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So welcome, each and every one of you, to the third of this particular round of studies in the Gospel of Matthew. And we have arrived this evening at chapter uh sixteen. So let's begin by reading the first two paragraphs of chapter sixteen of Matthew. Both of them refer to the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And the Pharisees and the Sadducees came and, tempting him, asked him to show them a sign from heaven. But he answered and said to them, when it is evening, you say it will be a fair weather, for the heaven is red. And in the morning, it will be foul weather today, for the heaven is red and lowering. You know how to discern the face of the heaven, but you cannot discern the signs of the times. An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of Jonah. And he left them and departed. And the disciples came to the other side and forgot to take bread. And Jesus said to them, take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. They reasoned among themselves, saying, we took no bread. And Jesus, perceiving it, said, oh, ye of little faith, why reason you among yourselves because you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive, neither remember the five loaves and the five thousand and how many baskets you took up? Neither the seven loaves of the four thousand and how many baskets you took up? How is it that you do not perceive that I spake to you not concerning bread, but beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. So the Lord give us good understanding and interest in his word. Two paragraphs then about Pharisees and Sadducees. And the first of them is the story how the Pharisees and Sadducees came with an insincere question, tempting him and asking him to show them a sign from heaven. And he rebuked them, remarking that they claimed to be able to interpret the atmosphere and the color of the sky, both evening and morning, and thus, uh, perceive what the weather would be on the next day. You can interpret the sky, says he, and yet this evil and adulterous generation cannot discern the signs of the times. Which raises the question, what signs? Of what times? What couldn't they discern? What were the signs of the times that should have now have been evident to them? To answer that simple question, I think we must remember how chapter fifteen ended up. It was the delightful story, first of all, of the Gentile woman that came and besought Christ to heal her daughter who was demon-possessed. And at first, the Lord Jesus made as if he wasn't going to answer her, and said that he was sent only to the lost tribes of the people, the lost sheep of the people of Israel, and then added, it is not proper to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs. And at first, it looked as if our Lord was being frightfully rude and very narrow-minded, but nothing of the sort, of course. What he was doing was eliciting that woman's faith. And when she, as she replied, yes, Lord, that's true. It's not good to take the children's bread and give it to the dogs. When she replied, it became ob- obvious that she had both repented and believed. For she said, yes, Lord, it's true, but even the little puppy dogs eat of the bread that falls from their master's table. Your God is so big. Though he blesses Israel particularly, he couldn't begrudge but a few crumbs to Gentiles. We noticed last week that she didn't resent being described as a puppy dog or as a dog. Gentiles were unclean. Our modern Gentile world is very unclean. Witness so many programs on the TV and on Radio Four, so-called comedies that blaspheme the name of God and Christ and get most of their mirth from perverted sexuality. But this good woman came and owned the fact she was an unclean Gentile. Her very daughter was possessed of an unclean spirit. But all watch her faith. To which our Lord, of course, generously responded, gave the word that drove out the demon from her daughter, and was a tremendous blessing to this Gentile woman. And not content with that, as he came back to the north of Palestine and went up in a mountain, but in that whole area near to the Gentile border, hundreds and hundreds flocked to him, and he healed their sick, and, uh, they glorified the God of Israel. There would have been no point in Matthew saying that if the people had been Israelites anyway. But these were Gentiles. And when they saw the wonders that the blessed Messiah did, these Gentiles glorified the God of Israel, and our blessed Lord made them a sumptuous repast. In chapter fourteen, we read how that the Lord made the Israelites a great banquet in a wilderness place, multiplying the loaves and the fishes miraculously to feed them with his royal bounty. But Matthew points out here that our Lord had i- a- had equal bounty for the Gentiles too, and he fed this large crowd of Gentiles in his mercy by miraculously blessing the bread and the fish. And if the Pharisees and Sadducees had heard the news, it ought to have been for them a sign of the time. Our Lord gave them one hint. Verse four, he said, there shall no sign be given them, but the sign of Jonah. But so that we might interpret that aright, let's look back, shall we, to an earlier mention of Jonah, you see. And that comes in the chapter twelve of this same Gospel of Matthew. In very similar verses. Twelve verse thirty, but he answered and said unto them, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of Jonah the prophet. And now he expounds what the sign of Jonah the prophet means. He says, for as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. He is drawing