Today we begin the New Testament, and we
will turn to Matthew's Gospel, Chapter 1.
And I would like to read from the
New American Standard Bible.
You may have noticed when I was going,
when we were studying the Minor Prophets, I
was using the New Living Translation, which is
a development from the Living Bible.
Well, because I have personally found it easier
to read those, some of those heavy Old
Testament prophecies for ease of reading in the
Living Bible.
But when it comes to studying doctrine or
studying the Word of God verse by verse
or word by word, we can't use the
Living Bible because that's only a paraphrase.
I prefer to use the New American Standard,
particularly when we come to the New Testament.
Now here we turn to the pages of
the New Testament, and the very first thing
that we read is the book of the
genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David,
the son of Abraham.
In the book of Genesis in the Old
Testament, there were genealogies given of various people.
And here also a genealogy is given.
It doesn't go all the way to Adam
like it does in Luke Chapter 3.
Here, it only goes as far as David
and Abraham.
And he's called the son of David and
the son of Abraham, which possibly indicates to
me that Matthew was primarily writing to the
Jewish people of that time, trying to convince
them that Jesus Christ was the Messiah.
And that's why you find in this Gospel
at least forty times where the Old Testament
is quoted to prove that Jesus is the
Messiah.
There are about fifty-three quotations actually from
the Old Testament in this book.
But there is a phrase that comes only
in this book in the Gospels, and that
is the phrase the Kingdom of Heaven.
It's referred to as the Kingdom of God
in the other Gospels, but the phrase the
Kingdom of Heaven comes thirty-two times in
this Gospel.
And I was thinking about that.
You see, when an expression is used frequently
in a letter or in a book, we
say there must be a reason.
The Holy Spirit inspired Scripture, and therefore there
must be a reason why he has used
that so often.
John the Baptist comes preaching saying, Repent, for
the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.
And then, after that, Jesus himself picks up
the same message in 417, Repent, for the
Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.
And even when he begins the Sermon on
the Mount, the first thing he says is,
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs
is the Kingdom of Heaven.
So we see that emphasis right from the
beginning.
And in the Sermon on the Mount itself,
Heaven is mentioned about eighteen times, just in
those three chapters, five to seven.
So what I understand from this is, the
entire Old Testament, right from the time of
God making a covenant with the Jews in
Mount Sinai, all the way up to this
time, was the Kingdom of Earth.
That means, you were given a land in
Canaan, you were given material prosperity, you were
given physical healing, many, many earthly benefits.
You had an earthly king, earthly riches, and
many things on earth.
But now, Jesus has come to lift us
to another realm.
And we must remember that as we turn
to the New Testament, that the Gospel is
the Gospel of the Kingdom of Heaven, as
opposed to the Kingdom of Earth.
So when you say you're saved, you know,
this is a very common expression among believers,
we're saved.
Saved from what?
I'd say, I hope you're saved from the
earth.
Not just saved from sin and saved from
hell, but saved from this earthly way of
looking at things, the earthly way of behaving,
earthly way of many things on this earth,
you know, interest in earthly things.
This is the Gospel of the Kingdom of
Heaven.
And Matthew is inviting those who are interested
in a Kingdom in Heaven.
Now, you see, there are a lot of
people in India who would like to become
citizens of the United States of America.
That's a very attractive place to go to.
But supposing I say, how many of you
are interested in going to Timbuktu or some
strange place in Africa?
Nobody's interested in that.
And it's somewhat like that, you know, hardly
anybody in this world is really interested in
the Kingdom of Heaven, because their mind is
so much set on the things of earth.
And when the Gospel is not preached properly,
you find a multitude of so-called believers
sitting in the church who are not interested
in the Kingdom of Heaven.
We have so many believers today who are
not interested in the Kingdom of Heaven.
They want to go to Heaven when they
die, but they don't want the Kingdom of
Heaven.
Now, Kingdom, unfortunately, is a word which we
don't understand today.
When this Gospel was written, everybody understood it.
For example, we don't say the Kingdom of
India.
We don't say the Kingdom of Sri Lanka
or the Kingdom.
Kingdom is used only where there is a
king.
Maybe the Kingdom of Bhutan, perhaps, there is
a king there, the Kingdom of Nepal.
But we don't say the Kingdom of India,
it's not a very common word today, because
there are not so many kings.
What we use today is the word the
Government of India, and that we can understand
a little better.
The Government of Heaven, that's what it means.
Otherwise, we get this phrase, Kingdom of Heaven
is a nice spiritual thing to talk about.
What does it actually mean?
It means the Government of Heaven in your
life.
You know, when you live in India, you
have to live under the rules of the
Government of India.
And if you come into the Government of
Heaven, you got to live under the rules
of the Government of Heaven.
Is that what you were saved to?
Have you changed your citizenship?
You know, when a person goes to another
country, he changes his citizenship, he becomes a
citizen of that country.
Do you know what salvation really means?
