Speaker(s): Zane Turk , Dan Miller
Sermon 12478
6:30 PM on 3/19/2023

Zane Turk –

Alright. Hey, good evening. Alright. Just in the next few minutes that we have together, I just want to invite you to
take off your sandals with me. Metaphorical, okay. Nobody take off your shoes, please. The
person next to you will be hating me the rest of the night! I was thinking maybe I could change
the message to the doctrine of socks! What kind of socks are you wearing tonight? I don’t know.
Are there any verses about socks in the Bible? I couldn’t think of any. We’ll have a rap on socks
after the message! Haynes, Fruit of the Loom. No. Alright. Hey, let’s have a message now,
okay? Stop laughing. (Prayer)

What does it really mean to take off our sandals? I think one of the applications for us is to
remove anything in our life that would be a hindrance to touching the holiness of God. There are
many things in our life that can be a hindrance to touching God’s holiness. For Moses, it was his
natural life, his natural way of thinking, his natural ability, his personal efforts and abilities.
But what does it mean that God is holy?

A lot of men and women have written amazing books and had amazing sentences said about what the holiness of God is, and a couple of those things is that God is set apart. God is sacred. God is transcendent above time. He transcends
space. God’s holiness means he has a hatred for sin. God’s holiness means that he is beautiful
and perfect and complete, inherently valuable and whole. God’s holiness means that he is
eternal and nothing can change who he is.

But I want to talk about a couple aspects of the holiness of God tonight, and I want to tell us
from the authority of the Bible what can happen in my life when I touch God’s holiness. What are
the effects of God’s holiness in my life? And is it possible that somebody like me could have
something as perfect and beautiful as the holiness of God in my life? What does it mean that
God is set apart? What does it mean that God is completely set apart from anything else?
In life, we have common things. We have things like basketball shoes. We have things like cars.
We have things like our favorite desk or we have things like our favorite outfit. These are
common things. They’re not holy because there is more of them. There is unlimited amount of
basketball shoes. You get the newest basketball shoes, the newest player, the latest version,
and they’re so precious to you, but they’re still common because many other people have them,
right?’

Or you get the coolest motorcycle, the newest edition, the strongest engine, the newest rims,
but it’s not set apart from anything else because there’s more of it. There’s always more metal.
There’s always another engine. There’s always new gas you can put in it, right?
But then there are things that are a little more precious than the common things. There’s the
gold ring. We have golden rings when we get married. We have diamonds that we buy for the
people we love that we want to marry. And we have the pearl of great price in the Bible, right?
But even then, there’s another pearl. Even then, there’s another ruby. Even then, there’s another
diamond. It is set apart from many things, but it is not in itself exclusive, the only diamond.

But when it comes to a thing and a person and a being as beautiful as God, we can say that he
is set apart from everything else, because he is separate from all of creation. He is separate
from all of creation. He is the only uncreated One. He is the only one outside of time, the only
one outside of space, the only one with no sin, the only one who is in and of himself holy and
complete and perfect. The Bible describes it as the beauty of holiness. It’s an amazing thing that
you and I have access to this holiness.

Now, what does the holiness of God do in the Bible? What does the holiness of God do in the
Bible? So, in Exodus 30, there is a holy anointing oil. Are we familiar with it? Quick raise of hands.
The holy anointing oil, that whatever this oil is placed upon, it becomes holy. The oil would be
spread in the most holy place in the holy of holies. Whatever this oil touches, it turns into a holy
space.

What does that tell us? It tells us that whatever holiness touches makes whatever it touches
holy. Holiness cannot be made unholy by sin. When Jesus cleansed the leper, he touched the
leper and instead of becoming sick himself, the leprosy had to leave and the leper was
cleansed. In Ezekiel 47, there’s a living water, living water coming from the temple of God and it
runs into a sea that is dead. Instead of the living water becoming dead, the dead water becomes
alive. Holiness cannot change and whatever holiness touches, it makes holy.

