James 1:27 - Basic Discipleship

Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches special Monday Morning Coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right. With look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it further and better work the applications into our daily lives. Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And, he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday Morning Coffee with Mark.

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast for Monday, November the seventh. I'm Mark. I'm holding a great cup of coffee. Well, actually it's not a great cup of coffee. I'm kind of struggling to dial in this particular blend of coffee beans and it's a, yeah, it's probably an okay cup of coffee, but be that as it may, I've got coffee, I've got my Bible reading schedule, I've got my notes from yesterday's sermon and I am ready to get this podcast going. Let's get started And we'll start that as we always do by thinking a little bit about the sermon yesterday. Yesterday I preached from James 1 27, a sermon I just called the Basics of discipleship. I think James puts together some important ideas here in a very fundamental kind of fashion that help us understand what it is to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. And I don't think there's a lot I need to add to that. James 1 27 is very straightforward. Religion is pure and unto file before God the Father is this, to visit orphans and whi in the affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world. And what I hope you're doing is being thoughtful about your discipleship. It doesn't come easily, it doesn't come automatically, but I'm gonna repeat how I ended yesterday. What are you doing? How are you planning to help someone in need this week? Have you spent some time in self examination to see if the world's ways are staining you? What are you doing as a disciple? Because real discipleship is done. It's not just talked about. Think about that and do something with it this week. It may have made plans yesterday to do that. Now it's Monday. Lots is going on that may have slipped through our fingers. The podcast is here to remind you, let's be disciples. This week It is Monday and today we're reading Ephesians five verses 22 to 33 Roman in Greek documents or literature. What we have here would be called a household code. This would be the order in rules for how family, how a marriage, how a household is to be put together and how it is to be run. And you should know that there's just not anything here that looks anything like how a standard Greek or Roman household would operate in those kinds of circumstances. The husband was the absolute desperate. He ruled over that house like a king. He could treat his wife as one without any rights or privileges of any kind, dictator, desperate. All of that comes to mind when you examine material outside of the New Testament discussing how the family should be run in the first century world, which makes Ephesians 5 22 to 33. So distinctively different Christian homes were different and any attempt to turn this material into something that resembles the despotic and dictatorship kind of ways of Rome and Greek society is just an absolute fail. Of course, so many people misunderstand the submission in verse 22 that wives are commanded to demonstrate to their husband's wive, sumit to your own husbands as unto the Lord. Submission is a term that means to rank under. It means to yield to it is a military term or rooted in some military terms and it is not, This is so significant here. It is not a term that is only for women and it is not a term that is about superiority and inferiority. Let me deal with both sides of that. First and foremost, there's lots of submission in the Bible, not just for wives, not just for women. We submit to the elders, Hebrews 13, verse 17, That's for all of us. We all submit to Jesus Christ. We all submit to governing authorities. Romans chapter 13, if we could get it through our heads, that submission is for everyone. I think we'd all do a whole lot better than than we often do thinking this is some kind of special class of of behavior that's only for women and only in marriage. And in fact, if men will think a little bit about how they feel about submission, for example, to the local elders that might help them in their home a little bit. Do the local churches', elders, stifle every opinion? Do they tell us to just obey blindly without ever asking any questions, without ever submitting any feedback? Well, well, of course not. That's just foolishness. Even in the military. Even in the military, the leader at the top, the general who's or the admiral who's running the battle, he solicits feedback from those that are on the front lines, what's really going on out there. So submission doesn't mean that a woman has no ability or no right to say anything to her husband about finances or the rearing of children or decisions that are being made. A true leader always solicits feedback. What submission does mean is that she yields to his authority, to his headship, to his leadership. That's what this is all about. And it doesn't mean that she's inferior again. Do we think in any way that we are inferior to political leaders, Governor Abbott? Oh, he's just a superior human being to the rest of us. That's why we submit to him. Of course not. Oh, President Biden, he's just a superior version of humanity. That's why we're in submission to him. Of course not. We are in submission to him because Romans 13 tells us to be in submission to governing authorities. Not because they are somehow quantitatively better people, but because they occupy a position. It's not about superiority. Women are not inferior to men in many ways, women are superior to men. That's a long list. Just like in many ways men are superior to women. There are things men do much better than women do. There are things that women do that are so much better than what men do. That's not about superiority, inferiority, it's about roles and where we best fit in God's plan so that the home can function in the very