Good morning and welcome to our worship here at First Presbyterian Church. We are so glad to see you here. We're so glad to have you with us today, particularly visitors. And whether you're a visitor or a member, we are here to worship the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, together as a congregation. And as a congregation, we'd like to get to know each other a little bit. One small way we can do that is you'll find a friendship, register, a blue pad on one or the other aisle of your pew. If you could find that and note your presence and pass that along, it'll give people on your pew a way to start to get to know you. Here are some other announcements in the life of our church that are important for you to know about. Our D-groups, that's our small groups, our small groups begin again today along with all of the worship children and youth programs. So please make note of that. Please visit the Fellowship Hall on Sunday, January 26. That's in two weeks to learn about opportunities for more involvement in ministries at First Presbyterian Church. There will be over 25 different ministries set up to inform you about a variety of ways to serve both inside and outside. Here are both inside and outside of First Pres opportunities exist for all ages. Visit the Fellowship Hall during the Sunday School Hour and also after the late service. Again, that'll be in two weeks. First Presbyterian Church will be hosting Paul Miller's The Praying Life Seminar, February 7-8. It's something that you need to register for beforehand. And there is a registration table set up in the connector today. Many of you are aware of Paul Miller and the Book of Praying Life. It's become really rather well-known and popular and has benefited many, many people in terms of bringing vital prayer into their life and an aid to anybody. So please take advantage of that seminar. The Pray for Me campaign, Tony Satter spoke of it last week. It's underway. Please consider being a prayer champion for a student in our church. The launch event is February 23rd and there will be opportunities coming up to sign up. There will be opportunities in the connector and Sunday school classes and in our D groups. And finally, there will be a congregational meeting on January 19th, 2014, that is next week at 9.30 after the early service. And at noon after the late service, congregation will be here in the sanctuary and it will be regarding the land exchange with UTC. And if you'd like to sort of visualize what that's about, you'll find small posters in the connector, black and white foyer where you can kind of take a look at that beforehand. And with that, let's prepare our hearts to worship our great God in King. So every blessing to my heart to see the streams of mercy never ceasing. Come for a sum of love is pleased. Teach me some of that somebody please. Mixed up on each of them. Yeah, baby, like a black God. Precious God. Great. I propose you. Would you please stand for our call to worship? It's great to be back together with you by the way. We traveled down the Dallas to be with our family and we were thinking about you during the hours of the services as quite often we think about the church around the world. Our friends in China and Germany and Africa and South America and the church gathers together on this day to worship our great King Jesus. This is our opportunity as the church representing Christ here in Chattanooga. Sing a new song to the Lord. Sing to the Lord all the earth. Sing to the Lord. Bless his name. Amen. My name. Tell me for a combination. Tell his marvels to every people. The Lord himself made the heavens. In his presence are splendor and majesty. In his sanctuary are power and beauty.
Of the peoples as a tribe to the Lord, beauty and power. As a tribe to the Lord, glory to the same. Surely to Jesus we have fled. And we find ourselves here, Lord God, in your presence with our brothers and sisters. And we take great delight in hearing one another's voices and seeing one another's faces. But Jesus, it's your face. We want to see, Lord, surely some of us are up to our neck in water. And as we stare up in hope, may we see you. So Holy Spirit come and manifest the glory of Christ in our midst for your glory and for our good. May we worship you with our hearts, our lives today as if this might be the last time on earth, on this side of heaven. We have an opportunity to give you glory in the midst of our dark world and the midst of confusion. And so we come and make our morning prayer, a prayer of adoration. You are our great King Jesus. We make our prayer in your name. Amen. Our affirmation of faith we are indeed using ancient words. Words which we believe strengthen our souls, establish our faith. Come for us in times of trouble. And place our hope in God and God alone to deliver us from hoping in ourselves, hoping in our bank account, hoping in circumstances of life or putting all of our trust in government, we transfer our hope to our great King Jesus. He's the only one who can transform our hearts. So Christian, I ask you, what do you believe? I am the maker of heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ is only Son and our Lord. Who wants to conceive by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, sat up under Pontius Pilate, was crucified dead in Mary. He was sent in heaven. The third day he rose again from the