In the sermon 'I Wanted, You Were Not Willing,' Jason Dohm discusses the deep desires of God for His creation and the persistent hard-heartedness of humanity. The sermon focuses on the last week of Jesus' life as recorded in Matthew 23, where Jesus laments over Jerusalem, symbolizing the stubbornness of God's people who kill prophets and reject His messengers. Dohm draws parallels with Galatians 4, explaining the symbolic representation of two women and two Jerusalems—one of bondage and the other of promise. Through various biblical references, Dohm emphasizes Jesus' fervent desire to gather and protect His people like a hen with her chicks, despite their unwillingness. The sermon highlights the consistent scriptural theme of God's tender entreaties towards a rebellious people and the nature of human condemnation as rooted in an unwillingness to repent. Ultimately, Dohm warns against treasuring up wrath and urges listeners to heed God's call to repentance.

Jerusalem Jerusalem the one who kills the prophets and stones though those who are sent to her How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings But you were not willing See your house is left to you desolate, for I say to you, you shall see me no more till you say, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Father, we come before you rejoicing that you have given your people your word. This mighty deposit to train us to overthrow all of our natural inclinations that would take us entirely in the wrong direction. But you have given us your mind on so many things in your word. God, I thank you for this text today.

I pray that you would cause it to be a mighty blessing to your people. There would be so much rejoicing in the words that you have said. We would find ourselves learning what you meant and rejoicing in what you said and obeying you. May it be that your people are blessed by the preaching of your Word today in Jesus' name, Amen. The title of the sermon today is, I wanted you were not willing.

This is a sermon text about the desires of God for His creation and about the hard-heartedness and the stiff-neckedness and the stubbornness of His creation. We are in the last week of Jesus' life. This actually started in chapter 21. 30% of Matthew, now we've been in Matthew for a year and a half now, 30% of Matthew is the last week of Jesus' life. So he lived 33 years.

Most of the gospels are about his three years of ministry. But in gospel after gospel, this isn't just true of Matthew, it's true of Mark. It's even more true of Luke and it's true of John. So much of the space of the Gospel is devoted to this last week of Jesus' life. It's just an incredibly important time to learn at the foot of the Son of God.

Jesus has just been exhausting himself. He's been laboring and laboring and laboring to give the truth to the visible people of God. Give the truth to the people of Israel and to expose the hypocrisy of the leaders. So we are coming to the end of chapter 23. This is it in chapter 23.

And Jesus has been teaching the multitudes and the disciples, but there has been a direct confrontation as Jesus is teaching the multitudes and his disciples. There has been a direct confrontation with the scribes and the Pharisees. He is condemning them repeatedly for their blindness and for their hypocrisy. These three verses that we are studying today conclude this discourse. This discourse concludes his public ministry.

Jesus will never teach multitudes again after the words that he speaks here. And so he is going to say other things but it will be primarily to his disciples and it won't be teaching of the multitudes. This is it. These are the last three words that Jesus will, these last three verses of Jesus' teaching publicly. In Luke's account of the triumphal entry, In Luke 19, Jesus wept over Jerusalem.

We don't get that in Matthew's account, but it's there in Luke. As he's riding in to the hosannas, to the praises of the people, He's not buoyed up by this. He's not lifted up by this and made glad by this. It grieves him. He is weeping over Jerusalem as the people are praising him.

This is what Luke records in Luke 19 verses 41-44. Now as Jesus drew near, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, If you had known, even you, especially in this your day, the things that make for your peace. But now they are hidden from your eyes. And then just a few verses later in verse 44, you did not know the time of your visitation. You did not know the time of your visitation.

Jerusalem has been visited by the Son of God, by the Messiah, by the Redeemer of Israel, but they didn't know the time of their visitation. So while the heart of God was for their peace, They didn't have the eyes to see it. So what we see in Luke 19 is the tenderheartedness of God in spite of the hardheartedness of the people. Did you get that? God is tender-hearted even though His people are hard-hearted.

He desired their peace. If it was us, we'd probably be wiping the dust off our feet. We'd probably be saying and thinking, good riddance, you ungrateful people. You hard-hearted, stiff-necked, stubborn people. But not Jesus.

He's weeping as he rides into Jerusalem. He wanted their peace but it was not to be because they couldn't see. They missed the time of their visitation. And this is what we see again here in verse 37 in our text today. We see that Jesus is tenderly lamenting for Jerusalem.

Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the words of Jesus here are just dripping with pathos. It's just loaded with emotion as Jesus grieves over this stubborn people that he wanted to gather as a hen, gathers her chicks. Jerusalem is not just any city, it's the city. It's the holy city. It's the capital city.

It's where all the leaders of Israel are. It represents a people. When Jesus says, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, is talking about the whole people. His heart is towards this people who bear the name of God and yet have been so hard hearted. The holy city has gone astray.

God has sent ambassador after ambassador after ambassador. He just keeps sending prophets one after another. They are all treated the same way. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to her. God has been trying to warn them and it has been because of the kind intentions of His will.

He has wanted good for His people. And that's why He's been sending these ambassadors. That's why the prophets have been coming one after another to warn them, to shake them awake, to throw cold water on these people to say, wake up from your slumber. And it's been an act of mercy. In chapter 22, Jesus told a parable of a king who had arranged a marriage for his son.

When he sends out his servants to bring in the people, What is it for? Is it a punishment? Is it a judgment on the people? No, He is inviting them to a wedding feast. He is inviting them to a wedding feast.

And they won't even receive these ambassadors. The kindness of God is everywhere in the Gospel of Matthew. As we come closer and closer to the death of Jesus Christ, you just see the kindness of God more poured out, even as he tells these parables of a people who won't even accept an invitation to a wedding feast, but mistreat the servants who would invite them and have them come to a feast. Let's begin this morning in the exposition in talking about the significance of Jerusalem. If you miss this, you miss what Jesus is talking about in the passage.

I said Jerusalem is not just any city and that is so true. Turning your Bibles to Galatians 4. I believe in Galatians 4 Paul actually unfolds what these three verses really mean when Paul tells us what Jerusalem is. If you miss this, you come away from this text and you say, Jerusalem is just a city, it's a time and a place, and there's a bunch of cantankerous people there and Jesus wasn't happy about it. While that's true on the surface, Jesus is teaching something so much more profound in these three verses.

Understanding it begins with understanding what Paul is teaching in Galatians 4. Galatians 4 will read verses 21-26. Paul writes this. Galatians 4.21. Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law?

For it is written that Abraham had two sons, The one by a bondwoman, the other by a free woman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh, and he of the free woman through promise, which things are symbolic. For these are the two covenants, the one from Mount Sinai which gives birth to bondage, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all.

In Galatians 4, Paul is teaching that there are two women and they are both mothers. The first is a bondwoman and each of these women that Paul is talking about represents a city. So you get it. There's two women, they're both mothers and each of these mothers represents a city. The first is a bondwoman and her offspring is a son born of the flesh.

Who was that? This mother was Hagar Who was the offspring born of flesh? It was Ishmael. And it's symbolic. That's exactly the words that Paul uses in Galatians 4.

It's a symbol. It's a picture of something. It's a shadow of something to help us to understand. And it's a symbol of the covenant of Mount Sinai, which gives birth to bondage. It's a covenant of bondage.

Gives birth to bondage. And Paul says this, it corresponds to the Jerusalem which now is. That's right where Jesus is in Matthew 23. Do you see this in Galatians 4 and how it relates? It corresponds, this covenant of bondage corresponds to the Jerusalem which now is the Jerusalem of Matthew 23 and is in bondage with her children.

So in Matthew 23 in our text for this week, when we see Jerusalem and her children, Paul is talking about this in Galatians 4. Jerusalem, The Jerusalem which now is the children born of flesh. This is exactly what we are seeing in Matthew 23. There is a second woman who is also a mother of offspring. This second mother is a free woman.

She's not a bond woman. And she gives birth to a son born of promise. This is Isaac, right? The son of promise. And That's symbolic too.

It's symbolic of a new covenant, a covenant of promise. Not a covenant of flesh, a bondage in the flesh, but a covenant of promise. Of course, this mother is Sarah. Paul ends by saying, the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. So there are two Jerusalems.

There is one in space and time that is on the table in Matthew 23 and it's symbolic of the bond woman, the mother of children born into bondage. And That's what we see in Matthew 23, but there's another Jerusalem. There's a Jerusalem above that gives birth to children of promise. A completely different kind of children. Revelation 21 verse 2 says this.

