you you Today, which is found in the entire chapter of Zechariah chapter four. So let's consider together Zechariah chapter four, verses one through 13. Listen carefully, for this is the word of the living God. And the angel who talked with me came again and woke me like a man who is awakened out of his sleep. And he said to me, what do you see? I said, I see and behold a lampstand all of gold with a bowl on the top of it and seven lamps on it with seven lips on each of the lamps that are on top of it. And there are two olive trees by it, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left. And I said to the angel who talked with me, what are these my Lord? Then the angel who talked with me answered and said to me, do you not know what these are? I said, no, my Lord. Then he said to me, this is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. Who are you, O great mountain, before Zerubbabel? You shall become a plain, and he shall bring forward the top stone amid shouts of grace, grace to it. Then the word of the Lord came to me saying, the hands of the Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house. His hands shall also complete it. Then you will know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice and shall see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. These seven are the eyes of the Lord which reigns through the whole earth. Then I said to him, what are these two olive trees on the right and on the left of the lampstand? And a second time I answered and said to him, what are these two branches of the olive trees which are beside the two golden pipes from which the golden oil is poured out? He said to me, do you not know what these are? I said, no, my Lord. Then he said, these are the two anointed ones who stand by the Lord of the whole earth. Thus far the reading of God's word, the grass withers and the flower falls, but the word of our Lord stands forever and we are grateful for it. Would you bow your heads with me as we ask the Lord for help this morning in the ministry of the word. Father God, we are grateful for this vision. And we pray, Father, that through the ministry of the Word as it is conjoined with your Spirit, whom we pray, you would send from heaven, you would help us to understand its meaning, you would help us to understand its message, and you would help us to understand, Father, the motivation by which we shall proclaim this message. Lord, give us eyes to see and ears to hear. We wish to see Jesus. We wish to see his kingdom. We wish, Father, and pray that the clarity of mind and thought and heart and soul that you shall give us today will go out with us from this place into the world in which we live. And that, Father, we might be light, that we might be the difference, that we might be salt, that we might be those who point as signposts to another way, a better way, the only way, the way, the truth, and the life, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Help us to do that, Father, without fear, for you have not given us a spirit of fear, but a spirit of power and of love and compassion. And I pray that we would make that known to a dying world, we pray, in Christ's name, amen. Well, it's visions like this that remind us that the Bible needs to be interpreted. There's, I mean, quite frankly, a lot of weird things going on in this vision, and we've seen a lot of weird things in this book, but I want to remind you that these weird things are visions, these weird things are dreams. If you've ever had a dream, which I think as pretty much everyone in here, you know that dreams can be weird. But there are dreams to be forgotten and there are dreams to be remembered, and this is certainly a dream to be remembered. In fact, it has been chiseled into the revelation of God for our remembrance and for the remembrance of the whole world these many millennia because it has deep meaning and significance. And if I could just give you the message of what this is getting at at the outset and then unpack it as I work through, it'd be this. This is really an Old Testament picture of the Great Commission. This is an Old Testament picture cast in old covenant forms and types and shadows of how the church is to be a light to the world and that that light is not fueled by our own ingenuity. It is not fueled by our own wisdom. It is not fueled or propped up by political cohorts, by political accords that we make with the culture or the zeitgeist, the spirit of this age, but it is brought about by the Spirit of God. And we need to remember that. We need to remember that the charismatics don't have a corner on the Spirit of God. We have access to Him as well. And it is that Spirit of God that fuels our mission to be a light in the world. I want you to consider this picture. I'm going to put all of it together just in a few moments here to try to illustrate for you what's going on. What do we see here? These lampstands, this lampstand is a menorah. In fact, in the Hebrew, it literally is metnorah, a menorah. So if you've seen a menorah, you know that it is typically a golden stylized tree. On one side are six branches, and on the other side, excuse me, on one side are three branches, and on the other side, another three, and in the middle, there's another one, and each spot is for a candle. And as you know, if you have any knowledge of how Jews celebrate things like Hanukkah, they'll light one for every night and so on and so forth, but here this menorah is being lit by oil. And you need to know that in the ancient Near East, it wasn't just the Jews, but it was all people back then, they would typically light their wicks with oil. And one of the best oils was