dead, he ascended into heaven, and sit on the right hand with the God of the Father Almighty. From then he sought out to tell us to quit from the dead. I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. You may be seated. It is encouraging to hear a speak, one another, these words of truth that we've learned through the years. The Holy Spirit convinced us of their truth. And so we stand together as God's people, hoping in Jesus alone. Now we also come to a time where we confess our sin. We are going to confess our sin in unison today by singing. We'll sing from our songbook, which is the little gray-ish colored book on page 16. We'll sing the first two verses of God be merciful to me. And then as the musicians continue, we'll have a time of silent confession where you can quietly pour out your heart to the Lord. Confess your sin and your hope for him. And then the elitist back and we'll sing verses five and six of God be merciful to me. Let's continue to pray. Father, we thank you that the truth of those words that we have sung in prayer that we have assurance of your mercy, your forgiveness that our guilt is removed. And so as a result, we can come to you knowing that you delight in hearing our prayers. We pray the prayer that your Son Jesus taught us to say, our Father, who art in heaven. God be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. We may be seated, Chris Saylor's and the new members come forward. It's one of the great privileges that we have from time to time in the life of our church to be introduced to new members and even to participate in baptism. So Chris will introduce our members this morning. If I could go ahead and invite our new members who have already been received by the... I'll lose in the session this morning if you would come up and arrange yourself on the stairs here. It's not a choreographed thing, but if you could just come up and turn around and face the congregation. I'll introduce you by name, and then I will read the questions to you that you're very familiar with. And you can face the congregation for those. Let me step up out of the way here. You can just remain facing the congregation while I read them and affirm them as I give you that direction. If you were here last month, you know that this is a group that was part of a class we had a group of about 17 or 18 that joined during December. But as with most of our busy culture, these folks were just in God's time in promise. We're not able to be there that Sunday or there were other things in the way. So we always set up an alternative Sunday and hope that we can get everyone else. And I think that we've succeeded in doing that this time. We're very grateful for your cooperation. Let me just go ahead as just to reiterate what Ron said. You know, for whatever the limitations are of new members in some ways, unless they've been here a long time there. You know, still not necessarily completely familiar with everything the church is doing or every corner of the buildings. That's something that I've been here almost five years. I don't think I've been in every corner of it yet, but that's another day. But, you know, what they make up for it is with a tremendous vitality and enthusiasm. They are excited to be here and to be, to have been received by the session. And they're excited to be jumping in and rolling up their sleeves to be a part of the body of Christ here at First Presbyron Church, Chattanooga. And you know what, that's an exciting thing that they can pass on us. Some of you that have been here a long time, you may need them to give you a little bit of new excitement and vitality because you've maybe kind of gotten too familiar and used to things, even though we do see changes, God leads it. So, I hope that you'll appreciate this new lifeblood in the body of Christ that is here at First Presbyron Church, Chattanooga. Without further ado, let me introduce them. And first, I want to mention, and if you would just raise your hands as I mentioned, your name so that people can identify with you. Derek and Tiffany Holland, they have a son and a daughter, and we are delighted to have them in our midst. And then we have Tia, Lewis, and her daughter, and we are delighted to have them as well. Then we have Chris and Jenny Meadows, they have a son and daughter with them. And then last but not least, we have Ken and Tiffany Patterson and their two daughters. We are delighted to have you all with us this morning. And I hope that we can do that not only in word but later today and in the following weeks that our members will also greet you personally and let you know that that is the reality. We are delighted to have you with us. Let me read again the questions of joining. These are part of the recognition of you having made a profession of faith that the session has already received. As you know, these folks who have gone through an extensive class, they have been to a pastor's dessert fellowship, they have been to interviews, and then they have met with a session. So this is not a fly by night operation. Anyway, here are the questions. No one has accused us of having that by the way either. All right. Here are the questions. Do you acknowledge yourselves to be sinners in the sight of God, justly deserving His displeasure, and without hope, save in a sovereign mercy? Do you? Secondly, do you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God