Why Christians Should Persevere - 19

Well, as I mentioned, today we come to the conclusion of Philippians chapter 3, and we will touch briefly into the beginning of chapter 4, and I point it out to you that the first verse of chapter 4 has become a little source of controversy to some people, because the placement of that verse, whether it should be in chapter 3 at the end or chapter 4 at the beginning, is a subject of some debate. And as you know, the verses and chapter divisions were not part of the inspired record.

They were added later for our convenience, and they were done with the contents in mind to try to make the divisions at logical and obvious places, but in some cases it's not so obvious, and it's not always logical, and this is one of those places where it could go either way. And I truly have no difficulty supporting its placement as verse 22 of chapter 3 or as verse 1 of chapter 4 either way. And we're going to save our exposition of this verse until next week, placing it with chapter 4, but we're going to use it to move backward into the last verses of chapter 3 in our study for this morning. What does chapter 4, verse 1 say? Therefore, my beloved and longed-for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, beloved.

It obviously is a word of conclusion, as that opening statement, that opening word, therefore, tells us. Based on something that has gone before, here's the exhortation, and the exhortation is to stand fast, to stand firm, to be faithful, to persevere. And that exhortation is rightly based upon a great deal of the contents of chapter 3 and indeed even further back than that, but especially on what is said in the last two verses of chapter 3. Where Paul says, For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body, that it may be conformed to his glorious body, according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself. Therefore, my beloved and longed-for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my beloved. And so verse 1 of chapter 4 springs us back into chapter 3, and we are going to look in verses 20 and 21 at four reasons why Christians should persevere.

Why? Why should we be faithful? Why should we keep on keeping on? Why should we not become discouraged? Why should we fail to keep our eye upon the goal and to recognize that our victory in Christ has already been secured and will be realized someday?

Why should we persevere? Number one, because our citizenship is in heaven. Number two, because our Savior is coming again. Number three, because our transformation is assured. And number four, because Christ possesses irresistible power.

Why should Christians persevere? Number one, because our citizenship is in heaven. Verse 20 again, For our citizenship is in heaven. Christians have heavenly citizenship. Christians actually have dual citizenship. That's not a very familiar concept to Americans because I don't think American law allows dual citizenship. If you come from another country and want to become an American citizen, then you have to forfeit the citizenship of your previous country in order to acquire that. But a great many countries, maybe the majority of countries in the world, will allow you to have dual citizenship. You can be a citizen of the United States and a citizen of France and so forth. Is that true in Brazil, John?

You can be a citizen of the United States and also a citizen of Brazil. And thus it goes. And so that's true of the Christian as well. We have an earthly citizenship, but we have a heavenly citizenship. We are citizens of this world.

No question about it. And therefore we are subject to the laws of this world. We're subject to the taxes of this world.

Don't we wish we could get out from under those? Remember that question came to Jesus. Do you and your disciples pay the tasks? In other words, are you citizens of this world? Do you consider yourself to be part of this world? And Jesus answered that by saying, first of all, well, tell me, do the sons of the kings pay taxes or not?

And the answer was, no, they don't. And so he was pointing to their heavenly citizenship. We are sons of the king, not on earth, but in heaven. But nevertheless, he said, in order not to offend them, go catch a fish and find the dairies inside and take that and pay the tax because we're citizens of two worlds. We're citizens of this world. And so we're subject to the laws of this world, insofar as they do not contradict the laws of God, the laws of our heavenly citizenship.

And we are subject to the taxes of this world and we're subject to many things that pertain to this world. We are citizens of this world, but we are also citizens of heaven. Now, this concept, I think, would have renovated particularly with the Philippians because their city was a colony of Rome. And that, again, is a little bit foreign concept to us, the way it worked in that day. But what that meant was that all of the citizens of Philippi were actually considered citizens of Rome. Most of the people that lived in the Roman Empire were not citizens of Rome. Most of them did not have the privileges of Roman citizenship. Paul did, as you know, and that was quite unusual. And he used that skillfully on many occasions and even talked to a centurion who said, well, I acquired Roman citizenship at great cost.

I had to buy it. I don't know if that means he bribed somebody or how that was acquired, but he did not acquire Roman citizenship by birth. But Paul said, I did. I was born a Roman citizen. And that was a great privilege and was a privilege denied to most of the people who lived in the empire. But the city of Philippi had been designated a colony of Rome, and that was a term that meant that those people were citizens of Rome.