best way. Maybe what's most important about submission is not what's said in verse 22, but instead what's said in verse 25, Husbands love your wives as Christ love the church. Yes, men lead the home, but men are to lead the home by modeling Jesus Christ. Think about how Christ gives himself up for us. Christ didn't come to this earth and demand everything and all perks and privileges and I want the corner office and everybody's gonna do for me. If Jesus wanted all of that, he didn't never left heaven in the first place. He had all of that. He gave that up to come here and sacrifice himself for us. The husband who loves his wife as Christ loved the church who gives himself up for his wife is the husband who's going to find his wife willingly following his leadership, particularly if the husband verse 28 loves his wife as he loves himself. Those two important notes help a husband be certain to exercise leadership in the very best kind of way. I'll give you one more note about this quite quickly. There is some attempts. I know this will shock you to water this down or to change this particularly in light of modern ideals of how the family and the home and marriage ought to be run. And so there's a very popular kind of thing going around, particularly the evangelical circles, that what this is really about is mutual submission. Everybody submits to everybody because verse 21 even says submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. So everybody submits to everybody and that just sounds amazing. Mutual submission, oh, that's where it's really at. But of course that is not what verse 21, which is part of Friday's reading. That is not what verse 21 is talking about. Verse 21 just says that everybody should submit to those who are in authority over them. And then Paul begins to detail where that is. Wives are gonna submit to the leadership of their husbands. Chapter six, children are going to submit to parents. And if this idea of mutual submission is really what Paul is talking about, then well let's just try that. Does does that work in the church? Christ submits to us and we submit to Christ? Oh yes, mutual submission. That's foolishness. How about in chapter six of Ephesians? Do children submit to parents? Oh, but sometimes parents submit to children again foolishness. This isn't about mutual submission, it's about each of us filling our roles so that the family will operate in the very best way. So let me finish with a great quote Fromto. I used Scott last week and I just really like some of the things that he says here To our minds, the word authorities suggests power, dominion, and even oppression. We picture the authoritative husband is a domineering figure who makes all the decisions himself, issues, commands and expects obedience, inhibits and suppresses his wife and prevents her from growing into a mature or fulfilled person. This is not at all the kind of headship which the apostle is describing, whose model is Jesus Christ. This is servant leadership. And I want to say again, I think the more husbands lead like Christ, the easier women find it to submit to their husbands. That doesn't mean that every woman who is not submitting is is failing to be what she ought to be because her husband is failing to be what he ought to be. But it's a great start when husbands take the lead. Many times wives find it very easy to follow. Hope that helps you with your reading today. Let's talk about the home some more. Tomorrow we'll talk about Ephesians chapter six and we'll talk about kids See you on Tuesday. Welcome to Tuesday and we're reading Ephesians six, one to nine here there's discussion of children and their responsibilities and parents' responsibility to kids and then there's slaves and masters beginning in verse five. Let's deal with a couple of things in verses one to four children Obey your parents in the Lord. For this is right, Paul's emphasis here is in the Lord and that does not just mean instructions if the parents are Christians or only if the instructions are somehow in line with what children expect a Christian parent should do. Paul's emphasis is that when children give obedience to their parents, they are acting in the will of the Lord. That's what kids need to be doing. That's how kids please the Lord Today, and I should say this verse two, Honor your father and mother honoring is to give different deference to to be preferred, to put first. And I think that needs a lot more exploring today. We really have gone from that uh, old fashioned idea of children should be seen and not not heard to a place where now parents have become the footmen and servants of children. Children are front and center. They dominate everything. They are the ones that everybody caters to. They are the ones who are put first given deference. They are the ones who are honored. We need to teach children to honor mom and dad and maybe that doesn't mean that we go back to the old fashioned ways where maybe children were suppressed and and not given any room at all. But there is something to be said for children respecting their parents and for showing honor, preferring parents, giving them deference. Just think about that in your own home. How are you teaching your children to honor mom and dad? That's a command of scripture. That's not something Mark Roberts just made up. That's something that God says children need to be doing instead of mom and dad putting the kids first. Kids need to put mom and dad first. What a radical idea when that it goes on verse three, Paul says, Society can function. And when we get things upside down and think about how we're seeing that in our own world today, when children are put first, when the kids are put in charge of everything, make all the choices, all the decisions, oftentimes society gets pretty shaky. The foundation of society is a solid home and that then is continued when fathers instead of provoking children to anger, discipline their children, bringing them up with the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Discipline is punishment for the purpose of improved behavior. That's what that's