Now, there’s a negative side to that. In Nu. 16, there was a rebellion and the sons of Korah said,
what makes you different from us, Moses? What makes you holy and what makes us not holy?
What makes you the leader and what makes us just the people that are common? And they
bring the censors and they come before God and say, God, we are holy like Moses. We are
burning our censors. And then what happens? Homework. Read Numbers 16. The fire of God
comes down and consumes them, but what does God say? They became holy. God says they
became holy. They wanted to be holy, so God made them holy. What was the result? They were
completely obliterated, insinerated. The holiness of God does not change but it will effect
whatever it touches.

And then in 2 Samuel 6, they put the ark of the covenant on a new cart and they bring it to
Jerusalem. The oxen stumble a little bit. The ark is about to fall, so someone puts their hand
there to hold the ark so it doesn’t fall. What happens? The holiness from the ark enters this man
Uzzah and he is dead. The holiness of God makes holy whatever it touches.

So, when Moses comes to the burning bush in Exodus 3, God says this, “take off your sandals.”
You can’t come into my presence with your ability. You can’t come into my presence with the
natural man. Take off your sandals. What is the effect of God’s holiness in my life? What is the
effect of God’s holiness in my life?

We see in Isaiah 6, Isaiah sees the throne of God high and lifted up and he sees the One who is
on the throne. He hears the seraphim singing, “holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole
earth is full of his glory.” And we know the story that the coal has to touch Isaiah’s lips. For
tonight, for you and me when we come into the holiness of God, what does it do to us? When
we get a glimpse of God’s holiness, it reveals who we truly are on the inside. It reveals the
nature of sin and depravity in our wicked hearts, in our self-righteousness. All of our sin comes
to the surface and it immediately becomes visible that we are not anything close to the holiness
of God. It reveals our depravity.

But what else does it do? It puts a reverence and an awe in us for the eternity of God. The side
of his nature that is outside of time. The side of his nature that is outside of space. When we
have an encounter with God’s holiness, our live is changed because we are cleansed of our sin.
We have a reverence for who God truly is.

And Moses is at the burning bush. He says, God, if I go to my people in Israel and they say, tell
us who is his name? Who is God? Who is his name? What is his name? What shall I tell them?
And God says this, he says, I AM who I AM. What can the holiness of God do for a teenager in
Baltimore City? What can the holiness of God do for a single parent? What can the holiness of
God do for a middle aged man or a middle aged woman who thinks I’m just going to live out the
rest of my life?

The holiness of God connects us with the eternity of God. It removes us from our natural way of
life. It puts new thoughts, eternal thoughts, eternal purpose in our life that we didn’t have in our
natural way of thinking. The holiness of God brings us there. The holiness of God cleanses our
sin. The holiness of God gives us an eternal purpose.

Moses, what are you going to do with your life? You are in the wilderness watching sheep. What
are you going to do with your life? You are going to lead my people out of slavery. You’re going
to lead them into the Promised Land. What does that mean for us? What can I do with my life?

I can come out of the land of slavery that I am in to sin and I can come into the Promised Land
where I am resting in God’s promises, thinking God’s thoughts, having a holiness in my heart
that is from God.
What does the holiness of God do for us?

It gives us an inner life of peace. It’s amazing how all of the old temples they had – we heard a
couple weeks ago from P. Justin – the temples go up reaching, get up to God, but the
tabernacle it’s on the horizontal land. It’s not build high. It’s built sideways. It’s covered on the
outside with gold. No, it’s not. It’s covered on the outside with skins of animals, unpleasant to
the eye to look at.

Maybe that’s like our life when we have the holiness of God. Somebody from the outside sees
me, and it doesn’t look like I have much. It doesn’t look like I have much and I’m okay with not
having many things. But I know that inside of my heart I have peace. Inside of my heart I have
joy. Inside of my heart I have cleanliness. Inside of my heart I have the purity of God, the love of
God, the life of Christ, and the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Not anybody can see it sometimes. Maybe
my life looks like some skins, but I have inner peace that I don’t need anybody else to know
about. I’m satisfied from the holiness of God.

