Kennystix's podcast
A Call for Courage in the Cause of Truth
The following message is by Pastor John Piper. More information from Desiring God is available at www.desiringgod.org. Father in Heaven I ask that tonight one of the effects of our time together would be that these several hundred folks here would become courageous in the cause of truth. I pray that you would so reveal Christ and his promises to us and his command to us that we would not be frightened by anything. I pray that we would be willing to take risks to speak the truth in every situation, in ways that fit the situation. I pray that we wouldn't shirt back from saying the hard thing, the true thing, the helpful thing that someone may not think is helpful. So God build your church tonight. I pray with courage. Honor the memory of William Still in this regard. I pray and, above all, magnify Christ in his name I ask it, amen. I've been delving into this little autobiography of William Still so that I could make a connection if possible between the theme of tonight and his life and it was not difficult to do. I don't know how many of you know that he served the church in Gilchumston, south Aberdeen for 52 years and he was known for his expository Christ-exalting word-saturated ministry but it was not always so. When he came, there was another agenda on his mind and heart. So let me read a few paragraphs patched together so that he can tell his story and then you'll hear the link between his story and tonight's message. There was no question about it, this is page 114, there was no question about the burning zeal in my breast as I began in Gilchumston, south in 1945. I doubt if a rather fierce attack on the town of an evangelistic nature was what they expected or wanted but that is what they got and I did fill the Kirk or Kirk or however you say that. To overflowing by the use of redemption songs and fiery evangelistic sermons which soon set the town a gog, that went on for 18 months which included visits to the town and to Gilchumston of various evangelists including Billy Graham and Alan Redpath, however I gradually came to the conclusion toward the end of 1946 that there was something vastly superior about the systematic exposition of the scriptures to the evangelistic ministry. It was obvious that the necessity for maintaining a high level of novelty was too time consuming and was taking up too much of our energies. If I said 18 months experience of ardent evangelistic work caused disillusionment, that was only part of the truth and was really beside the point. The truth is as I have said that I was beginning to discover almost by accident, although I know the Lord has another name for it, the value of the systematic teaching of the Word of God. And as that took grip of me in the pulpit during the latter days and months of 1946, I saw that a commission was given to me which was to be my task for the rest of my life rather than that of superficial evangelism which alas leaves so much of the glorious Word of God untouched. Therefore one of the most humiliating experiences of my life had to be endured in those early months of 1947. Indeed, within a couple of Sundays I lost a popular following and had to content myself with a far smaller constituency of attenders since the numbers which at first crowded our church building largely disappeared. It was as sudden as that. The cry went up, he's finished already. Finally, as I see it now, I was just beginning what has turned out to be, albeit costly, the most blessed portion of my life underlined that word costly as I read these last couple sentences. The costliness of having to deal with people in these ways, people you have known for years and have learned to love, these are some of the trials, indeed the deaths which the Minister of the Word is called to die. It requires courage, but every evil that plagues or is likely to plague the congregation or the parish must be dealt with one way or another. One of the things that most fundamentally, one of the most fundamental, really fundamental things which I discovered in the process of systematically preaching is that there is no part of the Word of God which although it may incur opposition and offense, when it is handled with care, respect, do attention to context, and what hurt by prayer does not yield saving as well as sanctifying truth. Opposition, offense, cost, courage. It requires courage, but every evil that plagues the church must be dealt with, page 132. I don't know if this is still in print or not, but I was thankful for it. It encouraged me. My topic is a call for courage in the cause of truth. My desire this evening is that God would use my words to inspire you to be courageous in speaking what needs to be spoken for Christ. My prayer is that God would overcome all the fear in your life. You never get beyond fear. You always have to overcome fear. One of the most effective evangelists of our church, Ken Curry, whose job is on the campuses. All he does is lead students in witnessing to unbelieving students on the 40,000 person university of Minnesota campus, which is about a quarter of a mile from our church. You can see it. He told us at the staff meeting, "There is never a day when I'm not anxious about doing this." He's done it for years and years. I think the reason for that is, one, the old man must be put to death over and over again, and two, there's nothing the devil hates more than evangelism. He'd be happy for us to do anything we want inside these church walls all day long as long as we don't get in his territory, and therefore any inclination towards talking to an unbeliever, Satan will mount every possible weapon that he has to disincline you to do that. One of his greatest weapons is fear, and to strip you of courage. Now there are several reasons why I want to focus on this. Number one is straight out of the Bible what the Apostle Paul told Timothy is coming. And it was coming