a parallel between Jonah's experience, who was thrown into the sea and a great fish swallowed him up. There he was, for what in Hebrew counting is three days and three nights, when the great fish spewed him out on the ground, you'll see. So our Lord draws the parallel. So shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. He's referring in advance to his crucifixion, his burial, and then his resurrection. A gigantic sign to Israel, witness the happenings of the day of Pentecost. But this time, as you notice in Matthew chapter, uh, uh, 16, he simply says, no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah. Doesn't add as Jonah was in the heart of the, uh, of the sea for three days and three nights, so the Son of Man shall be in the heart of the earth. No. Just the sign of the prophet Jonah. And what was particular about the prophet Jonah anyway? Well, he was one of the very few, perhaps the only one in that sense, that was sent by God as a Jew to evangelize Gentiles. He was sent to the great city of Nineveh, whose wickedness was unparalleled, and yet God had mercy on him. And poor old Jonah, he didn't enjoy the job, you see, and he explained to God why he ran away from it. He said, well, I- I- I- I feared you. See, when I go there with all my prophetic credentials and I preach and, and in, in, in a few days God will judge this city, then God, he said, I feared that, um, you being you, um, if they only repented, you'd forgive them, and then what would come of my preaching, you see? I, I mean, my prophecy wouldn't be fulfilled. So I ran off. Mm-hmm. I suppose there could be possibly preachers that are more concerned with their reputation than with the salvation of the lost, but I don't know about that. I will say. Um, Jonah going to the Gentiles. So our Lord is now emphasizing it, isn't he? Look at the great celebration on the mountain where the Gentiles came, and I healed them, and they glorified the God of Israel. A sign of the times, yes. For now, the gospel would eventually go to the Gentiles. But so that you may, I may try to convince you that I'm not making this up arbitrarily, let me turn you, if you will, to Acts chapter thirteen. Acts chapter thirteen. And this is a record of a sermon that Paul the Apostle preached in Antioch of Pisidia, not the other big Antioch, the Antioch in Pisidia. He preached a long sermon there, you'll see, and verse forty two tells us, and as they went out, they besought that these words might be spoken to them the next Sabbath. Now, when the synagogue broke up, many of the Jews and of the devout proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who speaking to them urged them to continue in the grace of God. Let's notice who the proselytes are. They were Gentile people in these sundry cities who had got tired of their idolatry and all the tomfoolery that went with it and paraphernalia. And they used to attend the Jewish synagogue because to them, as they heard the law recited and the commandments, it seemed to them that this was a philosophy far superior to their polytheism enacted by the priests in the temples. They were, to use a technical term that developed in those times, God-fearers. And among them, of course, were, uh, predominantly perhaps women. There was a reason for it, of course. As a woman, you could attend the synagogue and profit from it, or even be converted to Judaism. But conversion for men meant circumcision, and the men were not so keen on the matter. Anyway, the next Sabbath, verse forty four says, almost the whole city was gathered together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with jealousy and contradicted the things which were spoken by Paul and blasphemed. Paul and Barnabas spake out boldly and said, it was necessary that the word of God should be first spoken to you, but seeing you thrust it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life. Behold, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee for a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the uttermost parts of the earth. And as the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the word of God, and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. So now, as the Jews in the synagogue got angry and moved with jealousy to see so many Gentiles beginning to attend the synagogue at the preaching of Paul and not of their rabbi, they started to oppose the gospel. And Paul, uh, um, brings now to them the seriousness of their, uh, attitude. We had to preach the gospel first to you. That is the order of scripture. But now we turn to the Gentiles, for the prophets have said it. So let's take the hint and look at one of the prophets that said it. Which prophets the Pharisees and the Sadducees ought to have known, didn't they? Ought to have known by heart that the day would come when Messiah would not only save Jews, but Messiah would attract thousands upon thousands of Gentiles to him through faith in the living God of Israel. And the passage is, of course, Isaiah, that Paul quotes, the passage is Isaiah forty nine. Isaiah forty nine. And this is Messiah speaking prophetically through Isaiah the prophet. Listen, O isles, unto me, and hearken, you peoples, from far. Notice the call on the audience. It's not now the Jews, it's the islands, the, uh, peoples from far off. When you talk of the isles in the Old Testament, you're thinking of the distant places distant from Palestine. There were Greeks and Romans and things. Now, whether they knew at that time of us eminent Irishmen, I don't know. Anyway, they, uh, uh, um, that is the people now being addressed, and it's the Messiah addressing them. The