Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Good morning. 11:15.
[00:00:07] Good morning. Good morning. My name is Michael Feueling. I'm the lead pastor at the village church. If you have a Bible, would you open up your Bibles to Second Corinthians chapter three?
[00:00:19] This is one of those messages, by the way. If you are a note taker, this would be a great message, particularly on the front side of this message to take notes. And so we're going to do a little bit of training this morning to set us up. Sometimes something comes along that changes everything.
[00:00:40] And it's not that the old was bad, but that the new. It's so good that if we had the opportunity, we would never go back to the old. So I want you to just process this with me.
[00:00:54] There was a time when people were in sincere relationship with God without the Holy Spirit indwelling inside of them. Like, just process this. Like, there was a time, there were millennia where people would follow God and they did not have the Holy Spirit inside of them. And so before Jesus in the Old Testament and the Old Covenant, the Holy Spirit would rest upon people. The Holy Spirit would empower people for different jobs, different responsibilities, different tasks. But the Holy Spirit, God himself did not indwell old test Testament or Old Covenant believers like he does now. So I mean, just for a moment, could we consider together some of the benefits of having the Holy Spirit inside of you? For example, the Holy Spirit is your teacher when things don't make sense.
[00:01:45] In addition to your conscience, which everybody on the planet has, if you're a believer, he is also your convictor.
[00:01:52] He is the source of supernatural discernment when things are evil or things are off.
[00:02:01] He is your truth teller when you are in the middle of lies.
[00:02:06] He is your encourager. He is the one to give you strength or courage when you need to do something impossible or challenging. And he's not just with you, but he's inextricably linked to your body, your mind and your soul. Like everywhere you go, the Holy Spirit, if you have trusted in Jesus Christ, he is with you. So on a personal level, I could not imagine leading a church with a bunch of people who don't have the Holy Spirit. So I get asked pretty frequently. When people hear I'm a pastor, they don't really know that much about village church. They'll ask me, so what is village church like? And I almost never talk about our beliefs or the organization.
[00:02:50] I almost always just talk about the people of village church. And one of the most consistent words that I use to describe the people of village church is Reasonable.
[00:03:03] And it's like there's nothing we can't work through together. You get two reasonable people in a room, we could process most things right? And this is one of the reasons why we've never had any hesitation coming before the church, even on a Sunday morning, just saying, here's the good, here's the hard, here's the ugly. Let's process that and talk through it. And it's one of the greatest delights to be a part of a church community where one of the most dominant ways we resolve tens or conflict is with a spirit of reasonableness.
[00:03:32] But then go back to Old Testament leaders like Moses or Joshua or David or the prophets, and these guys had to spiritually lead a whole nation, none of whom had the indwelling Holy Spirit. Now can we understand why things might have gone awry? A whole lot. The Holy Spirit is one of the most protective mechanisms in our life to keep us unified and grounded in reason. All right, with all this in mind, open your Bible. Second Corinthians, chapter three. And what the Apostle Paul is doing in this chapter is he is training the Corinthian Church and what it means to be ministering to the world with the gospel in the era of the Holy Spirit and the New Covenant. If you don't know what those words mean, we're gonna unpack them here in just a moment. I want you to look at verse six with me. 2 Corinthians, chapter three.
[00:04:24] Paul says that we are ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. And then as he talks about the old covenant, he says, for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. So in verse six, Paul's in the middle of training this young church on a biblical subject that is of utmost importance for every true follower of Jesus to understand. Like, if you're going to understand this subject, it's going to be the subject that begins to unlock maybe your understanding of the gospel, your understanding of the Bible when you go from the Old Testament to the New Testament, your understanding of your ministry that God has called each and every single one of us to. Now, I'm going to tell you what the biblical subject is. Jinx. I'm going to tell you what the biblical subject is, and you're going to be very underwhelmed by it. But then we're going to explore this, and I think you're going to find it really, really helpful. The subject is very simple. It's the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. Now here's like, reality the vast majority of people that I ask them, what's the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant believers? They can't give me any kind of coherent answer. So one of my hopes is that at the end of this, you're gonna have such a clear understanding of this, and then we're gonna talk about, like, what does this really mean practically for our lives? So the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, first, for some of you who are maybe newer to the Bible, we have to actually define a term. What does the word covenant mean? A covenant is simply an ancient word for a contract or an agreement. For example, marriage is a covenant. And when you enter into a marriage covenant, this is an agreement. It's a contract that you're making with another person. And in marriage, it goes something like this. I will be with you and only you until death duest part. And so when you enter into a covenant, this is an agreement about a relationship that you're entering into. Now, every single person on the planet who has personally trusted in Jesus, whether you are aware of this or not, the moment you trusted in Christ and you said, I am sorry for my sins. I believe in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. God, you're not just God, you are my God. Save me and forgive me. The moment you made that decision, you entered into a covenant, even if you've never even heard the word before. In fact, you didn't enter into just any covenant. You entered into what is called the New Covenant.