And I’ll just end with this point very quickly. Me and my wife we went to Washington, D.C.
yesterday and we went to the National Gallery of Art. We went to the 17th century era and we
saw some Dutch paintings. We were in this one room and every single painting on the wall was
a sophisticated man or a sophisticated woman. They had these hats that are beautiful hats. You
take a photo in portrait mode because you want to get rid of all the imperfections on your face.
You clip it and you can kind of like crop your face and it’s like shiny and beautiful. This is like
their version of that.

You have someone sitting there like elegantly, and they’re painting you as you are putting your
arms on the table, right? Beautiful hat. Perfect position. Little feather coming out of the hat. Cuff
links like really sharp looking. Nice collar. They are all looking to be what? Important. Beautiful.
Set apart. Different from each other. And everyone is looking at the wall like, wow! Beautiful
painting. This painting here.

But then over in the corner, me and my wife are standing and we are looking at the most
beautiful painting I have ever seen in my life. This painting is ten people maybe huddled around
the cross. And it’s dark outside. They have a little candle, only a little bit of light. There’s three
ladders laying on the cross. A couple men are on these ladders and they are pulling down the
body of Christ, barely clothed, blood in his hands.

What are we talking about? The value of who God is. There he is. The most important man in
the universe. He’s not clothed. There’s no beauty that we should despise him. He needs
somebody else to take his body from the cross. And this is holiness. Remember how nothing
can take away the holiness of God, but in this one moment when he surrenders his holiness to
take sin upon his body. And at the same time, as the most beautiful, majestic one in the
universe, he’s becoming sin itself. The Father in heaven, the holiness of the Father is causing
him to turn away.

And Jesus says this in Psalm 22: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” vs. 3. “yet, you
are holy.” When we have the holiness of God in our life, there’s a lot of room for questions. Why
have you forsaken me? There’s a lot of room for doubt. You have not heard the words of my
groaning. Because when we have this, yet you are holy. We have a life that is touching the
holiness of God, and that holiness can change our life. Amen.

Dan Miller –

Good morning or good afternoon. Good afternoon. For those of you that do not
know me my name is Dan Miller. I attend with my wife and our six children. And we’ve been attending here for the last few years, and I’ve been asked to share a word with you all. I’ll give
you a little background about what I was actually asked to talk about.

I actually work for an organization called Gabriel Network, and those who do not know what that
is, we are a pro-life ministry. And so, we have mothers who call us who are actually seeking
help. They want to carry their child. They are pregnant. They are alone and they need help. And
so far this past year in the last twelve months, we had about 200 moms who have called us that
we were able to help as an organization. At this church, about five months ago we started a
ministry to help those moms.

Now, in the last five months or so since we started this ministry, we had about 80 moms call our
organization. This church has served ten percent of them. We have 50 churches. We are one.
These moms who have called come from different backgrounds. Some of them are married.
Some of them are single. Some of them have boyfriends. Some of them are completely alone.
We have moms who are dealing with Social Services. We have a mom who is struggling with
suicide. We had a mom who found out she was pregnant. Told her best friend. Her best friend
immediately made an appointment at Planned Parenthood for an abortion.

One of our ladies at our church called her. Talked to her. Prayed with her. Let her know that she
had value, her baby had value, that she was loved. Needless to say, that mother did not go to
that appointment. I get to talk to these moms through our help line as we follow up with them.
So far, one of these moms has rebound according to her words her relationship with Christ, and
another one has started to go to church and had never gone to church before.

The world tells us that’s not what we are supposed to do. The world tells us we are supposed to
tell them about their rights, their options, about women’s rights. But we believe that God has a
different plan, and we hold ourselves not to what the world says but to what God says.
The one thing I love about this church is that we teach the Word. We don’t coat it. We say it for
what it is. I love that. I love the people in this church. I love the men in this church. I love the fact
that we get to sit under amazing wise men like P. Schaller, P. Scibelli, and P. Love. To be able to
sit under them, hear their heart, hear their passion, hear their wisdom, hear their knowledge of
Scripture prepares us to go into the world.

