In the sermon titled 'Jesus' Model for Kingdom Building,' speaker Peter Allison explores the teachings of Jesus in Luke chapter 8, focusing on the model Jesus provides for spreading the message of the Kingdom of God. Allison underscores the importance of Jesus' public preaching across cities and villages, emphasizing that the objective was not merely to make converts but to proclaim the glad tidings of the Kingdom of God. This kingdom, central to Jesus' ministry, was not just about personal salvation but a broader concept of God's sovereign rule through Christ. Jesus' approach to ministry included training successors, notably the twelve apostles, who would continue spreading the gospel. The sermon also highlights the continuity of the Old Testament pattern of faithfulness and the establishment of churches with elders and deacons, alongside the New Testament practice of evangelism. Furthermore, the role of women in Jesus' ministry is acknowledged, as they supported his work and were present during significant moments of his life. Allison contrasts Jesus' model with the dangers of relying solely on academic institutions like seminaries, which can introduce harmful ideologies. Ultimately, the sermon calls for a heart dedicated to the kingdom's work, emphasizing obedience to Christ and the importance of supporting the gospel ministry.

Luke chapter 8 this morning, please turn to verse 1. So we return to our study of the book of Luke after a couple months in Proverbs. We pick back up in chapter 8 beginning at verse 1. Hear God's word. Now it came to pass afterward that He went through every city and village, preaching and bringing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God.

And the twelve were with him, and certain women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary, called Magdalene, out of whom had come seven demons, and Joanna, the wife of Chazza, Herod's steward, and Susanna, and many others who provided for him from their substance. And when a great multitude had gathered and they had come to him from every city, he spoke by a parable. A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the wayside, and it was trampled down, and the birds of the air devoured it. And some fell on rock, and as soon as it sprang up, it withered away, because it lacked moisture.

And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up with it and choked it, but others fell on good ground, sprang up and yielded a crop a hundredfold. And when he had said these things, he cried, He who has ears to hear, let him hear." May this our law be his delight and lead us to long for his salvation. Heavenly Father, thank you for preserving your word. Thank you for bringing it to us, for sending your messengers. And I pray that you would sanctify these sinful lips this morning, that through a vessel of clay, your Word, the Word of Truth and Life might be spoken to us.

May you drive away the chaff and preserve me from error. And may you bless a hundredfold with the hearing and preaching of this word. In Jesus' name, amen. Jesus gives here a model for Kingdom building. And I originally thought we would look at the parable of the sower, but as I spent more time thinking on this passage.

I realized that there's a model here in these first three verses that we really should look at first. And so I've read the parable of the sower without reading Jesus' explanation of that parable, which is an odd place to stop. But I wanted to give to us, to read the preaching that Jesus did, because that's what we will talk a little bit about. And so I read that to explain the first three verses. But this morning I'd like to look at these first three verses where Jesus gives us a kingdom building model.

This is what He did. It says afterward, Now it came to pass afterward. After what? Well, after he had this meal with Simon, remember in the previous chapter, it's been a couple months I realize, but he had this meal, this dinner, sort of a semi-private dinner with Simon, a Pharisee, and that was where he had been anointed by this woman, who I simply called a sinner. She anointed him with a very, she anointed him, she began to wash his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair as she kissed and it's repeated an ongoing kissing of his feet and of course Simon you remember is thinking well if Jesus is a prophet he would know that who is doing all this to him down at His feet and so Jesus knowing His thoughts exhorts Him and teaches Him and instructs Him.

So Jesus first of all then engaged in private instruction, private teaching house to house. Jesus taught people. He exhorted. He ministered in homes. But after this, now, and this is where chapter 8 picks up, he engages in public preaching.

He begins a public ministry, preaching the glad tidings of the kingdom of God. He went throughout the country. He preached in every city and village. He broadcast his message to repent for the kingdom of God was at hand. See, the objective of his preaching here was not simply to make converts.