[00:06:54] Now, the New Covenant is new because before that there was also something called the Old Covenant. So let's take a few minutes and we're going to jump into, we're going to define, so what is the Old Covenant? And then what is the New Covenant? And then we're going to see what this means for 1 Corinthians or 2 Corinthians, chapter 3. Paul says in verse 7, he's describing the Old Covenant. He says, now, if the ministry of death carved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses face because of its glory, which was being brought to an end. Pause. There's so much there. I'm just gonna focus on what we learn about the Old Covenant from Paul. Right here. Let me give you a summary of what the Old Covenant is.
[00:07:39] The Old Covenant was a good and temporary agreement with written laws and judgment.
[00:07:48] So four things. Number one, the Old Covenant was good. I want to be clear with you. It wasn't great. Because if it was great, you wouldn't have needed a new one, we have a new one, a better one that came along. But the Old Covenant was good.
[00:08:04] So when you're in a relationship with somebody, you would prefer to be with them in proximity, right? Especially if you're going to marry somebody, you want to be able to live with them and be near them. And so one of the challenges with God and humanity is God is holy and we are sinners. And so there's separation. What happens when a sinner enters the presence of a holy God? You get destroyed. And so what God did is he created an agreement, a covenant. And then what he also allowed us to do was to go to his presence. But you couldn't get very. And so his presence dwelled in the tabernacle. And then that turned into the temple. But the only person who could actually go into the room with the closest proximity spatially was the high priest one time a year, with tons of rituals and whatnot. And so even one person, one person, one time per year could get close to the proximity of Yahweh. And that was it. And even then, it was a petrifying experience.
[00:08:57] So this is good. I mean, like some proximity is better than none, right? But it wasn't great, because what do we want when we're in relationship with someone? We want to be able to be with them in their presence. And this agreement, the Old Covenant didn't allow that. But number two, the old covenant was temporary.
[00:09:13] So let's make this as practical as we can. I wanna show you a timeline of when the new the old Covenant started and when it ended. The Old covenant began with Moses, the giving of the law in 1446 BC. That is when the Old covenant began. Now, do you guys know this? They didn't call it the Old Covenant. They just called it the Covenant. Because for then it wasn't old. And some people would call it. And if you're reading your New Testament, they'll call it the Mosaic Covenant, the covenant, the Old Covenant, the Mosaic Covenant, all the same thing. And so for them, this is when it began. And the Old covenant ended permanently with the death and resurrection of Jesus about AD 30ish. That is the timeframe of the Old Covenant, just under 1500 years. And there was an agreement between God and all the people who were going to follow him. Now, Jeremiah 31, 31 says this, I will make a new covenant. I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts. And so the Jewish people for centuries were well aware that this covenant, this Mosaic covenant, what we Call. The Old Covenant was not supposed to be forever. It was temporary until the Messiah would come. The third thing about the Old Covenant is that it had 613 written laws. And here's the agreement before Jesus in this timeframe of 1500 years. A little less than that. If you were going to be in a relationship with God, here's what it meant. You're going to believe in God, and to prove that you believe in him, you're going to follow these 613 laws. And when you fail to do those, you're going to offer sacrifices as a payment for your sin.
[00:11:02] Personally very grateful that as a pastor, my job is not to be a butcher, because this is what the priests often had to do, was to butcher meat all day long. That were the sacrifices in place for people's sin.
[00:11:15] But number four, the Old Testament had, or the Old Covenant had a lot of judgment.
[00:11:21] I mean, don't get me wrong, there's a lot of grace in the Old Testament, but not when it came to violations of one of the 613 Old Covenant laws. When those laws were broken, the punishment was judgment.
[00:11:36] And if you were, you could have a substitute sacrifice or punishment for you, which is why they had the sacrificial system.
[00:11:44] So let's just give a summary here. The Old Covenant was a good and temporary agreement with written laws and judgment.
