or shame or fear or regret or loneliness or the feeling of purposeless or hopelessness or meaninglessness jesus can still release us he uses his power to release us to give us that freedom and that life that we all so desperately want you know there's lots of leaders in our world who use their power and authority to to suppress the truth to try to do away with people who are going to bring things to light if it's not helpful for them if it's not useful for their agenda if it threatens their authority you see herod is like that herod is a king who will use his power to hate the truth and suppress the truth but jesus is the king who is the truth and came to reveal it now in john chapter 14 verse 6 jesus says i am the way the truth and the life no one comes to the father except through me jesus didn't come to hide things jesus doesn't approve of us keeping things in the dark in fact he came as the truth and to bring us into the truth in fact the ultimate truth that jesus came to bring us into is to call us into the light of relationship with him to believe in him and embrace him as the truth from god yeah wonderful thirdly king herod was prepared to sacrifice someone else's life to save his own whereas king jesus sacrifices his own life in order to save owls not only that but king herod killed his enemies whereas jesus died for his enemies it's extraordinary isn't it yes yes there's a number of ways that we could seek to illustrate this and and mike and i are going to try two ways right so first one here maybe for uh some of the people here who love the the best memeable uh movie of all time shrek is that a word yeah it's like that word [Laughter] and there's a scene in shrek where where lord farquaad says to a whole bunch of knights some of you may die but that is a sacrifice i am willing to make you presented that very well yeah thank you thank you this is what lord farquaad does using his power and authority he calls on others to sacrifice for the purposes that he has jesus is different he sacrifices for the sake of others well let's try another illustration you've probably noticed this chess board here throughout the talk now uh james are you a chess player i am okay okay that's not a challenge for us to play good i'm glad i'm sure i would get beaten uh i think if i understand chess correctly that the aim of chess is to protect your king at whatever cost if i got it right james yeah or to avoid the king being cornered yeah there you go there you go so you've got all these other pieces around the chessboard and really you as the player who kind of represents the king you move and perhaps sacrifice all the players so that the king is spared but here's the great thing about king jesus jesus actually sacrifices his own life to protect all the other pieces on his team or perhaps even more profound not only just jesus sacrifice himself for his team but but even for the opposite for the enemies jesus actually lays down his life i mean this is just not the way that power and authority generally works it's a change no not at all it's not how chess works works and it's just not how the world works which is why jesus is so amazing i mean friends it really does take us to the heart of the gospel do you know the good news that jesus who is king who is lord who is god sacrifices his own life lays it down dies for people like you and me who were by nature his enemies why did jesus have to die well because our sin our rebellion us being enemies of god our creator means that we need to be punished judgment is deserved and it's death but jesus using his power willingly lays down his life for us his enemies taking the punishment we deserve so that we can be restored in our relationship to god no longer as enemies but as friends or even better than friends even as his family that we can call god our father i take it that matthew 14 just reminds us again how wonderful and how unique jesus is that he uses his power to sacrifice his own life not to save himself but to save us who were enemies so that we could be god's friends and that's profound isn't it and what we see here is that when you compare king herod and you compare king jesus jesus just shines ever more brightly there's no comparison there's no comparison at all you take all the rulers all the authorities all the human failings of authority that we've seen and we see jesus wielding his power graciously truthfully lovingly he really is an amazing king it is so wonderful to have jesus as your king in fact i would challenge you to try and imagine a better king to have over your life i just don't think there is jesus is such an amazing king and really john 14 by way of contrast is there just to remind us again to rejoice to celebrate in the fact that jesus is king to worship him uh to adore him to love him because of what he did for us friends in laying down his life for us and you know there may be a number of people who are watching here today who do not call jesus your king and you know a lot of us would like to hope that we would be like john the baptist relentless truth truth-tellers in the face of authority uh boldly standing for what is good and true and beautiful no matter what would happen to our status or our reputation but the truth is that all of us are more like herod and herodias we are more interested in suppressing the truth if it means that we don't need to change anything if we can live life our own way if we can do our own thing because the truth is that as mike was saying just a moment ago all of us try to live life our own way all of us say no to god all of us try to do things the way we want to do them but let me ask you will you stop suppressing the truth will you be someone who embraces the truth who loves the truth who who comes into the truth and knows that yes we deserve god's punishment his his eternal condemnation for what we do and what we have done but jesus our great king has given his life for you and me he has died and taken the punishment that you and i deserve and he is right now raised to life as lord and he calls us to to embrace the truth to come to him you know if you'd be interested in finding out a bit more about how to do that maybe maybe you can talk to the person who shared this video with you or maybe you can get in contact with us with a connect card and we would love to to