By now we are all extremely familiar with the camp theme. Familiar, that is, with its word, not necessarily with its meaning. Do we really know what zeal is? What is zeal? Now, I'm not going to spend a great deal of time on the subject of zeal, since the co-workers have already paid considerable attention to this subject, and therefore I shall move on from the zeal to the question about the Lord's house. But I would like to pause a few more moments on this subject of zeal.
And I think you will have observed already in my opening remarks, in my thanksgiving to all those who have labored in this camp, in leading us in worship, but not forgetting our camp managers, who also have put in countless hours of labor behind the scenes, and all the others who have made this camp possible. But in those opening remarks, I stressed again and again that I want to express thanksgiving from the depth of my being. We Chinese people are often a very polite people, at least we used to be. I don't know what happened to the politeness. When you go to China today, you wonder what happened to our culture. If you go to Hong Kong, you might also be puzzled as to what happened to Chinese culture. Courtesy seems to be no longer a meaningful subject. But we are not talking about courtesy on the superficial level. It is a deep inner sense of appreciation.
And superficiality has now taken over. And the point you and I must understand, if this camp theme is going to mean anything to any of us, is that when we talk about zeal, we are talking about a new quality of life that you may not be familiar with. The quality of life we are talking about is depth. Our lives are so superficial, the way man lives it. What we need to be saved from is superficiality. Where we all walk around with a mask. A mask is only that thin. But it is amazing how that thin mask can hide an entire personality.
You know, so many people get married to one another. They fall in love with one another. And then within a few weeks or a few months, they are talking about divorce. You know why? Because they have only seen each other's mask. They have not seen what is in the inner depth of the other person. In fact, the great tragedy is that many people don't even know what is inside the inner depth of their being. So that to become a Christian, we have to ask the Lord, show me what is inside me. Reveal my true self to me. I don't even know myself, what I really am. I don't even know why I behave the way I do.
As Paul said, the very good thing I want to do, I can't do it. The bad thing I don't want to do, I do it. I don't even understand myself. What's with me? But when people build up relationships, those of you who are married will understand very well what I am talking about. A few days even after your marriage, you suddenly wake up and you say to yourself, is this the person I married? Before the marriage, he was a different man. And after the marriage, another personality has come out. You never knew he was so bad tempered. You never knew he was so selfish. You never knew those things, did you? No. Why? Because all you saw was the superficial, the external, the mask. And perhaps you don't need to be too hard on him because he probably did not, or she probably did not, know. Even she did not know, or he didn't know what he really was like.
So, when we talk about zeal, we are not talking about just adding something more on top of everything else you have got. We are talking about a fundamental transformation in the very depth of your being. And if we don't deal with this fact, we can talk till our mouth is dry about zeal and we will not be talking about biblical zeal.
There are two kinds of zeal. Motivated by two different things. One is spiritual, godly zeal in which God is the center of that zeal. The other kind of zeal is a selfish, self-centered zeal. Zeal for oneself. I believe in myself. I live for myself. My whole zeal is directed for me. What is ambition? Ambition is simply selfish zeal to achieve one's own selfish desires and goals. Are we talking about that kind of zeal? God forbid. Then what kind of zeal are we talking about? Zeal for God. A spiritual zeal. But that's not possible from the depth of our innermost being if we are still the very center of our innermost being. If God is not the center of our being.
Let me ask then the question straight away. This camp theme, does it have any meaning for you? Will it have any meaning for you? Not unless God becomes the center at the very depth of your innermost being.
The Lord Jesus gave a wonderful promise in John chapter 7. And many of you who have been in BT or IT are very familiar with this verse in John chapter 7 verses 38 to 39. He that believes in me, out of his mouth will flow rivers of living water. I didn't hear anybody correct me. Alright. So he that believes in me, out of his hair will flow rivers of living water. Oh no. Out of his skin he will sweat rivers of living water. What's wrong with my quotation? Ah, you say, come on, let's look at that passage again. You see, we can read a passage and don't understand what it means. Out of his where? Out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water. But unless the gospel touches you not just in your mouth, not just in your hair, not just in your skin, but in the innermost depth of your being, then how can rivers of living water flow out of your innermost being? It hasn't even touched you there.
Now zeal is nothing unless it has touched you through the very depth of your being. Now this is the first point. You must realize this. Of course in a while we want to ask, why would it touch us in the innermost depths of our being? Now fortunately that question is not so difficult to understand because there is something that does work in the innermost depths of our being. What? Our selfish interest. We are at the innermost core of our being, every one of us, and let's not cheat ourselves, utterly selfish. Utterly selfish.
That is the reason why we are so touchy. Have you noticed how touchy people are? Oh they come. Why did this sister say this and that to me? Why did that brother say that? What did he imply? Oh the genius mind has gone to work to figure out what was behind those words. You see how deep you are? When it comes to carnal things you are exceedingly deep. The other person probably meant nothing at all. The other person was totally superficial, but you in your profound depth of self-interest were able to read into the other person's statement all kinds of things that were not even there before. You see how deep you are when it comes to selfish interests?
