Responding to the World of Unbelievers

Transcript

GR 2261
1/10/2021
Responding to the World of Unbelievers
Romans 12:17-21
Gil Rugh

We’re going to the book of Romans, chapter 12. What I want to do is look into Romans 12 and finish this chapter. And then in what we call our “Q and A”, but more my just addressing certain issues, I want to talk about some matters related to what we were discussing in our morning topic relating to the believer and resurrection. In particular, the condition between the death of a believer and the resurrection of the body; some matters related to that. So we’ll talk about that in our discussion time after.

We’ve been in Romans chapter 12, and basically, we’ve moved through what we call the doctrinal section of the book, and now Paul talks more about the application of that doctrine. It’s true that application and doctrine are woven and interwoven through the book of Romans and other books as well, but the greater emphasis in the first eleven chapters has been on explaining the doctrinal foundation, biblical truth. That understanding is the foundation for how we behave, how we conduct ourselves. Often the problem in evangelical churches is there’s more of an emphasis on talking about what we ought to do, how we ought to conduct ourselves, which is important. But if we don’t give enough attention to the biblical foundation for such a life, it can become rather subjective. We who are pastors, and others who are teachers have to be careful about that, where we spend more of our time telling people what they ought to do and how they ought to conduct themselves, or what they shouldn’t do than we do on setting the doctrinal foundation; out of which, if I can put it this way, naturally is to come the conduct. If I am now a child of God and enabled and empowered by the Holy Spirit, of course my life ought to be different. The Scripture unfolds what that is.

Paul is setting that out beginning in chapter 12 by what are foundational principles. Our lives are not our own. We’ve been “bought with a price therefore, glorify God in your bodies,” as he puts it in another letter. Here, he puts, “present your bodies as a living sacrifice.” A sacrifice which is holy, well-pleasing to God. We’re not to be conformed to this world. He’s spent the first, as we have it, eleven chapters of this instructional letter to the Roman church telling them the reason or basis. Well, of course our life ought to be different, not conformed to the world. He has transformed us. He has broken the power of sin. We died with Christ; we were raised with Christ to new life. This new life now is lived out. And then, on into the instruction. When He saved us, He brought us together as a body of believers so we could function together as the body of Christ in each place, where local churches meet. He has provided the gifts, and we worked through that. You see, this is foundational. How can people who claim to be believers say they don’t think they need to be part of a local church? That’s why, if we don’t have the doctrinal foundation correct, we’re just out there spinning around with our own ideas with subjective ways of thinking. This is God’s plan for our growth. All the parts of the body working together enable the body to grow. The individual members of the body grow by the contribution that all the parts of the body make. A natural analogy, as we have seen, with our physical body.

Then he talks specifically about our relationship together as believers, verse 9. Let love be without hypocrisy. Verse 10, Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. And so on. In verse 14 he touched on something. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. And then he went on to talk about primarily our relationship to one another as believers. But that statement, bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse, relates primarily to those, obviously, who are not believers who are going to be persecuting us. We’re not to react in the same way. But then he went on in verse 15, Rejoice with those who rejoice. 16, Be of the same mind toward one another. But now with verse 17 he’s going to go back and elaborate what he just mentioned in verse 14, bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse. And he comes back.

We have to be careful. We are a body of believers. We ought to manifest that. We are God’s family in this place. We’ve talked about that and stressed it. But we do have to deal with an unbelieving world around us. We are placed in this world at this time. It’s going to be a difficult place for believers. We ought to expect that but, we must be careful that we don’t become like them.

I think most of us have been taken aback to see something of the animosity and just basic hatred that goes on in the unbelieving world. We can’t be satisfied until we destroy those who disagree with us, and so on. We as believers need to be careful because that’s how the world treats others in the world. Now we’re in the world, but we’re not of the world. We mentioned in our earlier study today, our citizenship is in heaven, but we are to be good citizens while we’re in this world. But realize that there is a difference. We don’t belong here in the way that the unbeliever belongs. We don’t belong to the god of this world, who is the devil. The whole world lies in his power. He is the father of the unbeliever, but we have become children of the living God. He is our Father. There’s going to be conflict. Jesus said we shouldn’t be surprised if the world hates us. We want to be careful that that does not become a reason or an excuse for us to hate the world. It sends the response of responding like they do. They’re in payback. We see this in our political situation. If we get in power, we’ll pay back then you’ll get yours. If we’re not careful of that attitude, we think I deserve to be treated properly. I deserve, and we become experts in the Constitution of our country more than in the constitution for us as God’s people.

So this is what he’s dealing with, beginning in verse 17. It can become very personal and it does. It’s the responsibility of the church as the church because remember, it’s addressed to the church at Rome. But the church is comprised of individuals, and we function as we should as a church corporately when individually we function as we should. So the responsibility is placed on us here. He’ll talk about personal responsibilities here. We’ll get into governmental responsibilities when we come into chapter 13, which becomes also very pertinent for us in this day.