It wasn't simply to secure professions of faith from people. It wasn't simply to get people to pray a simple prayer, asking God to forgive them. The objective of his preaching was far greater. He had a much, much bigger objective. He was preaching the glad tidings of the kingdom of God.

The kingdom, That word is mentioned 46 times in the book of Luke. Forty-six times. Thirty-three of which are specifically referencing the kingdom of God. At least thirty-three of them. Referencing the kingdom of God.

What was he preaching? What is this kingdom that he was preaching? He's not talking here simply about people's personal salvation, although that's very much involved. This is a central theme, this kingdom message, this kingdom is a central theme of Jesus' public ministry. This pattern of, and we're going to look at that kingdom in a minute, but this pattern that we see here of Jesus going about from village to village and preaching in every village and every city is the pattern God's servants, the apostles, continued as they established the New Testament church.

They went to every country and every village and preached the gospel, repent and believe for the kingdom of God is at hand. And so we have the book of Acts largely recounts the history of Paul and the other apostles of Philip the evangelist of Peter going from city to city preaching this gospel of the kingdom. Now this doesn't overturn the Old Testament pattern of God's people having fixed homes and established churches where God's Word is preached each week. Rather we need to see this pattern that Jesus establishes here, which is followed by the apostles in the establishing the New Testament Church as and as adding to as adding to the pattern that was already established in the Old Testament. The pattern in the Old Testament was of generational faithfulness, of fathers teaching their families, commanding as Abraham did, their families after them in the fear of the Lord, instructing them as we're taught in Deuteronomy 6 to as our children as they as we walk by the ways We lie down as we rise up.

This is the pattern of Growing the church that was long established in the Old Testament the preaching week to week in all the synagogues throughout the land Moses was preached. And so it is to this pattern of God's covenantal faithfulness of building his church from the children of his believers that is added the work of going from village to village and country to country and establishing new Churches and that's what that pattern we have today as well Where where we continue to send? Evangelists we continue send preachers of the gospel to every tribe. And some of the greatest advances in reaching people that were unreached have been made by people seeking to bring the gospel to every tribe. Some of the greatest translation work and linguistic work has been done by people who are working to bring the gospel, this glad tidings of the kingdom of God to every village and to every country, to every people.

I would say that the Gospel translators are at the forefront of linguistic work being done today. But also, the New Testament pattern also continued the Old Testament pattern of ministry, right? Because where the Apostles established churches, they were very concerned to see that elders were provided for those churches, that there were elders that were raised up to continue those churches. In other words, when they preached to these crowds of people, whether it was preaching, whether Jesus preached in the synagogue or the Apostles preached in the synagogue or they preached down at the river or they preached in Mars Hill or they preached in the public square their goal was to establish a church and having established a church a body of believers they they were careful to establish elders and deacons to carry on that Old Testament pattern of building the kingdom. So the saints who are gathered by the preaching of the Word are also perfected by the preaching of the same word.

Jesus preached then the kingdom of God. Luke calls it the kingdom of God, Matthew calls it the kingdom of heaven. And they are very consistent in that. I don't think they altered their terminology, but they mean the same thing. What is said in Matthew about the kingdom of heaven is said in Luke about the kingdom of God.

This is the fifth kingdom that Daniel spoke about in his prophecy 500 years earlier. You remember he spoke of the four empires of the ancient world, the four great empires of the ancient world, the Babylonian Empire, which was the one in power when in his lifetime succeeded by the Medo-Persian empire, which was in turn succeeded by the Greek Empire, built by Alexander the Great in a very short time, which was then succeeded by the Roman Empire, built over a much longer time and lasting far longer and far greater extent. But all of these empires, they're gone. They don't exist anymore. Daniel spoke of a fifth kingdom that destroys the other kingdoms.

In one vision of that statue, a stone cut without hands, smashes those kingdoms to dust. It smashes this image of these four different metals to dust. That's what we saw in history. We look back, we see that the Kingdom of Heaven indeed conquered the Roman Empire in less than 300 years. And so this kingdom, the King of this kingdom is Jesus Christ.