You can make plans and devise programs. You can work day and night until your glasses become so thick. What for? For your selfish ambition. You will burn the midnight oil. You will work until the morning. You will study so that you can get better grades. You will play every kind of trick. You invite your boss to lunch. Take him out to the Hilton, to the Sheraton, wherever. So that next time he will promote you and give you a better salary. All the schemes are going through your mind. Selfish interest is at the depth of our being.
And God has a hard job. God has a hard job. To talk about zeal, we must be all wasting our time here. Because we are talking about transformation. We are going to say, as the scripture tells us, the only thing that can happen if there's going to be true zeal, is that an unbelievable selfish concern, self-centered interest, at the very core of our being, has to be taken out. And a totally new concern implanted. That is what Jeremiah speaks of. That He will take out of you this dead heart of stone, spiritually dead, and implant into your heart a living heart of flesh. Living. Take out of you a dead heart.
But in the living heart, which I have talked about before as a heart transplant. The Bible knew about heart transplants in the day of Jeremiah. He used that picture long before the 20th century began to do this on the physical level. Unless we understand what zeal is, unless we understand that there is no point talking about zeal whatsoever, unless we understand that it means a change, a change of heart, such as means a transplant of a carnal heart into a spiritual heart, a self-centered heart into a God-centered heart, then all our talk is hot air. We'll accomplish nothing, whatever.
So my question right away is this: are you willing to get a heart transplant? And I'm talking to Christians as well, because it's amazing how many Christians have a superficial Christianity. It's all on the outside. They know the jargon, as we heard yesterday, it's all hallelujah, praise the Lord. Until we are sick and tired of this kind of language. We are sick of external performances. People waving their big Bibles in our faces, quoting scripture verses to us. And even in their zeal wanting to drag us to church, we wonder whether they got points for this, or whether they get paid by the church to drag us there. Or maybe it just makes them feel good to be able to say, this person was brought by me, you see, and it proves to the church how spiritual and how active they are.
Now, don't get me wrong. I don't discourage you from bringing people to church or Bible study. I'm talking about motives. Motives in the depth of our heart. Are you willing, after all these days in the camp, to say to the Lord, I realize now, Lord, that I am a totally superficial Christian. I pray for two minutes and I am worn out. I watch TV for two hours and it's not long enough. I watch the soap opera and all the tears come running down. But the very thought of prayer makes me tired. And you know, I've had a hard day, Lord, so excuse me. I think what I need is not prayer but TV. Maybe you are right. I think we all need some relaxation. Because prayer is not enjoyable for us.
But, if you say, how about visiting your boyfriend or your girlfriend? Oh, yeah, the eyes brighten up. Can I go for two hours? Two hours? No, one hour. One hour only? You see, pray for one hour. When will this ever end? But two hours, five hours, the whole day with your boyfriend and girlfriend is never long enough. How come the day is over so fast? You see, you think we are not superficial? We are in the grip, the grip of superficiality.
Those of you who have the task of teaching CT or BT or IT, those of us who have to teach, you will soon discover how superficial everybody is. Ask them to write an assignment. You look at that assignment and you say, how many minutes did it take to write this assignment? I think I could have written this in about five minutes. You gave them two months to write the assignment, and this entire performance I don't think required more than five minutes. Superficiality, not only the time but the substance. You look at it, there is nothing there.
But let's not be hard on church members. How many times have you gone to a church and listened to a message and you wondered whether the pastor required so much as two minutes to prepare that message because the entire substance of that message could be summed up in about one sentence and he managed to drag this whole thing on for 45 minutes so that you needed toothpicks to keep your eyes open. Superficiality, that's what it is. Nothing but superficiality.
You and I all know this. Pastors, we ourselves are guilty. We ourselves must be saved by the grace of God from this kind of stuff. The whole church needs salvation from superficiality which is one of the most subtle and most dangerous forms of sin in our character. It expresses the sin of sloth, of cheerlessness, of a lack of reverence, a lack of concern, but above all the disobedience to God's call to love. That you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart. All of it. The heart here. We are not talking about superficial things, not with all your skin. With all your mind, with all your soul, with all your strength.
The very core of the gospel is zeal. Zeal is at the very core of the Christian life. How can you love God with your whole being without being zealous? Zeal. Why are we talking about zeal? Precisely because the church is not zealous. Therefore, in having this camp theme, we are making a confession to our own shame that we have to talk about this subject at all. We admit that we have very little zeal, not enough zeal, and in some cases no zeal at all. May the Lord give us conviction in the depth of our heart.
Now, talking about zeal, what is it? Well, the first point I have made is that it means innermost transformation of our heart by the power, the transforming grace of God. Have you got that? And if not, are you willing to let God perform by His resurrection power a transformation in the very depth of your being?
You know, if Christianity is the superficial thing it is today, I'm in the wrong job. I don't know what I am doing in the church. I would like to go out into the world and get myself another job, which will probably pay me five or ten times more than anything I get today, and where I can put myself with all intensity into the work. Because what grieves me sometimes when I look at the secular institutions, there is greater commitment, greater intensity in the secular institutions where the employees and the bosses will work overtime without complaints to make their companies successful. And Christians complain that too much is required of them. The standards are too high.
