Beacon Sunday Service September 17th 2023

Here's your assurance of pardon. For the Lord does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. As far as the East is from the West, so far does He remove our transgressions from us.

So let's just pray for their safe passage and journey here. I know they're so close. Tiff was here, like she was at Alvarado on Olympic, and she couldn't pass. She was like literally two blocks away from worshiping with us. Same with the other people who are on their way. So let's just pray for their safe passage. I know it's frustrating for them.

So let's just pray that somehow they can make it through to us and worship together. So let's pray for them.

Our ministry has grown organically just through how many kids we've had.

We can't protect them from the things that are happening with the the rhetoric of just what they're teaching in schools now. And even things that we cannot protect them over from them not being in, you know, not being with them in school, um, with their friends, wherever they are, it's everywhere on billboards, and we can't shade their eyes from it from forever, but we can pray over them. We can teach our children in our homes the best that we can. We can raise them to the best of our ability in the name of the Lord. Um so this let's lift them up. Let's just lift them up for their growth, their protection, and ultimately that God will save them.

Father God, we know that you are God that keeps his promises. We know, Lord, that you will hear our cries for help, that you would um hear us as as concerned members of this ministry. First, we've prayed for our members to come here safely to be able to fight through the traffic, not be discouraged to be able to come here and be determined to worship together with us to hear the word. So we pray for their safe passage here. We pray, Father, for our children. We just lifted them up to you, and we know that it's it's a tough world than what we grew up in, Father. We know that it's far different. It's a far it's it's so much more wicked than uh what we desire for our city to be. It's even just dangerous, Lord.

We pray for the protection of our kids from them to be uh for their souls to be guarded from uh just woke rhetoric and and just um even for their bodies to be protected from those to that mean to do them harm. We pray for their salvation. We pray for them as they go uh back to Sunday school today and they learn more about your word, that they would be filled, Father, and that seeds would be planted uh for their for their understanding of who you are. We pray, Father, for them at home as well, that they will continue to learn from their parents, and just uh that our households will be filled with the Holy Spirit, filled with the guidance of your word. Uh, I just pray for today that our worship would be blessed, and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

Praise God. Answers, look at that. Um, members are walking through, they made it, they were persistent, and they came uh and we're so we really are so happy to see you guys. Um, I'm gonna have our children dismissed. Uh today's teacher is pastor or is uh Uncle Stephen and or teacher Stephen and teacher Harold. Uncle Pastor Teacher Stephen. Um have a good Sunday school. Uh, as they're leaving, I'm gonna go through a time of uh announcements. Uh obviously, uh today's Salvadorian parade uh threw us for a loop. We we did not know none of it was on our radar. But what is on our radar is Ciclovia. Um that was scheduled a month ago and has been rescheduled to October 15th. Uh, please uh plan accordingly.

I did look at the map. I don't really think it affects us, but if it does, please take a look at their website. Um, Lighthouse Community Church is hosting a kids' mini conference. Um, I know that Tiff is interested in going, but if you would like to go, it's November 11th from nine a.m. to twelve p.m. Uh we are willing to carpal with anyone that wants to go. Please uh look on their website for more information and let um just let my family know if you'd like to go. Uh we're still looking for children's ministry volunteers. Um if you haven't volunteered yet and would like to, please let me know so I could do your background check. Uh, it's a quick and easy process for those who are citizens of America.

Um, and if you are uh just want to help out, it'd be such a help, big help for us. And of course, um our offering options are through Zell, Venmo, Cash and Check. Uh, I have the pleasure of introducing to this today's uh guest speaker who comes from the recommendation of Pastor Benchin. Uh, Pastor Steve Lee grew up in Upland, California, where he graduated from UC Riverside. And then Talbot Seminary. Part of his testimony is that he accepted Christ in junior high after a Friday night Bible study. He is happily married with a two-year-old daughter. Let's welcome him to speak with us today.

Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be with you this morning. Pastor Ben was my youth pastor at LA Humni, and so I've known him for many years, and he also married my wife and I. So his integral part of my life, my mentor, and so I thank him for allowing me to come to speak God's word to you. Let's begin with a word of prayer one more time. Father, as we come before you this morning. Lord Dale Moody said that the word of God was not given just to increase knowledge, but to change lives.

