God's Glory

The difficult doctrine that we're sinners, we got through the call to faith in Christ, we recognize all the things we have in Christ, and then in chapter 11, we get to that great doxology, that great declaration, for who has known the mind of the Lord, who has made His counselor, who has given a gift to Him that He might be repaid, for from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen. It's there once we've gotten all the doctrine, once we've gotten all our beliefs correct. We try to build a church there. We commit ourselves to being members of one body so that the world can see the light of God's glory. So I want to ask church, how have we been changed as we finish the book of Romans? Are we the same as we were when we began this study? If so, that's a real shame. Because James says we're like the man who went and looked in the mirror and walked away and quickly forgot what he saw. So you see, Romans tells us who we are without Christ, what God has done for us, and now who we are in Christ, and now what the great work we're supposed to commit to now that we are in Christ. We should be changed when we look at God's Word together. So a couple questions ask, are you more thankful? Do you honor God more? Those are the particular points of sin that Paul drew out. Everyone is without excuse because we don't thank God, we don't honor God. Do we trust Christ? We look to Him and say, I know I'm not condemned because of what He did for me. And third, the real particular application of Romans. Are we more welcoming? Are we more welcoming? These are particular application points that I hope we continue to think about and pray about as a church. Well, we get to Romans 16, and this is probably the chapter that we oftentimes kind of look over quickly because we don't know how to pronounce most of the names. But as I've studied it, it's been just an enriching time of meditating upon Paul describing a church. And Paul coming to what he felt like had to be the final instruction, and before I let you go, I've gotta tell you this, I've gotta warn you. People are gonna try to divide you. 12 to 14 is all about the body being united, and he has to tell us before he lets us go, do not let wolves come in. Do not let those who are gonna teach against the gospel, against the doctrine that I've taught you. Trust that God has sent Christ, and Christ will crush him Satan under his feet. And then we end with this doxology. There are three things I think we can look at and draw, at least three things, three big pictures that we can draw from Romans 16. Three descriptions of what God's people are supposed to be like. First, God's people love one another. God's people love one another. And when you read this greeting, or when you hear me read it, You're gonna hear the greeting, the greeting, welcome them, welcome them, my beloved, my beloved, my beloved. We see a description of a church that's loved and they love one another. They're committed to one another. So we can draw from this that God's people are supposed to love one another because that's how Paul is describing the church. Then we look at the command. God's people avoid troublemakers. God's people avoid troublemakers. Sheep love other sheep, and they avoid troublemakers. And most of all, God's people glorify God. Now, the three points, to make it a little more simple for us, diversity, divisions, and doxology. Those are the three main points. Diversity, divisions, doxology. Diversity is verses 1 through 16 and 21 through 23. That's where Paul talks about all the different kinds of people that make up the church and then what they're supposed to be like. Division is that warning, do not let these folks come in, avoid them. That's verses 17 through 20. And then the doxology, the praise to God, verses 25 to 27. Now, as I read over this yet one more time in preparation, I thought, what a great opportunity for one of our new elder candidates to come up and commit themselves to the public reading of God's Word this morning with Romans 16. And I thought, that really isn't serving them well, most likely. And it is my duty to butcher these names this morning. So bear with me as we read Romans 16. The names, they're not real familiar to us, but you'll hear the continued declaration, greet them, welcome them, my beloved. Let's turn to Romans 16, again, page 1064. I commend to you our sister Phoebe. a servant of the church at Sincrea, that you may welcome her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints, and help her in whatever way she may need from you, for she has been a patron of many and of myself as well. Greet Prisca and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who rest their necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks, but all the churches of the Gentiles give thanks as well. Greet also the church in their house, Greet my beloved Eponidas, who was the first convert to Christ in Asia. Greet Mary, who has worked hard for you. Greet Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners. They are well known to the apostles, and they were in Christ before me. Greet Ampliatus, my beloved in the Lord. Greet Urbanus, our fellow worker in Christ, and my beloved Stachys, Greet Apellas, who was approved in Christ. Greet those who belong to the family of Aristobulus. Greet my kinsmen, Herodian. Greet those in the Lord who belong to the family of Narcissus. Greet those workers in the Lord, Tryphaena and Tryphosa. Greet the beloved, Persis, who has worked hard in the Lord. Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord, also his mother, who has been a mother to me as well. Greet Asencritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Petrabus, Hermas, and the brothers who are all with them. Greet Philologus, Julia, Nereus, and his sister, and Olympos, and all the saints who are with them. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ greet you. I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught. Avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. And by smooth talk and flattery, they deceive the hearts of the naive. For your obedience is known to all, so that I rejoice over you. But I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent, as to what is evil. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Timothy, my fellow worker, greets you. So do Lucius and Jason and Sosipater, my kinsmen. I, Tertius, wrote this letter, greet you in the Lord. Gaius, who was host to me and to the whole church, greets you. Erastus, the city treasurer, and our brother, Quartus, greet you. Now to him who was able to strengthen you, according to my gospel, the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but has now been disclosed through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations according to the command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ amen we pray with me Father, I pray that you would help us to see this picture of a diverse church. A diverse church united in Christ, united in their love for one another, united in their work towards one another. United because their diversity helps clarify the truth of the gospel. They're not committed to cultural things, but to Christ and Him alone. Father, I pray that you would help us to recognize and avoid the troublemakers that cause divisions. Father, I pray that we would trust you to strengthen us, to bring about the obedience of faith for your glory. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Let's first consider the diversity, the Church of Rome. This is verses 1 through 16, and 21 through 23. And we see here, greeting is the controlling word. This is a personal greeting. And it's funny, if you go back through it, there's really no order to it. Romans is a very clear ordered book, but this section really has no order. It's as if he's just trying to think of all the people he knows in the church, and he even appears to maybe forget a name or two, and his sister. But we see here a love and an affection for all these people. And we see a great diversity. So as we look at chapter 16, and we can easily kind of just skim over this, I just wanna draw just the things I hope that we see from Romans 16. First, we see Christians welcoming other Christians. The very first person we see, Phoebe, she's to be welcomed. Remember, that was the controlling word, that was the controlling command of chapter 14 and 15. Welcome one another, as Christ welcomed you, Christians welcome one another. He's saying put it in practice. We see Christians love for other Christians. Paul continues to describe them, my beloved, my beloved. We see Christians recognizing the hard work of other Christians. Paul continues to say, they work hard for you, my fellow worker. They work hard for you, my fellow worker. So Christians work. Also the diversity of the body. We'll look at this, but there's male and female. There's Jew and Gentile. There's slave and free. It's Galatians 3.28, actually played out right here before us. They're all one in Christ, even though they really have nothing else in common. all different kinds of people, by the command of the eternal will of God, as we just read in the end. All nations, all kinds of people coming to the saving faith of Christ. So greeting is this dominant word, and so I just want to think about what it means to be a welcoming, greeting, loving people. And the first thing we've got to do is get past the command in verse 16, greet one another with a holy kiss. Because obviously a key question we all have is should we all pucker up and start kissing one another when we greet? Now let's be clear, this was a greeting in their culture. And so here the command to greet one another is a command to greet one another as one would expect. And in their culture, one would greet one another with a kiss. Whereas in our culture, we usually greet one another in a handshake or a hug. I think what we can draw from this is that Paul has commanded them to greet one another in a way that the other one expected. So, if you want to insist that we're supposed to be greeting one another with a kiss, I think this is something more from the culture that Paul is talking about. And if you wanna insist on it, I'm not gonna quarrel with you about it, but I'm not gonna kiss you either. I'll greet you, I'll even give you a hug. I'm not quite sure this should be seen as making a kiss a sacred way of greeting. A little more of a serious note. We see this as great declaration of a mutual love. Paul has not been to Rome yet, but he knows so many of them by name. He knows them well enough because of their travel or what he's heard, because he knows of their obedience. He knows enough to speak to them personally. He knows their name, he knows something about them, and he says, my beloved. Verse five, eponitis. Verse eight, implantus. Verse nine, stachys. Verse 12, persus. Paul has commanded that we love one another, that love be genuine. And he's modeling love. And it's a mutual love. Remember, Paul says, I wanna come so that I can be mutually encouraging. One aspect of love that we've already mentioned is this call to welcome. In Romans 14.1, the strong are supposed to welcome the weak in faith. In 15.7, welcome one another as Christ welcomed you for the glory of God. Of all things, the church is supposed to be a community of charity, of love, of welcoming, of greeting. We've talked about what it means to be a family because a family is marked by love. And I wanna talk about something a little more specific or a little different about our welcoming and our greeting and our kindness. I wanna think about are we friends in Christ? Are we friends? I like C.S. Lewis's