share with you some next steps on what it might mean for you to embrace this truth just one little uh last bit of encouragement from me um for you who are a christian watching today i want to encourage you if you are finding faith difficult at the moment to keep hanging in there with jesus lockdown's been hard for us for everyone just about in so many ways and it's made life harder and i think for many it's made faith harder and so you might be really struggling at the moment through lockdown and you might even be thinking is jesus worth it perhaps life hasn't quite turned out exactly the way you'd thought as a christian and maybe you're wondering should i stick with jesus or should i just walk away turn my back i think matthew 14 is an encouragement to you and to me to keep hanging in there with jesus he is a good king in fact the best king he comes to bring release and freedom and liberty he died for you he loves you he laid down his life for you and he's worth it and so even if you're struggling hard at the moment in lockdown i really want to encourage you to just keep hanging in there with jesus as your king why don't we wrap up mike we've seen a number of things here from matthew 14 haven't we we've seen that jesus is the greater prophet he is the one who speaks the truth relentlessly and boldly he is the truth jesus is also the greater king he is the king of kings who releases and liberates jesus is the king who is the truth and came to reveal the truth and we've seen that jesus is the king who laid down his life for his enemies sacrificing his life in order to save ours praise god for that friends would you pray with me please our father in heaven we thank you for king jesus that he is the king who releases and liberates who is the truth and came to reveal truth who ultimately sacrificed his life for us his enemies to save us from death and judgment and restore us our relationship to you father we praise you for jesus we rejoice in jesus we worship him for being the kind of king we should all want and the kind of king we definitely all need and father give us boldness to continue to preach the truth in a world even where it's unpopular and we pray this in jesus name amen amen [Music] once these trees [Music] seeing walking in jerusalem [Music] us [Music] is [Music] see the king who [Music] let the [Music] him soldiers breathing [Music] takes the blood of jesus [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] could not contain [Music] me [Music] who is [Music] lift your voices to the one who is [Music] praise the lord [Music] uh how good it is for us to lift our voices to jesus seated on the throne it's fantastic absolutely we've got mike here with us uh you guys have been texting questions which we love we're going to put them to mike and he's going to help us think through a little bit more which is awesome the first question we've got tonight mike is where can we read more about herod and the war in exile ah nice i take that question is referring to uh some of the other things that james said about the impact of herod's marriage to herodias the war that it started like and so the best place to go is there's a historian by the name of josephus he was a jewish historian who wrote about the the time that the gospels occurred the antiquities of the jews and uh the jewish war so if you want to read up more about the history around biblical times that's the place to go and the fascinating thing about josephus is that he mentions characters that are mentioned in the gospels and so many of the facts just line up it's great so he talks about you know pontius pilate he talks about jesus and john the baptist and herod and the great thing about that is it just reminds us again that the bible is a historical document it's it's reliable uh it matches up with all the other evidence of history at the time so uh josephus is a cool guy to read a bit more of josephus is your man if you're listening there you go awesome the second question that we've got tonight is what right does john the baptist have to keep herod accountable to jewish law and they've kind of written here assuming he was roman not jewish but maybe i'm wrong about it can you kind of help us i think through this event yeah what right um so i take it john's right comes from the fact that he's primarily a prophet i mean we think of him as as you know perhaps primarily the baptist or something but primarily he's a prophet and yes the prophet's kind of job description was to keep the kings um uh in line to to keep them in line with god's word and ways to to rule as a king and so kind of king herod or herod here the tetrarch he was ruling as a kind of a jewish king put in place by the romans so john had every right to talk into the way that he was living and ruling yeah yeah uh now the second half of the question kind of uh or well i guess the question is if he was a roman what difference would that make you still have the right then yeah interesting i mean maybe right perhaps not the right right word yeah um but definitely you know as as as one of god's people uh speaking god's truth um i guess he had an obligation as we all do to speak the truth in love more out of love than perhaps a right that we have but we definitely do want to keep speaking god's truth into the public sphere in the public square um whether we have the the right or not the most important thing is that we have a motive to love people to put god's will and god's word and god's ways before people knowing that they that is ultimately best uh for all people yeah that's really helpful thank you mike and thank you for all your work with james this week bringing the word of god it's really helpful terrific thanks everyone uh camera angles are going to work they're wonders now and anna is going to appear to me next to me awesome camera angles didn't work that magic but anna's still a few which is wonderful how good how good um everyone a great way for us to connect um to church and people at home is through connect cards so you can find a link to connect cards on the supports website or there's going to be a qr code in a few moments on the screen connect cards are a great way to let us know that you watch the live stream there's a little box that you can tick to say yes i watch the live stream it's a great way for you to share prayer