Called to Faithful Service

We are looking at a passage that I've chosen, especially for today. We're looking at Matthew 3, verses 13 to 17, and I've chosen this passage because I think John the Baptist really models what a servant leader in the church is supposed to be. There's really only one kind of leader in the church, and that is a servant leader. So we're going to be looking at John the Baptist second, but first we're going to look at Jesus. This text, like every text, is primarily about Jesus. And for our deacons to serve well, for us to follow Christ well, we must think about Jesus first. Our passage has really two parts. The first half is Jesus and John discussing, disagreeing over who should baptize who. A fascinating event where master and servant Well, they disagree as to who should be baptizing one another. And then we see the glorious baptism of Jesus when the father declares, this is my beloved son. And the Holy Spirit descends. Well, beginning with the second half. Let me read for us the passage in its entirety. Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him saying, I need be baptized by you. And do you come to me? But Jesus answered him, Let it be so now, for that it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness. Then he consented, and when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water and behold, the heavens were open to him and he saw the Spirit of God ascending like a dove and coming to rest on him and behold, A voice from heaven said, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. We're going to talk about Jesus first, because he's the person we need to be talking about the most. We need to be thinking about how we can follow him as our savior. Our passage teaches many important things about Jesus. We teach us about his identity. He is the son of God. He is the unique, only begotten son. He's anointed by the Spirit to be the Messiah. And he has come to identify the sinners. Our points this morning are going to be that Jesus came to identify with sinners. Jesus is anointed by the Spirit. Jesus is the Son of God. And lastly, we'll meditate on Jesus' call for us to be faithful servants. He identifies with sinners. He's anointed by the Spirit. He is the Son of God. First, Jesus came. to identify with sinners. Here we look at the baptism. He says, you need to baptize me, John. John says, no, you've got the order all wrong. And John was right in many ways. But Jesus said, no, let it be so now to fulfill our righteousness that I be baptized by you. How does this fulfill our righteousness? Well, the first thing we see with the baptism is it's the beginning of Jesus's public ministry. By being baptized with John, Jesus is tying his ministry as a continuation and a fulfillment of what John has been doing. It's important to remember here that John is the last Old Covenant prophet. Prophets from of old have been telling about this one Jesus who was going to come, and John gets to be the one that says, he's coming and look, there he is. There's the Lamb of God. So, Jesus being baptized by John is connecting himself as the fulfillment of all those promises by all those prophets. It's fascinating to think about the fact that John's baptism was a baptism of repentance. John was out in the desert calling Israelites to repent of their sins. It was a baptism of repentance of saying, I will no longer resist God. I will follow God. How is it that Jesus submits himself to John who is exercising a baptism of repentance. This question is important because we believe Jesus was sinless. There's nothing to repent of. Why would Jesus, who was born without sin, the only man to be born without sin, why would he need to submit himself to John's baptism of repentance? What do you think about what baptism is? Whenever we baptize new believers, when someone confesses Christ, we baptize them because they are getting a new identity. When they are immersed, it is representing the fact that their old self is dying and whenever they are brought up, it's representing the new life they have. An identity change takes place in baptism. Jesus, by being baptized in the baptism of John, I believe is identifying with sinners. He's already giving you a foreshadowing, a picture of what his life is all about, how he would end his life, identifying with sinners. You see, he's baptized as foreshadowing that he would identify with sinners. We look at the cross and we see that he was counted among the sinners. He was even counted as if a sinner. He himself, having never sinned, he perfectly obeyed the law in every way. He perfectly obeyed the Father in every way. He identifies with us as sinners so that he can be counted as a sinner. This is the most important truth we as Christians teach. This is the most important truth that we as Christians believe. That the sinless one, Jesus Christ, died in the place of sinners. He was perfectly righteous so that he could die in our place. He identifies with our sin so that God's wrath would be poured upon him. Our sins are what he was counted guilty for, but yet he had no sin. Jesus, the righteous one, takes on himself the identity of being a sinner so that he can stand in the place of sinners. All who believe in him no longer have their sins counted against them. All who believe in him are free of the guilt of sin because God has poured out his wrath on Jesus. He is just in that he has punished