Unequally Yoked

Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,

a ministry of Second City Church in Midtown Harrisburg.

This fall, we're studying the book of Second

Corinthians. Second Corinthians is a heartfelt

and practical book calling us back to the life

of the cross. We, like the Corinthians, so often

pursue glory, admire eloquence, shun suffering,

hide hurt, and hoard our goods. And yet the gospel

of Jesus tells us that resurrection comes after

a cross. that comfort comes after being crushed,

that the way up is the way down, that the way

to glory is through suffering, that his strength

is made perfect in our weakness. We'd love to

meet you and we hope you'll consider coming and

joining with us each Sunday morning at 10 a .m.

in the heart of Midtown Harrisburg. You can find

us online at SecondCityChurch .org and on Facebook,

Instagram, and YouTube. We hope you enjoy this

sermon. God bless. Word in heaven pray that we

would have a posture towards you that is one

that desires you to speak into our lives. That

you would speak the foundational words into our

lives. That we would find our life hidden with

Christ and God. God speak now. We desire to be

taught by you. But I pray that so many of the

words and thoughts that cloud our minds constantly,

maybe just thinking about the concerns of our

coming week or the joys of our past week or what

games might be on today or whatever would go

to the wayside, that we would hear your voice

this morning. Now may the words of my mouth and

the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in

your sight, O Lord our rock and our redeemer.

Amen. All right, let me address the elephant

in the room. Some of you are wondering why this

soup strainer is above my lips, this crumb catcher

right here. So let me talk about it for a second.

You want an explanation? I'll give you an explanation.

Okay, so whenever I have been shaving recently,

I have these three little people that reside

in my house, and these three little people have

been begging me and coming to me, oh, don't shave,

you're a mustache dad. And I have been strong,

resisted such foolish talk. been successful in

my resolve, but they won the battle. Until this

week, I was strong. Their voices, their cute

little faces, pleading won me over. And part

of it was that these past few weeks, we have

given some of our attention to the Seattle Mariners.

Amen, amen. Thank you for wearing that shirt,

Will. Because the Mariners have made it to the

postseason, they are currently in the American

League Championship Series. They haven't been

for 24 years. The Mariners have been a franchise

for 48 years. They've never made it to the World

Series. They're the only team that has never

made it to the World Series. And if they win

tonight, y 'all know this. I'm not hearing any

cheers. I can see Will smile. Henry knows what's...

They're gonna make it to the World Series! Woohoo!

So, anyway... Anyway. I saw all these baseball

players. We watch more baseball than normal,

and a lot of them have mustaches. And I'm like,

well, maybe that is cool. Maybe I need to heed

the voices of these three little people. So I,

the other night, left my mustache, and then...

We were at Lily's volleyball game on Friday,

and we saw some friends, and they said, oh man,

your kids were encouraging my husband to not

shave his mustache, and they were saying, quote,

Mr. Rowan has a sick stache, Dad. But then I

should let you know that as soon as I emerged

from the bathroom with said stache, The most

important human voice in my life spoke to me

saying, when are you gonna shave that? Okay,

so a few things are happening here. I listened

to the pressure of those around me, the cute

little voices. I felt the pressure, the social

pressure of my surroundings. The media I was

consuming became a louder voice than it had ever

been. Go Mariners. And isn't it amazing how quickly,

I mean, just very, this is a silly example, but

it is amazing how quickly we can pick up on that

which surrounds us and have our life shaped out

of that. It's incredible how it happens. It's

amazing how our surroundings can so influence

us that we can forget who we are. You and I both

know probably the truth of that famous quote

that's attributed to the motivational speaker

Jim Rohn. You are the average of the five people

you spend most of your time with. It could be

modified, of course. Let's admit it today, these

people don't have to be people that you know.

