Allen Jackson - Protection From Deception - Part 2
Hey, it's good to be with you today. We're gonna continue our study on protection from deception. We're gonna look at some very familiar parables which Jesus taught. You know, I think to step away from the Bible a bit and not imagine that we're judging it, but to invite it into our lives to help us understand the world we live in, that's a transformational invitation. We're gonna do that today and allow Jesus's words to inform our steps so that in the midst of a season where propaganda is flourishing and freedom of speech is being threatened, we can stand with God's truth and find not only protection, but freedom from deception. Enjoy the lesson.
The goal is fruitfulness and what we can trust, a principle throughout scripture, and we will look at it in some detail if not in this session, is that God is a just judge. And if he didn't give me the physical skills to play in the NBA or the NFL, which as a younger person, I thought was a significant breach of fairness, but he goes on to explain the parable. He said, "Listen then to what the parable of the sower means," and this is familiar to many of us, I suspect. He's gonna describe a farmer sowing seed and there's four locations where the seed falls, and Jesus gives it application in our lives.
"When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and doesn't understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places, the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away. The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth, choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown".
Just some big picture observations, all four of the destinations where the seed fell, where the farmer sowed the seed, Jesus describes as persons who heard the Word of God. So, everybody described in this parable was a recipient of God's Word. Again, the premise that we're trying to understand, and in its simplicity, but its import for our lives, is how we hear the Word of God matters, how we receive the Word of God matters. Everybody in this parable got presented with the Word of God. Three of the four, 75%, were not fruitful. Now, if you've only got a one in four chance of getting to the best outcome, this is no longer casual. And even amongst those who receive the Word of God and are described as good soil, there is a widely divergent outcome. So, it's not so consistent.
Now, there's four possible responses that Jesus describes to the Word of God. The first one, which he described as the seed sown along the path, is the people who receive it but they don't understand it. But the result of that, the evidence that they didn't understand it, he said, "You can't protect what was received from the evil one". Now, that's an intriguing piece of information that we all need to give some thought to. Satan wants to separate you from the truth of God's Word. He's going to purposefully intentionally try to dislodge its place in your life, in your thought, in your decision.
That's a very personal attack. And all of us, if we had time, could describe those times where you have questioned the Word of God. He goes all the way back to the opening chapters of Genesis when Satan shows up in the garden and says, "Did God really say"? Eve said, "Oh, no, we can't eat of this tree". And what did Satan say? "Did God really say"? Now, I find that the temptations vary as much as we vary as individuals, but that Satan comes to us and he questions the authority of God in your life. Do you really believe God created the heaven and the earth? Do you really believe the Bible is an accurate reflection of the character and the nature of God? Do you really believe there's only one way into God's kingdom?
Satan challenges, it's different amongst us, but no one escapes those challenges. Jesus has warned us about it, "Be prepared". The second destination he describes is the seed that's sown on a rocky place. And he said, "When trouble or persecution becomes," please note the cause of the trouble or persecution. It's not because the world is a troubling place. It's not because the evil exists. It's not because of injustice. He said, "When trouble or persecution comes because of the word," that if you decide you're gonna stand on a biblical principle or a kingdom of God idea, that challenges will emerge.
Gee, that seems kind of relevant to the world we're in. Embracing God's Word does not always bring affirmation and Jesus is telling us it's going to require perseverance to hold on to the Word, to be rooted in enough that we're not just a casual embracer of that. You see, growth requires change. You cannot grow without changing. You can change and not grow, but you can't grow without changing. So, that's going to, by definition, implement some friction. We don't all grow at the same rate. We don't all grow at the same pace. The same triggers don't bring growth to all of us. And so, the movement is varied and differentiated amongst us, and then that brings all sorts of questions.
Do you have the courage to allow the Spirit of God to bring growth to your life and not to step away from it or deny it or to be embarrassed by it because it's gonna be challenged? The third destination Jesus describes is the seed that fell among the thorns and he said, "Those are the individuals where the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it". The old English word for worry meant literally to strangle. "The deceitfulness of wealth choke it and make it unfruitful".
I think the practical expression of that is we set aside the Word of God for the opportunities. We see the things around us and if I just compromised a little bit, I mean, I don't have to completely deny my faith, I just kind of have to turn the volume down on it while I complete this deal. I mean, nobody really tells the truth when they pay their taxes. I mean, if it's the government's wicked, it's probably okay to cheat them, right? Wrong. You see, "The worries of life and the deceitfulness of wealth," the warning Jesus is giving us is they can cause his Word, even when we've heard it and received it, to be unfruitful. Don't set aside the Word of God for opportunities. It's a foolish path. I didn't put it in your notes, but I'll give you a verse. You can check me later to see if I told the truth.