[00:11:54] Guys, I don't want to live under the Old Covenant. And if you could bribe me, I would never go back under it. I don't want to be in a relationship with God in that time period. We are now in what's called the New Covenant. And so look at verse eight with me. Paul describes the nature of the Old Covenant. He says, will not the ministry of the Spirit, that's the New Covenant, have even more glory? For if there was glory in the ministry of condemnation. Do you hear kind of the way he describes the Old Covenant, like it's not in really great language.
[00:12:24] The ministry of righteousness, the New Covenant must far exceed in glory. Verse 11. He says, for if what was being brought to an end, that's the Old Covenant, came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory. Okay, so the Old Covenant, it was a temporary agreement with written laws and judgment. The New Covenant is different. The New Covenant is a permanent agreement that promises the Holy Spirit transformed hearts and surpassing glory.
[00:12:53] The New Covenant is a permanent agreement that promises the Holy Spirit transformed hearts and surpassing glory. Let's unpack this. Well, number one, the New Covenant is permanent. Here, here's a timeline of the New Covenant.
[00:13:09] The new Covenant began with Jesus death and resurrection in AD30ish. Why? Because what ended in AD30ish? The Old Covenant. The Old Covenant existed for just under 1500 years. And it was replaced at the death and resurrection of Jesus with the New Covenant. And the New Covenant is everlasting and never ever ends. It's not going to be replaced by some future covenant.
[00:13:33] Number two. The New Covenant comes with the gift of the Holy Spirit. So we said this earlier, the moment you trust in Christ, after Jesus is a part of the New Covenant. As a part of the new arrangement or agreement between God and people. When you come to Jesus and say, I'm sorry, I believe in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, not only are you given forgiveness, but you are given the Holy Spirit who permanently, forever dwells inside of you. Old Testament saints, they didn't get the Holy Spirit. New Testament saints, you get the Holy Spirit. This is one of the agreements. You come to God, you trust in Christ as your Savior, you get the Holy Spirit. And you can't say no to the Spirit. Like, literally, you're stuck with him. When you come to Jesus, whether you like it or not, you're entered into a covenant and you get all the benefits of that covenant. First of which is the gift of the Holy Spirit, God himself who dwells inside of you. Which brings us to number three. The new covenant produces and promises real heart transformation. So when you come to Christ and you trust in him for the forgiveness of your sins, not only are you forgiven, not only are you given the Holy Spirit, but then the Holy Spirit starts to go to work in you. And let me tell you, the Holy Spirit is obsessed with making you more like Jesus. He will not stop until the day you are dead to transform your mind, to transform your heart, and to transform your life. The Holy Spirit has one big objective, and he does it in so many different ways. But it is to make you and me to be more and more like Jesus. And you can try to get rid of him, good luck. And you can live in seasons of disobedience. And we see this happens in scripture, that you can, what the Bible says, quench the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit can say, go here. And you can be like, ah, Holy Spirit, I'm smarter than you. I know better than you. I know better than your word. I'm gonna do it my way. And he'll say, okay. And then he will be unrelenting in your mind. You sure you wanna do that? Sure. This is good. And there'll be a pit in your stomach whenever you are rebelling against him. And you will try to squish that pit. But I'm telling you, the Holy Spirit will never, ever leave you alone because it is intent. He is intent on making you more like Jesus.
[00:15:49] Number four.
[00:15:50] The New Covenant finally allows full proximity to God's presence. Remember, under the Old Covenant, if you got too close, you get incinerated. Under the New Covenant, there's different rules. Hebrews 4:16. The Book of Hebrews is so much about why the New Covenant is better than the Old Covenant. And he says this. Let us then, with confidence, draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. In other words, under the Old Covenant, you would enter the throne of God, the place where he dwelled, with hesitance and fear and trembling. And the New Covenant, he says, you, you get to walk into the throne of God with boldness and confidence, without hesitation, knowing that you are not going to experience judgment, but you are going to experience grace and mercy. There is a passage in the book of Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiastes 5:2. And it's a passage some of you are familiar with. In fact, even a song or three was written about this verse. I want to read it to you. Ecclesiastes 5:2. He says, Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God. For God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore, let your words be few. In other words, God's holy. You're a sinner. When you go into his presence, you should be afraid. Shut your mouth.
[00:17:20] And by the way, in the Old Covenant, is that fair?