olive oil. Now when you ran out of olive oil you were done and you had to go get some more and you had to go press out some olives and get the oil and bring it to the wick so that you could light the lamp again. What's interesting is on either side of this menorah, this lamp stand, There are olive trees, one on the right and one on the left, and they are feeding olive oil through golden pipes, it says towards the end of the chapter, into a bowl that goes on the top, and then the bowl feeds the oil to each one of the little branches, so the light on the menorah is perpetually burning. This is the picture that Zechariah gives us. Now, I want to talk about this very simply this morning under two heads. The first one's going to be short, the second one's going to be a little longer. And it's this, what did this mean, first question, what did this mean for Old Covenant Israel at this time in post-exilic Judah? And then secondly, what does it mean for the New Covenant Church? If you could think of it on two horizons, what it meant for Old Covenant Israel is the first horizon, what it means for the New Covenant Church is the second horizon. And God doesn't have two people, He has one people, and that's why the meaning for Old Covenant Israel and the meaning for New Covenant Israel is essentially the same even though it is fleshed out in a different context. Post-exilic Judah in the context of Old Covenant Israel and New Covenant Church in the context of everything that comes after the cross of Jesus Christ. Well, very simply, in the Old Covenant context, you have to remember that the Jews were getting a little discouraged. They were trying to build the temple and things were not going well. You know, you recall from the book of Ezra and the book of Nehemiah that Sanballat and other henchmen were trying to slow down the process. And you know that not only did the Jews simply want a temple so that they could make their sacrifices again, but you must understand that the temple was really the center of community life. The temple was really the center of a Jewish identity. It was part of culture and community and religion all bound up into one big structure called the temple. And so they were wanting to get their identity back, as it were. They were wanting to get back to this idea of sacrificing animals, because it was caught up in millennia of Jewish identity. But it was not going well, it was going really slow. And they were getting discouraged, and they were thinking, well, what kind of deals do we need to make with the political entities and powers of the day? Who do we need to join forces with? You know, how do we grease hands, as it were, to make this thing happen? And things were not going well. But what the Lord reminded them of is, number one, I am raising up a leader for you. His name is Zerubbabel. He is something of the governor of Judah at that time. You might even say that he was something of a proxy king, and we'll come back to that in a moment. And under Zerubbabel, his hands who laid the foundation of the temple or who started the reconstruction of the temple, the same hands are going to finish it. So what the Lord is telling them through the prophet Zechariah is what was started will be finished. And what's interesting is, what is started will be finished, and you will not say, when it is finished, great work, great work we have done. No, you will say, grace, grace to it. Why? Because it is not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord. In other words, from start to finish, oh Judah, it will be God who will accomplish this purpose. And that's why you will say, grace, grace to it. Undeserved merit, undeserved mercy to it, because God has made it happen. So you will simply be the vessels or the instruments with which the Lord will make this temple happen. Now, why did the temple need to be built? I said before that the Jews saw it as part of their community identity, but there was a much more central, important reason Why the temple needed to be built? Because the Jews needed to continue to be a light to the nations. Their worship needed to be highlighted and seen by all around because within the typology of their worship was a picture of the savior of the world who was to come. When that lamb was slaughtered on that altar, it was picturing Jesus Christ. And so that witness needed to go out to the world. It was the prophet Isaiah who said, hearkening back to what God did with Abraham, I will make you, this is Isaiah 49.6, I will make you a light for the nations that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. You see, Israel or Judah was to be a light to the nations and that brings us back to this vision. The menorah, it's lit. And are we, is Judah lighting it themselves? No, God with these olive branches is perpetually feeding it. Well, what is this olive oil that is perpetually feeding these flames of light, this message of salvation and hope to the world? It is the spirit. That's why he says in verse six, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord God of hosts. God is going to finish it. So do not despise the day of small things. Do not despise this temple which really pales in comparison to the original temple. Don't be on the side of the world that is mocking the little things that God is doing, because in the little things that God is doing, they will be so great that they will overcome the mountain such that, Zechariah says, who are you, O great mountain? Who are you, nations and political entities behind which are demonic forces that are trying to stop this menorah lamp amongst the nations of sending out the message of salvation, of a savior to come? Who