It means being saved from the Kingdom of
Earth to the Kingdom of Heaven.
And I'm sorry to say, the salvation of
many believers has not got that far.
They don't want citizenship.
They want to go there when they die,
and all the time they want to live
here on Earth.
And that is why their Christian life is
so unsatisfactory.
The other thing is, there is a word
used in Matthew, which is not used in
any of the other Gospels.
And that's the word, Church.
Twice, it comes in Matthew 16 and Matthew
18, Church.
Jesus spoke about the Church.
Now put these two things together.
The Kingdom of Heaven, not mentioned in any
other Gospel, Church, not mentioned in any other
Gospel.
Put them together, and you say, this is
what the Church is supposed to be.
The Church is supposed to be the Kingdom
of Heaven on Earth.
In Heaven, everybody knows the government of Heaven,
God's rule is known there.
But here on Earth, everybody runs their own
life.
And in the midst of people who run
their own life are a group of people
who say, no, we don't run our own
life.
We are citizens of another Kingdom, of another
country.
That is the Church.
Now do you think that the Church represents
Heaven in India?
I don't think so.
It's pathetic.
That's the thing that's grieved my heart for
years.
I hope it grieves your heart.
I'm not blaming them, I'm blaming us.
I'm not saying they, I'm saying we.
We, not they.
We are the Church, and we have failed
the Lord in this land.
I don't want to point the finger at
anybody else, I point it at myself as
part of this Church in India, which has
failed the Lord miserably in representing the government
of Heaven.
And I say, Lord, forgive us, help us
to represent Heaven better.
And Matthew, once you understand this background, is
presenting the ruler of this government of Heaven,
how he lived on earth, and how he
taught, particularly his teaching.
Matthew's emphasis is more on the teaching, there
are more parables of Jesus in this Gospel
than any of the other Gospels.
We have a whole chapter, Matthew 13, with
a number of parables about the Kingdom of
Heaven, his teaching that's emphasized in Matthew.
We have a whole chapter on the Pharisees
in Matthew 23.
We have two whole chapters, Matthew 24 and
25, on the coming, when the Kingdom of
God, the Kingdom of Heaven will be established
on the earth when Christ comes again.
We have three chapters, Matthew 5, 6, and
7, on the principles of this Kingdom of
Heaven, how the members of this Kingdom are
to live on this earth.
So it's very clear that this is Matthew's
burden as we consider this Gospel, and it's
good for us to keep that in mind.
And we find the book could be divided
into three parts, first chapters 1 and 2
about the birth of Jesus, and then from
chapter 3 to chapter 18 about his ministry
in Galilee, and chapter 19, verse 1 says
he moved from Galilee to Judea, and thereafter
the ministries in Judea.
And that's just by way of interest since
the scripture says that.
I just want to point out a few
things in these chapters as we go along.
First of all, in chapter 1, in the
genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Jews only mentioned
men, and they hardly ever mentioned a woman's
name in a genealogy.
You look back in the Old Testament genealogies,
it's always a man's name that comes there.
And significantly, when it comes to the genealogy
of Jesus Christ, there are four women mentioned
here, teaching us first of all that Jesus
had come to raise the level of women
from that degraded position that Jewish society had
given them, and that heathen society had given
them.
That's why you read about Mary Magdalene, you
read about Mary and Martha and the woman
caught in adultery, and the woman, the sinner
who anointed the feet of Jesus, and many
many prominent women.
And it says the people who supported Jesus
financially, Luke chapter 8, verse 3, were women.
So, here we see that four women are
mentioned in the genealogy, and significantly, not only
they are women, but they are some women
who got a very bad history.
The first one mentioned is Temar, in verse
3, to Judah were born Peres and Zerah
by Temar.
Temar was the one who was Judah's daughter
-in-law.
It was incest, incest means sex within a
family, like father and daughter or father and
daughter-in-law.
Here it is father and daughter-in-law,
incest.
And from that came a child.
And Jesus, he was in heaven when all
this happened, way back in Genesis chapter 38.
And Jesus watched it from heaven, and saw
this child being born out of incest, and
decided, I'm going to come through that line.
How many of you would choose such a
line to come through, so that in the
very first page of your biography, it is
written that you came from an incestual relationship.
Second, the second woman is Rehab, verse 5.
Rehab was the most well-known prostitute in
Jericho.
She was not even a Jew, she was
a heathen.
And she was a prostitute.
And she got married to a Jewish man
called Salmon.
And when Jesus saw that from heaven, that
Salmon, who had come through this Judah-Temah
relationship, decided to marry a prostitute, who was
not a Jew, a Gentile, and had a
child, Jesus said, I'm going to come through
that line.
Now notice, he's making specific choices from heaven,
because he's deciding which family line he must
come through.
Thirdly, there's a woman here called Ruth.
Now Ruth was a Moabitess, and she would
never have been born, listen to this, she
would never have been born, if Lot had
not committed adultery with his own daughter.
