Living By Every Word That Comes From God
Download MP3If you would, open your bibles to Deuteronomy chapter 6. Our next 3 weeks, we're not gonna be in Acts. We're gonna be in Acts 3 weeks from now. But for the next 3 weeks, we're gonna look at 3 different convictions we have as a church. I like to use the word convictions instead of the word value.
Joel Brooks:Not that there's anything wrong with value, but value seems to have this connotation of something you just believe and hold on to, whereas a conviction is something you believe that moves you, that propels you forward. And so we do have a number of convictions as a church, and we're gonna look at 3 of them. This morning, we're gonna look at the authority of God's word. Next week, we're gonna look at gospel community. And then the week after that we will look at seeking the welfare of the city, and then we'll be back in Acts.
Joel Brooks:But this morning we're gonna look at the authority of scripture. I was going through my notes in preparation for this and I thought, surely I've preached on this a number of times over the last 10 years here at Redeemer. And I was somewhat surprised to find I've preached on this one time in the last 10 years. The authority of scripture. And and the reason I think I haven't had to explicitly preach on the authority of scripture is because it's one of those givens.
Joel Brooks:I I hope you understand that that's a given. We begin every service with the reading of scripture. We end every service with the reading of scripture. Every sermon is saturated in scripture. We go through books of the bible from the pulpit.
Joel Brooks:Everything we do, we we try to do according to the scriptures, but I realize that it is good for us from time to time to actually dig in and explain the why. And I wanna explain the why. I realized I had to preach this sermon differently than I would have preached it or heard it 20 or 30 years ago. When I was a a youth, 15, you know, in the youth group, the authority of the bible was preached on a lot. But it was always done through this apologetic, you know, means in which the the pastor would defend the Bible.
Joel Brooks:The pastor would get up there and say, these are all the reasons you could believe that the Bible is true and just really pound that in. Give us all these facts, all these archeological evidences, all this stuff, like you could trust your bible. And and that's how I was taught that. But what I've realized is you can't do that in this culture. That's not where we are as a culture and that's not where we are as a church because I come upon person after person who would say, you know, all you're saying might be true, but why does it matter to me?
Joel Brooks:And so truth isn't a trump card. Truth isn't something you just put out there, like, okay. We we hear and we receive the truth. Therefore, let it change our life. It doesn't matter now.
Joel Brooks:We we don't necessarily need to hear truth, but how does that truth really affect me? So that's what I want us to look at this morning is really the why, why the authority of the Bible is so important to us. There's a lot of places we could look, but we're gonna predominantly look at Deuteronomy chapter 6 and chapter 8. Hear, oh Israel, the Lord our God. The Lord is 1.
Joel Brooks:You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You tell shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorpost of your house and on your gates.
Joel Brooks:Go down to chapter 8, beginning in verse 1. The whole commandment that I command you today, you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers. And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these 40 years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone. But man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the lord.
Joel Brooks:This is the word of the lord. Thanks be to God. If you would, pray with me. Father, we pray that in this moment, through the power of your spirit, the words that we have just read would be so much more than black ink on white pages, that we would hear your living son speaking to us, calling to us. Lord, may you be present in this room through your spirit actively working in our midst.
Joel Brooks:I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore, but Lord, may your words remain, and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. So I often get asked by people to recommend them a good book. I don't know why, probably just because I'm a pastor.
Joel Brooks:People assume I read a lot. And so, they ask, what's a good book I could read this year? And and pretty much every time, I'll say, well, why don't you read the Bible? And, yes. I get I get that kind of reaction there.
Joel Brooks:Usually a person rolls their eyes and like, okay, mister holier than thou. Of course Of course the bible, but besides the bible, what else should I read? I don't know if you've noticed, but all over Instagram and Facebook, people are posting pictures, you know, of of their reading list for this year. You know, you gotta neatly stack your books, you know, get it just right. Take the picture, you know, if that inspires you to read more, you know, go for it.