and Savior of sinners? And do you receive and rest upon Him alone for salvation as He has offered in the gospel, do you? Do you now resolve and promise in humble reliance upon the grace of the Holy Spirit that you will endeavor to live as becomes the followers of Christ? Do you promise to support the church and its worship and work to the best of your ability? And do you submit yourselves to the government and discipline of the church and promise to study its purity and its peace? Do you? All right. Thank you. We are going to have a closing prayer. In fact, I'd like to invite Pete Austin, the third to come up, and he's going to, in just a minute, close us, in prayer altogether and pray for the new members as well as for Tiffany Patterson. I'm going to ask Ken and Tiffany if they would step over. Of course, the children as well. Tiffany has made a profession of faith, but has never been baptized, and so we're going to do that at this time. So, Ken and Tiffany, if you could step over here to your right, thank you. Beautiful family. Let me just mention, as many of you have before, that Tiffany has made a profession of a faith in Christ. And we are called out of obedience to go through the sign and seal of baptism as part of public profession. It's done out of obedience. Let me be clear, as most of us know already, that no experience of baptism that the church does in the second of the baptism saves anybody. This is a sign and seal of what Tiffany as she's able to profess her faith is indicating God has done that already. As Christ has washed her over sins by a shed blood on the cross, he is justified her. The Spirit of God, according to God's promise and faithfulness, has entered in, and his spirit now engages her spirit as she daily seeks to walk in the newness of her faith in Christ. But this is something that we do out of obedience as part of our profession of faith, and Tiffany desired to do that, and we are loving the opportunity to do that here this morning. Again, this is a reflection of her union with Christ by faith in him, recognizing all that Christ has done for her as a believer in Christ, and we are delighted to do that. Let me just offer a brief word of prayer then. Heavenly Father, we do ask that the grace that is present, that you pour out daily upon your children, your saints, that it might be clear, even through the sacrament of baptism. Not only Tiffany's faithfulness, but even more so, Father, your faithfulness to her in Christ. We thank you and rejoice for her faith. We pray that you would cause it to grow and flourish even as you have called her to yourself, and it's in your name we ask it. Amen. Pete, I'm going to hand this to you. I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and in the name of the Son, and in the name of the Holy Spirit. God bless you. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I too am excited to have these new brothers and sisters join this part of your very large body. Thank you for the union that you put in with us to you and with us to each other, but also the unity you put within each one of us. That what we do in our hearts can be professed with our lips. And you have told us that if we believe in our heart with the Lord Jesus Christ and confess with our mouth that he is Lord, we are saved. And that's what these believers, these new brothers and sisters, these new members in Christ in this part of your body have done this morning. Thank you for them, for each one, and particularly for Tiffany, and she has publicly professed her faith by the receiving the sacrament of baptism this morning. Father, may we welcome and love these folks well, and may they love you with all their heart and soul and mind and strength. And we pray to that their lives will glorify you and that they will in fact enjoy you now and forever. And it is in the name of our great Lord and Savior, the worthy Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, even Jesus Christ that we pray. Amen. At this time we have the dismissing of children to children's church and we also have the opportunity to greet one another. Those of you that are toward the front, if you could take the opportunity to greet our new members this morning personally, that'd be great. It's good to hear the noise, it's fellowship, and it's good to be together as the people of God. We know that God does care about us, so we're going to go to him in prayer once more and ask him to meet the needs of our congregation. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you do care about us that we can come to you as Father, but just as Jesus instructed us to come to you as a Father who cares. Our earthly Father's care and they are imperfect. And as Jesus said, we want our perfect Heavenly Father to care for us in much greater ways. And so we come to you with that assurance, with that encouragement from Jesus Himself and pray that you would hear our prayers. We pray for Judy Smith and particularly her son Curtis and the whole Smith family that you would be with Curtis as his cancer is spread. Heal him, give them a sense of your encouragement and your closeness. We pray for Dana Lael's mother who has been hospitalized recently and we just pray that you would be with her and heal her and be with Dana and the rest of the family as they seek to care for her. We pray for Linda Richardson that her treatments