Now, we are getting ready for Easter. Big time of the year. So, I thought today I would share a
story getting us ready for Easter. Over the next couple of weeks usually with every church they
have Palm Sunday. They have their Easter celebration. So, I thought today I would share
something right before that happens.

So, if you would, turn in your Bibles to Luke 19. Luke 19. I’m going to be reading from the New
King James version, and it’s going to be a message that most preachers usually don’t talk
about. It’s us versus the world. It’s how the world views us as a church. It’s a sad message but
it’s a message that I think is actually encouragement especially when you go to a church like
this.

In Luke 19, we read in advance that Jesus is in Jericho. He is getting ready to enter into his last
week of his life. And right before that in the beginning of Luke 19, he walks into the city of
Jericho and there’s this little guy, a little tax collector named Zaccheus who was a wee little man
and a wee little man was he! Who got up on a sycamore tree to see what he could see.
And through a conversation that Jesus has with Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus ends up becoming
saved, and not only does he become saved but he goes out and says I’m going to return
everything that I stole. Everything that I took out of everybody, I’m going to return it to the
people.

Now remember he’s in Jericho. This is an important detail. Zacchaeus, tax collector, just came to
Christ. Now, all the leaders and all the people are starting to get together and they are getting excited. Things are about to change. You got tax collectors getting saved. They’re getting money
back. Man, this is pretty awesome. So, they think something awesome is about to happen and
they’re right. Within a week, the most awesome story that we know is going to take place but it’s
not how they envision it.

Luke 19, I’m going to be reading from the New King James starting in vs. 11. Man, they were
excited. Jesus is saving tax collectors. He’s getting ready to go into Jerusalem for Passover.
Man, this guy is going to start a revolution and we’re going to have the kingdom of God now. vs.
12-27. This is the Word of God. May we be encouraged and edified. There’s an interesting story.
We talked about it in Jericho.

Early on in Jesus life when he was little, he escaped into Egypt with his mom and dad. Then,
there’s a little passage in Matthew 2 around verses 19-23 where it says that an angel came to Joseph
and told them to go back, to go back to Judea. Now, Joseph in vs. 22 says that he decided not
to go back to Judea but to go north to Galillee because there was a man Archelaus. Interesting
fact. Interesting story.

I’m going to pivot a little bit. Who ever heard of the book or the play, “Ivanhoe” by Walter Scott?
It was one of the most interesting books that came out. The reason that made it so popular is
what was called historical fiction. Historical fiction. It created a whole new genre. I love historical
fiction.

Those of you who watch movies, Saving Private Ryan is an historical fiction. It was real events
with a fictional story in it. Titanic, the movie, fictional or historical fiction. Gladiator, same thing. I
love those kind of movies personally. You watch Titanic. You want to know what will happen to
Jack and Rose. Are they going to make it? Are they going to survive? Are they actually going to
get off the boat? What’s going to happen to the big, old diamond?

Saving Private Ryan, what’s going to happen to Private Ryan now that all the brothers are lost?
Will Maximus survive as a gladiator? All those things we know in historical fiction. Too often we
think of parables, we think they are completely fictional. Jesus often uses real events that
people know when he gives parables.

If I told you a story that there was a man who ruled in another country who decided to attack a
far away country. He had two planes and he had his soldiers get on those planes and attack
buildings in that other country. He then decided to find himself a fort, a house, where he could
hide. And he brought some of his servants in and said I need coffee.

He goes to the first one and says, I need coffee, and the first one goes to Starbucks and he
says, nope. I hate Starbucks. You’re dead. And another one comes and he says I’ll get you
some coffee from Royal Farms. He says I don’t like Royal Farms coffee. You’re dead. And a
third one comes and he says I’ll get you coffee from Dunkin Donuts because Dunkin Donuts has
the best coffee. He says you may live and you may now have a thousand wives when you die.
That is a fictional story that I made up. Who knows what story I am talking about though? 9/11.
The story happened 22 years ago.