are you, O mountain? You shall become a plane. So, what is small and weak and despicable in the eyes of the world today will be a mountain tomorrow that shall overcome the world. So, don't look to yourselves. Don't look to political circumstances to accomplish this task. I will accomplish it with my spirit. Now, that's what it meant to Judah in post-exilic Israel. Now, what I wanna spend the rest of our time on this morning is what it means for us. What does this mean? What does this picture mean of the menorah that's lit by the olive trees that are perpetually feeding olive oil to it? Well, I want you to consider three headings as I answer this question, and they start with Ms, all of them, okay? Because all of them are going to be, here they are, The mission of the church, the message of the church, and the motivation of the church, all right? So what does this vision mean for us as the New Covenant Church? I'm gonna answer it under three headings, the mission, the message, and the motivation of the church. So number one, the mission of the church. What does this vision tell us? Well, very much like Israel was to be a light to the nations, the church is to be a light to the nations. This is the Great Commission. Go out and make disciples of all the world. Tell them the message of the gospel. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. If anybody's going to hear the gospel, listen to me, it's not going to be the Republican Party that's going to do it. It's certainly not going to be the Democratic Party that's going to do it. It's certainly not going to be the Green Party that's going to do it. or any other whack job party out there, no. The only party on this earth that's going to do it, the only institution that's going to preach the gospel is us, the church. And that is why, can I say as an aside, we need to be very careful as the church about what is the center stage of our mission and purpose. Is it okay to help the poor? Absolutely, and we should. Is it okay to have a shelter for battered women? Absolutely, and if you're able to do it, and that's the heart of your congregation, and you've got the hook spot to get it off the ground, then do it. Do all those things. But if any of those good and noble things start to creep in, and your desire to redeem the city and they stop having this kind of marginal place in the church, and they start to have a principal place in the church, you know what's gonna happen? You're gonna miss the message of the gospel, and here's the problem. There's a lot of organizations out there that are doing those types of things. So if the church stopped doing those things, oh, there's other people that'll do it, but if the church stops preaching the gospel, who will preach the gospel? And so the gospel must be the center of everything we do. In fact, I would say, and I'm in good company when I say that, this. The gospel should be the center stage and the central purpose of the church in its proclamation, not only on Sunday morning and evening when we come together to worship, but in all these marginal ministries, you see? Because as we help battered women, as we help the hungry, as we help the poor, as we help counsel those who are considering abortions and all these types of things, we're bringing something unique to them. We are bringing the message of the gospel. We're bringing a message of hope. So we must be a light to the world, a light that is different and distinct and unique from every other organization out there. I don't wanna sound like the rest of the world, I want to be unique. If that makes me sound weird, so be it, then I'm weird, hit me again. It's the weirdness of the gospel, I'm okay with that. We need to be a light to the world. Now what's interesting is this text in Isaiah 49, six, that told Israel that she is to be a light to the world, it's a prophecy of the suffering servant. Now in the context of Isaiah 49, that suffering servant seems to be the nation of Israel. But when we get into the New Testament we see something very interesting. The New Testament apostles start applying these texts of the suffering servant. We see it in Isaiah 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53. Isaiah 53, the suffering servant. In Isaiah's day, they thought, oh, certainly this is the nation of Israel. By the way, we read 2 Corinthians 3 today, the Jews who read Moses, who still have a veil over their face, they still think that the suffering servant is Israel. They think it's the nation. They think that Israel's gonna suffer. And by the way, they've got some pretty good warrant for that, right? Have the Jews suffered throughout the years? Absolutely they have. But the apostle Paul will take this and he'll apply it to Jesus. But what's interesting is, in Acts chapter 13 verse 47, Paul takes this text from Isaiah that we are to be a light to the nation, and he applies it to his mission to the Gentiles. Isn't that interesting? He takes a text that finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ, and he says, I am carrying out the fulfillment of being a light to the nation. You want to know why? There's a very simple reason. Because through faith we are united with Christ, not only in all the benefits and privileges that He gives us, but we are also united in His mission to be a light to the world. So it could be said of Christ that He is a light to the world to bring salvation, and it'd be said of the church that we are a light to the world to bring salvation as we point people to Christ. What's interesting is we see in the New Testament an interpretation of this lampstand in olive oil. First, the lampstand in Revelation 1, you're familiar