Sermon from December 27, 2009
"Jesus Christ: Exaltation and the Governance of the World"
Revelation 11:15

Many years ago, I became interested in how the Church has expressed its devotion to God through the centuries. My interest has taken me to many prayer books and devotional guides. They have taught me to pray, and I am thankful to God for that.

There have been surprises. One of them is in the prayers during Advent, the four weeks leading to Christmas Day. You would think those prayers would center on the birth of Christ, His First Advent. Instead, they center on His Second Advent. For example, the prayer for today reads like this: “Purify my conscience, Almighty God, by your daily visitation, that your Son Jesus Christ, at his coming, may find me a mansion prepared for himself; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.”

Today’s sermon reflects the Church’s focus on the Second Coming of Christ. I call it: Jesus Christ, Exaltation and the Governance of the World. The sermons last Sunday and today are part of a series called: Who We Are. They present what defines Brandywine Valley Baptist Church.

In the first two sermons I told the story of this church’s 40-year existence, and I described this church as a safe haven, a training center, and a base of operations. The third and fourth sermons talked about who we are by describing this church as a community of faith and also a community of holy sinners. The sermons today and last Sunday are about Jesus Christ. Last week’s sermon focused on one biblical text, Philippians 2:5-11. Today, everything is moving toward one biblical text, but I need to prepare you to hear it by taking you across the entire Bible.

Hopes and Fears of All the Years
We often hear the word god outside church and synagogue, and people most often use it carelessly and profanely. Their ideas of god are as vague as their ideas of Sasquatch or the Man in the Moon. Inside church and synagogue ideas about God can be just as vague. There is only one cure, the Bible.

The Bible tells stories of the Jewish people and their relationship with God over about 1600 years. If you really want to know God, you have to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest those stories over and over in company with a community of faith like Brandywine Valley Baptist Church and indeed with the Church worldwide.

I have been doing that for over half a century. For a few moments I want to dip into those stories and let selected passages from them prepare you for the one biblical text toward which this sermon moves. We begin in Genesis 3:15.

Here God curses the serpent that tempted Eve to sin with these words: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” The Church has often called this the first preaching of the gospel and has interpreted Christ to be the woman’s offspring, who would be bitten by the serpent, the devil, but who would crush the serpent’s head.

Next is Genesis 12:3 and God’s call to Abraham. God said to him: “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Here in the foundations of Israel is a vision of Israel’s universal mission that is to be in force for as long as the world shall last.

Much of the story of Israel from Exodus through 2 Kings is a story of how they lost sight of their mission in the world with two exceptions, the Psalms and the prophets. Here are two examples from the Psalms.

The Lord reigns, let the earth be glad;
     let the distant shores rejoice. – Psalm 97:1

The Lord reigns,
     let the nations tremble;
he sits enthroned between the cherubim,
     let the earth shake.
Great is the Lord in Zion;
     he is exalted over all the nations.
Let them praise your great and awesome name –
     he is holy. – Psalm 99:1-3

No one saw Israel’s universal mission better than Isaiah. Here are two examples.

In the last days
  The mountain of the Lord’s temple will be established
     as chief among the mountains;
it will be raised above the hills,
  and all nations will stream to it.
Many peoples will come and say,
  “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
     to the house of the God of Jacob.
  He will teach us his ways,
     so that we may walk in his paths.”
  The law will go out from Zion,
     the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
  He will judge between the nations
     and will settle disputes for many peoples.
  They will beat their swords into plowshares
     and their spears into pruning hooks.
  Nation will not take up sword against nation,
     nor will they train for war anymore. – Isaiah 2:2-4.

Until the time of the apostles no one saw what Isaiah saw in Isaiah 65:17: the Lord said:

“Behold, I will create
     new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
     nor will they come to an end.”

Desire of the Nations
There are many more where those excerpts came from. They raised hopes until hopes were dashed by harsh realities. But they never lost their power over the spiritual aspirations of Israel. In the fullness of time Mary’s Son came, and hope returned and in keeping with the promise to Abraham escaped the boundaries of Israel and made its way among the nations of the earth. Listen to the voices of those who saw the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham.

Jesus said of Himself: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations.” – Matthew 28:18-19.

To the skeptical audience of ancient Athens the apostle said: “God has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.”

To the Ephesians church Paul said: God made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment – to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ. – Ephesians 1:9-10

To the Philippian church he wrote: Our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

The mysterious language of the last book of the Bible bears witness to the same sovereignty of Christ, the Lamb of God. 

I watched as the Lamb opened the first of the seven seals. Then I heard one of the four living creatures say in a voice like thunder, “Come!”

I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest.

When the Lamb opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” Then another horse came out, a fiery red one. Its rider was given power to take peace from the earth and to make men slay each other. To him was given a large sword.

When the Lamb opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come!” I looked, and there before me was a black horse! Its rider was holding a pair of scales in his hand. Then I heard what sounded like a voice among the four living creatures, saying, “A quart of wheat for a day’s wages, and three quarts of barley for a day’s wages, and do not damage the oil and the wine!"

When the Lamb opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature say, “Come!” I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth. – Revelation 6:1-8

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: Conquest, War, Famine, and Death! Their fearsome ride has captured the artist’s eye and the common man’s imagination down the long centuries of man’s inhumanity to man. Nothing new here!

What is new is hearing the many-eyed four living creatures say to those dreadful riders in a voice like thunder, “Come!” Their ringing imperative took charge of the old human habits and said, “Come! Even you will now serve God’s eternal purpose to bless all the nations of the earth.”

Fulfillment
And so we come at last to the one biblical text that articulates the vision toward which the grand sweep of God’s purpose moves – Revelation 11:15. Then the seventh angel sounded: And there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!”

In that kingdom we shall see the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever. – Revelation 22:1-5

The Pastoral Center of Gravity
Roger Shattuck, a professor at BostonUniversity, made a striking observation a few years ago that puts all I’ve said in perspective.

“In the long perspective of four thousand years, the Western world has discovered or invented only two master plots, two narratives of high explanatory power. . . .

“The sequence of Hebrew covenants followed by the New Testament Redemption story offers an account of things bestowed on us from on high by a single God. . . . “The new story of life emerging uncreated out of the primal slime and finding its upward way by natural elimination . . . has partially displaced the old story without destroying its teachings and ideals. . . . We have barely begun the momentous struggle between these two master plots, Christian and Darwinian.” (Forbidden Knowledge, p. 302)

The Christian master plot defines Brandywine Valley Baptist Church. On this point, if you are not with us, you are against us. What is at stake is the soul of humanity.

The tension between these two master plots is not really about evolution. Darwinian ideology hijacked the scientific theory of evolution. It uses the theory to give it ideas credibility. At the heart of Darwinian ideology is the belief that the world as we know it is raw material for man to use any way he sees fit. No divine purpose and no binding morality govern that use. This ideology insinuates itself into our lives without much discussion through TV, movies, the Internet, and political correctness.

We can hate it, lament it, and lash out at it; or we can oppose it by allowing the Christian master plot to define our lives. We have a better idea than Darwinian ideology.

So, you who pastor this church and you who govern it; you who teach and nurture the young; you who lead worship and pray and bear witness to the love of God – let us all do what we do, remembering “the momentous struggle between these two master plots, Christian and Darwinian.”

Above all, let us all do what we do, remembering that “the kingdom of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!” We know how the story is going to end. We also know that the path leading to that end goes through the Garden of Gethsemane and Mount Calvary. We also know that our present sufferings are not worthy comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us – Romans 8:18.