Pleading the pattern

The good thing is I don’t have to work today on account of it being Martin Luther King Day. The bad thing is I’m spending a precious day off of work suffering through a full-blown cold that came on me Saturday night and has progressively worsened. My head and ears are plugged but mucus is making its way out, causing lots of sneezing and grabbing of tissues, not to mention all the coughing. At least I’m not tempted to eat anything fattening since my taste buds are out.

So, I’ve got a bunch of different sermon passages I’m working on, but here’s a couple for now:

When the Bible talks about ‘the end of the world’ (Psalm 19:4 and Isaiah 62:11 for the earliest references), it’s not talking about the end of the planet, as some presume.

Isaiah 45:17 says, “But Israel shall be saved in the LORD with an everlasting salvation: ye shall not be ashamed nor confounded world without end.”

Jordan explains, “If you’re going to have a world without end, how can you have the end of the world?! Look at Isaiah 23:17: ‘And it shall come to pass after the end of seventy years, that the LORD will visit Tyre, and she shall turn to her hire, and shall commit fornication with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth.’

“Let me suggest something to you. You’ve got the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth. Can you see in that verse that word ‘world’ is not talking about the planet? The planet is the earth. The world in that verse is the organization of the affairs that are going on on the planet and we use the term world that way. We talk about ‘the wide world of sports,’ or ‘the world of politics.’ You know you’re not talking about the planet; you’re talking about an order and an arrangement.

“Sometimes we’ll talk about the word ‘world’ in the sense of an era. ‘The ancient world’ kind of a thing. The problem people have with the thing about the end of the world, and the world without end, is they think when He says ‘world without end,’ He’s talking about the destruction of the planet.

"No, what he’s really talking about is this present evil world. The arrangement of things that are under the control of Satan. The way the affairs of the things that take place on the planet are organized, rather than being under the control of Satan, they’re going to be taken and placed under the control of the Lord Jesus Christ and then you have the real new world order.”

*****

Jesus says in John 15:2: “Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.”

So if the branch doesn’t bring forth good fruit, he prunes it; cuts it off. Verse 6 says, “If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. cast forward as a branch and is withered.”

Jordan explains, “That verse right there makes this a classic passage used by the Calvinists and the Armenians (they say they’re opposites but they turn out being practically the same) to say that in order to test whether you’re saved or not, the real test of your salvation is whether you bring forth fruit or not.

“Lordship salvation is one of three things. Either you have to work to get saved (you promise to make Jesus Lord of your life and turn from you sin), you have to work to stay saved (that’s the Armenian where if you don’t work you’re going to lose it) or you have to work to prove you are saved (that’s the Calvinist). If you don’t work, it means you didn’t have it to start with.

“One guy says, ‘If you want to get to heaven over there, you’ve got to work, because if you don’t work you’re not going to get there. That’s the Armenian. The Calvinist says ‘If you’re going to heaven, you’ll work, and if you don’t work it’s because you’re not going to heaven.’ What’s the difference?! Well there’s not any practical difference.

“Calvinism and Armenianism are simply philosophical syllogisms that are designed to support and prove a theological concept. In the Calvinistic system it’s ‘determinism, fatalism.’ You ever thought about how impossible it is to practically live with that kind of a thought in mind? ‘Everything that happens, God controls it. Nothing happens that God didn’t authorize.’

“So when you go out and fall in the mud, spiritually speaking, and go out and live in sin—get drunk, rob a bank go home and shoot your grandma—I mean, if God determined everything that’s going to happen, what would you say about doing that?

“They haul you down to the police station and you’re going to say what the Muslim says: ‘Will of God.’ If God determined everything that’s going to happen, and nothing happens except what He determines is going to happen, then that’s exactly what you’re saying. They just have sense enough not to say it, like a bunch of politicians—you know when you get to what they really think they don’t want to say it because they’re going to lose some votes over here. Practically speaking, you can’t live by that kind of thinking.

“What people use the passage to do is to say, ‘If you have a superficial relationship with Christ, which means that you don’t show fruit in your life, that proves that you’re not really a true believer and you’re going to perish in hell.’

“Whether you’re an Armenian or Calvinist, that’s the way they take this passage and the problem with that is manifold, but obviously right on the face of it, when somebody says, ‘You got to bring forth fruit,’ the first question you ought to ask is, ‘What fruit?’ What is the fruit I’m supposed to bring forth?