He is the one whom God the Father has installed upon the throne, as he says in Psalm 2, yet I have set my King on my holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree. The Lord has said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you. Ask of me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance the ends of the earth for your possession and Paul said that He will reign until He has put all enemies under His feet.

In Revelation we find a host in heaven following the sounding there of the angel saying, the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, that means of His anointed, of the Messiah. And He shall reign forever and ever. Now you might be thinking, Well, hasn't God always been king? Isn't he sovereign? Hasn't he been reigning since the world was created?

And yes, that is true. But what we're speaking of here when we speak of this kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is where God's sovereign rule is mediated through Jesus Christ as he subdues rebel hearts to himself by the power of the Holy Spirit And as our will is changed from being opposed to God's will, from being an enmity against God, to submitting to that law and obeying it. That's the purpose. That's the purpose that Christ came. Obedience to his law.

And that's how he taught his disciples to pray. Pray for my kingdom to come and his will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. That is what he is preaching. That God would be honored by every knee confessing that Jesus is Lord, by every enemy being defeated, prostrate before his throne, either conquered in his grace or conquered in His wrath, but every enemy is conquered." This is in a sense an inward kingdom. When Jesus was asked by the Pharisees, when his kingdom would come that he was talking so much about, this is in Luke 17 in the middle of the chapter or so, he answered them that it doesn't come by observation.

You're not going to see the kingdom coming. You're not going to see an army. When the king of Babylon came, you saw it. He had a massive army. And he would just Set up siege works and destroy any city that stood in his path.

Jesus is saying the Kingdom of Heaven isn't like that. Oh, it's very real, but it doesn't come by observation. The Kingdom of Heaven isn't an outward kingdom. He said, the kingdom is within you. The kingdom is within you.

You can't see it because it is within us as God rules in our hearts. Hearts that have been subdued by King Jesus through the powerful work of the Holy Spirit. Now that kingdom grows extensively in the world. You can see it. It has an effect.

It's like Jesus compares it to a mustard seed, a tiny mustard seed that's planted in the ground. It's a little tiny seed, but it grows into a great tree and all the birds can find a shelter in it. He said the Kingdom of Heaven is like that. It grows extensively. It produces something that is visible it has an effect it also grows intensively he said it's like leaven that somebody puts in a in your bread dough and it permeates The entire bread dough it affects it you can't see it you put that leaven in there You can't see it and if you don't remember if you put it in or not you can't look at the bread and figure it out.

Because it's there, it's within it. It's not visible. But the effect is visible when the bread rises. And Jesus said the Kingdom of Heaven is like that. It grows intensively.

It grows as God's Word is preached, as hearts, rebel hearts are subdued to Him. As the Holy Spirit transforms us through His work of regeneration and renews our wills and our minds and makes us new creatures in Christ. That work, Jesus said, you can't see it. It's the work of the Holy Spirit. Now the Saint is the great imitator.

He seeks to imitate what God does. He can't do it on his own. He's not an originator. He's an imitator. And we can, just like pharaoh's magicians tried to imitate the signs that Aaron and Moses did.

Satan imitates, seeks to imitate in his kingdom this rule of Christ. He seeks to imitate it. This satanic kingdom of this age that Psalm 2 says is raging against the kingdom of God, against Christ, seeking to overthrow His reign. Satan wants to imitate that rule. Because you see, brutal oppression from without is really a weak and very crude form of ruling what glory Is there in saying yes look at all these subjects who do my will as long as I beat them to a bloody pulp As long as I threaten them to an inch of their lives as long as I can throw them in jail if they don't do it What kind of glory is there in such a such a rule?

Yet that's apart from the power of the Holy Spirit, that's the only really rule there is. So no, see that's realized as a very crude form of ruling. There's no glory in that. But see, Satan doesn't have the Holy Spirit changing hearts to bring a heart into submission to what he wants. And so he has to do it through deception and mind control.