Revelation 2:25 says, "Only hold on to what you have until I come". It's the message to one of the churches of Revelation. Hold on to what you have, "To him who overcomes and does my will to the end, I'll give authority over the nations". We've had a tremendous focus on our beginning point of our faith, our initiation into the kingdom. We've had a much, much, much, much, much smaller focus on how we finish this thing. But there are multiple passages where Paul said, you know, "Run in such a way to get the prize". Those are the only one's who's gonna get the prize. He said, "I beat my body, I make it my slave, lest after I have preached to others, I myself would be disqualified".
Or in Philippians 3:10, he said, "I wanna know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death so that somehow I might attain to the resurrection of the dead". There is no assumptive attitude there, there's no presumption in what Paul is talking about. Hold on to what you have. Jesus is speaking to a church and he said, "The one who overcomes and does my will to the end". I believe that's right in the midst of this parable and those thorns, it's so easy to get caught up by what we see happening around us and think, well, I, you know, it's not a really good time for me to be, like, biblically centered. Folks, every time is a good time to be biblically centered.
I know, we don't often think of Genesis 15 as being highly prophetic, but it very much is a prophetic passage. God revealed to Abraham a portion of the journey which his descendants would take en route to fulfilling God's promises. He said, "You're going to a foreign nation and you're gonna be enslaved there for," and he gives him the period of time in which it's going to happen, 400 years they'll be slaves there. And he said, "But when I'll bring judgment on that nation and bring you out".
It's the book of Exodus. What I think is important, and you may or may not know, is that there's a significant group of scholars, very celebrated scholars, whole schools of thought that occupy the most prestigious theological schools, that suggest this passage is not prophetic. They're teaching this for decades now. This is not like something new. This didn't emerge with the internet. They've been pumping this in to the people that are occupying pulpits and filling our seminaries for decades that it was compiled long after the enslavement in Egypt and the Exodus. It's included in this Abraham's covenant with God to add substance to the significance of the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
It's a way of telling the story that makes it look as if God was involved in it. It's sort of an elaborate scheme of self aggrandizement, as if you're gonna explain your family tree in terms of God's supernatural covenant with you, but that you shouldn't actually believe that God revealed to Abraham long before he even had a son of promise. Sarah's still barren, it wasn't like God really revealed that to him. So that instead of reading the scripture and embracing the narrative, they stand outside the scripture and evaluate the truth or the perceived lack thereof, so that you're not reading the Bible to understand the character and the nature of God, you're reading it to deconstruct it, to break it down into these pieces.
And with that deconstruction comes license, because if it's not the inspired authoritative Word of God, why would you submit to it as if it were authoritative? Then, you can redefine marriage or redefine anything else you want to. And it becomes much, much, much, much easier to promote deception. And what I've described to you is not some radical fringe, it's the mainstream approach to biblical studies, unfortunately, in many, many of our institutions. Look at John chapter 8. It's worth noting that this pattern is gonna continue.
John 8, Jesus is speaking. In Jerusalem he said, "Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad". And the Jews said to him, "You're not fifty years old and you've seen Abraham"! They're offended, "He has lost his mind". And Jesus answered, "'I tell you the truth,'" you better buckle up, buttercup, "'before Abraham was born, I am!' And at this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds".
Jesus is acknowledging the revelation which Abraham had. There's a note a little further in your outline that says the Bible helps us understand or the Bible helps us interpret the Bible. It's worth noting that when Jesus ministered in the 1st century, he believed that God had given Abraham a revelation. I'm gonna side with Jesus. So, when I talk to you about choosing to believe the Bible, I understand I'm inviting you to a position that in many places and many times may cause you to feel as if you're a minority. Well, I would remind you that in the parable of the sower, the people who received the Word of God were the minority. If you wanna be included in the majority, Jesus described your destination. He said, "There's a broad path and a wide gate that leads to destruction, but there's a narrow path and a narrow gate that leads to eternal life".
The courage to believe the Word of God, Jesus's contemporaries, the scholars, were not willing to believe this, the most educated amongst the people. These people have spent their lives as students of the Word of God, they can quote it almost in its totality, but they preferred their own interpretation of scripture. So, if you'll allow me once again, how you receive the Word of God is very important. Having access to God's Word, even when it's delivered by the Lord himself, does not ensure acceptance. Let me give you some contemporary ways we discount the Word of God, we do what Jesus's audience did. And you've heard many of these phrases, I suspect. You hear things like, "Well, the Old Testament is just not as authoritative as the New Testament".
Oh, so, like, God didn't get a best seller with his first effort, so he fired the writers. Or things like, "The God of the New Testament differs rather dramatically from the God of the Old Testament". Hm. Or maybe, "Miracles in the supernatural are no longer a part of God's provision. That stuff was important in biblical times, but now we have hospitals and universities". Hm. "Well, the whole role of the Holy Spirit has changed since The New Testament was written". You've ever heard any of these? You've heard all of these in churches, if you've spent much time in church world. "Perspectives on morality are different now. We're more enlightened".