already in his day, and it is here today, and so we need to hear it, and it's helpful to know that Paul saw it coming. So let me read 1 Timothy 4, verse 3. By the way, if you wonder, does he have a text, or is he going to jump around like he did on Sunday? Well the answer is yes. I have a text, and yes I'm going to jump around like I did on Sunday, and I do have a text, and if you want to go there right now and put your finger in there, it's going to be Matthew 10, 24 to 36, but it will take us a long time to get there. And I'll get there, and we'll do some exposition through that text. But here we are at 1 Timothy 4, 3, which says, "The time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching. But having itching ears, very amazing image, having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings, and will turn away from listening to the truth." Isn't that amazing? So what do you think they say about the speakers of the truth as they turn away? Nice things? Probably not. They have to justify what they're doing, and they can find all kinds of belittling words to use for the speakers of the truth as their itching ears accumulate, preachers, pastors, teachers, theologians who know how to scratch where people itch and not where people need. And justified in terms of felt need ministry. You know, I said this afternoon to the pastors gathered, "It is easy to preach to felt needs." Anybody will come to hear a sermon about a felt need. It is really hard to create felt needs which correspond with real needs. It's a real supernatural challenge to create by the Word of God and the power of the Spirit new felt needs that correspond to real needs. And if you do that, if God's anointing is on it, you can still have a hearing. But Satan will do everything he can to cause the itching ears to say to people, "You don't need that. You don't need that. That doesn't scratch where you itch. Get another pastor. Get another teacher. Get another small group leader. Get another campus leader. Get a different set of books." And you can get a book that scratches any itch you have. So that's my first reason for addressing this issue. If Paul is right, and of course he's right, the time has come when people will not endure sound teaching. And if they won't endure sound teaching, then when they hear sound teaching, wanting to justify themselves, they have to be little sound teachers. Otherwise they look bad. I mean, it looks bad to walk away from sound teaching, but it looks smart to walk away from foolish teaching. And therefore you've got to label sound teaching, foolish teaching in order to stay sane and to have people like you and think you're smart. So since this is here, it's going to take courage to go on teaching what is sound. That's reason number one. Reason number two for why this message is a burden to me is that we live in a day of, I think, increasing, though it's hard to imagine it sometimes increasing, increasing relativism and subjectivism. But names are put on it like postmodern and post conservative and post Christian and post propositional and so on. Here's what I mean by relativism. I mean the assumption that there is no such thing as an absolute, what is true and right and good and beautiful for you may not be true and right and good and beautiful. For me, it is relative to your perception and relative to my perception and there's no valid, arbitrating, objective, external criterion that can decide which one of us is in accord with something out there called truth, truth with a big T, true truth. It's Francis Schaeffer used to call it. Most people do not at least in their heads and pragmatically think there is such a thing. We desperately don't want to believe in such a thing because if you believe that there is a true truth outside of you objectively, then you've got to bring your life into conformity with it, which means certain things about you might have to change and the essence of sin and fallenness is that we want to be God. We want to call all the shots ourselves, we don't want to bring our lives into conformity with any objective standard in the Bible or anywhere else and therefore I want to have a bubble of absoluteness about myself and in that kind of context to speak statements like you must do this. You should do this. You ought to do this, those kind of sentences are going to encounter a good deal of opposition. What I mean by the word subjectivism, I said relativism and subjectivism is that in this world of relativism where what's true for you is true for you, what's true for me is true for me, the subject, that's the word at the center of subjectivism, the subject namely me, I, the subject, am God, I decide in my little bubble of absoluteness and autonomy I decide what's true for me and you can't tell me what I ought to do, get out of my face. I have my life to live and you're not going to intrude your morality in there to get these statements like imposing morality and so on. So we live in that kind of a world, relativism and subjectivism and it is very, very unpopular to come into that world speaking words like all authority and heaven and on earth belongs to Jesus Christ. Go therefore and tell everybody in all the nations they must forsake all that is not in accord with Christ, submit themselves to him, bow the knee to King Jesus and keep all his commandments. That's a very unpopular thing to say which is the last thing Jesus said before he went back to sit down with his father on the throne of the universe. So those two reasons and here's the third. There's a lot of confusion about humility, the primary indictment of Christians or anybody else who speak absolute truth, who claim to know what somebody ought to do or what somebody ought to believe, the number one criticism of choice is you are unbelievably arrogant. I can't believe you Christians are going to go around to all the religions of the world and tell them they should believe