and please be seated. And if you have a Bible, let me invite you to turn with me to Matthew chapter 18 this morning, verses 10 through 14. Once again, in Matthew 18, this is a passage about our relationships and especially how Christians are to treat fellow Christians. And especially as it may be that we have stumbled or they have stumbled, as we saw last week in verses five to nine.
That is, it may have been the world that was the cause or occasion of our stumbling. It may actually have been other Christians who were the cause or occasion of our stumbling or we may have been our own cause of stumbling. And we saw that that's a reality among believers. And of course, there is a temptation then to look down on those who have stumbled or even to write them off.
There's a temptation that we all might face at times. And here in verses 10 to 14, Jesus speaks to us about that temptation. And here we learn not to despise any of God's people because God does not despise them. We'll also then learn that genuine Christians are eternally and spiritually safe in God's kingdom because of God's angels and because of God's Son and because of God's will.
Let me invite you to hear then the word of God from Matthew chapter 18 beginning at verse 10. See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven, their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. What do you think?
If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the 99 on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than the other 99 that never went astray. So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. Amen.
This is God's word. May he write in our hearts, let's pray together. Father grant that the reading and especially even now, the preaching of your word by the Spirit would convict us and also comfort us. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Do you ever hear of big dogs, backyard, ultra, it's an ultra marathon where the competitors are some of the toughest and most successful ultra runners in the world? The race itself has no defined distance. You just have to run a four mile loop every hour until everybody else quits and you're the last person still running. The record now is 108 loops or hours covering some 450 miles.
Now everybody but the winner receives a DNF against their name. I had to look that up. Apparently it's something, as you can imagine, no runner ever wants applied to their entrance and their name. DNF, I mean, he did not finish.
You could have run 107 laps, 446 some miles. And the record is you just didn't finish. The founder of the race describes what it takes observing this race has taught me the secret of quitting, he says. People don't quit.
When they can take no more, they quit when they no longer believe they can win. Not believing you can win can take many forms such as a belief that you can't make the distance or maintain the pace. Whatever belief creates the doubt in your mind, it's not the loss of will that you must overcome. It is the loss of hope.
Well, Jesus here in the passage before us gives his people great reason for hope and to continue in hope so that they don't quit the Christian race, even if they're the ones that have gone astray. And Jesus wants us all to have this hope, this hope that we have, that this hope that he holds out for his stumbling, even straying sheep so that we might share God's view of them so that we might leave no one behind, but encourage each other. Now, the command is in verse 10. And then there are three reasons given for the command.
The command verse 10 is see that you do not despise one of these little ones. Now, remember, we talked about that expression, these little ones, it refers not merely to the youngest believers in the Lord's kingdom, but to all believers in the Lord's kingdom because as verses one to four show us, to enter the kingdom of heaven, we all must become like little children. And that little children expression is what Jesus continues to use to describe all of his people who have become like little children in poverty of spirit, in neediness, in dependence upon God to save them because they can't save themselves. So what Jesus is doing here is he's exhorting his disciples, these fully grown men, not so much that they should not despise kids or even infants that they shouldn't, but that they should not despise any believers, even the newest, the weakest or the strangest, even those who have stumbled or gone far astray.
Don't despise them, says Jesus. And that word means don't look down on them or think little of them and then treat them like they are insignificant or detestable. And he gives us three reasons for this and that's the outline of our sermon. Don't despise them because of their guardian angels verse 10, don't despise them because of the good shepherd verses 12 and 13, don't despise them because of the will of God the Father, verse 14.
First, don't despise them. Don't look down on them, don't think little of them and so detest them because of the angels, verse 10. See that you did not despise one of these little ones? For I tell you that in heaven, their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.
God's angels are God's servants for the sake of all of God's people, of angels Hebrews chapter one, verse 14 says, are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation? They're ministers of God from God, they serve God. And what do they do for him? They minister to us and they minister for us, for all who inherit salvation.
And there are different ways they serve, of course, we get different pictures across the Bible. Just remember for a moment that prophecy in Daniel chapter 10 of spiritual forces at work behind the scenes in human history, Daniel you may recall had been praying and mourning for three weeks over the suffering and sad condition of God's people in the days of Cyrus, King of Persia. And at the end of those 21 days, heavenly messengers came to him and one said to him, fear not Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard and I have come because of your words. The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me 21 days, but Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me for I was left there with the kings of Persia and came to make you understand what has happened to your people in the latter days.
What's going on there? The heavenly messenger says that there is a spiritual conflict behind the earthly conflict of this world. And the prince of the kingdom of Persia here, some demonic power, some fallen angel, was aiming to thwart the plan of God and to harm God's people. But behind the scenes, this spiritual battle lasted 21 days until Michael, one of the chief princes elsewhere, called an arch angel, he came to help in contending against this fallen angel, this demonic king of Persia.