Lord has called me from the womb, from the bowels of my mother has he made mention of my name, and he has made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand has he hid me, and he hath made me a polished shaft, in his quiver hath he kept me close, and he said unto me, Thou art my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified. That the Messiah is the embodiment of Israel. He is Israel to perfection. But now listen to what Messiah says. But I said, this is Messiah talking. I've labored in. I've spent my strength for nothing and vanity. Yet surely my judgment is with the Lord and my recompense with my God. And now saith the Lord that formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him, and that Israel be gathered unto him. For I am honorable in the eyes of the Lord, and my God has become my strength. Yes, he saith, that is God says, it is too light a thing, too small a thing, that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth. Oh, what a lovely insight this is into the heart of the person of the Lord Jesus. The thought that he would be anointed by God just to bring little Israel back to God was too small a task to satisfy him. Y- you know, it's a good secret, isn't it? If you're not satisfied, my dear brother, my dear sister, with the work you're doing for the Lord, and you're thinking of it as a poor thing, well, perhaps it is, is that you're not doing something big enough. You know, when it comes to sewing, I, I don't take to it easily, you know. I don't know which finger to put the f- the, the, the whatnot on to stop me pricking my fingers to start with. And then getting the needle threaded is a business, you see. Perversities. And then sewing on the buttons. Uh, to me, that's when I've sewn on a button, you know that's a tremendous achievement. But if you ask a good lady that can do tapestry work and embroidery to sew on buttons, she'd be insulted. She couldn't possibly be satisfied with sewing on buttons. She must be doing all this beautiful, big stuff. Our Lord felt like that. To be God's messenger to bring back, uh, little Israel. How could the Son of God, creator of the ends of the earth and of the vast galaxies of space, be content with a little work like that? Oh, if we would su- follow our Lord's attitude of heart, we must have something bigger enough to do for the Savior, that it can satisfy us. And what was this big work? Says God, I've given you for a light to the Gentiles, that you may be my salvation to the ends of the earth. Thus said Messiah in the prophet. It's this prophecy that Paul quotes in the, uh, uh, synagogue at Pisidian Antioch, as the Gentiles are coming. And when the Jews got full of envy, but, but he says, but yes, it was right we started with you, but now we go to the Gentiles because, you see, the prophet said that. And gentlemen, says he to this, to the rabbi in the synagogue, the prophecy is being fulfilled under your very noses. Look at it. Look at these scores of Gentiles coming. The ingathering of the Gentiles. What a marvelous sign that is, isn't it? Does it comfort your heart? Well, if we know history, it ought to. That tiny nation that began with one single, uh, a- Abraham and Sarah, and gradually over many centuries were taught the ways of God, and God educated them and got rid of idolatry, till by the time that our Lord arrived in Palestine, there were no idols in the temple of the Lord anymore. And Israel was strictly monotheistic, worshiping one God, which was a very big advance, wasn't it? Because to go to a people that are, uh, believe in many different gods and say Jesus is the Son of God, they would say, which god particularly? Uh, one of our gods, or do you have a lot of gods of your own? Which god in particular? But seeing Israel, when our Lord was born, was totally monotheistic, in Palestine at least, it now made sense for God to send his son and for his son to be proclaimed as the son of God. But all the prophet prophesied, Messiah through Isaiah the prophet was prophesying that yes, it would be preached the gospel first to the Jew, but then the mark of reality would be that the gospel would extend to the Gentiles. The question we ask is, has it happened? I think I've observed before, I used to say to my dear Jewish friends in this city, I would say, Otto, my dear chap, you know, show me another Jew that has led anywhere near the multi-millions of Gentiles to faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Can you think of any other Jew who's done it? There shall no sign be given you, says Christ, but the sign of Jonah, the Old Testament prophet who was sent to preach to Gentiles. Our Lord had given a foretaste of it, and the record is there in chapter fifteen. Now in chapter sixteen, he points out to them the signs of the times, which if there were any sight to see it, was a pointer to the reality of the Messiahship of the Lord Jesus. Second lesson with Sadducees and Pharisees. You'll see the disciples came to the other side and have gotten to take bread. And Jesus said unto them, take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. But you know how it happens, don't you? Well, perhaps you don't, but I've known it to happen. Of a Sunday morning, and there's a visiting preacher of some renown, and he gets up to preach, and there's this Mrs. O'Farrell in the audience, and she's got to entertain the preacher. And as he begins to preach, he happens to use the illustration of potatoes. Oh, the thought, did I switch the oven on so that the potatoes will be ready when we get home? Now, did I or didn't I? She can't hear any word of the sermon going on now, worrying