This is John writing in Revelation 21 verse 2. Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. The New Jerusalem is a bride made ready for her husband. It's us. It's those who have trusted in Christ, who are children of promise, who are the offspring of this other mother that is a free woman.

What is playing out in Matthew 23 is a drama that began in Genesis with Abraham and a bondwoman and a free woman and their offspring. It's playing out right before our eyes in Matthew chapter 23. And we see what a lamentable state it is to be a son or a daughter of the bond woman. They are all around. Jesus is surrounded by them in Matthew 23.

Children of the bond woman everywhere just like Paul says in Galatians 4. And Jesus is lamenting because it is such a lamentable state to be in bondage like that. Now, what is Jesus' desire? It is stated right here in the text. Jesus' desire is to gather His creation and to set them under His wings and to protect them and comfort them like a hen protects and comforts her chicks.

To bring the creation under his wings. It's a maternal instinct that is being described in Matthew 23. It is just like a mother hen. It is just like a mother hen who protects her chicks under her wings from cold nights and from enemies that would come and pick them off one by one. Not so under the wings of a mother hen.

And it's not just a desire, it's a fervent desire. How often I wanted to gather your children together. These are the words of the text in Matthew 23. How often. It's a fervent desire.

It's a persistent desire. Again and again and again, God is desiring to gather and bring under the shadow of His wings for protection and for comfort. Isn't this what we've seen of Jesus a hundred times in the Gospel of Matthew? This is no new topic in Matthew. We've seen this a bunch of times.

Consider Matthew 9, the last verses of Matthew 9. Matthew 9 verses 36-38. But when Jesus saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered like sheep, having no shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest." Those are the last words of Matthew chapter 9 and that brings us into Matthew chapter 10.

What is he doing immediately in Matthew chapter 10? He is sending out laborers. That's right when he sends out the twelve to preach the gospel of the kingdom, to tell people, repent for the kingdom of heaven is a hand, to heal the sick, To make the blind see and the deaf hear. This has been Jesus' desire over and over again. When he looks out on the multitude, he has compassion on them.

He preaches the Gospel and he sends his disciples to preach the gospel. Jesus is pulling from this rich imagery of being under the wings of God, under the protective covering of Almighty God. This is all throughout the Old Testament. I think the first place that I can find that it appears is in the Song of Moses in Deuteronomy 32 where God says that he has been like an eagle hovering over its young." That's the song of Moses in Deuteronomy 22. I've been to you like an eagle hovering over its young.

I've taken you up. I've carried you on my wings. And then in the book of Ruth, as Boaz describes what Ruth has done when she left her homeland and wouldn't forsake her mother-in-law. Wherever her mother-in-law was going, she was going too. And so she went to be among the people of God in Israel.

And Boaz has heard of this. And when he talks to Ruth, he says, I've heard about you. You've brought yourselves under the wings of Almighty God and you've sought refuge under the wings of God. And in the Psalms, it's everywhere. You see this phrase repeated, under the shadow of your wings.

It is an oft-repeated phrase in Psalms. Very often in Psalms. This is Jesus. This is God. What more could God do to demonstrate His desire to bring His creation under His protection.

What more could God have done, especially in the sending of Jesus Christ, the pinnacle, the peak of it, to demonstrate the kind intentions of His will, His desire, How often I wanted to gather you under my wings. How often I wanted. But you were not willing. By contrast, the desire of God is so clear in this. And the response of the people is so consistent here.

Not willing! God wants to gather. God wants to be a refuge. God wants to be the comfort of the people who trust in Him. But you were not willing.

Listen to Psalm 81 verses 11 and 12. Psalm 81 verses 11 and 12. But my people would not heed my voice, and Israel would have none of me. So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart to walk in their own counsels." Do you know that's what we're seeing in our text in Matthew? Israel will not heed his voice.

They're not willing to listen to Almighty God. And they will have none of God, so God gives them over. Just like we see in Psalm 81, verses 11 and 12. So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart to walk in their own counsels. You will have none of me.

You will not listen to my prophets. You'll stone the ones that I send to you. Fine. Have it your way. Have the desire of your own heart.

Or Isaiah 65 verse 2. This is right at the end of Isaiah. Isaiah 65 verse 2, I have stretched out my hands all day long to a rebellious people who walk in a way that is not good according to their own thoughts. It's almost exactly the same as Psalm 81. I held out my arms all day long to a stubborn and rebellious people.