Verse 17 says, “Never pay back evil for evil to anyone.” It’s interesting, we mentioned before as in other languages, but in Greek, because of the form of words and so on, you don’t have to put them in an order like we do in English. So you can arrange the word order to put the emphasis where you want. What happens in verse 17, the first words that you have is “to anyone”. To anyone, never pay back evil for evil. That gives you the breadth of this. He puts the emphasis on there is never an excuse or a reason that is acceptable for God for me to pay back evil to someone who does evil to me. I think that emphasis is important because we think, well, I understand the general rule, but do you know what happened? Do you know what they did to me? Do you know how I was treated? Well, verse 17. Never to anyone, and the “to anyone” begins it. It’s never to anyone! That’s pretty inclusive. That could be a difficult world to live in, a world that was unfair, unjust. Paul was familiar with that. He’s experienced it. You read his testimony to the Corinthians; how many times he was beaten. Did Paul ever deserve that? Well, no. The mistreatment, the abuse… You never pay back evil for evil to anyone. This goes contrary to the fallen nature. We live in a get-even world, and if we’re honest, we look at what happens in the political situation, if I can use it, because I know everybody has it on their mind and you wonder what’s the outcome here. We see this as the battleground. You think you got me, but I’m really going to get you. Pretty soon, we as believers begin to think yeah, I have rights, and I’m not just going to let these unfairnesses go by. And if I get an opportunity, there will be a payback day. “Never pay back evil for evil to anyone.”

A couple of other passages. Come over to 1 Thessalonians 5. Look at verse 15. ”See that no one repays another with evil for evil.” No matter what they’ve done, that never justifies and excuses my treating them in a way that I think they deserve. I didn’t do anything to them they didn’t do to me. In fact, I didn’t do to them even as much as they did to me. Wait a minute. I have to back up. Am I a child of God or not?

Sometimes the problems come and most often they come for us as believers, when we just decide we have a reason not to do what’s biblical. This simplifies my life because I can sit and fuss and fume about what I think has been done and how I was treated unfairly. Somebody did something and has done damage. But wait a minute. Lord, that really that has nothing to do with what I do. I can’t control what they did. All I can do is control what I do. What is my response to be? I get so taken up with what they did and how serious what they did was, and how unfair what they did was, but wait a minute. I can’t do anything about them. I am responsible for me. What am I to do? “See that no one repays another with evil for evil, but always seek after that which is good for one another and for all people.” We have to be careful. This isn’t just limited to believers. I’m living in an unbelieving world, and that’s why Romans 12 was so broad, verse 17. “Not to anyone.” Never to anyone do I repay back evil for evil. So we’re not just talking among believers I understand we have certain ways to treat each other and in our family, but this includes the unbeliever. For one another and for all people.

Come over to 1 Peter 3. Just go on through Hebrews, James, and you come to 1 Peter. We’ll go to chapter 3 where Peter writes about some of the difficulties we have as believers. Verse 8, To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit. Sometimes I have to stop and think, is that really me? Now note verse 9, Not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing. For, “The one who desires life, to love and see good days, must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. He must turn away from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous…But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.” So, really, I am here as God’s representative, manifesting His character. What did I get from God? Mercy. Grace. Kindness. Did I deserve it? No. Well yeah, but I’ve changed. He changed me. In this world, we’re in I was going to say a difficult situation—a pressure situation. The world hates us. Jesus said that. Don’t be surprised if the world hates you. It hated Me before it hated you. That’s John 15, remember. So we expect that. But I don’t give back what the world gives to me. I give back what God has given me to the world. And that makes me different. In that sense, a believer is hard to offend because what? I’m ready to forgive. I should be, so the principle, and there are other verses, but I’ve selected these.

Come back to Romans 12. I want to be careful my feelings don’t overrule here. That’s why the word of God has to be the ultimate authority and judge in my life. I can feel justified. I can feel I am right to do this. But, my feelings can never overrule the word of God. When I’m in conflict with the word of God, I’m in trouble, no matter how I feel. I feel, yeah, I had a right. I have to come to the word of God and He tells me what my rights are, and I represent Him. It’s offensive to Him when I misrepresent Him. I think that I’ll treat the world like they treat me but He is a God of love and understanding. Now, I realize we don’t want to go farther than the Scripture does in this. Look at Romans 12:17. “Never pay back evil for evil for anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men.” The unbeliever looks at others in the world and you know, we’ll see what’s going on and the conflict which is so open. I used that because the conflicts in our own country right now are so open. You see the back and forth. We are to be careful in all that goes on we maintain conduct which is above reproach. Some of the rioting we have, people feel justified because other people were rioting. It seems that they get their way when they riot, so we riot and then we’ll get our way. One deserves another. We are to respect what is right in the sight of all men. Certain foundational truths. The unbelieving world, to a certain extent, recognizes those. They don’t have a clear perspective on it, but it’s nice to be forgiving, it’s good to overlook when you’ve been wronged.