"Then they start giving you a long list of stuff: Can’t go to the movies (you guys think that’s nut but when I was raised you couldn’t go to the movies), can’t play cards and God forbid you go to a pool hall. They got their little religious rules. Can’t go into a Protestant church building. Then you need to know how much fruit you had to bear in order to prove you got some. The fruit is a visible measurable result of being in Christ, so you need to know how much is enough.

“But when you go back to the context here, it really isn’t that hard to
figure out what the fruit is. If you look down at verse 8, it says, ‘Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.
[9] As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.
[10] If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love.
[11] These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.
[12] This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.’

“If you go back to Chapter 13, Jesus Christ says, ‘A new commandment I give
unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
[35] By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.’

“The supreme fruit He’s pointing these guys toward is loving one another as He loved them. How did He love them? He loved them as the Father loved Him and He loved the Father: ‘You watch me (verse 9) and continue thee in my love. The way the Father loved me, I love you. Now you take the way I’ve loved you and go love each other. I set the pattern.’

“What the fruit is going to be is just the outworking of His life in them. That’s why He says to them in verse 5, ‘Without me ye can do nothing.’ It’s going to be the Holy Spirit writing His law in their heart and causing them.”

*****

Matthew 3 reads, 10] And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.
[11] I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:
[12] Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

Jordan says, “Isn’t that what we just read about in John 15? If you don’t bear fruit what happens? You’re cast into the fire. What’s He talking about? ‘He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost.’ That’s what happened on the day of Pentecost; that’s the inauguration of the New Covenant that Christ has been detailing to them. But He isn’t just going to baptize them with the Holy Ghost; He’s going to baptize them with fire.

“Verse 12 is a reference to the tribulation. He’s going to take Israel through that tribulation, that time of Jacob’s trouble. . . God doesn’t need a seven-year period to destroy the Gentile world powers. He doesn’t need seven years to avenge Himself against the Gentiles. What He’s doing in the 70th week of Daniel, at the time of Jacob’s trouble, is purging the nation Israel of the unbelievers so that all that’s left to go into the kingdom is the wheat and the chaff is going to be destroyed.

“God pleads in Ezekiel 20, ‘33] As I live, saith the Lord GOD, surely with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out, will I rule over you:
[34] And I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries wherein ye are scattered, with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out.
[35] And I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and there will I plead with you face to face.
[36] Like as I pleaded with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I plead with you, saith the Lord GOD.
[37] And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant:
[38] And I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me: I will bring them forth out of the country where they sojourn, and they shall not enter into the land of Israel: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.’

“Think about all the things He’s saying there in ‘the last half of the week’ when He pleads with them and feeds them. We studied how He would feed them with the manna in the wilderness. Jeremiah 31 says it’s going to be in the wilderness that they’re going to find grace. And He’s going to plead with them face to face.

“Israel’s scattered among the Gentiles, just like they are now. The fifth course of judgment will still be going on in the tribulation but He says, ‘I’m going to bring you back into the land, and into the wilderness.’ You remember Revelation 12 where He takes them out in that wilderness and it says, ‘I will cause you to pass under the rod.’ That’s the Antichrist.

“In Isaiah 10 he’s called ‘the rod of my indignation.’ What that tribulation period does is it purges out the rebels and part of that has to do with the outpouring of His wrath.

“Deuteronomy talks about it ‘as an iron furnace of fire.’ You remember the three Hebrew children who were cast into the furnace of fire by Nebby? ‘Heated it seven times hotter.’ There’s seven years in the Trib and yet God preserved them through it and when He came out the other end, the only thing that was burned was the ropes that held them, and the text says they didn’t even have the smell of smoke on them. No harm! He’ll preserve that believing remnant right through that.

“There are three times where the wrath of God is poured out. One is hell, the lake of fire. One is the Cross and one is the tribulation period.”

Editor's note: Done a lot of internet reading this weekend as a result of my illness. Here's an interesting interview if you're a Simon & Garfunkel fan like me:

http://www.esquire.com/features/what-ive-learned/meaning-of-life-2012/art-garfunkel-quotes-0112?src=rss