Not only being hearers of the word, and so deceiving ourselves, but being doers of your word. In your name we pray. Amen. For our text today, we're going to turn to Matthew chapter 5, verse 6. Matthew chapter 5, verse 6. This is a very famous passage, but uh Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, but I will be focusing on verse 6. The fourth beatitude. And this is the reading of God's word. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. The first three beatitudes, if you've ever studied this passage, deals with the sin of self. In poor in spirit, we turn away from self-seeking. In mourning, we turn away from self-satisfaction, and in meekness, we turn away from self-serving.

This fourth beatitude is more positive and is a consequence of the first three that when we put self aside and we better position ourselves to long after his righteousness. The word blessed in all the beatitudes means to be joyful or content. So in short, Jesus is saying, and the letters are all in red, Jesus says in verse 6, joyful and content are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Now the meaning of hungering and thirsting after righteousness that Jesus is referring to here in the fourth beatitude is one of the strongest and deepest desire. When Jesus says, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, he is using a present participle, which signifies continuous longing, a continuous seeking.

This desire for righteousness is to characterize our lives while we are on this earth. So to be hungry is not enough.

This fourth beatitude, Jesus is declaring that the deepest desire for every person ought to be to hunger and thirst for righteousness. Now, if we are to hunger and thirst for righteousness, what does this mean? What does this mean? Well, for both the unbeliever and believer, it is to hunger and thirst after Christ. For the unbeliever, it's to be hungry and thirsty for salvation that one can have by putting their faith in Christ. So it's to hunger and thirst after Jesus, who is our righteousness as our Savior. And for the believer, it's to hunger and thirst after righteousness, who is Christ, which refers to sanctification, which means becoming more like Christ. So for the unbeliever to hunger and thirst after righteousness is to hunger and thirst after Jesus' Savior.

And for the believer is to hunger and thirst after Jesus as Lord, as the Lord of your life. That's what Jesus is speaking about here. And I want to go to a cross-reference passage that's important. Can we turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 5? We're going to read verses 14 through 21. 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verses 14 through 21, Apostle Paul is writing to the church at Corinth. And in this passage, 2 Corinthians chapter 5, 14 through 21, there are no preset conditions for reconciliation, which we're going to read about here. Let's pick up in verse 14. The author is Apostle Paul and is writing to the believers in Corinth. And he begins in 14 of 2 Corinthians 5. For Christ's love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all have died.

And he died for all that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again. See, Apostle Paul, before he became Apostle Paul, as you know, he was one of the elite Pharisees, and he was known as Saul of Tarsus. As a matter of fact, before he met Christ, he even persecuted Christians and even killed Christians for the faith. He wanted to get rid of the Christian faith. He was a legalist. And so that's who he was before he encountered Christ on the road to Damascus. And so it's amazing that in verse 14 of 2 Corinthians 5, now as Apostle Paul as a Christian, he says, For it is Christ's love that compels him and is talking to the church at Corinth.

It's his love that compels us because we are convinced that Christ died for all, therefore all died, and he died for all, that those who live for themselves live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again. What Paul is saying is that since he became a believer, every single time he looked at people, or he looked at his circumstances, he's saying that the shadow of the cross always was upon his heart and mind of who he was before he met Christ and who he was after he met Christ. And it's saying that it's Christ's love that should compel us. That's powerful. And in verse 16, he says, So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view, though we once regarded them in this way.

Before he became a Christian, as I mentioned before, he was a legalist. In order to gain his approval, or to gain uh even uh paying attention to you, uh Paul looked at people and he sized people up based based on their resume, their worldly accomplishments, who they were. And Paul says once he becomes a Christian, he says, That is rubbish, that is rubbish, and he cherishes the salvation that he has in Christ. And so he says we don't see people from a worldly point of view, because love compels us, like the way love compelled him, and he no longer saw people from a Pharisaic legalistic perspective. He no longer sized people up, because he was so transformed by the grace of God that when he looked at his own life, he looked at his circumstances, he evaluated or observed people.

It was all grace, it was all the mercy of God.