Oh, so help me God, why don't you just go into the world and join them? Why shouldn't I go and join them? Just like a friend of mine, a millionaire in Hong Kong once said to me, you're wasting your energy and your talents in the church. If we had you in the world, our companies would be successful. Why don't you come? I'll hand you over one of my companies and you take over. You'll be the general director, general manager. You run the company. I know it will be a tremendous success. He feels that quality is simply wasted in the church because he knows the church that he knows is nothing but pure superficiality. It is garbage to put it in plain language without mincing our words. Why waste your talents in the church? Of course, gladly I can say he didn't know our church. He only knew other churches that he had been to before and now he doesn't go to church at all. In fact, he hasn't been to church for so many years. I can't count how many years. We used to be students together in London, England. For them, they despised the church. They despised the lukewarmness of the church, the superficiality of the church, the mediocrity of the church and they feel that anyone with quality is wasting their life in this kind of place and I can't blame him.
Let's come to our passage and continue to examine the matter. What, then, is the second point I would like to say about zeal? When you see me speaking, you see that I speak with an intensity which comes straight from my heart. I don't do any acting. It burns within my heart. When I think of the state of the church today, I have put in the best years of my life. I have turned my back upon the world. I turned my back upon the academic career. I turned my back upon a PhD that my professor offered to me to enter in the PhD program. I turned my back on what this world has to offer. To do what? To find a church that is corrupt and doesn't like to hear it. And that is why so many pastors today attack me for denouncing the church. And I will denounce it. I will not see the church in corruption and sin. I speak with intensity because God has placed that concern in my heart.
Look at the passage in John chapter 2 that you have been studying in your Bible studies. Zeal for Your house has consumed me. In John chapter 2 verse 17 you remember what it goes before that? It says when the disciples saw Jesus' action in the temple they remembered something. They remembered a verse from the Old Testament from the Psalms. Psalm 69 verse 9 which says, zeal for Your house has consumed me.
Now there must have been something about Jesus' action in the temple that made them think about scripture. Now that is quite remarkable. Is anything that you do reminding other people of the Bible? Do you so live out the word of God that you become a living word of God that when people see your life they think about the Bible? Oh yes, I remember what the Bible says. Jesus lived out the scriptures and when the disciples saw His action they remembered the scripture.
Now what was there to see? What was it about His action that caused them to think about the scripture? What do you think they saw? When you read the description there He drove out from the temple the people selling sheep and oxen and all this kind of stuff. He drove them out. And those people changing money there clinking and clanking their coins when others were trying to pray if it was even possible to pray in such a circumstance. He overturned their tables. He was, in other words, what? Exceedingly angry.
Have you ever seen a righteous man angry? Quite a frightening thought, isn't it? He was so angry, angry with a holy and divine anger. Not a fit of temper. Not losing one's temper. But with a holy controlled but intense anger. But you know even the money changers who are rough people, and those selling pigeons and doves and cattle and sheep, these are rough people, they took one look at Him and nobody dared to resist Him. Burning anger. The Western churches bring up their children in Sunday school on gentle Jesus meek and mild. Well there was nothing very gentle or meek and mild in the intensity of His divine wrath. Divine fury. You see there is the aspect of zeal. A zeal that expresses itself in intense anger.
Now I'm sure you have been angry. Anger is not a new emotion to you. Anyone who in your life has never been angry would you please raise your hand? I don't see anyone raising their hand. I presume you admit that every one of you has at some time or other been angry. So anger is not a foreign experience to you. But now the question is, for what have you been angry? What caused you to be angry? It was because you were wearing a pair of new shoes and somebody stepped on it and made a mark on your new shoes. You were angry. Or you were driving your new car and what did some careless person do? Put a scratch on your car. Put a dent in your car. Oh, the fire of anger burned in you. Oh, we all know about anger. Or you came home very hungry and what did your wife do? She went and burned your pork chops. And so what did you do? You had a tremendous row with your wife. You smashed the table. What did I marry you for? You think I worked the whole day sweating out there to put a bowl of rice in your hands and you just burned my pork chops?
Oh, anger. For what were you angry? We all know about zeal and one form of expression of zeal is anger. But what motivated the anger? Self. I don't mean to say that you should be delighted to have your pork chops burned. Of course you are not delighted. I am not saying there is anything wrong to feel angry over some of these things. But the problem is we only know one kind of anger, the kind of anger that concerns our personal interests.
Until God changes our hearts, has sin in the church, has the tragedy of the church ever caused you any deep concern? Only perhaps in the sense that you rub your hands to say, you see, I am not that bad after all. There are other sinners also in the church. Oh, good. Even the pastor is a sinner. After all, then in the judgment, my case is not so bad, his case is even worse. Maybe you're concerned again. You're not concerned or grieved or angry because God's name is being dishonored. You are concerned perhaps just about the reputation of your group or of your church. It could be a purely human concern. It's always this question of motive.