The story Jesus told is a real story that everyone in Jericho knew about. See Jericho was where
King Herod the Great had a summer home. It’s where he went all summer. He loved the ocean
or the sea. He loved going to the pools. Herod the Great was a crazy dude as you guys all
understand. He had ten wives. There were seven sons that we know about in the Bible. There’s
number one, Antipater. He’s the first born, so he is the next to be given the kingdom. Then, there
was Alexander and Aristobulus who were brothers.

But King Herod the great was kind of paranoid so he thought numbers two and three were trying
to kill him, so he had them killed in the pool of his house at Jericho. So, that left Philip the first,
his fourth son. But Philip I who was somebody that he wasn’t too sure about, but he thought he
would be a good fit to take over and he died.

So, about a couple months before he died though, his oldest son Antipater decided to plot and
poison him so Herod the Great killed him. So, that left Philip I now in charge. So, Philip I is now
the right person. But Philip I’s mom actually knew about the plot, so he said get rid of both of
them. I don’t like them anymore.

So, next up is a guy named Archelaus. Archelaus and his brother Antipater are brothers. They
are numbers 5 and 6 but now suddenly they’re next in line. They have another half brother,
another Philip, Philip II. Archelaus was a bad dude. Herod the Great was getting ready to die, so
he decided in Jericho to bring in all the Jewish leaders into the Hippedrome, and because he
knew the Jews would not mourn him, he made a rule that when he dies I want all of those
leaders killed, so there will be mourning in Jerusalem.

Now, he ends up dying and his sister releases them and lets them go, but the people are really
upset. One of the things Herod also did is he put a Roman eagle outside the temple which got a
big revolt going. So, he dies and now there’s this big revolt going on.

Guess who had to deal with it? Archeleus. So, Archelaus decides he’s going to go in there and
kill about 3,000 Jews to shut down the revolt. So, Achelaus is now kind of leading the charge,
but the one thing that happened with Herod the Great is the day before he died he changed his
will, cause remember the first born he killed. Number two and three he had already killed and
number four he had sent away, so that left Archelaus and Archelaus was given the area of
Judea where Jericho and Jerusalem are. His brother Antipas was up in Galillee. And their other
brother, half-brother Philip II was all the way northeast in an area called the Decapolis.

Now, here’s an interesting thing was that who is supposed to make this will? Well, Antipas who
you may recognize the name, he was the gentlemen who dealt with John the Baptist and had
John the Baptist killed. He was also there during the crucifixion of Jesus. You’re probably
wondering what does all of this have to do with anything?

Well, nobody liked Archelaus as we found out from that earlier story in Matthew 2. Archelaus has to
get approval by Caesar to become the king but Antipas is not happy. Now, here’s what you need
to know about Antipas. Antipas as you may know married Herodias, the woman who was
actually his niece/sister-in-law who was the daughter of his brother who had been killed. But
when Philip I got exiled, Herodias divorced him and married – this is a screwed up family. If you
can keep this, you are too much addicted to soaps. I’m just going to say that! Get off the reality
TV if you can follow any of this right now.

But Archelaus now, he’s now here and he says you know what? I need to get approval from
Caesar to become king, so he goes to Caesar so he can become king of the land. But the Jews
are not happy with this. They send 50 of their delegates, their leaders to Rome as well to say,
no. We don’t want this guy. He’s vicious. He’s violent. This is a guy we do not want as our king,
and we should actually become independent. And Antipas decides to go and also say, hey. I
think I should become king, because you know, that’s my older brother and he’s just a bad dude.
So, they go to Rome. Caesar sits. Of course, he lets the Jews know you are not going to be
independent. You’re still going to be under Roman rule. And he decides to take Herod the
Great’s kingdom and divide it up into three and a half areas.

