Grace OPC Sewickley PA

Sermon Series: Misc. OT Sermons

  • Five Pictures of God’s Grace

    Five Pictures of God’s Grace

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, March 10, 1991.

    About this sermon

    Psalm 107’s five divisions each illustrate the same finished work of salvation from a different angle: wanderers, prisoners, the sick, sailors, all delivered by the same acting God. As a wisdom psalm, its focus stays fixed on what God has done rather than on abstract praise. Grace, not human resilience, is what each illustration actually shows.

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    Sermon transcript

    This song is interesting in a number of respects. There is that aspect to it that grasps to me as something of the beginning of the song, the very first song. You may recall that we sang the first song this morning as we opened up our worship service.

    But you’ll know how the psalm ends, who it was that gave you the key to these things, and consider the public kindness of the Lord. The theme of wisdom is struck there in the psalm, in the last verse, and moves the psalm into the company, then, of the wisdom psalms. You ought to be wise. and take into account the things that have been said here. Matthew and Wisdom, of course, this is back in the very first psalm, is it not? The fear about how God makes a division between the righteous and the unrighteous, that God will make a difference. The first psalm stands with the imprint of wisdom.

    But not only that, this psalm reaches out to the conclusion of the Psalter as a whole. Maybe you recall that the last five psalms of the Psalter are what we call Hallelujah psalms. They are filled with praise. And though the matter of praise is put somewhat notoriously here in this psalm, it’s filled out marvelously as you come to the conclusion of the Psalter. I wonder if you could recite for me the last part of the 150th psalm with every finger and every breath. Praise the Lord. Now, you see, it’s a wonderfully placed psalm, reaching back to the very beginning and reaching ahead to the very conclusion of the psalter. Now, it’s unmistakable, is it not, as you run through the psalm, what is stated before the people are the mighty works and wonderful deeds of God, what he has done for his own.

    And these deeds, these acts, are to convince. How can there be any question in the mind of those who have been delivered, those who have been rescued? They are convinced by the actions, the activities of God. These activities stand as symptoms. They stand as symptoms in the past, so that people’s mind races back to these events, and in recursing those events one more time, again, again, And they gained consonance and silence. They lived in the shade of those acts, those mighty deeds of God. And after these deeds had happened, after they had been set as a spectacle, the people of God must never behave as if those acts or those events had not transpired.

    Now, the psalm itself is divided and divided into five parts, actually. You have an introduction given in the first three verses of the psalm, and verses four through one is the first of four illustrations that are given. The dominant image in these verses is that of the wilderness and of the wasteland. We can apply all that. Moving on to the second illustration and the third portion of the psalm, verses 10 through 16, you have the image of a prison or a dungeon. And there follows a striking illustration in verses seventeen through twenty-three. And here the language is filled with the vocabulary that concerns health, well-being, contrasted with disease, physical illness. And the last illustration, removing the powerful, detailed picture given to us, verses twenty-three through thirty-two, life at sea.

    And before we go on and mention the conclusion of the psalm, speak of it. I want you to note, and I’m sure you picked this up as you were listening to the psalm, or as you were reading it, there is something of a pattern given here in each of these successive illustrations.

    The psalmist begins in each of them by describing the state of the people as utterly desolate. There is no hope. But then, you see, they are told they cry out to the Lord in their trouble, These words are used repeatedly. It’s seen on there in verses 6, 13, 19, and 28.

    God hears them, God and they’re saved. having completed, then, with the exhortation that he’s given, or the exclamation, depending upon your approach to it, that all good men would thank the Lord for His goodness, that is, for His grace, that is, for His unmerited favor, and for His wonderful acts to the children of men. That’s in 8, 15, 24, and 30. That pattern is repeated. You never have to understand it. The summary statement, verses thirty-three through forty-two, followed by a brief exhortation with respect to this verse, is really usually over.

    Now, one other thing that is important for us to keep in mind as we move through the psalm is this. There are multiple illustrations here of the grace and the mercy of God. They’re wonderful illustrations to give you, and you can imagine that behind what the psalmist is saying, he could number any number of others. He could list any number of other instances that are words of consideration.

    But all of these issue from the singular grace of God. Multiple occurrences, but issuing from a singular grace. from God, God redeeming His own. He might even go so far as to say that in the final analysis, the mercies of God are reduced to one, one supremacy, as if it were a fountain out of which other mercies flow, so that these occurrences of mercy can be seen in light of the singular mercy of God. That’s what he has done. before his season. You know, at this peak in the history of salvation, there will be that singular grace, that singular demonstration of God’s loving kindness and mercy, that singular event, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And how will that happen when there flow multiple graces, so that the deliverances that we experience, for which we are called then to praise God, are but explicative of that moment’s wondrous grace that is found in Him come through?

    Singular character, then, of the grace of God is focused towards an introduction to the song of verse two. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. The singularity of their experience with God focused in the fact that they have been redeemed, they are saved. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so. Who he has redeemed from the hand of the enemy and gathered from the four corners of the earth.

    For that verse, the second verse of the psalm, brings before us even wider considerations, doesn’t it? And the four corners of the earth, now having been mentioned, sing to the praise of the four corners of the earth. For you see now, as the psalmist speaks, he brings before us the universal character, expanse, dimension of the redemption that is being accomplished by God for His people. The psalm is bursting in categories.

    Jewish people read it. Many of the illustrations and images arise out of Jewish history, but the language itself is suggesting something broader, something more expansive, something more magnificent still, as if when the psalmists were writing, he has the final work of God in view, how in fact God was going to gather his oath from the four corners of the earth. Saving them, yes, universal in proper scope and dimension, comprehensive, very least, let’s put it that way. Whether or not we can understand how in the Old Testament, too, David’s speech of God’s full redemption, His worldwide universal salvation, has been already accomplished five years, he talks in this form, we should at least understand this.

    The certainty of our faith, the greatness of our faith, the depth of our appreciation of the infinite mercy of God, are directly related to the accomplishment of redemption in its singularity. Focus on what God has done in laying the foundation for us in His great and mighty works. In the Old Testament, we think of the Exodus. In the New Testament, we think of Christ’s exodus. And Jesus’ words for the cross, these things.

    This Jew could see God’s redemptive works as totems of the coming grand final redemption and be praised to God in this manner. How much more should we who see that grand final work of God standing out past as an unshakable monument praise God? If this man has reason to praise God, you have all the more reason to praise Him.

    This man but dealt with shadows. The reality itself has been given to you. You are the beneficiaries. We might make excuses for him, He didn’t have the fullness of it yet. But what excuse can be made for us? Oh, that you praise the Lord for His marvelous kindness, for His wonderful words to us children. Well, we now turn to the body of the psalm, looking at the first picture there given to us, verses four through nine. As I said, the image that dominates is that of the luminous or the graceful.

    The psalmist, in this section, sees the people of God wandering about the desert. Now, these are not ordinary pilgrims. Understand what the psalmist is saying. These are not ordinary pilgrims. Ordinary pilgrims know where they’re going. And these pilgrims don’t know the way to their destination, and they have not made provision enough for their journey. But people, therefore, are described here as lost and do not know their way to the city. Being too long in the desert, they have run out of food. They don’t know where to find the water. Their quarrel is with God because God alone can help. No one else can. So they pray, and they are answered by God’s mercy who saves them by shepherding them into a city of safety. Now, think of it. Think of it as this sorrow is wed in the days of Jesus in synagogues.

    In that day when Israel lives in the land and in the city of Jerusalem, in that time God reveals just how much a wasteland their home is. Having come out of the wasteland of the wilderness, these people are still in a wasteland, they are still in a wilderness. In that situation, he will reveal to these people just how lost they are, even though they’re living securely in their homes and their buildings, in their towns and their cities. Having enough bread, these people are hungry. Having enough water, these people are thirsty. Knowing the way to Jerusalem and to the temple, they are lost.

    But Jesus says that he has come to seek and to save that which is lost. For I am the people of God that brings one who himself is the eternal spring and everlasting breath, and this one provides sufficient portion for the multitude that will come of me.” He says on one occasion, I am the way, the truer living way, and no one comes to my Father’s house, to my Father himself but by me. Therefore, when the sons of men are called upon to thank the Lord, they now must do so He has made plain to them just how lost they are, but sought them out in their lostness, and is the means of their deliverance.

    Such a picture sees the people confined in darkness, sees them confined as keeping a dungeon and in prison. We’re talking here about verses ten through sixteen. And in this instance, specific mention is made concerning the reason for their imprisonment.

    They have rebelled against God, bringing to mind the captivity. They are walled up in darkness. A darkness that is permeated with the honest threat of death, and that death is imminent. People are terrified, they’re chained, they’re helpless. Due to the powers of their own presence, and now in this hopeless and helpless state, they cry to God. And yet again, their crowd is more piercing, more filled with anguish than any herd in Egypt or in Babylon.

    For even one sitting in Judea, beneath one’s own fig tree, one is in prison. He is in Greek bondage. Even there, the stifling threat, the ominous darkness are felt. While proclaiming himself to be free, we have gained bondage to no man. He is chained, and how great is his slavery. But Jesus is coming. to set the prisoner free. For freedom, we have been set free.

    Galatians 5.1. If the sun makes you free, then you shall be free indeed. The darkness then vanished, light pouring in. No earthly or spiritual oppressor can restrain this liberation. Gates of bronze shatter, bars of iron snap. He sets the prisoner free. The third picture, verses 17 through 22.

    And here the people are described as sick, but it’s worse than that. They are sick fools. They are sick unto death, but they are devoid of wisdom in their illness. They have brought upon themselves their own condition. And now, rather than there being images with respect to oppression from that, we are faced with a description of the rottenness within. Just as disease rots away the body, so the foolish wickedness of this people takes its toll on them. So sick are the people they can’t eat. Food itself is noxious. Death this time around is not portrayed as lurking in the darkness.

    Instead, it’s a great and mighty city whose gates are even now opening to receive its citizens. The people are drawn to those gates as by a cart, as if they were opening courses. and cries himself to God. He sends his word. My answer is, therefore, this wildness, this death that takes its toll from the heavens, this decay. He sends his word, the word of life, and they are cured. We know who the Word of Life is. He is the Lord Jesus Christ.