in your God. You guys are the biggest heads in the unbelievably arrogant you are. That is the criticism of choice. The only way in that situation to be humble is to doubt. So there's a huge confusion. Humility has come to be identified with uncertainty and the only humble stature, the only humble demeanor is I'm not sure. If you say I know whom I have believed and I am persuaded that he's going to keep me and he would keep you if you yielded to him that is identified with arrogance. Let me give you a practical illustration of this, I printed this out just before I came from my own website because I forgot to bring it with me. So I went back and said I've got to have this, I found it and printed it about 30 minutes ago in my hotel room because I couldn't remember all the details of what happened back in 1999. In 1999 in America the Southern Baptists very controversially, that's the biggest denomination in America, about 15 million people and they're having their annual meeting right now. I'm not part of them, I grew up in the Southern Baptist Church but I belong to another group now. They decided that they would muster the whole church to pray for the conversion of Jewish people. Can you imagine such arrogance? And it hit the front page of every major paper in America. The arrogance of these Southern Baptists to muster 15 million people to pray that Jews would change their religion, would be the way they would say it, to become Christians. Incredible. So in our newspaper in Minneapolis they picked up on this and they quoted Abraham Heschel, well known Jewish theologian from the previous generation, to this effect, "Christians must abandon the idea that the Jews must be converted." This idea, Heschel said, is quote, "one of the greatest scandals in history." So the Jewish people are saying one of the greatest scandals in history is that Christians believe Jews must be converted to Christ, confess Christ as their Messiah, Christified, risen, coming to rescue His people, that's a scandal to believe that. So you have very sophisticated developments of two covenant theologies of Jewish covenant, Christian covenant, you stay with your Messiah, we'll translate our Messiah into whatever we believe and we'll both wind up in heaven. Now I read this and I was not happy with that in our newspaper and wrote a response to it two years later because at that moment Jews for Jesus, which is a very aggressive Jewish evangelistic group that I like very much, I like Moshe Rosen who founded the use of Jesus. They put on big t-shirts like Jesus as the Messiah and walked down New York and get themselves spit upon and mistreated and they just got big smiles on their faces. I love Jews for Jesus and so they're coming to town, behold your God campaign, BYG, big and all over the world they were doing these campaigns. The Kingdom of Minneapolis and I just jumped at the opportunity to have them based at our church because I knew we'd be in big trouble if we did. So they were, they were based at our church and went out all over the city for two weeks evangelizing and doing the work that I believe God called us to do for Jews and Gentiles and my oh my, did that hit the fan in the newspapers and nine large churches. I used to meet with these guys every month for breakfast. I don't meet with them anymore, it's just too uncomfortable. These pastors who said quote in the newspaper, they wrote a letter to me and published it in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, a circulation of you know 3,400,000 people and they said we feel that efforts by Christians to convert Jews are counterproductive, injurious to Christian Jewish relations in contrary to the true spirit of Christ. So I wrote a letter to the newspaper and explained by just quoting scripture and amazingly they printed it to see who does not have the son, does not have life. You reject Jesus, you reject God and they didn't like that either. And they wrote another letter naming me arrogant is the right word to describe any attempts at proselytizing in the case of the effort of Christians to win over their Jewish brothers and sisters, close quote. This was very useful at our church. Every church needs to have a good controversy like this, to find out if you really believe what you believe. You believe in hell, believe in heaven, you believe in Christ, you believe in the gospel or you just play in your religious gain. I mean this is good solid first century event except we didn't get thrown in prison. Yeah, Paul did almost in every city because he went to synagogues and said Jesus is the Messiah and they ran him out and go to the Gentiles and then they stir up the Gentiles because the gospel is for Jews and Gentiles, all nations should bow the knee to Jesus. If you don't, you don't know God. Jesus is the litmus paper of whether you know God or not. Your Hindu will you bow to Jesus, if you're Buddhist will you bow to Jesus, if you're Jewish will you bow to Jesus. If you don't, you don't know God. He who has the son has life, he who has not the son does not have life. Jesus is the litmus paper to test whether somebody's claim to know God is real or not. So there's an illustration of the confusion of humility. Arrogant is what a person gets called if they claim to see anything as true and proclaiming as true. Now I didn't plan to talk about humility tonight mainly but I think I should probably make a few comments about what is humility then if it's not uncertainty and I jotted them down. Where did I jot them down? I put it on the back of one of my sheets, there they are. Here is what my understanding of humility would be positively. Number one, humility begins with a sense of subordination to God in Christ. First Peter 5, 6, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God. Number two, humility does not feel a right to be treated better than Jesus got treated. Humility doesn't return evil for evil or reviling for