sin and he justifies us because the Son took the sin upon himself. See, it's this wonderful transfer. He transfers to himself our sin and he transfers to us his righteousness. He transfers to himself our wickedness and the wrath of God that was going to be poured down upon it, and he transfers to us the right to be children of God. To be declared holy and sinless. In order to truly appreciate this, we must first see that we're all sinners. We all lie. We all steal. We all put the Lord's name in vain. We deny God, we reject God, we do not live our lives always thanking God and depending upon God and trusting God. See, the very nature of sin is to declare that I am the king and he's not. We all go our own way and it is rebellious and offensive to God. That is why Jesus had to come and die for us. There is no other way. You may think you're spiritual, you may believe yourself to be a religious person, but are you going to God according to His way, Jesus Christ, or do you define how and when you worship God? Do you define the areas of life that God cannot have us stay in and then have your freedom there? Do you tell God how you should be living and how he should relate to you? For there's only one way to God, and it's through the Son, who is the way, the truth and the life. If you're not a Christian this morning, you'll never see the beauty of the cross until you see your sinfulness. We have all gone away. We all know we're sinners. We all know that we do things that hurt other people. And what you really need to realize is that you constantly are doing something, everything you do rather, as opposed to God. His wrath will be poured out upon your sin. What you must do is believe in Jesus so that his wrath is poured out on him and not yourself. Christian. Our primary temptation is to be self-righteous. If you are a believer today and you've come and you want to worship and you've confessed Christ, you can give your testimony. The greatest temptation we have is to look outside of the church and say, I'm glad I'm not like that person. That's the temptation that always comes to us. We must resist the temptation to be like that Pharisee. The self-righteous hypocrisy that says, I'm glad I'm not like them. I'm better than they are. No, we must long to be like the tax collector who says, Lord, I am a sinner. Forgive me. We never stop depending upon God for his grace. We never stop depending upon Christ and his righteousness. We must repent of believing we have earned the right to be with God. We must repent of believing that we deserve grace any more than anyone else. We must be like the resolution of Jonathan Edwards. That's New Year's Day. We'll think of a resolution. He said whenever he looked at a sinner, he would always guard his heart from saying, look at that sinner. And he would rather say, I am as vile as he and as dependent upon God's grace for my sin. Jesus came to identify with sinners so that he could die for sinners. The second thing we see here is that we have not only a baptism takes place after the baptism, the heavens open. Look at verse 16. And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water and behold, the heavens were open to him and he saw the Spirit of God ascending like a dove and coming to rest on him. First, the heavens open. This one is from the heavens. He has descended down to us to be like us in every way, but without sin. to walk among us. He's truly Emmanuel. The heavens open and the Spirit descends. Now, this is very important because, as I've already tried to explain, Jesus is connecting himself to the old covenant prophets and all the old covenant promises that one was going to come who would destroy sin and death. And the most important mark of that Savior is that he would be the anointed Messiah. Here, the Spirit descending gives evidence, visible, and now here we're reading about it, that Jesus Christ is Messiah. The Spirit has descended upon Him. The Spirit foretold in Isaiah 11. See, just as the Spirit was in the womb of Mary conceiving that human nature for the Son of God, protecting that human nature from all sin, now the Spirit has descended to begin the ministry of the Messiah, to strengthen His weak, human nature. Let's finish the scene before we think about the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all together. Verse 17, and behold, notice how Matthew is drawing our attention to these great events. Behold, the Spirit comes down. Now behold, a voice from heaven said, this is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. Jesus is the Son who was sent to please the Father. We thought about this last week with Galatians 4. Jesus is the Son of God. This is a key truth to understanding how all of Scripture fits together and a key truth to understanding who God is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. There's two different ways that Jesus is a Son. First, he's the Son of Eve. And the second, he's the Son of the Father, Almighty God. As we trace through Genesis, we kept tracing this son of Eve. After we had sinned, in the middle of the curse, God promised in Genesis 3.15 that a son would be born to a woman who would reverse the curse, who would conquer sin and death. And we kept tracing that line. Who was this child going to be? Who was this son of Eve who would finally conquer our greatest enemy? In Psalm 2, two weeks ago, we saw that God Himself would declare that