Let's move on quickly. Zeal, then, has also another aspect. Intense sorrow. Intense sorrow. Are you capable of intense sorrow for anything other than your own interests again? Have you read the book of Lamentations in the Old Testament? Very few people read Lamentations, you know that? How many of you have read the book of Lamentations twice? Would you please raise your hand twice? Praise the Lord. We have a few people who have actually read the book of Lamentations twice and maybe more. But you see most of us, reading it once is just about more than enough. Twice is too many times. Life has about so many pressures, so many difficulties, so many problems. You want to go home and read Lamentations too? Who wants to lament?
And yesterday we heard Lamentations is a very important aspect of the spiritual life. The New Testament says weep with those who weep. When did we ever weep with those who weep? Do we know any such intense feelings? Not enough to weep anyway. If somebody in our church, if some brother or sister has a tragedy, we just say, oh, sorry. You see how superficial we are? Does it touch us in the depth of our being? Enough to bring tears to our eyes? Oh, no. We can weep for ourselves, for the insults that we have to suffer, for the unfairness that we have to suffer. When did you weep for a brother or a sister? When?
You see, that's why I said the camp theme is an admission. It is a confession that we as a church have failed in the depth of our devotion. We have failed. Let's not pat ourselves on the back. We have a long way to go. And may God help us to become the kind of people who can think as Jesus thinks.
What did Jesus do? His zeal was expressed not only in this passage. But you remember what happened? In Matthew 23, Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered you as a hen gathers its chicks under its wings? You would not. Can you feel the intensity of that lamentation? And now, behold, your house is forsaken and desolate. Can you feel the intensity of the sorrow?
When Lazarus died, the shortest verse in the Bible in John 11 has only two words. Jesus wept. Jesus wept. When did we ever weep for the sadness, pain, and sorrows of other people? We weep for ourselves. Do we know how to weep for others? I mean genuinely, deeply, from the depths of our hearts, not because the anthem was so touching. When we go to the funeral home, I see people wiping their eyes. I think they are really weeping for themselves, thinking, when is my turn to be buried there? I'm sorry to be so blunt, but I think that is the truth.
So the third thing here is the intensity of sorrow. The fourth thing I want to talk about here is zeal expresses itself in yet another form. The intensity of joy. You see, zeal is a very complex thing. It can express itself in intense concern, in intense anger, as an expression of that concern, intense grief, or also in intense joy. Intense joy.
You remember the Lord Jesus again? When He saw the disciples' eyes were opened, and they came back from their mission rejoicing, at what God was doing through them, the Lord Jesus was filled with joy, and He lifted up His heart in praise and adoration to the Father and said, I thank you, Father. I thank you, Father, that you have revealed these things not to the wise of this world, but to the foolish, to my disciples, to those who are willing to follow you. He was filled with intense joy, joy not for Himself, but for what God was doing in their life. Do you know this kind of intense joy?
Of course, you all know joy. When you got your last hike in pay, your pay raise, 5% brought 5% increase of joy, and 20% brought 20% increase of joy, you wish that you had 100% increase. But when did you rejoice over others, for the blessing that God gave to other people, for the work that He has done in another person?
When we today participate at the baptism, will we be able to rejoice with those people receiving baptism? Or do we sit there and say, oh boy, another baptism? Every camp we have a baptism. How many baptisms do we have to have? I've seen this kind of thing, you know, I've been to this camp 10 years already, and there's 10 years of baptism. Or are you able to say, Lord, I thank you for this dear one. I thank you for the work you have done in that dear one. Your heart is filled with thanksgiving and joy. Can you feel it? No, not until the Lord changes the way you think.
Let's go on quickly. The fifth thing, the intensity of spiritual thinking. Thinking. I must stress this point. Why? Because you may think from what I have said up to now, that zeal only has to do with emotions. Intense emotions. The emotion of anger, the emotion of grief, the emotion of joy. No, zeal is much more than that. The emotions impel us and drive us and motivate us, yes, but that is not all there is to zeal. Zeal has to do with the intensity of thought. To love the Lord your God with all your heart, yes, but also with all your mind.
This is what I have called intelligent zeal. Intelligent zeal. It is not some superficial, nitwit, foolish, foolhardy zeal that rushes headlong and brainlessly into every endeavor. A person with intense zeal is a person who now learns to think for God. Every scholar who studies this passage in John chapter 2 has already perceived that Jesus' action in the temple was a carefully planned, carefully thought out action. The time was carefully chosen. It was chosen at the Passover time. It was not a haphazard random action that on the spur of the moment He blew up in righteous zeal. No, no, no, no. The Lord Jesus' action was carefully calculated and planned. His dynamic zeal was guided by spiritual wisdom, by spiritual wisdom and intelligence. And He carried out a symbolic action to declare a message to the Jewish leaders, to the religious leaders of His nation, and to the nation as a whole. Highly intelligent, carefully planned action.
And so, of course, I am not advocating that you leave this camp, next moment you are rushing into anger, and next moment tears are running down your face, and the next moment you are laughing and jumping with joy. So what are these people? Idiots.
# Zeal for Your House (Part 2)
...The time was carefully chosen. It was chosen at Passover time. It was not a haphazard random action that on the spur of the moment He blew up in righteous zeal. No, no, no, no. The Lord Jesus' action was carefully calculated and planned. His dynamic zeal was guided by spiritual wisdom, by spiritual wisdom and intelligence. And He carried out a symbolic action to declare a message to the Jewish leaders, to the religious leaders of His nation, and to the nation as a whole. Highly intelligent, carefully planned action.