would be successful. We pray, Father, that you would be with our honor roll, that you would be with those who can't make it here to church physically on Sunday morning, that they would know your care, your comfort, your presence, that they would know fellowship. We pray for those who are unemployed or under employed, that you would help them to find a job, that you would open those doors, that you would encourage them during this time, that you would meet their financial needs. We pray for families in our church, we pray for those that are struggling, that are having difficulties at this time, that you would bring your presence in the middle of those families, that you would bring harmony and peace and wisdom and understanding, and that you would protect all the families of this church, that they would know and grow in you. We pray for those that are single, unmarried in our church, that you would continue to encourage them and help them in their growth, that may they receive deep and vital fellowship in this body of believers. We pray that you would encourage them and use them in great ways in this church to serve just as your word says, that they are serving in this church. We thank you, Father, for them and pray your blessing on them. We pray for the various things that we're starting up even today, even this week, we would be remiss. We did not ask that you would be in it, that you would bless our D groups, our small groups, our worship offerings, our children's ministry, that you would be in all of those, that they would be a great blessing, and that you would be praised and worshiped as a result. We come to you this morning acknowledging that we are weak, that you are strong, that you are king, and that we delight in you, our king, and so we come as an active worship even now to make offerings and ties and give that which you have given to us to give it to you as an active worship this morning. We pray all these things in Jesus name, Amen. Would you please stand for the reading of God's word. Our scripture lesson today is found in the book of 2nd Thessalonians. I'll be reading from chapter 2 beginning in verse 13. But we ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers beloved by the Lord, because God chose you as the first fruits to be saved through sanctification by the spirit and belief in the truth. To this he called you through our gospel so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter. Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts, and establish them in every good work and word. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. In years ago, really the first century, when someone was baptized, they would usually step into the water or near the water, and they would stand in front of the church and this quite often took place publicly. And they were asked for questions. The first question before they were baptized they would have to answer is that do you announce the devil? They would say, I do. And they were asked, do you believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth? And they would say, I believe in God the Father Almighty. And then the third question, do you believe in Jesus Christ? His Son conceived or the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary? Yes, I believe in Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. And do you believe in the Holy Spirit and the fellowship, community, communion of saints? Yes, I believe in the Holy Spirit. And then historically they would either be baptized after they answered each of those questions or collectively toward the end they would either be sprinkled or they would have the water poured over them and some were actually immersed. And so when we come to the study of the Apostles Creed, I want you to recognize that it's historic creed. It's a creed with starts with one word. The word in the Latin is credo, I believe. And that's what we're going to talk about today. I believe. What does it mean to believe? Now next week I'll take us into the object of our belief. I believe in God. But today we're going to talk about faith, what it means to believe. And so I'm going to give you a little background on the origin of the Apostles Creed. I'll lay out some of the purposes of the Apostles Creed throughout church history as well as for today. And then I want to talk to us about faith. What does it mean to place your faith in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit? So first of all the origins of the Apostles Creed. Of the first Apostles Creed, if you will, three simple words. Jesus is Lord. Romans 10 says the word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. That is the word of faith that we proclaim because if you confess with your mouth, that Jesus is Lord. And believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. So in its simplest form, original form, if you will, the Apostles Creed was simply Jesus is Lord. From the book of Romans, we know that a person had to say that. They spoke it publicly, but they also believed it in their heart had to be something that they meant in the depth of their heart. But over the development of the Apostles Creed, it was expanded and obviously it has been the form we currently use was consolidated in the fourth century. You might be thinking why did it get longer? Why did they add more about God the Father and more about Jesus and the Holy