about whether she switched the oven on or not. Ha. So it was with the apostles, our Lord wanting to teach them a lesson about doctrine, uh, uh, distinguishing false doctrine from the true, and uh, he happened to use the metaphor, the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. That sparked in their mind the fact they'd forgotten to take bread. And he rebuked them for it. Oh, you of little faith. Don't you remember the first miraculous feeding, the loaves and the fishes, and how many baskets of fragments you took up? And have you forgotten the second miraculous feeding of the Gentiles and how many baskets you took up? Do you see, where is your faith? And that tells me this, that if the Lord has intervened to provide for my need in time past, once or twice, I ought to count on the fact, when next I'm in need, that he will provide for me. But I have to confess that's one of my troubles. I get in some difficult plight and wonder where on earth is what the solution of this is, and worry and worry and worry. And then the Lord, um, when the Lord, um, comes in and gives the provision, and I say, bless the Lord. And what is more, now he's proved himself to me, I'll never doubt again. You wait till the next time happens. Phew. I've got not got the logic of faith. His love in time past, as the hymn puts it, forbids us to think he'll leave us at last in trouble to sink. Each sweet Ebenezer, hitherto the Lord has helped me. Each sweet Heb- Ebenezer I have in review confirms his good pleasure to see me right through. And so he was not talking about literal bread, he was talking about the doctrine. But doctrine is called leaven because, you see, we feed on doctrine, don't we? We do need the doctrine to feed on. Of course, there is the rest of the stuff, whether like cornflakes, or if you prefer them, juicy ice cream and stuff, and the sweets are nice, aren't they? You see, a- after the main course. If you've got to go, if you're going to have healthy bones and lots of proteins and things, aha. You'll need some doctrines. Pray get your doctrines right, says Christ. Do you see, beware of the leaven, the doctrines that is, of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Then they understood how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching, the doctrines of the Pharisees and Sadducees. So what marked the teaching of the Pharisees to start with? Well, they were very well-intentioned people. I cannot now afford to go into their history. Some people think that the very term means that they're separatists, but they arose in the, after the Maccabees time, when the Maccabees fought for adherence to scripture, uh, in regard particularly to the traditions of circumcision and scripture and the temple services. But afterwards, the Maccabees themselves grew careless, and they appointed a, a, a high priest who didn't fulfill the rules of the Old Testament. And for that reason, amongst others, the Pharisee sect began, do you see, insisting on the carrying out of the Old Testament law, which was good and proper in itself, was it not? But then they, they, as they would put it, they put a bridge around the law. So in case you came near to breaking the law, they made sure by their rules and regulation you didn't get within yards of the law, within yards of breaking the law, and invented ten thousand and one rules, regulations, etcetera, etcetera. And it became a fearful burden upon the people. But godliness became a matter of keeping rules and regulations. Now let's get it straight. There are rules and regulations. You'll not go around backbiting, says the New Testament, and of course, thou shalt not murder, and thou shalt not commit adultery, and thou shalt not commit fornication, thou shalt not steal. These are God's laws. But to them, Pharisees had added a lot of rules and regulations, such as we thought about last week, the washing of the arms right up to the elbow before you ate to cleanse your possible defilement from contact with Gentiles, and all this kind of thing. It is so easy to make rule keeping a substitute for godliness. To have all sorts of rules and regulations, and yet in daily life, to live in unchristian style. Beware of the doctrine of the Pharisees. What about the Sadducees? Well, they were the other extreme. They wouldn't have these traditions of the elders. They said to them s- themselves, scripture is enough, and all these endless rules and regulations invented by the Pharisees, no, they wouldn't submit to them. Give us simply scripture. If I were to dare to say such a thing, well, I, I, I, I, I won't say it, but if I had have said it, I, I would have said, um, uh, uh, do you see, um, uh, the Pharisees were our dear friends, the Roman Catholics, and the Sadducees were Protestants. They wouldn't have all the traditions. Yes, but it was the Sadducees that developed modernism. And there were long years when Roman Catholics were more faithful to scripture than many theological Protestants. It was in the theological faculties of divinity, the Protestant faculties of divinity, that you would meet in my youth extreme forms of modernism. Sadducees, according to Acts, they didn't believe, you see, in angel or spirit. They didn't believe in the resurrection. They believed that when this life is done, that's that, there is no life to come. You will remember that it was the Sadducees that came to Christ. They thought themselves very clever, able to argue doctrines, you see. And they said to our Lord, you believe in a resurrection, don't you? Well, they said, well, tell us about this case then. There was a woman, you see, and uh, uh, she married, but her