And so, of course, I am not advocating that you leave this camp, next moment you are rushing into anger, and next moment tears are running down your face, and the next moment you are laughing and jumping with joy. The people say, what are these people? Idiots. What have we got here? We must understand that zeal has to do with loving God with our whole intelligence, with our whole mind.
Just like Jesus. When you read the Gospels carefully, you will understand that every move that Jesus made was guided by intense devotion, but also by intense, careful, strategic, spiritual planning. Every move was planned. Nothing was haphazard. How many Christians do you know who live their lives with this kind of spiritual intelligence?
The same is true of the Apostle Paul, who followed cheerfully in the steps of his Master. Burning zeal, burning devotion, but marvelous intelligence and planning. When he went to Jerusalem, it was all part of a plan. He planned to go there and he knew that he would be arrested. You read the Acts, you will understand perfectly the matter. He knew he was going to be arrested. Even the prophet Agabus made it very clear, both to him and to all the churches, that the moment Paul got to Israel and to Jerusalem, he would be arrested. Paul knew that. He didn't need the prophet to tell him that. But with cool and careful calculation, he went forward to Jerusalem to be arrested. And when the governor of Palestine was about to release him, he stopped the release. He deliberately stopped his own release by appealing to Caesar. As you can read in the book of Acts, where the governor said, had he not appealed to Caesar, I could have released him. But because he's a Roman citizen and he has appealed to Caesar, I have no choice but to send him on to Rome.
Why? Because Paul had already, as part of his carefully calculated plan, as an expression of his intense devotion, he had already planned to go as a prisoner to Rome and to die there, to die there if necessary. As he said in Acts, I am prepared not merely to suffer, but also to die for the sake of my Lord. This is not crazy mindless fanaticism. This is carefully thought out zeal.
You see, Paul, in everything he did, had intelligent, burning, but intelligent zeal. As you study the book of Acts, which you should do if you wish to grow in the Lord, you will see that all his missionary campaigns, all three of them, were carefully calculated, strategic, spiritual operations, carefully thought out. He chose carefully the targets that he would home in on, like a guided missile. He chose particular centers, for example, such as Corinth, for very, very good reasons. It was not that he happened to land in Athens or land in Rome by some happening or by some accident, and so he began to preach there. No, no, no. He chose the target of his operation carefully. He carefully executed his plan to bring the gospel of life to people.
Alright. I think we begin to see what zeal is about. And now we begin to see what zeal really means. I hope that you have clearly grasped what it is. And that in each of these things, you will pray that God will make you such a Christian because this is what a Christian ought to be. This is not some super Christian. This is not the model of some super Christian. The words, you shall love the Lord your God with your whole being, with your whole heart and mind and soul, was not just said to Paul. Not just said to Barnabas. Not just said to Peter. Not said to John. It is said to the whole of God's people. To the Israelites in the Old Testament. To the church in the New Testament. This kind of zeal is simply the basic quality. The basic quality of the Christian life. But how many Christians of this kind do you know?
Now, we see that this is how Jesus was. But how are we going to get onto the wavelength with Jesus? Let me approach this subject now in the second part from a slightly different angle. Let me ask you this question. How has your fellowship with Jesus been lately? How is your time of prayer? Your quiet time every day? How do you enjoy it? Do you enjoy it much?
And when you pray, what is it that you can manage to think of to pray about? Is it true or false? Did I exaggerate when I say that prayer for two minutes could just be about as tiring as most people can manage? And to get through twenty minutes you will need a special book to be able to read through those twenty minutes and end up with a prayer that may be also printed in the book which might take you twenty seconds to read through. Am I exaggerating in saying all this? Am I ridiculing anybody? I think not. I think not.
Why? Because frankly we don't have much to say in our prayers, do we? Lord bless daddy and mommy and grandpa and grandma and my baby too that he doesn't get sick too often, got too much wind and the milk doesn't seem to suit him too well, and my little brother there, and my son who is going to university, help him to get from C to B and maybe from B to grade A, and so on, help him to get into some department. And my other son who is trying to get into university is having a hard time, you help him too, Lord. And after that you forget, what else am I supposed to pray about?
You know why the spiritual life is so difficult? Why we cannot enjoy this whole business? Well the prophet Amos way back in the Old Testament, the prophet Amos, an 8th century B.C. prophet, 8 centuries before Christ, sums it up in one sentence. He says this: how can two people walk together unless they be agreed? That is, unless they have something in common to talk about, unless there is something in which they share a common interest. Or in modern terminology, unless the two people function on the same wavelength.
Now do you function on the same wavelength as Jesus or with God? Of course not, if you do not share His concern. You are walking a different road. You are operating on a different wavelength. And how can you communicate with Him? You are not even talking the same language. In other words, if we want to enjoy communion with God, we have to share the same concern with Him. But you are only concerned about yourself and what is Jesus concerned about? Well, this camp theme makes it very clear to us. There was one supreme overriding concern that Jesus had, which is what? My Father's house. Zeal for His house consumed Him.