reviling. It hands over to him who judges justly and takes whatever comes as you love other people. Three, humility asserts truth not to bolster the ego or control or to win an argument but as a servant of Christ and a servant of the adversary. The only reason to press truth onto somebody is because we believe it will save them. It will help them and we're willing to die to let that happen. That's the form, the attitude, the spirit in which we press truth. It's not about winning or looking good or getting the last word. It's about loving people. Fourth, humility knows it is dependent on grace for all that it knows and all that it believes. It has pity, it has pity on those who are still blind to seeing Jesus Christ as the beautiful compelling, captivating Savior because we were once there, Paul stressed it in Ephesians 213. Remember, remember you Gentiles that you were once cut off from Christ had no hope apart from the covenants. Remember that because in remembering it, it will give you patience and kindness and gentleness with others. Number five, humility knows it is fallible. Yes, we do know we're fallible. We see through a glass, darkly, then face to face, but we do see, we do see and you have to bear witness to what you've seen, always willing to learn, always willing to be corrected if somebody shows you from God's word that you haven't seen things as clearly as you should. And number six, humility speaks with joy that it can be shamed for the name because most failure to declare the truth is rooted in fear, which is rooted in pride. I don't like to look stupid and therefore I am a proud and arrogant person. And I think most fear is the reflex of pride is for me anyway. I'm walking down the street and I sense there's somebody I should talk to. My dis-inclination is I don't want to be made to look like a fool. That's pride. So humility is the opposite of that and therefore it releases courage. Let me read you one other thing before we move toward our text. 9/11 has had a huge effect in this regard. You would have thought that the effect of 9/11 or 7/7 would produce a kind of reverberation of absoluteness in a culture because you find commentators on the television and the radio who up till then are comfortable in stroking themselves with relativistic mumbo jumbo suddenly using the word evil. And you think the God, there is such a thing, the God, there it is. And for just a few days that was the case. Let me read you this amazing. This is from Douglas Wilson. This is a controversial fellow in Moscow, Idaho, in the United States and now in this there's something really provocative. The push is already on. In the aftermath of September 11 tragedy and in the wake of the impressive American military action in Afghanistan, we are hearing different voices calling for a domestic intolerance of every form of intolerance. Conservative Christians will find themselves under increasing pressure to deny the uniqueness of Jesus Christ. We will be allowed to keep a tiny Jesus but not permitted to affirm that He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Any claim to uniqueness on behalf of the Christian faith will be called as it has been already an American form of Talibanism. The reasoning goes this way. The thing which made these Muslim fanatics so dangerous is not that they believed a lie as we would hold, but rather that they thought they knew the truth. To these folks, truth is clearly the enemy. Truth is the adversary. Truth flies planes into skyscrapers. What would our nation do if a man came to us claiming to be the truth? We would do the same thing we did the first time. We would crucify him. In other words, for a moment, there seemed to be some illumination and then Satan massively co-opted the event to say what happened there is what you get everywhere people claim to know the truth. Taliban knows what is true, Christian know what is true, watch out for both of them and if necessary, put them in the jail before they blow anybody up rather than after. So we have our work cut out for us if we are going to be courageous, wise, as serpents and innocent as adults. So here we are at our text. That was a long introduction, Matthew chapter 10 verses 24 to 31. This is Jesus and I believe his agenda here, tell you what I think the main point is before we get there. His agenda, his main point is don't be afraid, speak what I tell you and don't be afraid. So starting in verse 24, a disciple is not above his teacher nor a servant above his master. It is enough for a disciple to be like his teacher and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household? So have no fear of them. For nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known. What I tell you in the dark, utter in the light, what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops. Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul, rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell, are not too sparrows sold for a penny and not one of them will fall to the ground without your father's will. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered, fear not therefore you are of more value than many sparrows. Now the reason I say the main point of those verses is don't be afraid is because he repeats it three times. Verse 26, so have no fear of them. Verse 28, do not fear those who kill the body. Verse 31, fear not therefore you are of more value than many sparrows. So if repetition is any key to what the main point is here, I think that's it. Don't be afraid. Let's put a finer point on it. Don't be afraid to do what? In verse 27 I believe is the fine point of the main point. Verse 27, what I tell you in the dark, you speak in the light and what you hear whispered. Now you proclaim on the housetops and do not fear. So the point is don't be afraid to speak clearly, what I have whispered, you do openly, don't be afraid to speak openly. I tell you in the closet you grip on the