Lot committed adultery with his daughter and got
a child called Moab, and from that child
came Ruth, who was also a heathen, as
the Jews considered it, a Gentile.
And Jesus saw that from heaven, and saw
Lot committing adultery with his daughter, Moab being
born, and from there Ruth, Jesus said, I'll
come through that line.
Another incestual relationship.
Think of that.
Why are these three women's names mentioned here?
Why did Jesus choose such a line?
The fourth woman mentioned is Bathsheba, verse 6.
David was, Solomon was born through the wife
of Uriah, that is Bathsheba.
She's mentioned here as the wife of Uriah,
not as the wife of David.
He had a son through somebody else's wife,
that's what it says.
Now, even though Jesus did not physically come
through Solomon, Joseph came through Solomon, but Mary
did not come through Solomon.
This is the genealogy of Joseph.
Jesus' physical genealogy deviates from David through another
son and comes through Mary, that's described in
Luke chapter 3.
Here the genealogy comes through Solomon, and that
is descended to Joseph, who if there was
a king in Judah, in Israel those days,
Joseph deserved to be the king, because he
was of the royal line, and Joseph's firstborn
son, according to the records, though Jesus was
not born of Joseph, was Jesus.
So he deserved to be the king of
Israel, that's the point of this genealogy, that
he came from the royal line.
Why did Jesus choose this line?
To show that he did not come to
call the righteous, but he came to call
sinners to repentance.
And when you go and proclaim the gospel,
please proclaim it in this spirit, as one
who is born of a sinful fallen race,
who has nothing to glory in.
You don't have to be ashamed of your
family line.
We live in a country where people boast
about being related to such and such a
big family person, to related to such and
such a bishop, this, that and the other.
I say, what are we?
Jesus, what could he say about his family
line?
That's the very first thing mentioned in the
first pages of the New Testament, teaching us
to fall on our dust and humble ourselves
and get rid of all the glorying we
have in stupid earthly things.
And then we read about the birth of
Jesus and I notice here that a number
of times we read about dreams in the
first two chapters, dreams, God guiding supernaturally through
dreams.
First of all, Joseph, it says here that
Mary, the mother of Jesus, verse 18, was
found to be with child by the Holy
Spirit and she was already engaged to Jesus,
to Joseph.
And when Joseph heard about it, verse 19,
it says, being a righteous man and not
wanting to disgrace her, he wanted to put
her away secretly.
Now notice one very important thing.
What is the subject of the gospel?
The subject of the gospel is how an
unrighteous man can become righteous before God.
That is the basic subject of the gospel.
We are sinners and how we can become
righteous before God.
Then think of the first person in the
New Testament who is called a righteous man.
Who is that?
Joseph, right here, verse 19.
Why is he called a righteous man?
Because he wanted to cover the sin of
somebody else.
Do you have that spirit?
Then you are a righteous man.
When you hear that somebody has sinned, what
is your immediate reaction?
If you are a righteous man, you will
cover it.
If you are an unrighteous man, you will
talk about it.
And I want to say to you, Joseph,
who did not know about Calvary, who did
not have the New Testament, who did not
have the Holy Spirit, is far more righteous
than millions of believers today who talk about
the New Covenant.
I would rather follow Joseph than the example
of millions of believers today.
Joseph was a righteous man with the old
covenant standards.
He decided to cover the sin, which he
thought, Mary, he thought it was sinful.
Later on, he discovered that she had not
sinned at all.
Can you imagine what remorse he would have
had if he had spread stories about Mary
and later on discovered that this was the
Holy Spirit?
And how can you pull back those stories?
When you tell a story to somebody, he
has already told it to 10 people before
you meet him tomorrow.
And you have told a story to somebody
else and that fellow has gone and told
another five people.
How can you pull it all back?
Once you have spoken something about somebody, you
can feel sorry, but you can never set
it right, because it has gone to 25
other people before you decide to set it
right.
A little exhortation from the very first chapter
of Matthew.
When you see somebody's sin, cover it.
It's in the very first page of the
New Testament, which we profess to follow.
You want to be a new covenant believer,
a new covenant church, do this.
And then Joseph did what the angel told
him to marry and we read Jesus is
called Jesus because he has come to save
his people from their sins.
Verse 21.
The very first promise in the New Testament
is not about forgiveness from sin, but about
being saved from sin, which is more than
forgiveness.
Forgiveness is that your past guilt is blotted
out.
Saving means I'm saved from my anger, saved
from the lust of my eyes, saved from
the love of money, saved from bitterness, saved
from jealousy, saved from Egypt means what?
Out of Egypt.
That's what it means to be saved from
Egypt.
To be saved from sin means I'm no
longer a slave to sin.
And that is the first promise in the
New Testament.
Verse Matthew 121.
You shall call his name Jesus because he
shall save his people from their sins.
The second promise in the New Testament is
Matthew 311.