[00:17:25] Pretty much. Guess what? We're not under the Old Covenant. That's Old Covenant language, New Covenant languages. You walk right into the Holy of Holies, into the throne room of God, and you walk in there with boldness, and you walk in there with confidence, and you let him know all of your needs. And you don't have to hold back your words because you have a heavenly father who has given you 100% full access into his presence.
[00:17:48] Now, my son, my daughters, the last thing I want them doing is, like, dad, can we talk? Like, have I done all my chores? Like, no. I want my children to walk up to me with the boldness and confidence that whatever is on their heart and mind, I want to hear and I want to come alongside of them and help them in any way I can. Now, should they be, like, not a jerk? Yeah, that would help for sure. Yeah. Don't do that.
[00:18:15] But I want them to have absolute boldness. Guys, this is one of the benefits of the New Covenant. You're not just offering when people, when you're telling them about Jesus, you're not just saying, oh yeah, you get to come into this relationship with a bunch of rules. Actually you get to tell them no, you're coming into a relationship with God where you are now getting full access into his presence and forgiveness and you have the presence of the Holy Spirit. Like, the new covenant is objectively way better than the old. You can't go near God in the old, you run to the throne of grace in the new. No Holy Spirit in the old. Now you get the Holy Spirit the moment you trust in Christ. Give me the new covenant any day now. Look at verse 14.
[00:18:51] This is one of those verses that might help you make sense of some relationships in your life.
[00:18:57] Verse 14, he says, but their minds were hardened. And he's referencing here a group of Jews who, they've heard the gospel and they're like, we don't want anything to do with Jesus.
[00:19:11] This also applies to basically anybody who is just so hard hearted to Jesus and the gospel and just kind of resistant toward it. They're like, I don't really want to talk about it. I think Christians, I don't want anything to do with Jesus. Right. He says, but their minds were hardened.
[00:19:30] For to this day, when they read the old covenant, the 613 laws, the same veil remains unlifted because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read, Moses is a synonym for the Mosaic covenant, the lawsuit. Whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts.
[00:19:56] Listen, their heart is hard not just to truth, like everybody in the world. Your heart is hopefully open to the truth of two plus two equals four. I mean, there's a few out there who don't like that. But like, by and large, 99% of people like, we're not hard to truth.
[00:20:12] People's hearts are hard to Jesus. It is striking. If you just watch typical media. Nobody's offended by polyamory or polygamy or other vile things or any other religion. But you get somebody who proclaims the real Jesus from the word of God, you would have thought the world was going to end. People are not hard hearted to lies. They are not hard hearted to fake Jesus'they. Are hard hearted to anybody who is proclaiming the real Jesus. You can get a Hindu up there, a Muslim up there, a Buddhist up there. Yeah, tell us your story. What's going on. You put a conservative Christian who preaches the word of God in a pure gospel and you're gonna get judgmental bigot. Why is that? It's not that their heart is hard to all truth, but their heart is hard to Jesus, the truth about who Jesus is. And so we have to understand that when we live in this world. Like, listen, there's a lot of truth out there and it's beautiful and people learn, et cetera. But there comes a point when you hit that conversation about the real Jesus and they get squirmy and uncomfortable and they don't like them. It's because there is a veil over their heart, because their heart is hard.
[00:21:17] Now, I can imagine Paul's teaching the Corinthians and he's like, listen, they don't like what you have to say because their heart is hard to Jesus. There's a veil they can't see. And I can imagine them saying, okay, well, if we're supposed to help people see Jesus, how do we help people see Jesus if they can't see? And how do we help people see the real Jesus when their heart is just hard and angry at him? Verse 16.
[00:21:41] Here's what he says. He says, but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.
[00:21:51] I want to take a moment and I want to talk to those of you here. You are not Christians. You know, you're not a Christian. If I were to ask you privately, have you personally trusted in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins, you would look at me and say, nope, nope, I haven't.
[00:22:08] You are not going to self identify as a believer.
[00:22:12] Do you ever look at other Christians and you think to yourself, how are they so annoyingly confident in Jesus?
[00:22:23] Like, they believe that he's God and that he died. He didn't just die. Like, we all agree he died, but then he died for sins and he was raised from the dead. And my Christian friends, like, they'll go to the death for this. Like, if you tell them, reject Jesus or die, they'll shed their blood for this. That is a very strange thing. And you're like, I don't get how you can have this kind of confidence.