Spirit? It got longer because of the heresies the church faced throughout those centuries. People who didn't understand who God was and I'll be preaching about God the Father and the triumphant God next week. They didn't understand the work of Jesus Christ. Don't wait. Was he really a man or did he just kind of look like a man and wait, you're saying he was totally God? Wait, you're saying he's totally God and he's totally man. There's a lot of issues for us to think through when we think about our understanding of who Jesus is or formerly our Christology. The Christian church is a creedal church and the creed was written within historical circumstances and so some of the language that's used. Had a meaning in that day that in some ways confuses us today and will unpack that as we go through. So the origin of the creed had multiple purposes. It wasn't actually written by the Apostles. It sounds funny to say Apostles Creed wasn't written by the Apostles. If it wasn't completely formulated until the fourth century, the Apostles had all gone to be with the Lord, but it's a summary of the Apostles teaching. So the purpose of this particular creed, although we have many, was first of all to give a bit of a summary of what it means to be a Christian or what a Christian must believe in order to be accepted before God. And it's kind of a shorthand form of what it means to be a Christian or what you have to believe to be a Christian. Now it's not meant to be exhaustive. There's many things that are not mentioned in the Apostles Creed. It's meant to be a summary. And then the second purpose of the establishment of the creed was to stand against the false teachings of the day. Thirdly, it was used in baptism opportunity as Tiffany took this morning through Pastor Eilers and the Sessions leadership to profess her faith before the people of God, this church and publicly, if you will, is very helpful. And then we also find that the Apostles Creed was used to help people in the establishment of their faith. And that's the purpose we're going to use it for as we go up toward Easter. Traditionally in the church, baptisms were either done immediately upon conversion after that person professed their faith, they were baptized. Or in some areas of the church, they waited until all the people who had professed faith in Christ throughout the year, they were all baptized on Easter morning. You imagine how glorious that must have been to gather everyone together, have a wonderful celebration of Christ's resurrection. And so we're studying the Apostles Creed and we'll finish at Easter time. And so I'll be preaching on the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter morning. Of course, you're not surprised by that. Well, it's the culmination that the Apostles Creed, if you will, is very helpful in establishing us in our faith. We've learned we have to put our faith in truth. Now, I want to have us return your eye to the text, if you will, here in 2 Thessalonians. The Thessalonians were undergoing great persecution. They were being persecuted by the Roman Empire. I don't know if you're in your brain, you know where Thessalonica is, but just think of Greece and think of it as a crossroads for industry, but for trade, for banking, for commerce. So it's a critical spot on the globe, a crossroads, if you will. They're under great oppression from the Roman government and also from some of the Jews in the area who had not accepted Yeshua as Messiah. Or they had not accepted Jesus as the Lord, the Christ. And so I want you to notice that in a way of encouragement, the Apostle Paul is speaking about the end times. What's going to happen at the end? And just let your eye go back to verse 9 there in chapter 2. The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders and with all wicked deception for those who were perishing because they refused to love the truth and to be saved. Therefore God sends them a strong delusion so that they may believe what is false in order that they may all be condemned who did not believe the truth but they actually had pleasure in unrighteousness. This is speaking of the end times the people will actually take great pleasure in unrighteousness. That's why many people think today we're in the end times, right? We're surrounded with people even in our city, even in this room who take great pleasure in unrighteousness. Now here's this connective contrast of that, that little three-letter word, that's a huge word, verse 13. But we ought always to give thanks to God for you. In other words, he's contrasting the saints and believers in Christ with those who are lawless and who take the light in unrighteousness. We give thanks to God for you, brothers, beloved by the Lord because God chose you by this, by the way, this little bitty passage is packed full with awesome doctrinal truth. God chose you, speaking of election, as the first fruits to be saved through sanctification, and now this little word by, it means how it took place, the vehicles through which your sanctification take place, the spirit and belief in the truth. So as we study the apostles' creed, we're going to focus on the biblical truth that undergirds each phrase of the apostles' creed in hopes that the spirit of God will rest on us so that we actually believe, that we understand and that we believe. So as we go through this series together, it's our hope