He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit
and fire.
There are two promises with which the Gospel
of Matthew begins the New Testament.
Number one, being saved from sin.
Number two, being baptized or immersed with the
Holy Spirit and fire.
We need both of these desperately.
If you are a new covenant believer, you
have to be saved from sin in your
life.
You have to be baptized with the Holy
Spirit and fire.
That's the New Covenant.
That's how it begins.
In chapter two, we read about the wise
men who came to meet Jesus.
You know the story, but it says there
was one foolish thing they did.
They were supposed to be wise, but even
wise people can do foolish things sometimes.
You know, and there's a warning for us.
It says that they followed the star for
many hundreds of miles.
I don't know whether they came from Iran
or somewhere there.
They followed the star and the star is
a picture of the word of God.
And that word of God would have led
them to Christ.
The word of God always leads you to
Jesus.
You just got to follow it.
They followed the star and then they know
the star.
They knew the king of the Jews is
born.
And they followed the star and they came
to Jerusalem.
Where a king's palace was there.
And then these wise men became foolish.
They said, oh, and now we've come to
Jerusalem.
We don't need the star anymore.
We know where the king's palace is.
Naturally, the king will be born in a
palace.
And that's where they were stupid.
And they went to the king's palace to
find if the king was born there.
And they said, we never heard about any
king here being born.
So those wise men had to humble themselves.
And it says they came out from the
king's palace.
And verse 10, again, they saw the star
and decided to follow the star.
And the star led them to a small
little hut.
And they went inside and the king was
there.
You know, if you follow the word of
God.
It will lead you to Jesus.
And it will lead you to where Jesus
is found today.
And Jesus is not found in the big
grand buildings among the rich.
Jesus is found among simple poor people who
love him and want to follow him.
They may be meeting in a little hut.
Follow the star.
Don't be foolish like the wise men where
at a certain point you say, well, now
I don't need to follow the word of
God.
I can use my reason.
You will go wrong.
Follow the star till it leads you to
Jesus.
And then the angel gave them a dream
saying, don't go back the same way.
Go another way.
And we read about other dreams which Joseph
had to save the life of the child,
to go to Egypt, come back, etc.
And then we come to the ministry of
John the Baptist.
Now, this word Baptist, it's a new word,
you know, which is invented by the translators
of the King James Version and brought into
the English language.
Because I understand that when the King James
translation was being made 400 years ago, the
king gave certain rules to the translators.
And one of the rules he gave them
was don't disturb existing church traditions.
And those days, you know, in the churches,
like in Anglican churches today, they were baptizing
babies, christening them.
Well, there was no name.
They were just christening them.
And these people, when they translated the scripture,
they came across this Greek word baptizo or
bapto, which in ordinary Greek language means immerse.
That's the translation.
But they didn't translate it because that would
have disturbed existing church traditions.
At the same time, they were honest people.
They could not say John the christener because
he was not a christener.
He wasn't christening anybody.
They wanted to be honest.
At the same time, they didn't want to
displease the king.
So they invented a word into the English
language, which nobody knew the meaning of.
Baptism.
It's like a strange word, you know, like
the English people, when they came here, they
took certain words back from here, like doby,
doby, d-h-o-b-i.
It's not an English word, doby, sahib, s
-a-h-i-b.
The words, they came here and took it
back and gradually it required a meaning like
that.
The Greek word was baptism.
So when the common people read the Bible,
they read baptism.
What is that?
I've never read that word before in English.
They look up the dictionary, no such word.
Oh, this must be what they do in
the church when they pour the water on
the child.
And so that's how child baptism came up
for your information.
John the Baptist is actually translated.
It should be translated John the Immerser.
I have never found a single translation in
the world that has had the courage to
translate that Greek word exactly like it is
written.
Because nobody will buy that Bible.
I mean, not nobody.
All the denominations that practice child baptism will
not buy it.
But I have to tell you the truth.
You go and ask the Greek scholars what
baptizo means, what bapto means and see if
it doesn't mean dip, immerse.
There's no other meaning.
It's not sprinkle.
I mentioned that in passing.
And we read here about Jesus coming to
John for baptism.
And when Jesus came, John said, hey, I
can't baptize you.
You need to baptize me.
It's true.
Jesus did not need baptism because it was
a baptism of repentance from sin.
And here's another wonderful thing we learn at
the beginning of Matthew's gospel.
Look at the wonderful lessons we've been learning
so far, just in these few chapters, certain
principles of the new covenant and of this
kingdom of heaven.
Think of Jesus baptism.
Why did he have to get baptized?
He had never sinned in his whole life,
not consciously, not unconsciously, not anyway.
There was no sin in him from head
to foot.
He was born holy.
And all through his life, he was holy.
The angel said to Mary, that holy thing
that shall be born of thee shall be
called the son of God.
He was a spotless lamb without any smell
or trace of sin.
He did not have a sinful nature like
we have.
Why did he stand in the queue?