All this is from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them, and he committed to us this message of reconciliation. So this hungering and thirsting after righteousness is what it looks like for the unbeliever, yes, is salvation that can only be found by putting your faith in Christ, Ephesians 2 8 9, for it is by grace that you are saved through faith. And then for the believer, hungering and thirsting after righteousness is to become more like Christ, which we call sanctification. But what this actually looks like day to day, as you go to work, as you meet with your friends, as you meet newcomers at church, or as you uh meet people in the world, is that is that hungering and thirsting after righteousness, who's in the person of Jesus Christ, transforms your mind and your heart so that you begin to have the mind and the heart of Christ.

So when you engage with people, you no longer see them from a worldly perspective as when you were an unbeliever, opposed to who you are in Christ. You don't size people up. You don't size people up based on their education, what college they went to, you don't size people up based on what kind of job they have, you don't size people up based on their resume, whether they're married or single. Um you don't size them up according to the worldly standards of how the world defines success. Because that's what the world does. But now love compels us. And now we live with a new the mind of Christ and the heart of Christ, even in the way that we engage with people. Do you see how the application to hungering and thirsting after Jesus is not just vertical, but it's also horizontal.

It's how you treat people. Matter of fact, John 13, 35, Jesus is by this, they will know that you are my disciples. If you love one another.

To know that everything we have has been purchased and done for us in Christ Jesus. At the same time, how we relate to our fellow man, our spouse, our kids, people at church, whoever is also a very visible reminder and evidence. And this hungering and thirsting after righteousness is this once saved, always saved. So this hungering and thirsting after righteousness is not talking about position, it's talking about intimacy. I'm going to say that again. This hungering and thirsting after righteousness is not position, but righteousness. I have a two, uh, her birthday just passed in June, so she's over uh two years old now. And my daughter Abigail, uh, she will always be my daughter, always. No matter how much candy she eats, or uh, you know, she um, you know, uh, she's at that age now where everything's about me, that two-year-old stage, and so uh sometimes she doesn't want to brush her teeth, and and you know, she wants candy and and everything else, and but she will always be my daughter.

Her position as my daughter and me as her father will never change, or her mother. But based on, as she gets older, based on her attitude and based on her obedience and everything else, it impacts our relationship, meaning she will always be our daughter, but I'm talking about intimacy. So we call this justification. Justification means that God, it there's a uh lingo for it, which is just as if you have never sinned. I like what we just read in the uh confession time, and that's what Christ does for those who put their faith in him. That that his perfection is called the great exchange. Hill song has a album uh called The Great Exchange, and one of my favorite songs in that album is um uh goes, you are good, you are good, when there's nothing good in me, you are Lord.

And then I like the chorus part. Uh Lord, I'm running to your arms, I'm running to your arms, and my heart will cry, no other name than Jesus. So this great exchange is at the moment a person puts their faith in Christ and Jesus becomes Savior, his perfect righteousness gets deposited into them. And their sins and imperfection is put on Christ. It's called the great exchange. And so our position with Christ never changes, just as my daughter's position will never change. But we're talking once again about intimacy. And hungering and thirsting after Jesus is about intimacy. And it's about this message, this ministry of reconciliation. Verse 19 that God was reconciling 2 Corinthians 5, the world to himself in Christ.

And this is the definition of reconciliation, not counting men's sins against them. I have the NIV, verse 19. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. Verse 20, we are therefore Christ's ambassadors as though God were making us appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God. And then verse 21, God made Christ who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Christ we might become the righteousness of God. So going back to the Beatitudes, Matthew 5.6, it says to hunger and thirst after righteousness is not talking about a program, it's not talking about an event, it's talking about the person of Jesus Christ. And also in Romans 1:17, Paul says, now a gospel has been revealed to us, and it talks about the righteousness of Christ.

And so this is talking about pursuing him in relation to intimacy, intimacy. Isaiah 49, 16 says, I have engraved you on the palm of my hands. I have engraved you on the palm of my hands so that I don't forget you. And the nail marks on Christ's hands and as well as his feet is a reminder to him as well as to us. When we see him again, we will see those marks, those nail marks that we are his, that we are his.