with it, I don't need to turn there. But you have the seven lampstands, the seven menorahs, each one representing a church. Each church has a lampstand, each church has a menorah, or some interpret it as a candlestick, however you want to interpret it, which means that Christ is among them. There is still union with Christ going on, such that in their proclamation of the gospel and everything that they do, Jesus is putting a stamp of approval upon it. But also, and I don't want to get too deep into this, it's very interesting that in Revelation chapter 11, you read of those two witnesses. Remember that? Two witnesses. People make a lot about who these two witnesses are. Some people say it's Elijah and Moses. Other people say Elijah and Enoch. I distinctly remember when I was in seminary, I was sitting in chapel one day. I didn't always go to chapel, but sometimes I did. And Dr. Godfrey preached that day. He was the president of our seminary, a very, very capable scholar, well-respected in the evangelical world, certainly in the Presbyterian and Reformed world. And he is a historian by trade, and he preached on Revelation 11 that day. And he made the bold proclamation that at least one of these witnesses was Martin Luther. He claimed that Martin Luther must be in the book of Revelation. Now, he even said after saying that, that as soon as he got done with chapel and went back to the faculty offices, that he would be the laughing stock of the New Testament department, the Old Testament department, the systematics department. And apparently that was the case. They all laughed him out of the room. they had that kind of relationship. But there is no need to isolate the identity of one or both of these witnesses to any one historical figure because the fact of the matter is that in Revelation chapter 11 verse 4 John basically says that these two witnesses are the lampstands and the olive branches. What is he thinking of? He's thinking of Zechariah chapter four. He's thinking, in other words, of the mission of the church. Who are the witnesses? They are one way to illustrate the representation of the church on earth today and the mission and the message that they bring to the world. And here's what's interesting. What happens to those two witnesses in Revelation chapter 11? They boldly proclaim the message of the gospel to the world, and what happens? They're received in a victory parade. No, no, no, they get killed. They get killed. They preach the gospel, they get killed, and then they're resurrected. It kind of reminds me of something that happened to somebody else, like Jesus. He preached the message of the gospel, he was killed, and he was resurrected. It also reminds me of what's going to happen to somebody else. The church, we preach the message of the gospel, we get killed, we get resurrected. You see the union with the church in Christ? You see, the union, the vital union, and so the mission of Christ must be the mission of the church. The mission of Christ, which is the mission of the apostles, is also our mission. We boldly proclaim the gospel, even if it means death, because we have the hope of resurrection. The two witnesses are simply the church. And it's interesting. It's interesting because when we look at this picture in Zechariah, the ever-flowing supply of oil to the lampstand, as I said, is a picture of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit fuels our efforts as the church to carry out the Great Commission. Now, if you're not convinced by that, if you're not convinced that when Zechariah says in verse six, you know, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit saith the Lord, I'll just refer you to Luke 4, 18, where Jesus, after reading the scroll in the synagogue says this, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim the good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of the sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. In classic Hebrew parallelism, I know this is in Greek, but he's thinking in Hebrew, he parallels the spirit of the Lord being upon him with the anointing of oil upon him for the purpose of proclaiming the gospel. So what do we see here? Coming back to the picture of the menorah. Olive tree on the right, olive tree on the left, fueling through olive oil the lampstand that burns brightly with its message. The Holy Spirit is fueling the church community to proclaim the message of Christ's first and second coming. So that's our mission. But what is the message? Well, I've already kind of said it, but let me dig down a little deeper. What is the message that we take to the world? Well, listen, beloved. Sometimes we say things like, you know, the gospel offends, the gospel offends, okay? And that's true, but because I like to qualify things, you know what we're really saying? Nobody's really saying that the message that you can have eternal life is offensive. Nobody would get offended at a free lunch. Nobody would get offended at eternal life. What do they get offended at? They get offended at what comes before the gospel, which tells them that they need the gospel, which is what? The law, which is the law that tells them you are a miserable worm of a sinner. Every thought that you have is continually evil all the time. You are not good enough, and you're certainly not good enough for God, and so you need salvation. That's what's offensive. And not only are they offended by that, but when you follow it with the gospel, they just think that that's a fairy tale. It's pie in the sky, by and by. So I want you to think about this picture of the menorah for a second. What does light do? What does light do? It illumines. It clarifies. You