KENYA - Perry, Maryanne, John and Steve

BRASIL

VISAS…. VISA ENCOUNTER

please keep the outreach in prayer. ﾊ There has been a noticeable resistance toward the Gospel within the city that has arisen. ﾊ God is preparing hearts, however, to hear the truth of Christ, and I know that He is going to use all of you to impact a "Samaritan woman at the well of Sychar" and an "Ethiopian eunuch on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza". ﾊ Please encourage your church fellowship this morning to intercede on our behalf for open doors and open hearts. ﾊ Doors into 3 mens prisons and 1 womens prison have opened wide for us. ﾊ The city is allowing us to use the outdoor amphitheater for the Sunday, October 21, concert. ﾊ As for universities and bars, they are all pending--they still have not responded to us with a "yes" or "no". ﾊ We will just go wherever the Holy Spirit leads us. ﾊ It will be a Book of Acts moment.

Tomorrow NightJUDGES 6

MIKE FOCHT… TIM CHADDICK

Matthew 12:1-8“Jesus - Our Rest”

INTRODUCTIONKEY OBSERVATION: In Matthew 12 we have recorded for us a series of crucial events in the life of Jesus.

These were decisive moments in the public ministry of Jesus.

These were times and events on which the whole of His life hinges.

REMEMBER: Each of the accounts of Christ’s life (the Gospels) shed unique light on the nature of Jesus

Matthew presents Christ as King –

He was born a King…. Born of the line of David…. Sought by the magi as “king of the Jews”

He gave that great discourse known as the Sermon on the Mount, which was the manifesto of the Kingdom, the manifesto of the King.

He has demonstrated His power as King in the miracles He performed.

He sent out His apostles with authority (exousia) as from the King to do the same.

In this chapter we are going to see the religious leaders of the day coming to their final decision regarding Jesus

The decision to totally and completely REJECT Him.

Rejection - not merely in the sense of having nothing to do with him.

Rejection in the sense that they came to the conclusion that nothing less than His complete elimination would be enough.

KEY INSIGHT: Thus, in this chapter we see the first definite steps that would culminate in Jerusalem with the cries of CRUCIFY HIM!

We are going to see four distinct stages in their increasing attitude of hatred and hostility towards Jesus.

1.) In Matt 12:1-8, we see their growing suspicion as we are given the account of how the disciples plucked the ears of corn on the Sabbath day.

The Scribes and Pharisees regarded Jesus with growing suspicion because He was allowing his followers to disregard the minute details of Pharisaical and Scribal tradition concerning of the Sabbath Law.

For the Scribes/Pharisees this was the kind of thing which could not be allowed to spread unchecked.

2.) In Matt 12:9-14, we see them move from suspicion to active hostility in the account of the healing of the man with the paralyzed hand on the Sabbath day

It was not by chance that the Scribes and Pharisees were in the synagogue on that Sabbath.

Luke says they were there to watch Jesus (Lk 6:7).

From that time on Jesus would minister under the hatred and malicious eye of the religious leaders.

3.) In Matt 12:22-32, we see the enemies of Jesus deliberately and completely blinded to the identity of Jesus when they charged Jesus with healing by the power of the devil.

It was at this point that Jesus spoke to them of the sin which has no forgiveness.

From that time on NOTHING Jesus could ever do would be right in the eyes of these men.

They had so shut their eyes to God that they were completely incapable of ever seeing that Jesus was full of grace and truth.

4.) In Matt 12:14 we see that the enemies of Jesus were no longer content to watch and criticize; they were preparing to act.

Suspicion, investigation, blindness were on the way to open action as there, they openly discuss a way to put an end to this disturbing Galilaean.

CRUCIAL OBSERVATION: Over the course of these events we are going to see how Jesus met this opposition.

EXAMPLE: In the story of the healing of the man with the paralyzed hand (Matt 12:9-14) we see him deliberately defying the Scribes and Pharisees.

This particular miracle was done in a crowded synagogue.

It was not done in their absence;

It was done when they were there with the deliberate intentions to formulate a charge against him.