Joel Brooks:I've been ribbing all of my, pastor friends who have been doing that because as they posted picture after picture online, not one of them has had a Bible. And I just have to point that out. I was like, really? You know, I'm gonna just kinda read the Bible this year, and then it's mister holier than thou again. But but I do wanna push that.
Joel Brooks:I wanna press that into us a little bit, that we should actually read our Bible, and not just go to all these other books. And I'm assuming that we all have bibles. It is the number one best seller. It's not even close. And so probably most of us have a bible in our home.
Joel Brooks:I counted this week, I have 15 Bibles that I could see in my house, which means I'm holier than you. Pretty much. It's just, it's amazing. I can't find my phone anywhere, but literally on every flat surface at our house, there seems to be a Bible scattered around there. And so you probably have a few bibles floating around, your house as well, and there's so many different bibles to choose from.
Joel Brooks:And so besides your translations, you know, you have your ESV, you have your NIV, you have your KJV, your NKJV, your NAS or NRS, your NLT, your CET. You have all these different translations you could choose from, but then you have your own kinda like custom Bibles. You have your application study bible. The creative bible. The every man's bible.
Joel Brooks:The Beautiful Word Coloring Bible, the Adventure Bible, the Inspiring Bible, unlike those other Bibles. The praise Bible also unlike those other ones. The 1 minute Bible, or the 3 minute depending on your devotional life. The 3 minute study Bible. The 1 year chronological Bible, and then let's not forget about the princess Bible.
Joel Brooks:Not to be outdone by the precious princess Bible, not to be done by God's little princess Bible, which is not to be undone by my beautiful princess Bible. There are no prince Bibles out there. It's only for little princesses out there. There's the Action Bible, the Amplified Bible, the Archaeological Study Bible, the Jesus Storybook Bible, the she reads the truth bible, which I love. There's there's literally a bible for every person out there no matter what your specific need is.
Joel Brooks:There's a Bible for everyone, and I found that we we buy Bibles kinda like we buy new workout clothes. Just hoping this time, this time, you know, is gonna make a difference. You know, because the reason you didn't work out last year is because, you know, you didn't have the right running shoes. You didn't have the right, you know, tights. But but now I mean, now you got the new Reeboks, you got the Lululemon's.
Joel Brooks:Alright. You've got it you've got it all together. So this time, you're gonna exercise, and then you look, and like, when when it quits raining. You know what? I'll start exercising when the weather improves.
Joel Brooks:And finally, you're like, you know, gosh, I'm just gonna go to Target. You know? And, because if you go to Target, it looks like everybody arrived after running a marathon. They're all dressed to run marathons, but they're just shopping in their new activewear. That's just that's just what they do.
Joel Brooks:But we we do this with our Bibles, don't we? We think, if I just get a new Bible, get a new journal, get my new pen, get it, you know, my new bible reading plan, and this time, this time it's gonna take. And if we do read our bibles, if we actually start getting in and reading our bibles, we find that we actually use it more as a supplement. This is a supplement to the other books that we actually devote most of our time and attention to. And what I mean is this, if we are struggling with being single or struggling with dating or if we are struggling in our marriage, what's the first thing we do?
Joel Brooks:We we go get a book about it, or we go online and we try to find some blog or some article about dating or an article about marriage, and we go there first. And hopefully, if it's a good book or a good blog that it's gonna mention some scripture and it's gonna kinda lead you towards Christ. We do that. That that that's that's great, but but rarely do we actually go to the primary source. Go there for our encouragement.
Joel Brooks:And so we usually use the bible almost as a supplement to the other things we go to. And I get it. I mean, I I really do because the Bible is a long, at times complicated book, or 66 books, written by many authors that spans a history of 1000 of years, and it is not arranged topically. So it's pretty maddening actually that it's not. I mean, imagine if I had started the sermon and I said, I would like everybody to open up their bibles to the section on parenting.
