We are going to be continuing in our series in Luke. We're in Luke chapter 12, and the series is titled Kingdom Come. So if you have a Bible with you, you can turn to the Gospel of Luke. It's basically about 3/4 of the way through your Bible. If you don't have one with you, the text will be up on the screen behind me in a moment.
Before we begin there, I just want to— thinking back to our week as I was preparing for the message, we were in care group for our final care group of the semester before we kind of head into the summer break, and Derek Matt Caff, our care group leader, just had us each share what are some prayer requests we had. And as we were going around doing that, Caleb Kenga shared something that had actually been on my heart as well. We had gone up to the men's retreat, so kind of dovetailing with Jennifer's testimony, we had a men's retreat this past weekend and we had gone up to that retreat and CJ Mahaney, our keynote speaker at the retreat, had taken us through the book of Job. And Caleb was struck in the same way I was that one of the things that wisdom calls us to learn in the book of Job is to prepare for suffering, which is a strange thing to think about most of the time. But Job is a book that teaches us trials are coming. They are a very hard thing in and of themselves. We were both struck, Caleb and I, and probably every guy there, by CJ just pausing and looking at all of us and saying, part of what we have to learn from Job is that trials aren't just coming. But in order to prepare for trials, we have to have a theology of trials or a theology of suffering. You don't want to construct that theology in the midst of suffering. When you're in the midst of hardship, you're oftentimes not thinking straight. So you want to construct the theology of it before you get into the middle of it.
And that's partly Jesus' concern for us this morning as well.
Recently in Luke's Gospel, He described that the disciples and these followers of His were living, He says, in the midst of an evil generation. That's how Jesus describes the day in which He came to minister, that it's an evil generation. He's saying that to the disciples to inform them of the world in which they're going to be ministering, to inform them of the world in which they're going to be walking out what it means to be a follower of Jesus. He's not trying to turn them against their neighbors. He's trying to inform them of the climate they'll face as they bear witness to the Gospel and proclaim the Gospel. In their lives. He continues that thought today in Luke 12.
Hear God's holy and authoritative word. In the meantime, when so many thousands of people were gathered together that they were trampling one another, He began to say to His disciples first, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. Nothing is covered up that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known." Therefore, whatever you have said in the dark shall be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in private rooms shall be proclaimed on the housetops. I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body and after that have nothing more that they can do to you. But I warn you whom to fear: fear Him who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him. Are not 5 sparrows sold for 2 pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are more valuable than many sparrows. And I tell you, everyone who acknowledges Me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God. But the one who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God. And everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say. The word of the Lord. May he write its truth upon our hearts.
Lord, we pray that you would send your Spirit now to teach us even here what it is that we ought to learn from this passage. You promise us that you give your Spirit to your people so that we can see and understand and apply and live in light of your words. And so we ask that you would do that now as you have promised to do. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
6 · Oswald connects last week's sermon on hypocrisy to today's passage, noting that Jesus moves from allusion to direct address of the topic
Well, last week we started to look at the topic of hypocrisy, and Jesus is returning to the topic today. In the previous passage at the end of Luke 11, He sort of alludes to the idea of hypocrisy, right? So cups that are clean on the outside but dirty on the inside. In today's passage in Luke 12, He actually uses the word hypocrite itself. Calls attention directly to hypocrisy.
7 · Oswald traces the etymology of 'hypocrite' from its neutral classical Greek meaning (one who interprets and expounds publicly) through its development as a term for actors wearing masks, to its eventual negative meaning of someone living a double life
And that Greek word that Luke uses to talk about this, that modern word for hypocrite has a history to it. There's an etymology if you want to use the fancy term. In classical Greek, historically, that word that Jesus uses and that Luke draws our attention to has a very neutral meaning. A hypocrite having a neutral meaning seems like a strange thing to us, right? Nobody wants to get called a hypocrite. But in ancient Greece, it was a neutral thing. Someone who was a hypocrite was somebody who interpreted things and actually didn't just interpret them, but they would then publicly expound on interpretation. That's what a hypocrite did in ancient Greece. And slowly as time developed, that term continued to transition and soon it became a term that was used to describe actors. An actor was called a hypocrite. You can see kind of how it developed, right? Initially, it's someone who expounds something. To a group of people, then it became an actor who was expounding things in a play. But in ancient Greece, in the ancient world, when you would have theater productions and actors would act, they would wear masks. And so as they would do their production, they would wear a mask. And as we understand, actors would take on a persona. And so they would play their role. And so it wasn't long after that that this idea of hypocrite started to have the negative connotations that we have today. Namely, this idea that a hypocrite is someone who is wearing a mask. They're living a double life.