So, he gives Archelaus, like the will had said, Judea. He gives Antipas Galillee. And then he gives Philip II he gives the Decapolis. They come back. Archelaus is ticked because those fifty people that are supposed to be leaders
went to Caesar to argue. So, he has them killed.
This is the story Jesus is talking about. So, let’s read this again. vs. 11-12. “A certain nobelman”
– Archelaus. “Went into a far country” – Rome. “To receive for himself a kingdom” – Herod the
Great’s kingdom. “So he” – Archelaus.

Here’s the fictional part. vs. 13. Now, the word there for “business” is to trade. Just so we are
clear on that. That’s what it actually means. To trade. Sorry, I just lost my spot. vs. 13-14, “He
sent a delegation” – the fifty Jewish leaders. “He” being Archelaus. vs. 15. His father’s kingdom,
Judea. vs. 16-20. vs. 21. We already know who Archelaus is, what he stands for. vs. 22-23.
The word “bank” there means to take something precious and trade it for your own gain. It is the
same word used when Jesus flips over the table at the temple.

The word for the table and the bank are the same. So, you can understand what he is saying. Why didn’t you at least do that? vs. 24-27. “But bring here those enemies of mine” – the fifty delegates. Too often we hear this
parable and we think that Jesus is the nobleman. Pay attention to the details. Does Jesus reap
where he does not sow? Is he an austere man? For those who serve him and love him and
follow him, does he cast them out? Does he kill them? Does this sound like Jesus to you? I
would argue it is not Jesus at all. It is actually telling us what is about to happen when we go
into the world.

Jesus is about to get crucified. He is going to be resurrected. He’s saying you think the kingdom
of heaven is coming now and it will one day, but until then, you will have a choice. You will have
a choice. Where is your loyalty going to be? Will you serve the world or will you serve me?
You see, as a church, we have a choice to give in to the world. We can give in to all the gender
identities that are going on out there. We can give in to the woke environment and culture that is
all over the place. We can give in to women’s rights and being pro-choice or we can say we are
going to stand with what God says. And I am thankful we get to stand here with a choice.

And I come to this church because of that choice, because I know every day it is a battle. I know
when I come to church, I’m going to be taught the Word of God. I know when I come to church,
I’m going to worship with my brothers and sisters. I know when I come to church, we are going
to pray together. We are going to edify each other. We are going to encourage each other. We
are going to teach each other. We are going to hug each other. We’re going to kiss each other.
We’re going to love each other. We’re going to do everything that we possibly can because we
know what we have to go into.

The world hates Christians. They do not want us to bring what we believe into the world. And the
world constantly says you got to choose where you’re going to fall. If you want to follow us, the
world will give you rewards. There’s ten minas for the one who wants to sell theirs. You know
what your faith is worth? A mina is $500. That’s what your faith is worth to the world. That’s it.
And you can sell it and you can get rewards here on earth or you can totally say you know
what? I’m not going to go that game, and I might get ridiculed, and I might get reviled. I might
get persecuted. They may say things against me for the Lord but that’s okay.

Matthew 5. P. Love talked about the beatitudes earlier this morning. It says, “You are the salt of the
earth (Matthew 5:13).” That is not an action. That is a being. You are the salt. It doesn’t say you are to
be the salt. It doesn’t say you act like the salt. It says you are the salt. You are the salt of the
earth. Now, it doesn’t define what salt is.

So, if you look in Mark, if you look in Luke, it tells us what salt is. Salt according to Luke was
used in the fields. It was used in the fields. It helped to nourish the grounds. It says that in Luke
14. It also says it was used in what the King James says a dung hole. I always wanted to say
“poop” from church! I grew up in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. We had the outhouses with the
Amish. I would go to the outhouses whenever I would work up at the farm, and in the outhouse
the only thing I would take from home was a thing of toilet paper cause I didn’t want to use corn
husks.

