SPEAKER_00: Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_00: You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jacob and Choir Praise Team, congregation.
SPEAKER_01: You guys sang like you're ready for a new year.
SPEAKER_01: That's good.
SPEAKER_01: We're excited about the new year.
SPEAKER_01: Happy New Year!
unknown: Happy New Year.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, come on.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all are much happier than that.
SPEAKER_01: Happy New Year! Much better.
SPEAKER_01: There we go.
SPEAKER_01: There's my people.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all ate way too many cookies and cake for the last two weeks, I can tell.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's great.
SPEAKER_01: Somebody asked me about uh they say, hey, I like that new jacket.
SPEAKER_01: I said, no, it's the only one that fits.
SPEAKER_01: So now we uh get to go through the fake exercise of uh holiday uh of New Year's resolutions that we're gonna lose weight, and then we just blow that off and go to Super Bowl parties and get right back to where we were, right?
SPEAKER_01: So uh it's fun.
SPEAKER_01: Well, we are excited about the new year.
SPEAKER_01: I hope you had a great holiday, and I hope you began on January 1 as we now go into our study of reading the Bible through chronologically.
SPEAKER_01: Uh we're using that uh platform, the Bible recap.
SPEAKER_01: But as you, if you started that with us, you saw that we're not reading somebody's book, we're reading God's book.
SPEAKER_01: And so we are reading through the scriptures together.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and I just want you to know, I am so blessed and encouraged by how many people are excited and have jumped into the process with us.
SPEAKER_01: Um we, Matt and I were fretting over how many books to order, and we ordered a bunch, and we thought, uh, we got too many or whatever, and we sold them all out, and we had another order.
SPEAKER_01: So if you didn't get one and you want one of the journals, uh they'll be in this week.
SPEAKER_01: You can uh buy and reserve one over in the Bible recap room right on the other side of the lobby.
SPEAKER_01: Uh also we ran out of all the bookmarks for all the reading plans, and so that was awesome, and we printed more of those.
SPEAKER_01: So we got so many people excited about it, jumping in.
SPEAKER_01: It's fantastic.
SPEAKER_01: So I hope you are excited and ready to go with us.
SPEAKER_01: If you're not doing the plan with us, don't worry about it.
SPEAKER_01: Uh nobody is gonna check your credentials at the door when you come into church on Sunday, right?
SPEAKER_01: Take the journey with us, and if you're doing another study, praise the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: If you're studying God's word, I'm all in with you, okay?
SPEAKER_01: That is good.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and as we uh walk through this journey, you can just take the journey with us on Sunday mornings if you want.
SPEAKER_01: That will be perfectly wonderful.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and uh my dad used to tell me all the time that uh a good leader is someone who does not ask uh their people to do something they're not willing to do.
SPEAKER_01: So I want you to know I fully read all my chapters and I'm all up.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: Uh so just want you to know I'm doing it alongside you, uh with you in this process.
SPEAKER_01: So uh as we get moving, you'll see there uh through the first three days uh we read through Genesis chapter 11, 1 through 11.
SPEAKER_01: Now, this week, uh as we begin reading, you will see the uh different nature of reading chronologically.
SPEAKER_01: Now, every year we put out reading plans for reading the Bible through in a year.
SPEAKER_01: And uh we put those out every year.
SPEAKER_01: It's the same thing this year, it's just different.
SPEAKER_01: Our scriptures, the way they are compiled, are compiled topically.
SPEAKER_01: So, like all the Old Testament prophets are together, the wisdom books are together, that sort of stuff.
SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's compiled topically.
SPEAKER_01: What we're going to do is we're going to read it chronologically.
SPEAKER_01: So, what that means is you take one of those books out of the out of the bookshelf that its topic is, you pull it off that shelf, and you stick it in chronologically in date order of how it be read.
SPEAKER_01: So, this is the first example of that.
SPEAKER_01: The book of Job is one of the oldest stories in all of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Uh many has the you know, people that study these things, commentators and you know, Bible scholars, sort of try to figure out where to put it.
SPEAKER_01: Many of them put it in before the story of Abraham.
SPEAKER_01: So this platform has chosen that spot.
SPEAKER_01: So we're going to jump from Genesis 11 to Job, and we read through Job, and then we come back chronologically and pick up Genesis with Abraham.
SPEAKER_01: So that's an example of how this is a little bit different than the normal reading plan you may have used in the past.
SPEAKER_01: But this one will be a blessing, I think, and it really gives you an overview of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And then each week I'm going to preach from one of the passages of those scriptures, and most of those sermons will look the same as they normally look.
SPEAKER_01: It's a here's a passage of scripture, and we work through that passage of scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Today is a little bit different because I want to set up the reading plan.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what I want to do is give you the story of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm going to give you seven principles to help understand as we read through Scripture how to really put it all in context and understand what the story of Scripture is.
SPEAKER_01: Now, Genesis chapter 1, uh, two, and three, those three chapters really are the overview of all of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you can find every bit of Scripture in those first three chapters.
SPEAKER_01: Uh back in the day, many of you will remember the reader's digest version of something, right?
SPEAKER_01: This is the reader's digest version of that.