They can be a baseball team that you grew up

following. Maybe it should be you are the average

of the top five social media accounts that you

consume. I have no doubt that most of us sort

of discount probably to our harm how influential

the media consume that we consume is. We think

I'm an independent person I do me But we all

know how much of how we live is just simply the

reality of what we've taken in The voices that

are loud in our ears How we've learned to think

and how we've learned to talk and how we have

learned to feel and behave and all the rest is

so often formed by what we listen to and what

we watch in our TVs and our computers and most

of all that box that just is persistently in

our pockets. We're not much different than the

Corinthians. Sure, they were not carrying around

all the tech that we do, but they had friends

and they had business partners and they walked

streets that were lined with temples and businesses.

called for their attention. Actually, if you

were in a business with another person, it was

very common that your business dealings would

be actually done in the rooms of the temples

that were reserved for eating the food that had

been sacrificed to idols. You were called to

live a certain kind of way. Here in our text

this morning, Paul's telling us, that there is

a fundamental voice in our life and that fundamental

voice, that fundamental reality is what has to

give shape to all others. And he's speaking to

this fact that we are so often pulled into these

other things. This other dynamic that shapes

us, saying that there's a more fundamental reality,

there's a more fundamental relationship than

these others. and they inform the others, they

shape the others. Because of this, we who have

found our life and put our trust in Jesus, we

are called to live actually as a distinct people,

living in distinct lives in a lot of ways from

those about a separate, holy lives. Here is the

truth, okay, in the Bible. We are called to live

in the world. We are called to live for the world.

for the life of the world. And yet, we're called

to live distinct from the world about us. As

the people of God, as people who have found their

life hidden with Christ in God, what this text

is telling us is that we are actually to not

pursue unholy unions and to find our life in

the Holy Union, okay? So that's kind of my two

points, the unholy unions and the holy union.

So here's how our passage begins this morning.

If you open up 2 Corinthians chapter six, starting

in verse 14, just the first sentence there, do

not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. It means

those not of the faith. That's literally what

it means, not faith. That's the word unbelievers,

not of the faith. Interestingly, the words together

that we have unequal yoke, that's one word in

Greek. It's just the word heterozyguntase. And

that does mean two coming together, but some

translate it, pull the yoke in the opposite direction.

Which makes a ton of sense why why would you

actually be connected yoke together with ones

that are going in the opposite opposite direction

Pulling in different directions. So you all know

probably the image of of a yoke It's a farming

instrument. It's a farming tool that's placed

over different animals to enable those animals

to pull something together To work together towards

a certain end This command actually comes from

the old testament there's a passage in the book

of deuteronomy in chapter 22 verse 10 says you

shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together

and uh it's kind of interesting this has kind

of two big reasons one's theological one's practical

the ox was a clean animal the donkey was an unclean

animal in the old testament law and so Partly

what's taking place is this prohibition of this

unequally yoked dynamic in Deuteronomy was to

be a reminder to the people of God of how it

just, the clean, the unclean, they're not supposed

to go together in this way. There's a theological

reminder that's taking place. The people had

bound themselves to God and it just went, you

can't then bind yourself to that which is not

of God. They found their fundamental relationship

with the one who had saved them. How can they

then be united in such a way with those who don't

follow that God? So there's this theological

dynamic at play, but there's also very much this

practical dynamic. If you just think with me

about the ox and the donkey, does that work very

well? I mean, donkeys are known as stubborn animals.

Ox are known as very strong, hardworking animals.

That's not gonna be a union that is actually

just practically very helpful. So you have this

theological and you have this practical dynamic

that play there. The yoke was an imagery in agrarian

society that was, of course, very, very familiar

to the people of that society. And I think it's

this reason actually why this yoke image has

brought up quite a bit in the Bible, actually.

So Israel, when they're said to be in slavery

in Egypt, were under the yoke of Pharaoh. There

was a theological thing that was going on. There's

a practical thing that's taking place there.