He is my Son. So we see that the Son of Eve was going to be also the Son of God. And this is further clarified in 2 Samuel 7. See, Jesus is the Son of God. This is extremely important. Jesus is the Son of God. This is where we get the doctrine of the Trinity. The most distinctive doctrine for Christians, the most important doctrine for Christians, and oftentimes the most difficult. The doctrine of Trinity is difficult. It's difficult because it reveals a God who's way beyond our comprehension. God is bigger than our finite minds can imagine. God is bigger than our ability to reason and think. And that's why it is difficult, because God reveals Himself to us and our mind cannot comprehend how great He is. He is the Son of God, the Son of the Father. You see, we articulate the doctrine of the Trinity as one nature, three persons. We say there's one nature because there can only be one God. There is only one God. There's one nature because if there's more than one nature, then you've got three gods. There's three natures. There's three deities. Ultimately, you have to have one nature because the will of God is in the nature. There's one will, there's one end, there's one purpose. There are three persons because, well, the three are confessed next to each other. So we see a father, the father here speaks to the son. The father is God, the son is God, but the father is not the son. The father is God, the son is God, but the father is not the son. It's very important because this is the beginning building blocks of the doctrine of the Trinity. You see the two right there side by side, they're not the same person, they're distinct, they're right next to each other and their identities are dependent upon one another. See, my identity as a father is dependent upon having a daughter. I'm not a father if I don't have a daughter. The father has to have a son to be the father. Their relationship is interdependent. The reason we believe all three of these are God is because they all claim to be God, they're all revealed as God, and most importantly, they all three do only what God can do. Create, save sinners and reveal God. Only God can create ex nihilo. Only God can save sinners and only God can reveal God and the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit all do these works. Let's focus in on what our passage is revealing about this Trinity. Jesus is the Son of God, the unique, only begotten God who came down to save sinners. What's amazing here is that there's one will in God, but there's three who work in unison But yet with distinctive operations. You see, the father is declaring that this is my son, the spirit is ascending upon that son and the son is going to go die for us. All three persons are operating inseparably for us. That's the beauty of the treaty. That's why it's so important. Jesus Christ had to be God in order to truly take away our sins. He has to be the Son of the Father to be perfectly obedient in a way that we never were. The beauty of the Trinity is that all three persons are committed to our salvation. That is a glorious, powerful salvation that cannot be shaken. All three persons are committed together. The Father calls us and sends the Son to die for us. And the Spirit converts our hearts. The Father raises up the Son, the Son ascends to the right hand of the Father, and the Spirit comes down to seal us. Over and over again, Scripture talks about how all three have different operations, but they're all focused on one thing, and it's our salvation. We can only respond by declaring how great is our God who saves us and how sure is our salvation. Have you thought about Jesus? He died for sinners. He is the Son of God, anointed by the Spirit. Let's focus on how we can respond to him. Jesus calls us to be faithful servants. Jesus calls us to be faithful servants. Here we're going to go back and look at this dialogue that takes place in verses 13 through 15. Jesus comes from Galilee. He comes to John and he says, I need you to baptize me. And John rightly says, how can I baptize you? You're the master, I am the servant. I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me? And Jesus answers, let it be so now. See, John is the last old covenant prophet. He gets to precede Jesus. He gets to point to him. He gets to say, that's the one. In John 2, he declares, that is the Lamb of God. There he is, behold. See, it begins with a fascinating disagreement because John knows he's unworthy of the task. As a servant of God, this is a great characteristic of a servant of God. He knows he's unworthy of the task he's called to. He knows he's inadequate. He's too sinful. He's not holy enough to baptize the Holy One. And so he refuses. And notice that Jesus doesn't disagree that he is unworthy. He just says, let it be so now. Do your work, be faithful. You don't have to be holy. I'm holy. Just be faithful. It's a fascinating disagreement. God ordained that John the Baptist would baptize him, and when Jesus declares with all authority that he will, John is faithful. He doesn't have to have the right credentials. He just simply has to be obedient to God. What we see here is a model of a proper perspective for a Christian. John has the proper perspective. See, as sinners, we constantly use perspective as to what our role is and what our position is. We constantly think we deserve more than we have. That's the sinful heart that's never