[00:22:50] This confidence only happens according to verse 16. When or after one turns to the Lord. Listen, like, you can't know what is behind a closed door until you walk through it. And other people can tell you what's behind the door. And you're going to take all of that by faith, but you're never going to understand firsthand until you Actually make the decision to walk through the door and see what's on the other side. And then you can look at it and be like, oh, it's exactly like they said it was.
[00:23:17] But until you turn to Christ, you're still going to have the veil. This is striking. The veil is removed after someone turns to Jesus. And so what you're gonna have is everything that you need to trust in Jesus by faith. You have everything you need to know that Jesus is God, that he died on the cross, that he was raised again from the dead. All of history points to this. It is so obvious and clear. And the moment you decide, I'm done playing games, I'm gonna apologize to God because him and I are not okay. And I'm gonna ask him to forgive me. And I'm gonna believe in life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. After you turn to him, the veil is removed and you go, oh. And your faith to a degree, becomes sight. But most people, like, I've got questions. And I'm like, you know, bring all your questions. I think you should ask every difficult, challenging question you have. But there will get to a point where the only way you're gonna get the most real answers you need is to surrender and to believe in Jesus Christ for the first time. And I love this. The moment you do this, whether you like it or not, you get brought into the new covenant, an agreement, a relationship between you and God. And part of that agreement is everybody who comes into relationship with God. The Holy Spirit of God fills them forever. And you begin the relentless pursuit of becoming more like Jesus. And when you give up, the Holy Spirit strengthens you.
[00:24:34] Look at verse 17.
[00:24:36] He describes this experience of turning to the Lord and having the veil of your mind and soul removed. He says, now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And my question is, freedom to do what? And he tells you two things. Verse 18. He says, we all with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord.
[00:25:02] I'm going to leave Bible language for a moment and just translate this into modern language.
[00:25:08] When you trust in Christ, you are now finally free to see Jesus for who he is. With a soft heart and no veil, you're able to behold the Lord for who he really is.
[00:25:24] And the second thing you're free to do happens in the second part of verse 18. Says we are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. You might be tempted to read that and go, I don't know what that means. Let me tell you what it means. Not only are you free to see Jesus for who he is, but you are now, finally, after you have turned to the Lord, you are free to experience transformation. Here's what people want. God, change me. I don't wanna trust in Jesus and give him my life, but I want you to change me. And here's the deal. You don't get the transformation until you trust in Christ.
[00:25:59] You don't get Holy Spirit, transform me and make my life better and change all the parts that I've been unable to change without first coming to him and saying, I am sorry, forgive me of my sins. I need you to be my God and to help me because I can't do this thing on my own. Everybody wants the transformation without the submission to Jesus. But I'm telling you this, he's like, listen, I get it. You got a lot of questions. Turn to Christ. The veil will be removed. And now you get the opportunity to see him for who he really is. And you get the Holy Spirit who will transform you. And I love this line from one degree of glory to another. Very simply, what it means is this, like, if you're a Christian and you've trusted in Christ, the Holy Spirit has already started working in you. And to a degree, you are like Jesus. But are you fully like Jesus? Oh, no. All the spouses are kicking each other. Not a chance, buddy.
[00:26:48] In a year from now, you're going to be more like Christ to another degree. And so he says, we are beholding the glory of the Lord. We are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. Here's what it means. You are being because of the power of the Holy Spirit inside of you. The promise of God for anybody who comes to him, more and more transformed more and more into the image of Jesus.
[00:27:15] Now, there's a rubric that I have found really helpful. I'd love to share it with you. And what we see is that there are three primary areas of our life that the Holy Spirit wants to transform. Some of you are like, Holy Spirit, help me lose weight, transform this body. That's not his primary concern, by the way.
[00:27:34] And I put this in the form of a prayer so you can see this God, might I have the mind of Jesus.
[00:27:41] I want to think like Jesus. I want to have the doctrine of Jesus. I want to have the beliefs of Jesus. I want to have the mindset of Jesus. And so one of the key areas that the Holy Spirit is going to transform is your mind. We all suffer from believing so many Lies from our own sin, from culture, from family patterns that we grew up with, false doctrine given to us. And the Holy Spirit wants us more and more from one degree of glory to the next one degree of Christ likeness, to be more like Christ in the way we think God might. I have the heart of Jesus to share Jesus convictions and his passions, to be angry at the things that make him angry, and to be happy and thrilled at the things that make Jesus happy and thrilled. Holy Spirit, would you transform not just my mind, but my affections, my emotions, my passions? Would you give me the passion that Jesus has for the things that he has? And so the Holy Spirit, like, you're passionate and I'm passionate about so many things. And he's gonna slowly reduce passion in some areas and replace it with, with passion from the heart about the things Jesus is passionate about.