And he does. And we are witnessing today the results of 70 years of mind control and deception perpetrated on the American people so that they'll walk around in masks. People are voluntarily wearing these masks. And they're even more willing to report people that don't. To protect themselves from something that's never been proven to kill anyone yet.

The CIA has directly and indirectly for 70 years paid agents to operate within our media. We call it the mainstream media and lately we've been calling it what it is, fake news. And that's become a popular term only in the last couple of years. But it's been going on for 70 years. There's been congressional investigations into it.

And it's not our purpose this morning to mine into these those details but there's obviously extensive documentation it's our purpose this morning to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom but to also point out the deceptions of Satan to try to do the same thing to try to obtain this voluntary compliance with his agenda but he can't unless he resorts to he resorts to deception. This then is the purpose of Jesus' preaching, of his coming, of his kingdom work. To bring about the obedience of his will on earth even as it is in heaven so that Christ is crowned and glorified as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. That's the purpose, His own glory. His own glory.

Now the next thing in Jesus' model here is that He trains successors. Notice it says that he went around preaching in every village and city, preaching and bringing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God. And there's this little sentence, and the twelve were with him. This is the twelve that you remember earlier he had called specifically called selecting them out of a larger group of disciples. He set these men apart to be his apostles to be his preachers.

And so what's he doing here? He's taking them with him as he preaches to train them because in the next chapter a little later he is going to send them out to preach themselves. And then they are going to come back and he is going to evaluate what they did. See what he's doing here, he is training his successors. He's training those who he will use to plant the New Testament church.

You notice there's no seminary here. There's no seminary here. Knowledge is very important, especially doctrinal knowledge of the Word of God. Paul exhorted Timothy to study, to show himself approved unto God. But there is no seminary involved here.

Seminaries over the last 150 years that have taken men out of the local church and away from the oversight of local sessions and put them in ivory towers with academic scholars has been proven to be the entry of deadly poison into the church today. And it started with theologians who believed that man sat in judgment of the Word of God. They operated from the presupposition that it is our job to sit in judgment of the Word of God, that we must decide what is in the Word of God and what isn't in the Word of God. But Then it moved on very quickly to outright rejection of the Word of God by the very people who were supposedly proclaiming the Word of God. This all came, and I'm not going to trace the history of it, but it came from early enlightenment thinkers and went into Germany.

Many American theologians were going over to Germany to various universities there to study and they picked up these ideas and they were couched in scholarly and academic and very good sounding and noble themes. Who wouldn't want to study the date, the origin, the location, and the authors of the Bible? It certainly is a good field of study. But It was done by people who believe that man sits in judgment over the Word of God. And it's our duty to decide what is in the Bible and what isn't.

And we have to do that very carefully and all that stuff. But you see right from the beginning, it's got it upside down. God is the one who decides what's in the Word. God is the one who canonized His Word, and He canonized it from the moment it was given. It was God's Word.

It's not up to men to make God's Word God's Word. So this idea crept into the church through the seminaries. This whole idea of higher criticism Sounds good if you say it's simply the study of the date, place, and authorship and so on. But it was a lot more than that. And I'd like to just give you two quick examples of how this manifested itself.

And I said 150 years ago, we're going to go back 120 years to see where this was already back then, in terms of undermining the Word of God. So there's something called the Auburn Affirmation That was a document written in 1924. And it begins, We the undersigned ministers of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America feel bound in certain actions of the General Assembly of 1924 and of persistent attempts to divide the church and in bridge its freedom. Now why are they saying there are attempts to divide the church and bridge its freedom? Because there were people who recognized that the Word of God had been lost and they were saying, we as Christians have to believe some things.

Now what do you suppose they were saying we as Christians had to believe? Well, basic things like Jesus is God, that He's born of a virgin, that He'd perform miracles, that His Word is true. Do you think those are foundational to the faith? So why are they saying, abridge our freedom? What do they believe?