And consequently, they demonstrated that. They dressed like the people in Rome. They followed the customs of the people in Rome. I'm told that if you went to Philippi in that day, at times you could scarcely tell the difference whether you were in Philippi or in Rome because they were citizens of Rome and they acted like citizens of Rome. And so this illustration that Paul gives is very, very compelling to the people that he's writing to when he says, don't act like the world, don't act like citizens of this world because your citizenship is in heaven. You are citizens in heaven. And heavenly citizenship, obviously, takes priority over earthly citizenship. It's the highest citizenship.

It's the one that we cling to. As the world declines around us, I think we can appreciate more and more the fact that we are not first and foremost citizens of this world. We're only that in the secondary sense, but that our citizenship is in heaven.

And as the world declines around us, I think our loyalty to the world and our appreciation for the world and hopefully our love for the world also declines. And we look more and more to heaven where our true citizenship lies. But nevertheless, because we are people of the earth and we live in this world and we rub shoulders with people in this world and we make transactions, we buy and sell, and we carry out our business in this world, from time to time we have to be reminded of this truth. Our citizenship is not primarily on earth. Our primary citizenship is in heaven. And Paul is saying this in contrast to the people in verses 18 and 19 that we looked at last week.

He said, remember, for many walk, these are professing Christians, for many walk of whom I told you often and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, who's in destruction, whose God is their belly, whose glory is their shame, who set their mind on earthly things. But in contrast to that and in contrast to those who are living and manifesting that their only citizenship is upon earth and they live like it, they reflect that in their lives, our citizenship, we who are born again, our citizenship is in heaven. Heavenly citizenship takes priority and heavenly citizenship dominates our behavior. Though we are in this world, we no longer belong to this world system. We work within it. Jesus talked about this in his high priestly prayer when he said that, praying to the Father about his disciples, he said, they are not of the world, but they're in the world.

I'm leaving them there for the time being. And that's where we are. We are in the world. And we therefore operate in the world and we affect the world around us, but we no longer belong to the world system because, and this is what's so glorious about it, we no longer share the world's condemnation. We've been removed out from under the condemnation that hangs over the world and the people who live in the world. And we've been placed in a different kingdom with a different citizenship. And we no longer are under the destruction that awaits the world. And so we look to our heavenly citizenship.

It's a great privilege. And we no longer belong to that world system. And that's why we live like Christians, not like worldlings. There is a vast difference between citizens of heaven and citizens of earth. And Paul says that is manifested in the lives of God's true people, those that he referred to in verses 18 and 19, who thought they were Christians, who claimed to be Christians, but whose lives were no different from those who are in the world.

Paul says they are mistaken. Their end is destruction. They're still under condemnation. And their lives reflect that. We're not saved by our good works. We're not saved from condemnation because of the way we live. But we demonstrate the reality of salvation by the way we live.

And when we live like the world, we're demonstrating that we belong to the world. But when we live like citizens of heaven, we demonstrate that we have heavenly citizenship. And furthermore, because we are citizens of heaven, primarily over the world in which we live, then we understand that our warfare is spiritual warfare, not carnal warfare. This is sometimes difficult for us to grasp. But the Bible tells us we, who are Christians, do not wrestle against flesh and blood.

But what? Against principalities and powers and the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in heavenly places. In other words, our warfare is spiritual. We are actually warring against Satan and against spiritual beings. It is a spiritual warfare. And you can't win a spiritual warfare with earthly weapons. You can't win a spiritual warfare by employing earthly techniques. Now, it occurs to me that a lot of Christians get the fight right, but they don't get the right right, if you understand what I mean. Christians are engaged in warfare.

We are to be fighting. But we're to fight in the right way, the biblical way, the way that we are instructed to fight according to the word of God, not according to flesh and blood, not according to carnal principles, but rather according to spiritual warfare. And we need to understand that. It's because we're citizens of heaven. We don't operate in the realm of representing our savior and fighting for truth. We don't operate in the realm of worldly systems and worldly operations. We don't belong to that anymore. And we recognize that that's passing away. And we recognize that victory is not found in that level. We wrestle not against flesh and blood. One example of that is that we as citizens of heaven understand the place of politics in our world, but we know politics will never, listen to me, will never, listen to me, will never solve the world's problems.