[00:28:48] God might. I have the life of Jesus. I want to love like Jesus. I want to love those who Jesus loves. I want to be angry at the kind of people Jesus is angry at. And I want to do it in a way that brings God glory every step of the way. And so we look at, we look at our lives, what is the Holy Spirit actually changing? What is he actually transforming? Your mind, which is a messed up place, your heart, which is really broken. And our lives, which are basically devoted to the service of our own kingdom. And the Holy Spirit's like, no, we're going to do something different in your mind. We're going to shift that heart pretty drastically and we're actually going to change the focus of your entire life from building your kingdom to the kingdom of Jesus. And so when we talk about the benefit of the New Covenant, right, Old Covenant saints, they didn't get this. They had to do that all on their own. And it was a struggle and they failed miserably. But when you come to Christ, since his death and resurrection, everybody who comes to Christ, you get brought to the New Covenant with the gift of the Holy Spirit and the promise of transformation. Slow, but very, very effective.
[00:29:53] Verse 18 brings us to the first of our so what's. I have three for you, but number one in gospel ministry, all spiritual fruit is from the Holy Spirit.
[00:30:10] I want you to Notice in verse 18 who gets all the credit for the transformation. Verse 18 says for this, the transforming work the Holy Spirit will do in you to make you more like Jesus. All this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
[00:30:27] Paul wants this young church to know this, that gospel ministry, it's not about awesome, you doing awesome things.
[00:30:37] Gospel ministry is about weak. You watching your strong God do great things through you.
[00:30:50] I have preached a lot of sermons here, and I want to tell you that there have been some terrible messages that I've given. I mean, just bad.
[00:31:00] And you have been so gracious and so merciful with me. I've been preaching here for quite a while, and there are actually specific messages going through my head, a bunch of them. My content at times was so belaboring, My headspace was distracted. The sermon dragged on and on. Like, one sermon was an hour and 15 or 20 minutes. And you endured. Like, that's a miracle.
[00:31:25] Sometimes I get up and I'm distracted, and I'm just personally overwhelmed. There's things happening, and it's not appropriate for me to get up and talk about them. But, like, I get up here and I'm like, oh, my gosh, and I'll get done. And I'm like, what just happened?
[00:31:37] Like, oh, my goodness. And I'm embarrassed, but okay, fine. And then one to three days later, this is kind of the average. Something funny happens. I get a really specific kind of feedback to the message that I call fruit feedback. It wasn't just like, oh, good sermon. That was interesting. That was helpful. It's like somebody emails me or they text me and they say, God really did a work in my heart through that message. And I'm like, that message? That was the worst message I've ever given. And it's like, Jesus is so intent on making sure that I understand the fruit. I don't get to bear that my job is to be faithful and to do the best I can with limited resources and human weakness. But at the end of the day, it's like Jesus is like, the fruit was from me all along. And what I've just found is that sometimes when I am at my worst, when I'm not all there, when I'm distracted and frustrated and overwhelmed, and I'm just really kind of embarrassed, to be honest. Like, the Lord ends up doing the most amount of work because he wants to make sure that I know for the rest of my life. Whatever good came out of my preaching, it was all the Holy Spirit. The best I can do is talk at you. And if by God's grace, he takes this weak experience and he does something transformative in your heart and mind, let it be said he gets every single ounce of the glory. In gospel ministry, our job is faithfulness. God's job is fruitfulness. Moms and dads, we've tried to bear a lot of fruit in our Kids lives, haven't we?
[00:33:05] Our job is faithfulness. God's job is fruitfulness. So number two, one of the most popular arguments against Christianity simply just does not understand the Bible. This sounds a little bit random, but I want to just throw you a bone real quick because this teaching on the difference between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, it actually becomes really, really important when you are dealing with non Christians who sort of have a hard heart and they don't like Jesus. So one of the most popular arguments against the Bible from people with a hard heart who are trying to disprove Christianity and show that all Christians are hypocrites, it goes like this.
[00:33:42] Well, do you eat pork? Yeah. That's awesome.
