Sovereign Comfort for Uncertain Times
00:00:00.000 | Boy, if 2020 has taught us anything, it's that the times are always uncertain and our
00:00:09.860 | lives in this world are far less stable than we realize.
00:00:13.060 | More and more, it seems like the only predictable thing about this life is its unpredictability.
00:00:18.660 | So in the middle of the current social and medical and economic upheavals that very few
00:00:23.600 | of us could have foreseen this spring, what eternal promises root us?
00:00:29.020 | We in fact have some amazing promises from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who apparently
00:00:33.360 | knew that our lives would remain unpredictable until He returned.
00:00:37.700 | So He left us with His closing words in Matthew 28 verses 16-20.
00:00:42.440 | And there we read this, "Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which
00:00:46.280 | Jesus had directed them.
00:00:47.780 | And when they saw Him, they worshipped Him, but some doubted.
00:00:51.120 | And Jesus came and said to them, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.
00:00:57.820 | Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and
00:01:03.380 | of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded
00:01:07.860 | you.
00:01:08.860 | And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.'"
00:01:13.740 | Here's Pastor John expounding on what these promises from Christ mean for us today.
00:01:20.540 | Jesus came up and spoke to them saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and
00:01:27.580 | on earth."
00:01:28.580 | "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth."
00:01:33.100 | Now that's a very lofty claim for anybody to make.
00:01:38.880 | It has been given to Him by God the Father.
00:01:42.380 | Because He died, He overcame guilt, He overcame condemnation.
00:01:49.780 | Because He rose again, He overcame suffering and He overcame death.
00:01:54.660 | And since He has triumphed over guilt and condemnation and suffering and death, He has
00:02:00.680 | also triumphed over Satan.
00:02:03.780 | Because the only way, ultimately, that Satan can damn the people of God is with guilt and
00:02:11.300 | condemnation.
00:02:12.820 | And the only way he can rough us up is with suffering and with death.
00:02:18.180 | And if suffering and death and guilt and condemnation have been conquered by Jesus in His death
00:02:24.540 | and in His resurrection, Satan is empty-handed today in his ability to destroy believers.
00:02:31.320 | This is a tremendous thing.
00:02:32.940 | And therefore, therefore, Philippians 2 says, "Therefore God has highly exalted him and
00:02:40.580 | given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee shall
00:02:45.900 | bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord
00:02:50.900 | to the glory of God the Father."
00:02:52.940 | Which is just another way of saying, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been
00:02:59.100 | given to Me."
00:03:01.420 | So here's our King who's commissioning us.
00:03:05.020 | This lofty claim, "All authority has been bought by Me, possessed by Me, given to Me,
00:03:13.660 | I have all authority in the universe."
00:03:16.700 | Let's ponder it for a minute.
00:03:18.940 | All authority, really, all authority.
00:03:22.740 | All authority over Satan and all demons and all angels, good and evil.
00:03:28.980 | Authority over the natural universe, natural objects and laws and forces like stars and
00:03:35.980 | galaxies and planets and meteorites.
00:03:39.640 | Authority over all weather systems, winds and rains and lightning and thunder and hurricanes
00:03:45.200 | and tornadoes and monsoons and typhoons and cyclones and all their effects like tidal
00:03:50.740 | waves and floods and fires.
00:03:54.700 | All authority over molecular and atomic reality, atoms, electrons, protons, neutrons, subatomic
00:04:02.340 | particles, quantum physics, DNA, chromosomal reality.
00:04:08.940 | All plants, all animals, doesn't matter what size, whales, redwoods, giant squid and
00:04:16.060 | giant oaks.
00:04:17.900 | All fish, all wild beasts he has authority over.
00:04:21.820 | All invisible animals like bacteria and viruses and parasites and germs of every kind he has
00:04:28.380 | authority over.
00:04:29.540 | He has authority over all the parts and functions of the human body, every beat of your heart,
00:04:35.540 | every movement of the diaphragm, every little jump across a million synapses in your brain.
00:04:42.140 | Jesus has all authority over all those physiological phenomena in your body.
00:04:48.460 | He has all authority over nations and governments and congresses and legislatures and kings
00:04:54.180 | and premiers and courts.
00:04:56.940 | He has all authority over armies and weapons and bombs and terrorists.
00:05:01.620 | All authority over industry and business and finance and currency.
00:05:05.780 | All authority over entertainment and amusement and leisure and media.
00:05:11.180 | All authority over education and research and science and discovery.
00:05:16.300 | All authority over crime and violence and all families and all neighborhoods.
00:05:21.460 | And he has authority over his body, the church, and over every soul in the universe and every
00:05:28.660 | moment and every second of every life lived now or previously or forever and ever, anywhere
00:05:38.380 | in the universe.