definition of friend. I think it really captures what it means to be disciples together. C.S. Lewis defines a friend as, or friends, as two people who walk side-by-side in the same direction. Two people who are walking side-by-side together in the same direction. So if you think about this in a different context, two young men may be friends because they love basketball. They always talk about basketball, they play basketball, they challenge one another in basketball, they help teach one another in basketball, and they watch basketball. So what they're committed to do together, side by side, is committed to a life that just loves basketball. If we translate this to Christians, it's two people who are going to walk side by side, who talk about Christ. Who challenge one another in Christ. Who have the same direction, have the same expectations, because quite frankly, friendship in a church should be the easiest thing, because friendship is defined for us. The expectations and the goals are right here, they're handed down. So friendship in the church is when we commit to walk side by side with somebody for the purpose of helping one another achieve more faithful discipleship so that Christ is more glorified. And so I ask, what kind of friendships do we have in the church? Because we can talk about being a family and there's a kind of a warm feeling about that, but being a friend is hard work. It's a commitment. It's a labor. So I ask, who are we seeking to walk with and share our lives with most? Someone recently said this statement to me and it stuck out in this, someone's presence in the church is defined by how close of friendships they have in the church. They actually said if their best friend's not at church, they're not gonna be there either. There's some truth to that. If I don't have a real commitment to the other people in the church, I'm not going to be committed to be there. Because a friend is someone we're committed to. A friend is someone who we say we're going to share our lives with. And so if you ask about a vision for being friends, let me just say what it requires. It requires shared time together. It requires a shared experience, that's your conversion, that's your walk in faith. It requires shared expectations. You have to know that when you tell a secret to a friend, they're not gonna share it with other people. There's shared expectations as to what's appropriate, inappropriate, and again, thankfully, God has given us what the clear expectations of friendship are. There's gotta be a shared goal. To be sharpened, to be more faithful. Now here's just a general rule of life. If you want good friends, you have to be a good friend. If you want good friends, you actually have to commit to the hard, difficult work of being a good friend. So why is friendship so hard to find in a church? It's because Christians so easily lose their way. It's because we're not actually committed to those who start wondering, and we pull them aside and we say, friend, you're not living up to the expectations. We're not walking together in such a way that we're committed to one another. And folks easily go off the way. The thing about this bigger picture of welcoming, how often do you take recognition of who does not welcome you? Right, so we all come to church and we're all expecting to see somebody and well, do we take notice that we have a list of the people who don't welcome us? The Bible says make sure you're welcoming. Make sure you're proactively welcoming, and I want to make sure you hear me. We are supposed to be proactively seeking to welcome one another. But I kind of want to flip this on its side because they talked about this quite a bit the last few weeks. Are you easily welcomed? Because there's two commands in Scripture. There's a command in Scripture. We're supposed to love one another, but we're also supposed to realize I should be easy to love. The call to discipleship is to be easier to love and to be more loving. So whenever we think about who we are and how people approach us, we should be saying, I want to be easy to love. Let me give you an example of somebody who's hard to love. Someone who's always complaining and is always negative. It's exhausting to bear on someone who's always negative. It's exhausting and it's contrary to everything scripture says because the church is supposed to be a place of encouraging, of building up. And so I think it's a good opportunity to say, can we do a self-reflection? Can we ask other people, am I welcoming to others? Am I easy to love? Is there something I can do to make myself more available? And I can tell you one of the key things is what kind of words do you use? Another application here. Because Paul, he walks through a number of names in a very personal way of a church he's never visited. So I want to challenge you Jefferson Park. Can we walk through the directory that contains only less than 200 names and say something about each of those numbers? Paul's never been to this church, but he can speak so personally and name people. It's a model for knowing people personally and loving them. Can we walk through the directory and know who people are and know how to pray for them? And if we were to describe each person, what would we say? There's a call to relationship. So there from the greeting, from the welcoming, we can see that it's a loving community and Paul models a greeting and a welcoming, but Paul also talks about the work of the church. He talks about the work. He calls many his fellow workers, Prisca and Aquila, verse three. They're about the work of discipleship. We know this from the book of Acts. They take Apollos aside and they help disciple that young man. They're about the work of discipleship. Verse 21, Timothy. Verse nine, Urbanus. Verse 12, Traphaena and Traphosa and Persis, they're