Come back to Proverbs 3:1, “My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments; for length of days and years of life, and peace they will add to you.” And note this, “Do not let kindness and truth leave you.” Kindness and truth in all of my relationships. Verse 3, “Bind them around your neck, write them on the table of your heart.” They ought to be prominent in your life. It’s always before you. My first thought is, I want to function here with kindness. I want to function in accord with His word, His truth, it’s on my heart. Verse 4, “So you will find favor and good repute in the sight of God and man.” That’s what we’re doing. The unbeliever ought not to be able to find any real fault in us. What did Pilot have to say about Christ? I find no fault in Him. Now, He’s going to be unjustly treated as He is, but the testimony even of the judge from the world, ‘I can’t find any fault in Him’, will make up a case against Him. But we can’t do anything about that. I can’t do anything about the lies that may be told about me. Neither can you. If someone slanders you, you can’t do anything about that, except maintain a good reputation so that any accusations against you are false. Now, they may “win the day”, but there was no real truth in them. And that’s what we want to be concerned about.

We could have stopped in Daniel. Remember when they were accusing Daniel? He ended up in the lion’s den but they couldn’t find anything wrong with Daniel except that he prayed to the living God. Well, that’s a good testimony. He still ended up in the lion’s den because of false accusations. It was all constructed so that even the law went against him, of the time, but they were going to have to catch him. Well, if they’re going to say, well yeah, if we’re going to trap him, we’ll have to be on the basis of him having a life that adheres to the word of God.

We may someday be prosecuted. We were sued as a church and went to court. There may be a day when it’s offensive to society for us to talk about a man and a woman. God’s plan for marriage is between a male and a female. Some of those things we can’t change. We have to just say this is what the scripture says. But it can’t be that our conduct gets out of step from what it should be. It’s in accord with the word of God.

Matthew 5:16, “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” Now, that doesn’t mean that that is always going to happen. Jesus led a perfect life and He ended up crucified. Paul led a godly life and he ended up executed. That’s not a guarantee. We ought to stand out from the world. The world can look at that and would have expected them to respond differently, yet they responded so graciously, so kindly. It’s like they overlooked the offense. So, our conduct, even before the world is to be good conduct. Now, they may hate us for it. They did for Jesus, I’m a man who’s told you the truth. But if they hate the truth, they’ll hate you. Well, we except that, but we understand that.

Come over to 1 Corinthians 10:31, “Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” Now note this, verse 32, “Give no offense either to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God; just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, that they may be saved.” I’m not concerned in this world about getting my just due. Paul says, remember when he was in prison unjustly?

He wrote to the Philippian church and said, what? My imprisonment for the cause of Christ has given me opportunity for sharing the gospel, even with the household of Caesar. Don’t lose perspective. Paul could have been hammering away. He doesn’t mind saying, I’m a Roman citizen, I have rights but when those rights are abused and taken away, Paul doesn’t go to pieces. Now I’m on a crusade for the Roman constitution, so to speak, and I will get my rights. No, here I think I’m functioning consistently in accord with the word of God and consistent with the rules of our government are, as much as I can.

So, we please all men. Not that we’re men pleasers in the wrong sense, but in the right sense. No matter what they do to me, I want to do good to them. I want to bring something of God’s goodness to them, so they might see in me what they won’t see in a person who’s not a believer. You know, its easy to be caught up in the emotions of the time. We’re bombarded with the world’s way of thinking and pretty soon, we’re really agitated, worked up, and we’re really ready to go to battle. It’s sort of like what we saw recently at our capitol. What are people thinking? Would you think it’s a good thing to see a Christian involved in that kind of activity? Well, he’s defending the rights of the constitution! We say no, my goodness no. But some how people, and I’m not saying there were Christians there, but just an example. We want to be careful in our conduct personally. That all they can say is, yes and have to realize they didn’t treat us fairly. We did the best we could and were faithful, never seemed vengeful. We were always kind, no matter how people treated us.

That’s what’s to characterize us. We’re doing it for the glory of God. If I lose sight of that and think, my rights we do this stuff. All of us battle with it and when we’ve been treated unfairly and unjustly, or something goes on that really becomes personal we don’t like, we can begin to unravel. And it gets to us. We have to come back to, this is all about bringing glory to God. My life here is for that purpose, it will soon be past. It doesn’t matter, the injustices that may have been done to me. I want to please all men. My real goal, whatever goes on, I might have the most mean, unkind, unjust boss but, my concern is that he might come to know the Savior.

For the time I worked in the world. I had a Roman Catholic boss, and I had a Jewish boss. In the world’s perspective they were good men. They treated me right. Sometimes they did dishonest things. I had to be careful that I didn’t do dishonest things. Well, I can’t do that, that would not be honest. Part of what I did was to keep the books for that business. I never was an accountant, but my responsibility entailed being responsible for the books so I had to say I can’t do that. I had opportunity with both the Roman Catholic and the Jewish and we could sit down and talk. I would talk about what Christ has done. I didn’t want to lose sight of what I was about there. It’s the character of Christ seen to all men.