Never. Because the problem is deeper than which party is in power and which candidate is in place and which laws have been passed. The problem is deeper than that.

It goes clear to the heart. It goes to our very nature. It goes to our sin nature.

And what we see in society around us, and we see society crumbling around us, what we're seeing is a demonstration, a manifestation of the sinfulness of the human heart. And all the laws in the world can't change that. And all of the political movements in the world can't change that. And we understand that, at least we ought to, and we should act accordingly.

We know that politics can never solve society's problems. And therefore, we do wage warfare against the sin and declension and corruption that's around us, but we wage spiritual warfare. And I think a wonderful example of that happened just in the last week or two. The Supreme Court tossed out Roe v. Wade.

The Christians rightfully applauded all across this land. It was an unjust ruling to begin with. It really wasn't based upon clear constitutional wording.

It was shoehorned in. And finally, finally, finally, it was rejected. There's no longer a national right to abortion.

It passes back to the states. And the dust had scarcely settled on that until in the state of Kansas, a conservative state, a Republican state, a red state, 70 percent of the people voted to retain abortion, to reject any law in Kansas against abortion. They voted to retain the right of abortion.

So the political battle, you might say, against Roe v. Wade was won. And what do we see? We see the manifestation of the human heart. You can't change this until you change human hearts. And human hearts desire no longer to see this going on in our society. And how do you change human hearts? Not by politics, but by the gospel.

And please don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that Christians shouldn't be involved in politics. We take up our earthly citizenship and we act as responsible citizens. And we vote prayerfully and knowledgeably. And we do participate, but we recognize this is a minor matter.

We do that as a matter of earthly citizenship, just like paying our taxes and obeying the laws of our land. But we recognize that we are primarily citizens of heaven and any progress we make upon the earth has to be made in the realm of Christ's kingdom. And therefore, we give the gospel far higher priority than politics.

Why? Because politics can't change one human heart, but the gospel can and does change millions of human hearts. It's the power of God unto salvation. And so we give priority to gospel work. We give priority to the work of churches that God has established to carry out this work of Christ's kingdom in this world. We give priority to missions to proclaim the gospel not only here, but around the world. We give priority to supporting the proclamation of God's word and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Because if any serious and lasting change is going to take place in our society, that's how it's going to take place.

As God is pleased to open hearts to his word and to cause hearts to be changed by his word. And until that happens, we can, you know, I don't know what your politics are, but you can put your political party in charge of all the branches of government and pass all the laws that you think ought to be passed. And guess what? American society remains unchanged. Whoopee doo.

What did you do? Whoopee doo. Our citizenship is in heaven. So we should persevere because our citizenship is in heaven. Number two, because our Savior is coming again. Back again to verse 20.

For our citizenship is in heaven from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. Our Savior is coming again. Now note his exalted position now. It is in heaven. And that indicates the completeness of his earthly mission. He finished the work that he came to earth to do and so he ascended back to heaven. He completed his earthly mission.

It indicates his identity, his true identity is God Almighty. Where is he in heaven? He's on the throne of God. He's not an angel in heaven worshiping around the throne of God and crying holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. He is on the throne of God in heaven. That demonstrates who he is. He is in heaven.

It indicates his present rule. We're not waiting for Jesus Christ to rule. Jesus Christ is ruling now from heaven. You say, I can't see it. But the Bible tells us so.

So what are you going to do? Believe sight or believe the revelation of God's word? And the Bible tells us that he is ruling now and that even though things look bad around us, that he is orchestrating all of this for his purposes, just like Joseph.

We've heard that illustration, that reminder so many times to his brothers. You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good. The devil means it for evil, but God is going to use it for his good. All kinds of mischief is going on in our world by people who don't love the Lord and hate his word.

And they seem to be prevailing. They mean it for evil. That is in opposition to God and opposition to the Bible. But God means it for good. He has a way of working that out to accomplish his good purposes. You say, well, I don't I can't figure out how that's going to happen.

I can't figure out how he's going to do that. Did you really think that God expected you to be able to figure all this out? To understand his mind and to know what he's doing? Did you think he intends to reveal all of his thoughts and processes to you?