I'll show you. They want to express their convictions in matters pertaining thereto. So at the outset they say, we affirm and declare our acceptance of the Westminster Confession of Faith as we did at our ordination. They're saying, okay, are still believing the confession here, we are not changing our vows. We sincerely hold and earnestly preach the doctrines of evangelical Christianity in agreement with the historic testimony of the Presbyterian Church in the United States.

We believe the doctrines of evangelical Christianity. That's what they're claiming. Let's see if they do. They go through a little history of how circumstances got to this, but this is a history in which men like Charles Briggs were tried for heresy because they said the Word of God wasn't inerrant. And in his case, he was convicted, but after him, really, was nobody ever convicted of believing those ideas.

And so 25 years later or so, 25 or 35 years later, we're at this point now. It says, with respect to the interpretation of the Scriptures, the position of our church has been that common to Protestants, quote, the supreme judge, says the confession, by whom all controversies of religion are to be determined and all decrees of counsels, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men and private spirits are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other than the Holy Spirit speaking in Scripture." The Supreme Judge, in other words, is the Holy Spirit speaking in Scripture. So that's what they want to affirm. But then they say this, there is no assertion in the Scriptures that their writers were kept from error. Direct statement.

There is no assertion in the scriptures that their writers were kept from error. Direct statement. There is no assertion in the scriptures that their writers were kept from error. So The Bible could have errors in it. How do you know what's wrong and what's right?

Well, we have to figure that out. They go on to say, well they talk about some more history of some of this battle for the faith, but they go on to say, the General Assembly of 1923 expressed the opinion concerning five doctrinal statements, the ones I just told you about, the deity of Christ, the virgin birth. The 1923 assembly said that each of one of these five doctrines is an essential, quote, an essential doctrine of the word of God and our standards. They say we are opposed to any attempt to elevate these five doctrinal statements to a position of test for ordination or for good standing. In other words, you can be an evangelical Christian, you can believe in the Westminster Confession of Faith, you can believe in the doctrines of evangelical Christianity, but you don't have to believe in the virgin birth of Christ in order to be ordained a minister in our denomination.

That's what happens when man sets himself up as the judge of the Word of God. This poison came through seminaries. It didn't come through the person in the pew. It came through the seminaries. They say, The opinion of the General Assembly attempts to commit our church to certain theories concerning the inspiration of the Bible and the incarnation, the atonement, the resurrection, and the continuing life and supernatural power of the Lord Jesus Christ.

They're saying, you're trying to restrict us to believe certain things about this, and we're feeling constrained. They say, we all hold most earnestly to these great facts and doctrines. We all believe from our heart that the writers of the Bible were inspired by God, they just weren't kept from error. That Jesus Christ was God manifested in the flesh, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, and through him we have our redemption, that having died for our sins he rose from the dead and is our ever living Savior, and that in his earthly ministry he wrought many mighty works, and by his vicarious death and unfailing presence he is able to save to the uttermost." Well that sounds pretty good, but remember these are liberals so they've redefined what all those words mean. Some of us regard the particular theories contained in the deliverance of the General Assembly of 1923 as satisfactory explanations of these facts and doctrines.

Some of us, okay, Some of us, remember these are the ministers of the Presbyterian Church, some of us, they said, believe that what you said last year, what the General Assembly said last year about the virgin birth, the deity of Christ, being essential doctors, some of us believe that way of understanding it is an adequate explanation of the Scriptures. But we are united in believing that these are not the only theories allowed by the Scriptures as explanations of these facts and doctrines of our religion. In other words, we all believe in Jesus Christ. We all believe that He's the Son of God, but what that means, we don't agree on. We all believe that He came to save us, but what that means, we don't agree on.

Was he born of an actual virgin? Or was that just some words for some concept that sounds nice? Do you actually believe the Word of God or not? They're saying you don't have to actually believe what the Word of God says. And you can still be a minister.