Come over to 2 Corinthians. I’m not using that as an example because I always do that, but it is what I always should do. 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul says in verse 4 at the end of the verse “we do not lose heart.” The battle is relentless, but we can’t give in. “We have renounced the things hidden because of shame but by the manifestation of truth,” that’s what our life is, to be a manifestation of God’s truth. It is seen everywhere in all we do. “Commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” And even though man is a fallen being and his conscience is defiled it is not completely destroyed. Part of what aggravates them is when they are exposed to your life of truth. It reveals something of what they are as something of the light of God’s word comes into their life. For some that further antagonizes them and makes them angry which can make your life more difficult because if you would act like them they would feel better about their conduct. We don’t want to come to that. We can’t come to that because we have renounced the things hidden because of shame. We don’t walk in craftiness or adulterate the word of God. Be careful. We don’t want to adulterate the word of God, mixing it so that we can justify ourselves. “By the manifestation of truth,” that ought to be what clear about our life. It’s a life of truth and truth means we reflect God’s character in kindness. We hate sin. We hate false doctrine. We are not going to oppose it in the way the world goes about it. We are going to oppose it with truth. We commit ourselves to every man’s conscience.

Over in chapter 8, verse 21, “For we have regard for what is honorable, not only in the sight of the Lord but in the sight of all men.” Here he is talking about how money was handled. We want to be careful with those things, honorable. We don’t want to say well my conscience is clear on it. That’s not good enough. I want to be careful that my conduct cannot be doubtful.

I remember the early days of the church. We always had great people to handle the matters, but I never wanted to sign checks. I was always afraid someday somebody may be going back through and look at an old check from years ago, see Gil’s name on it and say I wonder what he was writing that check for. You know, I want to be careful. Better I don’t have my name on the check. Oh, this looks like, yeah, he has his name on the check. Probably writes checks for some of his personal stuff and just puts it in. It’s good that I’m not there. I mentioned when I was responsible for some of the finances in business. At the time it was one of the largest food stores on the east coast, but I would be careful. How am I going to talk to my boss about the Lord and how the Lord changes a life if he finds out I’ve been pilfering from the cash register or something like that. I have to be careful that I do what’s honorable and I have to be careful of appearances. I have to think about that. Not only is my conscience clear but how will other people see this. To the best of my ability, I want to maintain clarity on that, and we do.

Come over to 1 Peter chapter 2. 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 12 “Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles.” Now he is writing to Jewish believers so as Peter, the apostle to the Jews, he writes about Gentiles as a synonym for unbelievers, those who would be most opposed to them, not only because they are Jews but because they are Jewish Christians now. “Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles so in the thing in which they slander you as evil doers they may because of your good deeds as they observe them glorify God in the day of visitation.” It may be at the coming judgment there will people who say I came to know the Lord, I observed their behavior and in the most difficult circumstances where I would have expected and would have thought they had the right to respond, they didn’t. That’s what we are concerned about. We want to keep our behavior excellent. It is a reflection on the God I serve, how I behave, how I act here. Look down in verse 15, “For such is the will of God, that by doing right you may silence the ignorance of foolish men. Act as free men, do not use your freedom as a covering for evil but as slaves of God. Honor all people, love the brother, fear God, honor the king.” And that’s where Paul’s going, when we get to chapter 12 [of Romans].

So in all of our behavior we are the best of citizens, the best of employees, best employers, the best that we can. We’re going to stumble, we are going to say things we shouldn’t, but we want to fix it right away. We don’t want that to become a pattern and a road we go down.

Down in chapter 3 while you are here, verse 16 then we have to move on. “Keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ, will be put to shame. For it is better if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong.” He doesn’t say you won’t suffer. Peter is writing, he’s going to be executed unjustly. The important thing is to maintain the testimony so that if the world was honest, they would say they or we didn’t deserve it. The kind of treatment and the example is Christ. He died for our sins once for all, the just for the unjust that He might bring us to God. So that’s the pattern.

While you are in Peter come back to chapter 2, verse 21, “You’ve been called for this purpose. Since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example.” We are not saved by following the example of Christ but we want the example of His character to be the example for our character. “He committed no sin nor was any deceit found in His mouth. While being reviled He did not revile in return. While suffering He suffered no threats but kept entrusting Himself to the one who judges righteously. He bore our sin.” He’s our example. I want to be like Him. So, with all the unfairness, the injustice we should be prepared for worse. As believers in the world in which we live we have a hard enough time even among ourselves, it seems like we have a hard time, and we do. But we want to grow through that. We ought to want to understand it.

I don’t want the offenses that may happen to become personal. I can’t control anybody else. Quite frankly some many times that people have come to me to complain, it’s about somebody else. They usually don’t come to complain about themselves because then I’m going to say, fix it! They come to complain about someone else. Then I have to say neither one of us can do anything about them. I find it helpful to keep it simple. Gil what is your responsibility? I have to catch myself, even in my perfected state, I have to stop and say wait Gil. What are you doing thinking about this? Why do you have those kinds of thoughts? Does it matter what they did? What’s that got to do with your response to what they did? How are you handling this?