8 · Oswald establishes that Jesus warns not only about the Pharisees' hypocrisy but about hypocrisy's contagious nature — it spreads like cancer, threatening the disciples themselves
That's part of what Jesus is drawing our attention to. These Pharisees, He warns His disciples, have hypocrisy. But He also warns them as hypocrisy is not limited to just His opponents, it's not limited to just the Pharisees. The real danger is that hypocrisy has a tendency to spread. Hypocrisy spreads. There's a cancerous nature to it. It's malignant.
9 · Oswald explains Jesus' metaphor of leaven — a sourdough that can go bad and spread toxicity unnoticed through the entire lump — as an image of hypocrisy's hidden, contagious danger
Jesus actually says it's the leaven of the Pharisees. Now, leaven is a kind of sourdough, and it's a kind of dough you have to work very carefully with. And if you're not careful, this sourdough that's related to this exact word that Luke uses, it would go bad really quickly. And if that sourdough went bad, it actually became toxic. And without knowing it, once it had gone bad and it's in the lump of dough, it would spread to the entire lump and the whole thing would become toxic and inedible. And so that's the idea that Jesus is giving them. This hypocrisy of the Pharisees can spread to you. And if it spreads, it spreads unnoticed, often below the surface, spreading its toxicity.
10 · Oswald offers the analogy of a virus to make Jesus' leaven metaphor more accessible to a modern audience unfamiliar with ancient bread-making
Now, we've got a couple bakers in the congregation, but for most of us, if you're like me, you don't work with yeast or sourdough very often. So there, I think maybe the image of a virus is a helpful way of capturing what Jesus is talking about. Hypocrisy is like a virus, and initially the infected person seems totally healthy, and yet even in this appearing healthy stage, they're spreading the virus to others.
11 · Oswald explains that 'leaven' in Aramaic is a homonym also meaning 'word,' revealing that Jesus is using wordplay to emphasize the danger of the Pharisees' teaching — their words are the toxic leaven
In Aramaic, the language of the crowd, so as Jesus is teaching in and about these crowds, He's probably speaking Aramaic. And that word "leaven" is a homonym. So I had to look that up. A homonym is a word that sounds the same but has two different meanings. And that word "leaven" in Aramaic is a homonym that means both "leaven" and word. So Jesus is playing on words when He says this. He tells them the leaven of the Pharisees is hypocrisy. The word of the Pharisees is hypocrisy. It's a rhetorical device. He's warning His disciples they have to be on guard against this toxic leaven in the Pharisees, specifically their teaching.
12 · Oswald establishes that the Pharisees' hypocrisy is not merely behavioral inconsistency but doctrinal — their teaching misses the point of Scripture and blinds them to the Messiah standing before them
It's not just like we saw in the previous passage that there's this inconsistency between how the Pharisees proclaim things and how they live their lives, right? So they are meticulous tithers. They are meticulous about following God's commandments to obey and give 10%, right? But they're neglecting the weightier things. It's not just that that's the problem. The problem is also there's this hypocrisy in their words, which goes all the way back to that ancient Greek understanding of What is a hypocrite? It's someone who interprets and then proclaims that interpretation to those who are gathered. The problem with the Pharisees, Jesus says, is they are interpreting and they are proclaiming their interpretations, and their interpretations are completely missing the point of the Scriptures. They're oblivious to the Messiah who's right in front of them.