When they're freed from Egypt, actually, there's

three different passages in the Old Testament

when the people of God go back and they worship

Baal, particularly Baal of Peor, and they're

told to be under the yoke. Three times they're

said to be under the yoke when they're worshiping

a different God. There's a theological dynamic

that's at play, but it's also a practical dynamic

that's at play. The prophet Jeremiah talks about

how God broke the yoke of slavery. He broke the

yoke that the people were carrying also when

they were under the idols around them. So Jeremiah

pits these ideas together. There's this theological

idea of being under yoke. There's also this practical

thing that's happening. That's in Jeremiah chapter

Jeremiah 2:20

2 verse 20. Of course, if you think of yoke,

You might think of actually the words of our

Lord Jesus himself right in Matthew chapter 11

Matthew 11 · chapter mention

Jesus says these words come to me all you who

labor and are heavy laden and I will give you

rest Take my yoke upon you Interesting that he

actually speaks the idea of labor and rest in

the context of a tool that was used for labor

He says take my yoke upon you and learn from

me for I'm gentle and lowly in heart and you'll

find a rest for your souls." And then he says

again, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

The Lord is connecting this theological reality

of coming to him with the practical reality of

gentleness and lowliness and an easy yoke. Jesus

is also pitting in this idea that you're going

to carry a yoke. Whose yoke are you going to

carry? He knows this sort of history in the Old

Testament, the yoke mentioned in light of other

gods, the yoke mentioned in light of slavery

and hardship. He's saying, which yoke will you

put on? One brings freedom, the other servitude.

So here in 2 Corinthians, Paul is saying that

you can't be unequally yoked. Don't do it. Don't

do it. It doesn't work. And the fact is that

the Bible bears this truth out in different stories

and different commands. When you are yoked with

unbelief, the sad fact of history is that often

actually unbelief tends to steer the ship. When

you find a fundamental relationship in your life

is with somebody that's not following Jesus,

it's often the case that that begins to sphere

the relationship. And actually this is why when

I say do not be unequally yoked, what is the

relationship that you're most likely to think

of? What relationship? Marriage, yeah. Most of

you will probably think of the relationship of

marriage. Interestingly, marriage is not necessarily

the main thing that's being talked about in this

passage. Actually, if you'll remember, this is

in the context of false teachers who have yoked

themselves to the traveling teachers about them,

bringing their resumes and all the rest. They

are yoking themselves with the way of the world.

And yet we properly apply this to the institution

of marriage because it's a fundamental relationship

that you yoke yourself to somebody else in. Marriage,

you can say, is the closest human yoke that you

can share with another. And it's true. The Bible

tells us actually, don't marry somebody that

doesn't follow Jesus. Don't marry somebody that's

not committed to the Lord. And you can make positive

arguments for this. for marriage only to be among

fellow Christians. Think about Jesus' argument

that we just heard in Matthew 19. He calls the

people back to the beginning. He says, God is

the one who makes this institution. And this

institution is actually seen as two walking together

with the Lord. That's the ideal. Not hiding from

the Lord, not one of them hiding from the Lord,

not one of them hiding from the other person,

but two walking together, man and wife. husband

wife, with the Lord. Okay, so right from there,

right from the very beginning of chapters of

Genesis where Jesus sort of builds his theology

of marriage off of we can have that sort of positive

argument. We also heard from Proverbs 31 that

it says, a woman who fears the Lord is to be

praised. So you can make different positive arguments

for... marriage to be between two Christians,

but then actually you can make a significant

sort of negative argument. There's some prohibitions

in the Bible. You can find them in Deuteronomy

and Joshua and elsewhere, where it just says,

don't marry those people who are not following

the Lord, very specifically. But then actually

some of the worst and most detrimental stories

in all the Bible have to do with a leader deciding,

I'm going to marry somebody who is not following.

the Lord. And so we can think of kings like Solomon,

like Ahab. And then we can also think, if you

actually kind of come a little bit closer to

the New Testament, when the people of God are

returned from exile and they're confessing their

sin, in the book of Ezra, there in the later

chapters, in chapters 9 and 10, one of the main

things that they are confessing is how they intermarried

with people that were not following the Lord

and that led them astray. There's all kinds of

things in the Bible that come down to this fundamental

idea that your fundamental relationship with

the Lord influences the others. It's just unwise,

it's theologically wrong, it's practically foolish

to be yoked to unbelief. So, Paul goes on to

say verses 14 to 16, says this. Let's go to these

questions. For what partnership has righteousness

with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light

with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial?