We come to government doesn’t treat us fairly. How are we going to respond? I’m going to get out the Constitution and I’m going to show them. Well, I can claim the Constitution. They may tell me that doesn’t apply to your case, too bad. And I’ll say well I’ll tell them what I think about them! No. I’ll share with them what God’s done in my life. What did Paul take the time to do before Roman authorities? He shared the gospel with them. He didn’t try to point out how inconsistent they were even with the Roman law they were supposed to represent. We get caught up in things.

Come back to Romans chapter 12. We haven’t even gotten to the challenging passage. Maybe that’s the challenging passage. Look at verse 18, “If possible, as far as depends on you, be at peace with all men.” That’s all I can do. Again, if there’s going to be a conflict, Lord I don’t want it to be my fault. “As much as depends on me I want to be at peace with all men.” I’m not looking for trouble. Again, I want to be careful we don’t compromise truth for peace. We don’t fail to address sin in the name of peace. There is a time now it is offensive to tell people that God created man as male and female. I realize that is offensive. Even the terminology they are attempting to erase. Some things I can’t do anything about. “So as much as depends on me.” Remember I have truth bound around my neck and in my heart as well as kindness. I can’t sacrifice one for the other. I’m going to be kind, so I won’t bring up the truth. “But as much as depends on you be at peace with all men.” That’s my responsibility. Now if they don’t want peace with me I can’t change them. But if there’s a conflict here it’s not going to be because of me. It’s got to be because of them.

“Never take your own revenge, beloved, leave room for the wrath of God.” Now note this, “for it is written, vengeance is Mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” You see how serious this gets. I don’t want someone else’s sin to become an occasion for my sin against God. I took God’s place. I tried to usurp God’s authority. I wanted my vengeance. God says vengeance is Mine. “Never take your own revenge.” You know, if we really as Christians say we believe the word of God and if we took it at face value, never take your own revenge! You leave it. It doesn’t mean justice won’t be meted out. You know what the problem is. I don’t know that God will take care it. So the problem really becomes my relationship with God. I think it’s their problem. It’s really my problem. I’m offended. I’m upset. I’m not happy. We got some new little babies in our family and you know they will quickly let everyone know when they are unhappy. Sometimes we as believers are like that. I’m not happy. Then we become a little older we just pout. Wait a minute! You never take your own revenge, beloved. And Paul is saying this out of love. He understands it’s not easy. But it is not complicated. It’s not that boy, this is really hard to understand. It’s not necessarily easy to implement it in the situations that are most pressing. “Leave room for the wrath of God because vengeance is Mine. I will repay says the Lord.” I leave it all in God’s hands. It is up to Him.

The next verse goes with that. “If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink. For in doing so you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil. Overcome evil with what is good.” I think these verses all go together and they are somewhat parallel. Verse 19 “Leave room for the wrath of God.” Let God take care of it. Vengeance belongs to Him. He’s the judge. He metes out what needs to be done. So “if your enemy is hungry feed him. If he is thirsty give him a drink. In doing so you’ll heap burning coals on his head.” I take it that’s talking about judgment. It is a difficult passage. All the writers acknowledge that. Sometimes it’s been taken as shame and a number of years ago I thought that’s probably the best way. Then I tried to look more at Scripture and what it says. I think what he is talking about is that’s part of God’s judgment. He metes out the judgment. The thing that swings the case for me is when you talk about “burning coals” in the context of judgment it is always a metaphor that is of judgment. Leave God bring the judgment. Don’t you try to bring it. That’s what he’s talking about. “Vengeance is Mine. I will repay says the Lord.” So you do what you should do which is be kind, be generous, be thoughtful, no matter what they are doing to you as your enemy now. If your enemy, the person is doing what he can to destroy you, and you have opportunity to do something good for him, do it. God will take care of the vengeance side. That’s His! That’s what he’s talking about.

Come to several passages. 2 Samuel 22 and this is David. He’ll repeat the exact same thing in a Psalm so I’ll just mention the Psalm after we look at 2 Samuel 22, look at verse 9. You see here the anger of God. He started out, David speaking here, verse 2 the Lord is my rock, my fortress, my deliverer, God my rock, in Whom I take refuge, my shield, the horn of my salvation, my savior. You save me from violence and all. Then you come down to “he cried out to the Lord and then the Lord’s anger, the Lord brings judgment. Verse 8 the earth shook and quaked, the foundations of the heavens were trembling, were shaken because of His anger. Now note, smoke went out of His nostrils, fire from His mouth devoured, coals were kindled. So, you see that picture of coals here and the fire. It is a picture that God now bringing judgment, vengeance. That fits with “vengeance is Mine says the Lord.” So our responsibility, I want to keep a separation. I’ve had this discussion even with other pastors. We have to be careful we don’t cross the line and think it’s our responsibility to mete out the judgment that God has reserved for Himself. Sometimes in church discipline there’s been disagreement over this. I mete out the judgment that God says if people won’t repent. Well, what if they weren’t sincere? They weren’t genuine? Then God will have to take care of that otherwise I think I’ll step in and do what only God can do because I can’t see the heart. I just don’t think they were genuine; I’m not satisfied it was.