You see, there was a big queue of
people getting baptized.
And Jesus, who looked just like any other
carpenter, Jewish carpenter, dressed like all the others,
goes and stands in the queue.
They don't know who he is.
Some of the people from Nazareth would have
said, yeah, that's a carpenter, Joseph's son.
And he goes in the queue.
And can you imagine what the reasonings that
would have come into his mind?
People will misunderstand you if you stand in
the queue.
People will think that you have committed some
secret sin in your life.
That is why you're confessing it now.
You can be misunderstood.
Your testimony will be affected.
But none of these things bothered him.
His father had told him, go and be
baptized.
He did not lean upon his own reason.
That's what I wanted to emphasize.
If he had leaned upon his own reason,
he would never have been baptized.
If he had consulted you and me, I
think we would have told him, Lord, you
don't need to get baptized.
You don't need to get baptized at all.
This is for sinners.
But his father said, go and identify yourself
with sinners.
Even though you're not a sinner, go and
identify yourself and stand there.
You know, some of us are so holy
that we don't like to be identified with
sinners.
We like to show that we are a
little holy.
And that's why our ministry is so pathetically
useless, that God cannot accomplish what he wants
through us.
Jesus identified himself with sinners totally, though there
was not a spot of sin in him.
We who are so holy think that we
are better than that group and better than
this group and better than this other group.
And the more holier than others you think
you are, the less useful your life is.
Let's humble ourselves and say we are sinners,
saved by the grace of God.
We're not better than anybody else.
We're not better than any other Christian.
And our group is not better than any
other group.
God have mercy upon us if we think
otherwise.
And we see here, he told John, you
have to baptize me because that's the only
way I can fulfill all righteousness.
What did righteousness mean for Jesus?
It meant doing the will of his father.
And he did it.
In Matthew chapter 4, we read about the
temptation in the wilderness, the three temptations.
And since they are going to come again
in other Gospels, I'll leave them for the
time being.
We go to chapter 5, chapter 6 and
7, where we read about the Sermon on
the Mount.
And this begins with this expression in Matthew
5, 3, blessed are the poor in spirit.
And I want to emphasize that, that the
fundamental quality for entering God's kingdom is poverty
of spirit.
Poverty of spirit is like a master key
with which you can open every door in
this palace called the kingdom of heaven.
All the riches of heaven can be yours
if you have this master key called poverty
of spirit.
What does it mean to be poor in
spirit?
Let us consider what it does it mean
to be poor in money, then we'll understand.
Let's take the example of a man who
is poor financially.
A beggar.
A beggar who comes banging at your gate
in the morning and maybe you give him
one rupee or something like that.
He comes again tomorrow morning.
He'll come again day after tomorrow morning.
He's always in need.
I've seen beggars in Bangalore whom I saw
25 years ago begging on the streets.
They're still begging on the streets today.
They are poor.
They're always aware of their need and they
are humble enough to come to a gate
and say, yes, I've been coming for 25
years.
Please give me something.
I still need money.
Now apply that spiritually.
This is what it means to be poor
in spirit.
To go to God and say, Lord, I'm
a needy person spiritually.
I don't have need of money.
I've got plenty of that.
I don't have need of health.
I've got plenty of that.
But spiritually, Lord, I'm in need.
If you don't give me, I'll have nothing.
That beggar would starve if he doesn't get
money.
Lord, I'll starve.
And Lord, tomorrow you'll find me at your
gate again.
25 years from now, you'll still find me
at your gate.
40 years from now, you'll find me at
your gate.
I'm poor.
You know what Jesus said about such people?
The entire kingdom of heaven belongs to such
people.
Do you want to possess the kingdom of
heaven?
Keep this attitude all your life.
One day when God uses you mightily, my
brothers and sisters, uses you to bring many
people to Christ, and uses you to build
churches, don't forget to be this beggar who
goes to God and says, Lord, I'm poor.
Please give me.
Please teach me.
Please give me your spirit.
Please give me power.
Please give me love for these unlovely people.
And please give me purity, Lord.
My heart is so filthy.
It's the beggar who becomes holy.
It's the beggar, the spiritual beggar, who gets
the best from heaven.
But you've got to be humble to be
a beggar.
How many of you would like to go
to somebody's house and knock and say, please
give me some money?
That's pretty humiliating.
We don't like to do that even before
God.
But that's the only position in which you
can get all the riches of heaven.
And I want to be in that place
till the end of my life.
I don't want any other place.
I know that God has made me tremendously
rich and he's got more to give me
if he gives me grace to remain in
that place forever.
And I want to encourage you to be
there forever.
There are many other things like this.
You could read there about mourning and being
pure in heart.
Let me just mention one thing.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they
shall see God.
Verse 8.
I read it like this.
That when your heart is pure, everywhere you
look, you will see God.
You will see God in your circumstances.
You will see God in the people who
help you.
You will see God in the people who
harm you.