Far from evading the challenge, Jesus is about to meet it head on.

He met it with warning.

He makes it crystal clear where their attitude was taking them.

He warns those men that, if they persist in shutting their eyes to the truth of God

That they were by an act of their own will, on the way to shutting themselves out from the grace of God.

He met it with a series of radical claims.

He declared that He was greater than the Temple (Matt 12:6), and for them the Temple was the most sacred place in all the world.

He declares that He is Lord of the Sabbath.

He is greater than Jonah, and no preacher ever produced repentance so amazingly as Jonah did (Matt 12:41).

He is greater than Solomon, and Solomon was the consider to be the human standard for wisdom (Matt 12:42).

In verses 43-46 He met it with the statement that the gospel can do for men what the Law can never do.

Finally, He met it with a definition of who His family truly is.

(Mat 12:1-2 KJV) At that time Jesus went on the sabbath day through the corn; and his disciples were an hungred, and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. {2} But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the sabbath day.

Jesus is on His way to the synagogue.

They’re walking through the field together

And as they are going the guys taking handfuls of wheat and rubbing the wheat in their hands to get the chaff and husks off.

Then they would chew on the kernels of wheat.

KEY INSIGHT: Deuteronomy 23 gave them the right to do this .

Hunger is an essential human drive.

There are some desires that must be bridled… desires that we must die to… like sexual desire before marriage….

By contrast, hunger is to be satisfied.

That is why God, in His law, specifically made provision to satisfy hunger.

You could go through somebody’s field and if you were hungry you could take an apple off the tree or take some grain in your hand and rub it and eat the grain.

You couldn’t bring in your harvester.

But the Law did make provision for you to take what your hand could hold and eat.

So - According to the Scriptures -

These guys are not stealing….

They are not doing anything unlawful in regards to civil code or religious observance.

BUT - These guys literally jump in and say, “Your disciples are breaking the law.”

NOTE THIS: Jesus and His disciples weren’t breaking the law…

But they were breaking the traditions of the scribes.

BUT - what they were doing was flying in the face of the traditions of the day….

Man-made traditions that the Scribes and Pharisees had made more important than the Word of God.

The Sabbath was supposed to be a rest.

That’s what the word means, a reprieve or a rest.

But, in reality, the keeping of the Sabbath had become anything everything but a rest.

Here is what the LAW OF GOD says about the Sabbath in the 10 commandments -

(Exo 31:15-18 NKJV) 'Work shall be done for six days, but the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.

God said - REST on the Sabbath. Don’t work on that day.

However - The Scribes and religious leaders had much more to say about the Sabbath than the Lord

By this time the Talmud had something like like 23 pages on keeping Sabbath.

WOULD YOU NOTE WITH ME that Jesus’ disciples are not at all embarrassed to pick the grain because they’re with Him.

They KNEW how pure… how genuinely holy He was.

They KNEW His love for the Scriptures

They KNEW His love for His heavenly Father.

They also SAW His eyes all day.

They saw His love for sinners.

They saw how He treated sinners and tax gatherers and prostitutes.

As a result there was a perfect liberty on their behalf to rub the grain as they walked with Christ.

Now evidently the Pharisees are waiting there to ambush them.

By the way - I don’t know how they got close enough to Jesus to see Him walking through the fields with His disciples

Because according to their own Sabbath traditions they were supposed to be only 3000 feet from their home on the Sabbath.

But somehow here are these Pharisees, the legalists; they’re way out in the fields.

And they must have be stooping down in the grain and all of sudden come popping up and ‘Ha we caught you.’

By the way – THAT is the M.O. of the Pharisee –

The pharisee/legalist is forever trying to find the speck in the other persons eye. SIN-SNIFFERS

They are always watching your liberty in Christ

They jealous over it because they are miserable in their legalism… And they can’t stand it that you enjoy your relationship with Jesus.

And there are still those around today.

In regards to legalism and our relationship to the Sabbath

(Exo 31:15-18 NKJV) 'Work shall be done for six days, but the seventh is the Sabbath of rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. {16} 'Therefore the children of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant. {17} 'It is a sign between Me and the children of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested and was refreshed.'" {18} And when He had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.