This becomes another way I’m going to go another step. We want to be careful in our life, so you see here coals were kindled. That seems to be fitting. It’s in the context of God’s judgment. Psalm 18, verse 8, you could go to there. Come down to verse 13, of still in 2 Samuel 22. “From the brightness before Him coals of fire were kindled. The Lord thundered from heaven. The Most High uttered His voice, He sent out arrows, lightning, His judgment came. So you see when you say you heap coals of fire on his head that’s what God’s going to rain down on him. Vengeance is Mine. I will repay says the Lord. So we do what’s right and if they haven’t come to bow before God He’ll deal the judgment on them. Vengeance, because ultimately the attacks on you as a child of God are attacks against God. You are the object of their hatred because you belong to God. They will hate you because I chose you out of the world Jesus said. So I don’t want to lose that perspective.

So as God’s representative I manifest His character now which is a time of God’s patience. These are days of God giving men opportunity for salvation, His kindness. You know I get frustrated. I’m ready for judgment to come sometime. Well God will decide the time. Right now, why is God delaying His judgment? He’s patient. He’s “not willing that any should perish but all should come to the knowledge of the truth.” If I’m not careful I find myself thinking I’m glad these people are going to find out what God is really like and what they really deserve. Wait a minute! Wait a minute! Wait a minute! Right now I ought to be concerned about time for them to come. The Lord is patient with them, but I can’t be? The Lord is kind toward them withholding and restraining His judgment. I can tell them about judgment to come but I have to leave it to God to bring that judgment. Right now, I want to manifest His kindness. I want to tell you about His grace. It’s true. There is an eternal hell. I don’t want you go to that hell. It doesn’t matter how they mistreated Paul. He’s in prison and he’s not there holding seminar’s on how unjust he’s been treated and how unfair the Roman system is. They don’t even function according to their own laws. He’s there telling people about Christ! Well God put me here so His purpose for me here is for this. When he is before Felix or another Roman authority, he’s there what? Telling them about Christ and coming judgment so that they would have the opportunity to believe. He’s before Herod, a godless man. He said Herod I know you know the scriptures. You know what I am saying is true. Let’s talk about what matters. If we get off track who is left to tell the world about the saving grace? Well, I’m caught up in the system. I’m ready to go to war over the injustices going on. Well, who’s going to bring grace, God’s patience and kindness? That’s what we’re reflective of.

So, these coals of fire. Judgment will come. Don’t get ahead of God. You figure well justice delayed is justice denied. You think that is true biblically? You think anyone is going to escape God’s righteous judgment? No. Well then you just think they deserve it now because you deserve it. I deserve it. Wrong.

Alright, you can go to Psalm 18 verse 8 and 12, they quote the two verses we just read in 2 Samuel 22. Come over to Job and then we have to wrap this up. I have half a dozen verses but you’ll have to leave it. Job chapter 41, verse 20 “Out of His nostrils” and here he is talking about God’s judgment, God’s justice. Verse 20 Out of His nostrils smoke goes forth as from a boiling pot and burning rushes. His breath kindles coals and a flame goes forth from His mouth.” So, you see this picture. Psalm 140 verse 10, Proverbs 6 verses 27 to 29, Ezekiel 24 [verse] 11.

So come back to Romans. Just to pull this together. So when he says “you’ll heap burning coals on his head” every time he rejects the gospel, rejects truth. Now for some, the Philippian jailer in Acts 16 he comes to salvation. What were Paul and Silas doing? Complaining about the injustice of their beating and the pain and now here they are confined in the stocks? They are singing praise to God. It gives opportunity then as God intervenes for them to share with the Philippian jailer.

You know we lose perspective if we let the world take over our thinking and it starts at home. It starts in the little things. The best preparation for me if persecution will break out against Christians in our country is to handle things as I should today. The best preparation, we saw this in Ecclesiastes, for tomorrow, is today. If I don’t deal with the little hurts, if I don’t deal with my feelings of injustice or dislike or unfairness or whatever I don’t like today I’m not prepared for what’s going to come for tomorrow. I’m losing ground. And the devil has a way of maneuvering us in what we think are the little things.

One more example, I was surprised at how many people were so surprised at what happened at our capital. I remember talking with Marilyn and saying, you know when they were burning buildings in cities in different places in the country, I said you know, when things get out of hand you can’t control it and it spreads. Well, where would it end up? Oh, that’s the worst thing that has ever happened. It didn’t deal with what it should deal with. That’s the way our sin is. We tolerate what we call the little sins. It’s a personal thing. It’s just one on one, that person I don’t like. Deal with it! If I don’t deal with that, I’m not prepared to deal with it as maybe the opposition gets larger and more intense. If we don’t raise our children so that they handle things as they should when they are young they get old and they’re still handling it like a two-year-old, throwing fits. I have a right not to be offended. And pretty soon we’re like this. I have a right not to be offended. I don’t like this. I don’t like the way this is worked out. Well, who cares? Are you a believer? Do you care what God thinks? Do you care what God wants? Then it comes down to me, it’s so personal. Gil then do it! I don’t want to. I don’t feel like it. I’m going to sit in the corner and pout and I’m going to let everybody know I am unhappy. Well then maybe I ought to stop and think. Gil are you really a child of God? Are you telling God you don’t care what He wants? You don’t care what He says? You’re going to do what you want. I’ve got a serious issue here. You have to resolve this before God. Really this doesn’t involve anybody else. This involves You and me. I have a problem. I don’t like what You’re doing. That may mean I’m not Your child and there’s good reason why I don’t like what You are doing. I don’t belong to You. I’m Your enemy or I am Your child that’s going through adolescence and I’m just fighting against You and I can’t do that. So, we have to resolve that.