husband died before she had any children, you see. So, fulfilling the Jewish law of the levirate marriage, uh, the, uh, this, uh, man's brother, he had six brothers, uh, but the next brother in line, he married the dear lady, and he died without any children. And so the third m- m- man married her, and he died as well. And they said that all seven had her, uh, uh, uh, uh, so, uh, they all died, and then she died. I understand that. She would have died after seven husbands, I would think, anyway. And, uh, uh, uh, so that was that. Of course it was a made up yarn, you know. But, uh, they said, now tell us, if there's such a thing as a resurrection, in the resurrection, uh, now whose wife shall she be because she had all. What absurd intellectual nonsense it was. What? What silly argument it was, to be sure. Sad, wasn't it? They thought they had a, an argument that proved there's no resurrection. And they thought they'd won by proving it. Could be a sorry world, couldn't it, in which there's no resurrection and no final judgment. It would mean that the vast millions of people that have lived and died on this earth without any justice, cruelly treated, persecuted, die, no hope of justice ever. And that only one of the things. Our Lord called upon on that situation to say, uh, that there is such a thing as a resurrection. How would you prove it from the Old Testament? Because our Lord himself hadn't died yet. We Christians talk about the evidence of his resurrection, and rightly so. And why on earth we don't preach it more often in our sermons to the world, that I haven't got round to understanding yet. We talk about the atonement endlessly. Why don't we preach the resurrection of hope for a hopeless world? But anyway, when our Lord, uh, said to them, you greatly err, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God. It is the fact that in the resurrection, they, we shall be as angels. Men shall, men and women shall be as angels. They neither marry nor are given in marriage. It's not said they can't, be it noticed, it says they don't. There's no need to perpetuate the race up there, do you see? No need for a generation. They are as the angels of God. But then he added evidence. He said, have you never read what God said to Moses at the burning bush? He said, I am the God of Is- of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob. And he said it in answer to Moses' inquiry, you see. When I go to them and say, the God of your fathers has appeared to me, what am I to s- and they say, what is his name, what am I to say? It was in that context, God identifying himself. Who is this God? He's the God of Abraham. Oh, I see. And according to the Pharisees, Abraham was dead and gone these thousands of years and crumbled to dust. And God says, I am the God of Abraham. What do you mean, I am the God of Abraham? I am that I am. I am the God of Abraham. You mean you were the God of Abraham? No. I am the God of Abraham. You see, when God sets up a relation between himself and one of his redeemed people, that relationship is like God, eternal. What's your name, June Smith or something? And you're a believer? God defines himself by you. I am the God of June Smith. The relationship is eternal. If I went to God, uh, and I said to God, excuse me, Lord, but did you know Abram? I get asked questions not quite like that sometimes. I go to a place and they say, did you know, uh, Spurgeon? What do you mean, did I know Spurgeon? I'm not that old. May look it, but I'm not that old. Hoo. Spurgeon? He lived year, he died before I was born, anyway. If you went to God and said, did you know Abraham? God would say, what do you mean, did I know him? I know him. Here he is. Marvelous, isn't it? He defines himself by his redeemed people. The relationship lasts eternally. Second lesson, therefore, provided by the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And with that we come to the glorious confession by Peter of the Christhood and the deity of the Lord Jesus. Verse thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. Now when Jesus came into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, who do men say that the Son of Man is? And they said, some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. He saith unto them, but who say you that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, blessed art thou Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. We notice first the place where our Lord saw fit to raise the question. He came into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, and if you have ever done a tour of Israel, you will probably taken up to a place called Paneas, right in the north of the country, and you would have been shown a rock face with an old niche there that once was a statue in it, a pagan statue, and otherwise it's said to be a beautiful spot in some people's eyes by the fact the grass is green and little rivulets come that are part of the source of the Jordan River. But of course, that doesn't give us the impression of what it was in the days of Christ. Herod Philip had been granted that as part of his dominion, and Herod Philip had built a palace and a, a, a, a, a, a temple with four pillars to it and a sizable city up there. So it wasn't a, a, a wild, uh, place and a secret place. The point of it was, it was right on the border with the Gentiles. It was there that our Lord challenged his apostles to say who they thought he was, as distinct from the opinion of the crowds. And Peter confessed the Lord Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the living God. It was no accident, was it, that our Lord should ask for that