    He came to a peaceful manner whom imagined themselves to be well, but Jesus says, come for the sake of the healthy. They don’t need this issue. I have come for the sake of the sick. And he claims, then, that sin sick terminates, makes his people well with spiritual dying, so that all the appearances that pertain to this life are reversed.

    You may be cherishing in the outward man, but you are gaining grace in the inner man unto the day of Jesus Christ. Jesus makes us live. The last verse is 23 through 32, maybe the most famous. Here the people of God are portrayed as accompanying saviors and worshipers.

    For them, these sailors and merchants, if you will, for them the sea cannot be avoided, and war and life can be avoided. Sailors and merchants of this divine cannot avoid life on the sea. We can avoid life. These have no choice but to face it and to cross the sea.” But what of the sea? The sea is the place of chaos, instability, uncertainty, disruption. Never is man’s life so tenuous as when he’s on the sea. And in this sea-like existence, the people of God then meet all life’s fury.

    It’s a fury unmatched by anything in creation. In fact, it is a supernatural fury that is unleashed, like that of Philip’s son. Chaos and uncertainty are then raised to their power. God’s people are the rest men of their senses. Although land-bound—the Jews weren’t a sea-carrying people—although lands bound with their feet well anchored on terra firma, these people, the people of God, are adrift. The abyx self gapes around them. Hell opens its mouth beneath them. The raging powers of the deep rise to indulge them. But God rules the sea, and he stills the storm. He conquers the chaos and shoves aside uncertainty, doubt, fear, trouble, distress. He buries his people’s sin with the host of hell and seeds, and in his eternal kingdom These sins are never known again. Do you remember Jesus in the boat? The boat was on the sea, but it raged against him and his little church. His disciples said to him, don’t you care that we perish?

    And the raging monster dies away. And God’s people are brought to their desiring end. With Christ in the Lord, the little church sails for home and rides safely against all that it wants. A company of widows Testament planets, little children. Accompany the weak, forsake them, be amazed.

    The song now sung by the faithful magnifies the grace of the Lord. Such a song the elders wish to hear from the people of God. They are mentioned here, the verse 32. For such a song exhibits the wisdom of the kingdom of God and demonstrates that those who sing it have experienced God’s goodness.

    Truly, for these people, The Lord whom they hymn, about whom they sing, the Lord whom they praise, the Lord whom they extol, He, at reveal, finally, fully, Christ, is their chef, their livery, their physician, their pot. The question is, do we know Him? And will we praise Him? for his marvelous works, his incredible demonstrations of grace and kindness. If we know him, if we know the shepherd, the livery, the physician, the pilot, let us give thanks to the Lord for his mercy and for his wonderful gifts to his people. Amen. So, that’s it.

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

  • Two Souls Knit Together

    Two Souls Knit Together

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, February 18, 1990.

    About this sermon

    Saul, Jonathan, and David each carry real symbolic weight here, in a sermon that doubles as a case for reading the Old Testament redemptive-historically rather than merely morally. Jonathan’s soul knit to David’s, in the covenant language of chapter 18, pictures a bond that goes beyond ordinary friendship. Christ himself stands behind David in that pattern.

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    Sermon transcript

    Now, when Saul saw David going out against the Philistine, he said to Abner, the commander of the army, Abner, whose son is this young man? And Abner said, By your life, O king, I do not know. The king said, You inquire whose son you did. So when David returned from killing the Philistine, Abner took him and brought him before Saul with the Philistine’s head in his hand. And Saul said to him, Whose son are you, young man? And David answered, I am the son of your servant Jesse, the Bethlehemite.

    Now it came about when he had finished speaking to Saul that the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David. And Jonathan loved him as himself. And Saul took him that day and did not let him return to his brother’s house. Then Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David with his armor, including his sword and his bow and his belt.

    So David went out wherever Saul sent him and prospered. And Saul sent him over the men of war. And it was pleasing in the sight of all the people and also in the sight of Saul’s servants. And it happened as they were coming, and David returned from killing the Philistine, that the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing to meet King Saul with tambourines, with joy and with musical instruments. And the women sang as they played, and it said, Saul has slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands.

    Then Saul became very angry, for this saying displeased him. He said, they have ascribed to David ten thousands, but to me they have ascribed thousands. Now what more can he have but the kingdom? And Saul looked at David with suspicion from that day on. Now it came about on the next day that an evil spirit came from God mightily upon Saul And he raged in the midst of his house, while David was playing the harp with his hand, as usual, and a spear was in Saul’s hand. And Saul hurled the spear, for he thought, I will pin him, I will pin David to the wall.

    But David escaped from his presence twice. Now Saul was afraid of David, for the Lord was with him. but he had departed from Saul. Therefore Saul removed him from his presence and appointed him as a commander of a thousand, and he went out and came in before the people. And David was prospering in all his ways, for the Lord was with him. When Saul saw that he was prospering greatly, he credited him. But all Israel and Judah loved David, and he went out and came in before them.

    So tonight we are engaging in a little experiment, a little experiment in interpretation. And the focus of this experiment will be verse 1 of chapter 18. Now it came about when he had finished speaking to Saul that the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him after himself. Now, there are a couple of reasons for this experiment.

    One is to place before you, in a capsule-like way, an example of the kind of approach that I have been taking to the scriptures since I arrived in this pulpit in 1976. Now, you may not have caught up to me yet. You might not quite understand what I’m doing. And if you feel that way, don’t think that you’re alone. When I first arrived here, I, of course, was privileged to have in my congregation my aunt. Well, that may have been a dubious privilege because you see my aunt was a lifelong speech teacher and she knew what made for good speeches so she must have sat in her pew for over a year trying to figure out what my method of speaking was I didn’t have the traditional three points And I didn’t have the appropriate summations and applications at the end of each point.

    And it just didn’t seem to fit. Just didn’t seem to square with what she was used to. But she tells me she persevered. And she hears what I say and hangs with me. She picks up the transitions in the message and is able to pick out the main points, which invariably are few. There are few main points in the messages that I give. Actually, believe it or not, the outlines to my sermons are very simple.

    That is another instance, you know that We did assimilate some from Oakdale and one of those was Sharon Crowley. And Sharon also had her troubles when she first came here to Grace Church. She would sit and listen and she would puzzle and peruse and reflect and conclude, what in the world is he talking about? She decided that She wasn’t going to let me get the best of her. So she started bringing pen and pencil and pad and started taking notes and endured that first year and it got easier and easier for her to grasp.

    The experiment interpretation, and I like to do this periodically so that we have sort of a refresher course, and this passage offers us a very, very clear example and a relatively easy text to demonstrate what I’m all about when I preach. My purpose is to for this passage now, in terms of the covenant, and in terms that will draw out for us its rich testimony to Christ and His Church. You could say that that is the motto for my preaching. If you add to that little formula the glory of God, you have it all. My intent is that you might know God better, that you might see Christ more clearly, that you might grab hold of the covenant more tightly, and that from the texts that we have in Scripture, be it Old Testament or New. If you want a little help in understanding better this approach to scripture, you may want to check out of the library the first volume of S. G. DeGrasse’s four-volume work, Promise and Deliverance, and read his little introduction. Because in that introduction, he sets out this method of preaching and teaching for you.

    All right, enough of the introduction. The first focus that I want you to see in this passage is the figure of Jonathan. Jonathan. Who is Jonathan? Now, if you say he is the son of Saul, you have certainly said the truth. But have you said all that can be said? See, that’s where we start to dig. That’s where we start to ponder and reflect. Jonathan is truly the son of Saul.

    But he is more than just the son of Saul. Abstracting it a little bit, he is the son of the king. He is the son of the king of Israel. This throne is different than all thrones, this king is different than all kings, and this son is different from all sons of royalty. The throne in view is nothing less than that throne that belongs uniquely, not to Saul, but to God. And the one who sits upon that throne is brought into a unique relationship to the God whose throne it is.

    As son of the King, this one is heir. Every time you see son, translate heir. Every time. Now, think about that for a minute. Here’s a lesson for you. Son of God. Heir of God. the inheritor of God, son of man, heir of man. All that is man. All right. This one, then, who is the son of the king, is the heir to the throne. He is heir to that which that throne symbolizes, indicates.

    You could say that this one, Jonathan, is entitled to the title Son of God, because of his proximity to the throne that belongs to God. In the Old Testament, There are occasions where the kings of Israel are called the Son of God. Solomon is called the Son of God. There are psalms in which that title is applied to David in light of the eventual coming of David’s seed and greater son.

    Son of God. who is Jonathan, son of Saul, but also son of God, and as son of God, like unto Christ, a Christ-like figure, a Christ figure, if you will. We see in Jonathan an anticipation of the figure All right, if Jonathan is a Christ figure, who then is Saul? Jonathan is Saul’s son, Saul himself is upon the throne that is proximate to God, the throne that is bound to God uniquely. Yes, don’t shy away from it. If you’re leaping ahead here in the analysis, if Jonathan can be compared to Christ, then Saul can, yes, be compared to God, God himself. He is a lord over God’s kingdom, seemingly at this point. He is a king who is bestowing kingdom blessings and meeting out the inheritance. He is seen in the role of God himself, and he is to be disciplined by that role. As is God, so should be Saul. Therefore, in Israel’s king and in the king’s son we have a picture of God and of God’s son.

    Now if Jonathan is like Christ and Saul is like God, who is David? Who is David in relationship to them? promote how the passage develops. You see how in verse 1, Jonathan’s life, as it were, his soul is knit to David, he loves David as himself, he is bound to him. Think of what then Christ is bound to. When you are trying to understand David in relationship to Jonathan, Jonathan being the Christ figure. Go with it a bit.

    Saul takes David that day and doesn’t let him return to his father’s house. Why, it is as if David has now been made a son in the house of Saul. He has been, as it were, adopted. Former house, he doesn’t belong there, he now belongs with Saul and his household.

