Guarding the Flock

as we've been seeing in recent weeks for
three years now the Apostle Paul has
been proclaiming to the Ephesian Church
what he calls the whole Council of God
and the whole Council of God we've been
seeing in recent weeks is the sum total
of God's saving message through faith in
Jesus that saving message has two
components to it one component is
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you
will be saved the second component is if
you don't believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ you're going to be lost eternally
that is sobering business we've talked
about that and that is why Paul says in
verse 31 of this chapter to these
Ephesian elders remember that for three
years I never stopped warding each of
you night and day with tears and that is
also why he said earlier in verse 26 27
I declare to you today that I am
innocent of the blood of all men for I
have not hesitated to proclaim to you
the whole will or the whole counsel of
God Paul is leaving them with a good
conscience because he has done
everything that he can to both talk
about the positive side of the faith
which is the blessings of God in Christ
Jesus and the consequence is the
negative side of the faith if people
refuse to embrace the Gospel message and
now as we said earlier the time has come
for Paul to leave the Ephesian Church
permanently verse 25 now I know that
none of you among whom I have gone about
preaching the kingdom will ever see me
again this is the last time
that he is with the elders of the
Ephesian Church and understandably
that's a very traumatic experience for
them not only will they miss him big
time but leaving them creates a
leadership vacuum the universe abhors
vacuums because into the vacuum of his
leadership other people will try to step
in and they will try to do damage to
God's people because of their sinful
purposes and so Paul ever OnGuard ever
wanting to protect God's people warns
them about that in the verses 29 to 31
he says I know that after I leave savage
wolves will come in among you and will
not spare the flock even from your own
number men will arise and distort the
truth in order to draw away disciples
after them so be on your guard wants you
to notice that in those couple of verses
there are two very distinct enemies that
Paul warns against the first is what he
calls savage wolves I know that after I
leave savage wolves will come in among
you and will not spare the flock savage
wolves and wolves of course are the
traditional enemy of sheep they are
predators they have no desire but to
kill and to destroy and to scatter them
and they are savage in their attack some
of you will remember stories that I've
told about the early years of my youth
when I was a shepherd for a couple of
years and the story went like this I had
worked on the farm of a relative had
made a couple hundred dollars and was
pondering what
do with my hundred a couple hundred
dollars when and I don't even remember
who it was somebody suggests that I
ought to invest it in sheep very unwise
decision in retrospect but I did I went
out and I bought 25 sheep
unfortunately my oldest brother decided
that since I had to look after 25 sheep
he bought 89 more and put me in charge
of all of them and what a challenge that
was because our farm was fenced for
cattle it was not fenced for sheep and
if you know anything about sheep sheep
are not hindered by barbed wire fences
they just stick their head under and
they get down on their knees and they
wrap all their sweet little wool around
the barbs in the barbed wire and once
one is across everybody else follow so I
ended up spending a lot of time in the
field just guarding the sheep until we
had enough time effort and money to get
proper fencing for them but the story
that I'm about to relate to you happened
early one morning my father whose
bedroom was just across the road from
where we kept our sheep was awakened by
a tremendous commotion in the field
where the sheep were where were grazing
or sleeping at that time and upon
investigation discovered that I believe
two neighbouring dogs had gotten into my
flock of sheep of at night and by the
time he got me out of bed and I came to
investigate what was happening it was
still very early in the morning
just around dawn I could not believe my
eyes because dead and dying sheep and
lambs were everywhere and had a whole
new appreciation for what the Bible
calls Salvage wolves
if domesticated dogs can do that much
damage imagine what a savage wolf can do
to a flock of sheep it was a terrible
experience and Paul's
one of the things that's gonna happen to
you after I leave his wolves are going
to come in and they're going to attack
the Church of God now we know from the
New Testament that these savage wolves
wolf attacks on the Christian Church at
the time generally came in one of two
forms the first was persecution from Jew
and Gentile
you'll recall that earlier on in Acts
chapter 19 we have that whole story of
the big riot in Ephesus headed up by