about. Parents are told to do that by God you don't discipline your children. You are in San. You are failing to do what God has specifically instructed you to do. Hope that helps you some with the home. Lots to think and pray about there isn't there. Let's think about slaves and masters. There are approximately 60 million slaves in the Roman Empire at the writing of Ephesians chapter six. About one third of the city of Rome was made up of slaves and I don't think Paul is endorsing slavery here at all. He's trying to put some curbs on it and reform an institution that was deeply embedded in Roman's society and I know that there's a lot of discussion about that and why the Bible doesn't do away with slavery. I've had opportunity to think through that with you when we talked about reading the book of FileMan. You can go back and listen to that lesson. It's a 9:00 AM lesson on West Side's website. Talked about that some in my Bible class in Genesis as we talked about Joseph and what happened during the time of the famine. I won't re dig all of that, but it is important to realize the New Testament church wasn't here to reform society. The New Testament church was here to help men and women be right with God. What is important about that is of course as more and more people came to be right with God, what happened to slavery? What was accepted everywhere in the world, Everybody just assumed that's just part of how life goes. The conqueror in slaves of the ConEd, No. Now slavery is viewed as abhorrent and awful and it is largely been exterminated around the globe. Why is that? Yes, that's because of the influence of the gospel. So here there is discussion. Maybe we could make good application of this on our own jobs that we are not to be I serving people pleasers. Verse six I service is a term that occurs only here ending Colossians 3 22. It is probably a term that Paul coined himself, which makes me feel a little bit better when I coined terms like bestest and mostest. Paul did that and maybe I can do some of that as well. I think this material is very straightforward. What we need is to read it and then we just need, we talked about this Sunday about being a disciple. We need to do it. I'll see you tomorrow as we continue in Ephesians chapter six. It is Wednesday and we are completing the book of Ephesians today. Ephesians chapter six, verse 10 to 24 is our reading for today, one of the most famous sections of Ephesians and that's saying something because Ephesians is full of so many famous passages, but here is the armor of God, Ephesians six beginning in verse 10. Finally be strong in the Lord. It is an expression that means to be strengthened in the Lord and it pictures the Christian as a soldier in the army of God. Remember the picture of the Lord is a mighty warrior who leads the hosts of heaven is a very common theme and image of God in the Old Testament. Psalm 35, Isaiah 42. Lots and lots of places in the Old Testament see God as a warrior at the head of his legions or host. And then again in the book of Revelation, Jesus the mighty warrior king is seen several times. That's imagery that we are not as familiar with and maybe sometimes people are uncomfortable with. Some denominations have banned the singing of the song Onward. Christian Soldiers. We can't have that kind of military language anymore, but there is a fight going on between good and evil between light and dark and Paul says, Christians need to get in it and if we're gonna get in it, we need to have the armor necessary to win that fight. In some ways, this section is very much just kind of restating some of the themes, particularly that idea of putting on the new man. Chapter four talks about that verse 24, but this is very much that new nature, that new man, this is how we act towards sin and those that study letters and Roman letter writing form will tell you that this place in the letter is a place where the writer would recapitulate and restate the major themes. So that means that lots of emphasis needs to be given to this section. Maybe read over it a couple of times, think back through Ephesians and think about the ideas and Ephesians that are being said one more time. Maybe like a great symphony in that last movement, all of of the major melody lines and the various interplay between the various instrumentation, all of that is brought to the fore as it crescendos. One more time, and I think this is verses 10 to 20, is that crescendo Paul walks through the various pieces of armor. Most of those don't need a lot of explanation. The belt verse 14 probably does. That's not a belt like you have through your Levi's or wranglers that holds your pants up. The Roman soldier's belt is more like a leather apron worn beneath the other armor kind of like shorts would protect his thighs, um, and would protect also his abdomen and so forth. So that's a little bit different than belt. Please notice here about the shoes, the gospel of peace. There's a little bit of an ironic use there as Paul talks about how the gospel of peace will make us ready for war. We need the shield of faith and we need the helmet of salvation. I love the idea of salvation being our helmet. That's the hope of salvation. Verse 17 and of course the sword of the spirit. The sword is the only offensive weapon the Christian soldier has. The word of God is what we go to battle with. Finally, Paul concludes verses 21 to 24 with some personal notes, very, very close to Colossians four versus seven and eight, and this would help us notice verse 21, TKI is there again. He's the one carrying the mail. He's the one carrying the mail to Colossi, to fa Leman and to eus. TKI is such an important lieutenant in Paul's service. What a great book Ephesians is. I have loved reading this book with you and I hope that you are deeply impressed with this idea that Ephesians sets before us that because we're in Christ, we need to walk worthy of our calling. Tomorrow we'll go to Philippi. I'll see you on Thursday in the book of Philippians. It is Thursday and we begin the book of Philippians. Today, our reading today is Philippians