The lovely thing about Scripture, you know what, it just gets back to as long as it is between God and me I can work it out with Him. If it’s between you and me and God I can’t do anything about you. As long as I think it’s your problem and I’m going to make it your problem things don’t get better. So, when I back up and say, well Lord the only person I can deal with is me. And if I’m not being what You say I should be it doesn’t have anything to do with anyone else. It’s not what they’re doing or not doing. It’s a matter of me responding to where You’ve put me, willing to be what You want me to be.

Alright, let’s have a word of prayer. Thank you, Lord for Your word. It is clear. Lord we want to be honest before You and You know our hearts. You know our thoughts. We struggle with a willingness to be and do what You want us to do in these difficult situations. Thank You for the clarity of Your word. Thank You for the provision of Your Spirit. Thank you, Lord, that by Your grace we can be everything that You say we should be if we willingly submit ourselves to You. May that be true. We pray in Christ’s name. Amen.

I just want to make some comments. We talked about resurrection and the resurrected body today. That opens a lot of questions, I have thoughts, everything can become a series of studies. While I was gone, I was working through some of this and had thought about doing a mini-series on it but I just want to make some comments about related matters to the resurrection body.

One of the issues is what about the time between our death and our resurrection. “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.” So, there will come a time, if Christ doesn’t come [first], when we will experience physical death. We will move out of our body and into the presence of the Lord. Come over to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. We’re not going to look at a lot of verses, but this is a foundational passage. In 2 Corinthians chapter 5, Paul seems to be dealing with the fact, a lot of his emphasis is we are looking for the coming of the Lord, but in this passage in 2 Corinthians he faces the reality that I may die. And that always was a reality to him but sometimes it comes to us more. If you go through a difficult illness or disease, you get old, you function and recognize these things more. You know, now at my advanced age, there’s more of a chance that I won’t get to the rapture. Sometimes in my prayers I wouldn’t say I remind the Lord, but I talk to the Lord about it. Lord, if I’m going to get to go in the rapture it’s going to have to be sooner than later. I prefer that. That’s what I’m really anticipating but obviously at my age I don’t have as much time for the rapture as someone who is twenty. They may have the next sixty years that the rapture could come in. Chances of me getting to be a hundred and forty are slim. So here Paul is talking about, verse 16 of chapter 4, “we do not lose heart though our outer man is decaying our inner man is being renewed day by day.” For momentary light affliction is producing for us and eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison.” That’s what we are talking about. Glory is our future.

Compared to eternal weight of glory the afflictions of this life are momentary and light. And I don’t want to make light of them. They can seem overwhelming, and almost are for us at times. But when you compare that to the eternal weight of glory they are nothing. The fact that Paul was so persecuted and ultimately executed. He’s had two thousand years of the glory of God’s presence and really he hasn’t even gotten started because he didn’t get his resurrection body yet, and he faces that reality. This is true for us because we look not at things which are seen but things which are not seen, verse 18, key verse. Once we stop walking by faith and walk by sight things unravel in our lives. We have to walk by faith. I believe what the word of God says. “The things which are seen are temporal. The things which are not seen are eternal. For we know if our earthly tent which our house is torn down,” He’s talking about our physical body. If it’s going back to dust, It’s pictured like a tent, a house we live in, a temporary structure. That’s why he calls it a tent. It is a temporary house. That’s what this physical body is in its present state. I can’t outlive it. It is a temporary house. Will I make two hundred? No. It’s temporary. We have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens and in as much as we have put it on we will not be found to be naked for indeed while we are in this tent we groan being burdened because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life. Now some have taken this passage to mean we get a temporary body so that when we die and our spirit leaves this body we get a temporary body. We don’t want to be unclothed so God gives us a temporary body until we get our physical body resurrected. I don’t think that’s what this passage is talking about. Paul is talking about my ultimate desire is not death when I leave this body. My ultimate desire is to be clothed with my glorified body. That’s why he is talking about the things which are not seen are eternal. It is characterized by glory. It’s the body God’s prepared for me which is like the body of Christ. Remember our citizenship is in heaven, Philippians 3 and when He comes He will transform this body into conformity with the body of His glory. Now in between we are disembodied spirits. Paul has been dead for two thousand years. His body has disintegrated, gone back to dust, but he is living in the presence of God as a spirit. Well, what is that? Well remember angels were created as spirit beings. They are ministering spirits. Hebrews chapter 2 tells us angels are ministering spirits. They never did have a physical body. They never will have a physical body but they can function as spirits. They have an identity. They are not just this cloudlike substance. In fact, and we don’t have time to go there, but back in Genesis chapter 18, you can go back there and read that. The first eight verses remember Abraham. Three men come to him and they are angelic creatures, one probably being the preincarnate Christ, the angel of Jehovah, the angel of the Lord. They come and we know that two of them are regular angels because they will go on to Sodom and Gomorrah to bring judgment. Rescue Lot and bring judgment. You know what they do? Abraham invites the three to sit down and have dinner. So, he goes out, picks out the best of the herd, gives it to Sarah who gives it to the servants. Marilyn still thinks our house ought to function like that, but it doesn’t. It stops with her. They prepare the meal. They have curds and milk and meat. They sit down and you know what it says? Those three men ate. You know what that means? Angels are spirit beings, and they can eat food too because they sat down and ate the meal and then went on their way. The third, who is the preincarnate Christ stays to have conversation with Abraham and reveals something of His deity in the power He has.