know, you're walking in a dark room and you can't see anything and you pull out your phone and you're able to just flip up that, I don't know, I have an iPhone 5, I don't know how it is now. Maybe just do it with your mind with an iPhone 12, I don't know. But with mine, you gotta flip up the menu and you press the light, and what does it do? It shows me everything in my way, okay? Boys and girls, that's what light does as we preach the gospel. You know what it does? Through law and gospel, it tells people who they really are. It tells people who they really are as they stand before God. And really what we're doing is we're disturbing the grandiose narrative that most people have about themselves, right? I mean, most people walk in this world where it's a comic book narrative and they're the superhero. They're the good guy. They're never the bad guy. Or if they're the bad guy, they're the bad guy in that movie where the bad guy is the good guy. But they're always the good guy. They're always the superhero. And we're coming along and we're saying, you're the scumbag bad guy. That's how bad you really are. You are despicable. That's what the law does. So what is the message of the menorah light, the menorah church? It's judgment and salvation. We are first telling them everything is not okay. When the people say, peace, peace, we're coming along like the prophet and saying, there is no peace. Everything is disturbed. Everything is wrong. I don't care what your portfolio looks like. I don't care how many houses you have. I don't care how pretty you look. I don't care how straight your teeth are. What I'm telling you is that God has a controversy with you. You must tell them that God has a controversy with them. Let me tell you something. If an unbeliever can be comfortable under the preaching of law and gospel in this church, either they weren't listening, or they didn't understand, or the preacher didn't do his job. An unbeliever, when he or she comes into this place, should feel uncomfortable. And this is again why we don't try to do what is often called the seeker-sensitive approach when it comes to church. We're not trying to make people feel comfortable. Now, we want to greet them with a smile. We want to give them a soft place to sit and all those types of things. I'm not saying be a jerk, but I am saying when it gets down to the nitty-gritty, when it gets down to tacks of brass, okay, when it gets down to the main thing, We're going to offend them, and if we're not doing that, we're not doing our job. But it doesn't stop there. We're also giving them the message of hope. And here's what's interesting. If you think of the temple in the Old Covenant. On the inside walls of the temple, on either side were pictures of menorahs, okay, lampstands. So basically what you had is you had the priest and outside he would make the sacrifice on the altar, you see. That's judgment, judgment's death. The lamb is slaughtered, the lamb is killed, blood flows out of this ordeal of judgment on the altar. But then, the lampstands form a path that take you into the holy place, and then into the most holy place. And in that picture, beloved, we have a picture of law and gospel. The law kills on the altar outside, but as we follow the light of the menorah on either side, it takes us to the very presence of God in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Even the menorahs give us, in the Old Covenant context, a picture of how we are made right with God. The light illumines the way. And this, for our purposes in the new covenant, this path of Menorah is the path from Golgotha, where the Lamb of God was slaughtered, to God's holy place, from judgment to reconciliation. So we've seen the mission, we've seen the message, but now what is the motivation? What is the motivation for this great commission? What is the motivation to take this message to the world? And yes, we as a Reformed church need to hear that we need to evangelize. We need to hear what our motivation is. And though it is an important motivation to be theologically correct in our gospel articulation, that's very important, okay? Our primary motivation is that we be led by the Spirit, that the Spirit motivate, that the Spirit fuel, just as this olive oil fueled the lights in this vision of Zechariah, so for the church today, the olive oil Spirit of God is to fuel our lamps in this world, not only here on Sunday, but as we go out into the world, go out into a dark place, we are to be fueled and driven and motivated by the Spirit. Now, if we're doing that, it's going to overcome four things. It's going to overcome four things. Let me give them to you this morning, and I'll be done, okay? Dependence on the Spirit to accomplish the Great Commission, number one, overcomes the paralysis of fear. It overcomes the paralysis of fear. In Zechariah, he says, he asks that question in verse 7. Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain, and he shall bring forward to the topstone amid shouts of grace, grace to it. Well, then you need to come into context, beloved. Just as Zerubbabel in the Old Covenant was the governor or the king under whose leadership the temple was built, so Zerubbabel serves as a type of Jesus Christ in the New Covenant who is likewise building his temple out of stones. No, out of living stones called the people of God. He is building his temple, and what he begins, he will finish. And that needs to go deep into the recesses of our heart when we're standing before an unbeliever and we are faced with the prospect of sharing the gospel with them. Who wins? We win. We win. We get the kingdom. We get the prize. We get Christ and his righteousness. We get it all and we want to bring this person with us. Do not fear, the Lord has not given us a spirit of timidity but of power. That's what He's given us. God is going to finish what He started. Look at verse 8, then the word of the Lord came to me saying, the hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house. His hands shall also complete it. Then you will know that the Lord of hosts has sent me to you. What did Christ do in His first coming as He laid the foundation of the church? At one point in His ministry He said, I saw Satan falling from heaven. And then in Revelation 20 we read that Satan is bound. That's now, beloved. Satan is bound right now so that he cannot what? Deceive the nations. So that you and I can go out into the world and go to a people who in some sense are not being deceived as much as they were before Christ came. And there is an openness there for us to give them the gospel. Christ saw Satan falling from heaven. That was the foundation. He is limited during this time, but when Christ comes again, when he puts that top stone on the final eschatological temple, okay, he's gonna throw Satan into the lake of fire and our mortal enemy will be gone. So this is what Christ is doing, and for this reason, we should not have a spirit of fear. I've shared with you often how my children teach me things, and I wanna share a story. We have a playground right across the street from our house that just got renovated, so a lot of people are coming to it. And I'll tell you what, over the last probably four or five weeks, as we've gone to that playground, typically on a Saturday, there are kids there and their parents are there. So I almost always get an opportunity to broach the topic of the gospel with people. But, you know, I'm human, and a few Saturdays back, I took the boys there, it was actually at night, and they were playing with another kid that was there, and they were just having a great time, and I was standing there with this child's mom, and we were just talking, passing the time, and I'm just thinking to myself as I'm talking about superficial things, I'm just thinking, how am I going to steer this toward Jesus? How am I gonna do this? And all of a sudden, One of my boys comes up, I won't tell you who it was, I don't want to embarrass him. He just comes up and he just says, excuse me daddy, and I stopped. And then he looked at this mom and he's all, excuse me, do you believe in Jesus? And you know what she says? She says, yes, actually I do. I love Jesus. And I'm like, wow. What a wimp I am and how courageous my child, you know, out of the mouth of babes, there it is. And I was so proud of my son. And it just reminds me, you know why he was able to do that? Listen to me, beloved, listen. Okay? How often does Jesus, our Lord, talk about the simplicity and the immense potency of childlike faith? Now, I've talked to my son, and make no mistake, he tells me, Daddy, I'm scared sometimes. I'm scared sometimes when I wanna share the gospel with somebody at the playground, because, you know, I mean, like, what if I share it with a kid and he doesn't wanna play with me? And my wife, in a very wise manner, answered, well, If people don't wanna be a playmate with you because you've shared the gospel with them, they're not the kind of friends you wanna have. He's like, okay. So he conjured up his courage and he shared the gospel. He wasn't fearing man. He was fearing the flames of hell that were tickling the feet of the person who was in front of him. And he said, I've got to let it loose. I learn a lot from my children. We can learn a lot from our children. The Lord has not given them a spirit of fear, and we should follow their examples. So the first thing that dependence on the Spirit of God does is it helps us to overcome the challenge of the paralysis of fear. But here's the second one. Here's the second thing, dependence on the Spirit of God in this task of the Great Commission helps us overcome what I'm calling the myth of influence. Look at verse 10. Look at verse 10. I'm going to translate this differently. This is my own translation because I think the ESV, which is generally a really, really good translation, just really dropped the ball here. Here's how 10 should be translated, if I could say that as humbly as possible. For who dares to scorn or make light of the day of small things? Question mark done. Who dares? to scorn or make light of the day of small things. These seven eyes of the Lord which scan throughout the whole earth will rejoice when they see the plumb line in Zerubbabel's hand. Now what is going on here? both in Zechariah's day and even in ours, it's drawing attention to that spirit, not only within the age, but specifically in the church, listen, that is embarrassed by what the church is accomplishing, is embarrassed by what the church is accomplishing. Years ago when I was on Facebook, I'm not on it anymore, but I remember somebody posted this picture and it was one of those side-by-side panels, you know, like, And the first panel was somebody trying to change the world and they were on their knees in a pew praying. And he said, this is how religious people change the world. You know, kind of like in a condescending way. And then the next panel, it showed somebody in a factory working. He's all, this is how atheists change the world. We actually do something. Oh, okay. Okay, I think sometimes, beloved, that gets into our head and it starts tap dancing in our head and we think we've got to be doing more, doing more, doing more. We've got to redeem the city. We've got to get out there and redeem culture. We've got to purge the culture of its