one, one to 11, and there's an awful lot that I'd like to say in a background kind of way about the book of Philippians, but I'm not saying that today on the podcast because I want to say that Sunday in the New Testament church road tour, we will go to Philippi. We'll talk about that city, We'll talk about this church, the founding of it. We'll talk about Paul's love for this church and that's what you're gonna get through today's reading. Paul loves these brethren so very much He begins with Paul and Timothy. Actually Timothy is with Paul, but Timothy doesn't really appear a whole lot in this book. This seems to be very much Paul's writing and he says, I thank God verse three, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. Paul is praying. He's praying regularly. He feels verse seven so attached to this church. They are so special to him. They matter so much to him and so he cares about them. I will give you the summary that I'm gonna give everybody on Sunday so that you'll have something to work with as you do your questions and so forth. Not easy to summarize the book of Philippians, but there's a couple of major ideas that walk all the way through the book of Philippians. I guess I should be careful with the term walks since that's the theme in the book of Ephesians. Walking's not really the emphasis in Philippians. Here's what I'm gonna use as a summary. As you read, see what you think about this. See if it works for you. I think there's a couple of big ideas that just keep coming up and here it is. My summary is this, I love you, so I don't want you to waiver in your faith, work together and imitate Christ. Paul's love for these brethren just keeps coming out. He wants them to be strong, particularly because there are some opponents and some enemies. Look at 1 27 standing firm in one spirit. He wants them to be unified. There are some problems with bickering. Seems like there is some issues with that going on. Famous passage in verse two of chapter four, Yoda and sin taiki are called out for their bickering and fussing and then there's lots in this book about models and that primarily looks to Jesus Christ imitate Jesus Christ. Chapter two verse five, Have you this mind among yourselves which is in Christ Jesus. So the idea here, I love you, so don't waiver in your faith, work together in unity and imitate Jesus. I'll give you one more thing from today's reading, verse nine. It's my prayer that you that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment. The book of Philippians is a thinking person's book. Paul constantly calls for the Philippians to think, engage their minds, discern what they ought to be doing. Watch for that. Lots of thinking in this book. See, tomorrow we'll read a little bit further in Philippians chapter one. It's Friday, you made it to the end of another week. Today we're reading Philippians chapter one versus 12 to 20 and hear Paul informs the brethren then Philippi that he loves so much about his situation. I want to say I think this is more than just news. I think this is the beginning of that modeling thing. Be like me as I imitate Christ. Watch for some of that. As Paul works through this particularly, he's talking about being in prison. He is writing this while being chained to a Roman guard. Think about that and where Paul is in his life. This is the Acts 28 passage that talks about Paul being under house arrest. This must have been a very difficult time in Paul's life, but he continues to do the best he can where he is. He does talk about some people, verse 15, who are preaching Christ from envy and rivalry and there's lots of conjecture about that. What exactly is Paul talking about? Notice he's more concerned that the message is preached. He's not concerned about the motivation of the preacher. This is different than in the Book of Galatians where Paul is so concerned about judaizing teachers who are preaching a false gospel. These men are preaching the truth. They're just doing it for the wrong reasons. Maybe they're doing that to embarrass Paul or maybe they're trying to get Paul into more trouble. Maybe this is about rivalry. They they want positions of leadership. They want accolades for themselves. Paul isn't concerned about that as long as the message is being preached, that's what matters. That's what he wants and that's what he wants the Philippians to focus on. And then he starts talking. Verse 19, right here at the end of our reading today about deliverance, that this will turn out for my deliverings. That's a phrase out of job chapter 13 verse 16, and Paul probably is talking there. It's a term there that is used of salvation and maybe are we we're trying to figure out here are the Philippians praying that he'd be released from prison or that he would be executed and go on to heaven. It does seem like the issue of imprisonment is not as important to Paul as it might be to us or it would be to the Philippians, but deliverance here does seem probably to be getting out of jail. He talks about that even more in Monday's reading, but I think they are, They are praying that Paul will be delivered and that he will get to come to them. Let's think about that more on Monday as we'll, complete chapter one. But that'll be our reading for today and I hope that that helps you as you're considering and starting in the book of Philippians with me more about Philippians, more about Philippi on Sunday at the West Side Church of Christ. Hope that you will be there and that you'll be there in person. As always, I thank you for listening to the podcast, Hope that you're following subscribe or whatever it takes to make that app deliver the podcast to you directly and automatically, and I hope that you're enjoying it and telling others about it. But until next week, or maybe even better until Sunday when we get to talk about the Philippian Church in the 10 40 hour. But until Sunday, may your coffee be delightful. May your Friday be wonderful and may the Lord be with you today all day. I'll see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.

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