Joel Brooks:What would you have done? They're like, I would like everybody to open their bibles to the section on dating or on marriage. You you wouldn't know where to go. And and it really is maddening. I mean, I gotta confess, it would be so much easier, wouldn't it, if if our bibles had those tabs where you could be like, I struggle with anger or I struggle with parenting or parental anger, you know.
Joel Brooks:Like, you find that tab and you could just find it and you could flip it or like, you want the tab for how to raise, you know, 3 girls in an iPhone culture, you know, find find that tab and and like, and just read it. I mean, honestly, wouldn't it be so much easier if that's how the Bible was structured? But it's not. And you know what? God did it intentionally this way.
Joel Brooks:This wasn't by accident. God intentionally gave us His word this way, a word spoken through many people at many different times and cultures, spanning a history over 1000 of years. And all of the application points in there, those points that we so crave, the reason so many of us just go to the bible, all those application points are actually woven in to the much greater grand story of creation and redemption. And that's what we see. And the reason is there's not an area in our life that we can live in isolation of God's grand story.
Joel Brooks:There is no little isolated area that you could just go to, and I I just wanna fix this here. God says, that doesn't work that way. Every part of your life fits in to the great narrative going out throughout all of human history, creation and the redemption. And so we have to see it through that lens, and and I get it. It it can be hard.
Joel Brooks:People all of the time, they came up to Jesus and they asked him for answers concerning a certain application or for a certain topic, and Jesus always responded to them. Haven't you been reading your bible? I mean, I was just going through Matthew this past week and you have in Matthew chapter 12, you have people coming to Jesus and they're asking about the nature of rest or the nature of the Sabbath. And Jesus responds, well, have you not read what King David did? I mean, King David, how he took the showbread that was in the temple when he was hungry, he he did something that wasn't lawful at that time.
Joel Brooks:And so he pointed to scripture to teach them an application point. Later in Matthew 19, people came to him and said, they wanted to know more about the nature of marriage and divorce. And Jesus responded, well, have you not read? God created them male and female. In Matthew 21, more people came to Jesus and this time they wanted to know about the nature of worship.
Joel Brooks:What does worship really look like? And Jesus says, well have you not read that out of the mouths of infants and nursing babes, God has prepared praise for himself? People come to him and they ask about what is the end times gonna look like? What is judgment gonna look like? And Jesus says, well, have you not read?
Joel Brooks:Have you not read that the stone that was rejected became the chief cornerstone? Over and over again, Jesus asked the question, have you not read? Have you not read? Never once does he point to somebody and say, have you not read this book? Have you not read this article?
Joel Brooks:Have you not listened to that teacher? Over and over again, Jesus says, have
Jeffrey Heine:you not read the scriptures?
Joel Brooks:And here's here's the thing. He was talking to people who had. All of those arguments. Those those questions that I just said, they they came from people who were scribes and Pharisees, people who had given themselves to the study of scripture, but they were reading scripture differently than Jesus was reading it. They were reading scripture just to gain information, just to gain knowledge, to learn what God had said in the past.
Joel Brooks:Jesus went to scriptures to hear what God is saying in the present. How God is still speaking to us, still communicating to us. Jesus went to the scripture to hear God's very own heart, and there's a world of difference between approaching scripture those two ways. Jesus, He gave a parable in Luke chapter 16, and it's an unusual parable. It was about a rich man and a servant of his named Lazarus.
Joel Brooks:And the way the parable goes, the rich man and Lazarus, they both die. And when they die, they 1 goes to hell, the rich man goes to hell, and Lazarus goes to paradise where he's with Abraham. And in the parable that Jesus is giving, the two sides can see one another and they can talk to one another. So you have the rich man and Lazarus, looking at one another. And the rich man's in agony.
Joel Brooks:And while he is in agony, he he he yells out at Abraham and he asked for help. And and he says, I know I'm here, but can you warn my brothers? My brothers, they're still living and maybe could you send Lazarus? I see Lazarus there. Could you send him back from the dead and go and warn my brothers about this place?