God in the shimmy eyes who curse you,
like David saw.
You'll see God everywhere because your heart is
pure.
When your heart is not pure, what do
you see?
Oh, that brother who's troubling me, that difficult
wife, that difficult neighbor.
You'll have a lot of problems when your
heart is not pure.
Blessed are the pure in heart, they will
only see God.
Now a pure heart is different from a
clean heart.
A clean heart is just a good conscience
that I've not sinned in any way.
A pure heart is a heart which has
got no place in it for anyone other
than God.
You know a man can have a good
conscience and still have other interests in his
life other than God.
There are lots of people like that.
They don't sin in any obvious way.
Their conscience is clear, but their ambition is
on this earth.
But a man who's got a pure heart,
his ambition is not on this earth.
His whole heart belongs to God.
It's total purity.
That's a pure heart.
Okay.
Chapter 6.
He speaks about practicing our righteousness and our
fasting and our praying before God alone.
You know, I've met a lot of people
in my life who speak about fasting.
And let me tell you my observation in
the people I've met.
Almost all the people who fast tell other
people about it.
Do you know that Jesus gave only one
command about fasting?
Only one.
And that was, when you fast, don't tell
anybody.
And that's the one command they disobey.
How many commands did God give Adam?
One.
He disobeyed that.
How many commands has God given children?
One.
Obey your parents.
What do they disobey?
That one.
How many commands has God given to those
who fast?
Only one.
Don't tell anybody.
That's the one they disobey.
See, man's like that.
So let us raise up another generation of
people here who will obey that one command
on fasting, at least from today.
Okay.
And not only in fasting, but in praying
and in giving.
Don't tell anyone.
Don't let anybody know about it.
But there's such a lust.
I must get some honor from somebody who
should know that I have fasted, that I
have prayed, that I gave so much money
for God's work.
And the Lord says, you lose your reward.
You'll have nothing left in heaven.
You lose your anointing here on this earth
as well.
And it's happened to lots of people.
Okay.
There are many other wonderful things.
We could spend hours and hours on the
Sermon on the Mount alone.
But we don't have time.
I want to encourage you to read Matthew
5, 6 and 7.
He speaks there about a number of subjects
about, and the main subjects are related to
the inner life, the life of the righteousness
of the Pharisees, Matthew 5 and verse 20
was on the outside.
And when he says your righteousness must be
more than that, what he's saying is your
holiness must be inside.
That's what he meant.
Not more in terms of quantity, but more
in terms of quality.
The quality of our righteousness must be fundamentally
different.
The Pharisees had an earthly righteousness, but we
are talking here of the kingdom of heaven.
And in heaven, the important thing is the
inner life.
It must flow from within.
Your adultery must, freedom from adultery must not
just be outside, within.
Freedom from hatred, murder must be within, that
you don't even get angry.
Everything must be within.
So the kingdom of heaven is within you.
It's inside that it begins.
Chapter 7, Jesus spoke about false prophets.
And I just want to say a word
here about false prophets, because it's very important
to understand this in our day and age.
Verse 15, beware of false prophets, Matthew 7,
15, because they will come in sheep's clothing.
That means the correct doctrine.
Sheep's clothing means correct evangelical doctrine.
But inside, they are wolves.
What do wolves do?
Wolves are interested in eating up what the
sheep have or the sheep themselves.
And when a man is interested in exploiting
other believers for his own gain, he's a
wolf.
If he wants to exploit you to make
money for himself, he wants to exploit his
Christian faith to make money for himself.
He's a wolf.
But that wolf may be clothed in absolutely
perfect evangelical fundamental doctrine.
That's the sheep's clothing.
And that's where you get deceived.
If you listen to the doctrine, you'll think
he's a sheep, but he's actually a wolf,
because he is trying to exploit you financially
or in some other way.
His Christianity is one where he's trying to
make gain for himself, a name for himself,
some honor for himself.
That's a wolf.
So, but very often today, the understanding of
a false prophet is his doctrine is wrong.
I tell you this.
Listen to me.
If you go only by wrong doctrine, I
tell you, you'll be deceived thoroughly.
Look at character.
Jesus said, how do you discern false prophets?
Verse 16, not by their doctrine, not even
by their ministry, but by their fruits.
You shall know them.
Matthew 7, verse 16.
It is not by their gifts, but by
their fruits.
Look at their character.
Have they got humility?
How do I identify a false prophet?
Not by his doctrine, not by whether he's
got supernatural gifts, but does he have the
spirit of Christ?
Is he a humble brother?
Is he free from the love of money?
Does he emphasize purity of character?
Is there purity in his relationship with the
opposite sex?
These are the things by which I identify
a false prophet and God has protected me
for 40 years.
You go by doctrine, you'll be led astray.
I'll tell you that.
And yet that is the only test by
which people assess false prophets today.
And that's why Christendom is in its pathetic
carnal condition.