Demetrius the silversmith his business
is suffering he's got his business
associates all riled up and they get the
whole city riled up and and it's an
extremely dangerous situation for the
church and for the Apostle Paul in
particular and sets the stage for his
leaving of the city to continue on with
the rest of his missionary journey Jesus
warns against that continually in the
New Testament there are savage wolves
who hate God's people who hate what they
stand for and who have no desire but to
see you destroyed and torn down and as
I've said many times we live in a
culture where increasingly the culture
is in tie Christian values and where the
courage of unbelievers is increasing to
the point where persecution against
Christians is becoming more and more
prominent that is what Paul is warning
them against when he says savage wolves
are going to come among you there's a
second kind of savage wolf though that's
very common in the New Testament and
including today and that comes from
false teachers who are constantly trying
to invade the church
and lead God's people astray both in the
Old Testament and in the New Testament
one of the Bane's of the existence of
God's people is false prophets or false
apostles who are trying to lead God's
people in directions where God does not
want them to go Jesus talks about it in
in the Sermon on the Mount he says to
his disciples watch out for false
prophets they come to you in sheep's
clothing but inwardly they are ferocious
wolves in other words they blend in with
the Christians they look like sheep but
inside they don't have an interest in
the well-being of the Sheep they want to
take advantage of you and if you look at
Paul's ministry himself then you will
see that in addition to the persecution
that he suffered from Jew and Gentile he
also suffered from false brethren false
apostles false prophets who constantly
tried to undermine his particular
ministry he releases in 2nd Corinthians
chapter 11 concerning such people he
says they are false apostles they are
deceitful workmen masquerading as
apostles of Christ and no wonder for
Satan himself masquerades as an angel of
light it is not surprising then if his
servants masquerade as servants of
righteousness they look like they belong
but they are ferocious wolves so that's
one of the groups that Paul warns
against he says there are wolves out
there they may look like sheep but their
intention is to hurt and kill and
destroy because they do not have the
heart of Jesus
and they do not have the spirit of Jesus
but then there's a second category of
course that he warns against in this
particular passage and that is
troublemakers that are much closer to
home even from your own number men will
arise and distort the truth in order to
draw away disciples after them
it isn't just out there he says that you
face an enemy the enemy can even be with
Ian these are people from your own
number who distort the truth and the
reason for distorting the truth is to
draw away disciples after them they are
sectarian they want to destroy the unity
of the church and they want to build
their own following and of course the
history of the Christian Church has been
filled with people like that and there
are some principles behind this that I
want to take a few moments to try to
explain to you so bear with me as I talk
about the fact that every community of
people in the world typically consists
of a variety of constituents I don't
know if you could read all of that the
see here stands for consist constituents
so constituency one two three four five
and six making up the sum total of the
community think of Canada we've just had
the census of 2016 at least certain
aspects of it the results come out and
we know that Canada is increasingly a
multicultural nation and so in Canada we
have people of French extraction we have
people of English extraction we have
people of Western European extraction we
have people of Caribbean extraction we
have people of African extraction
now increasingly the largest number of
immigrants coming to Canada are people
of Asian extraction these are all very
distinct communities and a community if
the basic unit of society is the family
then families make up tribes and society
is by definition tribal in the sense
that you have all these groups of people
who are related either by culture Orvil
anguish or by blood or by purpose now
the challenge then and we need the
picture back up again the challenge is
how do you keep a multi cultural
community together
Canada is becoming increasingly aware of
the fact that we have all these diverse
communities that didn't even think of
mentioning the indigenous people who are
of course in the news all the time now
and growing four times faster
statistically than the rest of the
population well the world's answer to
that is that you need common values that
are mediated by leaders so here you have
your values think of this as what we
call the Canadian value and the circle
around that represents the leaders who
advance those kind of values to try to