Now if zeal for God's people doesn't consume you, then obviously you don't share the same concern with Jesus. He is concerned about one thing, you are concerned about something else. Now how can two walk together when two people have totally different concerns? And no wonder when you come to Him in prayer you don't know what to say. Run out of things to say in two minutes. There is nothing left to say. And when you pray for this person or that person you cannot even pray with any deep genuine concern because we don't really understand that all of this really has to do with prayer anyway. What does it have to do with God's plan? What does it have to do with the future of God's people? Where is all this going anyway?
So this second part you have to understand, that zeal is not just something that consumes you, it is vital for your relationship with God. Vital for your relationship with Jesus. Only when you let God change your heart, give you this intense concern, save you from yourself and become occupied with His concern, only then you suddenly find that you are on the same wavelength with Jesus. You are talking the same language as He speaks. You share His heart and His mind. And of course that kind, then you are beginning to talk. You are functioning on the same wavelength, talking the same language. You are discussing the things that concern Him because these things also concern you. Now in short you become in fact a co-worker with Jesus. A true disciple.
What is a disciple? A disciple is one who walks with his master. But how can two walk together when they are not even walking in the same direction because they have different interests? You see the picture?
What is the root of the spiritual problem of so many Christians? Our time is quickly gone but I want to tell you another thing which we must quickly dwell on. If you do not share God's concerns, not only will you not be able to communicate with Him and you will find the whole Christian life not only burdensome but also meaningless. Frankly meaningless. Simply because you are not even going in the same direction as Jesus is going. We are called the disciples' church. You won't even be a disciple unless you walk in the same direction.
But even worse than that, if you are not walking in the same direction, if your concern is different from Jesus' concern, you know what is going to happen? There is going to be conflict between you and Jesus. Conflict. There are many Christians today who are in conflict with God. In fact one could say virtually the whole church is in conflict with God.
In my student days there was a group of theologians which included a number of bishops of the church, one very well known Anglican bishop and quite a number of American bishops of the Episcopal and other churches, who came out with a declaration. They declared that God is dead. The world was shocked. The world was shocked. Here are theologians and bishops of the church, leaders of the church, who declared that God is dead.
You know when I listened to this I realized the truth of the situation. It is not that God was dead, it was that the church was dead. You know that what you really are will be reflected in the way you think. If you are spiritually dead, then for you God will be dead. But for the person who is spiritually alive he is able to say with the Apostle Paul, I know whom I have believed. I know Him. But these people don't know Him. As far as they are concerned God is dead because they are dead. These bishops are dead. These theologians are dead. And I should know. I studied under some of these professors, these theologians. I knew them personally. They are dead spiritually. They don't know God at all.
I vividly remember my Old Testament professor once discussed this matter as friend to friend with me, and he discussed the question about God. And I thought, this man is supposed to be a professor of the Old Testament and he himself doesn't know whether God exists or not, whether God lives or does not live. He doesn't know. Pitiful. It is not knowledge that helps you to know God. It is spiritual commitment. And there is no such commitment in these theologians and sadly enough in these bishops. The church is dead. And a dead church comes into conflict with God.
You know that the worst enemies, as I have warned you before from scripture, the worst enemies of God are not the non-Christians. Never make that mistake. Neither in the New Testament nor in the Old Testament nor in the history of the church, if you have ever studied church history, will you find that the most determined and most dangerous enemies of the church are non-Christians. These are Christians. And especially the leaders of the church.
Who condemned Jesus to death? Who accused Him and got Him crucified? The leaders of the church. The leaders of the Jewish nation. All of them were high priests, Pharisees, Sadducees, these kinds of people. And therefore I say again, if you are not walking with God, sharing His heart, not only will you not be able to commune with Him, the danger is the time will come that you will be His enemy. You will fight against God.
The greatest atrocities carried out against faithful Christians in the history of the church were carried out by other Christians against Christians. Christians. You have heard of the Spanish Inquisition where the Roman Catholic Church not just executed believers who did not agree with the Catholic teaching but slowly and skillfully and painfully tortured them to death. You can't imagine Christians doing this kind of thing. Oh yes, oh yes, that's in the history books, not invented by me. But in case we Protestants begin to get self-righteous, forget it. The Protestants did pretty much the same thing in the barbaric actions of the Protestant princes, Protestant leaders, especially in Germany and Netherlands. The Anabaptists were slaughtered. The Anabaptists are the forerunners of today's Baptists. They were slaughtered, put to death, executed and tortured to death by Protestants also in the tens of thousands. We are not talking about one or two.
We are dealing with something very serious. We are dealing with eternal life or eternal death. My time is gone. I have so much to share with you and we must close in a few moments. But I hope I have said enough to impress deeply upon your heart why you must urgently, not tomorrow or the day after, but urgently ask God to transform you in your life so that you can not just enjoy communion with God, enjoy Christian life in its depth and in its richness, so that God can make you a fountain of living water coming right out of the depth of your being. Because if it doesn't come out of the depth of your being it won't come out at all. So that God may make you the kind of Christian that He wants you to be. Zeal for Your house.