Joel Brooks:And Abraham responds, says, no. They have Moses and the prophets. They should listen to them. The rich man, he thinks, I must not have must not have gotten through. If a dead person were to come back to life and go and warn my brothers, they would listen to him.
Joel Brooks:Absolutely. And Abraham responded with these earth shattering words. Says this, because if they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither would they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead. Just let that sink in. If they do not listen, presently listen to Moses and the prophets, they, neither would they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.
Joel Brooks:That is a weighty, weighty statement concerning the power of scripture. Jesus was saying this in this parable. God still so powerfully, presently speaks through His word, that it has more of a transformative power in another person's life than if somebody were to be raised from the dead and go talk to that person. That's how powerful His word is. And it's interesting.
Joel Brooks:I think Jesus goes on later to prove His point. When Jesus gives parables, He he never names people. He never gives them names except for here. He names the poor person Lazarus. The rich man doesn't get a name because he's just a rich man.
Joel Brooks:Alright? But Lazarus has given a name for 1, I think God knows every one of us by name, but I think he gives them the name Lazarus for a different reason. Because shortly after this, Jesus is going to raise somebody from the dead. And who is that person? Lazarus.
Joel Brooks:He actually raises a Lazarus from the dead who goes out and the Pharisees and the scribes see him. And do you know what they want to do with Lazarus? Put him to death. Literally, a man raised from the dead goes to them and they're not convinced. It says they sought to put Lazarus back to death.
Joel Brooks:I don't know what miracles or signs we often ask or look for from God to know that he's real and that he is speaking to us. You know, we all think of these like, oh, if I could just have this, if I could just have this. Here are Jesus' own words here. I gave you my word. You have the scripture.
Joel Brooks:Think of the power of this. It's more powerful than if somebody were to rise from the dead and talk to you. Listen to God speak through his word, and he speaks in the present tense to us. If you are bored with your Bible, it's because you only believe in a God who spoke in the past. There is no way you can be bored if you were looking in your word and you're saying, speak Lord for your servant is listening, and you want to hear the words of God speak to you.
Joel Brooks:Alright. Let's look at Deuteronomy 6. Let's look at that again. Verses 45 should be familiar to you. It's called the Shema.
Joel Brooks:The hero, oh Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is 1. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, with all your might. Jesus said this is the most important commandment, that and to love your neighbors as yourself. But I want us to look at verses 6 through 9 here. He says, and these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
Joel Brooks:You shall teach them diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorpost of your house and on your gates. Now Jesus or or god here, he could have just said, remember these these words. Just just remember them.
Joel Brooks:But but instead, he he lays it all out for how you are to remember and how you are to read. And he says, you need to put your words in your heart, and you need to talk about them on your children, and when you're sitting down, you're thinking of them. When you're when you're standing up, you're thinking of them. When you're walking, you're thinking of them. When you're lying down in bed, you're thinking about these things.
Joel Brooks:Pretty much all of life. He's describing all of life here, the word of God is is central and then he even adds, and and put them on your door. Put them on your gates, bind them as a sign on your hands, put them as frontlets between your between your eyes, Do whatever it takes to work to make the word of God central. And then he says the same thing again, Deuteronomy 11. The same thing again in Joshua 1.
Joel Brooks:He is pounding this home in us that this should be what we do with scripture. So it doesn't take much to see how important this is to god. But if we were to be honest, and I I mean, I don't walk lightly here, but I'm gonna walk here. If we're to be honest, when we read Deuteronomy 6, we would probably, most of us in here, have to confess that it seems like it's describing something else in our life, something else that has become central, Something else that we look at when we are sitting down, when we are standing, when we are walking, when we are driving. First thing we look at when we wake up, last thing we look at before we go to bed.
Joel Brooks:A thing that's a sign always on our hands, always before our eyes. It looks like it could be describing something else in our life, whether it's our constant need to to be checking whatever social media it is or our emails or text. And I I really I don't wanna be the old man saying get off my front lawn. Alright? I'm not that's that's not why I'm going here.