SPEAKER_01: Another generation of us, we remembered, we got our way through school with Cliff Notes.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you remember Cliff Notes, right?
SPEAKER_01: Like I never read a book in high school.
SPEAKER_01: I read the Cliff Notes.
SPEAKER_01: Except for Moby Dick.
SPEAKER_01: It was so bad.
SPEAKER_01: It is such a horribly written book that I read every word of it and tortured myself all the way through so I could prove to my English teacher in high school just how terrible that book was.
SPEAKER_01: So that kind of gives you an idea of what kind of student I was.
SPEAKER_01: And uh and so this is the this is the it's all right there.
SPEAKER_01: It encapsulates, it sets up the story, and from this foundation you walk all the way through to the prophecies of the end of human history as we know it in the book of the Revelation.
SPEAKER_01: And so it is all right there.
SPEAKER_01: So today what I want to do is give you seven principles as you read through Scripture that help put it all into context and help us understand that.
SPEAKER_01: So here's the first principle.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to turn with me in your Bibles to Genesis chapter 1, verse 1.
SPEAKER_01: Genesis chapter 1, verse 1.
SPEAKER_01: Now, often we uh these verses become so familiar to us, they begin to lose a little bit of their impact.
SPEAKER_01: I was I was coming in from the other campus this morning, and I saw one of the guys in the hallway, and we were laughing about nice to be in a routine, and I told him, man, I don't want to see another cookie.
SPEAKER_01: At least for a week.
SPEAKER_01: Like I've had enough, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01: And nobody likes cookies any more than I do, but I like need a break for about a week or two because they've become too familiar, right?
SPEAKER_01: And so things become a little familiar, so we forget sometimes the impact of these scripture verses.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to what the Bible says in its very first verse.
SPEAKER_01: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let's think a minute about what this scripture is.
SPEAKER_01: This first book, Genesis, was written by Moses.
SPEAKER_01: Now, Moses was not there at creation, right?
SPEAKER_01: So Moses wrote the first five books of Scripture, the Bible tells us.
SPEAKER_01: Think about when Moses wrote that.
SPEAKER_01: He is God's anointed leader, leading the children of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: He is establishing the children of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: As we'll see later in Genesis chapter 3, God gives the first prophecy of his Redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: And then later on, when we get through Job, we'll read about Abraham, and God makes another promise, and through all of that, he creates the nation of Israel as the funnel through which he brings the Redeemer into the world.
SPEAKER_01: Moses is that first God-anointed leader, as you know, that led the children of Israel out of Egypt.
SPEAKER_01: And God has prompted him and is speaking through him and writing through him to create this foundation of Scripture for the nation of Israel to begin to codify it, if you will, to put it in place so they will know who they are and what's happening and where they're going.
SPEAKER_01: As the world around watches Israel as the light of the world and the one who will God will use to bring the Redeemer, as they watch all of that, they want to know why it works.
SPEAKER_01: And he is trying to spread the message of his promised Redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: And so Moses sits down in that context.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what's great about this as you read chronologically through this, everybody normally ski over all of the genealogies.
SPEAKER_01: So here's what happens in these genealogies in the first part of Genesis.
SPEAKER_01: What happens is we get an understanding of the unfolding of history and we realize how much these people who lived over 900 years all overlap each other.
SPEAKER_01: And part of what that tells us is that the people who were there and experienced, Adam and Eve.
SPEAKER_01: Imagine Adam and Eve sitting with their children, their grandchildren, 700 years later, their great-great-great-grandchildren's great-great-grandchildren.
SPEAKER_01: If you live 900 plus years, that's what you get, right?
SPEAKER_01: And they're telling them the story of creation.
SPEAKER_01: And they're telling them about all happened.
SPEAKER_01: And so we are passing down back in that time, oral histories, they are passing them down and they're adding their genealogies to them so that the eyewitness accounts are never lost.
SPEAKER_01: And as you read these genealogies and you overlap all the math, you realize that they all knew each other, right?
SPEAKER_01: You realize that Abraham knew Noah, and Noah knew Methuselah, and Methuselah knew all, and they're all connected.
SPEAKER_01: And so when Moses sits down to write down this story, under God's prompting, he is doing so with clear factual information about the history of how this has unfolded.
SPEAKER_01: Now here's the next thing you know about it.
SPEAKER_01: Moses is writing to explain to the children of Israel who we are, what got who God is, what's happening, and how this works, that we are here and God is bringing his Redeemer into the world.
SPEAKER_01: So Moses has a God-driven, anointed, God-inspired process that he's doing.
SPEAKER_01: He is telling the story of God's redemption.
SPEAKER_01: That's important for us to understand.
SPEAKER_01: And so principle number one in reading scripture, and as you read through this, is that this is God's story.
SPEAKER_01: It's not the story of man, it's not the story of history.
SPEAKER_01: It is the story of God.
SPEAKER_01: It is who he is, what he purposes, and what he does.
SPEAKER_01: It is his work.
SPEAKER_01: He is the driving force in everything that happens according to his plan as creator.
SPEAKER_01: And often when we come to Scripture, we don't mean to, it's just part of our human experience, but we come and we say, you know, I have this question in life, or I have this struggle in life, and I need to understand how this works.