Or do you think he intends for you to trust him when he tells us that he is ruling in the heavens and everything is being accomplished according to his will? And so Jesus Christ is in heaven and he's ruling upon the throne of God. And so because our Savior is coming again and he is one of majestic personage, which you notice how rare this is to find four titles and names ascribed to him in one verse, in one place. Verse 20, we eagerly await for the Savior, the Lord, Jesus Christ.

Four titles, four names that are ascribed to him here. The Savior who is in heaven, he's coming again. Now, Caesar wanted to be called Savior and was considered to be the savior of the people of Rome.

And he wanted people to look to him as their savior. He's the one who could save them. He's the one who could help them. He's the one who could provide for them.

Things haven't changed much. Government loves to do that. Whatever the government is, whether it's a monarchy like Caesar or whether it is a representative government.

But whoever's in government, whoever's in power, many times endeavors to get the citizens to look to government to supply everything. Look to us as your father. Look to us as your savior. We'll provide. We'll make things right.

But it doesn't work out very well. Because they're just fallen, sinful human beings like the rest of us. But Caesar wanted to be called savior, but he's not savior. Jesus is savior. He is Lord. And again, Caesar wanted to be called Lord. And that's Christians went to their death by refusing to call Caesar Lord. Just call him Lord and you'll be all right.

Can't do it. He's not Lord. Only Jesus is Lord.

Oh, come on. We worship all these gods. You can call them all Lord and you can add Caesar in there and call him Lord too. And then your life will be just fine.

You can live in peace and we won't bother you. Can't do it. Caesar's not Lord. Jesus is Lord. Then you die. I'll die.

I can't do it. Caesar's not Lord. Jesus is Lord. He is Lord. He is Lord. He's risen from the dead and he is Lord.

Every knee shall bow. Every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. So he's savior. He's Lord. He's Jesus. That speaks, of course, of his incarnation, his humanity. He was born of a virgin.

Thou shall call his name Jesus. And that tells us they took upon him human nature and lived that perfect life of obedience. And no other human being has lived and then died a sacrificial death on the cross that he didn't deserve.

He didn't deserve to die at all because he's the only one who had lived perfectly. And therefore, the wages of sin is death didn't apply to him. But he voluntarily gave up his life. He handed over his life as a sacrifice for sin.

And he did that in his humanity. And so he is Jesus, the man, the sacrifice. And he is Christ. And that means anointed one, the Messiah. The promised Christ of the Old Testament scriptures has been fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth. He is savior. He is Lord. He is Jesus. He is Christ.

And that's what the apostles spread across the world to proclaim, particularly starting in the synagogues with the Jews. Stop looking for your Messiah to come. He's already come. His name is Jesus. He came. He lived. He died. He rose again.

He's back in heaven. Worship him. The promised Messiah has come.

He is Christ. And he's coming again. And we notice Paul's eager anticipation for his coming.

Our citizenship is in heaven from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. We eagerly wait. Now, this is interesting because as we see as we go on that Paul is talking about what happens when the Lord comes, namely that believers receive their resurrection glorified bodies. And so it appears that Paul's eager anticipation of Christ's coming is linked to that as much as it is anything else.

It's a link to other things that take place that he's coming, but they aren't mentioned here. But he's coming. The time, therefore, of the believer's full and final redemption is coming at his time of coming. He's coming, and therefore the time of the victor's final conquest comes when he comes. He's coming, therefore, the time of the believer's vindication.

He believed the world scoffed, but he believes the world continues to scoff and sometimes persecute. But when the Lord comes, the believer's faith will be vindicated and the world will be shown to have been wrong, terribly wrong, fatefully wrong all along. But the Lord is returning, and when he does, he's going to resurrect the bodies of believers from the grave. And this is a glorious future, and therefore persevere, persevere, stand fast in the Lord, my beloved.

Do that because our citizenship is in heaven. Do that because our Savior's coming again. And this coming again of Christ created such eager anticipation in the heart of Paul. Why does it seem to create so little eager anticipation in the hearts of so many Christians today? Have we grown cold? Have we grown indifferent? Have we forgotten? There's a link between living like heavenly citizens and anticipating the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. John tells us in 1 John 3, 3 that those who love his appearing live in a more godly way. I've forgotten the exact wording there and I thought I could quote it and it flies away from me. Who was I talking to this morning about fading memory?

It does happen, doesn't it? So let's just look. It's 1 John 3, 3. I've got a new Bible too. It takes me longer to find things now. Turn these pages.