Joel Brooks:Like but do you know how devastating this is in our lives? Do you have any idea? And I'm not talkin' about the like, just because every psychological study out there is gonna tell you the harmful effects of screen time. I'm not even going there. This is why this is so devastating to us.
Joel Brooks:Is because what we are putting central. The voices and the images that we are allowing to define our value, our self image, our use of time, the things that we think about. Think of the things that we are allowing to be central to us, and that creates such a shallow existence. I would almost call it subhuman. It is such a shallow, shallow existence, and God has something so much greater for us.
Joel Brooks:You wanna know the why? The why is he doesn't want you to be such a lonely, anxious, depressed generation. He he wants us to be so much more and that involves getting scripture to be central to us and it it plays out like this. Knowing scripture deepens your life, so walk through just some of the common experiences that you have. Alright.
Joel Brooks:I can I can go to the hospital and I can visit one of you when you have a a baby? One of the things I enjoy doing as a pastor, and so, you know, I got to go into the Housings when they had their triplets. Alright. How can you not be happy? I mean, when you're going there and you're seeing the triplets being born there and, and and you rejoice with them, but you wanna take it deeper?
Joel Brooks:Is when Psalm 139 comes to your mind. And you think, God, you formed their inward parts. God, you knitted them together in their mother's womb. I praise you, God, for Benjamin and Lucy and Charlotte are they are fearfully and they are wonderfully made. And now that already good experience just got deeper and fuller.
Joel Brooks:Or if on an Easter Sunday, I can see my girls dressed up in in their pretty dresses, which I mean, what father's heart would not melt when you you see your daughters dressed up in such a way. Any father's heart would melt, but you wanna take that experience even deeper? You look at them and you think James 1, that every good and perfect gift comes from my father in heaven. Lord, these gifts are from you and it deepens it. Or you could go outside and you could look at the stars.
Joel Brooks:You have to leave Birmingham because you wanna see more than 3 or 4, but, like, you know but go out. Who doesn't enjoy, you know, sitting under a big sky and looking at all of the stars? Everybody enjoys that. But you wanna deepen that experience. You think of Isaiah 40 and you hear God say, lift up your eyes and see who created these things.
Joel Brooks:Don't just look at the stars, look at who created them. And he brings them out he brings them out by number their host and he calls them each by name, and by his great might not one of them is missing. All of a sudden, these experiences become so much richer, deeper, fuller. You begin to enjoy life for for the reason that God gave you life in which all of it's a celebration of who he is. All of life becomes worship when His word becomes central to us.
Joel Brooks:This is actually what the first temptation of Jesus was about. Would the word of God be his very life? Remember the first temptation you you find in both in Matthew and in Luke? And one of the reasons I love the the temptations of Jesus because if you think of it, all the other very personal things that went on in Jesus' life, we don't know about. But this was the one thing that happened to Jesus when He was alone, and we know about it.
Joel Brooks:And that means the only reason we know about it is if Jesus told others. And he said, people need to know what happened here. And so Jesus pulls out something that happened to him personally and says, everybody needs to hear and to know this. They need to know these temptations. And the first one is crucial.
Joel Brooks:Jesus has been fasting for 40 days, so he's hungry. And as he's hungry, Satan comes to him and tempts him and says, command these stones to become bread. Now, Satan didn't appear to him, you know, in a skinny red suit and a pitchfork, then it wouldn't have been a temptation. Like, hey, that's You're Satan. I'm not gonna do whatever you say.
Joel Brooks:Satan works in more subtle ways. Likely, you know, Jesus, he's out there in the deserts 40 days. He's hungry. He's tired. He likely just hears a voice in his head.
Joel Brooks:I know you're hungry. Gosh. You've got to be so hungry. You know it doesn't have to be this way. I mean, you're a god.
Joel Brooks:Right? I mean, if if if you are God, can't you just create some food? I mean, look at those look at those stones. They're about the they're about the size of the the bread that you like, those rolls. Why don't you just turn those stones to bread?