requests that you've got going on uh you can share news and encouragement you can ask any questions you have um to be answered on the podcast i'm the podcast's biggest fan and please uh ask those questions so that there's stuff for me to listen to throughout the week um and we'd especially love you to fill out the connect card if you're new or visiting so you can give us your details and that church can get in contact with you about next steps we're going to have a few moments now to fill in that connect tied [Music] [Music] is cold but you're my one [Music] you must [Music] uh hopefully you've had enough time to fill those out if you haven't we'd love for you to do that there's a team that meets together to read through them to pray for you so please do take the time to fill out one of those connect cards we have got two more videos of people who are keen to share with us what they've learned to encourage us in that and so we're going to pass over to those now g'day nurture just got a quick book review of god's big picture by von roberts this book gives an overview of the whole bible and helps you understand how the different parts fit together it does that by breaking the bible into eight sections and then traces the overarching theme of the kingdom of god through each section at the end of each section there's some kind of bible study questions so if you wanted to read it with a friend or with a group it'd be super easy to do that the book is simple but not overly simplistic and it helps you understand the bible in a way that would take a long time to work out just by yourself i wish i had read this book earlier uh other people that i think would benefit from it would be sunday school teachers and youth group leaders and just anyone who's looking to deepen their understanding of biblical theology get around it hi night church i'm haley if i haven't met you before and i've just been asked to share something that i've uh learnt from a book that i've been reading called how to talk about jesus without being that guy by sam chan i am someone who has felt the weight of evangelism and the need to share the gospel but i just feel so awkward when i have to bring it up or share my faith with people but this book has really shown me the value of not necessarily isolated and awkward conversations about the gospel but building relationships in intentional ways so that sharing your faith and inviting people to things like church um and even church events is just a natural part of your relationships with people it's been a really practical read and really challenging and it's just reshaped how i think about evangelism so that it's not so scary and it's not so daunting so i have been really challenged and encouraged by this book it's been fantastic to hear from all of you who have sent videos in thank you for sending those it's really great to hear how god has been growing people throughout lockdown and so yeah thank you for sending those through uh it's been a good night hasn't it yeah as we we've sat under god's word as we've listened to him speak one of the things that has stood out to me has been uh the difference between herod the king and jesus the king jesus the high and mighty and glorious king of all and yet he comes down to help the lowly and the needy he gives up his own life for his enemies and that is the sort of king that i want to follow yeah i was really reminded uh i like i like to think of myself as a bit of a john the baptist you know willing to be bold tell the truth even when the consequences might be harsh i think i've been reminded that i'm much more like a heron who is so concerned by people's perceptions of me that i might be willing to not speak up and i've been encouraged tonight to speak up even when it might be hard yeah that's a really tricky thing and really helpful yeah um church is gonna move on to zoom in just a minute uh tonight you guys get to choose uh who your hosts will be which is exciting oh boy we've got uh josh charles and lucas in running a room uh lauren conway and mike everett in another uh josh and carly are running one angus and ben matthews sam and sophie so many good options oh boy so many cheese what to choose uh you get to make that decision yourself though so hopefully we will see you on zoom in just a minute as we wrap up this part of the service i'm keen to read a couple of verses from romans 8. in them it says for i'm convinced that neither death nor life neither angels nor demons neither the present nor the future nor any powers neither height nor death nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of god that is in christ jesus our lord what wonderful truth um yep well night church thanks very much for joining us tonight it's so wonderful to have you on the live stream go and make disciples jesus will be with you the king of all creation set aside his crown a servant to the father's love descended from his throne above of is [Music] days of this earth [Music] god of resurrection conqueror of ruler over everything the lord of lords and king of kings is [Music] all the things [Music] heaven and earth to jesus christ [Music] [Music] every heart and tongue confess your name all names [Music] jesus [Music] [Music] forever [Music] uh [Music] [Music] there's a reason why the curse of sin is broken there's a reason why the darkness runs from light there's a reason why we stand here now forgiven [Music] are not jesus there's a reason why we sing on through the night there's a reason why our hope remains eternal is [Music] [Music] [Music] there's a reason why our hearts can be courageous there's a reason why the dead are made alive there's a reason why we share his resurrection is [Music] [Music] [Music] oh he's alive [Music] [Music] where is [Music] is [Music] is [Music] [Music] praise is king he [Music] is alive [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] he's alive [Music] you

Channel: St Paul's Anglican

Views: 338

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: yt:cc=on, church, night church, st pauls, stpaulsanglican, st pauls anglican, church service, Sydney church, carlingford, Carlo church, bible teaching, matthew sermon, Matthew, gospel, sermon on Matthew, bible sermon, church in the area

Id: 36_kq0t-8bY

Length: 91min 20sec (5480 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021