fellow workers. He even notes the work of some. Phoebe is a servant. The word there actually deaconess. Mary who worked hard for you, verse five. We too often, our language betrays us. So let me say what the church is not. The church is not a building where you come to be entertained by a pastor. I'm not that entertaining. Shouldn't it be? You shouldn't be looking to be entertained? The church is not a building where we gather and then you just sit there and you hear something. No, notice how he describes the church in the first few verses. The church, in verse five, greet also the church in their house. What's he referring to there? The people. The church are a people who are committed to one another in love and in labor. The church is a people who love one another, serve one another, welcome one another, and work with and for one another. Now here's a basic point. Christians are called out by God to have a new life, a new purpose, and to do a new kind of work. Christian, you have been called to the most important work God has set aside on this side of Christ coming back. You all have been called and gifted to do a great and marvelous work. We're all called to be builders. Everybody in this church, everybody who's part of this church, you're called and equipped and gifted to be builders. And you're called and gifted and equipped to build up the church. Now let's just pause for a second and think of something very glorious about this. member matters. When we think about the fact that God calls every member, he gives and gifts every member. Every member is a builder up of all the other members so that we become one church. Every member matters. You matter. Your work is important. The flip side of this is if we're not working The church we're part of is gonna be defective because the church needs every member because every member matters. So thinking about the fact that Paul calls out and recognizes so much work, Christian, what is our work? Where are we investing our energy and our labor? Is it to build up the body? If we're too busy to commit to building up the body, we are simply too busy. Now, I wanna talk about this from the leadership standpoint, and I wanna confess, we don't do a very good job of facilitating opportunities for you to work. And one of the goals of our new elder candidates and elders together, Lord willing, is that we're going to commit to fixing this. to equipping the body, facilitating the body. Something that's always unhealthy in a church is that 80% of the work is done by 20% of the people, and when that 20% is burned out, we try to get 20 more percent to do it. It's an unhealthy pattern. If we all commit to the work, it's joyful. If we all commit to the work, the burden is lifted, it's healthy. And one of the ways that we can help encourage one another, identify others in their labor. This is something you all can do to help build up the church. One of the things you can do as a builder, recognize the work of other builders. Your nursery workers right now, that should not be a thankless job. They're working right now so that you can come in and listen to God's word, Lord willing, proclaimed, and the Holy Spirit changing you without distraction. Thank them. Well, when you see somebody doing something and it's building up and they're encouraging, point it out. Don't let an opportunity go past where you see somebody doing a work that's encouraging and you fail to say something. You've got to talk to others and make sure they know what they're doing that's working. Let me speak to the men particularly. I think one of the key aspects, one of the key characteristics of what makes a man a man in scripture is that he takes responsibility and does work. Men take responsibility for other things, for other people. When we take a wife, when we seek to marry a woman, what we're saying is, I'm going to take responsibility for you. When we have children, what we're saying is, I'm going to take responsibility for you. When we commit to tasks, we're saying, we're going to take responsibility for this task. Men, I want you to earnestly pray about how you are proactively seeking to take responsibility for others. One final note on work, and I want to address our church regarding the elder candidates. It's easy to think of deacons being promoted to being elders. And let me just say, it's really odd, and it should never happen again. I mean, it'd be weird if it happened again, that all the deacons become elders. It's unusual. It's not a stepping stone. And let me make it very clear, deacons becoming elders is in no way a promotion. It's actually taking a lower service. It's taking a greater and weightier and more difficult service and responsibility. It is not a promotion. If you think it's a promotion and you're seeking a promotion, please just stop because it's not going to be a promotion. Being an elder is a weighty and difficult, demanding responsibility. It's a different kind of service. It's not a promotion. Finally, let's look at the More pointed, clear points here. Paul describes a church that's diverse. As I said, there's Jews, Greeks, slave, free, men and women. There's something just amazing about how many women he mentions in this passage. He starts the greeting out by mentioning a woman. The first two people in the greeting are women. The first one's Phoebe, and we have a lot of information about her. Phoebe is actually entrusted with carrying this letter to Rome. Phoebe is described as a sister and a servant. She's a sister because she's equal in all regards with all the different blessings and benefits that every believer gets. She's a servant because she gets what a sister is supposed to be and that she's willing to commit her life to being a servant to God and his people. Prisca or Priscilla and Aquila, we know them because of