00:05:40.500 | He has all authority.
00:05:42.580 | Jesus has all authority and that's why he has a right to say, "Go everywhere."
00:05:51.380 | Verse 18 is the search warrant for breaking into other cultures.
00:06:01.100 | Almost nobody in America believes we have a warrant to do this today.
00:06:04.900 | This is a massively politically incorrect thing for us to do, namely world evangelization.
00:06:10.860 | But we have a warrant.
00:06:13.020 | We have a warrant.
00:06:15.820 | You don't do this kind of thing without a warrant.
00:06:18.700 | You don't go into somebody's culture or house and say, "Jesus is Lord of this house.
00:06:24.700 | Jesus is Lord of this culture," without a warrant.
00:06:28.900 | What's the warrant?
00:06:30.620 | Verse 18 is the warrant.
00:06:34.140 | I have died, I have risen, I have triumphed over all my enemies, I have all authority
00:06:40.500 | in heaven, I have all authority on earth.
00:06:44.220 | Go.
00:06:45.620 | Jump over verse 19 with me to verse 20 to see not only the lofty claim but the loving
00:06:51.740 | comfort.
00:06:52.740 | "Lo, I will be with you always, literally all the days, to the end of the age."
00:07:02.620 | There are three pieces to this.
00:07:04.660 | Call them identification, continuation, and duration.
00:07:09.140 | There's three pieces in verse 20 at the end.
00:07:11.580 | What do I mean by identification?
00:07:12.900 | I mean, would you please, for a moment here, ask the Lord to reveal to your heart what
00:07:19.660 | stands in the page that the one who promises never to leave you and always be with you
00:07:26.980 | is the one who has all authority in the universe.
00:07:31.140 | Would you please, right now, whisper a prayer in your heart.
00:07:34.180 | I'm whispering it right now for you, that God would open your eyes to what that means.
00:07:39.300 | Lord, just do it.
00:07:41.620 | Would you come at this moment and put these two verses together.
00:07:45.620 | Verse 18, all authority in the universe, all power, all right.
00:07:53.060 | The right and the power to do as you please in every area of life, every culture, every
00:07:58.820 | people, every religion, the right and the power to be Lord and King.
00:08:04.260 | You have spoken to your people, "I will always be with you to the end."
00:08:16.420 | Get it?
00:08:17.420 | The one who said, "I will always be with you," is that one, the identification.
00:08:22.820 | The continuation is found in the word "always" or "all the days," and what I mean by that
00:08:27.100 | is not just length of time, but unbroken time.
00:08:31.900 | See the point?
00:08:33.220 | He doesn't go on vacation on Mondays.
00:08:36.300 | Pastors think he goes on vacation on Mondays, and so they get real depressed and discouraged
00:08:40.820 | on Monday morning.
00:08:41.820 | "Where's God?"
00:08:42.820 | Well, the answer is, "As close as your skin," because he doesn't break his word.
00:08:49.220 | He does not break his word.
00:08:50.500 | I don't care how blue the day is, Jesus doesn't lie.
00:08:54.100 | I will always be with you.
00:08:56.900 | Dark, bright, up, down, bad, good, death, life, I will always be with you.
00:09:04.340 | Hebrews 13.5, "Be content with what you have, for he has said, 'I will never fail you, and
00:09:12.660 | I will never forsake you.'"
00:09:16.020 | So he giveth or he taketh God his loved ones, ne'er forsaketh.
00:09:27.740 | His the loving purpose solely to preserve them pure and holy.
00:09:40.500 | Swedes have good theology.
00:09:46.900 | Though he giveth or he taketh, God his loved ones never forsaketh.
00:09:57.620 | That is a great line, very applicable to the global church during this spring season of
00:10:01.900 | social and economic and medical upheaval to begin 2020.
00:10:06.820 | That clip was from Pastor John 21 years ago in a sermon he preached on November 1, 1998,
00:10:12.500 | titled, "The Lofty Claim, The Last Command, The Loving Comfort."
00:10:16.940 | You can find the entire audio recording at desiringgod.org.
00:10:19.860 | Thank you for listening.
00:10:22.000 | If you haven't done so, you can get the latest episodes by subscribing to Ask Pastor John
00:10:26.140 | in your favorite podcast app in Spotify or by subscribing to DG's YouTube channel.
00:10:30.900 | To find other episodes in our archive or to submit a question to us of your own, go online
00:10:34.560 | to desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.
00:10:40.380 | Well next up is a question I've been wanting to ask Pastor John for a long time now.
00:10:44.780 | What sins disqualify a pastor for life?
00:10:49.340 | Are there any?
00:10:50.340 | That's up next time on Friday.
00:10:51.340 | I'm your host Tony Rehnke.
00:10:52.340 | We'll see you then.
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