Huh. Those are messages that you can hear in churches and all of them are taking the Word of God and setting it aside, standing outside of it, deciding which portions we will embrace and which portions we want. And with that, there's tremendous license and Jesus is not Lord. I got a couple of minutes. The Bible helps us understand the Bible or interpret the Bible. It's a unique characteristic of the book. You don't have to understand its original languages. If you'll take your Bible and persevere and read it in a systematic way, God will bring you insight to understand the story. I'll give you a couple of examples.
In Daniel chapter 9 and verse 2. So, this is Daniel. He said, "In the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the scriptures, according to the word of the Lord given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years". Daniel has spent his life as a slave in Babylon under, first, the Babylonians and then the Persians when the empire fell, and he said, "I was reading the prophet Jeremiah and Jeremiah said we going home after seventy years and we're at the end of the run".
Daniel believed the prophet was relevant for his life. So, if you don't believe that God owes the ending at the beginning and helps us understand it, then you need to take Daniel off your heroes list. Some of you prefer the New Testament even after this lesson. Jesus understood that himself, he was fulfilling Old Testament prophecy. In Matthew 26 Jesus told them, "This very night," he's talking to his disciples, "This very night you'll all fall away on account of me, for it is written: 'I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.'"
He's quoting Zachariah 13, but he understands what's happening in his life hundreds of years later is fulfilling what God had said. The writers of the New Testament understood Jesus to be fulfilling prophecy. So, it carried to Jesus's disciples and those who followed him. In Matthew 4, "When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he returned to Galilee. Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake," the lake is the Sea of Galilee, "in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali to fulfill what was said to the prophet Isaiah: 'The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, along the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.'"
Matthew, in putting together his Jesus story quotes Isaiah the prophet, is being fulfilled in Jesus's life. Daniel believed God was fulfilling the words of the prophets. Jesus understood God to be fulfilling his prophetic Word. Jesus's followers, in informing the church after Jesus's ascension, believed that God was fulfilling his Word. The question is about the 21st century church. What are we going to say about the Word of God? Are we going to ascribe it to myth, rather masterful way of forming human behavior and enlightened responses to the challenges and the vicissitudes that life brings, but denying it the role of something that's inspired and supernatural and therefore authoritative in our lives? Is it something that we'll choose when it's convenient?
We think we can use it to negotiate some sort of a contract for the end run, but not something that we would give enough authority that it becomes actually a limit or a boundary or a defining principle in the day to day behavior of our lives or the day to day choices of our morality? Or do we imagine that it's truly been inspired by the Spirit of God and therefore becomes our rule of faith and practice? And when it's difficult to understand, we will wrestle with it until we decide to submit to its authority in our lives. It's not the complex passages of scripture that are our problem, it's the very simple ones like love your neighbor as yourself. Oh, unfortunately, I understand all of those words. Right? It would be comforting if there was like an 11 syllable word in there and I could go, "Well, it's not really clear what propitiation means".
What you choose to do with the Word of God has more bearing on your life than the circumstances of your birth, the educational institutions where you have served, the physical gifts you have or do not have, the IQ that you possess or perhaps don't. Your relationship to the Word of God, your willingness to believe it and to put it into practice, will define your journey through time and your role in eternity. Encourage one another, help one another in a time when deception is rampant and the messages cascade over you, when you're made to feel foolish if you believe this.
And there are names of educated, sophisticated people with all sorts of religious things wrapped around them that stand apart from the Word of God. Encourage one another, help one another, pray for one another. It's under an assault. And because we've been distracted, because we fit into those earlier categories in the parable of the sower, we have lost several years of the harvest and now we've got the hard work to do, but it's worthwhile. It is worthwhile.
I brought you a prayer. Why don't you stand with me? I don't like religious lectures. If all I wanted to do was give religious lectures, I would have gone to the university. The hours are better and you can have tenure. And so, sometimes I wrestle a little bit, just a moment of confession, when I prepare a prayer for you, it seems a little anticlimactic to read a prayer together. My inclination is to give you an invitation and let you respond. And there are times where I think that is helpful and appropriate, but we do life together a lot and my hope is that you'll take these prayers and then make them yours beyond here. Pray them in your home, pray them together for your children, or over your family.
You see, it's the response to what we've heard that brings the fruitfulness. So please don't imagine that you've heard it and therefore you're good to go. And I'm not trying to diminish your response by inviting you to this prayer, but it seems to me that if we can kind of break the ice, we could take that first step together, then you have some momentum if you choose it. But you have to choose the Lord. Let's read the prayer together:
Heavenly Father, you created us and you understand us better than we understand ourselves. In humility we present ourselves to you with a desire to learn. We are listening, we choose to cooperate with you. Forgive us for our stubbornness and rebellion. Grant us understanding hearts, Holy Spirit lead us in paths of righteousness. Our desire is to walk uprightly before you. May a revelation of Almighty God be granted to our generation, in Jesus name, amen.