They're kind of stiff and don't yield to my fingers quite as easily. And everyone who has this hope, that is the hope of the Lord Jesus Christ's return, everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. And eager anticipation for the return of Jesus Christ has a sanctifying effect, a purifying effect upon the lives of believers. We need to ask the Lord to stimulate an eager anticipation in our hearts even as it did in the heart of the Apostle Paul. But why should we persevere?

Number 3, because our transformation is assured. And that's what Paul tells us moving on to verse 21. When the Lord returns, verse 21, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body? And so there's a reference here to the body we now have. And the body that we now have, according to our text, is a body of humiliation, a body that's in a humble state.

And what does that mean? Well, number 1, it means it's a body that's designed for earth, not for heaven. And earth is certainly a lower state than heaven. But number 2, as we know, our bodies now, though designed for earth, have been marred by sin.

And so now we have another blow, you might say. These bodies weren't made for heaven and upon earth they have now been very damaged because of sin. And therefore, our bodies are beset by all kinds of infirmities. And we all suffer infirmities from time to time and many of us are dealing with ongoing infirmities that we have to deal with.

And some are well known and some are not so well known. But things that we're struggling with because our bodies are bodies of humility. They're bodies of this humble state. They're bodies that have been touched by sin. And they are bodies that are destined for death. These present earthly bodies aren't designed for heaven and they aren't designed to live forever. And so if you're not making preparation for death, you are closing your eyes as tight as you can against the truth.

You don't have to even believe the Bible to recognize this truth. All you have to do is read the obituaries and we have deaths in our community every single day. All you have to do is attend a funeral service and are reminded at that service that we don't live forever, nobody lives forever. Our bodies are destined for death.

And therefore, for you not to prepare for the inevitable reality of death is most blind, it is most foolish, it is most bullheaded, and it is most dangerous. These bodies are in a humble state. Greek philosophy likened the body to the tomb of the soul or in some cases the prison of the soul. And they thought in terms of the soul being released into glorious freedom at death. And the body that was holding back the soul would now be gone. And the soul would be able to enjoy greater freedom, be able to develop into what it was supposed to be. That was their concept about death and dying and the release of the soul.

Well, you can see why they might have reasoned that way. Because they could see the crumbling of the body, they could see the death of the body, they could see the problems with the body. And therefore, it seemed to them that the body was a great bondage, a great weight, a great hindrance. And that what we longed for was to be released from these bodies.

But that's not the way the Bible tells us to think. The Bible tells us to look forward to the glorification of our bodies. Not the removal of our bodies, not the extermination of our bodies, but the transformation of our bodies. And because of the transformation of our body that is coming, we should persevere because that's a glorious day. The body we have now has a lot of problems, but what about the body we shall have? Well, it is going to be in conformity, we're told, with the body of His glory. And though we don't know everything we'd like to about the body of Christ when He came out of the dead, we do know some things about it. And we are told here that our bodies are going to be essentially the same as His.

That's amazing. A body that is substance, but not blood. A body that can eat, He ate in front of His disciples. But a body that is not bound by earthly limitations, He passed through walls. A body apparently that can travel instantaneously through time and space like our bodies cannot.

We're confined to one place at one time and so forth and so on. That's the body He had when He came out of the grave, this glorified body. And the bodies of believers are going to be like that. When the Lord returns, we are going to have bodies like the one He had coming out of the grave.

And that's no shabby prospect. In fact, that's held up to us here as one of the most glorious aspects of Christ's return. John Eady, one of the commentators I study for the book of Philippians, said about the coming of Christ to change our bodies. He said, and I quote, The great function which Christ shall discharge at His coming. Almost as if Eddie's saying, this is the primary thing that He's coming to do.

I don't know if that's really what he intended to say and I may be misunderstanding his statement. But he certainly wants to exalt the fact that this is one of the most important things that Christ will do at His coming. So it should not be a negligible thought to us.

We tend to scarcely think about this. We think about dying and our souls going to heaven and like that's the conclusion of it all. That's the finality of it all.

Oh, no, no, no, no. And we're going to find out when we die and our souls are in heaven without our bodies that we are still incomplete. And there is a sense in which a bodyless soul knows that it's not complete and is longing for that day when it shall receive its glorified body and then shall be complete. Salvation not only saves the soul, salvation also saves the body, but it does so in stages. And the soul is saved first and is released to death and then the body is saved when the Lord comes a second time. What a glorious reality. So keeping that in mind, be faithful, persevere to the end. We've got a glorious future ahead of us.