And the vision concludes in Daniel chapter 10, verse 20 this way. Now I will return, the heavenly messenger says, now I will return to fight against the prince of Persia. And when I go out, behold, the prince of Greece will come. But I will tell you what is inscribed in the book of truth.
There is none who contends by my side against these except Michael, your prince. He says the battle is going to continue. The demonic prince of Persia will give way to the demonic prince of Greece just as one nation state gave way to another. But the heavenly visitor will keep up the fight, Michael contending at his side, Michael, whom he says to Daniel is your prince, chapter 12 verse 1.
Daniel is told that Michael is the great prince who has charge of your people, some angelic prince of the people of God. So there are these unfallen angels who contend with fallen angels for the sake of the people of God. I don't know what that contention that fight looks like. But we also know that there are angels who do other things, angels or these same angels perhaps do other things.
They're set to strengthen the people of God. Like you remember in Matthew chapter 4, when Jesus was out in the wilderness being tempted by the devil, it says after 40 days of fasting and of being tempted while he was still in the wilderness with wild animals, the angels came and were ministering to him. The angels came and ministered to him. I want to ask one day, what do they do?
Now ordinarily, we don't see these angelic beings. Do you remember in second Kings chapter 6 when the king of Syria wanted to capture the prophet, Elijah, in the city of Dothan? So he sent horses and chariots there, great army. And they came by night and surrounded the city.
And when the servant of Elijah woke up in the morning and he went outside, he saw an army with horses and chariots all around the city. And well, he was greatly disturbed, of course. And the servants said, alas, my master, what shall we do? And Elisha said to him, do not be afraid for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.
Now it's just Elijah and the servant. And so Elisha prayed and said, oh, Lord, please open his eyes that he may see. So the Lord opened his eyes, the eyes of the young man, and he saw him behold the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire around Elisha. What's this?
An army of angels to stand against the forces of darkness. And the prophet Elisha knew it, but his servant didn't have eyes to see until the Lord God gave him those eyes. Well, we usually don't have eyes to see angelic beings or to know that that's what they are when we see them. Hebrews chapter 13, verse 2, actually exhorts believers, do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unaware.
Well, now back to Matthew chapter 18. Jesus speaks of the angels who always see the face of the Father. And something that Jesus is indicating when he says, their angels always see the face of my Father in heaven, that he's indicating that each of his people have their own personal individual guardian angel. That there's one particular angel at least for each particular believer.
Some people hold that view, but that stretches this text beyond what it says, and there's no other scripture to point us in that direction. But what Jesus is telling us is not only, what Jesus is telling is not that there is necessarily one angel for every believer who is that believer's guardian angel, but that angels do guard the people of God and serve God for the sake of his people. Calvin says to the angels is committed the care of the whole church and they help individual members so far as their necessity and situation demands it. And notice Jesus says of these angels verse 10, they always see the face of my Father in heaven.
They have unrestricted access, unmediated access to God himself, God the Father. I mean, we have mediated access. We come to the Father through Jesus the Son, our mediator and great high priest. They simply just have access, unrestricted.
And Jesus' point is what? These angels do not despise one of the the littlest ones of God's kingdom. And so we are not to despise them either. If angels think of it, smarter, wiser, stronger, faster, with mysterious supernatural capacities, we don't have, wholly or certainly, the unfallen angels are always perfectly obedient, who have unfiltered access to the throne of God if they don't, having beheld the face of God the Father, don't turn their face at even stumbling and straying believers and despise them, even the weakest of believers.
If they don't despise them, who are we to do so? Yet it is a temptation for all of us. There are many people among the people of God we just don't like. There are many people among the people of God who's personally personality rubs us the wrong way or their spiritual immaturity becomes an occasion for us to look down at them or their slow progress in growth.
Tense us to give up on them or their, well, let's just say, it's silly ideas and strange lifestyles and continuing sinfulness and unsound theology. Tense us, oh yeah, and they're wrong about politics and schooling. It tempts us to wish they'd find Christians more like themselves and go gather with them somewhere else. And in doing so, we're thinking lightly of them and treating them wrongly.
Or maybe it's their fruitfulness that troubles us. Jesus said in the Gospel, chapter 13, that people bear fruit. The word of God planted in the heart grows and bears fruit, but some bear 100 fold, some bear 60 fold, and some bear 30 fold. And it is the case that sometimes the 60 fold folks look down their nose at the 30 fold and the 100 fold look down their nose at the 60 fold.
And it is also the case sometimes that the 30 fold look at the 100 fold and say, well, who do they think they are? They're so active in ministry, they're out and about. They're always doing something. They've got lots of responsibility or whatever.