    So this union that exists between Jonathan and David, this bond that exists between Saul and David as David is brought into the house by Ruth of adoption, in this relationship David’s devotion to Saul displaces his devotion to his natural father. The description now of what takes place in the relationship between Jonathan and David. For Jonathan, the son, is bound in a remarkable way, spelled out for you in this text, to the one who has become a son. The son, the son, is bound to a son. Now look at the way in which this bond is explained for us.

    This covenant brings David into such relationship to Jonathan that it seems as if they are together in a way that they are inseparable. Whatever is Jonathan’s is David’s. David becomes an heir with Jonathan to all that Jonathan shall in fact lay claim to. And Jonathan withholds nothing from David because Jonathan loves David as himself. Nothing will be denied or kept back from David. So great is Jonathan’s love for him. David is thus exalted by root of this union with Jonathan to share in all things with him.

    Look what happens. Jonathan actually humbles himself for the sake of David. He takes off his robe and gives him his royal dress. Verse 4, he gives him the royal robe. Not only does he give him the robe, he gives him his armor, his sword, his bow, and his belt. He gives him all his implements indicative of his power, his pride, and his karate.

    David is exalted by root of this union with Jonathan to share all things with him. And now, David himself becomes a royal figure, an heir of all things, and he fights in Jonathan’s strength, with Jonathan’s armor, his sword, and his bow, and his belt. And David then is commissioned as a servant of the king. and he prospers under the eye of his son. Why, if Jonathan is the Christ, and Saul is as God, then David is as the believer, a son of God. And what every son of God is destined to have is seen in what David gains through the exaltation that comes to him by root of the humiliation, or the humbling, of Jonathan, the great prince.

    Why, it’s the gospel. And in this picture of the gospel for you, Jesus Christ is preached to you in the figure of Jonathan. And hardly ever in no testament has it been preached more eloquently. There are few as great as Jonathan. And let’s see just how good he is. So our first point here is the figure of John. The second point is, you guessed it, the figure of David.

    Because it isn’t adequate to just go through the story with Jonathan as the Christ. Because Jonathan isn’t the Christ. And in this picture, ultimately, he will not be the final picture of Christ. So we have to read the story again. from a little different point of view. This time focusing on David. Who is David? if we start now thinking about him, walking through the passage with our eye focusing upon him. Well, what’s gone before? Two instances of great significance.

    One, David has been anointed by Samuel. Saul has proved himself unworthy not once but twice, and God has commanded the prophet Samuel to go and anoint David in Saul’s stead. David is the secret and hidden anointed one of the law. He is truly the heir apparent to the throne. in Saul’s place.

    But not only that, we also have the story of David fighting against the giant. And the giant is the epitome of all the forces of wickedness, as if the very powers of hell were resident in Goliath. And David has been triumphant over him, and he has vanquished the enemy He has slain the giant, he has been victorious over the powers of hell, over the powers of wickedness. So now, David is ascending to his rightful place, and that in keeping with the ancient prophecy.

    Saul was of the tribe of Benjamin. But the ancient prophecy given by Jacob in the 49th chapter of Genesis tells us that the scepter shall not depart from Judah. Judah is the one who is destined to reign, and David is coming from the tribe of Judah. Therefore, David is the rightful heir to the throne, the true son, and the veritable son of God.

    Here he is, though entitled, though veiled. And along this line, then, we move from seeing Jonathan as the Christ figure to seeing David as the Christ figure, and that’s par excellence. But if David is the Christ who is Saul, Now, we might want to hold out along the lines of what we’ve already established, that Saul is to be viewed positively as God himself, but we see in relationship to David, as David becomes the Christ, Saul is no longer a positive figure, he’s a negative figure.

    He stands over against. David. He is failing in his kingship. His kingdom is going to be taken away from him. So God has told him through Samuel. His anointing has been rejected. He is being removed. When it came time to fight the Philistines and face the champion of the Philistines, where was Saul? He was shaking in his tent. And the little shepherd boy, the one who was the embodiment of weakness, proved to be the deliverer.

    So, Saul, not a positive figure now, but a negative figure. One rejected by God, one who is ignorant of David, even after the battle he’s asking questions. sends Abner to find out who he is. And in time now, as the story progresses, as we’ve read, he becomes David’s sworn enemy, set upon destroying him. Did you know, for instance, in verse 11 of chapter 18, when Saul hurls the spear at David, the literal translation of his words there are these, I will pierce David to the wall. Did that give you a clue?

    The piercing of the Son of God? And who is responsible for the piercing of the Son of God? Who sets himself to destroy the Son of God? No, it’s not specifically Satan, though Satan is at work. It is Israel. Israel in his apostasy. Saul becomes a picture of the eventual state of Israel, when Israel rejects the cross and sets a course upon destroying God’s Christ. So then, if David is the Christ and Saul is apostate Israel, Who is Jonathan?

    Going through the grid from this point of view. Jonathan recognizes David immediately. Immediately. He witnesses what happens to Goliath when David fights And everything clicks. Everything makes perfect sense to Jonathan. Though there may be a veiling of the glory in this shepherd boy, in this child without any apparent claim to the throne, Jonathan sees it immediately.

    He recognizes David as if by a ministry of the Spirit within him. and he is bound to this one and he loves him as himself. This one has become David’s champion. I’m sorry, this one has become Jonathan’s champion. David has become Jonathan’s champion. Jonathan in this relationship to David now becomes as a son and is knit to the son. Before, Jonathan was the son, David was a son, but now David is the son and Jonathan is a son.

    Jonathan, then, who has privilege, Jonathan who has rightful claim, Jonathan who has everything, surrenders everything. No one ever had more. He is heir to the throne, to a throne in this world, and he surrenders it all to the one whose claim is greater. In fact, he gives away everything for the sake of this one that he loves. In the former picture, David was the picture of the believer.

    In this picture, Jonathan has become the picture of the believer, whose faith and love is set solely upon the Lord’s true anointed one. If Saul is apostate Israel, Jonathan is true Israel, faithful, faithful Israel, who finds life in Christ. In many ways, Jonathan anticipates a New Testament figure, one that bears his name, John the Baptist, who says in John 3.30, he must increase, I must decrease. We may well start by seeing Jonathan as a picture of Christ, but we end by seeing David as the picture of God’s Son. We may well start seeing David as the picture of the believer, but we end with Jonathan being the picture.

    Here’s how it works itself out. We have in this brief passage then, a picture of the Messiah in Jonathan, and what the Messiah gives When we look at Jonathan and his role as Messiah in this passage, we concentrate specifically upon what the Messiah gives to the believer.

    He gives exaltation, royal privilege, sonship, power, honor, glory. He gives all those things. just as Jonathan gave to David. But as we look at the picture a second time, the passage a second time, we see here a picture of the Messiah as it relates to David, and what in fact the Messiah gave. What a blessing blessed gain it is, a throne, exaltation to be sure, power over enemies, the ability to please God, to please the people that belong to Him.

    The picture of the Believer, insofar as it relates to David, paints for us what the Believer gives. And the picture also given us here of the Believer in relationship to Jonathan is of what the Believer gives. There remains the figure of Saul, the great ambiguity of history. In him we see the privilege of Israel, brought nigh unto God. but who through pride and envy is judged and cast out of the presence of God.

    And finally, we see the covenant. What is the covenant all about, in the end, as this covenant is struck between Jonathan and David? Is it just merely a contractual arrangement a legal document signed by both. It is a binding and a living of souls. So that the life of the one becomes the life of the other. That’s the nature of covenant.

    The language is repeated for you twice. verse 1 and verse 3, so that you don’t miss the point. How is it between God and his people, Christ and his church? Christ makes his life yours. He humbles himself in such a way that everything to which you are subjected, He subjects Himself and that in life, in order that you might be exalted and come to have that station, that standing, that enjoys every blessing that belongs to Him. His life is knit to yours. You are bound to Him. He has given His all for you, and now you give your all to Him.

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

  • Entering Christ’s Victory

    Entering Christ’s Victory

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, November 20, 1988.

    About this sermon

    Four scenes in Joshua 5 all preach Christ crucified, which shows that the cross runs through every text of Scripture. Grace means entering a victory Christ has already won. Circumcision and Passover both point past themselves to that finished work.

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    Sermon transcript

    This seems to be a way for jumping around. So tonight we did that this morning. We’re doing it again tonight. Joshua chapter five. hear the word of the Lord. Now, it came about when all the kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan to the West, all the kings of the Canaanites who were by the sea, heard how the Lord had dried up the waters of the Jordan before the sons of Israel until he had crossed, that their hearts melted and there was no spirit in them any longer. because of the sons of Israel. At that time, the Lord said to Joshua, make for yourselves with knives and circumcise again the sons of Israel the second time. So Joshua made for himself with knives and circumcised the sons of Israel and give the app are low.

    And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them. All the people who came out of Egypt who were males, all the men of war, died in the wilderness along the way after they came out of Egypt. For all the people who came out were circumcised, but all the people who were born in the wilderness along the way as they came out of Egypt had not been circumcised. For the sons of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness until all the nation, that is, the men of war who came out of Egypt, perished Because they did not listen to the voice of the Lord, whom the Lord had sworn that he would not let them see the land which the Lord had sworn to their fathers to give us a land flowing with milk and honey. And their children, whom he raised up in their place, Joshua circumcised. For they were uncircumcised because they had not circumcised them along the way.

    Now, it came about when they had finished circumcising all the nation. there that they remained in their places in the camp until the appeal. Then the Lord said to Joshua, Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from so the name of the place is called Gilgal to this day.

    While the sons of Israel camped at Gilgal, they observed the Passover on the evening of the fourteenth day of the month on the desert plains of Jericho. And on the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land, unleavened cakes, and parched grain. And the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten some of the produce of the land. So the sons of Israel no longer had manna, but they ate some of the yield of the land of Cana during that year.

    Now it came about when Joshua was at Jericho. that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing opposite him with a sword drawn in his hand, and Joshua went to him and said to him, Are you for us or for our adversaries? And he said, No, rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord. Joshua fell on his face to the earth and bowed down and said to him, What has my Lord to say to his servant? And the captain of the Lord’s host said to Joshua, Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is full. And Joshua did so. Our Lord, your word has gone out into the earth. Servants have been raised up by you in keeping with the prayers of your people. And as there is to be that harvest throughout the earth, there is also the harvest gathered here. So, Lord, now, by your word, life is imparted. Change comes. for those formerly under the shadow of death and life is granted.