And then finally, one more. Why should we persevere? Because Christ possesses irresistible power, the last part of verse 21. Again, verse 21, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body. Now this, according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself. According to the working or the exertion of the power by which he will subject all things to himself.

Christ possesses irresistible power, the power to accomplish our bodily glorification. Now the skeptics like to look at this doctrine of the glorification, the resurrection and glorification of the believer's body and say, ha, ha, ha, that's impossible. While the body decays, it goes back to dust.

The dust particles get scattered. Many bodies are destroyed. What about the bodies that drown at sea and are eaten by the sharks? What about bodies that are burned up in a house fire and you can't even find the body anymore? What about this?

What about that? Ha, ha, this idea of the Lord transforming and resurrecting these bodies. That's a foolish idea.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Not if you believe in what the power of God. The people who have trouble with believing in the resurrection and glorification of believers' bodies are also ones who scoff at the doctrine of the creation, that this world was created by the power of God. And yet, I mentioned Wednesday night, a lot of scientists are not satisfied with the scientific explanations. They are not satisfied with the generally accepted explanation of evolution. Some scientists have said what we need is a new theory, a new doctrine of evolution. The one we've got now does not answer the questions. It doesn't explain what we see. Honest scientists, many honest scientists will tell you that.

Well, of course not, because it's not true. But when you refuse to believe in a God who's big enough to create all these things and refuse to believe that by His power He created everything that is seen, then of course you have difficulty figuring out where it came from. God told us. God's revealed it to us. God's given us His word. It's as simple as this.

In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. That includes everything. That's comprehensive. That explains it. We don't really need any more explanation than that. But if you say, well, I don't believe that.

I'll figure it out for myself. It didn't get here that way. I know it didn't get here that way, but I can't figure out how it did get here.

But I know it didn't get here that way. When you reject the truth, and of course you can't come up with anything that's better because how can you come up with something that's not true that's going to explain what you need the truth to be able to explain? And if you reject the truth, you won't be able to understand it or explain it. And it's the same way with the resurrection. How is Christ going to raise the bodies, the decayed, dying and dead bodies, bodies, some that have been dead for thousands of years, how's He going to resurrect those and glorify those at His coming? I don't know any more than I know how He created the world, but I know He will. And I know He's got the power to do it. He's going to do it by His irresistible power. That's faith.

We believe the revelation of God. He's got the power to accomplish our bodily glorification. And therefore, He has the power to subdue all opposition. According to the workings by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.

The present circumstances in our world look like they're going in the opposite direction, away from God, away from righteousness, away from His control. But in spite of appearances, which look very daunting, the Bible tells us that He's got everything under control. And when He comes, we're going to see that.

He's able to subdue all things to Himself. Who raised Jesus from the dead, by the way? Well, you can find statements in the Bible that attribute that resurrection to all three persons of the Trinity. Sometimes we're told that the Father raised Him. Sometimes we're told that He was raised by the power of the Spirit. Sometimes we're told that He was raised by His own power, the power of the Son, which is not surprising because if the doctrine of the Trinity is true, then it is three persons but one God. And so whatever one person of the Godhead does, the other persons of the Godhead have done equally. And what that means is that Jesus had the power to raise Himself from the dead.

And Jesus had the power to glorify His own body. And if He had the power to do that, why do you think He won't have the power to raise ours and to glorify ours? Of course He will.

Of course He will. And so He has the power to accomplish our bodily glorification. He has the power to subdue all opposition. And He has the power to establish His comprehensive rule. The day is coming when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.

And He has the power to contest, to maintain His uncontested rule forever. When He comes, He's going to say, that's it. No more opposition. No more arguing.

No more bickering. No more refusing to surrender and to obey. Every knee shall bow.

Every tongue confess. From here on out, it's my kingdom and everybody's going to operate according to my rule. It's been my kingdom all along but I've let you run your course for my purposes up until now. But now the time has come and everything is going to be done according to my command. And so Handel had it right. When he comes again, we're going to acknowledge King of Kings and Lord of Lords. King of Kings and Lord of Lords forever, forever, forever and ever. Can't you just hear it? It's glorious. That's the truth. That's what this text is telling us.