Acts. They're faithful workers, they've risked their lives. This is probably the rite in Ephesus he's referring to. We can see here Paul is acknowledging how important women are to the health of a church, how important the work of women are in the church. We can even back up and look in Jesus' ministry. Jesus has a lot of women always around his ministry, and they're very dependable. They do a lot of work. I'm not sure if that's because all the disciples, they seem to be fairly independent. They're not dependable. There's always a contrast. The women are necessary. So let me say this loud and clear. Women are important for the health of a church. We see it in Genesis. It's man who needs help. So God provides a helper. The clear point is that in marriage, the man needs help. In his life, a man needs help. In a church, it's no different. Men, we need to be humble enough to say we need help. Because, quite frankly, the ministries that women are seeking to be responsible of at Jefferson Park, they're the ones we never think of because they just run smooth. Thank you, women. Now, the other thing about women in a church Our focus is too often on this one prohibition. Women cannot teach men. And there's two groups that really wanna talk about this. One, they wanna make sure women know they can't teach men, and then they wanna add to that oftentimes. Or there's a group that says women can't teach men, but let's try to find the gray area that we can figure out where they can teach men. Let's stop focusing on this one verse, and it's pretty clear women cannot teach men from 1 Timothy. But the Bible is very clear about other things than women. Women have dignity. They're equal with man, being made in the image of God. The Bible is very clear that the salvation of women is united with Christ just like a man. There's no difference. The Bible is very clear there's a duty of women. They teach other women. Women are not given the one prohibition about teaching men because they're not able to teach. They're actually commanded to teach. It is not saying there's something wrong with women that they can't teach. It's simply saying there's an order and we submit to it. Let me make sure we hear it loud and clear. Women are necessary for the health of a church. teaching one another, serving faithfully, serving dependable. And we as a church need to think about what we're doing to make sure women feel like they are properly put in place to use their gifts and to serve. I also want us to note it's not just male and female and the importance of females in the ministry. Note how international it is. Verse four, he's clearly naming Gentiles, and verse seven and 21, he refers to kinsmen. I believe this is simply saying they're Jews. Some are wealthy, some are slaves. The city treasurer is in the church, Erastus, verse 23. Prisca and Aquila, they're wealthy, they have a home big enough to host a church. And other names, according to some of the scholars, they're names that are most likely, if not definitely, slaves. The church is diverse. This is one of the beautiful things God designed so that our gospel is always purified and not cultural. The more diverse we are, the more pure our doctrine and gospel will be. Because when all these different cultures come together, we have to realize, you know, a lot of the things we pretend to adopt as gospel, it's really just our culture. Having diversity helps purify our faith. Let me say something else. A church that is less diverse than its community is defective. A church that is less diverse than its community is defective. If it is the eternal wise God's desire for all nations, all kinds of people to come to Christ, why is it that Sunday morning is the most segregated time of the year in America? It shows how defective the church is. It shows that we don't believe a gospel that's powerful enough to unite us with people who have nothing like us at all. We're supposed to desire and work towards proclaiming the gospel in such a way, welcoming in such a way, that everybody who's submitting to Christ and believing in Christ wants to be here. And again, it should challenge us. What are we communicating that makes others who are not like us feel like they can't be part of us? Do we communicate that Christians dress a certain way? Need a certain financial status? Have a certain kind of family? We can only be Christians if we're not messy. Friends, if Christians can't be messy, we're communicating that. It's false advertising. It's false advertising because we are messy. False advertising because we're not declaring what it means to be a dependent rebel. A rebel who's been saved by grace. It goes back to friendship. Are we open to new kinds of friends that are different than us? Are we trying to be friends with people who are in the same stage of life as us? Are we seeking to be friends with people who are committed to Christ and walking with him? So think about your friends. How different are they from you in financial status, in vocation, in family? How different are they? If they're not that different, you've prioritized something in your friendships that goes beyond Christ and discipleship. Now, should we have friends that are like us? That's fine. But if all your friends are just like you, It's not Christian friendship you're pursuing. So we are supposed to be a diverse church. Now let's look at this warning, and it comes at kind of just an odd time. It's actually between greetings. It's almost as Paul, you know, he's declared this great command, welcome one another, welcome one another, and now he's gonna say, but I gotta tell you, there's a warning. Before I let you go, I have to tell you a warning. I appeal to you brothers to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught. Avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. And