    We thank you, our God, for by grace we have been saved. Your word has come to us and we have received it, that because of the workings of your spirit in our hearts. And now our father We are delighted to live before you. And we pray that the new life granted us may be manifest to all. We pray, our Lord, that you will be gracious in forgiving our sins, for they are many. And that our eye may continually, by your word, be directed to the cross of Christ. What through Christ and his sacrifice. Now we have been forgiven. We have been reconciled unto you. With these things in mind, our God, we approach your word now, expecting fully your blessing for Jesus’ sake. Amen.

    I’ve been interested in this passage for a couple of months now. I had the opportunity to hear a message preached on this text some time ago by a young man aspiring to the ministry, presenting himself before the presbytery as a candidate for licensure. I was quite distressed by his presentation, even though we did pass him. And the reason for that was because we heard so little about Christ. As we worked our way through the text with him, it became apparent to me that his background, his training with regard to preaching, had not emphasized the fact that we are compelled to proclaim our Savior. from that we find not only in the New Testament, but in the Old Testament as well.

    I would hope that that is apparent to you. Those who have been with me for some time now realize that I am pressed to preach Christ and him crucified. I am pressed to preach the gospel from every text that we find in Scripture. And I hope that it is apparent to you as well, that I am not here imposing upon the text a meaning that it did not intend. But rather, to preach the text aright, we must relate that text to our Savior, to Christ.

    My method may become predictable after a while. It might even put you to sleep. But I ask you to consider your Savior and ask yourself the question, can I actually doze off while my Savior is being presented to me? And that’s from the various portions of the Word of God. It is then your love of Christ that focuses your attention as you read various texts. It is your devotion to Him.

    And the preacher or various preachers may well wear you out. You might become so used to their style and approach to things that it all becomes quite ordinary after a while. But please, as you think about that you think about various passages portions of Scripture. Be impressed. With your Savior. Hear him see him. And as you were alive to him real. How he is there revealed. For you.

    Well here we are in the book of Joshua We actually have four episodes here for segments for divisions for this passage we read this evening. We have, first of all, verse one, which tells us something about the stress of the Amorites and the Canaanites. Then versus two through nine, which tell us about the renewal of the covenant. and the circumcision that takes place there at Gilgal. Thirdly, in verses ten through twelve, we have the renewal of the Passover or the sacramental meal. And then, fourthly, verses thirteen through fifteen, the introduction of this mysterious figure the one who identifies himself as the captain of the post of the Lord.

    At each juncture in this passage, we will be confronted with the old as we are face-to-face with the new. Now, if that doesn’t bring before you the consideration of Christ. It certainly should. For all of these segments, each in turn, will present you with that finally to be realized in the ministry of Jesus Christ, your Lord.

    First of all, the distress of the Amorites and the Canaanites. We read of how they have heard of the coming of the sons of Israel. We read of how their hearts melted and there was no longer any spirit in them. These Amorites of Canaanites, here spoken of, are those tribes in which evil, if you will, is being perfected. In these tribes, we are seeing evil rising to the heights of remarkable consistency. As if there were never more evil people upon the face of the Earth.

    You remember what is said to Abraham in Genesis 15 when God is making covenant with him. He previews for Abraham what is going to take place for him and his children. As he makes mention of the land that is promised to Abraham that land of Canaan, in which Abraham is presently a pilgrim and sojourner.

    He tells him that the wickedness, the evil of the Amorites, is not yet complete. So the Amorite tribes, the Canaanite tribes, now have reached that point in which there is, if you will, a perfection of evil. a perfection of evil discernible in them. Well, as I said, each of these segments of this chapter will push us on to further consideration. For as there has been this perfection of evil in these trials, there is then a comparison that is established between them and the demonic forces that stand behind them. We think of the quaking of these tribes as the sons of Israel, or the sons of God, enter into the inheritance promised. But we also think of the shaking, the quaking of demonic forces as the kingdom of God makes its entrance into this land years later. And those demonic forces are given voice. Spare us. We recognize who you are. We tremble before you. The day has not yet arrived. Has it? are completely and utterly overthrown.

    Thus it is that these tribes are brought into line with forces and powers which stand behind them. These tribes are speaking of a perfection of evil. and comparable to demonic forces which shudder at the advance of the kingdom of God, Jesus Christ at the head. What about us as we translate these matters into circumstances which we face.

    We don’t wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, spiritual wickedness in high places. Ephesians chapter six, verse twelve. The old, the old here preaching to even those who experienced it then, of something yet to be realized, and that coming in the ministry of Jesus Christ for the benefit of the people identified with him. With that one, with his kingdom, an entourage of those united to him by faith, making advance not against bastions in which flesh and blood dwell, but making advance against the heavens themselves, in which now wickedness has been entrenched, but is to be displaced due to the marvelous work of our Savior. We may well find ourselves trembling before forces arrayed against us, flesh and blood. But the message you see of the New Testament is spiritual wickedness has now been discomfited by the advance of our Lord.

    And you always reason from the greater to the lesser. If, in fact, the spiritual forces have been discomfited, and we need not fear them, they being the greater, then you need not fear flesh and blood arrayed against you. Why are you afraid of mere men? You need not even fear devils. Alright, the first installment from chapter five, the second being the account of the circumcision at Gilgal, verses two through nine.

    Once more, the experience itself, we won’t reiterate the experience, we won’t go over it again, we’ve read it, But you see, that experience presses us on to something else. There’s a marvelous complication within the text. You see, those who have received the sign of the covenant, those who are identified to be identified by it, are here very realistically portrayed for us, and actually truly as the uncircumcised. The circumcised are the uncircumcised. Now, there’s a definite literalness to all of this. They were to be circumcised, they weren’t, and they have become the uncircumcised. There’s a spiritual lesson, of course, being read out to us here. And if those who were the circumcised were in fact the uncircumcised, those who were to be the purified, those who were to be the holy, are the unsanctified, those who are unclean. So we move from the old into the new.

    Given to us here, as the covenant is renewed, and the nation submits itself afresh to the covenantal right. any later day. There will be a nation of the circumcised. But though they bear that mark of the covenant, the truth of the matter is that they are the uncircumcised in light of the arrival of the final administration of God with regard to his There is not merely then that transaction at the Jordan in the days of Joshua, there is that transaction at the Jordan in the days of John the Baptist, in the times of Christ himself. And in that time, though circumcised, the nation will in fact be, spiritually speaking, uncircumcised. It will be necessary for them to submit to a new ministration. By which, then, their sanctification, their separation unto God, will be declared.

    We are told here in Chapter five, that it was at this time that the reproach of Egypt was removed from Israel. But it says, if Egypt itself is able to move from place to place in the considerations of the word, not just that geographical land there to the east and in the southern part of the Mediterranean world. But that land of Egypt able them to move into the territories of Canaan itself. There is a reproach yet of Egypt that is resident within the land of promise. Israelites become Egyptians.

    They in need of plenty and we do. Beyond them, that land which itself is corrupt and the administration appropriate to it. We are brought to a greater inheritance, one demanding a final administration through sacramental song. On to our participation in the realities of. As we have moved from the circumcision to circumcision. In the framework of this older administration, so now there is that movement from circumcision. As indicative of that entire older administration to baptism. And what that signifies for us. a cleansing appropriate for entrance into the final inheritance of God. And that effected by one none other than Christ and the spirit of our Christ on our behalf. Installment to circumcision at Gilgal. installment three, the Passover versus ten through twelve.

    We are moving from meal to meal. Progressive. In the very best. There was that meal in Egypt as the nation was delivered. But it seems that they did not keep the meal. During the forty years of the wanderings, they move from meal to meal. There is then that celebration of the Passover as they enter into the land of promise. Moving from meal to meal, in the interim there comes that provision for them. the man of supply. All of this typical of the experience which we ourselves have.

    Are we not also moving from meal to meal? Has not our Lord told us he will not celebrate the feast again with us until he celebrates it anew in the kingdom of his Father? He will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the realization of that time of the great feast celebrated above. We too move from meal to meal from the Passover experience of Jesus Christ on the eve of his crucifixion, to the day in which the feast will be renewed in the kingdom of God above. And until we come to that time, there will be that meal set for us, or that provision rather, that reminds us of the origin of the blessings meted out for us. testifying as well to our inheritance of God.

    So, we move from meal to meal. We move from circumcision to baptism. We move from those physical enemies to the spiritual enemies. All of that being spelled out for us as we work our way through Joshua chapter five, but so as to leave us then. With the impact, the meaning, the significance of all of this, we don’t pass any further along in the story until we are confronted with that one through whom all of these things will be realized. We come to verses thirteen through fifteen, and here so wonderfully, so compellingly, our Lord is portrayed for us. It won’t be just a matter of us moving from enemies in flesh and blood to enemies in the spiritual realm. It won’t be merely a matter of us moving from the right of circumcision, a bloody right at that, to the right of baptism.

    Neither a movement from one meal to the other But this Joshua, as wonderful as he is, must, in the end, give way to another. And so there is the confrontation, as the chapter ends, between this Joshua, appropriate to the administration of Israel, appropriate to an administration of types and shadows, he then giving way. to the beauty, the magnificence of this one to whom he points.

    It is an apocalyptic scene, if you will. A vision, a vision read out before Joshua as he contemplates the city of Jericho there before him. That city speaking to him of all the force and power, the strength, the might of the enemy. How, in fact, is this nation of Israel to displace those who are in place? By what means will Victory be gained.

    The man appears opposite him with sword in hand. Joshua approaches with the question, are you for us or for our adversaries? Then comes the astounding answer. Neither. Here, absolute allegiances are testament. The truth, veracity of perspective is tried. Your understanding, it is scrutinized. We always asking the question, well, Lord, are you on our side or are you not? to which comes the reply. You have a question a little mixed up, don’t you? The question isn’t whether I am on your side, it’s whether you’re on my side.

