Matt Chandler - Jesus Our Victory

if you have your Bibles that is going to be our passage go ahead uh and turn there we’re just going to walk line by line through that uh this is week three uh of a 3-week series on the gospel I I plan on doing this same series uh every fall it’ll be earlier uh usually Late July into August uh and we’re just going to call it this was this is the gospel not was but is the gospel uh and the idea is we just want to kind of take the gospel like a diamond and we want to look at it from different facets and be reminded what it is because the people of God have a tendency to forget in fact most frequently when the gospel is clearly in the scriptures it’s not being used evangelistically it’s being used to remind God’s people of what’s most true about them and so it seems right and good that we would weave that into how we do things here at the Village uh and here’s been our sentence I’m confident in the sentence and the reason I’m confident is it works with third and fourth graders uh and so if third and fourth graders are like oh yeah I get that then I am super confident that this room can nail it here’s the sentence this is the gospel all of your sins past present and future are fully freely and forever forgiven in the person and work of Jesus Christ and so here’s where we’ve been uh week one we talk about we talked about Jesus our reconciler like sin in its Essence fractures things along relational lines like you and I were designed created by God to run on if you will as if the fuel of our life is the presence of God and when we’re in the presence of God we see ourselves rightly we understand ourselves in a way that’s correct and then we’ll live out of that good design from God into the relationships we have around us where sin creates distance from God then we either misunderstand or mislabel ourselves we can’t rightly understand ourselves and that always plays out in what I’ve call beef with other people right because we’re threatened by or angry with or and most of that comes from not rightly understanding ourselves and not being rightly related to God but Christ has come to reconcile us to God and being reconciled to God and welcomed in his presence you remember that what is Jesus really after he hasn’t come to you with a list what he wants is you all of you mind body and soul nobody else wants that deal everybody wants one or two of those not all three of those but Jesus wants all of that and the real fuel of the Christian life is not ever incre reing moral betterment but a deeper love relationship with God through Christ that transforms us over time Christ has reconciled us to the father and therefore reconciled us to ourselves and therefore we have a shot to reconcile around horizontal lines and then last week uh we talked about Jesus our Ransom and and we talked about the fact last week that sin bends us inward so that we actually get stuck in side of ourselves and so almost everybody I know at some level has some angst in their soul they they feel like they they know they’re meant to be more than they are right now they feel called to something greater but they just kind of feel stuck and we looked last week that that’s what sin bends us Inward and then we get stuck in ourselves the the Bible would call that bondage or or spiritual Decay and Christ has come to Ransom us out of that into life lifelike as God designed it to be and then I very intentionally put this week’s uh topic on this week because it’s a great bridge uh between this sermon series and what we start next week next week we start six weeks Thrones and thorns and we’re just going to look at uh the current political train wreck that’s in front of us and how we might rightly live and relate into that I’m not too worried about anyone being offended by that sentence because if you send me an email and you’re like I think everything looks great out there there then I have another file in which I would put that email uh rather than seriously consider it you are way outside all sociological data it’s a train wreck everybody knows it nobody’s confident what in the world are we doing and how should we live Faithfully into it I want to talk about what Christian nationalism is and what it’s not uh I want to talk about why policy matters policy matters because people matter I want to talk about how to live Faithfully into this moment trusting that Christ is on his throne and our ultimate allegian is to the kingdom of God even as we seek to be great not good but great citizens of the United States and so that starts next week so I’m tackling this week on purpose put it right here um the the primary atonement theory for you theological nerds uh of the first thousand years of the Christian faith it was called Christus Victory or Christ the Victor and and so we’re going to look at Christ and his coming and what he came to do not not just save us from Individual sins but he came with a great deal of violence towards darkness and sin and Brokenness and the devil and principalities and powers and not only did he come with that violence he backed