13 · Oswald synthesizes Jesus' warning: He alerts the disciples to hypocrisy's spreading danger specifically to prepare them for coming opposition and persecution, when authorities will arrest them rather than crowds gathering to hear them
Jesus warns His disciples, to be mindful, to be on guard, to be aware that all these forms of hypocrisy have a tendency of spreading. And He gives them this warning to prepare them for ministry in the midst of an evil generation. He warns them to prepare them that opposition is coming. At the end of the passage, He says, "I will give you words by the Spirit," right? For when they haul you into the synagogues and the assemblies and in front of the authorities, there's a time coming when it's not going to be crowds trampling each other to hear what I say. It's going to be authorities chasing you to arrest you.
14 · Oswald transitions from exposition to application by emphasizing that Jesus is preparing disciples for a time when the gospel message will not only be unpopular but dangerous to proclaim
And it's there that I think we have a very easy transition to applying our text today. Jesus wants the disciples to know There's going to be a time when the message of the kingdom is not popular. It's not palatable. There's going to come a day when proclaiming that message is unpopular. And maybe even more than unpopular, it's dangerous.
15 · Oswald identifies the sermon's central danger: not false teaching or hypocrisy, but the fear of what others can do to you, which silences gospel proclamation
And to prepare for that difficulty, the difficulty of following Jesus, Jesus draws their attention to the topic of fear. The greatest danger isn't necessarily the Pharisees' bad teaching. The greatest danger isn't even necessarily the spread of hypocrisy. The greatest danger that Jesus wants to warn the disciples of, that He wants to warn anyone who would follow Him of, the greatest danger is being afraid of what others can do to you and then failing to actually proclaim the message. Jesus knows there's days coming when disciples are going to make public professions of a crucified Messiah. They can't imagine that right now, but he knows the cross is coming, and with the cross, the shame of the cross. And one day these very disciples are going to stand in front of people, in front of synagogues, in front of kings, in front of Roman rulers, and they're going to proclaim and share about this crucified Messiah who has given to deflect the wrath of God for all those who believe in Him.
16 · Oswald provides historical examples from the apostles' lives to illustrate the kind of opposition Jesus is preparing the disciples to face
Peter is going to stand before thousands of people at Pentecost, the people who crucified Jesus, and he's going to proclaim to them this crucified Messiah. Paul is going to be put on trial. He's going to be beaten for this message. John is going to be exiled to the prison-like island of Patmos. And all the different disciples, all the apostles of the early church are going to face difficulties like this.
17 · Oswald articulates the passage's core imperative: disciples must replace fear of man with fear of God to stand strong under opposition
And if they're going to stand strong in the face of massive, powerful opposition, they must exchange the fear of man for the proper fear of God. That's a very good word for us today. It's a good word for Christians from every generation. But it's also especially relevant for us.
18 · Oswald introduces a surprising contemporary application point: social media as a context where fear of man operates
And here's one counterintuitive reason why. Social media.
19 · Oswald narrates the invention of Facebook, focusing on the strategic genius of exclusivity and the like button, establishing how social media platforms engineer approval-seeking behavior
That might seem like a strange place to point our attention. When Mark Zuckerberg and his buddies were inventing Facebook in a Harvard dorm room, one of the most ingenious things that they did— they did a lot of ingenious things outside of just even the sheer Brilliance of all the coding they were doing, right? One of the genius things they do is they make Facebook this exclusive thing. They don't just let anybody in on Facebook. First, it's just the hoity-toity Ivies. So it's Harvard and Yale and Columbia. And then Stanford. But it's just this elite thing that really cool people get to do. And so they just slowly extend the exclusivity of it, which makes it so that everyone wants to be a part of the in-crowd. Another genius thing they did was as they're typing out their code, they installed this little box, little blue box with a thumbs up symbol, right? A little thumbs up symbol inside a blue box. We all know what it means. It's the like button. They really thought hard about that name. They had a lot of strategy marketing sessions. What should we call this? The like button. But that like button is not innocuous. It's not lacking in power and significance. In fact, in the past year, the like button has gotten fancier, hasn't it? Now it's not just you like something. You can have a sad face, you can have an angry face, a wow face, a laughing face. You can show your emotions through the like button. You click a button. And you express your approval to all the world on the web that you support what someone has posted. And all social media does it now, right? Twitter has likes. You can even retweet if you really like it. Instagram has those little hearts you can click. Every flavor of social media has some form of that simple idea.