    So this is a battle in which a nation is being established in a particular part of the world, which it set its eye upon, as if it was just one more marauding band taking up residence in some place it hadn’t before, as if it’s something that we can consider along the lines of how nomadic tribes eventually settled down, found a place for themselves in the world and society progressed, civilization was advanced. The one who is operative here is the Lord. The one who is operative here is the Christ. For his purposes, his plan, his intention, all of these things are working themselves out.

    The question is, are you on his side? Have you in fact surrendered yourself before him? Will you surrender after the manner of Joshua here? Who do you think you are? You actually consider yourself to be one, even as men would assess it. You actually consider yourself to be one as great as Joshua. Joshua is confronted with this one, and he falls down prostrate before him. What is your attitude towards him? How do you react when the Lord Jesus Christ is revealed to you?

    I keep my seat. I’m not moved at all. I’ve heard it all before. If Joshua falls down, As if one as great as Joshua falls down. Have there been times in prayer for you when you felt, look I can’t get low enough? Maybe you said, I don’t need it. But even that didn’t seem to happen. And before you were done with your prayers, you found yourself stretched out literally on the floor, prostrated before your Savior.

    The one who confronts Joshua here identifies himself as the captain of the hosts of the Lord. Now, Joshua could have said, Well, I’m sorry, you’re mistaken. I happen to be the captain. I happen to be the captain of the host of the Lord. But Joshua, even at this point in redemptive history, understand the real life.

    What about the battle that is coming? Will it be won by the armies of Israel? No. Even that is subjected to its own convolution. The battle will not be won by Israel. In fact, they don’t do anything. All they do is march around the walls. All they do is shout and blow trumpets, as if they were attended to some other army, an army not seen, and that’s precisely the point.

    The victory will be won, will be accomplished by this one who has identified himself to Joshua as the captain of the host of the Lord. And Israel and Joshua, this Joshua, will merely enter into that victory. And that is what then, for the experience of Israel and for the experience of the Church, spells grace.

    What about the church’s struggles? What about your struggles? Take it on the grandest scale of the church. The church makes too much of herself if she fails to understand that it is merely a matter of her entering into the triumph that is already affected in Christ.

    That is how the Apostle Paul is able to say In Colossians 1.23, that the gospel has already been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, as if it was an accomplished fact. All he is doing is entering into the accomplishment already taken.

    You in your own personal life, why do you strain? Why do you struggle? Why do you battle so? to the point where you give up five years ago, you surrender to make any difference. I’m going to keep going to church. I’m going to keep playing this role out. I believe Christ is, in fact, the son of God. I will hold on to that.

    But as far as this battle with sin is concerned, forget it. I’m not going to do it anymore. For you on a personal level, it’s no different than it is for the church at that level of the church. The victories and found in your personal struggling and your personal agonizing and all of the plans that you come up with renovating your life and turning over new leaves here and there. It simply isn’t going to. It simply isn’t going to happen. You’re not going to be able to do anything. The victory is already won.

    The testimony to your humility is that you enter into the triumph that is already accomplished for you, and that’s how you give Christ glory. That’s what he wants from you. No amount of your strivings or planning is of any value against fleshly indulgence. That’s the conclusion of Colossians 2.

    The only thing of value is for you to enter into the victory and triumph of Christ, so that you in all humility may affirm that it is all of grace. Now if you want, I don’t want to become a champion of the victorious life syndrome, If you are sensitive to a lack of power in your life with regard to temptation, if you are having difficulties, this is the message, and it’s gospel. It’s all of grace. Let me tell you, it’s good news. It’s good news. prefigured for us here in Joshua chapter five.

    It’s spelled out for us episodically, if you will, as we move from the beginning of that chapter to its conclusion and the end, focusing upon this mysterious figure. And in the fullness of God’s revelation, we know who he is. Jesus Christ, the son of God, the captain of the hosts aboard. whose victory for us is efficacious, and we praise him for this. Let’s pray.

    How we thank you, our God, for the revelation given us through your servants of old, and your servant who gave to us this record of the times of Joshua. How wonderfully, marvelously your spirit is at work to open our eyes so that these stories are opened up to us and we are able to perceive in them the pattern of the passage of the old or the passing of the old and the dawning of the new. How wonderfully, then, the gospel, the New Age, Jesus Christ, our Savior, are portrayed for us. May we, Lord, in keeping with the power found with you, live in the fullness of that revelation that has been given to us, so that despite the struggles, we will realize that victory is won. And by grace we have been invited to participate in that triumph. We thank you our God. Build our faith

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

  • Shame Borne, Intimacy Gained

    Shame Borne, Intimacy Gained

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, May 29, 1988.

    About this sermon

    David’s own shame runs through Psalm 25, met by the intimacy with God promised in verse 14 to those who fear him. Christ has already borne the shame of all the elect, which is what makes that intimacy possible at all. The same order holds in marriage and family: husbands, wives, and children love each other best by loving God first.

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    Sermon transcript

    Let my enemies exalt over me. Indeed, some of those who wait for thee will be ashamed. Let, excuse me. Indeed, none of those who wait for thee will be ashamed. Those who deal treacherously without cause will be ashamed. Make me know thy ways, O Lord. Teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth and teach me For Thou art the God of my salvation. For Thee I wait all the day. Remember, O Lord, Thy compassion and Thy lovingkindnesses, for they have been from of old. Do not remember the sins of my youth or my transgressions. According to Thy lovingkindness, remember Thou me. For Thy goodness sake, O Lord.

    Good and upright is the Lord. Therefore he instructs sinners in the way. He leads the humble in justice, and he teaches the humble his way. All the paths of the Lord are loving kindness and truth to those who keep his covenant and his testimonies. For thy name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity for it is great.

    Who is the man who fears the Lord? He will instruct him in the way he should choose. His soul will abide in prosperity, and his descendants will inherit the land. The secret of the Lord is for those who fear him, and he will make them know his covenant. My eyes are continually toward the Lord, for he will pluck my feet out of the net.

    Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted. The troubles of my heart are enlarged. Bring me out of my distresses. Look upon my affliction and my trouble, and forgive all my sins. Look upon my enemies, for they are many, and they hate me with a violent hatred. Guard my soul and deliver me. Do not let me be ashamed. for I take refuge in thee. Let integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I wait for thee.

    Redeem Israel, O God, out of all his troubles.” Let’s pray together. Again, Lord, we ask that your word would be all that you have intended it to be for us. May it be a spring so that we are refreshed, a table so that we are nourished, a light so that we can see our way properly. All of this, Lord, we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

    Psalm 25 speaks much about shame, or being ashamed. You note the first verses of the psalm, especially verses 2 and 3, how they speak about the threat of shame, the reality of shame, in the following slide. But also the conclusion of the song. There’s twenty. Where this theme is again mentioned. Do not let me be ashamed for I take refuge in the. David.

    Is in distress. And he prays to the Lord in his distress. And that distress, though there are many aspects to it, involves this matter of shame. In the ancient world, in the world that David knew, even that world which our Savior knew, There was nothing, nothing more distressing than public exposure or public humiliation. And that’s what is in view as David speaks. Public dishonor, public opprobrium, public shame. As David prays that he be spared shame, he also is setting his heart upon his God, who alone is his hope.

    There is then that which sustains him. In his present circumstance, in his distress, and you will know. How he speaks about that which sustains him. Verse fourteen. The secret of the Lord is for those who fear him, and he will make them to know his covenant. Here is then. That present point. That is applied. To the circumstances which David faces.

    In the midst of his distress with the threat of shame surrounding him. He finds his solace in this truth that God is near to those who fear him, who serve him, who reverence him. And to those who do fear him and reverence him, the Lord is pleased to make known to them his covenant.

    The language used in this fourteenth verse is that of intimacy, and intimacy with God. First of all, with regard to the matter of the secret of the Lord. To whom belonged the secret of the Lord? Why, the secret of the Lord, or the counsel of the Lord, belonged to the prophets. For to the prophets, the Lord had revealed his purposes and his intentions. But now, David, speaking as if for all of God’s people, talks of an intimacy that exists with God that might be thought to belong to the prophets alone.

    Not so! The secret of the Lord is for those who fear him. Actually, the prophets in the Old Testament were understood in different ways from which we have come to understand. The prophet in the Old Testament was one who was welcomed into the council chambers of God there to receive from God and understanding of the things that were taking place in the world, and would surely take place in the world, as well as that pure and proper interpretation and instruction that came forth as a result of what God was doing.

    But here, David speaks in such a way so as to encourage all. In the midst of distress, with the threat of shame hanging there surrounding us, yet our solace is in an intimacy with God, an intimacy that is described in terms of that intimacy that is peculiar to the prophets.

    They, in this respect, know greater than we For we as well know the secret of the Lord. So tightly bound is God with his people. Here, then, is the language of fellowship. Here is the language of covenant, which the second line of that fourteenth verse makes plain. What is covenant but intimacy, relationship, union, if you will, the union of the parties in view, God and his people, so that nothing is hid from the people.

    How wonderfully it is stated by David. How much this becomes the focus of true religiosity, the true religious life, true piety in scripture. That desire for God’s nearness, that He would be near to us, that He would be near to me, that I would walk with Him, have fellowship with Him, that there would be that union between Him and me, between Him and us. But with what reverence does David treat this subject? What glory surrounds his prayer and his words here?

    To be sure, in our own time, there is much talk about being near to God. We have become so adept at the use of that language that we have developed a familiarity with God that even breaks ranks with the sentiments and the spirit of David as he speaks. God is a chum. He’s a friend. He’s a buddy. He’s like our counselor at summer camp. Thus we breed into this matter of our relationship with God a triviality, a benality. God becoming so familiar that His glory is compromised, His majesty is even denied, and the awesomeness of His person is lost sight of.

    Yes, the glory of God, His majesty, His awesomeness, and a pure desire that we would be near unto Him, that that relationship which the prophets experienced would be ours, that we would be consumed by our thoughts for Him and our love for Him. I might say that it’s not just this song or the songs that speak about this whole matter of our intimacy with God. In fact, the entirety of Scripture can be approached along these lines. The objective of the biblical revelation is to present to us the story of God’s dealings with man so that man may be rescued and brought back to God, and God enjoy that fellowship with man which he envisioned from the beginning. How many things improve now upon our considerations of what makes for good religion.