Some of us are united, or we are united, in believing that these are not the only theories, so they called the virgin birth a theory, not the only theories allowed by the Scriptures and our standards as explanations of these facts and doctrines of our religion. And that all who hold to these facts and doctrines, whatever theories that they may employ to explain them, are worthy of our confidence in fellowship." Now, going right along with this, it became a rejection of creation. This is right when people also rejected what the church has historically believed about creation. Now, I'd like to go to a second example. A few years later, Dietrich Bonhoeffer is a German theologian who is gaining popularity today.

Who is gaining popularity today, but I'd like to talk about what he believed, because he believed these things, and he writes very candidly about what he believes. He writes like an academic. He doesn't mean with certain words what we think those words mean. And I'll give you an example. In a recent survey of Christian college presidents, 89% said they believed in the Genesis of counter-creation, but only 52% believe in a young earth.

Well, they don't obviously believe the Genesis account of creation. See how they redefine words. And that's what's going on with these doctrines of the faith. And so Bonhoeffer writes, And a lot of these things come out of his letters. So he's talking about Rudolf Bultmann, who wrote a paper, who believed that we needed to demythologize the Bible.

We needed to take the myth out of the New Testament, out of the Bible. He's somebody, he's one of these thinkers and he said, Bonhoeffer said, my view of it today would be not that he went too far and took too much out, but that he didn't go far enough. It is not only the mythological conception such as the miracles, the ascension and the like, which are not in principle separate from the conceptions of God, faith and so on. It is not only the mythological conceptions, such as the miracles, the ascension, and the like, which are not in principle separate from the conceptions of God, faith, and so on. It is not only the mythological conceptions, such as the miracles and ascension of an ascension, that are problematic, but the religious conceptions themselves.

You cannot as Boltman imagines separate God and miracles but you have to be able to interpret and proclaim both of them in a non-religious sense. He said In another letter to the same friend, Boltman would seem to have felt Barthes limitations in some way, but he misconstrues them and hence goes off into the typical liberal reduction process and by that he means the mythological elements of Christianity are dropped and Christianity is reduced to its essence. So these people believe the Word of God contains the Bible, it's our job to figure out what in that Word is the Bible, is God's Word. And so that's why Boltmans are trying to demythologize the Bible. And Bonhoeffer's saying, no, we can't demythologize the Bible.

He says, I am of the view that the full content, including the mythological concepts, must be maintained. Bonhoeffer says, the Bible, we can't take the myth out of the Bible, we have to keep the myth in the Bible. The New Testament is not a mythological garbing of universal truth, as some would have said. This mythology, the resurrection and so on. The resurrection was a myth he said.

In other words that people actually are rising from the dead. The mythology is a thing itself, But the concepts must be interpreted in such a way as to not make religion a precondition of faith." And he goes on, he says, he goes on to write, There is no longer any need for God as a working hypothesis, whether in morals, politics, or science. Nor is there any need for such a god in religion or philosophy. In the name of intellectual honesty, these working hypotheses should be dropped or dispensed with. There is no longer any need for god.

That's where seminaries have gotten Christian preachers. They're no longer Christian preachers if they're not preaching Christ. He says, at this point nervous souls start asking what room there is left for God. And Being ignorant of the answer, they write off the whole development which has brought them to this pass. He goes on, I won't read everything, but he ends with this comment in one letter, but through the fragile and broken Bible, God meets us in the voice of the risen one.

That, that, those doctrines came from seminaries. And men who went there as young people in their twenties were taught these ideas by people who should have been their faithful mentors and teachers. And they trusted these people and they began to absorb these ideas. And today you can even look in the Ligonier Study Bible and it has these ideas riddled throughout it. If you read the notes, if you read the introductions to the books, these ideas, the ideas that have come from these kind of scholars.

Now, a lot of times to be fair, they say, they kind of reject them, but they should be, and even be in the Bible. What use does that garbage have in the Word of God? That has come because of seminaries. Now I'm not saying that without seminaries people can't become corrupt, But that is not the model that we see Jesus using here. Jesus took the men who were going to be the preachers of the New Testament and He took them with Him as He went preaching.