it up and so that’s where we’re headed today years ago and and I mean that a decade ago let me put it like that Lauren and I had had taken the kids to Disney speaking of principalities and powers and selling your soul to the evil one uh and we had gone to Disney and then we had made a blood Covenant that we would never do that again it was like 106 200% humidity nothing but lines and $40 corn dogs and I’m like no I’m not I’m not this is before they were even crazy like they are now right uh this was like good old days like it was aerial right it wasn’t what we’re looking at now and and so we had friends that were like you got to try the Disney cruise though you got to try the Disney cruise you got and I had all my I’m not not doing the Disney cruise man I’m not one it’s stupid expensive and and two I I’m I’m not doing we’re not Cruise people I’m not going to do the Disney cruise and um they prevailed them and the pressure for my kids they they were smart because they stopped talking to Lauren and I and just went to the kids they’re not good friends I mean they’re outside that circle now uh we still know them we still talk to them when we see them just don’t put a lot of effort in being around them and so we sign up for this Disney Cru and here’s what I’ll tell you Disney they know what they’re doing man if you’re bringing kids on a vacation they know like you check your bags at the airport the next time you see them they’re in your room what that might not sound like a big deal to you but if you’re you’re dragging around three toddlers with Chandler blood right that’s that’s dangerous in and of itself and so uh we we we got our bags in the room and I’m going to be straight it was it was epic man it it was epic and the way we worked our schedule is we did early dinner and then they had these like Broadway like shows around Disney characters we went to the the the late dinner uh early show late dinner and uh then at dinner um there there are these adult only parts of the ship where you and your wife can go and have a drink and catch up on the day there’s a pool in a hot tub that only adults can get in uh and if you’ve ever been around Disney or Disney Cruises yes please um but we we would be at dinner and then like Cinderella would come up to our table and ask my little girls if they wanted to come play with her and her friends now if I was to say to my daughters do you guys want to go to you know never Neverland and play while Mom and I go and grab a drink to no no they would not want but Cinderella offering yes please or Captain Jack Sparrow or Darth Vader on Star on the Star Wars one t absolutely see you later pops they got these little bracelets on you can track them nobody’s going to kidnap them and and then they go and then Lauren and I go to the front of the ship and and we would you know catch up on the day and we’d laugh and um and and then we’d go pick up the kids about 11: at night and and on deck in the main deck every night they have this massive screen playing old Disney movies with all the ice cream you could eat and Lauren and I said there’s no reason to say no on this trip and so we 11 o’clock at night I got these little toddlers were like rolling out and they’re ah crushing ice cream and Lauren and I are just sitting there um watching Disney movies on the deck Under the Stars a until one of them like just basically collapsed into the chair ice cream on the chest we’d pick that kid up dip him in the pool and then and then oh I outed read we’d pick one up dip them in the pool and then we take them to bed and we put them to bed and I am embarrassed to tell you how late we started sleeping as we got into that week and here’s what’s crazy about it didn’t matter because if we got up and hypothetically at 1 in the afternoon they’d give us breakfast they’d bring it to our room or we could go and they’d have it ready for us we got whatever we wanted whenever we wanted it it was no matter what we were looking for how we wanted to tweak things or what Adventure we wanted to go on they did it they made it happen it was simply a phone I just pick up the phone hey we’d like to move this we’d like to do this we’d love if somebody could bring this to the room not one time they go well sir we don’t our policy is no they’re like got it done and and that was kind of our week on the Disney cruise now what’s interesting and I feel like I can say this because I’ve been around for 30 years um I think a lot of people think the Christian life looks like the Disney cruise like you you heard I I don’t know who told you this you heard that if you gave your life to Jesus then then you know he was going to sprinkle fairy dust on you and there was never going to be any suffering never going to be any difficulty never going to be any pain never be any struggle that that your life was up and to the right all the days of your life and then when that doesn’t happen then people grow disenchanted they grow frustrated by they believe that God has failed them when God had never promised them the thing they’re holding him to see the Christian Life