    We set our hearts about making the world a better place to live in, and in the process we’ve lost sight of God and a proper passion for Him. It’s as if we love the world more than we love God. Our pursuits are in terms of public legislation and public policy, and so the world intrudes once more.

    And our vision becomes obscure, and our minds become foggy. We can’t think straight anymore. And in the process, God is lost. We busy ourselves with our lives. We run here and there, we pack the kids in the car, we go to ball practice, soccer practice, ballet lessons, whatever else is out there, and somehow we lose sight of God. And our responsibility to Him, our passion, is lost.

    Is Anna Karenina the greatest novel that was ever written? Well, I guess we could have an argument about that. But maybe you remember the story, Anna goes down to St. Petersburg and there she’s introduced to society. And one of the great matrons of St. Petersburg society is observing her and makes the observation, well here is a woman capable of a great passion. Well indeed. We all know how that passion turned out, but in looking at the Christian Church, we looking at ourselves, we too capable of a great passion? What about a passion for God?

    A love for Him that knows no rival, a love for Him that judges all other loves that we have. Him first of all, above all else. As the hard pants for the water brook, so my heart, my soul longs for Thee, O God. I will set God and His Kingdom above all else. His righteousness first, knowing that my Father in Heaven will care for me and take care of every other concern that I have.

    So the pressures mount. Will I, because of those pressures, push aside the Word? Will I, because of those pressures, push aside the opportunity that I have day by day to commune with my God, will I, because of those pressures, push aside the meetings of the Church and my responsibilities to my God in that respect? We allow ourselves every excuse, I’m too tired, I can’t think.

    I pray and I go to sleep. So why try? Oh you who love God, you must. For this matter of your religion isn’t something that works in and of itself. It is a desire cultivated. It is a desire cultivated. And you must cultivate it. You must exercise. You must expend energy. Concentrate upon your devotion to God.

    Love Him. David will bear up in his distresses because he loves God, and God loves him. And he will bear up well because he cultivates that relationship and that passion he has for God, and he is determined that nothing will improve. Yes, there have been sins, and he confesses those. They are put in their place. They will not intrude. For he will seek forgiveness from the one who alone can forgive. David then will bear up by his cultivation of this passion for God. And how we admire David.

    But you know this theme of shame that we mentioned at the beginning is very interesting. And maybe in your mind you have been running ahead of me a little bit because you remember 2 Timothy. And you recall how many times Paul speaks of shame there. But now when Paul speaks of shame, there seems to have taken place some sort of shift, some sort of transition. Something has changed in his approach to things.

    For it seems as we read the psalm, that the circumstances surrounding David were perfectly capable of bringing shame to him. But now, as we read the testimony of Paul in the New Testament, one for whom Christ has now come, one for whom now Christ has revealed himself, one for whom Christ has died and been raised again, now we see that even these circumstances cannot, they cannot bring shame to that one trust. So utterly powerless are they. Oh yes, the shame in David’s day was a problem.

    Spare me the shame. But in Paul’s day, I don’t care if shame comes. For I am persuaded that my God is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against the day. And we still worry about being embarrassed? Come on now, follow the thought. Hang in there.

    David on the plane of this world, worried about the shame that may come to him. He prayed that that shame be removed. He despaired it. But now, because of Christ, that one who bore our shame, that one who became a public spectacle for us, all shame has been removed, and there’s nothing, I say nothing, that can come into your life that can truly bring shame to you in the aisles of your Father. if in fact you are pursuing your love for him according to that revelation that has been given in Jesus Christ. The solace and the concentration point of the heart is still the same as it was for David. A passionate longing for God. and a love for him that knows no rivals at all.

    Please, understand me. You will love your wife well if you love God best. Some of you men need to hear that. You will love your wife well if you love your God best. You do not prove yourself by trading in your love for God for your love for your wife. It’s no good. And you wives will love your husbands well if you love your God best.

    And we can say the same thing about children. How many people interrupt their schedules because their children have pressing duties that interfere with responsibilities to God. And for the sake of these children and our love for them, we defer to the children and forget God. God will understand, our children won’t.

    No, no. And you know it. You know it. Well then. Distress is, yes. The threat of shame, for sure. But in the center of it all, First of all, above all else, my passion and love for God. Amen. Help us, Lord, We are driven to you. But if driven to you, then let us enjoy the fellowship, the nearness that we have with you and to you. And may that communion and union that exists between you and us fly. O Lord, to the good of our souls, to the glory of your name, for the exaltation.

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

  • Missions and God’s Own Name

    Missions and God’s Own Name

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, August 21, 1977.

    About this sermon

    Missions has real roots in the Old Testament, contrary to the modern church’s assumption that it begins at Pentecost or the Great Commission. Isaiah 42’s servant song sets the proper aim: not church growth or cultural influence, but God’s own name sanctified among the nations. Three conclusions follow from that aim, each measuring missions against the same standard.

    More sermons from Isaiah · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    a text for my new exegesis of these things. So, Isaiah 42, verse 9, verses, “…behold, my servant whom I have hold, my chosen one in whom my soul delights, I have put my spirit upon him, and he will bring forth justice to the nation.” He will not cry out or raise his voice, nor make his voice heard in the street. A bruised green he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not extinguish. He will faithfully bring forth justice. He will not be disheartened or crushed until he has established justice in the earth, and the coastlands will wait expectantly for his law.

    Thus says God the Lord, who created the heavens and stretch them out, who spread out the earth and its offspring, who gives breath to the people on it, the spirit of those who walk in it. I am the Lord. I uphold you in righteousness. I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you, and I will appoint you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the nations, to open blind eyes, to bring out prisoners from the dungeon, and those who dwell in darkness from the prison. I am the Lord. That is my name. I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to graven images. Behold, the former things have come to pass. Now I declare new things. Before they spring forth, I proclaim them to you.”

    Our Father in Heaven, we are asking, as we always do, for the ministry of Your Word to be with power in us, that in hearing the Word, we in our hearts, being humbled, might be willing to obey. Father, put far from us the thoughts of a mindless attention given to Your Word. Instead, our God, may we concentrate our hearts and focus our attention upon what it is You have to say to Your people. us, our Father, in the message of your word, and encourage us, though we find in it many perplexing things. Bless us this evening, Lord, in this period of time in which we concentrate upon what you are saying to us. For Jesus’ sake, amen.

    In the weeks to come, we are going to be looking at the various divisions of the session that I have announced to you, the divisions of worship, education, and mission, and in succession we’re going to try and take these various aspects of the Church and its life and deal with them and try to come to some sort of understanding about what the Scriptures say about these particular areas in the life of our own congregation and the life of the Church at large. We’re not going to take them in that order—worship, edification, and mission. We’re going to reverse them, and we’re going to begin and we’re going to think about mission, and within mission try to understand a little bit more what the nature of evangelism is within the Church, and the obligation that is laid upon the Church evangelistically.

    Now, at the end of these evening services and these messages, I hope to be able to inject some conclusions into some messages that I bring on Sunday morning, and there particularly deal with some practical matters. I hope to take up some practical matters in the area of worship, and as some of you have requested, to concentrate on the area of giving in particular. A number of you have asked for direction in giving. And I hope to be able to give some attention to that area at the conclusion of these messages on Sunday morning.

    Also, we have the perplexing question of Christian education. We are in a unique position in our day. There are certain assumptions, educationally, that are being made by the Church, which may or may not be good things. I’m not in a position to say at this point. But I believe that it would be good for us to take stock of the position of the Church with regard to education and ask ourselves some very pointed questions.

    Now, I don’t want to scare you all away, but to ask such pointed questions as, is the Sunday School really the vehicle most able to carry on the educational ministry of the Church? Or, what about our vacation Bible school program that we have had in our congregation for a number of years, but this year we were unable to have it? Is this a ministry that we should feel obligated to return to, and if we do go back to it, with what attitude should we approach it? What about the area of the Christian school? Is that a proper area to consider?

    In the area of mission, we are particularly concerned with personal witnessing, and I know a number of you have spoken to me on this matter, spoken to me of your concerns with regard to the outreach of our own congregation, and I hope to be able to say something positive about witness Now, with regard to mission, which we take up this evening, I’m breaking this down into these areas.

    Tonight we will be considering mission and the Old Testament. Next week we’ll be considering Jesus and mission, and we will search the Gospels. Then we will take up the difficult portions of this picture. If you don’t think these are difficult, wait until you get to Acts. Acts and mission, the book of Acts, and if that isn’t difficult enough for you, wait until we get to the epistles and consider the subject of mission. And then, finally, we will be taking up mission and the contemporary Church.

    Now, I believe for myself that there is a dilemma in the Church today, in the area of mission, as that encompasses evangelism, and I believe that that dilemma has arisen because the Church has forgotten that its motivation is to arise from the Scriptures and from the Scriptures alone.

    And I get the feeling, often, that there are, in a number of works that have been published on the matter of evangelism and mission, a reading back into the Scriptures themselves, contemporary problems and contemporary situations. so that it isn’t any longer the scriptures that appear to be normative. Rather, it seems that certain circumstances of our day have demanded certain practices or certain ideologies with regard to missions that don’t necessarily flow directly out of scripture, but are arrived at by ingenious methods of induction. Now, I think that there are other things that need to be brought to the attention of the Church. The fact that the net result of this approach to the matter of missions has resulted in a loss of the Bible’s point of view, and also a flattening out of the Scriptures without appreciation for the historical progression of God’s unveiling of himself, so that no matter where one might turn in the Scriptures, he tends there to find proof texts for his own position rather than trying to understand the context in which those texts arise. Now, in this I am, if I seem a little enigmatic at this point, taking some hopshots at a systematic theological approach to the issue of missions. And I know that there are some classic books that have come out in Reformed circles on the matter of evangelism and missions that have not endeavored to trace out the development of the theme of mission scripturally, but rather merely assumed a certain amount of baggage textually with regard to the matter of missions, and they have gone on and presented their arguments without real close examination of the texts that they’re using, and without a sensitivity to the historical context in which those texts appear.