hold a society together now I've got to
tell you that long term that's going to
fail and I can tell you why because
we're trying to reverse the tower of
bball without the Lord Jesus who alone
can bring different cultures together
God cursed the Tower of Babel to scatter
the population into all these different
language groups and when resources
become limited and problems arise we'll
talk about that in a moment
then this cozy coexistence begins to
fall apart and we
seeing it in Europe we've seen it in the
middle-east and sadly enough I suspect
eventually we're importing that into
Canada Canadian values alone will not
hold this together now that's society
but the church also consists of
different constituencies even a church
like this consists of different
constituencies consider for example that
some of us here are of Dutch extraction
born and raised in the Christian Church
that's one constituency some of you are
born and raised in other Christian
traditions and you have joined our
community because you have found an
affinity with us others still were not
raised in a Christian community at all
found Christ here and have become part
of Christian community now add to that
you've got people separated by age and
by language and by worship style and by
preferences and by histories you can
understand the challenge of building
Christian community because everybody
thinks what they have is the norm you
will have noticed that the songs you
like are the best songs in the world and
the songs that somebody else likes are
never as good as the songs you like
that's just the reality so if the church
is doing its job that is how the church
is composed of different tribes tongues
and languages what is the glue that
unites us well you see the Jay standing
for Jesus because it is in him that God
intends to unite everything in heaven
and on earth that's why I said earlier
multiculturalism apart from Jesus is
going to fail because what Pentecost
represents in the book of Acts the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit the
declaration of the mighty acts of God in
the languages of all the people
represents a reversal of the Tower of
Babel under
in that place so the cultural linguistic
and and and whatever else separates
people changes when you come to faith in
Jesus and you let Jesus do his thing he
breaks the barriers and in Christ there
is neither male nor female slave and
they're free Jew or Gentile you're all
one in Christ Jesus
and you're the children of God that's a
genius of the church church doesn't
always do a very good job living it out
but that's why God gives the Holy Spirit
and that's the beauty of the church that
God can hold up there's a multicultural
assembly of different people with
different tastes different skin colors
different languages different food
styles different worship styles and
makes them love the Lord their God with
all other heart soul strength of mine
and love each other
Jesus is the glue who holds his people
together but he does it then by leaders
that he establishes and so we have Jesus
that ties all these different elements
together and then we have leadership
that God establishes that serves as
ligaments of the body I love the way
Paul puts it in Colossians chapter 2
verse 19 it's talking about the Lord
Jesus from whom the whole body grows as
God causes it to grow but supported and
held together by its ligaments and
sinews by its ligaments and sinews now
some of you have dislocated shoulders
some of you have dislocated knees you've
been to the doctor and you know what it
is that holds your body together
it is ligaments and sinews and my
understanding of that passe
is that through the Lord Jesus and
people that he raises up God bridges the
gap among different constituencies in
Christian community so that in uniting
around Jesus and in uniting around the
leadership that God raises up in
Christian community you have these
different groups that may not have much
to do with each other they're joined to
each other through Jesus and through the
leadership to whom they give their
loyalty and whom they trust does that
make sense are you understanding what
I'm trying to say here because you'll
see where this is going in a moment and
why Paul is concerned because you see
the glue that holds this multicultural
church at Ephesus together is not only
Jesus but also the Apostle Paul he led
them to the Lord he has a relationship
with them day and night he has been
teaching and warning in public and from
Houston you've got a relationship with
everybody but now what's gonna happen
he's going to go away and what do you
think is going to happen when he goes
away well we said it earlier it creates
a leadership vacuum and in a leadership
vacuum what happens is that to the
degree to which the leaders are gone and
to the degree to which Jesus begins to
fade into the background
guess what happens the relationship that
the glue that binds everybody together
through the sinews and ligaments that
Jesus has provided now begins to fade