rested. That's a sinful, restless heart that's always thinking, if only I had this more. I deserve more of this. What do you believe you deserve? Is it respect? Recognition? Reward? More responsibility? Let me ask you another. What do you covet for other people's lives? What do you long for and never have enough of? Is it money, titles, friends, or praises? Simply, we believe God owes us something we don't have. We're constantly tempted to believe that God owes us something. We deserve better. There's no humility there. We are naturally not humble. We are naturally prideful. We are naturally opposed to God and always thinking He's not doing His job. If He would just let me have the keys to the kingdom, I could do it better. So there's two things we need. The first is a proper view of God. He is the Almighty Father who gives every good gift from above. He is wise. He is perfect. He is good. He gives us what we need. He gives us what is good for us. He gives us what is good for the church. He gives us what is good for the kingdom. He gives us what is good for His glory. He is good and He gives us everything we need. He doesn't keep anything back from His children. If we ask for bread, He doesn't give us a stone. He gives us What is good? We must always remind ourselves of the goodness of God. So we must have a proper perspective of who God is. We also need a proper perspective of our position. We need to discipline humility. We need to always come under God and recognize His authority. We always need to place ourselves in submission to Him. It doesn't come naturally. It must be intentional. You see, two great theologians define humility very similarly. William Law, a major influence on William Wilberforce, who you probably know better, said this. Humility is nothing else but a right judgment of ourselves. You know this figure more, Charles Spurgeon. Humility is to make a right estimate of yourself. See, as sinners, we're prone to puff ourselves up and think more of us, more of ourselves than we really should. We think we're more, we think we're more deserving. We think we are worthy of more. Because what we need to do is have a right judgment of ourselves and a right judgment of God that He gives us what we can handle. We need to study God's Word so that our minds are disciplined. See, in this text, we see John the Baptist, and I'm thankful he's a positive model. He's not longing for more authority. He's not longing for more responsibility. He's not looking for more. He's actually afraid of more. He has humility. He has a proper perspective of who he is in God's plan. He recognizes his loyal position. He did not compete over territory. Some of my favorite phrases in Scripture come from John the Baptist. I am not worthy to carry his sandals. In other words, Mark says, I am not worthy to untie his sandals. He must increase, I must decrease. These are great declarations that put us in a proper perspective. Here, he has a proper perspective. He is not worthy of baptizing Jesus, but God has called him to it. And he is called to be faithful. The first step in getting that proper perspective is to realize what we really deserve. Again, what do you think you deserve? If your first answer is not wrath, then you've got a wrong perspective. If when I ask, what do you deserve, and the first answer in your mind is not, I deserve the wrath of God, you don't have the right perspective. You don't have a thankful, humble perspective. I'm so thankful for many brothers who when I ask them, how are you doing? They say, better than I deserve. It's a good practice because it reminds me, yes, I don't have it. I don't have what I deserve. I'm doing better than I deserve. It's a good practice to say because you're reminding yourself and your brothers and sisters when they ask you how you're doing. Friends, if we think we deserve anything beyond the wrath of God, we will never have the right perspective to love God, to know God and to serve him. The entire nature of sin is to make ourselves the king. We think we all deserve to be kings and queens. Our perspective is to repent of this, to stop parading around as if we are free and can do whatever we want, however we want, and believe in the God who saves us. We have received what we do not deserve if we're Christians. We have received what we do not deserve, and that is the love of God. We have to always remember there's nothing lovely about us. There is no reason that God looked at us and said, I have to have them, they're so lovely, I will go and die for them. No, he looks at us and he sees our sin and he sees the disgust. Yes, he sees that we're made in his image and he had already planned to come and die for us. But when he looks at us, there's nothing lovely about us. He doesn't fall in love with us. He loves us because he loves us. He loves us because he chooses to set his affection on filthy sinners. Praise God, we do not get what we deserve. Praise God, we get so much more than we deserve. The fear that we can take that For granted. Always thinking we deserve the love of God, we have earned this, the longer we exist, the longer we confess faith, the longer, the more temptation we have to become that self-righteous Christian. We are sinners saved by grace and then amazingly incorporated into the plan of God. Again, I'm just taken back by John the Baptist. I'm taken back by him because he's refusing an honor. He's