20 · Oswald applies the passage's warning against fear of man to social media, arguing that the like button subtly cultivates people-pleasing by shaping what believers are willing to post based on anticipated approval
But as believers, We must beware of the like button. I don't mean to say if you ever clicked the like button, come forward and repent after the service. Like, that's not what I'm saying at all. We'd hopefully have a very full altar at the front or a lot of hypocrites, because I'm sure people have clicked those like buttons. But we are called to beware of the like button because that button doesn't just empower others to approve of our posts or our tweets. It also has the power to influence what we share, doesn't it? The knowledge that people may or may not like what we post to our feed, that can stir up a very subtle kind of fear of man. There can be this deadly people-pleasing side to social media. Oh, I'll post this because people will like it. If I post this, I wonder how many people will like it. You ever posted something and then gone back just to see how many people have liked it? You can even click on the little thing under the like button and it'll list them for you. It's not enough just to know that 16 people have liked it. I need to know which 16 people. Who approves? Who agrees? Social media. It has this dark underbelly when it comes to feeding our fear of man and the impulse to please people, to increase our virtual likability.
21 · Oswald confesses his own struggle with fear of man on social media, admitting he has hesitated to post gospel content for fear of what unbelieving friends would think, making the application concrete and personal
And it's not just that we can use things like Facebook to project this false sense of our lives, right? There can be a hypocrisy on Facebook, this sense of just everything's always beautiful and wonderful. But there's also this effect on social media of feeding our desire to fit in, feeding our desire to please others, making sure we don't rock the boat. And that can be especially dangerous when we hesitate to bear witness for Christ because of what our so-called virtual friends may or may not think of us. I can think of times when my finger has hovered over the post button. My cursor is on it, I'm sitting there, I feel like I should share this, it's good, it's edifying, it's encouraging, and then I wonder in the back of my head, "What's my unbelieving high school friend gonna think?" It's a sad thing to admit, but it's true. And I've felt that battle looking at the Facebook screen.
22 · Oswald qualifies his social media critique, clarifying he is not advocating obnoxious online behavior or elevating social media's importance, but rather warning against its fear-of-man dynamics
Now, I'm not saying we should abuse Facebook and become one of those obnoxious people that's just like screaming at everybody on Facebook. Because what happens to those obnoxious people is everyone else unfollows them. So they're on Facebook where they're literally yelling into a vacuum. I'm not saying that's what we do, right? And I'm certainly not trying to give social media an outsized importance. In fact, many of us, I think, would do well to use less of social media because it has this kind of narcissistic element to it.
23 · Oswald escalates the application: if believers cannot bear witness on social media for fear of disapproval, they will not be able to bear witness when real persecution comes
But if we are enslaved to the like button, if we're fearful of posting about our faith for fear of reprisals or even just eye rolls, What happens when the cards are truly down? When we have to bear witness to Christ in a way that really costs us something? Not someone unfollowing, not people not liking us, but when there's a real cost. Or even when we're presented an opportunity to share the gospel with someone in person. It's in those contexts that Luke 12, I think, points us to a danger of being driven and shaped by the like button. I only do what I think others will approve of. You have an outsized fear of those people who can click a button. Or those people who can only take your life. It's a misplaced fear.
24 · Oswald synthesizes Jesus' dual purpose: preparing disciples to bear joyful witness to the gospel while simultaneously preparing them for inevitable opposition
Jesus wants his people prepared to bear witness. He wants people, as we heard from the participation mic this morning, prepared to bear witness that there is a fountain of joy and delight that God offers us in Christ Jesus. He wants us prepared to share that message and to infect others with the way the gospel has transformed us. But he also wants to prepare us that there will be people, sometimes many people, sometimes supposed friends, sometimes powerful adversaries who will always oppose this message. That's the reality of the gospel, this upside-down kingdom in the world of a fallen kingdom. And so Jesus wants us to deal with our fear. He addresses it here in this passage.