Let me say one more thing about God's house and we must close here. The Lord Jesus said, destroy this house and in three days I will raise it up. That was a staggering statement. Put yourself in the temple. Huge crowds of people standing there listening to the Lord Jesus and He makes a statement like that. You see this beautiful temple glittering with golden ornaments, beautiful marble stones, one of the wonders of the world. Destroy it? Destroy it? Blasphemy! It is the house of God. How can you talk like this? How can you speak in this way? Oh, righteous indignation coming up.
But destroying God's house was nothing new. You know the strange thing was that they were building the house at the very time that they were destroying it. They were physically building the house, you see. Here the house was being built. They had already spent how long? 46 years building that house. You can imagine every little stone was being ornamented, gold was being painted up here. They expended so much money, expense, energy to build this beautiful house. 46 years had already been spent building that house. But it was already destroyed. Physically built, spiritually destroyed.
600 years before that, Solomon's house, the temple which Solomon had built for God, had been destroyed. So the idea of destroying the temple was nothing new. That magnificent temple of Solomon was burned to the ground. Magnificent building was destroyed. Why? Because of sin. You think God is interested in beautiful buildings? He is interested in beautiful people, not in beautiful buildings. But that could never get into their mind.
And what kind of people are beautiful in God's sight? Are you beautiful in God's sight? Does God look at you and see beauty, His beauty in your life? Are you made in His image? God is supremely beautiful. I think the day when we see God we will be overwhelmed with His inexorable beauty. But the Bible speaks of as the beauty of holiness. You know the sinner is afraid of holiness. Holiness frightens him. But the righteous man delights in holiness. The beauty of holiness as the psalmist calls it. God wants beautiful people, not a beautiful building. And therefore if the building is beautiful but the people who worship in it are ugly because of sin, He will destroy the building. And that is what Jesus meant. Yes, you have a beautiful building, but destroy it because there are not a beautiful people. You are a stiff-necked, disobedient, rebellious people as you have always been. Destroy this building. God doesn't want this building.
Oh, that's blasphemy. They think that talking about the building is blasphemy. In two days I will raise it up. What? Are you? 46 years we have been building this building. In fact the building was continued to be built even after Jesus was crucified, as we know from history. Also from this statement about 46 years we know even the year in which the Lord Jesus spoke because we know from the Jewish historian Josephus that Herod the Great began to build this temple in the year 19 years before Christ, 19 BC. So that 46 years later we know that when the Lord Jesus was saying these words it was the year 27 AD.
And the temple went on being beautified until the year 63. Nearly 40 more years on they kept on beautifying this temple. From 27 to 63, another 35 years or so. It was destroyed only 7 years later. Only 7 years after all the building project was completed, when the building was at its most magnificent, 7 years later it was leveled to the ground as Jesus our Lord said, not one stone will be left upon another. It was completely destroyed only 7 years after they had expended how long, 80 to 90 years to beautify that building. Wiped out in the year 70 when the whole Jewish nation perished as a nation.
Destroy this temple. Why? This temple was standing there. But do you know what the Lord Jesus said? Yes, the temple was there. The problem is that God is not there. God is not in that building. You read for yourself Matthew 23 verse 38. Let those words of Matthew 23:38 be deeply imprinted in your mind. What did the Lord Jesus say? How often would I have gathered you but you would not. Behold, look, He said, if you have eyes to see, behold your house is left to you forsaken and desolate. Forsaken by who? By God, of course. God has forsaken the building. You can keep on building it. You can put more gold on it, put more crystal on it, put more jewels on it. But God has forsaken it. Therefore this house is meaningless.
What is a temple for? What meaning is there in the temple? The temple only has meaning for one reason. What is that reason? If God is in the temple. It is His presence that makes the temple meaningful. If God is not in the temple, the most beautiful building in the world is meaningless. I heard that in California they built a crystal palace, a huge beautiful building that cost who knows how many millions of US dollars to build. But is God in that building? No, God is not. Where is God to be found? In the new temple. The one that Jesus raised on the third day.
Just as the Lord Jesus said to the Samaritan woman. And maybe Christians still have not learned the lesson and they are still building temples today. They still like the word tabernacle. Look outside the front door. See on the front door what's written there. You'll see the word tabernacle. The word tabernacle was simply the early form of the temple. We are still building temples and tabernacles or churches or whatever it is you like to call it. God doesn't dwell in such places. Our Roman Catholic friends still can't quite get it into their head that God doesn't live in the church, not even because the host is there. No, no. God dwells in you. In you. If He doesn't dwell in you and in me, then He doesn't dwell here at all. Not at all.
The significance of the temple, and with this we must close, the significance of the temple is this: that God's special presence, His saving presence, is to be found in one place on earth. At that time, in the temple. The Bible in the Old Testament has two supplementary, complementary things to tell us. One is that God in one sense can be found everywhere. But can you meet Him everywhere? Not unless you are a spiritual giant. And most people are not spiritual giants. How can the common person find God? Only in the place where His special presence is to be found. And where is that? The temple appointed by Him. His special presence is to be found there. It is there where the atonement was made through the sacrifices. It is there where the priest ministered and prayed and taught the people of God. God's special presence is what made the temple special. But once God's presence was not there anymore, He might as well destroy the temple. The temple has no meaning whatsoever.