So, spirit beings are real beings. When they appear, I went through and we don’t have time to look at some of those, but when Gabriel appears for example, he appears as a man. Sometimes it says there was a man. Daniel says I saw a man standing there and he will later say it was Gabriel, the angel. Well, it wasn’t a physical man, but he is manifest. So, I take it when we get to heaven, if I would die tonight of a heart attack, my spirit, the body without the spirit is dead, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord, Paul goes on to that in chapter 5 of Corinthians here where we were. Therefore, being always of good courage, knowing while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord, we are of good courage and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.

But that’s not the final. I look forward to that, but my final goal is the redemption of the body. I take it in our spirit we will be identifiable. We will recognize each other even as spirit beings. We don’t lose our identity. We can be seen for who we are like Gabriel could be seen. He didn’t have to be seen but he could be, and he manifested himself. I take it when he is in the presence of God in heaven, the angels all appeared. They have their individual identity. So, I can’t say more than God says but I take it we have our full identity as persons. We are not clothed with this physical body, but we are conscious, aware, alive, function as we could function in the presence of God in glory. We will know our loved ones. That’s what glory will be. So, we have our identity. Just like you don’t have to have the body to have the identity, but as physical beings God created us to be embodied.

So, as we talked about this morning the body is permanent, but we can live outside the body. There’s been a couple of our believers who passed away just this week. They left their body. Their body is put in a grave. They are in the presence of the Lord fully alive and aware. The angels have all awareness. They are personal beings. Gabriel could say when the authority of when he said to Zacharias regarding the birth of John and Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist said how will I know these things are true, what does Gabriel say? I am Gabriel who stands in the presence of God. What do you mean how do you know what I say is true? I come from the very presence. He has identity and he’s not everywhere. He is a being. He is not bound by time as a spirit being.

So that’s something we have to look forward to. So I take it loved ones that have passed on, believers, they are enjoying great fellowship in heaven. We saw the martyrs pictured in the book of Revelation under the throne. They were asking God when will You avenge our blood? That will come God says in His time. It’s not yet time. Vengeance is Mine, I will repay. But they have an identity. They are who they are. One more example. This is Samuel and you can read about it in 1 Samuel 28. Remember Saul went to the witch of Endor and asked her to call up Samuel and Samuel does appear. Saul doesn’t see him, but the witch does. Samuel says why have you disturbed my rest? Now Saul can talk to Samuel. He has identity but his body hasn’t been resurrected. It is a unique case, but he still has his identity. The witch of Endor could describe Samuel. This is what he looks like because Saul couldn’t see him. Saul said, it’s Samuel! So even in his spirit condition he is identifiable. So I take it between all believers who have died, how many, that are in glory now, none of them have received glorified bodies except Christ. That goes all the way back to Adam, but they have an identity. Remember Abraham, God is the God of Abraham, and He’s not the God of the dead He’s the God of the living. Abraham’s alive today, not in his body but in his spirit. So, I can’t tell you much more about the spirit but it’s who we are within. This body is a cloak, but this body is eternal, but don’t make more of that than God does. What is special about it is He is going to re-create it, this body with glory. So just to fill in that gap since I’m like Paul, I’m getting closer to that point, I’m more interested in it. When my spirit leaves the body, I want to know. I’ll be in the presence of the Lord, I will, and I will be identifiable. I look forward to meeting my parents, others, that I will look forward to meeting Abraham and so on. You can look forward to that too but I’m hoping for the rapture. That’s the best because the last enemy is death, and it will be an enemy and it won’t be resolved until death is done away.

Let’s pray. Thank you, Lord for Your grace, the riches of Your word. I pray these truths will encourage our hearts, strengthen us. Lord I pray we will fix our minds on them, bind them around our neck, fill our heart with them. Lord may they guide our conduct, our thinking, and our behavior in the weeks before us. Use us to bring the gospel to those we come in contact with. May we show patience and kindness as a reflection of Your patience and kindness in these days of salvation, all that You might be honored. We pray in Christ’s name, amen.