confession there, on border of Israel and the Gentiles. In light of the coming history, we've already talked about it. It was in the plan of God, and it would be some Jews that accepted him as the Son of God. It would be myriads of Gentiles, and to this present day. This is the great stumbling block with Israel, is it not? It is the deity of the Lord Jesus. Peter confessed him, thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And as we saw at the beginning of these studies, our Lord congratulated him, blessed art thou, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And on that occasion, we observed, of course, that this wasn't the first time that Peter had met the Lord Jesus. It wasn't that one day he woke up and God said in his ear, Peter, and he said, yes, Lord, speak, I'm listening. And God said, look, Peter, Jesus is, uh, you know, the Christ, my son. And Peter said, well, Lord, if you say so, I believe it, but who on earth is this Jesus? Wasn't like that. Peter had walked and traveled with Christ, had listened to him preaching, had offered him his boat as a pulpit, had experienced the miraculous draught of fishes, had been sent out as a missionary for Christ, and had come back with wonderful tales of the power of Christ over demons and so forth. It was with that evidence in front of him that then God revealed the significance of the evidence. And Peter came to see that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. And if we want the great assurance in our hearts of the deity of the Lord Jesus. Well, don't suppose it's going to be a revelation that you weren't thinking about it and never have thought about it, and suddenly it will strike you like a bolt from the blue. Start by reading the evidence. Listen to the words of Christ in scripture. Read what he did. Read the story of his resurrection and the marvels of the triumphs of the gospel. And let God himself reveal to you the significance of the evidence. How shall we understand it? As pri- p- God p- Christ went on to say, I say unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. How are we to understand these verses? It is almost impossible, unless you're coming absolutely new to the history of Christianity, to answer the question without first coping with the claims that have been made all down history on this particular verse. Our Lord saying, thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. The Roman Catholic Church now for some centuries has claimed as follows, that Peter eventually went to Rome and then became the first bishop of Rome, that he had the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and those keys were then, um, transmitted by him to the subsequent bishops of Rome. That the bishops of Rome down the centuries have inherited this authority that was given to Peter. It is upon Peter that the church is founded, and all subsequent bishops of Rome, uh, hold the see of Peter and all their doctrine, at least what they teach ex cathedra, when they're teaching officially as the Bishop of Rome, what they teach is infallible. It used to be that if you disagreed with that, then there was no hope for you but the lake of fire. It's not true. It just isn't true. Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven, is not true solely of Peter. Let's turn, if you've got a Bible open, to chapter eighteen, where the same authority is given to the church at large. Let's take up the context in verse fifteen. And if thy brother sin against thee, go show him his fault between thee and him alone, and if he hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. But if he hear thee not, take with thee one or two more, that at the mouth of two witnesses or three, every word may be established. And if he refuse to hear them, tell it unto the church. And if he refuse to hear the church also, let him be unto thee as the Gentile and the publican. Verily I say unto you, what things soever you shall bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatsoever things you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. And you see from the context, this is not just true of Peter, the supposed bishop of Rome, there's doubt historically about that too, but a- and all subsequent bishops of Rome, this is true of the church in general. And when the church solemnly comes to a position, as in this case, over what you may call church discipline, authority to exercise it is given to the church as a whole. Let's look at another scripture that shows us that very same thing. One Corinthians chapter five. One Corinthians chapter five. The trouble in Corinth was at that time, chapter five verse one, it is actually reported that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not even among the Gentiles, that one of you has his father's wife. Now, when it come- came to sexual matters, Greeks took a lot of shocking. You would have to tell even Greek Christians when they were first converted, you had to tell them, as you notice from the epistles, that fornication was sinful. Greeks wouldn't have known that. This is as ordinary as getting up in the morning. To say, you'd need to tell a Greek, even when he was converted, you'll need to tell him that. But Greeks did have certain, uh, uh, taboos, that a man should take his father's wife, even if the father were now dead, was such a horrible thing to a Greek as to be an absolute scandal. And here was the church at Corinth allowing a man who professed to be a brother, a believer, and they were puffed up and glorified, gloried in it as though it were a sign of their Christian freedom. Oh dear. Sometimes we hear that, hear that lovely word