And that is why the prophet Ezekiel said, I beheld and I saw. What did he see? He said, I saw the glory of the Lord rise up above the temple and then it departed and went away. The prophet said, God has left His temple. You know what that means? It means that the temple will be destroyed. So when Jesus was speaking here He meant exactly the same thing. The temple was going to be destroyed. And in three days a new temple will be raised up. How? Through His resurrection. Through His resurrection.
When Jesus was raised from the dead, you know what happened? The first thing He did was to bring His church into existence. The Father raised Jesus from the dead and Jesus raised the church into being at precisely the same time. You can read that in John chapter 20. What happened in John chapter 20 is this, you see. The apostle John, and it tells us there I believe in verse 8, it says that John believed. You say, hey wait a minute, John was one of the apostles, why does it say he believed? Because now for the first time he believed in the New Testament sense of the word belief. And what is the New Testament sense of the word belief? You read it in Romans chapter 10 and verse 9. And for all of those of you who are being baptized today I would like you again to read it before you go into your baptism. Romans chapter 10 verses 9 and 10. And there it says in Romans chapter 10 verse 9, it says this: that he who believes God raised Jesus from the dead. You see, the resurrection is a vital element both in bringing the church into being as well as in the confession of salvation.
Up to that point Jesus had not been raised yet. It was not yet possible to believe in God and in the resurrection of Christ in the New Testament sense. John, you can say the apostle John was the first believer in the full New Testament sense. And as you read on from verse 11 of John chapter 20, you see that Mary Magdalene was the first person granted the privilege to see with her eyes the risen Lord Jesus, and to believe in Him, and to worship Him as "my Lord and my God."
The church came into being on the day of the resurrection. I will raise up my church on the third day. And that's exactly what He did. Exactly what He did. Many Christians are still mistakenly supposing that the church came into being on the day of Pentecost. No, no. It came into being on the day of the resurrection. And today those who are going to be baptized, not on some day of Pentecost, but on this day when they will be buried with Christ and raised with Christ into the resurrection life. It is the resurrection life which is the mark of the church.
Now, I keep coming, like the Apostle Paul, to one last thing. Just like in the letter of Philippians Paul says finally, he says finally again. You just said finally one more time. So I confess to having the same practice as the Apostle Paul in this point. I would like to finish with one verse and leave this in your mind as we close. And that is verse 18. Because it is exceedingly important.
What does verse 18 say to us? The Jews then said to Jesus, what sign have you to show us for doing this? What sign? What sign do you show us to prove that you have authority to do what you have been doing in the temple? What is the sign you will show us? And Jesus in answer to the question about a sign says this: destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up. That is the sign.
What is the sign? The sign is that He will raise up His body in three days. Think about it very carefully. The sign will be the sign given to the Jewish people. They ask for a sign. What sign do you give us? And through them to the whole world. What is the sign? The sign of God's power. What were the Jews asking for? Show us that you have God's power and God's authority, that you are truly speaking for God. Show us your spiritual credentials. And Jesus said, yes, I will give you a sign. And this is the sign: on the third day I will raise up the body. What an amazing sign. What a mind-boggling sign this is.
A sign is for what purpose? A sign is to help the Jewish nation and the whole world to believe. There needs to be a sign. And Jesus said He would give them a sign. And you know Jesus is no liar. If He said He is going to give us a sign He will give us a sign. And you know what is a sign? What is a sign? If it was His own personal resurrection alone, did the Jews ever see it? Of course not. They couldn't see such a sign. What is the use of giving them a sign that they couldn't see? You know very well from the New Testament that the only people who saw the risen Lord Jesus were the disciples, not the Jews. Therefore it's not fair to say, not to the Jews, much less the whole world. They didn't see any signs.
But when we realize that He is referring to the body, not only of His physical body which is included in it because without His personal physical resurrection there would not be a church at all. His own physical resurrection is the foundation for the existence of the church. The church is built on the physical resurrection of Christ. If Jesus didn't rise there wouldn't be a church. But it is the church that is the sign. The body of Christ, as the church, which is a sign for the whole world to see.
What is the church? You are the body of Christ. I am the body of Christ. In short, you and I are God's sign to the world. And if we fail here we are going to have to answer to God and to the world. In other words, if the world is to believe in God, it will be because of you and because of me, or not at all. The church is God's sign to the world.
Read when you go home afterwards, 1 Corinthians chapter 3 and verse 16, where Paul says, you are God's temple. You are God's temple. You are the body of Christ. And 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and verse 19: your body, your physical body, this body, yes, not some other body, your body is the body of Christ. Your body is the temple of God. You know where God dwells now? Not in the church building. Not in this tabernacle. God dwells in you and in me. God's special presence is found in one place today in the world. You are that place. That is what the Apostle Paul is saying. You are that place. You are God's sign to the world.
It is because of you that God has chosen you to be that sign through His redeeming transforming resurrection power. When you go to work, when you go to school, you are God's sign. Has anybody believed in Jesus because of you? Have you been the sign of God that you were meant to be? Has God transformed your heart and put His intensity into you?
Let us be quiet before God in prayer.