But they would have a little bucket there that would have a little Dixie cup about this big and
they would have a little bucket of rock salt. After you did your business, you would take the thing and you would dump it in there. Very weird thing but you knew you were supposed to do it
because it was supposed to take away, allow the moisture to dry up so there wouldn’t be the
stench as well as not allowing things to grow.

That’s what Luke says the salt’s purpose was. I hear preachers talk about it and it’s about flavor
and it’s about preservation and it’s about trading. No. Luke tells us what salt is for when he says
it was for the fields and it was for the dung hole, the outhouses. That’s what salt was actually
used for.

The world says we don’t want you. We want to throw you out. And all you are good for as
Christians is to be trampled on by men. And we say okay. That’s fine. We will go where the need
is. We will go where the worst is because honestly, that’s us. We know what it’s like to be
wretched to need the grace of God. We know what it’s like to understand salvation. We know
what it means when it talks about grace and mercy and love.

We are the church that says if you want to cast us out of your world, that’s fine. Right before you
are the salt of the earth it says the last beatitude. vs. 11-12. I love the fact that we can come
here and we can worship together. See, on Sundays we come to get filled because we know
we’re going to get abused. See, today we are here at church as a Body because we want to be
encouraged because we know out there we are going to get crucified. We come to church
today, we come to the house of God because we know out there we are going to go to a world
of evil. We come to church today to hang out and to worship like P. Love said with saints,
because tomorrow we’re going to the world of sinners. We come here today because we want to
be encouraged.

We want to worship because we know we are going to be going into work and to schools and to
our life where the world wants to attack us. I am so thankful that we live in a church like this
where we can be encouraged. The parable of the minas as we get ready to enter into the Easter
holidays is just a reminder that our eyes must always be on Christ. You are the salt of the earth.
You are here for a reason. You are here to be in the ground, planted, helping things grow. You
are here to stop the stench that the world is already creating.

We live in a world that is ugly. We live in a world that wants to reject it. But I’m so thankful for
ministries like this and the ministries we have for these women who just want to show them
Christ. It is a good Christ we serve who loves us, who protects us, who does not care about our
past or our problems.

Adam had a broken family. Noah had drinking problems. Abraham was a coward. Isaac was
easily deceived and Jacob was a manipulator. Joseph was sexually abused. Moses was a
murderer. He was a liar. He was a coward. He ran. He had anger issues. Joshua could not stop
trying to feel like he was inferior because of the person before him.

You have people like Samson who was a womanizer. You got people like David who did nothing
but struggle with their time pornography and yet God continued to use those people. Solomon
was a, he did nothing but worship idols. He got caught up in the world. Thomas was doubting
who Christ was. Peter was denying who Christ was. Paul was killing those who wanted to follow
Christ.

If you think you cannot be used, stop believing the lie. God wants the foolish. He wants those
who want to come here. The word that follows in Matthew 5 says when salt has lost it’s saltiness
or season or flavor depending on what translation you use, that word for “saltiness” is the same
word that is used for “foolishness” in other places in the Bible. It’s always foolishness to what the
world considers wise.

We are the foolish. We are those that the world wants to cast away. And I am so thankful that
we have a God who still continues to use us, and love us, and pull us out of the crap and say,
you know what? You’re worthy.

We are getting for Easter over the next few weeks. I just hope you guys are able to find time to
just give God so much thanks. Let him know how much you appreciate what he has done for
you. This is an amazing God. The parable of the minas. You are the salt of the earth. I love
when you connect those two. I will finish by simply saying in Mark 9 and Luke 14, they both talk
about salt and they both use the same phrase which is “salt is good.” Let’s pray. (Prayer)

Please enjoy these sermon notes from the messages preached at Greater Grace Church in Baltimore. These notes are provided to aid in your study and understanding of the Word. Note that these notes do not represent complete, word-for-word transcriptions. Also, they may contain omissions as well as some errors in spelling and structure, etc., as we attempt to provide them as soon as possible. Our hope is that these notes serve as a way to help you search and connect with messages on related subjects and passages. Thank you for your interest in the ministry of Greater Grace.