[00:33:46] Then you're a hypocrite because you just pick and choose which parts of the Bible you want to read. Because if you were a real follower of God, you'd follow all of his rules. Go something like that. And immediately. I know two things in that moment. Number one, I know their heart is hard and they're not actually interested in having productive conversation about Jesus. I know that. But I also know they haven't read the Bible very well and that they don't actually understand how the Bible itself is put together, which is not their fault. Probably nobody ever taught them or trained them. But this is where you get to step back and you get to go, yeah, of course I'm not following the 613 laws because that was the Old Covenant. It existed for just under 1500 years and it was expired and it was replaced by the New Covenant where you can eat all the bacon and pork you want and you go, amen.
[00:34:30] I know every time I talk about the New Covenants, I always make a bacon joke. It's old, but I love it and I love bacon. So there.
[00:34:38] But this is one of those things where, like, if you just don't understand this difference, like people don't know what to say. Like, well, yeah, I mean, we don't obey those laws. Well, why not those laws? Because they are part of an old covenant that has been retired and we now have a New Covenant. And there are a lot of similarities, are there not? Like under the Old Covenant, it's don't murder. And guess what? The teaching of the New Testament or the New Covenant, don't murder. You shouldn't steal in the Old Covenant. But guess what? It's also reiterated in the New Covenant. And so even though like that law is retired, there's a lot of similarities. But I'm telling you, thank God, the sacrificial system isn't in there because Jesus fulfilled that, died once for all, forever. Food regulations aren't in there, thank goodness. You can eat whatever you want. Some things are stupid to eat, but you can eat whatever you want. Number three, lastly, turn to the Lord so that you might be saved. And what I just appreciate about Paul is he's just so simple. At the end of the day, I can't make you do anything. You can't make other people do anything. But what you can do is point them to Jesus Christ and say everything you want, all the things you want. You want transformation. This life isn't all you and your effort. It's not. It's not getting you what you wanted. You want transformation, he's got it. You want forgiveness with God, he's got it. You want eternal hope with heaven, he's got it. You want to even understand Jesus a little bit better. He's got. All of that happens when you turn to the Lord. And so I just have wonderful, beautiful news. If you are here and you have never trusted in Jesus, you can turn to the Lord at any moment, anytime, any day. I think today's the best day.
[00:36:11] But when you turn to the Lord, you enter the new covenant. And when you turn to the Lord, your sins are forgiven. And when you turn to the Lord, you're given the Holy Spirit. And when you turn to the Lord, that Holy Spirit, he goes to work and he begins to do in you what you were never able to do yourself. And the best way I could end this message is to say, turn to the Lord. You will never regret it. And one of the things I love about talking to people who have really, truly trusted in Christ is you won't ever hear them say, man, I really wish I could go back to a time without the Holy Spirit.
[00:36:45] There is something beautiful and wonderful that happens inside the heart, a transforming work when you trust in Christ. And it's one of those things that, yeah, it's hard, change is challenging, but it is worth it. And once you have the veil removed, you don't ever want to go back to the place of ignorance. Once you have full access to God, you would never want to go back to not having full access to God. And so if you're here today, and that is a decision, you're like, I just know I need to make that, Come talk to one of us. We would just love, love to help you answer questions. Maybe you're like, I've got major roadblocks. I'm not gonna do that until I Get some questions answered. We'd love to help you answer questions. We would just love to help you, wherever you're at, on your spiritual journey, take a next step toward a relationship with God. Sound good? Amen. Let's pray together. Father, thank you for how helpful and clear the Apostle Paul is. I can imagine that this Corinthian Church is struggling to live in the middle of this shift from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant. All this change, the laws they were required to follow, they no longer need to follow. This had to have been so challenging for many, especially of the Jews in Corinth. I want to thank you, God, for the freedom of the New Covenant. Thank you for the Holy Spirit. Thank you that you take the veil away when we turn to Christ. Thank you that we can't undo this covenant or get rid of the Holy Spirit. God, we are just so, so grateful that we get to live on this side of the cross.
[00:38:13] Lord, you have been good and you have been faithful. And so, God, it is our joy to respond to you with all the goodness and kindness that you have given to us by lifting our voices and worshiping. Lord, it is our joy to say in Christ alone, all of these benefits happen not because we were good, not because we were spiritual religious, but because of Jesus. And so it is our joy and honor to continue to worship you. And we do all of this in Jesus name. Amen. Vil Church. Amen.