But though they were stubborn, though they were rebellious, does God withdraw his arms? No, He held out His arms all day long to that people. The history of the Old Testament is the history of the people who are so stubborn, who are so hard-hearted. But it's also a history of a God who will not abandon them, who is so patient, is so kind, is so long-suffering in sending one prophet after another prophet after another prophet after another prophet to warn them and to appeal to them and to call them to come under the shadow of his wings. Friends this is the nature of damnation.

This is the nature of being condemned by God. This is the nature of being told, depart from me, you who practice lawlessness. The unregenerate cannot because they will not. That's what's being taught in this text. Did you get that?

Now we're talking, we're explaining the doctrines of grace here. Much is misunderstood. The unregenerate cannot come to God. Why? Because they will not.

They will not come to God. In other words, it's not that they want to repent. If only they could repent. If only God would have mercy on them, they would repent. No.

The nature of the inability of the unregenerate is that they are not willing. They don't want to. So there is not a pool of people out there who are noble hearted, who are seekers, who if they only had the right sermon at the right moment, they would repent. No! The unregenerate don't repent because they don't want to repent.

They want to be their own God. They want to have their own thoughts prevail. And so they are unable because they are unwilling. Every man, woman, child ever born has a nature that is at enmity with God. Born at war with Almighty God.

Unwilling. Unwilling, unless they are raised from the dead. This is what it means to be dead in transgressions. This is what it means to be dead in transgressions. This is what it means to be dead in transgressions.

To not have a willing bone in your body despite what you might say, despite what you might pretend to everyone else. There's not a willing bone in your body before God puts His hand upon you. Listen to John 3, 19. Now this is right after John 3, 16, for God so loved the world. John 3, 19 says this, and this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, but man loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.

This is the condemnation. Do you want to know about condemnation? Jesus tells us in John 3, 19, why are people condemned? Because the light has come into the world. Jesus Christ is the light of the world.

He has come into the world. But men don't love light. Men love darkness because their deeds are evil. Not some men, all men. All men love darkness unless God would raise them from the dead.

So Jerusalem is more than just a city full of cantankerous people at a point in history. It represents the children of the bondwoman, the children of the flesh, the children who are natural and are born into this world at enmity, at war with Almighty God and are not willing to be gathered by God. Are not willing, though God desires it, are not willing to be brought under the protection and comfort of His wings. As Paul says in Galatians 4, Jerusalem is a picture of those born in the flesh, those who are under bondage, who have a righteousness of their own, which is from the law, which is no righteousness at all. It's self-righteousness.

How will Jerusalem mount a defense against the righteous judgment of God? Have you ever thought of that? Read this text and ask yourselves, with God describing the kind intentions of His will towards these people, and how often, how much He has done to gather them, how many prophets He has sent to them. How are these people going to mount a defense against the righteous judgment of God? How will they say, God, you didn't do enough?

You're unjust, God. You didn't send enough prophets. You didn't provide stern enough warnings. You didn't reach out tenderly enough, God. You are unjust.

Who will say that? In the day when the secrets of men's hearts are laid bare and your own thoughts accuse you. Ezekiel 33, verse 11. God is commanding Ezekiel and he says, Say to them, as I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked. But that the wicked turn from his ways and live.

Turn, turn from your evil ways, for why should you die, O house of Israel?" This is the voice of God. And you hear it so clearly in our text today in Matthew 23. Why would you die when there is a Father who would gather you under the shadow of your wings, God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked. And if our affection for the doctrines of grace have caused us to think that somehow God takes delight in the death of the wicked. We just have to come back to the Word of God.

The Word of God doesn't say that. Nowhere does the Word of God say that? God does not delight in the death of the wicked. He is glorified by the death of the wicked. He is declared to be just and He receives glory.

When the wicked are judged, but God takes no delight in the death of the wicked. There you have it. And actually it's in multiple places in Ezekiel and multiple places outside of Ezekiel. But God does not take pleasure. And So if we have any sort of a framework that would cause us to think, God likes the death of the wicked.

God is delighting to crush the wicked, then we've not understood what the Scriptures say. So what about you? Easy enough to pick on Jerusalem in Matthew 23, but what about you? How often has God desired to bring you under the shadow of His wings to be your refuge, to be your comfort. But He has found you unwilling.