is a lot more like the USS Missouri in World War II uh I’m picking that ship in particular it saw a ton of battles it was in iojima it actually shelled the mainland it was also the ship that the Emperor of China came on to when he surrendered and on the Disney cruise there’s no hunger there there’s no not a lot of prayerfulness there there’s not a lot of angst there’s not a it’s just ringing a bell and getting what you want but on the USS Missouri there was a ton of prayerfulness there was an awareness of submarines and other battleships and the occasional comicazi there was a longing to get home safely knowing that they were in a fight and there was an awareness and an expectancy that drove those Sailors lives in a way that no one on the Disney Cruz ever felt the the Bible paints this picture of the Earth as a war zone between good and evil Cosmic forces that’s how the Bible talks about the the Earth it doesn’t talk about it as this place where everything’s going to be up and to the right the whole story of the Bible is this conflict between good and evil forces that this is the framework of the biblical narrative it’s just we’re not we’re disin chanted in the modern world we’re on the other side of the Enlightenment and we think talk like that is kind of silly much much to our own harm that that people can be demonized but there’s probably not anything really like a demon like political structures could be evil but there’s probably no real force behind that it’s just bad people doing bad stuff and when we see the world like that we miss what what’s actually going on in Ultimate Reality the primary gospel narrative for the first thousand years like I said was Christus Victor Christ the Conquering Warrior and that that has fallen deeply out of favor in the modern world we want our Jesus Smiley and happy with feathered hair bright light shining on his face kind of like that light is hitting me right now and all he’s got is fairy dust of goodness making all your dreams come true we want him to be Tinkerbell not the reigning conquering king of glory but the Bible has a lot to say uh about God as a warrior and about how Jesus has come to do great violence against principalities and powers and so let me walk through some of these with you Exodus 143 the Lord is a warrior the Lord is his name th this is being written right after the plagues in Egypt and if you here when I was preaching through Exodus or you did the men’s and women’s Bible study on Exodus it’s important to note that each of those plagues represented a corresponding God either of Egypts or the surrounding Nations and so God is like what we when they say the Lord is a warrior the Lord is his name because he had just wrecked shop against Egyptian little G Gods like this is how it it played out like oh oh you worship raah the son God blanked out the sun where is he now oh I choked him out that’s he’s not here oh you worship the Nile you think that in the Nile you have life and meaning and purpose boom I’ll turn it to blood and kill everything in it right th this was Cosmic Warfare th this was not just plagues sent to punish Egypt this was a Full Assault on little G gods that we read about all over the Old Testament this is Isaiah 42:13 the Lord will March out like a champion Like a Warrior he will stir up his Zeal with a shout he will raise the battlecry and Triumph over his enemies for some of you church folk you love you some Zephaniah 3:17 I know you do but everybody leads off the first part of the verse they just go to that part where he sings and delights in you the Lord your God is with you the mighty warrior who saves he will take great Delight in you in in his love he will no longer rebuke you but will rejoice over you with singing it will not be 6B 8 o sweet baby Jesus that saves you in the day of trouble it will be the mighty warrior who saves Jeremiah 20 11-12 but the Lord is with me like a mighty warrior so my persecutors will stumble and not Prevail they will fail and be thirst thoroughly disgraced their dishonor will never be forgotten as I said the the Bible paints this picture uh of the Earth being the battleground of these um Good and Evil forces and you and I caught right in the middle of it the oldest book of the Bible we have is actually not Genesis it’s job and in job you see God battling the waters and the chaos of the waters and these sea monsters Leviathan and he’s conquering and trining this is that dialogue he has with job where he’s like dress for Action like a man I’ve got some questions for you where were you when I was calming the chaos of the waters where were you when I wrangled up Leviathan and broke his neck where were you when and the answer was I wasn’t that was job’s only answer and then we read about uh throughout Israel’s history they they did not separate out what they were seeing in regards to nation states Wars and battles from things that were happening in the heavenly to them they were they were combined that that God was The God Who would defend God was The God Who would win God was The God Who Would restrain he he was a God