Joel Brooks:So the temptation comes this way, suddenly. It has so many nuances, this temptation. The first being that Satan wants Jesus to doubt the Word of God spoken over him just earlier. Once Jesus had doubt his identity, right before Jesus went out into the wilderness, he was at his baptism and God the father spoke to him. This is my beloved son.
Joel Brooks:He heard the word of God as clear as day, but that was 40 days ago. And now Satan suddenly goes, if you are the son, if he wants Jesus to doubt the very word that he had heard only earlier. Satan is saying, look at the look at the circumstances out here. Is this really how a a son would live? If if you are a son, you would do these things.
Joel Brooks:Jesus could have rationalized making these stones into bread. I mean, it's actually a good idea, isn't it? I mean, he's hungry. God doesn't want him to die. As God's son, he has the power to do this.
Joel Brooks:It's not gonna hurt anybody. Nobody's even gonna know, and he's just meeting a God given desire. What could be wrong with that? But I want you to notice how Jesus does not argue with Satan. He does not debate with Satan.
Joel Brooks:If you ever attempt to debate with Satan, you're gonna lose. Alright. He's got 1,000 of years of experience over you. You're going to lose. Jesus, he just goes to the word of God, and that's how he combats the devil.
Joel Brooks:Now now don't think of, like, I grew up, I kind of thought of this, you know, like this is almost this duel, you know, going back and forth. Some of us think of scripture as like a Harry Potter duel. You know, Satan's gonna throw something at us or, like, thy word, I have hidden in my heart that I might not sin against thee. And Satan goes, well, what about lust? It's like, well, second Timothy 2/22, flee from youthful lust.
Joel Brooks:And then you're like, you know, you're just like, you're shooting spells at one another. And I used to think that's how scripture works. I'll I'll use a CS Lewis reference next time, for those of you against Potter. But, but that's what we think. Like, you just kind of, you know, we just kinda fight the devil with it.
Joel Brooks:You send a scripture this way. He distorts it this way. You just go back and forth. That is not at all what is happening here. When Jesus is talking to Satan here, he's trying to remind him self of something we all need to hear.
Joel Brooks:Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds, and that's an act of proceeding, every word that is currently coming out of the mouth of my father. I live because of the Word of God. I exist because of the Word of God. I am who I am because of the Word of God. I find life in the word of God.
Joel Brooks:He's reminding himself of this. Deuteronomy 8, the context there is Israel's been out in the desert for 40 years. They've been wandering around. God reminds them right before after he's taken care of them for 40 years, he reminds them right before they enter the promised land, he says, hey, just remember, these last 40 years, I was teaching you something. I was teaching you something.
Joel Brooks:You were hungry and I fed you. Remember you had this desire in you and you looked around and you saw there is no way to meet this desire. There's nothing before me I see. There's nothing I hear. There's no way to meet this desire.
Joel Brooks:But then I spoke, and you were fed in a way that was unimaginable to you. Your fathers had never heard of manna. You had never heard of manna, yet you feasted because of my word. Now you're about to go into a land where you're no longer gonna need that manna, but you are gonna need my word. You're gonna need my word.
Joel Brooks:If you wanna do more than exist and you wanna actually live, you're gonna need my word. That's what God is calling us to, not to walk around numbly existing, but to actually have the life that comes to us through his word. And so the questions we need to ask is where does my heart find satisfaction? Where do I find life, not just existence? Do I go to my bible for more than just guidance or for more than just rules or knowledge?
Joel Brooks:Do I go to my bible to hear words of life being spoken to me that I can make central so my entire life can be a celebration of God. That's what he's calling you to. Pray with me. Father, create in us a God given hunger to hear you through your word. Your spirit breathing life into your word and writing it on our hearts make us hungry to do more than just exist, that we could take even good experiences, or the bottom could drop out in the depths that you were calling us to.
Joel Brooks:Lord, I pray we would make the word of God central to our lives. As we leave this place, Lord, I pray we would hear over and over again that we don't live by bread alone, but we live by every word that proceeds from your mouth. And we pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.