Turn your Bibles to Romans 2. Paul speaks about this in his letter to the Romans. He talks about how great of a judgment is reserved by those who would disregard, cast aside, trample on these tender appeals of a God who would bring you under the shadow of his wings. This is Romans chapter 2 beginning in verse 4. Romans chapter 2 verses 4 through 6.

Or do you despise the riches of his grace? Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart, you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who will render to each one according to his deeds. Paul is saying that most people will take tender entreaties, the tender appeals of a God who with these maternal instincts would gather under His wings. What will most people do with that?

They will presume upon it. They will despise the riches of His goodness. What are they doing when they despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering. They're treasuring up wrath. They're just heaping it up.

Day by day, every day of patience and longsuffering that is rejected is a day of piling up wrath for the day of wrath, when God will come and judge righteously. It's terrifying. How often have you heard the Gospel preached? How often has God pricked your conscience and entreated you to repent, but you were not willing? Our text today isn't for people who lived 2, 000 years ago.

Our text today is for you, when God pricks your conscience so that you will repent, when God brings you under. In His mercy, He brings you under the sound of the Gospel. How often? Paul says, if you will not hear Him, If you will have none of God, if you will not hear all these actions on His part of mercy towards you that you are treasuring up wrath for the day of judgment. You are just heaping it up.

And every sermon where the gospel is preached to you is actually adding to your condemnation if you will not repent. In verse 38, or back to Matthew 23, Jesus declares that their house is left to them desolate. The word desolate, the Greek word, is used 50 times in the New Testament. 32 of those times it's translated wilderness. Your house is left to you like a wilderness.

And the picture is one of a barren wasteland. God has withdrawn Himself. It's left to you. God has said, you won't listen to me, you'll have none of me, then have what you want. Do you know how terrifying the thought is of being left to have what you want?

If God leaves the natural man to have what he wants, he'll destroy himself. 100% of the time, without exception. What is this house? In the context of what has come before and what has come after, it almost certainly has to be the temple. The place of worship, the place where God has set His name, the place that God has inhabited in a very special and particular way, and now He is leaving.

He is leaving a barren wasteland. And soon enough it will be a barren wasteland. We are coming to chapter 24 with a desolation. The making Jerusalem into a wilderness and a barren wasteland is going to become not figurative. I think there is so much figurative here, but it is also very literal.

Jerusalem and the Temple are going to be a wilderness, a barren wasteland. Listen to Isaiah 64 verses 9-11. Isaiah 64, 9-11. Do not be furious, O Lord, nor remember iniquity forever. Indeed, please look, we are all your people.

He's talking about Israel. We are all your people. Your holy cities are a wilderness. Zion is a wilderness. Jerusalem a desolation.

Our holy and beautiful temple where our fathers praised you is burned up with fire, and all our pleasant things are laid waste. This is the end of all those who would cast aside the prophets. This is the end of all those who would take the messengers that God has sent them. Everyone at the end of their life is going to be able to point to many messengers where God entreated and God called and drew towards repentance. Those who will cast them aside and refuse to repent, this is the end.

What happened to Jerusalem? What Isaiah is talking about in Isaiah 64 where he talks about Mount Zion being left a wilderness and Jerusalem a desolation and the temple where their fathers had praised God, being burned up and all the pleasant things laid waste. This is the end of all those who will not listen to the prophets that God has sent you one after another after another. In verse 39, let's read verse 39. For I say to you, you shall see me no more till you say, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord." Jesus is saying, you're not going to see me again until You declare what is said of the Messiah in Psalm 118.

He is quoting Psalm 118 and we have seen this recently. It is what the people were saying as Jesus came into Jerusalem, the triumphal entry. In Luke 19, in Luke's account of the triumphal entry, the people are saying, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, just like we have in our text today, What do the Pharisees say? Teacher, rebuke your disciples. The Pharisees cannot bear to hear the people praise Jesus with Psalm 118, which declares him to be the Messiah.

They can't bear to see it. So they say to Jesus, the Pharisees say this to Jesus, teacher, rebuke your disciples. Make them stop saying this. And Jesus says, if they're silent, the rocks will cry out. This has to be said.