that was a God of War like like we read about in Exodus the Lord is a warrior the Lord is his name in fact we read that that this conflict is so real that that some sometimes the reason a prayer was not answered quickly or why people suffered Injustice or were in poverty or some natural disaster fell upon someone or some people group this had something to do at times with this contingent activity of these Rebel gods that they were out of control that they were bringing chaos and darkness to bear on the earth in fact throughout the Old Testament everyone shares an acute awareness that the Earth is being held hostage by evil forces to such a gree such a degree that it can only be freed by a radical inbre of God and they believed that was going to happen really soon in the Messiah and that takes us to our passage today so this is Hebrews 24-18 Jesus is going to fill in a lot of these gaps for us he’s going to explain who Satan is he’s going to talk about what he came to do to him and and then we’re going to just see all of this play out but first let me get into this text with you since therefore the children share in Flesh and Blood that’s us he himself like wise partook of the same things the same things being what Flesh and Blood I don’t want you to ever get over the Incarnation it’s while that God the son second person of the Trinity co-eternal with the father has always been will always be is the power by which everything is not only created but held together he’s the one behind the natural laws holding the universe together condescended and put on flesh and blood put this on baffling that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death that is the devil and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery for surely it is not angels that he helps but he helps The Offspring of Abraham by the way that’s you and me if you’ve got a church background you a little kid probably saying Father Abraham had many sons and many sons had Father Abraham and I am one of them and so are you so let’s just praise the Lord right arm left arm what’s amazing to me and where your mind will really start bending is I have heard that song sung by little kids in both Africa and India right why because Christianity is global God has made a new people that’s not one ethnicity one socioeconomic class not one nation state he is gathering men and women from every tribe tongue and Nation on Earth and Christ did not come for Angels he came for the children of Abraham therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service to God to make propitiation that’s atonement for to cover right the sins of the people for because he himself has suffered when tempted he is able to help those who are being tempted I I hope just that phrase lands on your heart in a good way this morning because he suffered when he was tempted we might receive Mercy as we experience the same thing see the compassion of God in Christ so when Jesus comes he he begins to explain this kind of cosmic fight a little bit more he he calls Satan the ruler of this world he does that in John 12 John 14 and John 16 and this Greek word ruler means the highest official in a city or a region that that’s the word used in the Greco Roman world like this guy has all the authority now Jesus and his disciples don’t believe that he had ultimate Authority but borrowed Authority that somehow he’s kind of got his fingers in this world but whenever God wants to break those grimy little fingers he will along the same lines we see Satan depicted as possessing all the kingdoms of of the world that’s Luke 4 in fact it it might be it might be helpful to think that all the various kingdoms of the world can be described as a single Kingdom Under Satan’s rule John goes so far as to claim that the entire world is under the power of the evil one and Paul does not shy away from labeling Satan the God of this world in 2 Corinthians 4 and the ruler of the power of the air that’s Ephesians 22 to but here’s what’s great everything about Jesus’s coming was about vanquishing and doing violence to that Kingdom he he came to utterly decimate and Destroy them this is acts 10:37 through 38 talking about how he’s come to do this you yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea beginning From Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed how God anointed Jesus Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil for God was with him so anytime for the rest of your life here’s what I’ve hoped for and prayed for this week when you’re reading the gospels and you watch Jesus cast out a demon heal someone who’s sick rebuke a storm curse a fig tree you would Marvel at kind of the Divine warfare that’s happening in that moment I don’t know how well you know your Bible I don’t know your background do you know that nobody in the Old Testament ever casts out a demon think in all the Miracles we see in the Old Testament the the Red Sea being parted Fire coming down and burning up the offering the prophets of Baal being destroyed on and on and nobody cast out a demon and Jesus just shows up and