that as we hear the truth of God's word as expressed through the apostles, then it would strengthen our faith, that it would establish us in our faith. It's one of the reasons that we do discipleship in this church, not only because the Lord Jesus Christ commands each and every one of us to make disciples. But part of the discipleship experience is that we understand truth better. You understand it as a student, and you understand it as a teacher, and so the apostles' creed was very hopeful in establishing people in their faith. Because not everybody had a Bible. I mean, go back into the first century. The majority of people on the face of the earth, based on the research I've done, they were illiterate. They couldn't read or write. About 10% of the people who existed in the first century were illiterate. And they didn't have Bibles available. They couldn't reach forward into a pew. They probably didn't have pews. They probably were meeting in someone's home. They couldn't reach forward and pick up a copy of the Bible. They didn't have any. They were in scrolls, more than likely, the synagogue. And so what do these people do? They had to memorize things. They had to fill their mind with these thoughts about God. Well, what do you do when you're helping an illiterate person learn things? You repeat. You simplify. You try not to sacrifice content, but you simplify the apostles' creed was so helpful in strengthening people's faith in establishing them in an understanding of the way the triune God works, but it was also very helpful in evangelism. Think of the last time you presented the gospel to somebody or you led someone to Christ, just kind of in your mind's eye remember the last time you sat down with an individual or a group of people and you presented your understanding of the gospel. Wasn't it helpful to have a little bit of a memorized form in your head? Wasn't it helpful to go, oh, I'll go through the apostles' creed. We say that in church every Sunday. I've got that one. We believe in God the Father on my creed. And we believe in Jesus Christ and you work your way right through and you present the gospel by using the apostles' creed. Now, some of us have memorized many, many other things as well. I remember I came to faith through somebody read the four spiritual laws to me. Just as there are physical laws that govern the physical universe, so there are spiritual laws that govern the spiritual universe. Law one says that God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Really? I had no idea. I had never been exposed to that thinking. And so when you're going out like the first century church did to tell the truths of Jesus, they didn't have a Bible. They would just whip it open and say John 3, 16. Let's go through that one here. Read it for yourself. They didn't have Bibles and they were illiterate about 15% of the people in the United States are illiterate. About 20% of the people globally are illiterate. There are many people in Chattanooga who are illiterate. Many of us tutor children in our schools. Some of us work in prisons. And many, many prisoners are illiterate. Many of our children are illiterate in some of our schools. And we can't just send them home and say, oh, at the Good News Club, they talked about John 3, 16, Mom, they gave me this little Bible. Would you read it? Because I can't read it, Mom. And Mom says, oh, I don't know how to read either illiteracy. You see the apostles' creed given its historical context helps us understand how significant it was for the church to have a summary. Paul refers it to it as traditions here. If you look carefully at the text, look at verse 15. So then brothers, stand firm and hold to, hold to what? The traditions that you were taught. Now some people go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Traditions, what if the tradition was, you know, you had to take off your shoes and give a holy kiss before you could come into church, right? So is that the tradition? No, look how he qualifies it. He said the traditions that you were taught by us, us meaning the apostles, either by our spoken word or by our letter. And so the apostles' creed was formed from the written and spoken word of the apostolic authority or the apostles. It's very helpful in evangelism, very helpful in establishing people in our faith. That's one of the reasons it's critical for each member of our church to be well established in their faith, to be strong in their understanding of what it means to be a Christian, so that you can speak clearly when you're presenting the gospel. You know, it also is amazingly helpful to have this sense of what you know about God when you're undergoing persecution. And surely that's one of the reasons Paul included this in his letter, this idea of these traditions that grew out of the authoritative word of God because the Thessalonians were under great oppression, tremendous persecution. You know, we don't think that we're under very much persecution. You know, growing up as a child, I didn't sense much persecution in the United States at all for Christians, but I do believe that persecution is growing within the United States. In fact, many of my friends have said, you know, I can't believe that I actually live in a time when you can be persecuted for being a Christian. People will not shop at your business if you take and hold to Christian