roof and announce it. So the issue here is feaking and a lot of other things that require courage, a lot of other things besides speaking that require courage. But that's what Jesus is talking about here. To open our mouths and say in public with one other person or a thousand other people, what you know you have seen of him in the Word of God in your study or closet or bedroom. So the main point, don't be afraid, clearly openly say what you have been taught by Christ or put it positively, be courageous and speak the truth. Now the rest of this text, all of it, is motivation. That's why I chose it. All the rest of this text, every line in the rest of this text is to help you not be afraid and there are five arguments and I want to just point them out to you. See if you can see them with me as we walk through the text and they won't take long. Number one, notice the word so or it may be therefore in your text and if you don't have a so or therefore in your translation, get a new translation. Because the Greek oon is really there and ought to be translated as something. Verse 26, so or therefore have no fear of them. Now you know that every time you see a so or a therefore something was just said, right? Something has just been said and you're drawing an inference out of it. You say something, I'm hungry, therefore I will eat. The therefore means there's a reason given and I'm drawing, I'm going to eat. Now what went before, let's read it. If they have called the master of the house beelzebul, how much more will they malign, how much more those of his household therefore have no fear of them. Now Jesus means for us to infer and experience fearlessness because he what he just said in verse 26. Does that work for you? Didn't obviously for me when I first read it, that argument did not work for me. You read it again, if they have called the master of the house beelzebul, how much more will those of his household get into trouble, therefore don't be afraid. That doesn't work, that should be therefore be afraid. So I'm not God, I don't treat the Bible like that. When I don't get the Bible, I get under it. I don't get over it and say, Bible, you make no sense. I'm not going to believe you anymore. This is where meditation and thought and reflection and prayer and labor and if necessary reading commentaries to help you. So I'm going to say Jesus makes sense. My brain is the problem, not Jesus. And the longer I thought on it, I think now it does make sense. So let me see if I can help you see it. If this were a class, I'd get you to show me what you've seen and maybe I would learn a thing or two, but there are too many of you to do that. Here's the way I understand this argument for my fearlessness and your fearlessness. If they call the master of the house, he's picturing a house here and he's the master. He's the head of the house. Because they call the master of the house beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household? Meaning, if you are getting maligned, you're in the house probably. That work? I like evidence that I'm in the house. I like evidence that Jesus is my master. I like the feeling that I'm in the same boat with Jesus. That argument starts to work emotionally for me. That if I'm getting in trouble by humbly, meekly, lovingly, telling it like it is, I'm with Jesus. I'm in the house and I've got a householder who's gone before me and yes, I expect to be treated no better than he, but all I want to die with him so that I might rise with him. So I think that's the way the argument works. That household idea is, if they treated me that way, my household members are going to be treated that way, therefore, don't be afraid of that. It confirms you're in the house. That's argument number one. Here's argument number two. Notice the word, just a few words in verse 26, the little word four. Now four, I hope that's there. If it's not there, you've got a problem with your version, four because is the logical opposite of therefore. That means an argument is coming. Well, therefore means the argument went before and a four means the argument is coming after, so that's where we have to look for it. Let's read it. So have no fear of them, four, don't be afraid of them, four, nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known. Don't be afraid. Hidden things will be known. Everything hidden will be known. Everything that is covered will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known. Does that encourage you to be bold? Isn't it remarkable? I don't think Jesus worries too much that you could understand him the first time around. I think Jesus spoke most of the time to force a second time around. I do. I only base that on the fact that I'm dumb and I don't get it the first time around. And so since I don't get it so often the first time around, I'm assuming he's spoken away, at least for John Piper, to get me to come back a second, a third, a fourth time. It's called meditation. It's called reflection. So I'd come back and say, "Okay, Jesus, how does that help me be bold?" You said it does. I have no fear of them because nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known. I think it means you speak boldly, truth, and the people looking at you roll their eyes, cluck their tongues, and look at each other with demeaning glances. One of the things at that moment that should give you tremendous courage is they won't do that in a thousand years. When the skies split and King Jesus is revealed with his holy angels in the glory of his father, the sign of the Son of Man appears in heaven and unbelievers call for the rocks to crush them so that they won't have to face the wrath of the Lamb. They won't be rolling their eyes anymore because all the truth will be revealed. Nothing that you ever spoke will fail to be vindicated." I think that's what he said. So let your heart run forward a century or so. Which does it matter? Do you want to