25 · Oswald brings in John 12:42-43 to show a tragic biblical example of leaders who believed Jesus was the Messiah but refused to confess Him publicly because they loved human approval more than God's glory
In John 12, there's this tragic statement that gets made. Jesus says many of the authorities and leaders in Israel were actually coming to believe in Him. They were professing belief. We actually think He is who He says He is. We think this guy's the Messiah. But then we read this incredibly sobering statement, John 12:42-43. These leaders in Israel who were coming to believe that Jesus was legit, but for fear of the Pharisees, they did not confess it so that they would not be put out of the synagogue, for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God. Put another way, they feared man more than they feared God. Put another way, they love the glory of the like button more than the coming glory of the returning Son of Man.
26 · Oswald quotes Luke 12:4-7 directly, emphasizing Jesus' command to fear God alone, who has authority over eternal judgment, while trusting His providential care for even the smallest details of creation
Jesus confronts us on this very ground. Luke 12:4, I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body and after that have nothing more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: Fear Him who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him. Are not 5 sparrows sold for 2 pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are more You are more value than many sparrows.
27 · Oswald contrasts wrong fear (fear of man, fear of being 'on the wrong side of history') with right fear (fear of God), arguing that those who stand with Christ now are on the right side of the only history that matters — eternal judgment
The wrong kind of fear is ungodly and it's dangerous and it's this crippling sort of monster. It can paralyze you. It can overwhelm you. It can drive you into sin. It can twist your desires. It can blind you and make you short-sighted. When we hear people accusing Christ followers of being on the wrong side of history, that's a popular saying that gets thrown out today, right? You are on the wrong side of history. And we tremble. Oh no, I don't want to be on the wrong side of history. That's the wrong kind of fear. Being on the wrong side of history, being scared to be on the wrong side of history, that's being afraid of those who can kill you and do nothing more. But Jesus' whole point here is that those who follow Him, who cast their lot with Him, who risk slander and rejection and even persecution, those true Christ followers are not on the wrong side of history. If the wrong side of history means you might die, then yeah, in a human earthly sense, you might be on the wrong side of history. But if the wrong side of history relates to being cast into judgment, then those who stand with Christ are most certainly on the right side of the only kind of history that actually matters. Those who stand tall with the Son of Man before all men now will find that when history concludes, the Son of Man is standing for them before the Father and all the angels of heaven.
28 · Oswald articulates the sermon's core mechanism: ungodly fear of man is not simply removed but replaced by a greater, holier fear of God
And for that to happen, Jesus tells us, fear must be subjugated. By fear. Fear has to be driven out by a greater, holier, purer kind of fear. The fear of man replaced with the fear of God.
29 · Oswald narrates a formative encounter with his college roommate's Norwegian mentor, who challenged him with a probing question about whether he truly knew — experientially, not just textbook-wise — what it means to fear the Lord
One of my best friends in college, Nate Eisner. Nate and I had a great relationship. We were roommates, direct roommates for 2 years, and we would have We just had a sweet relationship. I can remember times praying with Nate until like the wee hours of the morning just because the Lord had led us. And he had this mentor, this guy he had met on a missions trip during the summer. His name was Henry, and he said it kind of weird because he was from Norway. So I can't even do the accent, but he said it in a very strange way. And Nate would have these marathon phone calls in Norway with Henry. So either really late at night or really early in the morning. And one of them was doing the flip side of it. And Henry was this mentor. And so when Nate got married, Henry flew out from Norway to marry Nate. And I remember sitting in his parents' living room, and Henry was a pastor, he was a mature believer, and he was interacting with us. And he looked at me specifically, and I will never forget this, and he said— he'd kind of heard, you know, I was interested in going to seminary and that sort of thing, and he said, tell me, What does the fear of God mean to you? And it was just one of those sobering questions in a room full of people, a handful of whom I really knew and a bunch that I didn't know, and this guy that I had known about for a couple years but actually only met for a few days. I just sort of mumbled the Sunday school answer, "Oh, the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom." The fear of God is is the beginning of wisdom. For what it's worth, that was true. But that wasn't what Henry was asking me. He was asking not for the textbook definition of the fear of the Lord. He was probing to see if I had experiential knowledge of that fear. Do you know know what it is to fear the Lord? Did I actually fear the Lord?