away and who do you think steps into the
vacuum I'll tell you who steps into the
those are the leaders of the varying
constituencies these are people who
represent the value of these
constituencies they have submitted
themselves to Jesus and to the leaders
that Jesus has raised up that glue is
beginning to diminish and out of your
own midst people begin to emerge who
build their own constituencies and learn
a long time ago that the people that the
leaders that people elect and this is
true across the board to democracy is
not necessarily are not necessarily the
people who make the best leaders did you
know that through the people elected
their leaders those they believed best
represent their interests why do you
think Trump is President of the United
States because he is perceived as best
representing the interests of a certain
segment of the population just like
Hillary was viewed as the best person to
represent an other portion of the
community so when a vacuum a leadership
vacuum arises and this is what post
talking about what happens is that other
leaders step in and you have depending
on you know how devoted they are to
Jesus and how committed they are to the
purposes of God you have a a breakdown
in the sum total of the community and
each of these communities becomes
fragmented particularly when resources
become limited particularly when times
get hard you've seen this in Europe
you've seen this in the Middle East
people that have lived side by side for
generations that have gotten along with
each other
somebody stirs them up and you have
neighbors turning each other in and
neighbors killing each other and you say
Oh that'll never happen to me and little
everyb mics don't be so she don't be so
sure
don't be so sure because Satan is sly
and he knows how to play in our fears
and he knows to play on our places of
wounding to make us think that if we
don't defend ourselves and stand up for
our own rights nobody else is going to
so just to move this forward now can you
with me here in the early church there
were two heresies - distorted teachings
that were constantly trying to invade
the church and do serious damage the
first is what I would call a return to
observing the law of Moses I returned to
observing the law of Moses when the
gospel was preached it was always
preached first to the Jews
many Jews responded to the gospel and
thousands of Jews were swept up into the
Christian Church these were people who
all their lives had lived under the law
of Moses they observed Mosaic rituals
they knew they had been handed down by
God and though they had come to Jesus
they tended to slide back into observing
the law of Moses they wanted to return
to circumcision they wanted to return to
observing seasons and special days they
wanted to both be Jewish in Christian at
the same time and it sounded perfectly
plausible to them because what could
honor God more than if you are trying to
observe the law Paul in the book of
Galatians
addresses that issue and here's what he
says to them and you can you can sense
his anger he says you foolish Galatians
who has bewitched you interesting word
because it means that their spiritual
warfare involved in this there are the
elemental spirits of the universe who
try to take you from grace put you back
under the law that's the whole topic in
itself who has bewitched you before
whose very eye your very eyes Jesus
Christ was clearly portrayed as
crucified I would like to learn just one
thing from you
did you receive the spirit by observing
the law or by believing what you heard
are you so foolish after beginning with
the spirit are you now trying to attain
your goal by human effort do you
understand what the issue is with what
the New Testament calls the Judaizers is
it wrong to live right is it wrong to
want to observe the law of mode that's
not the issue the issue is what makes
you acceptable before God
is it your observance of the law is it
by leaving right does God love you more
does he give you the spirit better
because you are a good person or does he
give you the spirit by coming just as
you are leaning on Jesus and knowing
that because they him your righteous
before God and the law does not make any
difference you observe the law out of
love for Jesus it's not the keeping of
the law that makes you a child of God
can I say it clearly enough that is the
issue and that is the issue that God's
people slide into again and again most
of us who become Christians if we fall
away
we don't necessarily fall away into the
bad things of the world all some of us
do obviously but we tend to slide back
into
legalism we slide back into thinking I'm
just slightly better than you are
because I don't do what you do and I'm a
little Hollyer because I practice more
Christian disciplines than you do and we
feel kind of smug about ourselves and we
fail to understand that Paul says in
Christ Jesus neither circumcision or
uncircumcision makes any difference what
makes a difference
is faith working through love see the