    Now, the tragedy of this, I believe, is that it is laid obligation possibly—I don’t just say possibly at this point, I’m not going to say it too definitely—possibly it is laid obligation on the mass of Christendom that the Scriptures themselves do not lay on the masses of Christendom. and creates within the Church a tension where people are laboring with a guilty conscience for things they shouldn’t have a guilty conscience about, at least in the way in which the contemporary expositor of missions has outlined their obligations. There might be other ways in which they should feel guilty with regards to missions, but very possibly it should not be in the way that contemporary theologians have laid that obligation on the people. Okay, are you with me so far? I hope that just isn’t a lot of excess verbiage. I hope that… I hope we can get through them rather quickly.

    The problem for contemporary mission theology is as much what the Bible says about missions as it is what it doesn’t say about missions. We begin there as a starting off point for our consideration of missions in the Old Testament. I’ll pose a problem. Is there truth a mission or an evangelistic command laid upon Israel. And by that I mean, is there a command in the Scriptures anywhere to be found in the Old Testament that lays upon Israel an obligation to go out to the nations for the purpose of converting them and bringing them within or under the umbrella of God’s covenant. Think about your own testimony. That’s the question. Is there truly a mission command laid upon Israel in that Israel is commanded to go out to the nations for the purpose of converting them.

    The man is to the nation as a whole, yes. All right, let’s take a few verses, for instance. There are those who have suggested I think that this is primarily found in the liberals of the turn of the century. There are those who have turned to the law and seen there verses which they felt were declaring an international brotherhood which laid constraint upon Israelites to indeed bring those who are outside of Israel, within the umbrella of the covenant.

    They would turn, for instance, to the command in Leviticus 19.18, which simply says that we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. That’s addressed to Israel, that the Israelites are to love their neighbors as themselves. And they have understood neighbor in the broadest sense of the word. in terms of an international brotherhood which lays obligation then upon Israel to bring the nations, or to go out to the nations with an eye towards involving them in the worship of the covenant God of Israel.

    Is this text indicative of the purpose of the law? that those outside of Israel might be impressed with Judaism and want to it? Is that the purpose of the law in the Old Testament? Does Israel keep the law in order to win converts, and is there this missionary dimension to the law itself?

    I think if we read that passage as it is in its context, the neighbor there spoken of is the fellow Israelite. The neighbor there spoken of is the person who is already under the umbrella of the covenant, and within that chapter there are particular prescriptions with regard to the stranger who comes into the country, or into the town, or into your house, and how you are to behave towards him. The stranger is the non-Israelite. The neighbor is the Israelite in that commandment.

    What about the psalms? We read, for instance, this morning a psalm that might suggest that Missionary obligation is laid upon Israel. You remember our response of reading this morning, Psalm 96, how it begins, sing to the Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the Lord, bless His name, proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day, tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the people. Now, from a surface reading of that, it seems as if there is obligation then laid upon Israel on the basis of this psalm for them to go out to all of the earth and proclaim God’s glory to all peoples.

    But is this truly an obligation in this psalm laid upon Israel to engage in missionary activities? Much rather, this is a call to Israel to declare God’s glory to the nations that have come to her. You see, it’s not Israel going out to the nations, it is the nations coming to Israel. And then, you see, those nations that have come to Israel are commanded later on in the psalm to come into the courts of the Lord, into His very sanctuary, and when they come, they are to bring an offering with them.

    In view is the day of the new psalm, and this psalm then is prophetic of what shall surely come to pass. It is, in view is the day of salvation when the whole universe will praise God, and that’s how the psalm concludes. Israel is not seen here as going out to the nations, but the nations rather are seen as coming to Israel and to her sanctuary in Jerusalem, to worship the God of Israel as the only God.

    What about the prophets? Now, there are some theories about prophets. A lot of the theory concerning the prophets is that most of the prophets that you have in your scriptures, what they have written, came from the post-exilic age, and actually returned from Babylon, and that the prophetic message developed in contrast to the strict, legalistic, priestly cult that was ruling in Jerusalem. And the prophets were sort of the forerunners of Jewish liberalism. Remember those strict injunctions of the priests and the leaders, Ezra and Nehemiah. And this brought response from the prophets who were motivated, so it is said, by a grander view of God.

    It is suggested then that what we have at the conclusion of Isaiah, chapters 40 through 46, are a missionary obligation laid upon Israel in terms of Israel being the servant of the Lord. who in her task is to take God’s law to the coastlands, and we read about that in Isaiah 42. Indeed, many of the Jews who were contemporary with Jesus understood these portions of the prophets in this manner, but Jesus had some rather scathing things to say about that interpretation of these prophets. And you can read that in Matthew 23, verse 15. These passages concerning the servant of the Lord, though there is application for Israel, certainly focus on the future and the coming of the Messiah. And they are simply, for the most part, reiterating the perspective of the Psalms. It is not Israel that is going out to the nations, but rather the nations that are being gathered to Israel and to Jerusalem itself, and to the sanctuary that is set there. I guess the most perplexing prophet is Jonah. What about Jonah? Isn’t Jonah a missionary book? Is Jonah written to chide Israel for not being missionary-minded?

    Is that the purpose of the book? Much rather, the purpose of Jonah is to set forth the nature of God. that the God of Israel is the God of all the earth. It is to set forth the character of the servant of God, his prophet, or those who would agree with God’s purpose in his kingdom. That purpose is ultimately to bring covenantal blessings to all of the nations. Jonah is a divine warning to God’s people, as God’s people are embodied within Jonah himself. A warning to God’s people for the time when God will send forth His message and His call to the nations. But it is not a chiding of Israel for not being missionary minded, it’s a chiding of in that they do not understand the universal implications of the God whom they worship. If Israel is given no missionary command, what is her relationship to mission?

    Second question, page five. We’re getting there. That was pretty good, wasn’t it, Earl? What is your relationship to mission? Israel’s election is for mission. You remember Abram’s call in Genesis 12? The third verse, how does it read? Genesis 12 verse 3, the very last line, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. Israel’s election is for missions.

    Abram’s call points that out, that the eventual destiny of the election of Israel is in order that all the nations might be blessed, and it is this that the visions of the prophets focus upon in their vision of the coming manifestation of the fullness of the kingdom, which means all the nations then are going to be brought within the umbrella of God’s coming.

    But further than this, Israel’s deliverance—remember her redemption from Egypt? is a picture of mission fulfilled. This is a picture of the gathering of the nations yet to be accomplished. In Israel, the blessings promised to Abraham begin And the blessings to the nations have begun in that Israel is the picture of all the elect, redeemed by the mighty act of God.

    So it is as an exodus that we have a picture of God not just calling to himself one ethnic but a people for his own possession, a people in whom he dwells. Not defined ethnically, but defined religiously. Here, then, as I said, is a picture of the blessing In this sense, then, Moses is rightly compared not only to Jesus Christ in the book of Hebrews, but to the Apostle Paul by Paul himself in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. Moses becomes an Apostle, and in the word of the Apostle, the nations then by the message that he has been ordained to give are drawn unto the God who has made the world and redeemed his people. But this isn’t the final picture, because you know that Israel then goes on to become established. Israel’s establishment in the land is a picture, in some sense, of a continuing mission of the kingdom of God.

    What is the obligation that is laid then upon Israel after it has experienced this redemption and been brought together by God at Simon? It’s the obligation that they themselves, as the peculiar treasure of God, are to keep His law, are to keep His commandments from the heart. You can read of this in Deuteronomy 28, verses 9 and 10. You can also read about it in Exodus 19, verses 5 and 6.

    The continuing mission, then, of the established Israel is not so much focused upon a going out to the nations as it is to the sanctifying of God’s name before all people by keeping his commandments from the heart. Israel, which has become The reason for the blaspheming of God’s name among the nations is chided by Christ indirectly in the Lord’s Prayer, when He, in establishing the new Israel, teaches His disciples to pray, “‘Hallowed be thy name.’” The object, then, of the ministry and the message and the mission, it seems, at least from this particular angle, is that the name of God might be sanctified in the midst of those who have been called. To this end, we might trek through all of the epistles of the New Testament, and in the epistles of the New Testament you will find that it is this image that lies behind Paul’s, John’s James admonition to the Christian churches that have already been established, that in them God’s name is to be sanctified by the kind of life they live in response to what God has done for them. The emphasis of the epistles is not mission in the sense of going out to your neighbors, going out to the ends of the earth, but rather the emphasis of the epistles, it seems to me, is on being the established community in which God’s light is clearly seen through people who obey obediently from the heart God’s commandments.

    We’ll try to take this up a little bit more when we get to mission and the epistles. Now, please try to understand this. This does not mean that I am saying that there is no evangelistic responsibility on the Church of Jesus, nor on you. Nor is it saying that I believe that missions are over with and it’s time for us to be doing something else. What I am trying to do is understand the silence on the matter of mission in the epistles to the Church. and be sensitive to the structure of the Old Testament in seeing as a possible background for that emphasis in the New Testament, certain standards in the situation of Israel. What is the model that stands in the back of the mind of those who write to those Christians in the established churches? Let’s think about the conclusions here for a minute. Basically, I have three. There is no missionary command laid upon Israel.

    At the same time, secondly, Israel is a vehicle of God’s mission to the world through Abraham, and also through his promise to Abraham and through the vision of the prophets, as they foretold the coming day, a blessing to the nations. Israel is a vehicle of God’s mission to the world through Abraham’s promise to Abraham and through the visions of the prophets of the coming blessing and glory to the nations. At the same time, thirdly, Israel is a picture of missions at various stages. In one sense, in picture form, Israel, as the elect, is the nations being redeemed and gathered by God for worship of Him. But more than that, Israel is also those nations established by God in the world.

    It is very possible that when Paul becomes silent with regard to the matter of mission to the Church, that he sees the established Church not so much as the nations being gathered or gathering, as it were, before God, but rather… Excuse me, I’d better go back and start again. It could possibly be that Paul doesn’t see the Church as the nation being gathered in the process of being gathered, or gathering, as it were, in the process of gathering, but rather as gathered already, as already established. The nations gathered already, and with that attitude he approaches the Church.