What portion does a believer share with an unbeliever?

What agreement has the temple of God with idols?

Okay, let's think back on marriage for a second.

We say in our world, if it feels right, it must

be right. I feel so good though. We connect.

But then think about this. Your marriage relationship,

if you're married, is the relationship that you

have to figure out some of the biggest questions

in life that are going to impact you on so many

levels. Where are we going to live? What kind

of questions are going to help you address that

question? Is the Lord going to guide you? Are

you going to seek his face in that? Do we have

kids? How do we train those kids? Do we train

those kids, as the Bible tells us to, in the

fear of the Lord and in the admonition of the

Lord, in the ways of God, or do we not? How do

we spend our money? How do we give our money?

How do we spend our time? Just big questions,

just practically speaking. It's a very foolish

thing to say, you know, I'm going to have this

foundation for my life, the Lord, and I'm going

to unite myself to somebody who has a totally

different foundation. It's going to approach

all the main fundamental questions of how I'm

going to live in my life from a different place.

How do you have a fundamental partnership when

the foundation from which you make your big decisions

of life is different? Suggesting that at the

very least, there's a theological argument to

be made, but there is a practical argument to

be made. This is a foolish way of engaging in

the world. OK, so Paul asked these questions.

Well, partnership has righteousness with lawlessness.

Well, righteousness has to do with right relationship

with God. It also, righteousness in the Bible

is not just being right with God, but righteous

living actually has to do with the right relationship

with those about you. So he says, well, how do

you do righteousness and lawlessness? Lawlessness

would be the exact opposite. It's not having

a right relationship with God and not having

a right relationship with others. And he says,

these things don't work together. I mean, one

is this defined, one is this defined. They don't

work. What fellowship has light with darkness?

Of course, the Bible, this is the common thing

that is pitted against each other in the Bible.

Darkness is almost always in the Bible an image

of being morally corrupt. And lightness in the

Bible is the very presence of God pressing into

the world. I think of John chapter one. The light

shines in the darkness. And the darkness can't

overcome it because these two things are so separate.

Light, dark. Christ and Belial. You're probably

scratching your heads, what's that? Belial is

the Hebrew word. It refers to wickedness and

worthlessness. It's a word that sometimes refers

to the enemies of God's people and sometimes

it's a reference to Satan, the enemy of God.

But the point is that you can't, these things

don't They're not compatible. They don't work

together. So what Paul is getting at here is

that believers and unbelievers, they have different

moral values, righteousness, lawlessness. They

have different spiritual spheres within where

they work, light and dark, Christ and Belial.

They have different masters that orient their

lives, that give direction to their life. And

he also says they worship different things. What

portion does a believer share with an unbeliever

was most likely a reference actually to that

food that is sacrificed in the temples? We can

think of actually the sacramental meal of Christians.

It's saying this is our identity. That says what

agreement has the temple of God with idols? Temple

of God and a temple of idols. How can you be

a temple of the Lord and unite yourself fundamentally

to that which is not united to him? They worship

different things. Here is a truth. Let me go

back to it. We pick up quickly to the voices

and the values of those who are around us. We

do. You do. I do. Our kids do. This is reality.

And this happens in the church in Corinth, and

Paul's calling them out. Of course it happens

to us today. We might actually, very likely,

we don't see how this is happening to us today.