SPEAKER_01: And we come to Scripture and we ask what it says to me, what it adds for me, how it encourages me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm looking for answers in what I need from Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And we're not to come to Scripture looking for answers, we're to come to Scripture looking for Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: He is the person and the center of this story.
SPEAKER_01: It is what he does and what he plans and how he works and what he is about, and our job is to line up with him.
SPEAKER_01: It is his story, and from the very beginning, Moses makes it clear in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
SPEAKER_01: And just so we're not lost in that, when we begin the New Testament and the story of the Redeemer that God actually did send, it begins in exactly the same way.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to the words of John chapter 1, verse 1.
SPEAKER_01: In the beginning was the Word, and that is John's Word for Jesus, God's name for Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: He refers to him as the Word.
SPEAKER_01: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
SPEAKER_01: This is God's story.
SPEAKER_01: This is Jesus' story.
SPEAKER_01: He, Jesus, was in the beginning with God.
SPEAKER_01: All things were made through him, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And without him, Jesus was not anything made that was made.
SPEAKER_01: In him Jesus was life, and the life was the light of men.
SPEAKER_01: The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
SPEAKER_01: And so in the very beginning of the New Testament, the coming of the promised Redeemer and His flowing forward, we begin with the same description.
SPEAKER_01: In the beginning was God.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus was God.
SPEAKER_01: He is a part of that picture of the Trinity that we refer to often.
SPEAKER_01: What is the Trinity?
SPEAKER_01: That is the three-person expression of God as one person.
SPEAKER_01: He is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: It is a bigger, more majestic concept than you can often give information to or give description to.
SPEAKER_01: It is the fullness of the personhood of God.
SPEAKER_01: And so God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, God, all of God, who he is, is there and the beginning, and he creates and he unfolds all of it.
SPEAKER_01: And as we read Scripture, we need to always be reminded, we need to not let our human experience change our perspective.
SPEAKER_01: I am coming to God.
SPEAKER_01: I am coming to his story.
SPEAKER_01: I am coming to find out who he is, what he is doing, what he requires, what he expects, and how he loves.
SPEAKER_01: It is his story.
SPEAKER_01: Principle number two, that we'll see, because of that, we see that God is the creator.
SPEAKER_01: God is the creator.
SPEAKER_01: And as you read in Genesis chapter 1, excuse me, in Genesis chapter 1, what you get is the unfolding of God as the Creator, and you realize and you understand and are taught that God created all of this around us.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's a point I want to kind of get into.
SPEAKER_01: And I've always wanted to take Genesis 1, 2, and 3 and take about six months and preach my way in detail through every word of those three chapters.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you hit these and there is so much there.
SPEAKER_01: It is all of Scripture, it is all there.
SPEAKER_01: I'd love to take the entire month of January and half of February and let's talk about creation.
SPEAKER_01: There's just so much in that.
SPEAKER_01: It's so fascinating, it's so exciting.
SPEAKER_01: There's so much to prove there about who God is as creator.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: And so you're tempted when you're reading through to go, oh, this is too much.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to stop here and I'm going to dig into it.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: And that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01: We should do that.
SPEAKER_01: And you need to keep a list of books that you want to read about topics that you run across when you go through this.
SPEAKER_01: But there is a deep value in going through the chronology of Scripture and reading the overarching narrative so that we have context and understand all this together.
SPEAKER_01: And so you'll run into those things as you go through this.
SPEAKER_01: I've already run into several of those.
SPEAKER_01: Man, I went down the rabbit hole of the Tower of Babel and all that kind of stuff, and I thought, man, I could spend like three weeks on that.
SPEAKER_01: But you know, as we're reading through this, resist that temptation, keep a list of what you want to study, and let's plow through.
SPEAKER_01: But here's what's important that we understand in this narrative reading.
SPEAKER_01: What Moses is trying to explain to us, what John was trying to explain to us, is God is the creator.
SPEAKER_01: It is his world.
SPEAKER_01: He made it.
SPEAKER_01: It is not ours.
SPEAKER_01: You are not yours.
SPEAKER_01: You are his.
SPEAKER_01: It is his.
SPEAKER_01: It's not your money.
SPEAKER_01: It's not your talent.
SPEAKER_01: It's not your life.
SPEAKER_01: It's not your time.
SPEAKER_01: It's God's.
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes we don't spend enough time recognizing that he is God and we are not.
SPEAKER_01: And that we must follow him and we must serve him and we must love him and we must honor him and we must worship him.
SPEAKER_01: He is God.
SPEAKER_01: He has put it in place.
SPEAKER_01: Why is there so much time and so much effort and so many generations and so many whatever, dollars, brains, everything else put into evolution and billions of years and the Big Bang and all this other kind of stuff?
SPEAKER_01: Why is that?
SPEAKER_01: Well, Scripture tells us that we are to understand that Satan has in place authorities and philosophies of man and all of that that are designed to lead us astray.
SPEAKER_01: And in a nutshell, all of that stuff is designed to disprove God as the creator, because if we can disprove God as the creator, then he no longer has authority over us.
SPEAKER_01: That's the essence of all that.
SPEAKER_01: I was reading a study this week.
SPEAKER_01: I just ran across it.