thing with the distortion of the gospel
is that you only need to be off a
fraction of a degree
it looks imperceptible I could preach
you a sermon I think I could maybe I
think I could preach you a sermon that
was just off enough to fall into the
category of being a Judy Iser many of
you might or might not notice it because
it would be off that little but all you
have to do is be off a fraction of a
degree and what happens down the road
you end way out to lunch Paul gets a red
horn I mean this issue is so critical in
the book of Galatians that Peter
remember Peter called of God first to
deliver the gospel to the Kurth to the
household of Cornelius a Gentile
Barnabas who was a man a son of
encouragement loved everybody they got
caught up in this to the point that Paul
had to rebuke them publicly because he
was so interested in preserving the
Judaizers are always among us and the
distortions are very slight but they
build a different system not a system of
salvation by grace through faith
but a system of salvation that is subtly
rooted in my background in my character
in how I live and in how I observe
things before the face of God
okay one more heresy then we're going to
be done for this morning as a second
heresy that the New Testament church
fought against tooth and nail for two to
three hundred years and that is a
philosophy that is called Gnosticism
it's rooted in Greek philosophy it's
very complex in its sum total but really
boils down to this
the Gnostics thought that creation
physical creation was fundamentally bad
and the way that you got redeemed from
being fundamentally bad was not by
coming to faith in Jesus who would renew
us but by acquiring what they called
gnosis Gnosticism the word gnosis means
knowledge and they believed that if you
had insight that other people did not
have and you could find the right theory
to live by then you could be delivered
from from the power of the flesh and you
could live your life in a way that
matter to God ironically the outcome of
that was it didn't matter what you did
in your body so you could say no you
want but God would love you anyway
because you see you had an edge over
other people you had a gnosis that other
people did not have this was so
pervasive in the culture that both the
book of Colossians and first John are
used of God to address it listen to what
Paul says reading to the Colossians 2:8
see to it that no one takes you captive
through Hollow and deceptive philosophy
which depends on human tradition and the
basic principles of this world rather
than on Christ the basic principles of
this world the basic the elemental
spirits of the universe I believe are
demonic structures that shape the
philosophical thinking of people that
that lead us away from grace in Christ
and that teach us that if only we tried
it harder
there are ways around Jesus to be
righteous and to be holy and for the
Gnostics that involved special
revelation special feeling special
insights the church fought Gnosticism
for two to three hundred years John
talks about it also 1 John chapter 4
dear friends do not believe every spirit
test the spirits to see whether they are
from God because many false prophets are
gone out into the world many false
spirits have gone out into the world if
you read the rest of that passage he
talks about what the test is to see if
the spirits are from God and if you
remember the passage you might remember
what is the test has Jesus come in the
flesh if Jesus has come in the flesh and
you believe that Jesus has come in the
flesh that is to say was truly human
then you're listening to the Spirit of
the Lord the spirit of Gnosticism denies
the reality of humanity Jesus wasn't
really real the result is that real
people cannot really be saved in the
real world how many people do you know
who don't believe that the gospel can
fundamentally change people for the
better in the urine ow by the power of
God's Holy Spirit that's a form of
Gnosticism it happens everywhere so Paul
says you got two problems that you're
going to
face wolves they're gonna try to take
you out man
and he says from within you've got
people who want to build their own
following and they will do that by
distorting the truth of Jesus I'm only
halfway through but I think we better
stop out of consideration for you but I
want you to do some thinking read the
passage that we have read this morning
what's the solution that Paul raises up
for the dilemma that we face in other
words how can God's people be protected
from savage wolves and from wolves in
sheep clothing from within or without
that try to take us places or we ought
Annette ago the New Testament is so
committed to the truth of the gospel
because only Jesus saves and if the
enemy can wean us away from Jesus into
all kinds of fanciful speculations and
wonderful spiritual experiences and God
knows what he's got it by the nose
because he knows the end will lead to
our destruction thank God that he cares
for the church and that he's made
provision that the church can stand firm
you