Even though Jesus said you will not be
able to discern them by their doctrine or
their gifts, but by their fruits.
Now I'll come to gifts.
Here are the gifts.
In verse 22, you read about people who
had gifts.
He talks about the fruit of the spirit
and the gift of the spirit in the
Sermon on the Mount.
First gift is prophecy.
It's one of the fruits of the spirit.
Lord, Matthew 7, 22, we prophesied in your
name.
We cast out demons in your name.
We did miracles in your name.
We had all these gifts of the spirit.
And the Lord says, depart from me because
you lived in sin.
They had the gifts of the spirit and
they went to hell.
They preached to others.
They healed others.
They cast out demons and the preachers went
to hell.
Now, how many of you believe that when
you see a healing campaign, a man casting
out demons, prophesying and doing miracles, that it's
possible that that man may finally go to
hell?
I don't think any of you believe that.
Do you?
I hope you do.
I believe it with all my heart that
man may go to hell.
I don't know.
I want to see his fruit.
I'm not interested in his prophecy and his
casting out demons and his miracles because Jesus
said here, verse 22, many, not one or
two, many, many people who cast out demons
and who heal the sick and who prophesy
in my name.
I like to send them to hell because
there's sin in their private life, which you
people don't know when he stands on the
platform with a spotlight on him.
He who has a year to hear, let
him hear.
I preach this for so many years, but
I still find very, very few people who
believe it because our nature is such we'd
rather believe ourselves than what Jesus says.
I want to raise my hand to heaven
and say, I believe what Jesus says.
I don't believe myself and I don't believe
what you say either.
Let God be true and every man a
liar.
There are many, many people who are going
to come to the Lord in the final
day and say, all these gifts I had
and they go to hell.
Why?
Because they don't have character.
Now reverse it.
Do you think there'll be people who come
to the Lord in the final day and
say, Lord, by your grace, my sins are
forgiven.
And by your grace, I lived an overcoming
life, but I never prophesied.
I never healed the sick and I never
cast out demons.
Will the Lord say to him, go to
hell.
You who never healed the sick and you
never cast out demons.
It won't work like that.
The opposite is not true.
You can have fruit and no gifts and
enter God's kingdom and you can have gifts
without fruit and go to hell.
That's what God says.
Depart from me.
I never knew you.
Is it possible that people who are casting
out demons in Jesus name doing miracles in
Jesus name prophesying today's multitudes of prophets prophesying
in Jesus name that one day Jesus will
say to them, I never knew you.
These are the false prophets who got gifts,
but no character.
No humility.
They love money.
How can such a man be a disciple
of Jesus who loves money?
That itself should open your eyes.
Please, we live in a day of tremendous
deception.
Be alert.
Chapter eight.
We read about the miracles that Jesus did.
He not only spoke.
He cared for people.
He cared for lepers.
When a leper came to him and asked
for healing, he healed him.
When a centurion came and asked for healing
for his servant, he healed long distance.
The centurion was such a humble man.
And he said, Lord, I'm not worthy that
you come under my roof.
Just speak the word and it'll be done.
And when Jesus heard it, he said in
verse 10, I have not found such great
faith.
Matthew 8 10 with anyone in Israel.
Now I learned something from there about the
character of Jesus and the kingdom of heaven.
Do you know what that is?
A habit that all of us Indians need
to learn.
You know what that habit is?
Publicly appreciating people.
We are so reluctant to publicly appreciate a
person.
Oh, he'll become spiritually proud.
I don't want to tell him anything.
You are more foolish than Jesus.
I mean, you're foolish.
Jesus was not.
Jesus was wise.
You are foolish and he was wise.
He was not afraid to praise a Roman
centurion.
I have never found such faith in all
of Israel.
Do you think that Roman centurion ever forgot
that sentence for the rest of his life?
He was so encouraged that he must have
been such a wholehearted disciple.
Sometimes you are a godly man.
You give one word of encouragement to a
younger brother.
That may be the thing that sends him
full steam ahead to follow Jesus for the
rest of his life.
Why don't you give that word of encouragement?
Because you foolishly think, oh, he may become
proud.
Jesus didn't think like that.
He could publicly praise Peter.
Blessed are you, Simon Barjona.
My father in heaven has revealed this to
you.
He looked at Nathanael and said, there is
a man in whom there is no guile.
Jesus was lavish with his appreciation of people
who were not perfect.
You think that Roman centurion was perfect?
You think Nathanael was perfect?
You think Peter was perfect?
It's so many faults in them, but he
appreciated them.
We cannot even appreciate godly people.
We cannot even praise godly people.
That is the pathetic nature we have as
Indians particularly.
I've seen it in Indian society.
We are so reluctant to appreciate.
And even people who say they are born
again, new covenant and every fantastic word they
use, but they haven't learned this habit of
Jesus Christ.
To appreciate where you see something good in
someone.
That's what I see here.
And I'm greatly challenged by it.
And I want to do it much more
than I've done it in the past.