SPEAKER_01: There were a big poll done in some magazine or something in England, and they did the hundred most important Britons.
SPEAKER_01: And number four on the list was Charles Darwin.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: Like, it's awful.
SPEAKER_01: You have a guy who becomes a scientist because he's rejected the God of his fathers and he's in rebellion against that.
SPEAKER_01: He does some good scientific study, but then he creates these conclusions that have nothing to do with the research that he did.
SPEAKER_01: They are false in their nature and now have pretty much been disproven at a large level.
SPEAKER_01: And then you have a world of people who are in rebellion against God and they take his false conclusions and they build false conclusions on that and false conclusions on that, and then you have a house of cards that under any kind of actual scientific study falls apart.
SPEAKER_01: And yet, how could that guy be named the fourth most important Briton in a hundred years?
SPEAKER_01: Like, really?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, they even ranked him ahead of John Lennon.
SPEAKER_01: How can you do that?
SPEAKER_01: Don't understand.
SPEAKER_01: So what you get is this whole house of cards is built for one purpose.
SPEAKER_01: If I can disprove that God is the creator, I can disprove his authority over me.
SPEAKER_01: And we've got to understand that this is all about God's world and God's plan and God's design.
SPEAKER_01: Principle number three.
SPEAKER_01: Principle number three, God made us to love us and to be in relationship with us.
SPEAKER_01: Again, Moses is explaining to his people, you are God's people.
SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: God loves you and he wants to be in relationship with you.
SPEAKER_01: Moses, why do we build that tabernacle over there?
SPEAKER_01: Because God wants to live in the midst of his people and to show himself to us.
SPEAKER_01: In the book of Genesis, in the very beginning, you get to these famous scripture in John, I mean in Genesis chapter 1, verse 26, when God says, Let us make man in our image after our likeness.
SPEAKER_01: Again, the plural name of God.
SPEAKER_01: You have there the fullness and the magnitude of God.
SPEAKER_01: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: In Genesis chapter 1, verse 1, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
SPEAKER_01: That's the Hebrew name of God, Elohim, and that's a plural name.
SPEAKER_01: Here you see, let us make man in our image.
SPEAKER_01: John 1 says Jesus was there with God, and all things were made through him.
SPEAKER_01: And the fullness of God comes to this process, and all of who he is is creator God.
SPEAKER_01: And what does he do as creator God?
SPEAKER_01: I've made this incredibly beautiful place and all of this, and I want someone to love.
SPEAKER_01: In John chapter 4, he wrote, Jesus said this: God doesn't just love, God is love.
SPEAKER_01: His essence involves love.
SPEAKER_01: And so as a loving God, he decided, I'm going to make man, I'm going to make him unique from everything else, and I'm going to make him in my image.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: So that we could relate together.
SPEAKER_01: And one of the things that you see in the narrative of Scripture is over and over and over and over, God is reaching into mankind because he wants to have a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: Not because we deserve it, but because he is the creator and he has made us and he loves us as the creator.
SPEAKER_01: It's incredible how much you read in this narrative the extent and the lengths to which God goes to reach into our lives to show us that he loves us.
SPEAKER_01: Even in the story of Cain and Abel, we've talked about before, Cain here is rejecting God and he's giving this offering in the wrong way, and God steps into his heart and says, Cain, don't be careful.
SPEAKER_01: Back up from that.
SPEAKER_01: Control your emotions.
SPEAKER_01: God is reaching into his life because he loves them and he doesn't want him to run away.
SPEAKER_01: You get the picture here of Enoch, and Enoch, the Bible says, walked with God.
SPEAKER_01: Even when the earth gets so horrible that God repents of making mankind and all of the rampant sin, he still comes back to Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And he started over from a place of grace and love because he loves us and he wants to reach into us.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, what you read here is, Let us make man in our image.
SPEAKER_01: And we see here in Genesis 2 and in Genesis 3, God walks around in the cool of the day with Adam and Eve.
SPEAKER_01: You go to John chapter 1, where it talks about in the beginning was the word, and then it talks about him coming as the Savior, and it says he tabernacled with us.
SPEAKER_01: And then you get to Revelation chapter 21, when you see the new heaven and the new earth and all of that.
SPEAKER_01: And it uses the same phrase, Jesus comes down and lives among us as his people.
SPEAKER_01: He desires a relationship with us.
SPEAKER_01: And you need to hear, if you hear nothing else I say today, you need to hear that God loves you and he wants to be in relationship with you.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to this.
SPEAKER_01: There's a beautiful piece of work, musical work, that Janet and I love.
SPEAKER_01: It's called Savior.
SPEAKER_01: I mentioned it a couple of weeks ago.
SPEAKER_01: I would highly recommend it to you, especially as you begin to study, because it's a musical work.
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of like an it's kind of like a it's just the story all through song, right?
SPEAKER_01: And it goes from the creation and it goes all the way through scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And it's a beautiful overview and some incredible pieces of music.
SPEAKER_01: After the creation, there's a song called My Heart Belongs to You.
SPEAKER_01: And it tries to capture this narrative of why God loves us and made us in his image to love us.
SPEAKER_01: The magnitude of who God is, his creator, and his desire to love as the creator God.