30 · Oswald expounds Jesus' sparrow-and-hair illustration, arguing that Jesus is not asking for a correct economic answer but probing whether the disciples grasp God's sovereign omniscience and providential care — do you fear this God?
Jesus asks a similar sort of question. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? He's not looking for the textbook market answer. Actually, with inflation today, It's actually 2 sparrows for a penny and a half. Jesus, no, that's not what he's asking at all. The point is God knows and ordains what happens to every sparrow. The same God has numbered the very hairs of our heads. For some of us, that's lots of hairs and it's really mind-boggling. Some of us, it's fewer hairs and it's still mind-boggling. God has numbered the hairs of your heads. The point is the same. Jesus is asking them, Do you fear this all-powerful, sovereign, all-knowing God? This is the God who looks down at Earth and all He has created, and He knows every single sparrow that gets sold for a penny. These are inconsequential beings, and this God knows what happens with every single one of them. And He looks at your head, and He knows exactly how many hairs you have on it. Translation: He controls all, He is all-powerful, and He knows all. He is much, much, much bigger and more significant than you. And He, in all of that significance, looks to you. And He cares for you.
31 · Oswald defines the fear of the Lord as awe — a deep, bone-level reverence mixing dread, worship, and wonder, which is the appropriate response to encountering the truly awful (awesome) God
The fear of the Lord is about awe. It's about a reverence that reaches down into our souls and into our bones. Awe is an emotion that goes deep in our hearts. Awe is this mix of dread and worship and wonder, and that gets stirred up when we encounter something that is truly awful or awesome, not the flippant way we use those words, but something that is truly, really awful. When we encounter that, there's awe. Encountering Almighty God is a truly awful thing, and it demands reverence, and yes, even fear.
32 · Oswald quotes Psalm 33:8 as biblical warrant for his definition of fear as awe, showing that Scripture commands all humanity to stand in awe of the Lord
Psalm 33:8, let all the earth, let all the earth Fear the Lord. Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him.
33 · Oswald directly challenges the congregation: contemporary Christians lack awe for God
We live in an age when people, even Christians, have an acute lack of awe for God. When was the last time the awe of God gripped your heart? As you gathered in His presence with the Spirit being poured out in worship? When you just stopped singing and sat down and just thought, "This God is holy." When's the last time you were praying by yourself and you felt compelled by the Spirit to prostrate yourself on the floor Because this God is awesome and transcendent and powerful because He is God and you are not.
34 · Oswald provides rapid-fire biblical examples of awe-filled fear in the presence of God — Moses at the burning bush, Isaiah in the throne room, Abraham receiving blessing — illustrating how the saints of old encountered God
Moses wouldn't even look at the burning bush. The burning bush is this representation of God, but not really God's face, and Moses won't look at the bush and he takes off his feet. Isaiah fears for his very life. "Woe is me, I'm undone!" as he stands in the throne room of God. Abraham is getting blessings from God. God comes down to bless Abraham and what's the first thing God says to Abraham? "Fear not." God doesn't just throw away words. He's saying that because Abraham is encountering this This awesome being, and he's scared. And God is going to bless him, and before Abraham's going to hear the blessing, "Abraham, fear not."
35 · Oswald corrects a shallow understanding of worship, challenging the assumption that being 'moved' in worship means leaving happy
We talk about being affected and moved in worship, and I do it too, and I want that. But I think a lot of times what we mean by that is, "I want to leave happy." You know what the Spirit wants to do to you in worship? Or in prayer, or when you're reading the Scriptures. He wants to leave you in awe.