starts throwing them out of everything and I know our movies make us believe this is like it’s dualistic like they’re equal in power and we’ll see who wins that is not the way it plays out like when Jesus shows up the demons are mortified have you come to destroy us before the appointed time I know who you are the Holy One of God or they they begin to bargain like because I have one like a 15-year-old girl right and what I mean by that is no don’t ground me just take my phone it’s it’s like don’t destroy a throw us into those pigs there is not one moment in which Jesus commands what is demonic to obey and they don’t do so immediately there’s no fight there’s no wrestle there’s no gosh and even how the whole story ends in the Book of Revelations Jesus just all the armies of Darkness are gathered in Armageddon in the b in the valley of megiddo and Jesus just show he just says his name I am boo and it’s over like it it’s like a two it’s like an old Mike Tyson fight it’s just over but you’re like bum that you spend the $300 on paper viw right it lasted all of two F three seconds I mean it’s just over like that and every time you read about someone being healed demons being driven out like all you’re seeing even when he rebukes the storms and the weather you see both his authority over the natural process and the chaos of principalities and powers that can behind can be behind those Natural Things his authority is complete his victory uncontested Jesus in the New Testament author saw demonic influences not only in demonized people and diseased people but directly or indirectly in everything that’s not consistent with God’s Reign for example swearing Oaths Temptation lying legalism sexual cersion false teaching anger spiritual blindness and persecution all seen in the New Testament as being satanically inspired uh for this reason and this is going to be huge going into where we’re going the next six weeks for this reason Paul taught that whatever Earthly struggles his children you and I found themselves in they were to think about it like this this is Ephesians 6 for we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against the rulers and against the authorities and against the cosmic Powers over this present darkness and against the spiritual forces of evil in the Heavenly places there is widespread theological scholarly consensus that these powers are very closely related to or identical with the destructive spiritual forces of various social structures governments peoples Nations Rel religions classes races tribes and other social groups this is why for Paul and I know this going to be disorienting for some of us but just come with me for the Apostle Paul sin was not primarily an individual moral Brokenness but a cosmic level Brokenness that had fractured everything and our personal lives were caught up in it his categories were sin law and flesh and he viewed those things and taught about the those things as like these qu autonomous powers that hold people and groups bondage th this is why you you’re never going to be able in your own effort conquer sin and death and principalities and Powers there there’s not enough creatin monohydrate CrossFit or jiujitsu on Earth that’s going to get you ready for this this stuff’s Cosmic and woven into the fabric of the universe you cannot you will not win you will believe that you’re winning as you turn yourself Inward and make more of a mess than you started with and this is and and I’m just telling you I’ve been here a long time this is going on in people’s lives over and over and over again where they’re seeking to fix something by their own effort and might and only making it worse anybody testify you got a little bit of that in your background yeah okay there’s just hands up in Liars that’s all that’s in the room and so that thank you you’re a part of the okay let’s keep going now let me clarify there is sin within our own Hearts which surely must be dealt with that’s what I spent the last two weeks trying to deconstruct but there is also the sin and death outside of ourselves for which we are not culpable there is a whole world that is groaning as in the Pains of childbirth that’s how the Apostle Paul put it so maybe we are both perpetrators and victims of sin we are both perpetrators and victims of sin we are not just perpetrators and look at me we are not just victims emphasis on that in this moment we are both and then here’s the good news according to the New Testament the central thing Jesus came to do was just blow all that up let me let me run you through this in John 12 he came to drive out the ruler of this world in 1 John 3 came to destroy the works of the devil in our passage today he came to destroy the one who has the power of death that is the devil what' he come to do to destroy the Devil not slap his hand not punch him in the face to kill him he came to destroy him to decimate him to ruin him to take everything from him that’s why Christ has come not to make you feel better about yourself to destroy the works of the enemy like this is violent language th this is not