But it's happening. It's happened. And some of

you may know that much of higher criticism as

it approached the Bible came out of Germany in

the late 19th century. They approached the Bible

and they said, you know what, this is the part

that we probably, this probably isn't really

true. We'll take this part out. Take that part

out. There's a history of that. We talked actually,

in the adult science school, we talked about

the Marcionites in the early church this morning.

Come next week, you'll learn more. So people

have done that, but in German higher criticism

in the 19th century, that was the approach to

the Bible. And this actually pushed into the

early liberal fundamentalist controversy in the

early part of the 20th century in the United

States. But this was a huge thing in Germany,

particularly. And let me tell you about something

that happened in 1933, it's actually the day

after Martin Luther's 450th birthday. And that

day on the 450th birthday of Martin Luther, there

was a German pastor who spoke and said, actually

speaking out, you may know that Martin Luther

had some anti -Semitic stances, and he spoke

out against that in 1933 in Germany. And he said,

we must worship the suffering Jew, Jesus. Jesus

himself is our hope. And the next day, 20 ,000

Christians gathered together in the German evangelical

church, led by their church leaders. They gathered

together in the Berlin Sports Palace. And one

of the things they did actually is they renounced

and that man was defrocked actually. The man

who spoke the day before, a well -known pastor

in the German church. But after they sung, now

thank we all our God. What a great hymn. This

pastor Joachim Hassenfelder got up and he announced

that he was implementing the infamous Arian paragraph

in his diocese. What that did, it had dismissed

all Christian Jews from holding any office. and

it was effective immediately. The Bible, at that

meeting, was re -examined and all of its non

-German and pro -Jewish elements were said to

be non -authoritative. And Jesus was placed as

a proud Jesus and not a suffering servant. And

again and again it said that that speech was

interrupted. By the 20 ,000 people he was speaking

to with applause Fundamental dynamic of who they

were Had been so yoked to the world about them

But you could say that the fundamental idea of

who Jesus is was discarded And the fact is there

is story after story in church history about

things like this. Fundamental relationships being

formed by that which is not Christ and the gospel

being lost in political alliances, in marriages,

in friendships. There's no question the primary

people you spend your life with that you give

your ear to, you give your heart to shape you.

And they can bring you closer to the Lord Jesus

or they can take you farther away. Our passage

warns us against unholy unions. It also encourages

us to a holy union. This is a little shorter

if you're looking at your time as I just did.

So a holy union. I hope that as I say some of

this, some of you are asking, well, Pastor, what

do we do? We're called to be in the world. And

wasn't Jesus himself partly scandalous and he

was disregarded by many of the religious leaders

of his day because he was a friend of sinners

and he dined with them, lived life with them.

Or maybe, maybe, you have been reading your Bible

and you remember back in 1 Corinthians chapter

1 Corinthians 5 · chapter mention

5 when Paul, to the same community, wrote this,

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate

with sexually more immoral people. Not at all

meaning the sexually immoral of this world or

the greedy and swindlers and idolaters. Since

then you would need to go out of the world. Then

Paul is very, very clear. You can't just leave

the world about you. They need to know Jesus.