by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive. For your obedience is known to all so that I rejoice over you. But I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. This is a challenging declaration because Well, we'll all love that call, welcome one another, even though it's gonna make us feel uncomfortable. Welcome one another. But this command, avoid those that cause divisions. Avoid other human beings that cause divisions. This is difficult. And we need to realize that he describes these contrary people, these people in very clear ways. One, they promote false teaching. Paul has given us doctrine one through 11. If anybody opposes this, if anybody says something contrary to this, they're not to be welcomed, they're to be avoided. They're selfish. They're not pursuing the glory of Christ, they're pursuing their own appetite. Now that one's a little difficult because that's getting in the motive and that's very difficult to discern. They're deceptive. They're smooth talkers, they have flattery. They're convincing. They speak with flattery, and they're convincing. Something about these people, or the kind of folk he's saying avoid, they're not submissive. They seek to teach without being teachable. They want other people to follow them, but they don't follow anyone else. They refuse to take responsibility. They're the kind of people who always wanna talk about other people's faults, never their own. They're the kind of people who are teaching so that you think about them, not Christ. Now, I find this to be very difficult. Because we hear, all right, a weaker brother, they're gonna cause quarreling. Welcome them, but don't quarrel with them. Avoid those who call divisions. I wrestle with how you know when somebody's a weaker brother who needs patience, and when someone is giving contrary doctrine, it needs to be avoided. This is a real wrestling match that we need to think about as a church, because here's the reality. Satan will attack his church. If you think we're not susceptible to having false prophets that come in and teach false doctrine, and use flattery, you're most susceptible to follow them. It happens, it's happened. We need to be aware of this. If we think we're a church that is promoting the glory of God and the grace of God, he's going to send in those to seek to distract us. So this is an important chapter for us, folks. We welcome And we avoid. And then knowing who to welcome and who to avoid is difficult because here's the thing. If we think about how to identify those who are divisive and dangerous, they don't wear name tags. Right? No one's ever had the name tag wolf. No, they come in sounding more Christian than the normal Christian. Sorry, we do have a wolf. Wasn't it? We'll move on from there. Just realized that got awkward. That's not the role they're playing. These folks, they're good salesmen. They know how to catch your ear, they know how to say the right thing, they know how to capture you. So weaker brothers, they just need patience, but the others, they need avoided. So let me just walk through, as we think about those characteristics, how to recognize them. Someone who is divisive, someone who's dangerous, they're always tribal. So someone who's divisive, what they're doing is they're always trying to gather another group of people around them because what they have to say isn't biblical. What they need in order to be heard is to say, I represent this group of people, so you need to listen to me. A divisive person is always trying to create a smaller tribe within the family of the church. That's how you know they're divisive. That's when you know to avoid them when they're seeking to cause and create a new tribe. Secondly, they seek influence. This is the whole point. They're either after power, money, or sex. Whenever somebody is pursuing a higher calling, whenever they're pursuing something, those are the three vices that typically want to put people in leadership. They want more power, more money, or sex. They're wanting influence. They want to help others think that they should be leading them. On the other side of that, they want to lead others, but they do not want to follow anyone. You know, a mark of a sheep is that they follow Christ, that they hear His Word and they follow. A mark of a sheep is that they recognize the Word of Christ. What we have to realize here is that there's gonna be people who flatter you and make you think you're hearing something that's Christ-like. And that's why one of the keys is to stay close to the herd. Stay close to the flock so that you are able to recognize and are able to be around those who are able to recognize the wrong words. Because another characteristic, they're gonna sound biblical. They're gonna lack substance, but they're gonna sound biblical. Remember back in Genesis three. When Satan tempted Adam and Eve, it was so close to being right. What Satan said, but it was wrong. The deception is going to be close to the truth. Finally, they distract from the work of Christ. They want your eyes to be on something that's going to get you revved up that does not help you get built up in Christ. They're gonna get you excited about things, but they're not things that are of Christ and to build you up. So what should we do? That's how we identify them. What should we do? Well, Paul says, be watchful. Be watchful. We don't live in a world, Satan still exists. We live in a world where Satan still exists. We don't live in a world where we're not in danger all the time. We are not free from danger. We need to make sure we're focused on the word of God and being watchful from it, which is really the second point. Be watchful and be discerning. Look at verse 19. For your obedience is known to all so that I'll rejoice over you, but I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil. If