36 · Oswald expounds Deuteronomy 10, emphasizing that the foundational requirement God places on Israel is to fear Him — a fear that leads to love, service, and obedience
Deuteronomy 10, Moses is about to die and he's reminding Israel, this rebellious, crazy people, before they go into the Promised Land, of all the stuff that God has done and all they're called to do. It's one big final sermon. In Deuteronomy 10, he says this, "And now, Israel, what does Yahweh the Lord your God require of you?" Don't read any further. What's he going to say? What does the Lord your God require of you but to fear Yahweh the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, to love Him, to serve Yahweh the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul? Behold, to Yahweh the Lord your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it. For Yahweh the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God. He is not partial. He takes no bribe. He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow. He loves the sojourner. You shall fear Yahweh the Lord your God, and in that fear you shall serve him. And hold fast to Him, and by His name you shall swear. He is your praise. He is your God who has done for you these great and terrifying things that your eyes have seen.
37 · Oswald contrasts the biblical vision of worship grounded in awe-filled fear with the shallow contemporary notion of 'praise and worship,' calling the congregation to deeper encounter
That's a lot deeper than the contemporary notion of praise and worship. That we would have that kind of encounter when we come to worship on Sunday mornings.
38 · Oswald connects the awesome God who demands fear to the promise of Luke 12:11-12 — this same God will fill believers with His Spirit to give them words in their moment of greatest need
That's the same God who promises that in the moment of need, when we bear witness to neighbors or even authorities, this awesome God will fill us with His Spirit. To give us words to speak.
39 · Oswald illustrates the Spirit's promised empowerment with Stephen's martyrdom — in his moment of greatest need, the awesome God gave Stephen words and opened heaven so he saw the Son of Man standing for him
It is the awesome God who, as Stephen is standing there stripped down, a bloodthirsty crowd picking up rocks, proclaims the gospel to his murderers and sees this promise, sees heaven open up and a recognition and a realization the Son of Man, the Son of God, is standing with him in that moment.
40 · Oswald confesses his own fear of man in a small, concrete context — passing out flyers for a church movie night — creating relatable vulnerability
There's a part of my heart that's a little scared to go pass out the flyers for the movie night. Like, let's just be honest. Hi, I'm from Providence. We have a movie. I hope it doesn't offend you. I'm not soliciting. It's free. I'm not selling you anything. Please come. Run away.
41 · Oswald provides Peter's Pentecost sermon as another illustration of the Spirit's empowerment, showing how the same cowardly Peter who denied Jesus was filled with boldness to preach before thousands
God will fill you with His Spirit in your moment of most acute need. He's going to fill Peter with such massive boldness that sitting in front of thousands of people who weeks prior are screaming, "Crucify Him! Crucify Him!" He's going to stand in front of those same people and he's going to preach full of the Spirit with such boldness that they recognize this Jesus is really alive. He's been raised. I remember when he taught and we said his teaching is with authority. And now this man Peter teaches with the same authority. What do we do, Peter? Repent and believe the gospel.
42 · Oswald identifies the passage's grace: God commands fear of His judgment, then immediately assures believers in Christ that they will face no punishment at that judgment because their sins are purged in Christ
This passage is filled with great grace. God wants to make us confident. He wants us to rest in His sovereign protection. Do you see that grace in the passage? The holy and awesome God tells us, "Fear Me." and no one else. Fear me because I have the power to send you into hell, to send you into a place of eternal punishment. And then in the next breath, he tells us if we stand with Jesus at the final judgment, there will be no punishment. What goes unsaid is that we should fear God and we should fear that judgment, but because in Christ our sins have been purged and done away with. All that's left is Christ's holiness. There is grace in this promise.
43 · Oswald reiterates the gospel promise: fear God now, stand with Jesus, and at the final judgment God and all heaven will stand with you — the reversal of fear
Fear the one who has the power to condemn you to eternal punishment. If you stand with the one he sent, the Son of Man, Jesus, at the final day when history is truly written, you will have no one to fear. And this God and all the host of heaven will stand with you.
44 · Oswald establishes that the gospel does not remove fear but purifies it — transforming ungodly fear into holy fear
In Christ, we are given a purified fear of the Lord. Fear doesn't disappear, it's just been changed.