values. Now, there are different ways to hold to Christian values, by the way I might add, there's a loving, kind, embracing way to hold to a Christian value. And there's another way of holding to a Christian value that makes the Christian appear to be a judgmental jerk. We must be very wise in how we hold these truths and how we present the love of God to the people in our culture. I'll touch on that in a moment. But I want us to understand that knowing God's word and knowing God helps us when we're under persecution, when we struggle. Also during worship, we use this as churches around the world, use the Apostle's Creed to help us when worship. We speak the truth to one another as we summarize this in the Apostle's Creed. So those are some of the purposes of the Apostle's Creed. Let me talk a little bit about faith. Now, it's important for us to understand what faith means and what faith doesn't mean. In order to have faith, we need three things. We need knowledge, but we need to have an understanding of something in order to put our faith in it when I heard the good news of Jesus Christ back in 1975 for the first time. I was like, I never heard that before that God loves me that I'm a sinner. I understood that part. I said, but Jesus died for you and took your sins on him, self, and then gave you his righteousness. I never heard that before in my life. In fact, I couldn't believe it. But I would say to you, no one can believe that apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. In 1 Corinthians 2.14, Paul says, the natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, whether you go. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God. They are folly to him. He's not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. They're not only unwilling. They are unable to understand. Verse 18, for the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing. But to us who are being saved, it's the power of God. When people hear the gospel and they think that sounds stupid or simple or ridiculous, do you know what? In some ways, they're right. When you present the gospel to a skeptic, to a non-believer, and they look at you and say, you know, I'm really glad that works for you. But that doesn't work for me. It doesn't add up. You should not be surprised. The only thing you should be surprised about is that by the powerful work of the Spirit, you do believe it. That should be what surprises us because it's a miracle. When we met as a session in between services and we heard our new members, or this second part of our new members who joined, when they answered those questions, it's like my heart was leaping inside of me, but it's a miracle. When kids said, I believe, it's a miracle. And so when we approach a skeptical, lost world, and they think the gospel is folly, that's only what the Bible teaches us. We need to be very, very gracious and patient and understanding and prayerful because what is Paul teaches about sanctification, in other words being said apart for God? He says the vehicles by which these take place are, I'm in verse 13 again, the Spirit and belief in the truth. If the Spirit of God does not attend the Word of God, you are not capable of believing it. You're incapable. We are incapable of believing in God, apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. You can know a lot about God and not be a believer. The North American churches, we are filled with people who can give you the right answer, but do not believe it. It's a work of the Spirit of God. We need to humbly approach the Spirit of God and ask Him for help that He would open our eyes. Ephesians 2 says it this way, for by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing. It's not your own doing. For by grace, unmerited favor. In other words, you can't earn it. You've been saved through faith. And this is even your faith is in your own doing. It's the gift of God. Our faith is a gift from God. The three parts of faith, knowledge, ascent and obedience. That's the classic definition of faith. If you go back through the history and the theology of the church, they divide faith into those three components. You must know before you can believe. Well, that makes perfectly good sense. How are you going to believe in something you don't know anything about? You're ignorant. But you begin to know. But then you must agree with what you know. It begins to make sense to you. It's so fun to watch people come to faith in Christ. Don't be afraid of the questions. You have the same ones, by the way. Enjoy their questions. Oh, yeah. Let me tell you what the Lord's taught me over the years on that one and share. And what what the spirit does is he takes that truth. Remember truth and spirit. He takes that truth and he begins to convince them that it's true. They move from thinking it's folly. They move from not understanding it to where they begin to understand it. They begin to embrace it and then it becomes so irresistible to them. They have to have it. It's so fun to watch. And they begin to agree. And then they move into a life of obedience. One of the ways to measure the difference between a person who knows about God and a person who believes in God is they obey God. They're known by their fruit. Now we are not called to be fruit inspectors, by the way. The church is filled with fruit inspectors. And sometimes the pastor is the chief