Truth in your life and mine. But as I spoke about, and as Paul speaks about that we no longer treat people from a worldly point of view, it's in how we forgive people and how we reconcile. And I find this is a challenging truth, not only you know, among people in general, but especially Korean Americans. We have a hard time forgiving people and a hard time reconciling. And what the Bible implies here is that hungering and thirsting after righteousness also is exhibited in your life in the way that you reconcile and forgive people. Whether you hold on to bitterness. You know, that's why in Matthew 5, Jesus says, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. He says, the pagans love those who love them, and they hate those who hate them.

But he says, be perfect as sons of God. As believers, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, as I spoke to you about, is having the heart and mind of Christ, becoming more like him. And how we do that is to pray for people who hurt us. It's difficult. Pray for people who rub us the wrong way. That God would bless them. See, this hungering and thirsting after righteousnesses is far beyond a theological truth. Important as that may be, it's far beyond just a vertical relationship with God, but it's your horizontal relationship to man, to people, and how you are maturing in your relationships with people. Not from a secular point of view, loving with strings, or manipulating people, but love, the Christ's love compelling you.

Look at Apostle Paul, the author of 2 Corinthians 5. And how he hungered and thirst after righteousness after he met Christ on the road to Damascus. How he loved and prayed for the very people that he even persecuted when he was a Pharisee, uh a Pharisee, Saul, Saul of Tarsus, the very people that he would imprison and kill, now he loved. And he planted churches to continue the Christian faith. And now, as a believer, he himself was imprisoned for sharing the gospel. And he died for sharing the gospel. See, in Apostle Paul, you can see a man who accepted Jesus as Savior, salvation, and who had the heart and mind of Christ as he lived his life. And how he continued to hunger and thirst after righteousness.

I'm going to share with you the results of hungering and thirsting after righteousness. But let's go to Matthew 5 6. I don't want to miss this second part. Matthew 5 6. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. And here's the second part to verse 6. Very important. For they will be filled. They will be filled. So here Jesus is saying that those who hunger and thirst after me, that they will be satisfied. This word filled in the Greek is curtazzle, which is frequently used of feeding an animal until they want nothing more. They're so full with food, their stomach, that they're so completely satisfied. And Jesus says, When you hunger and thirst after me, spiritually, emotionally, relationally, financially, you will be completely satisfied.

And this is what Jesus means to be filled. One will be filled with obviously Christ, but his goodness, and they'll be filled with his knowledge, the mind of Christ. Romans 15 14. They will be filled with the fullness of God, Ephesians 3 19, full of the Holy Spirit, Ephesians 5 18. And Colossians 1 19, they'll be filled with a knowledge of God's will. That they will know what decisions to make in their lives. Because they'll be so one with God in Christ that the decisions they make will be led by God, and they will know. That is what it means to be filled. Now I want to end with how do you genuinely know that you are hungering and thirsting after righteousness. Well, I shared a lot in relationship to vertically and horizontally in reconciliation and forgiveness.

But I'm going to give you three more, and I'm going to be done with my message. First, how you know that you are genuinely hungering and thirsting after Christ, not only as Savior, but as Lord, continuing to become more like Him is dissatisfaction with self. Romans 7 24 25, what a wretched man I am, Apostle Paul says, who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Doesn't mean you hate yourself, but it means you no longer look at your own righteousness, but you look at Christ's righteousness. Whether you're an unbeliever or a believer, you realize how broken you are. You realize how sinful you are. That even though we've been saved and redeemed by Christ, we still have our sinful nature, and we still have the ability to continue to fall according to our flesh.

Galatians 5 16, walk in the Spirit. And if you walk in the Spirit, you will not have the desires of your flesh. And how often, even as Christians, are we prone to sin because of that sinful nature still within us? You realize that at the end of the day, you cannot save yourself. Only Christ can. And this is not only as Savior, but every single day. Every single day without God, you realize you're too weak. And you'll disappoint yourself. And it's in your disappointment that you're able to find grace and mercy in Christ. The second mark of someone who is truly hungry and thirsting after God's or Christ's righteousness is craving after God's word. John 17 17, sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth.