have people saying nice things about you now? Or do you want to have the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords approve you at his coming to have your simple childlike words written across the sky vindicated forever because you have to believe all that, but that's what's here. Don't be afraid of them. Don't let them be your God. Don't let their disapproval govern you, let Christ govern you, let the coming last day, the great assides when all things hidden will be revealed and his people who looked so out of it, they looked so belittled and so demeaned and so wrong in Scottish culture perhaps of the 21st century now shining like the son in the kingdom of their father. I love to bring together Acts 5, is it 41, where the disciples leave having been beaten and they leave and it says they rejoice because they were counted worthy to be shamed for the name. So shame covered their faces as the enemy would have it and then put that verse together with Matthew 1341 or 43, I can't remember, it's right there somewhere where at the end of the parable of the wheat and the pears are one of those parables. You'll have to go there and find out whether this is really true. It says that they will shine like the son. Their faces will shine like the son in the kingdom of their father, so a face covered with shame will be like the son. You can't look at the son. I just look around at you and your faces. You're just so ordinary. Scottish people are really ordinary, there are any other kind of human beings than ordinary and I just try to imagine each one of you in the kingdom with a face so reflective of the glory of God that I can't look at you directly, any more than I can look at the son, see as Lewis said, I would be tempted to bow down and worship you if I saw you. Everybody you meet on the street out there, Lewis said, is a potential God or a potential demon, the one you will shrink back from because of the horror that they are in hell or the other you will be tempted to bow down and worship because the glory that they are in heaven. That's coming. You're going to be vindicated someday. That should keep you for huffing and puffing and belittling anybody. If God has approved, you don't need their approval. You can just love them. You can lay down your life for them. That's argument number two. Here's argument number three, verse 28. Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. I preached a sermon on this one time and I gave it the title, fear not. You can only be killed. We have a downtown church just like this one. I don't know where your nearest poor neighborhood is. It's a pretty business-like area but our church has a business like here on one side, University of Minnesota over here, kind of a light industry thing over here and the poorest neighborhood in the city right there and most people don't want to live there. A lot of our people live there. They choose to live there. They used to be able to get cheap houses there but it's dangerous. You can hear gunshots and there's a lot of drunkenness, drug dealing, prostitution, alcohol on the street. We moved in there when we came to the church, this closest neighborhood of the church. I hate cars and I like to walk and so I didn't want to drive. Good grief. I hate the drive. Why would you want to drive if you can walk? I'm not a typical American that regard. America has a great love affair with the car but I don't. So we moved in and I preached that message to try to get people to move in. You know the term white flight. Whites leave the city, 50s, 60s, 70s in America leave the urban core to urban poor, many of whom are African-American and others, not all. So the white flight. I wanted to reverse that so bad I can hardly stand it 25 years ago and so I came and preached that kind of message. I said come on Bethlehem, what are we living for? Try to find the ideal neighborhood, the ideal neighbors, the ideal school, the ideal police protection. Why do you need heaven now? That's an over realized eschatology. We are called not to have heaven now. Heaven can wait, it will come and that it will come with most definite certainty is why you can let it go now. Do not fear those who kill the body. Move in next to them and win them to Christ. Who else is going to? What does it mean to be a Christian? You just like the world does and run away from danger and risk. That's what Jesus is saying. Don't fear those who kill the body. Go after them. Let me just put another little piece on that. We have a few other peculiar things about our family, we've never had a television. So I thought I'm going to raise four sons and they're going to be really weird. They're going to be square out of it, everybody's going to laugh at them. That never happened. They've all grown, married, have wives, have children, follow Jesus. Because I think part of it, grace of God is the answer to that sort of thing, but because I said to them and I said to anybody who asked that question, I said, look, you don't need a television to show you reality if you live in the right neighborhood. Why wouldn't you just, instead of watching the evening news, go out and watch the evening news? Do you hear it? I can be there before the police get there. My boys saw me pull men off of women, trying to rape them in my front yard. They saw me go out and try to get the drain spout that they yanked off our house and we're banging each other to pieces in the front yard. That's the way they grew up. They were very savvy. They were street wise. Nobody at their schools thought they were out of it. TV watchers who lived in the suburbs were out of it as far as my boys were concerned. They thought it was, in fact, they became way too prejudicial in that regard. They liked inner city types and became prejudiced against the suburb types, which is sin coming out no matter what you do. So I preached that sermon because of that text, fear not. You can only be killed