fruit inspector. Now were to be gardeners, were to toil in the soil of a person's heart with the word of God in the power of the spirit. Now I'm going to disagree a little bit with the classical definition. Oh, after all that. Yeah, because it misses a component. Knowledge, a scent or agreement is a good synonym there. Knowledge, agreement and obedience. If you can prove it, it doesn't require faith. And so faith is believing what God has revealed to you. And sometimes he's revealed some things to us that we can't exactly prove. Now I pay the poor atheist or agnostic who tries to prove there isn't a God because that that's just kind of sadistic fun to watch that one. But also pity the Christian who thinks they can prove God. You see, we seek to reveal to others what God has revealed to us in his word. And we do our very best to explain it. But there's always a modicum of faith involved. Always a modicum of saying, I can't totally prove it. I've never seen God. Now we believe in George Washington, right? Now I know we have some older members in our church, but I don't think anyone met George personally. But we believe why there's a manifestation of a manifold witness. A reveriety of credible witnesses. I'm like, I do believe George Washington existed. I'm not sure he did everything they said he did. The whole cherry tree thing is always a little ant for me. But I do believe even though I've never seen him. So in a way that's a picture of faith. But we're talking about a faith that is so different than that. That's just the acknowledgement of a historical figure. We're talking about believing in Jesus Christ who we believe existed as the second person of the eternity in eternity past became a man, lived a perfectly seamless life. By the way, each one of these phrases are little bombs that go off in a thinking person's mind. And then he suffered death on a cross, a substitutionary, vicarious death in the place of his people's sin. He took that on himself. And then he went into the ground. He was dead, buried. But then he was resurrected. He's given a new life. And then he ascended to heaven and right now he's seated somewhere as a physical being. Jesus Christ is seated in the heavenlies. And one day he will return. And I'm asking you to believe that. And I think a lot of thinking people would say, you are crazy.
And I would say you're right. I am crazy for Jesus because he is my only hope. It is Christ who gives us comfort. He is our only hope. And apart from the Holy Spirit, you cannot. I did not say will not. I said, you cannot believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord, the Son of God. So help us Holy Spirit. This man, Paul, a cart was known to be a disciple of the Apostle John. He died when he was 86 years old because he stood in front of the Roman Emperor. And instead of saying Kaiser, Kurias, he said, Yeshua, Kurias. In other words, rather than saying Caesar is Lord, which was demanded of him by the Roman government, the Roman Emperor. He stood before the Roman Emperor and said God has been kind and faithful to me for 86 years. I'm not about to turn my back on him now. And he gave up his life because he said, I believe Jesus is Lord. We live in a critical time. He lived in a critical time. I would submit to you that we also live in a critical time. The number of Christians who were killed for making a profession of faith doubled between 2012 and 2013 worldwide. It doubled. It went to 2,123. Those are the ones that are documented. North Korea is the most dangerous country in which to live, where if you're carrying your Bible, you would either be imprisoned or killed. I'm not talking about the first century. I'm talking about today. Christian live in the power of the spirit, the truth that you believe. Let's pray. So father, for those in the room now who don't believe they think that we're weird, we're talking to you and we can't see you. We've never seen you father. In fact, we never will. You're invisible. So we speak to you in faith. We speak to you in faith because of the manifold witnesses we've received through the apostolic word accompanied by your Holy Spirit. You've not only helped us to learn and to know you've helped us to believe. You Holy Spirit have caused us to be more sure of Jesus' resurrection than we are of George Washington. You've caused us Holy Spirit to place our lives in your hands so much so that we're willing to take risks. We're willing to risk our money. We're willing to risk our reputations. We're willing to risk everything we have for you. So convinced are we that you are the one true God worthy of praise. So glorify your Son in our lives and give us comfort, comfort. That word means courage, Father. Pour courage into each person under the sound of my voice. Pour hope into the hearts of each person under the sound of my voice. All that Jesus would be made known in our hearts and around the world today. To those who are literate and those who are illiterate, Holy Spirit come and bring glory to Jesus we pray. We pray in Jesus' name and all God's people said together. Amen. Would you please stand and receive the benediction? And now may the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord cause His face to shine upon you. Be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up its countenance upon you and give you peace both now. And in the life everlasting. Amen.