that picture of Jesus that you remember from your son Sunday school room growing up you know the white guy with feathered hair that that’s not this this is the one we read about in Revelation has a sword in his mouth he got a tat on his thigh his Ro robes dripping in blood this is this is King Jesus the warrior king who sits enthroned reigning and ruling and he has no adversary what do you think we’re singing when we sing you Reign above it all all means all He reigns above it all one of my favorite stories that Jesus tells about this is in Luke 11 he he’s telling a parable and he said there’s this really powerful man he’s very strong he’s very wealthy he’s got this house and it’s it’s got a giant gate and it’s got guards all around it and the strong man is as safe as he can be and so everybody’s kind of dialed into the story and then Jesus says until somebody stronger shows up I don’t know if he did that but I would I mean and when the one who is stronger than the strong man comes he binds the strong man and plunders his property this was Jesus saying this was Satan’s world but the kingdom of God is at hand and the kingdom of God is driving out the kingdom of darkness and you and I I are a part of the plunder that have been rescued out of this broken Cosmic mess that sin brought about so while the cosmic thief comes only to steal kill and destroy Jesus came into the world to Vanquish the thief so that we all might have life and have it abundantly I love this one uh you get to see this often here um Colossians 2:15 Jesus disarmed the rulers and authorities and made a public example of them triumphing over them you you see this most frequently in the testimonies of the Saints um i' I’ve told this story before I’ve been here 21 years you’re going to have to get used to some redundancy but uh back when we did um we we had celebration weekends where people had five minutes to share their testimony before we baptized them we just couldn’t keep up with the volume of baptism so we made some changes so you can get baptized today if you want but we used to do it no we need to we got to do this this and then you’ll get to share your testimony and this woman um she got in the water and she just told of you know how with her ex-husband they had kind of got in the swinger scene and and all the Heartbreak that had brought her and the destruction that had brought her family and um how Jesus has begun to heal her and healer relationship with her kids and and and it was just this beautiful testimony you guys did great you like cheered freaked out and rejoiced for new life and then um uh little Reed’s riding home with me so I put Reed in his car seat in the back of my uh my little Honda cord back in the day and I’m driving home and sweet Reed from the back seats like Hey Dad like yeah bud and he’s like is swinging a sin re CU we had a swing set in our backyard and sweet little baby Reed was like wait I I’m swinging do I am I am I okay and so I did what any leader of his home would do I said you ask Mama when you get home she can fill this in for you she’ll let you know she explain that whole thing to you right no but he I mean I know that’s a funny little story and I know Reed’s in here which is why I told it but um what' she do did she not just openly shame and show the Triumph of Christ over the thing that was meant to destroy her like was it not the work of the enemy in her life I’m not saying that she didn’t need to own her part but but no little girl is like when I grow up man I would love to be shared by my husband with other do like that’s not something happened something happened there there’s that not culpable not culpable something went on there and and because of that bent of iniquity gave yourself over and now you’re caught now you’re trapped now it’s getting worse than you ever imagined now it things are burning down that you didn’t even know could catch fire and and all of that was meant to destroy and devour her and she got in the water and said not today because Jesus’s power over both my sin past present and future and Satan’s power to woo and Destroy has shattered against the sword of the reigning Warrior King Jesus who sits enthroned on high and we all celebrated and and freaked out at her story that’s why look at me that’s why I’m always trying to pull you out of your past cuz the enemy wants you to feel shame in that and Jesus wants to weaponize it against him like what what bit of darkness in your life couldn’t be flipped on its head and and turned in into just like a Precision Grace Missle in someone else’s life in the kingdom of darkness yeah you you don’t have anything behind you that you should be steeping in shame about that’s been paid for in full on the cross of Christ what you’ve got now is a great weapon against the enemy and he’s been completely disarmed there’s not even anything he can do about he’s just going to take that hit right on the jaw isn’t that fun that’s so fun that’s how I’m trying to live like I bring on that Temptation for me cuz I I’m going to try to spin this back on you I’m I like a little little