because that's what he says. Do not fear those who kill the body, that's all they can do, they can't kill the soul. So don't be silent, speak no matter what it might cost. That's argument number three. They can only dispatch you to paradise. And you know that phrase reminds me of something else I should say probably. That's the confidence that our souls will be dispatched to paradise immediately upon our martyrdom is what sustains us in fearlessness. How are we different from terrorists who blow themselves up outside falafel shops in Baghdad killing eight women and children and how are we different? And the answer is we don't kill. We die. He who would be my disciple let him come after me and take up his cross and follow me. Christians lay their lives down to save people. They don't kill others to go to paradise. They die for others to go to paradise. That's a huge difference. My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my disciples would be fighting. My kingdom is not of this world. America is not the kingdom of Christ. And the great tragedy is that Islam associates the West with Christianity. They simply identify it. We export all the sin and we bring all the bonds. That's Christianity. Oh, that the church could be so counter cultural in America and Scotland and Iraq and Germany and everywhere else that the church could be so counter cultural that Islam would not be able to make that mistake. Not true now. May it become true. Maybe if Christians began to be imprisoned in America and Scotland, the Muslims would have to say, hmm, I guess Christianity is not the same as American culture. That might be a very useful thing in finishing the Great Commission. You know that all the unreached peoples of the world almost are in the hardest places right now. Hindu places, Buddhist places, and Muslim places. 4,000 unreached groups, South Asia and other places. There's only one way that the Great Commission is going to be finished, martyrs. This isn't going to happen with blimps dropping tracks on certain castes in India. It's going to happen with real, live, human bodies, loving people, not killing people, and laying down their lives. More people will be saved through Gram-Stains events than through any kind of aggression from the West. It's dying. The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. And I think this text is a great help to help us open our mouth. That's argument number which, 3, number 4, I'm almost finished because when I finish these 5 will be done. Verse 30. Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. That encourage you to be bold and speak what needs to be spoken. Even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Why did he say that? Why did he say I know the number of the hairs on your head? What a useless piece of information. What's the point? Surely the point is intimacy. The point is to count hairs you've got to really get up close and tie little ribbons around them and you count them twice. I don't know what other reason he would have said that except to say we adopted Talitha when she was 8 weeks old. I don't think she'd mind me telling you this. She's African American and we love her so much. Her hair is different than our hair. Hair's a big deal, right? She's got to learn to do hair. White folk together learn to do hair. I watch my wife, she's really good at this. She creates some of the most magnificent hairstyles on Talitha's head. It takes about 2-3 hours, but what I've noticed is I sit there and Talitha sits on a stool. Noelle straddles either side of the bench and they sit there for 2 hours. They put a DVD in the thing or whatever and she works on her and she works so meticulously because he has little tiny braids and that makes me think of this text. Noelle hovered over Talitha for 2 and a half hours. It would take longer if she had to count. She's just making a couple dozen braids, but there's a mother hovering over a daughter and here's Christ hovering over John Piper. I know you so well. I can tell you a number of freckles on your arms, a number of hairs on your head, every blemish on your body, I know you and you are mine. So if you ever need a sense that in the conflict of the world when people are alienating you and you now feel totally alone, you're not. You're not only not alone. You are intimately known, cared for. That's argument number 4 as I see it in the words even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Final argument. This is a combination of two verses, 29 and 31 to see the whole logical development. But let's read 31 first, verse 31. You are of more value than many sparrows. Now you might think that's a good enough argument right there, but it's better. It's better when you put it together with verse 29. Not one of them, these sparrows. But one of them will fall to the ground without your father's will. They do fall to the ground. The little sparrow in a forest somewhere in the highlands reaches the end of its days and just falls off the limb and becomes fertilizer. That doesn't happen without God, Jesus says. Not one of them will fall to the ground without your father, your more value than they. Which doesn't mean you won't fall to the ground. It means you won't fall to the ground apart from the merciful will of your father. Jesus said in Luke 17, "Some of you they will put to death." Two verses later, "Not a hair of your head will perish." That's jolting. Some of you they will put to death. Paul was probably beheaded by Nero. Well, what in the world does it mean, "Not a hair of your head will perish"? What, they move your hair? Not a hair of your head will perish when they put you to death. It means, "I know the number of hairs. Your more value than sparrows. Nothing that falls a sparrow that I do not ordain. And therefore I am with you and I will catch your precious head. I will mend you in the resurrection. I will take your soul into my embrace until that day. You are