What does the word sanctify mean? It means to set apart. And so if you truly are hungering and thirsting after Christ, to become more like him, the heart of the heart of Christ, the mind of Christ, that cannot be possible without loving God's word. And not just attaining spiritual knowledge, but again, like D.O. Moody said, being transformed and becoming more like him. That you will have an increased appetite for the word of God. And third and finally, how do you know that you are truly hungering and thirsting after righteousness? It is prayer. John James 5, 16, the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. You will desire to pray. Because in God's word and in prayer and in being dissatisfied with yourself, you will desire Christ intimacy, intimacy through prayer.

Prayer without ceasing. And continuous conversation with God.

Is that we would truly long after Christ. The first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. For this is the first and greatest commandment. And that our longing and hungering after Christ wouldn't be merely just events. Wouldn't merely just be uh programs, but would be a personal relationship every single day. And that we would ask the Holy Spirit to fill us and to give us these desires that we be one with Christ. And that people would see Christ in us. And uh 2 Corinthians or 1 Corinthians, Paul uses a term, the aroma of Christ. Yesterday I was uh at the mall, I think, and we're just getting some errands done, and there was a guy at the food court that just walked past me, and boy, he put too much cologne.

It was very heavy, and it was so heavy. We're at uh uh Brea Mall, and they have Mungoi and barbecue, so it's a buffet, but you gotta cram the meat and all the veggies into a small bowl. But there's a guy with a uh, I don't know what you call that big pan, walk, whatever it is, but so even against that smell of meat and vegetables and broccoli, I smelled his cologne. He put a lot on. I tried to impress someone, I don't know. But when he walked by, I knew it was him because it was smelled very strong. And Paul says that we are to have the overall of Christ, which means that people see Christ at us, and they're able to feel Christ by looking at us, our words, our lives, our action, our sacrifice.

That's what I pray for Beacon Church. That this ministry, that this church, but also the church is not just the building, but it's the body of Christ, that you would be the aroma of Christ in your home to your children, where you go to work, to your relatives, to unbelievers, to believers, that the message and the ministry of reconciliation will continue through you and to me. Father, we come before you this morning and we thank you for this fourth beatitude, that it is not just a one-time event at a retreat five years ago, but it is a continuous relationship, vertically, where we increase by having the heart and mind of Christ, and that that displays itself in our devotion to your word, devotion to prayer, devotion to placing our ultimate hope in you, not in self.

It reveals itself in the way that we reconcile with people that we have conflict with, in how we forgive people, in our prayers, not just for those we love, but even those we hate, those who persecute us. Oh, this message is so timely, so applicable, so clear, so gospel. Romans 5.8, the Bible says that God demonstrates his love for us, that while we were yet sinners, while we're yet sinners, he sent Christ to die for us. That God, while we were against you, you still sent Christ. That's the gospel, that you initiated reconciliation with us, and that God, we would follow your footsteps. Being Christ-like cannot just end with knowledge or Bible study, but must be seen, felt, as Tim Keller says in our lives.

We are all forgiven sinners. May your gospel shine brightly through our lives and our words and our actions today, this week, and every day until the glorious return of Jesus Christ. And it's in his name we pray. Amen. Amen. Uh beacon, let us respond in worship. As we were just encouraged. Um seen as righteous before the Lord. But may we just take that and apply that horizontally in the way that we have intimacy with Christ, and as we just share our lives, being saved with those that do not know him, whether in our workplace or uh in our homes. So in all of that, may we respond with yet not I, but through Christ and me, because ultimately it's not about us, it's what Christ has done through us.

And so may we sing that together. Let's all rise.

Oh, how strange I can sing all his mind but to the prize.

But I am not the same. For by my side the savior, he will stay.

His power is display through this I hope. My shepherd will defend me through our team's valley where we have been one and I shall overcome yet not I through Christ.

No fate I dread, no fate I dread. I know I am forgiving. Yes, the future the price has been paid yesterday for Jesus prayer and suffer for this I hold to his I hope my sin has been defeated. I can see I am free not I but through Christ with every breath, with every breath, I long to follow Jesus.

This is our prayer, for he has said that he will bring me home. Yes day by day I know he will remove until I stand with joy before this thy home.

When the race comes, still my lips shall be not I but through time when the race when the race comes, still my lips shall repeat, and not I but through Christ and not I but through Christ.