SPEAKER_01: And so here's the picture that it paints.
SPEAKER_01: Imagine God having created all of this.
SPEAKER_01: And as you read in Genesis chapter 1, it is good, it is good, it is good, it is good, it is good.
SPEAKER_01: And there's all of this, and God is the only one who sees it.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to the lyrics of this song.
SPEAKER_01: Who will hear the music that I hear?
SPEAKER_01: Who will hear the sounds that fill the air?
SPEAKER_01: Imagine the birds and the animals and the breeze and all of that.
SPEAKER_01: God says, who will hear that?
SPEAKER_01: Who will see the radiant beam of light dancing for a sun that warms the morning sky?
SPEAKER_01: Who will know the beauty of my earth since the joy and wonder of its birth?
SPEAKER_01: Who will see the glory of the world that I, God, have made?
SPEAKER_01: And who will walk beside me in the garden in the coolness of the day?
SPEAKER_01: Who will feel the summer wind that moves across the water as it flows?
SPEAKER_01: Who will enjoy the orchestrated mystery that soars within my soul?
SPEAKER_01: Who will hear the music that I hear?
SPEAKER_01: I will create man to be in my own image from the dust of the earth and breathe into him my own breath of life.
SPEAKER_01: Is that incredible?
SPEAKER_01: God wants to walk with you.
SPEAKER_01: He wants to share with you.
SPEAKER_01: He wants to see alongside you what you see, and he wants us to see what he sees, and he desires to be in relationship with you.
SPEAKER_01: And that is an overwhelming principle of Scripture that you must see.
SPEAKER_01: For God so loved the world that he gave his only son.
SPEAKER_01: He wants to be in relationship and he made us to be in relationship.
SPEAKER_01: That brings us to the next two principles.
SPEAKER_01: Principle number four: biblical love is giving selflessly to another.
SPEAKER_01: All throughout Scripture, when you see it, when you understand the word love, we need to understand that love is the giving of yourself to another.
SPEAKER_01: It is sacrificing who you are.
SPEAKER_01: Again, for God so loved the world that He gave.
SPEAKER_01: We talked about that on a Sunday in December.
SPEAKER_01: God has designed from his selflessness and his mercy and love and giving an understanding of what love is.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Genesis chapter 2, when he put Adam in the garden, he said, Listen, all of this beauty is yours, and you enjoy all of it except for this one tree.
SPEAKER_01: Why would God do that?
SPEAKER_01: Well, first of all, he's creator.
SPEAKER_01: He can do it how he wants to, right?
SPEAKER_01: And what God has designed is a relationship, and he desires a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: So he wants that same definition of love that he has given in our lives, he wants us to give to him.
SPEAKER_01: And so he's told Adam and Eve, I need you to have a sacrifice.
SPEAKER_01: I need you to make a choice to put me above yourself, my plan above your plan, and I've established this process of choice so that you will sacrifice yourself and give to me in the way I've sacrificed myself and given to you.
SPEAKER_01: And so all of that, all throughout Scripture, how many times do you see choice, choice, choice?
SPEAKER_01: The children of Israel, as Moses is writing, he says, I have put before you a choice.
SPEAKER_01: When Joshua divided out the inheritance, as we studied this summer, and he told everyone, God has put before you a choice.
SPEAKER_01: A choice.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus brings into the world a choice that you make, whether you follow him or not.
SPEAKER_01: What is the choice to follow Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible makes that clear, as we talk about here often in Romans.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says, if you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
SPEAKER_01: What is that confession that Jesus is Lord?
SPEAKER_01: It means that you take your life, everything you've been, everything you are, and everything you ever will be, and you give it all to him.
SPEAKER_01: He gave his life for you.
SPEAKER_01: That's why you're giving your life to him.
SPEAKER_01: When you say, I love the Lord, the Bible defines what that is supposed to look like.
SPEAKER_01: Commandment number one, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.
SPEAKER_01: I was listening to a sermon from Adrian Rogers a couple weeks ago, and he brought up this discussion, and he was talking with another theologian about why American cultural Christianity had gone so weak in so many ways and so many places, and he said, Listen, y'all have changed the language of Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: You went with the word commitment, and you eliminated the word surrender.
SPEAKER_01: I'm committed to milkshakes at Chick-fil-A.
SPEAKER_01: I've shared that with you before.
SPEAKER_01: I'm deeply committed to that.
SPEAKER_01: But what does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: Well, that means they have some good ones at other places, or I can go to Brahms and get a banana split.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: Commitment allows room for out.
SPEAKER_01: Surrender, it's all gone.
SPEAKER_01: It's all gone.
SPEAKER_01: And when you give your life to Jesus, it is a biblical love model of giving your life completely to him because he gave his life for you.
SPEAKER_01: Which brings us to the next principle.
SPEAKER_01: Sin.
SPEAKER_01: We see in Genesis 1, 2, and 3, sin enter into the world.
SPEAKER_01: Sin is rejecting God personally, and it is rejecting his authority from a place of selfishness.
SPEAKER_01: In Genesis chapter 3, you see it explained.
SPEAKER_01: Satan comes to the serpent, the serpent, and Satan in the form of the serpent, comes to Adam and Eve, and he tempts them.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what the tempting is.