Very clear. I think Paul actually addresses in

some ways this question even to the Corinthians

in the following verses. So let me read them

again, okay? Starting verse 16. Therefore go

out from their midst be separate from them says

the Lord And touch no unclean thing then I will

welcome you and I will be a father to you and

you shall be sons and daughters to me says the

Lord Almighty I Think he answers this This unholy

the dynamic that is at play with saying don't

have unholy unions and yet don't leave the world

Which by the way, isn't that sort of the temptation

we others say let's you can do whatever you want

or let's just live in a ghetto That's how Christians

tend to do grab it all flee at all. How do we

do this? I Think the answer Paul is giving us

is that there is a holy union That is so foundational

to our lives that if that is the yoke which with

we are bound to, the yoke of Christ. And if that

really is the fundamental relationship, the foundation,

then, and only then, can we press into the world

about us. So Paul here actually quotes from quite

a few passages, Leviticus 26, Isaiah 52, Ezekiel

20, Ezekiel 37, 2 Samuel 7, he does all that

in that quote there. And he says, This is who

you are. This is who you are, and if you get

this, then the other things come. So who are

we? Paul quotes Leviticus 26, and he says, we

are God's temple. All right, that's how that

began. We are the temple of the living God. Leviticus

26, we are the place where God resides. I mean,

that's what Christians actually believe, that

the Holy Spirit is so present in us that it can

be said of you, you're a temple of God. God finding

his home within you. And as surely as an idol

or anything unclean was prohibited from being

in the temple in Jerusalem, the same is true

with Christians. We can't follow idolatry, we

can't follow sin. We have this fundamental identity

that God is within us. Then Paul goes on to quote

Isaiah 52, and what he says is, you're God's

people, you're God's temple, you're God's people.

I will be their God, they shall be my people.

And then he says, therefore go out from their

midst, be separate. Which is saying, how can

you live for yourself anymore? How can you live

in this other identity? God's people. Now practically

this is what one person I read said this the

Christian might choose to be part of his or her

corporate corporations family picnic But to refrain

from participating in the daily water cooler

gossip session You know what I mean by that this

idea that you can live and yet you you live you

live differently Separate And Paul goes on to

quote 2nd Samuel and Isaiah 43, and he's saying

this in both of them, you are God's children.

The temple of God, the people of God, actually

the family of God, loved by Him, found our life

through Him. We're also protected by Him, we're

disciplined by Him, we're provided for by Him,

and we're cherished. by Him. This is the fundamental

reality of who we are. This is how Paul addresses

this question. Who are you? You're God's temple.

You're God's people. You're God's children. So

there is a holy union that is the foundation

for all of your life, all of your being. What

does holy mean? Holy means set apart. What it's

saying is that if you are set apart as the temple

and as the people and as the family for God,

then how could you possibly be yoked, bound together

in such a way that influences your life and directs

where you go with something that is not connected

to God? That is the point of this passage. Let

me give you a couple of quick questions and then

I'll end. I want you to reflect on some of this

today, maybe over lunch with a friend or a spouse

or maybe sometime this week. What does it look

like for you to live a wholly separate life for

God? Can you ask each other that? What might

you need to do to actually distance yourself

From that which is not in union with Jesus Let

me ask this is a similar question what ditch

do you fall into? The total separation ditch

or the assimilation ditch, what's your inclination?

How can you live deeper into the life of Jesus

how can he be the foundation What might you need

to put on or take off that that relationship

can be your foundation? How about this? What

are the five voices that are loud for you? They

can be your friends, they can be your parents.

Maybe they are relationships on your phone, not

in -person relationships. What are the five relationships

that are loudest, whose voices are loudest? And

then are they pointing you to Jesus? Are they

doing that? Okay. For real. So I'm gonna end.

I'm not keeping this mustache. I'm not. If the

Marys win tonight, let's be honest, I'll probably

keep it on during the World Series. But it's

going away. Why? because there is a voice in

my life that is more important than kids' friends

saying, Mr. Rowan has a sick stash. And it's

my wife's relationship. Her voice is the loudest

human voice in my life. This most foundational

human relationship for me. And I think at least

that invites me to ask, and I hope it invites

you to ask, is the Lord the foundation. Is he

the voice? Is he the yoke that directs and steers

your life? Let me pray for us. Lord, thank you

for your word. We pray that we would hide it

in our hearts. God, we feel the tension of living

in the world and yet being yours in the world.

God, would you deepen our relationships here

in this church that we might speak to one another,

encourage one another towards following you?

God, would we be circumspect of the voices that

are influencing us and that are shaping us? God,

would we be very cautious to bind ourselves to

that which is not directing us towards you? And

would all of our life, our whole being, Be offered

to you in worship as temples of God, as the people

of God, as the very sons and daughters of God.

In Jesus' name, amen. God bless.