In Matthew 21, which is recording the events the day after the triumphal entry, the very next day, the children are declaring Psalm 118 about Jesus. Hosanna to the son of David. The chief priests and the elders are indignant. They just can't stand to hear Psalm 118 said of Jesus. Listen to Philippians chapter 2 verses 9 through 11.

Philippians 2, verses 9-11. This is right after the more famous portion of Philippians 2 that talks about Jesus leaving the glory of heaven to take on the form of a servant and to become obedient to death, even death on a cross. These are the very next words in Philippians 2, verses 9-11. Therefore, God has highly exalted him and given him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Everyone will declare Psalm 118, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Everyone will praise Jesus Christ. Every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess. Every Pharisee that said, Jesus rebuke your disciples for saying this, will declare it. Every chief priest and elder who were indignant about those children, quoting Psalm 118, will declare that Jesus is Lord to the glory of the Father. All those in every age who have rejected Jesus Christ will see Him again.

That's what Jesus is teaching here in Matthew 23. You'll see Him again. You can rage against Him. You can rail at the Gospel. You can spit in the face of the prophets that He sends to you, or you can kill them.

You'll see Jesus again. You'll see Him again. At the bodily resurrection, on the day of judgment, on the day where every man will be called to account before him you'll see him and There will be a uniform response And it is to bow your knee and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Turn in your Bibles to Proverbs 1. We're going to close with Proverbs 1.

What is the difference between the two words? The last words of Proverbs 1, beginning in verse 20. Wisdom calls aloud outside. She raises her voice in the open squares. She cries out in the chief concourses, at the openings of the gates in the city.

She speaks her words. How long, you simple ones, Will you love simplicity? For scorners delight in their scorning and fools hate knowledge. Turn at my rebuke. Surely I will pour out my spirit on you.

I will make my words known to you. Because I have called and you refused. I have stretched out my hand and no one regarded. Because you disdained all my counsel and would have none of my rebuke. I also will laugh at your calamity.

I will mock when your terror comes. When your terror comes like a storm, and your destruction comes like a whirlwind. When distress and anguish come upon you. Then they will call on me, but I will not answer. They will seek me diligently, but they will not find me, because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord.

They would have none of my counsel and despised my every rebuke. Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their own way and be filled to the full with their own fancies. For the turning away of the simple will slay them, and the complacency of fools will destroy them. But whoever listens to me will dwell in safety and be secure without fear of evil. Aren't the councils of Scripture so consistent and beautiful?

Don't you find the same thing everywhere? That God has cried out wisdom from every street corner and appealed and rebuked and entreated. And rebuked and entreated. What more can God have done that He has not done in and through Jesus Christ His Son? God would have been just as the King of the universe, as the one who has given you every breath that you've ever breathed.

God would have been just to just told you what He required and held you to it and condemned you the first time you ever sinned. But is that what God has done? No. A thousand times no. Had he done that, who could call him unjust?

Can the pot rise up and say to the potter, can the clay say to the potter, why have you made me like this? Why have you done this? No, the potter does whatever he desires, but look at what the potter has done with this clay. He's reached out his hands all day long. He's appealed in the most tender ways.

He's sent prophet after prophet after prophet to say, Come under my wings. Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. My yoke is easy, my burden is light. What could God have done for you that He has not done through Jesus Christ? Will you receive His entreaties?

Heed them. Listen to His voice. Repent when He calls you to repent, or will you treasure of wrath for the day of wrath? This is the question that our text in Matthew 23 brings us to. Let's pray.

Our Father, I thank you for your tender mercies demonstrated to us through Christ. I pray God that you would forgive me for ever having attributed any hardness to you. The hardness is on our side, in our own hearts. I thank you for the mercies throughout the ages, but especially, O God, the mercies through Jesus Christ. If your mercies were new every morning in the Old Testament, what are they in Christ?

I pray God that you would give, ears to hear, and eyes to see, to everyone who is here who has not received the Gospel, that rather than treasuring up wrath for the day of wrath, that they would hear your voice, see the beauty of Jesus Christ and repent. Oh God, visit us. Pour out your Spirit upon us. I thank you for your word. I pray that we would be a people transformed by it and taught to love Jesus Christ and His mercies towards His people.

Oh God, may we be a people abiding under the shadow of your wings, rushing to be under the protection and the comfort of your wings, that you would be our refuge. May it be so in Jesus' name. Amen.