freedom trotted out now, don't we? In justification of all kinds of sexual immorality. People are free. Paul calls upon them now that in this case, and in any such case, if a bro- a man that is called a Christian, a brother, is guilty of certain out- outlandish sins, they are listed in verse eleven— that they shall be exercised serious church discipline. In the name of our Lord Jesus, he says in verse four, ye being gathered together in my spirit with the power of our Lord Jesus, to deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Verse seven, purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, even as you are unleavened. For our Passover also has been sacrificed for us, even Christ. Seriousness of church government. It is told us by some historians that when Luther discovered the doctrine of justification by faith, great godly heroic man he was, and preached it and defied the emperor of Europe, who was the emperor of Spain at the time, that he had much sympathy with Christians who said that the church of God is not coterminous with the state. It is a coming together of believers, not perfect, not perfectionists, but genuine believers that are seeking to live godly lives. And that our people are notorious, publicly notorious, as sinful in their behavior. Then they shall not be accepted into the church unless they repent and show signs that they are believers. Or if they're in the church, they shall be dealt with for the sake of Christ. This is not narrow-mindedness. Paul appeals to the Old Testament institution of Passover, the night the people were redeemed from the wrath of God by, uh, the blood of the Passover lamb, that night. And for days afterwards, they had to eat unleavened bread. You couldn't have the one without the other. And Paul urges it on them here. Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us. We keep the feast, therefore, not with the old leaven of hypocrisy, malice and hypocrisy, but with the unleaven of, of, uh, uh, sincerity and truth. And Luther was inclined to go along with it. Except, of course, that some of the German princes had defended him. Some of them were notoriously immoral. They were allowed into the church. For the gospel's sake, not only narrow-mindedness, church discipline, therefore, of this kind, is necessary. And mark it's not only about sexual matters, if anybody be shown to be covetousness, that is making money by doubtful means, so that it becomes a scandal amongst people in general. It calls for church discipline. But I quote the passage not to, uh, uh, uh, uh, preach a sermon on church discipline. I quote the passage simply, uh, to point out that the authority given to Peter of the binding and the loosing does not establish him as something, uh, preeminent amongst Christians or the subsequent bishops of Rome. This was an authority given by our Lord to the church in general, as you see from chapter, uh, eighteen of this gospel and from the passage I have quoted from one Corinthians. What the Lord Jesus meant by the other things that he said, we shall have to leave till next week if the Lord has not yet come, and we must consider it then. Now filled with all naughtiness of heart, um, I, I, I, I, I want to set you a question to be thought about in this coming week and to be in readiness to answer, uh, when you appear next time. Only if you haven't found the answer, well, never mind. There are gentlemen sitting around here that will answer for you. Never mind. And the question is this. Mm-hmm. Anybody here claims to have a soul? Those of you, yeah, some even now dare to say it, but those of you who claim to have a soul, I shall be asking next week, because the passage invites us to do it, what is your soul? What is it? A- and where do you keep it? If you, if I were to ask you, is your soul saved, I hope you'd say yes, it is. Then I would have to ask the question twice over. Uh, this saved soul of yours, where do you keep it? And what is it now you've got it? Because next, uh, week, God willing, if we come, we are to hear about the possibility of losing our souls. And our Lord makes the at first problematic statement that he that loves his soul shall lose it. He that loses his soul for my sake shall keep it. Is that true? That the way to keep your soul is to lose it? Well, you can see what difficulties I'm in already, can't you? And I, I propose the question to you for next session so that we can go with the minimum of time to consider our Lord's words in this connection. What does he mean by saying, he that loves his soul shall lose it, and he that loses his soul for my sake, the same shall keep it? What is the soul? And if you've got one, where do you keep it? But now that for next week, let it not disturb your slumbers for tonight. Let's just give thanks for God and his word. Our Father, we thank thee for these lovely records of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. We thank thee for opening our eyes to see all his wisdom and his grace. We thank thee for the witness of history. We thank thee for him who was dead and buried and is risen again and is at thy right hand in glory. We thank thee, Father, with all our hearts for that union between ourselves and thee, which our blessed Lord has effectualized. So give us a heart that we may live for thee, that we may trust thee in all life's exigencies, and be used to spend our lives as best we can for the glory of our Lord in this age and in that which is to come. So now we thank thee for Christian fellowship and for the refreshments provided for us now. Bless our conversation together through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.