you wanna be able to know how to recognize one of these wolves, Stay close to God's word and you're able to discern what is good and what is evil. This goes back to Romans 12. Be transformed. Do not be conformed so that you can approve what is acceptable and good and perfect, the will of God. So we're watchful. We're staying close to God's word. Third, and this is what we've been singing of most of our morning worship. The God of peace. will soon crush Satan under your feet. Paul knows that Satan's gonna continue to attack, and he's wanting to assure them we already have the victory. Long for the day where there is no more division and distraction in the church. Long for the day when Christ comes and puts an end to all the false teachers. Long for the day that when Christ crushes, finally, once and for all, the head of Satan. The victory's already been won. And then finally, know that Christ is with you. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. God will not let his church go too far. God will not let his church be corrupted. God is the one who protects us and keeps us. Be watchful, stay close to God's word, be close to the flock, be discerning, long for when Christ will finally crush Satan and know that he is with us. Finally, let's look at the doxology. Now to him who was able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Christ Jesus, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages, but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all the nations according to the command of the eternal God to bring about the obedience of faith to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ. Amen. Three parts. First, God strengthens you. He's gracious. He called you, He's with you, He's not going to abandon you. He did not spare His own Son, He's not going to abandon you. He's going to be committed to you and He's going to strengthen you so that you can be obedient in the faith. Look at those last few words before verse 27. He's going to strengthen you to bring about the obedience of faith. Christian, endure the trial. Persevere. God is with you. Trust that the trial is going to have its proper outcome, and that's going to bring about a character, and a worship, and endurance, and a steadfastness. He strengthens you. He keeps you. He gives you everything you need to be obedient in the faith. Secondly, God reveals Himself to you. Everything between that declaration, He will strengthen you to bring about the obedience of faith, it shows us that God has been progressively revealing Himself throughout history. He's been making promises, and now we live on the other side of that where all those promises are fulfilled. Something that's interesting about the word mystery in the New Testament, mystery is always described as revealed, disclosed. When we talk about mystery in the New Testament, it's not a mystery we're still wondering how's it gonna play out. No, it's a mystery that we know the ending to because Christ is fulfillment of every promise. Genesis three, we could go back. He promises Adam and Eve. He tells us a child will be born of Eve. She will crush our enemy. She will crush Satan. He will crush Satan. Shall we be born of Eve? He's going to defeat death with his death. He's going to give us freedom in the cross. He's going to give us new life in his resurrection. Everything we need has been accomplished for us. So now we can look, and if you're not a Christian this morning, that's what you need to hear. You are under a curse because of your sin. You will face a righteous and just God. and your sin will cause you to be crushed by His wrath. Unless you believe in Jesus Christ, who came to take the penalty of your sin, to be crushed in your place, so that when you believe in Him, you're forgiven. When you believe in Him, you have new life. Do not leave here today without talking to somebody about what it means to believe in Jesus, so that you can have new life. Christian, we live on this side of the cross. We have all the Bible to rejoice in because we see what he's been planning and doing and that his will has always been for all of us to come to faith. Finally, God desires his own glory. That's good news. God desires his own glory. It's good news, it's not selfish on God, but it's good news because of there's nothing more glorious. God has committed himself to that which is most glorious, and he puts us on the path to enjoy that which is most glorious, and that is him. To him be glory forevermore. You've been invited to participate, to partake of, to behold that which is most glorious. Now there's so many things in this world we think are glorious. A championship, a victory, a new car, a new house, whatever that next thing is you think is going to let you really taste glory, you're only gonna want more glory. Because you're created for the greatest, most eternal, perfect glory, and it's God's. And if you believe in Christ and you pursue that glory, you will be satisfied. When you behold him, when you pursue him. So church, we're, we're caught at the top of the mountain to behold that glory. And we're going to behold that glory as we commit to being a body that's loving one another, working with one another, serving one another, pursuing His glory together as disciples. Will you pray with me? Father, we thank you for speaking, for giving us the words in the Bible, so that we can submit to them, so that we can know them, so we can know you, so we can know what to expect from you. We know what to believe and what to do. We need your strength to do them. We need your grace to understand and to commit ourselves to your work. May we all learn to be builders, to be builders up of the church, so that we all grow in maturity together. so that we all behold your glory together. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.