sins, sins that are not even in the Bible, but we just make them up, like white guilt and stuff like that. We've got to purge the culture of these things. But what we begin to lose is the foolishness of the gospel. And you know where we get like, I think the church kind of gets like that teenage girl, she was in the cafeteria, right? And she just so wants to be noticed by the quarterback, right? And she's like, does my hair look okay? She's getting her little mirror out. Do I look alright? Where is it? Is it coming over here? Shut up, don't say anything, you'll embarrass me. And the church gets like that. The church gets like that. And what we start doing is we start putting superstars up in front who I've been a Christian for two seconds, right? But they're a superstar, so we've got to put them up there, all right? And, you know, roll their sleeves back and then, you know, let them see your tattoos on your arms and your big aviator glasses like a good hipster would wear. And, you know, but yet what we don't realize is this is the myth of influence. This is the idea that if we become like the world, if we make friends with the world, if we get warm to the world, then they'll want to hear what we have to say and they'll believe it. Now, there's some truth to that, right? I mean, we should try to befriend the world. There's no doubt about that, but I just want to make one little distinction this morning. Listen to me. When you're going through that process in your head, ask yourself, what is it that I'm trying to accomplish? Am I simply trying to be friends with this person? Am I willing, upon being friends, whenever and however that looks, to actually tell them something that may end the friendship? Do you understand what I'm saying? Am I willing to tell them something that may end the friendship? Because in the mission of the church, listen to me, you're gonna have to be willing to lose people. You're gonna have to be willing to lose people. And if you do like so many do in the evangelical world and trying to be like the world and trying to make the church like the world and the compromising of truth, you're going to miss the point. You see, you can never normalize the gospel for the world. The gospel is always going to be like trying to pound a square peg into a round hole in the minds of the world. It doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense that blood would atone, that blood would cover, that blood would cleanse and forgive. It doesn't make sense that a man who lived 2,000 years ago is able to make me stand in the day of judgment by giving me his righteousness and him taking my punishment. It doesn't make sense. This is the myth of influence. If I'm nice to people and they accept me, then my influence will cause them to accept the gospel. But in so doing, as I said, we may need to compromise theological truth to acquire that influence. And the great innovation of so many church growth movements is that they offer Christians a religious environment that does not clash with the rest of their lives. Think about that. That's what Hillsong does. Give them a religious environment that does not clash with the rest of their lives. That kind of sounds like the Corinthian church. I'll bet that's what a lot of people in the Corinthian church were saying. Let's give them, Paul, a religious environment that will not clash with the rest of their lives. How do I know this? Because in 1 Corinthians 5, A man sleeping with his stepmother, they're like, oh, this is the essence of grace. This is what grace looks like. We could be around someone, or at least he's not sleeping with a man. It's his stepmother, but God is so gracious. We're just going to accept him. Paul says, even the pagans are blushing at such behavior, and you're not. Stop trying to bring the world into the church. The church is different. No, the gospel came to save us and the gospel came, listen, to make war with any remaining vestige of our old life which does not submit to the leadership of Christ. It's not here to form a peace treaty with the world. The gospel is here to make war with the world. We don't manipulate the message of the gospel in order to fit sinful patterns in our lives. We manipulate sinful patterns in our lives in order to fit into the message of the gospel. That's what we do. The grace of God has appeared, Paul says, bringing salvation for all people, training us, training us, this is what the gospel does, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. That's Titus 2, 11 and 12. So the message of the gospel is neither hip nor culturally relevant. The church is not pushing brands or culturally relevant slogans. We have one brand and one slogan, Christ and Him crucified. That's our brand and that's our slogan. That's what we're here to give. Young people, that's what we're here to do, okay? If you're a hipster, that's great. I don't mean to throw the hipsters under the bus, that's great. If I were young, maybe I would dress that way too. Probably not, skinny jeans are a little too far. But evangelism is not by political and cultural might or power, but it's by the Spirit of God. Now, where does the Spirit of God, okay, fit into our evangelism? I want you to turn very quickly to John 16. Turn to John 16. Where does the Spirit of God as olive oil fueling our Great Commission message, where does it fit into our motivation? Well, I think if you take Jesus' words in John 16, 8-11 to heart, you'll understand why. Jesus is saying that He's going to go away, but He's going to send a helper. The helper is the Holy Spirit. He says in verse 8, He will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. Concerning