KEY OBSERVATION: The Sabbath was a sign between God Almighty and the nation of Israel in their generations.

After studying the Scriptures it is my conclusion that the church is not Biblically commanded to observe the Sabbath.

INTERESTING: Of all the commandments the only one that is set aside in the NT is the keeping of the Sabbath.

It’s still wrong to have any other God.

It’s still wrong to worship idols.

It’s still wrong to take the Name of the Lord in Vain

It’s still wrong for children not to honor their parents.

It is still wrong to commit murder

It’s still wrong to commit adultery.

It’s still wrong to steal.

It’s still wrong to lie

It’s is still wrong to covet.

Every one of those laws is still upheld in the New Testament.

But not so the Law of the Sabbath -

(Col 2:13-17 NKJV) And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, {14} having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. {15} Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it. {16} So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, {17} which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.

(Mat 12:3-8 NKJV) But He said to them, "Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: {4} "how he entered the house of God and ate the showbread which was not lawful for him to eat, nor for those who were with him, but only for the priests?

KEY OBSERVATION: Have you never read? = Don’t you ever read the Bible?”

Of course King David was their favorite subject.

And here’s the key phrase, “When he had need and was hungry.”

KEY QUESTION: WHEN was David in need?

It was at a point in time when David was not recognized as King of Israel.

He was anointed but not recognized

Which is exactly how Jesus stands before them at this moment.

{5} "Or have you not read in the law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath, and are blameless? {6} "Yet I say to you that in this place there is One greater than the temple.

INSIGHT: Most of them had the law memorized.

Jesus reminds them of those who are serving God, the priesthood.

They’re busiest work day was the Sabbath.

They had to offer double sacrifices of certain types on the Sabbath day.

The Sabbath was the day that they worked harder than any body else.

And that was by God’s ordinance.

Jesus is in essence saying –

They don’t profane the Sabbath because their services involved with the temple - And I am saying to you that one greater than the temple is here.

And If the priests in the Temple are sanctified in their work and thus exempt from the Sabbath law

Then my disciples who serve Me (and I’m greater than the temple) are certainly not under the law in regards to satisfying human hunger.

{7} "But if you had known what this means, 'I desire mercy and not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the guiltless. {8} "For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."

THIS absolutely blew their minds… here they begin to totally reject Jesus

1.) JESUS CLAIMS to be the CREATOR of the Sabbath = DIRECT CLAIM TO DEITY

He in essence says -“I’m the one who said Ex. 20:8-10 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: 10But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God:

THIS was the key reason they wanted to see Him dead…

John 10:33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.

John 19:7 The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.

2.) HE DEFINES the Sabbath

CRUCIAL: God didn’t create man in the beginning because He wanted somebody to keep Sabbath.

He created the Sabbath to be a blessing to man.

It was simply that.

It was to bless man.

KEY INSIGHT: BY the way - the Sabbath predates Judaism.

It goes back to the Garden of Eden.

There man and God rested together.

KEY INSIGHT: The first full day of Adam’s life was the seventh day… the day God rested.

On that day man sat and fellowshipped with God

THAT was the point of it the Lord’s Sabbath.

THAT is why I do believe that the principle of the Sabbath is still to be observed

We NEED that REST – that time dedicated to drawing near to the Lord!

Your need to be refreshed in your relationship with God takes precedence over ceremony or tradition.

For you and I Jesus rose on the first day of the week

The eighth day

8 = the number of new beginnings.

We read in Acts 20 and 1 Corinthians that it was on the Lord’s Day - on Sunday that they brought their offerings.

They gathered for worship and broke bread because it was resurrection day.

It was the day that memorialized the new creation.

4.) HE IS our Sabbath

He is our rest.

Our rest is not in an ordinance or a day.

Our rest is found in the person who hung on the cross and paid for all of our sins; and is risen; and has imputed His very righteousness to us. Jesus is our rest.

Hebrews 4:9-10

There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. 10For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from

his own works, as God did from his.

COMMUNION

OFFERING