actually going to argue with his master because he doesn't believe he's worthy of it. What perspective? You see, it's not our positions that make us more able to serve. It's not our gifts that make us more able to serve. It's our faithfulness. We must never think that we deserve A position, a bigger role or a bigger opportunity. We must always recognize it is by God's gift and His grace that He ever uses us at all. It's not our position that allows us to glorify God, it's our faithfulness. It's not how gifted we are, it's how committed we are to using our gifts for God's glory. The homebound member who can't get out of bed. They can glorify God more than I, who can stand up here and preach. Because they can sit in their bed and pray unceasingly, having their heart fully committed to God, completely desiring Him. That is what glorifies God. It's not a matter of what we can do or what our gifts are or how much we serve. It's a matter of where our faithfulness is. It's a matter of where our love is. It's a matter of what we desire. See, it's about the glory of God. Not what we can do to get the praise of man. As Christians, we must all commit to serving the king faithfully in whatever way he calls us. We don't have a resume to have a job description. I do this, I don't do this, I do this, I don't do this. Now, when God calls us, we do whatever he asks. For those who are ambitious in the plan of God, hear the challenge from Augustine. Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plant a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility. How can you lay that foundation of humility? How can you lay down that proper perspective of who you are and who God is? Well, as we looked last week at the incarnation, I would start there. In order to be a monk, with Athanasius. Athanasius started his own monastery. The first thing he had to do was meditate on the Incarnation for seven years. The Incarnation is mysterious. The Incarnation, as Sean argued, is the greatest miracle. It blows your mind as to how God can become man. The Creator becomes the creature. If you want to pursue humility, which means you're pursuing thankfulness to God, Meditate on the Incarnation. Let Christ's humility humble you. The second way, Hal, is really to follow the model of John the Baptist. There's a painting of Christ's crucifixion by Grunewald. It's one of my favorite paintings because on the side, John the Baptist is doing this. I typically like words better than pictures, but this picture just says it all. He's pointing to Christ. He's pointing to the crucified Savior. He's pointing to the Lamb of God. That's what his whole life was. You can summarize his life by just doing this. Does this summarize our lives? Is this what we're primarily motivated by? To point to Christ. Lastly, the most humble thing we can do is pray. Because when we pray, what we're saying is, God, it's in your hands, not mine. I'm a doer. I want to get out there and get my hands dirty. I want to see fruit. I want to be involved. I want to try to be in control. It's a simple temptation, I think, of all of us. When I truly need, when I truly want to trust God, I know I need to go pray because I'm putting it in His Mighty hands. You see, when we pray, we're saying, God, it's not what I can do. It's what you can do. We're training our hearts and our minds to say you're the good God who's going to do it in your good time. It's not. It's not me. Let me be faithful when I need to say or do something, but ultimately we're laying down before God and saying we are dependent upon you. As we look to our next group of deacons, calling them deacons is somewhat difficult because they're really going to be co-laborers in the gospel. Sean has already been one, Brian and Chris. There's a unity there, and I appreciate how God has gifted and granted each one specific gifts and talents. We're co-laborers in the gospel. As we conclude, we're going to be praying for them as we ordain them. But we need to be praying for them. Pray for these men. Pray for their wives. Pray for their walk. Pray they'll be protected from sin. Pray that we'll be unified and faithful. You need to be praying for us because you should have stopped trusting in us to do everything right. Pray that God would use us to do His will. We need your prayer. And deacons, co-laborers, this is what you must be committed to. First and foremost, keep me accountable to that. I've already said my temptation is to get out and do it rather than to get on my knees. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, we thank you. We thank you for your love that is so evident in the fact that you have sent your son. You have loved us who are unlovely, and You have loved us in the greatest way. You have sent Your Son to die for us. We thank You that You have given us Your Spirit so that we are not alone, but we are kept by His power. We are sealed by the Spirit. Continue, Lord, to use Your Spirit to work not only in the leadership of the church, but in every member. Unite us so that our hearts are sewn together for the sole purpose of glorifying You and loving You. Help us, Lord, to proclaim the Gospel to one another faithfully. Help us, Lord, to proclaim the Gospel to the world faithfully. We praise You, our great God. Lead us. Lead us in the battle against sin. Lead us. to the victory that we can only have in Christ. In your holy name we pray. Amen.