never alone. Be courageous. Walk into that Colosseum and speak my word." Maybe it would be good to close with a little story from John Patton. John Patton, I think it's from here, isn't he? Here meaning Scotland. And he went to the New Hebrides about 150 years ago and he went to the island of Tana with his bride. They had just been married. No Christian had ever walked on this island before. There were about 4,000 natives and they were totally pagan and cannibalistic. Two missionaries had been eaten on another island nearby some years before and he's taking his new bride onto this island and within six months she died, no no, let's leave the time out, within a year or two she had a son, little baby, and she died. And then the baby couldn't live, so the baby died. He dug the graves for his wife and his baby with his own bare hands and put him and said I would have gone mad, had not the Lord been with me. He stayed on that island I believe four years, one or two people to Christ who became a devoted servant and then there was an uprising to kill him and to drive him off the island. And his friend was willing to risk his life to show him a path of escape. Now many times John Patton had walked right into the middle of conflict risking his life to say to factions that were warring with each other, lay down your arms, this is not the way God wants you to live and they had not killed him. But now all of them had united to come kill him so he discerned that this was time to flee. Sometimes you stand, sometimes you flee just like the Apostle Paul stood and sometimes went into a basket over the wall. So he began to escape and they were gaining on him and his friend said the only way you're going to escape is to climb this tree be totally silent, hope they don't see you, when they're under you come down and go over there there's a boat and you'll be able to go to another island. He climbs the tree and he sits there and I think I'll just close our time together by reading what he wrote. Notice what he wrote later about his feelings in the tree. Because you talk about fear, totally alone, one friend, the friend has led the wild goose chase off to distract them, hopefully he'll survive and you're there and they might at any moment look up and then you will be killed and eaten probably. I mean, could you be more afraid than that? Being entirely at the mercy of such doubtful and vacillating friends as those who had helped him except for one, I thought I though perplexed, felt it best to obey. I climbed into the tree and was left there alone in the bush. The hours I spent there live all before me as if it were but yesterday. I heard the frequent discharging of muskets and the yells of the savages. Yet, I sat there among the branches as safe as in the arms of Jesus. Never in all my sorrows did my Lord draw nearer to me and speak more soothing to me in my soul than when the moonlight flickered among the chestnut leaves and the night air played on my throbbing brow as I told all my heart to Jesus alone, yet not alone. If it be to the glory of my God, I will not grudge to spend many nights alone in such a tree to feel again my Savior's spiritual presence, to enjoy His consoling fellowship if thus thrown back upon your soul, this is His closing exhortation to you. If thus thrown back upon your soul, your own soul, alone, all alone in the midnight, in the bush, in the very embrace of death itself, have you a friend that will not fail you then? I don't know who you are tonight, but it is possible for you to be freed from fear. You may not be a believer. You may not know anything about that experience. He's saying, and I'm saying to you, "Have you a friend like that who in the clutches of death and danger will so minister assurance and confidence and hope to you that you can rest as in the arms of God Almighty?" You can have a friend. Jesus has come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Make my yoke upon you and learn from me, find me, and lowly in heart, and you'll find rest for your souls. My yoke is easy, and my burden is light. All authority in heaven and on earth belongs to me. Go make my disciples, baptize the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, and lo, I'm going to be with you. I'll be with you to the end of the age. That's all we need in order to overcome our anxieties and to speak what he once spoke. Father in heaven, would you work this in me? I want to experience this even as I walk home tonight. I want love to abound for people and courage to give me the grace to speak where there needs to be a word of grace, salvation, hope, correction, rebuke, guidance, encouragement. And I know that I speak for hundreds in this room. We want this text to come true in our lives. Would you come and do a fresh, deep work tonight to create courage and broken heart hearted boldness in the cause of your truth? I ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you for listening to this message by John Piper, pastor for preaching at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Feel free to make copies of this message to give to others, but please do not charge for those copies or alter the content in any way without permission. We invite you to visit Desiring God Online at www.desiringgod.org. There you'll find hundreds of sermons, articles, radio broadcasts and much more, all available to you at no charge. Our online store carries all of Pastor John's books, audio and video resources. You can also stay up to date on what's new at Desiring God. Again, our website is www.desiringgod.org, or call us toll-free at 1-888-346-4700. Our mailing address is Desiring God 20601 East Franklin Avenue, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55406. Desiring God exists to help you make God your treasure because God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. [end]
Christ gives us all we need to be courageous in the cause of speaking the truth.