And we read about a number of healings
here.
And I want to move on to chapter
nine, where we read of this blind man,
two blind men who came to Jesus in
order to follow him.
In order to be healed rather, Matthew 9,
27.
And Jesus said to them, do you believe
that I'm able to do this for you?
Verse 28.
Before Jesus did a miracle for them, he
asked them a question.
Do you believe that I'm able to do
this for you?
And they said, yes, Lord.
And their eyes were opened.
Jesus said, according to your faith, be it
unto you.
Verse 29, which is a principle.
Now I want to ask you some questions.
Did they want their eyes to be opened?
Yes.
Did Jesus want to heal them?
Yes.
But still, their eyes would not have been
opened if they did not have faith.
Now apply that to yourself.
Do you want something from God?
Yes.
Does God want to give that to you?
Yes.
But you still may not get it if
you don't have faith.
Supposing one blind man had said, well, Lord,
I'm not very sure whether you can, you
know, I'm not so sure.
But perhaps you can open one eye.
The Lord would have said to him, according
to your faith, be it unto you.
And he would have come out with one
eye open.
Praise God.
He would have said, my eyes open.
And the other fellow goes in and he
says, Lord, I believe you can open both
my eyes.
And he comes out and has both eyes
open.
And so that one eyed man starts the
one eyed denomination.
And this two eyed man starts the two
eyed denomination.
This fellow says, Jesus can only forgive sins.
This fellow says, Jesus can forgive sin and
give victory over sin also.
And this fellow will call the other fellow
a heretic saying, no, no, that cannot be
possible.
Because in my case, he opened only one
eye.
Brother, that's because you had faith only for
one eye.
That's why he opened only one eye of
yours.
Don't get upset with this other man.
He had faith for both eyes and he
not only got forgiveness, he got victory too.
It applies to us today.
Which denomination do you belong to?
The answer is, according to your faith, be
it unto you.
You believe Jesus can only forgive your sin.
But he leave you defeated by your anger
and your lust and your pride and your
jealousy.
According to your faith, be it unto you
all your life.
You'll be defeated by your anger and your
jealousy and your lust and your everything.
But your sins will be forgiven.
Another fellow sitting here says, no, Romans 6,
14 says, no sin will have dominion over
me.
He gets both eyes open.
Don't get upset with him.
He's not a heretic.
He's got something more than you, but not
because he's better than you.
Because he trusted the promise of Jesus Christ.
Matthew chapter 10, we read about Jesus calling
his 12 disciples and giving them authority for
their ministry.
And then he told them, it's not only
authority that you're going to have in this
ministry.
I believe you need authority.
You and I need authority in the service
of the Lord.
But more than that, along with that authority
comes persecution.
I send you as sheep, verse 16, Matthew
10, 16, in the midst of wolves, be
shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves.
If there is one word we need to
remember in India today, it's that word.
God sends us as sheep in the midst
of wolves.
Don't be foolish.
Don't be stupid.
When you go to places where heathen people
are in control, don't say foolish things, which
will unnecessarily provoke them.
Be wise in how you present the gospel.
Think, don't think zeal means you go around
denouncing all the idols and all the goddesses
and gods.
That's foolishness.
Be wise as serpents, harmless as doves.
Present Jesus Christ without denouncing their religions and
their idols and their gods.
Present Jesus.
Lift up, show them that they are sinners
and that Jesus is a savior.
Be wise as serpents.
Be wise in your handling of money.
Be wise in, oh, I believe one of
the greatest needs among Christian workers today in
India is being wise as serpents.
Don't unnecessarily reveal a lot of information to
people when there's no need to reveal it.
Be wise as serpents.
Don't unnecessarily make enemies of people if there's
no need to make enemies of them.
Be harmless as doves.
Don't harm anybody.
And one last thing before we close.
Your enemies will be members of your own
household.
Verse 36.
When we follow the Lord, we are going
to have misunderstanding from our own relatives.
A prophet is never accepted in his own
country or among his own people.
He is never accepted among his own relatives.
And the Lord said, if you love father
or mother more than me, you can never
be worthy of me.
Verse 37.
So let's learn to recognize that we are
going to find it difficult from our own
relatives.
And in the days to come, we are
going to find it difficult in the world
outside.
But if I'm willing to lose my life
for Jesus' sake, verse 39, I will find
it.
And one last word.
You know, if you receive a disciple, verse
42, in the name of a disciple and
give him a cup of water, you will
not lose your reward.
Even if you give a cup of water
to a brother or sister, Jesus will take
note of it.
Let us serve one another in every way
we can.
This is the kingdom of heaven on earth.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, we thank you that you sent
Jesus to this earth to establish the kingdom
of heaven on earth.
And you've done it in the church.
Help us to understand your word that we
can build that kingdom in our life around
us.
We are weak, but thou art strong.
Make us wise to build your church in
this land.
In Jesus' name, Amen.