SPEAKER_01: Why don't you eat that tree?
SPEAKER_01: She says, Nah, we can't eat or touch it.
SPEAKER_01: God said we can't do that.
SPEAKER_01: And Satan comes and he says, This you will not die, for God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like him, knowing good and evil.
SPEAKER_01: This begins the whole process of sin.
SPEAKER_01: God doesn't love you.
SPEAKER_01: God is holding out on you.
SPEAKER_01: God's plan is not the best for you, which means God doesn't love you.
SPEAKER_01: And it attacks the very character of God.
SPEAKER_01: And when we sin and reject him, we are rejecting him personally and the fact that he loves us and wants to be in relationship with us.
SPEAKER_01: We are also rejecting his authority.
SPEAKER_01: You are directly contravening the authority of God as the creator.
SPEAKER_01: And when you sin, you are violating the instructions and the commands and the rules and the plan put in place by the creator God of the universe.
SPEAKER_01: And it is sin.
SPEAKER_01: And it comes from a place of selfishness.
SPEAKER_01: She thought, you know, that does look good.
SPEAKER_01: I bet it tastes really good.
SPEAKER_01: You got all this other stuff you can eat from.
SPEAKER_01: But no, I want that one.
SPEAKER_01: The choice that God put in front of them to love Him and to choose to follow Him, we now reject because it looks good to me and it's desirable for me to be as wise as God, and so I want what I want.
SPEAKER_01: And sin at its essence is you reaching out for what you want instead of what God has commanded and God has designed out of his love for you.
SPEAKER_01: Sin.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what you read, learn as you read through this.
SPEAKER_01: Here's some attributes of sin.
SPEAKER_01: Number one, sin struts.
SPEAKER_01: Sin struts.
SPEAKER_01: How many times do you see that rebellious spirit as a part of sin?
SPEAKER_01: Man, God comes into Cain's life and he says, Why are you upset because I rejected your sacrifice?
SPEAKER_01: If you read that story and you understand in Genesis chapter 4, here's what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: Cain, who was one of Adam and Eve's sons, is a farmer.
SPEAKER_01: Abel, one of Adam and Eve's sons, is a shepherd.
SPEAKER_01: At the beginning, after Genesis chapter 3, when Adam and Eve sinned, God gave the first prophecy of Jesus who would come and sacrifice himself for us.
SPEAKER_01: He would die for our sins.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that they had tried to make fig leaves to cover themselves, and they couldn't do that, and that didn't work, and they still felt guilty, and that God sacrificed an animal.
SPEAKER_01: And so he taught them that picture of salvation.
SPEAKER_01: And so he shed the blood of that animal, and then he made for them coverings, the Bible says, out of those animals.
SPEAKER_01: He taught them blood sacrifice for sin to cover your sin.
SPEAKER_01: And as they went through the generations, you know they've been taught that, been taught that, been taught that.
SPEAKER_01: And Cain, who is a farmer, thinks, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: It's not God's garden, it's my garden, because I worked hard in that and I did that, and I've learned how to fertilize, and I made that good, and I'm really proud of that.
SPEAKER_01: And you know what?
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna take the fruit that I'm most proud of, and I'm gonna give that as an offering to God, so he'll say, Thank you, Cain.
SPEAKER_01: That's the essence of that story.
SPEAKER_01: And sin struts.
SPEAKER_01: And he strutted before God, and his sin was judged.
SPEAKER_01: Even when he was judged, this I can't imagine the rebellious spirit of this.
SPEAKER_01: Cain looks at God and he says, Your punishment is too harsh.
SPEAKER_01: Like you talk about not repentant at all in any way.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you we ended with the story of the Tower of Babel.
SPEAKER_01: What is that about?
SPEAKER_01: The strutting of sin.
SPEAKER_01: These guys that made this city, and Nimrod, and all these guys you read about, and man, they're all proud of what they're doing, and they're awesome, and they're great at this, and they built this thing, and they're going to build this tower to show God how great they are.
SPEAKER_01: And God judges it.
SPEAKER_01: Sin is rebellion before God.
SPEAKER_01: Sin struts.
SPEAKER_01: Sin stains.
SPEAKER_01: Our holiness is gone with sin.
SPEAKER_01: When God finds Adam and Eve in the garden, the Bible says they were hiding from him.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because they knew they had sinned.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that they tried to make clothes for themselves and they took fig leaves and tried to weave them together.
SPEAKER_01: That's why you see those silly pictures of Adam and Eve who were naked in the garden because they were unashamed and unafraid, walking around with the little fig leaf things and all that kind of a deal.
SPEAKER_01: That picture is wrong.
SPEAKER_01: Those came after sin because of sin, because sin made them feel guilty and ashamed of who they are and what was going on.
SPEAKER_01: And they tried to cover what was inside by covering on the outside, and it did not work.
SPEAKER_01: And so they hid from God because they couldn't cover their own sin.
SPEAKER_01: Sin stains us, it causes evil in our lives, it changes our minds, our hearts, our lives, and it judges us.
SPEAKER_01: Sin stains us, and that's why Jesus came and he died for us to take away the stain of sin.