sin, because they do not believe in me. Concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you will see me no longer. Concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. Now what does that mean? That means that when we go to articulate the gospel, our principle goal, according to Jesus here, fueled by the Holy Spirit, is that we convict the world. concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. That's what the Holy Spirit does. Do you see that connection? If the olive oil Spirit of God flowing into our evangelism efforts is present, it's present in the conviction of sin, righteousness, and judgment. Well, thirdly, and very quickly, depending upon the Spirit of God overcomes the malignancy of apathy, okay, apathy. There's nothing more malignant in carrying out the Great Commission than to be apathetic for what God has done for us in Christ. If it's not important to you, listen to me, if it's not important to you, if the message of the gospel is not important to you, if it's not the center stage of all that you are and all that you want to be and all that you want to accomplish, the gospel fueling all things, if it's not important to you, why would it be important to anybody that you would share it with? Apathy is a malignant cancer in the great commission of the church. That's all I have to say about that. And finally, dependence upon the Spirit of God overcomes the atrophy of not applying the gospel to ourselves. You know, one of the reasons, listen to me, one of the reasons that we struggle with evangelism is that there is atrophy in actually applying the gospel to ourselves and living out the gospel on a daily basis, okay? Because if we're not, if I could put it in these words, exercising those muscles, what do I mean by that? What do I mean by applying the gospel to all of life? I mean to all of life, beloved. I mean applying the gospel to your marriage. By the way, in Ephesians 5, that's what Paul said it should do. If you go to a counselor and you say, I need help in my marriage, and they open up the Bible to Ephesians 5, and you respond by saying, well, I already know that. You don't get it. You don't understand that your marriage is supposed to be a picture of the gospel. And to the degree that like Jesus, listen to me, like Jesus in Philippians 2, you start losing yourself, emptying yourself for your wife, for your husband. and he or she starts doing the same thing, you're going to see a picture of the gospel in your marriage like you've never seen it before. But if you go on insisting on your own way, insisting in a kind of overly aggressive way, husbands, on you being the head and your wife submitting, that's true, that's biblical, but we can overreach in those things. If we insist on those things, we're missing the servant leadership of Jesus Christ as put on display in Philippians chapter 2. The gospel is meant to apply to everything. The gospel is meant to be applied to your despair, to your fear, to your timidity, to the lust that you face. All these things, I think of what God has done for me in Christ, and the gospel, as I exercise those muscles in applying the gospel, it now makes me desirous to go out and share this life-central message with everybody else. And so, dependence upon the Spirit of God overcomes the atrophy of not applying the gospel to ourselves. So this is the message of the lampstand. Fueled by the olive oil Holy Spirit for the purpose of making Christ known among the nations, burning brightly. My question this morning for you is, is this something that you desire to do? Do you desire to make Christ and him crucified known to a watching world? If you're not, I just want to invite you to come back to the foot of the cross this morning, in your mind, in your heart. You come back to the foot of the cross and be amazed once again, just like we read in Psalm 85 this morning. Be amazed and be rejuvenated once again for what God has done for you in Christ. That you, a miserable, dirty, lousy sinner, have been redeemed by a gracious and condescending God through the person of Jesus Christ. And that steadfast love that he proclaimed in the gospel at the very beginning of time echoes down even to today and is applicable to you if you will but turn from your sins and believe in Jesus Christ. And then stand up from that great act of mercy and grace and out of gratitude go out and be a light to a dying world. Let's pray. Father God, we do thank you for this vision of Zechariah. And Father, I lift up to you our church, Father. I thank you for the many ways in which a number of members in this place have ongoing evangelism encounters, Father. I thank you for that, Lord. I pray that you would give us greater zeal in that area, Father. I pray that we can learn from our children how to be courageous. I pray, Father, that we can in turn teach them how to be courageous as they get older and the complexities of life begin to crowd in upon their conceptualization of what it means to evangelize, what it means to share their faith, what it means to live their faith. Father, make us strong, make us courageous, remind us that at the tail end of that great commission when Jesus gave it some 2,000 years ago, he said, and lo, I am with you always till the end of the age. So Father, thank you for that promise of Jesus, and please send him from heaven once again to retrieve your church. We ask these things in Christ's name, amen. Let's stand for the glory of Patri. ♪ Glory be to the Father ♪ As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. People of God, I send you out with the benediction of your King. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen. You are dismissed.