And there's a temptation to envy and jealousy. I mean, we do this in both directions, but the angels don't despise. Even the most young, weak, weird, foolish, or fruitless of God's people, so neither should we. That's the first thing.
The second is we're not to despise other believers because of our good shepherd. Verse 12, what do you think? If a man is 100 sheep and one of them is gone astray, does he not leave the 99 on the mountain and go in search of the one that won astray? I mean, this is what shepherds do.
They hunt downstraying sheep and sheep are notoriously animals that stray. In point of fact, Isaiah 53 notes all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. And what did God do?
I mean, just like Adam and Eve went their own way in the garden of Paradise, so their children, their posterity, that's us, we've done likewise. And what did God do? Isaiah says, all we like sheep have gone astray, each to his own way, but the Lord has laid on him, the iniquity of us all, the hymnist, the servant, the coming servant whom we know is Jesus, the good shepherd, who laid down his life for the sheep, dying for our sins, taking the burden of our crookedness, the burden of our waywardness and wickedness and suffering that just penalty did us. And you who trust in Jesus, first Peter two says, you are straying like sheep, but have now returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls.
So Jesus reminds us, we Christians are sheep who have gone astray and we are sheep whom the Lord searched for and found, and we are sheep over whom the Lord rejoices, verse 13, if he finds it, the stray sheep, truly I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the 99 than ever went astray. So what is he telling us then? That God doesn't despise even the sheep who belong to his flock yet have wandered away. He doesn't throw up his hands and say to himself, well, fine, I've got plenty more at home.
We didn't want that one anyway. He doesn't say, 99, I mean, that's great, statistically this is really good. You know, where's that one? Who cares?
He loves his sheep and he takes responsibility for them when they get themselves lost. He hunts for them, he seeks them out, he finds them, and we're to be likewise, Jesus is saying, we're to have the same heart, the same care and concern considering it our responsibility to care for and look for wandering sheep to bring them safely home. I mean, not to write them off. There's an ecclesiastical application here, of course, there's an individual responsibility when you know people.
There's an ecclesiastical responsibility. And the church has a body ought to not wash their hands of believers who go astray, but in love, pray for them, and pursue them looking for open doors of opportunity. And it's one of the things we tell new members around here. I mean, we have five questions we put to new members, and one part of the last one is, do you submit yourself to the government and discipline of the church?
And part of what they're saying is, and I try to tell them this, is what we're asking you is, do you want to be held accountable, right? If you wander off and end up in a far country, do you want us to seek you out? Throw an arm around your shoulder and say, Jesus loves you, we love you, please come back and walk with us together with Jesus. Well, that's what you're saying when you're doing a theme or that you want the church to do for you.
Sometimes, straying sheep, of course, think they found greener pastures elsewhere. But God says, you know, don't despise them. Don't write them off and treat them lightly, or as inconsequential, or like they don't matter, because of their guardian angels, and because of the good shepherd, and because of God the Father's will, verse 14. So it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish.
Do you see how this passage says, the Father loves you? He sends His angels to contend for you, because He loves you. He sends His Son to be your good shepherd, to search for you, to find you, to bring you home, because He loves you. And He has determined that none of His little ones will perish because He loves you.
It's not the will of my Father in heaven, that even one of His people should perish. Conversely, we might put it this way. It is His will, that they all be found, that they all escape final destruction, and all inherit the kingdom of glory instead. This then is a verse that roots us in the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.
Part of the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints is that the saints persevere. That is to say, we don't, true believers in Jesus, having the seed of God planted in them, having the Holy Spirit as a deposit in them, having Christ in them, while we do, and wrongly sin, sometimes terribly, we never fully and finally fall away. We may, however, partially, temporarily, go astray. And from our side of things, of course, we need to repent and believe.
That's the Christian life, repent and believe. Sometimes we need to have our repentance and our belief renewed, refreshed, when God brings us to our senses. But from God's side of things, notice He holds on to His people. The saints persevere because the Father perseveres.
It is not His will, that any of these ones should perish. Jesus said in John chapter 10, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they will never perish. And no one will snatch them out of my hand.
This is so encouraging. What a comfort. He's a faithful shepherd who died for his sheep, gives them eternal life, hold on to them that they would never perish. But Jesus continues, my Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand.
Who? The sheep. How did they come to be the sheep? My Father gave them to me, Jesus says, you know, dear Christian, that you are the eternal donation of the Father to His beloved Son, that the Father determined that His Son should be a bridegroom and He prepared a bride for her and presents her to Him having given us to be part of that bride.
And Jesus says, no one can snatch my sheep out of my hand and no one can snatch my sheep out of the Father's hand. It's not His will that any should perish. Now you may have failed this command of Matthew 18, I know that I have. Look down on one of Christ's people, even though the angels in heaven don't fail to seek after His strange sheep, even though the good shepherd pursues them, and you may even have written them off as a lost cause, but God the Father hasn't.