SPEAKER_01: And Scripture talks about when we place our faith in Christ, we are cleansed whiter than snow.
SPEAKER_01: Sin also spreads.
SPEAKER_01: It's incredible from Adam and Eve's sin, Cain and others, and it spreads.
SPEAKER_01: And as mankind spreads, as you read that, you read that sin spreads, and the world got so evil that God, and just in just a number of generations, that God says, Okay, I'm done with this.
SPEAKER_01: This is wrong.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna send a flood, I'm gonna judge everybody but Noah, and I'm gonna start all over.
SPEAKER_01: And if you notice, when he starts over with Noah, he gives another set of holiness, and this is how you're supposed to live, and it doesn't take very long, just a few generations, and all of a sudden you get the Tower of Babel, and sin has spread, and once again we're strutting before God as humankind.
SPEAKER_01: Sin spreads, it spreads everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: And finally, sin seeds suffering.
SPEAKER_01: Suffering is always the result of sin.
SPEAKER_01: We live in a fallen world, and sin creates suffering, and all of that happens because of sin, and it all is because of the rejection of God.
SPEAKER_01: Principle number six holiness is God's standard.
SPEAKER_01: He can do that because it is his world and he is the authority and the creator.
SPEAKER_01: And so all throughout Scripture, you read the judgment of sin and the judgment of sin and the judgment of sin.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because holiness is God's standard.
SPEAKER_01: He told Adam and Eve, if you eat that fruit, you are rejecting me, you are rejecting my authority, and in that day you will surely die.
SPEAKER_01: And they died spiritually, and the physical death became inevitable because of that sin.
SPEAKER_01: There is judgment for sin.
SPEAKER_01: The flood is the judgment of God on sin on mankind.
SPEAKER_01: The Tower of Babel and spreading all the languages and sending everyone out and all that, scattering everyone, all of that is the judgment of God.
SPEAKER_01: God judged us individually.
SPEAKER_01: He judges Cain's sin.
SPEAKER_01: He judges humankind with the flood.
SPEAKER_01: He judges sin.
SPEAKER_01: And we have to understand that even when we're saved, when we start getting into the New Testament, if you understand in the Old Testament, holiness is God's standard.
SPEAKER_01: In the New Testament, when you find Christ and you give your life to Him, you enter into a process where God is changing us and transforming us.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible word will be sanctified.
SPEAKER_01: He is changing us into the image of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And all throughout the New Testament, you read that holiness is the standard for Christians who've been redeemed.
SPEAKER_01: We sort of treat it from I'm coming from zero, and so if I do this well, that's good.
SPEAKER_01: I do this well, that's good.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm this good, instead of, here's God's standard.
SPEAKER_01: I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned, I've sinned.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus, I want to repent of that sin, and I want you to change me and transform me to make me holy again.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Peter, the Bible says, be holy, because I am holy.
SPEAKER_01: Holiness is God's standard, and He judges sin.
SPEAKER_01: And we live in a world where it's not great a lot of times to talk about sin and the judgment of sin, but when you begin to read Scripture, it is, you can't get away from it.
SPEAKER_01: It's everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: God's standard and the failure of standard is sin, and sin is judged.
SPEAKER_01: And God has the right and the authority and the responsibility to do that because he is the creator God.
SPEAKER_01: But praise the Lord for principle number seven, written all throughout the pages of Scripture, because God made us for relationship, and because God loves us, and because God is sovereign and in a charge and in control, he is not going to let sin win, and he is not going to leave his creation that he created subject to sin, and victory is his.
SPEAKER_01: And so from the very beginning, God's loving plan is to redeem his creation, both mankind and the world.
SPEAKER_01: As soon as sin happens in Genesis chapter 3, God steps in and Genesis chapter 3, verse 15, and he says, Listen, here's what's going to happen.
SPEAKER_01: I'll put hatred between Satan and his kind, and man and woman, and through the woman there will be a seed who will come, a person who will come, and he will deal a fatal blow to Satan.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says he'll uses the word picture, he'll bruise his head.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Satan will only bruise his heel.
SPEAKER_01: And that's a prophecy that Jesus would have to go to the cross and he will have to die there in our place.
SPEAKER_01: But then he rose again on the third day, conquering death and sin to live for eternity and to accomplish God's plan of redemption.
SPEAKER_01: And that bruising of his heel in that word picture means that he brings a fatal end to Satan and his rule at the end.
SPEAKER_01: And the book of Revelation is the culmination of the promise in the book of Genesis.
SPEAKER_01: God promised to bring a redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: He brings a redeemer, the person of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Through Jesus, he redeems his people.
SPEAKER_01: And ultimately, as prophesied in Revelation, we know that God will redeem his world, his people, and bring it all back to what he created in the first place.
SPEAKER_01: God's plan is redemption.
SPEAKER_01: God is working throughout humankind to bring about redemption.
SPEAKER_01: Again, what I said before, if you heard one thing, you heard me say, hear that God wants to have a relationship with you.
SPEAKER_01: This is the mechanism through which we have a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: He made Adam to walk in the cool of the day and to experience, as we read, all of the majesty that soars within God's soul, to walk with him and to celebrate him and to receive his love and to love and worship him in return.