He shall reign forever and ever and ever. I can't sing when my voice is good and it's not good right now. But anyway, I wish I could.

I do. I can sing. I just can't sing nicely. But it doesn't keep me from singing. I've got a song in my heart and he's coming. When he comes, he's going to establish his righteous rule and it will be uncontested forever and ever and ever and ever. We ought to let Jonathan sing that for us.

That would sound a whole lot better than my singing it. All right, let's wrap this up with some lessons. First of all, about world conditions. It's as simple as this. Despite what we see, God is in complete and perfect control. Don't forget it.

Don't doubt it. In spite of what we see with our eyes, the Bible assures us that God is in complete and perfect control. And Christians believe the word of God.

We know that that is true. What does this tell us about the human body? Well, it tells us some important things, I think, about the human body. It is important that we avoid earthly glorification. These bodies of earth are not glorified and we try to glorify them.

We try to paint them up and make them stronger and do the operations and the Botox and the different things to try to glorify these earthly bodies. But we're swimming upstream, aren't we? We're fighting a losing battle.

It doesn't matter how much of that we do. We don't really gain much. We keep losing. We keep losing. The bodies keep decaying.

They get weaker and weaker until they die. In many ways, it's something of a fool's errand, isn't it? And we need to understand that. We don't want to try to glorify our earthly bodies, but this is what our text is teaching us. Not only do we want to avoid earthly glorification, but we want to avoid earthly denigration. We shouldn't denigrate our earthly bodies.

The Bible doesn't do that. That's Greek philosophy. The body's a tomb. The body's a prison. The body's a problem. Don't honor your body.

No. The body is a glorious manifestation of God's creative wisdom and power and is destined for eternal glory. Can I say that again? The human body is a glorious manifestation of God's creative wisdom and power. And even as it now is marred by sin, it is nevertheless a glorious manifestation of God's creative wisdom and power. And it is destined in the lives of believers for eternal glory.

Don't glorify these present earthly bodies, but don't denigrate them either. And my final lesson is about the role of faith. The role of faith. Faith is superior to sight if it is true faith. Now, a lot of things that people call faith are not true faith. A lot of things that people call faith is, I believe really hard what I want to believe, but there's no basis for it. True faith is believing what God has said, what God has revealed. And when God has said it, then we can believe it. We can count on it.

We can be sure of it. And therefore, we need to anchor our faith in the revealed word of God. Sometimes people bless their hearts. They want so badly to have something happen.

They want to be healed or have one of their loved ones healed. And they think if I just believe it hard enough, it'll happen. Well, we're taught that by false teachers. And people hear these things all the time.

Just name it and claim it and so forth. And if you believe this strongly enough, then it will happen. And that's a misrepresentation of what the Bible says. We know that God can heal, but He doesn't promise that in every case He will. We know that it may be His will, and we are to pray to Him and certainly to ask Him to heal if it be His will. But our faith needs to be resting firmly upon the revealed word of God. We take what He has said, what we wish He had said, what we want Him to have said. We don't take His words and twist them, but we believe what He's actually said. And so we need to anchor our faith in the revealed word of God. And that means, for those of you who are outside of Christ, let faith lead you to Christ in salvation. Believe God.

That's what you need to do. Believe God. The problem with a lot of unbelievers is they think their intellect is superior to God's revelation.

It's not. But when you realize that God's revelation is superior to your intellect and you're willing to, just like with a child, like faith, believe what God has said, then that faith will lead you to Christ and lead you to salvation. And for those who are Christians, that means that our faith will govern our lives.

We go to God's word, we find out what He has said, and we govern our lives accordingly. Faith isn't governing my life the way I think it ought to be. Well, I think the Lord would have me do this.

I would think the Lord would have me do that. The Lord told me this. The Lord told me that. He's told me a lot of things as well. And everything He's told me is right in here. My problem is not that He hasn't told me anything.

My problem is I haven't paid attention to what He has said as I should. And the more I do and trust Him for what He has said, then the more my life is guided by His word and the more I honor Him. Shall we pray? Father, we thank you for your word that teaches us, that guides us, that rebukes us, that strengthens us. And we pray, O Lord, that you will give us persevering faith until the Lord returns and ushers in His eternal kingdom as we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.