    I think that you can get a feel for where I’m going. I seem to be wrestling with the problem of the absence of missionary directors to the Churches in the Epistles, trying to account for that. Now, I am not suggesting that what I am going to propose is going to find acceptance with everyone, but I hope that in this we can just be faithful to the scriptures and also try to understand what lies behind this direction struck by the Father. Next week we’ll take up Jesus and mission, how he sees mission in the Gospels.

    Do you have any questions? I know that’s Mark’s clue, but I’m trying to… Alright, okay. I think to a degree that that is true. In fact, I was reading one man this last week who said that the Floss, Professor Michens at the Pre-University of Amsterdam… No, I think that that is probably the right direction. They are the messengers to the world. That is dissolving. So you can trace out that idea of dissolving. I guess you can get a flavor for it in Philippians chapter 2.

    I think that’s a good passage to look at in terms of how Paul preaches the church, possibly on the background of his Old Testament, how he sees the church on the background of the Old Testament. He says, do all things without grumbling and disputing. You know where that came from. that you,” this is verse 14, 15, and 16 of Philippians 2, “…that you may prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God, above reproach, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of faith, so that in the day of Christ I may have cause to glory, because I did not run in vain or toil in vain.” It’s almost like he has the experience of Moses in the back of his mind there, when he portrays his own ministry, giving his instruction to these people. But, you know, when we think about the Church as being light to the world, we usually think of that in terms of mission, but it seems here from this passage that what Paul has in mind is ethical behavior, holiness. Let your light. Right. Matthew 5. Right.

    One kind of comparative defense is that God created man and created man for the purpose of indulgence. And indulgence is God. Man is seemingly God, but it’s indulgence. There’s a whole history of the world in the Scripture that God’s working to bring man back to indulgence. So on his covenant of indulgence for the purpose had its place within that list. I mean, hand it back, oh, hey, you’re God.

    And the government was given a model that could be used elsewhere as well. So the people were extremely engaged, showing that the government was not meant solely for Israel, and that Israel was going to be used as a missionary, a professional missionary. Well, I wouldn’t necessarily see If I define missions narrowly as going out to the nations, I wouldn’t see that circumstance as missionary activity. We understand it. I see that as the nations coming up into Israel, indicative of what is taking place in Israel during this particular period of their history. The nations, in a sense, are coming in, and you’re observing that process by the stranger and the soldier within the gauges must submit himself to the law. And, in fact, many of them did become Israelites themselves.

    But it isn’t missionary activity in the strict sense of the word. I mean, it wasn’t because of actual problems I just had, you know. Commissions being dispensed from Jerusalem to go to the ends of the earth for that purpose. Now, in Jesus’ day, the Pharisees enjoyed doing just that, just that very much. And they were involved in the activistic missionary endeavors.

    Jesus says, you’ll circle the globe to get one thonder. And you’ll make him, I don’t know how many times a child would tell it himself, but that was his indictment himself. I think there’s a couple of things involved. Jesus is really tied into the history of his redemption, and knows himself that missions in the truest sense cannot be carried out until after Christ dies and the grave begins for redemption. to be able to adjust the time in the present.

    And then, in about the middle of the year, about twelve-ten, the plan did find me to start this job on the south side of Nantucket. And that’s just the beginning. And all I’ve said is that I’m just going to keep doing it. That’s it. He should have been married by now. He should have been married by now. Well, let’s conclude with hymn number 371.

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.

  • Moses and the Burning Bush

    Moses and the Burning Bush

    This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Misc. OT Sermons” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, June 12, 1977.

    About this sermon

    Moses meets God at the burning bush after decades in the wilderness, and no dramatic religious experience qualifies him to lead God’s people. Church officers today follow God the same way, through perseverance. The wilderness years were his real preparation.

    More sermons from Exodus · Browse all sermons

    Sermon transcript

    There are two things I want to say to you this morning, and I hope that I am able to say them to you briefly, and yet to the point. This is going to be a two-point message, not the traditional three-point. As a matter of fact, I don’t know when I last preached a three-point message.

    I want to look first of all at Moses, this great call of Moses, and secondly we want to look at the revelation of God himself in this passage. Now we’re a generation that’s been weaned on Cecil B. DeMille and the movie The Ten Commandments, and the impression that we get from that film is that the education and the training that Moses received in Egypt was indispensable to his later ability to lead the children of God through the wilderness. Now, I don’t know how much overlap there was, and I don’t think it is very important from the Bible’s standpoint. You get the impression from the way the story is told in the Bible that those first forty years of Moses’ life when he was living in the courts of Pharaoh, being educated and trained possibly for a position of rulership and authority in that land, are relatively unimportant. And it’s not a matter of taking those 40 years and adding them to the 40 years which Moses lived in the wilderness of Midian, and saying that that gave us the complete man. It seems to be the point in the scriptures that the second 40 years, those years spent in the wilderness, contrast all that Moses received in Egypt. It’s as if in those forty years, Moses has to unlearn everything that he learned in Egypt, rather than simply adding to the experience of training for the court, training alone in the wilderness while shepherding a bunch of dumb sheep. Now, you see, Ed Hardesty’s an educated man. He even went to the same college I went to.

    That’s all to the good, I think. But you see, it isn’t that education that has prepared or equips and hardesty for ministry in this church. It may be that Ed, being a very capable young man, could step into a political office in this community and do a very, very good job. But it isn’t Ed’s ability to move well in circles of this community that equips him for office in this church. Ed’s a good dresser. He’s very neat. But it isn’t the fact that Ed dresses well or carries himself well, or seems to get on in this world very well, that equips him for office in this church.

    Ed presently is taking courses at the University of Pittsburgh in preparation for management in industry. But it isn’t those courses in management that equipped Ed to manage in this church. You can compare all of that with the riches of Egypt. What is necessary for Ed and any leader in the Church of Jesus Christ is a confrontation with the living God in whom resides all power. The impression that one receives in reading the story of Moses and his call is that after all of these eighty years, Moses is convinced of one thing.

    He’s a weakling. He doesn’t have any strength to do the Lord’s work. He’s ill-equipped, and if it’s to be done and done by him, it must be done by God through him. It’s not a matter of him bringing all of his worldly wisdom and everything that the world has prepared him in to the office and saying thereby, you must listen to me because I’ve got all these degrees. Or I set coffers on its seat for the first time in its entire existence. It isn’t that which prepares any man for office or enables him to fulfill that office. It’s the fact that he has met God at the end of his strength and realizes and is able to demonstrate in his life in a way that’s convinced us that God is the one in whom all power resides. This is equipment that doesn’t come from the courts of Pharaoh, it comes from heaven. It’s not something that arises out of the ground, it’s something that comes down from above. That’s what fits men for us.

    But there’s something else in this passage, and it is the revelation of God himself in a bush burning yet not consumed. Now what in the world is that symbol all about? the bush burning, yet not consume God in the midst speaking out of it.” This burning bush is a picture of God in his relationship to his people. And I would say in our day, as in the day of Moses, what the Church of Jesus Christ is in need of, especially As it pertains to leadership are men who, through the mediation of the Word, have been to Mount Horeb and seen precisely the same thing, and walked away understanding what they’ve seen. That doesn’t tell us what it means yet.

    God in the midst of his people, that’s what the burning bush is all about. The bush burning, yet not consumed. The bush is the symbol of God’s people on fire because of the persecution and opposition of this world, much like the children of Israel in the land of Egypt presently, under the gun, being attacked. their cry going out to God. Yet God, in his promise, since he is the God of the covenant, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the midst and thereby assuring the people of God that though they’re on fire, they will not be consumed.

    Though it’s a bad day, though things aren’t working out well, Though the church seems to be in decline, overall they aren’t from the community beating your doors down to get in. All of those things are in some way related to what that burning bush is all about.

    We ourselves belong to a church that has been victimized for forty years in this country. Interesting. Interesting that for forty years Moses should be in the wilderness. We have been under the gun, and what we need in elders and in pastors are not men that can point us once more to the riches of Egypt and seduce us by that. Not at all.

    What we need are men that have been to the mountain and seen the bush and understand the people of God as those who are under fire, and yet, because of the fact that God is in the midst, are not consumed. We need men who in the depressing times descend upon us, come upon us as they do with avalanche regularity, can give a reason for the hope that is in them. When things look hopeless, we need men who stand before us and proclaim to us the genuineness and the stability of our hope in God. That’s what we need. I believe that we have such a man ordained into the office this morning, and God grant us more. who are learning continually to put to death that complaint that arises out of their heart that becomes the impetus to direct their eyes back to Egypt longingly.

    Rather men who have seen that vision and understood it clearly, at the most depressing times, able to stand among us and to point us to the indestructible hope that is ours in God. Now that hope’s indestructibility has been demonstrated to us positively in Jesus Christ, because if there ever was one who came under the gun, it was He. And yet you see, Jesus Christ was not consumed. On the third day, he rose again. And that is the substance of our hope.

    Men who firmly have that implanted in their heart will leave the church as it has never been led before, from the pew, not from the pulpit, from the pew. And we will see things in the Church that we have never witnessed in its history. You and I both long for days like that.

    And days like that will come again in God’s refreshing times when he will grant to us again men who stand with Moses on a mountain and witness the glory of God as even in that day it was revealed and pointed to Jesus Christ himself. Our Father, we ask you that we might not consider the riches of Egypt as that which equip us, but rather choose the riches of Christ and the riches of the glory of the kingdom instead. We ask you, Father, that we might see the bush burning and understand that though the people of God are oppressed and seem to be without hope, yet it is true that our God is in our midst, speaking. And we are refreshed by what he says, pointed in the right direction, gained confidence, even as we know what was said there on the Mount of Horror was so perfectly and completely and finely said in Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray that Ed Hardesty might be a man cut from the tree of Moses, and that he might lead with leech shields and myself, humbly, these people according to the vision. We pray these things in Jesus’ name. Amen. Please prepare.

    The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.