And they stayed under his mentorship as he was not talking in a classroom. He wasn't a scholar. He didn't write books and articles, but he preached and he ministered and he served. And that's how the disciples learned. Jesus made the invisible kingdom visible.

People were transformed through his teaching and through his healing Demons were expelled the blind saw the deaf heard the dumb spoke But it wasn't just the physical that he healed they were transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit. Their lives were changed. Jesus made the invisible kingdom visible in his preaching. He cleansed the unclean. The woman mentioned here, Mary Magdalene, seven demons were removed from her.

Others who had infirmities. You see, Jesus didn't take a bride who was without spot or wrinkle. Rather, Christ sanctifies and cleanses his bride with the washing of water by his word and he sets his people apart Jesus takes the broken Jesus takes the sick Jesus takes the dirty Jesus takes a foul and unclean the infirm and the sick and He heals, He restores and He saves and He purifies for Himself His own peculiar people who are zealous for good works. He does it through the washing of the water of the Word. This is what sets us apart.

He prayed to the Father, sanctify them by Your Word. Set them apart by Your Word. Your Word is truth. And then look at the response of the church to Jesus preaching Jesus is supported by those To whom he had preached who were in the kingdom. He didn't need these people.

It says these and many others. It names Joanna, it names Mary Magdalene, it names Susanna, and many others. It said, provided support for him from their substance. Jesus didn't need these people to support him. He could feed five thousand people from a few fish and loaves.

He could raise any money he needed just like he had Peter find money for the temple tax in the mouth of a fish. He didn't need these people to give to him. But he chose to be supported through the gifts of those who were brought into the kingdom so that as our sin bearer he could be tempted in all points like as we are yet without sin. So that as our high priest he could sympathize with us because he was supported by people. And as a high priest he could sympathize with us having experienced all that we experience.

He allowed himself to be supported so that he could be our example. It's like he washed the feet of the disciples to be an example, Just like he suffered to be an example. He was supported by people He didn't need to support him so that he could be our example But he was also supported By them to allow the Saints to allow these whom he had ministered to these whom he had helped the privilege of participating in the kingdom labors with him. You see because the church supports the kingdom work through its ties and its offerings. It is a ministry but it is a ministry that Paul says is to our advantage to give to the kingdom.

Paul said is to our advantage. See, our heart goes where our treasure is. Do you want to have a heart for the kingdom of God? Do you want to have a heart for the preaching of the word of God? Do you want to have a heart for the preaching of the word of God?

Do you want to have a heart for the obedience of Christ on earth as it is in heaven? Do you want to have a heart for preaching and reaching every village and every country with the gospel? Then give to the kingdom. Give to the work of the kingdom because your heart will go where your treasure goes. Those who receive a prophet in the name of a prophet receive a prophet's reward.

You see women are highly regarded here by Jesus. These are the women who went with Him. These are many of the same women who were at the cross with Him. The church is not ashamed of Christ's testimony. These women went with Christ.

When he was reproached, they were there. They didn't desert him. On the cross, they were there with him. The church is not ashamed of Christ or his testimony. Paul instructed Titus, Timothy, not to be ashamed of the testimony of the Lord, but to share with Him in the sufferings for the Gospel to the power of God.

I pray that each of us will not be ashamed of Christ or of His Word, whether it's in our home or in the public square. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Word. We thank You for Your Holy Spirit who teaches us that Word, who makes it precious to us. We thank You for that Word that reveals You, our Savior, that reveals your beauty, your glory, your amazing love, and your mercy to us in Christ. We thank you for your Holy Spirit who washes us the water of regeneration so that we are clean, so that whatever corruptions and stains and fallings We are able to stand before You in white robes, washed white with Christ's blood, saved from Your wrath.

Father, we thank you for your word that shows to us our beautiful Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.