Do you see how good God is to His children? How patient? How long suffering? How generous and kind?
How persevering and preserving. This is how God treats each one of us in His family. Is this then how we're treating one another? I read the story of Dr.
Dupree Rain. He was chair of the Fine Arts Department at Fermond University. And after his daughter had been married to her husband for 30 years, her husband left her just before the children left home. And he left her in a terrible financial condition, and then remarried a woman with whom he had had an affair.
And Dr. Rain, the father of this betrayed daughter, had to come out of retirement in order to support his daughter and her children. And it was a very humbling experience for him. But about 12 months later, this son-in-law, son-in-law, was diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer.
And the first person at his side in the hospital was Dr. Rain to minister to him and to give him the hope that we have in Christ. Because Dr. Rain had throughout the whole ordeal, despite the injury that had been done to him and done to his daughter and to his grandchildren, he had kept in mind two things, that what his son-in-law had done was absolutely wrong and deserved God's condemnation.
But at the same time, he desired to see him recovered for the Lord Jesus. And so he prayed earnestly that God would convict him of his sin and God did. And he repented and he died restored not only to his father-in-law but to his father-in-heaven. That's the attitude we all ought to have, not ignoring the evil of sin, but at the same time desiring to see the sin or restored.
Calvin said by his own example, Christ now exhorts us to honor our weak and lowly brethren. For he descended from heaven to be their redeemer, to save not only them, but even the dead, those who were lost. And it is unworthy to reject in our pride those for whom the Son of God did so much. For they are not to be assessed according to their own virtues, but according to the grace of Christ.
A wandering disciple is not to be assessed according to their own virtues or their lack thereof, but they are to be assessed according to the grace of Christ. Well, there's an application then here in all of this for Christian parents. And I'm going to quote it length, Tim Chally's article, children who bloom in an instant, you can find it online by googling that a great question, deep in the hearts of many Christian parents is why some children bloom quickly when they profess faith while others take much longer. Why is it that some seem to burst into life while others seem to drag?
Some truly do appear to burst into life immediately, awakening the God sanctifying grace as they put sin to death and come alive to righteousness, as they quickly lay aside habits of spiritual laziness and put on habits of spiritual industrious. And some truly do appear to crawl into life, to bloom over years or decades rather than moments. They do awaken to God sanctifying grace, but at a snail's pace. And they do replace poor habits with good ones, but slowly rather than quickly and often only after a long, hard, back and forth battle.
Parents, he says, do well then to be patient with their children and not to be overly concerned with those who seem to be blooming slowly. Just, he's not saying don't be concerned for a child who's outside of Christ, who has an abraced Christ. Of course you're concerned for them. You pray for them.
But in speaking about the children who are in Christ, but are blooming slowly, he says, well, there are countless examples of people who burst into life or into what appeared to be life, but who fell out of it just as quickly, the plants that are first to bloom in the garden are often the first to wilt. Some children who are once the envy of parents everywhere are now the shame of their own. Meanwhile, some of their peers came to life slowly, but only because they were putting down deep roots within. Though they may have been little change, there may have been little change on the outside.
There was great work going on inside. Slow growth is often more lasting than quick. And so he says, parents also do well, not only to be patient with their children, but to faithfully foster whatever growth they do see. A plant that has just sprouted is at its most vulnerable state and must be carefully protected.
The smallest beginning of life must be gently nurtured. God himself does not break a bruised reed, and parents must not break a young faith. They do far better to rejoice in all progress, not just great progress, to commend every evidence of grace, not just the most prominent, to encourage all advances, not just the most extreme. They do well to pay attention to trajectories, more than accomplishments, to find joy in where their children are headed, as much as where their children are, and then parents, he says, must guard themselves against cajoling, nagging, or unfairly comparing.
It is far better to nurture than to needle, to rejoice in new evidence of life than to lament old evidences of sin. It may well be that those who burst to life are especially gifted by the Holy Spirit, or have been given an extraordinary measure of zeal, but either way, he concludes, all growth certainly reflects divine activity and divine blessing, and whether fast or slow, God works in his own way, and at his own pace, patience is a precious virtue for parents, and gardeners alike. Well, that by way of application, see that you don't despise even the least of these in the kingdom of heaven. Don't despise any believer, because the angels don't, because the good shepherd doesn't, because God the Father doesn't.
Let's pray. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we thank you for the love with which you have loved us, and your gracious patience with us. We thank you for the hope that we have in Christ of the consummation of glory yet to come. We pray that you would mature us by grace until that day, in Jesus' name.
Amen. Amen. Let's stand together in soon.