SPEAKER_01: And sin broke that.
SPEAKER_01: And God said, I am going to break sin and its principles, its responsibility, its chains, its results.
SPEAKER_01: And he sent Jesus, and Jesus, who was at the beginning, who is God, went to the cross and died in our place to pay the price for our sins, to be our redeemer, so we can accept him as our Savior.
SPEAKER_01: We can be redeemed and step right back into that relationship that Adam had.
SPEAKER_01: We can walk with God in the cool of the day.
SPEAKER_01: You can read from his word who he is and what he's doing and how it meets your life.
SPEAKER_01: And you can hear his commands and you can hear his structures and you can hear his desires and you can hear his plans for you.
SPEAKER_01: And in prayer, you can have the Holy Spirit speak to you and see from his word, and you can walk with him, and you can begin to see life differently.
SPEAKER_01: You recognize the hand of God in what's happening.
SPEAKER_01: You recognize answered prayer.
SPEAKER_01: You recognize the miracles of God.
SPEAKER_01: You see the beauty of creation and that God made all of this.
SPEAKER_01: You experience the love of God as a heavenly Father as He speaks to us.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Romans 8, He bears witness with our spirit.
SPEAKER_01: He speaks to your heart.
SPEAKER_01: You are walking with Him the way Adam walked with Him.
SPEAKER_01: Because Jesus has redeemed you and reestablished the relationship.
SPEAKER_01: And you can look forward to the promise and hope of the complete and full redemption that happens in the book of Revelation.
SPEAKER_01: This week, as we were driving around holidays and all that, Janet was finishing her deal.
SPEAKER_01: Janet did this journey and she finished dead on time on December 31st.
SPEAKER_01: It was awesome.
SPEAKER_01: And she was, we were in a spot where she was listening to it on the Bible lap, and the guy was reading it to her.
SPEAKER_01: And she just made the comment to me it's a little weird to think like I'm reading Revelation and the end, and then tomorrow I gotta jump back to creation.
SPEAKER_01: As we talked about that a minute, we're like, that's not weird.
SPEAKER_01: That's the way it's supposed to be.
SPEAKER_01: They are inextricably linked.
SPEAKER_01: The promise of Genesis 1 is the redemption in Revelation 21 and 22.
SPEAKER_01: The work of God that began in the Garden of Eden is culminated in Revelation 21 and 22.
SPEAKER_01: It is the first and last chapter of the same story.
SPEAKER_01: It is all connected, and that is God's promise to you.
SPEAKER_01: That is his promise to you.
SPEAKER_01: If you read his story and you understand the principles and his desire to be in a relationship with you and his sending of Jesus to be your redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to bow your heads as we close this morning.
SPEAKER_01: And if you've never accepted Christ as your Savior, you've never realized with that clarity that God desires a relationship for you.
SPEAKER_01: That he sent Jesus to redeem you so that you could be in that relationship with him.
SPEAKER_01: You've never understood the extent to which God has reached down into life and human history to bring the gospel and salvation and redemption.
SPEAKER_01: I want to invite you to give your life to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Not because it's mine to offer, but because God has offered it to you.
SPEAKER_01: He's described it in his word.
SPEAKER_01: He loved you by sending Jesus to die on the cross in your place to be your redeemer.
SPEAKER_01: And you can love him in return by taking your life, everything you've been, you are, and you ever will be, and give it to him.
SPEAKER_01: But friend, he will redeem you and your life if you will give your life to him as he gave his life for you.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to pray, God's people are going to stand and sing a testimony that shows you they believe in what we're studying and talking about together.
SPEAKER_01: We'll have ministers at the head of our aisles.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, if you want to come, you come.
SPEAKER_01: If altars open for prayer, if you want to come pray.
SPEAKER_01: If you'd like to be saved, we want to invite you to come and talk to one of our folks.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, we're not going to pressure you.
SPEAKER_01: You don't have to make an immediate decision.
SPEAKER_01: If you're ready, come and give your life to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: If you want to talk more and explore the journey and pray with someone about that, just come and tell us.
SPEAKER_01: We'll make appointments, we'll sit down with coffee or milkshakes or whatever it is that you do, and we'll walk the journey with you, whatever you need.
SPEAKER_01: But no, Jesus desires a relationship with you.
SPEAKER_01: And he gave himself for you to make that happen.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, we are so overwhelmed with the magnitude of who you are as the creator.
SPEAKER_01: And even when we violate your authority, and not just violate your authority, we reject you personally.
SPEAKER_01: Yet you loved us so much and you demonstrated that love for us that even while we were in the condition of rejecting you, Jesus came to be our redeemer just as you promised and envisioned from the beginning.
SPEAKER_01: And Lord, if there's someone this morning who wants to enter that journey, who wants to be redeemed by giving their life to Christ, Lord, I pray you'll give them the freedom to respond.
SPEAKER_01: For us, I pray that this will be a moment of worship as we conclude where we can praise you for this incredible work of redemption.
SPEAKER_00: It is in your name we pray, and all God's people said.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this message has been a blessing to you and helped to strengthen your walk with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Please know we want to minister to you and pray for you.
SPEAKER_00: Send an email to contact us at fsfbc.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith at First Baptist Church.