Jesus Is the Medicine of the World — A Call to Share the Gospel - Sermon 5th May 2019

G'day. Thanks for joining the Heights Church podcast today. We hope you enjoy our message.

If you're in the Sydney area, be sure to join us at the Heights Church at Gostelmurie

Cornfield Heights, Summingsville.

Welcome, Church. Today's Bible reading comes from 2 Timothy 3, verses 10-13.

2 Timothy 3:10–13

You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose,

faith, patience, love, endurance, persecutions, sufferings.

What kinds of things happened to me in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra,

the persecutions I endured?

Yet the Lord rescued me from all of them. In fact, everyone who wants to live

a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evildoers and imposters

will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.

So I want to start the talk today with a story.

I haven't met this lady, but I know many people who have, and her story is,

it's a little bit traumatic, but it's inspiring.

Her name is Helen Bahani. You may have heard of her. There's a book that came

out about experiences called The Song of the Nightingale.

But Helen was a member of the Rima Church, which is an evangelical Protestant church in Eritrea.

Eritrea, as you can see behind me, is a country in Africa. It's on the southwestern coast of the Red Sea.

That's wedged between Sudan and Ethiopia.

Eritrea is sometimes called the North Korea of Africa.

The country is run by a dictator who has absolute power. And in Eritrea,

life is extremely difficult for Christians and became incredibly difficult for Helen.

On the 13th of May, 2004, just after she released an album of Christian music, Helen was arrested.

You can see a picture of her behind me. She was arrested because she refused

to sign a document to say that she would stop telling people about Jesus,

both in word and in music.

She was put in a prison in a military camp north of the capital of Eritrea,

which is a city called Asmara.

She was denied contact with her family, she was denied medical care,

and she was denied legal representation.

Nights in the prison camp were cold, cold to the point of hypothermia.

But in contrast, the days were hot.

So hot that your skin would stick to the metal of the shipping container which

was the structure used as your prison there were nasty bugs that would constantly

bite you and there was no relief for two and a half years this was where Helen was kept,

During her imprisonment, Helen would often sing songs to God,

or she would find scraps of paper and write scriptural encouragement to her fellow prisoners.

On many occasions, when she was caught writing the notes, her guards would beat her.

They would ask her where her Bible was. Where was she getting these pieces of scripture?

They'd ask her, is it in your head? And then they'd say, well,

we'll have to beat it out of you.

So they'd carry her outside to a courtyard, surround her, and beat her with wooden battens.

When they'd finished, they would throw her back into the shipping container cell.

On one occasion, while she was being beaten, she turned to one of the guards

and said, I don't hate you. You're just carrying out an order.

I'm also carrying out an order not to renounce Jesus, so carry on.

She would later say that every insect bite, every beating would bring her closer to Jesus.

Helen could have escaped all this suffering all she needed to do was sign a

piece of paper saying she would not tell anyone about Jesus,

something she totally refused to do again later in life she was asked why didn't

you just sign the paper why didn't you make it stop why didn't you take the

chance to be free her response,

I won't forget it I don't think you will her response was Jesus is the medicine

of the world and he must be shared,

She was eventually released late in October 2006 And she and her daughter Eva

fled to Khartoum in Sudan And they were eventually granted asylum in Denmark Where she lives today,

still serving her Lord and Saviour But let's not forget that Jesus is the medicine

of the world And he must be shared,

It's going to come up a few times this morning,

So in the section we read today of 2 Timothy, we're reading through Paul's final

instructions to Timothy in this letter. Excuse me.

They could also be Paul's final instructions to Timothy ever.

Paul is following through on his training of many years, and he's equipping

Timothy to follow his instructions in making disciples who make more disciples.

Again, he's summing up the great themes of this letter. He's re-emphasizing

to Timothy what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.

And to live a life dedicated to him. And he's encouraging Timothy to live that life.

Like I said before, in many ways, there's not a lot new in what we read today,

because throughout the whole letter, Paul is encouraging Timothy to guard the

gospel, to live the gospel, and to share the gospel.

If you like, and in standing with the vision of the heights,

to know Christ, so to understand who he is, what he has achieved in our behalf,

and hold on to it always, that's know Christ.

To grow in Christ, to continually encourage and disciple each other in the light

of the gospel to serve Jesus, and to show Christ, remember that's to each other, evangelism,

sorry, discipleship, to each other, discipleship, and to the world, evangelism.

In this passage, we're reminded of all that has gone before.

We'll work through it fairly quickly, and then we'll work through some implications for us.

So, if you've got your Bibles, have them open at 2 Timothy 3,

2 Timothy 3:10

verse 10, and we'll work through that. It'll also be on the screen behind me.

But Paul reminds Timothy of his teaching, his way of life, and all the things

he suffered. You see that right at the very beginning.

He emphasizes that in and through all this, Jesus rescued him and encourages

him to continue following. despite persecution and despite suffering, kind of like Helen.

In fact, Paul says persecution is normal. It's what happens to anyone who follows

Jesus, who lives a life for him.

That's the first part. But then he warns Timothy.

He warns him about false teachers. He says to him, he wants Timothy to be the

voice of truth for the gospel because there'll be other voices out there, voices not of truth.

He wants him to continue in the way that he and Paul had already been working

together, showing, teaching, training others from Scripture in what it means

to have faith in and to follow Jesus.

Just as a side note, remember that Paul, when he talks about Scripture here,

he's talking about the Old Testament.

There's no New Testament at this stage. Paul is emphasizing to Timothy that

the Old Testament Scripture that Timothy, as he says here, has known since he

was very small, was all about Jesus.

And it's able to make everyone, to quote, wise for salvation through faith in

Christ Jesus and that all scripture was from God and was to be used to teach,

correct and train all those who serve him.

So I know we talked about this last week but can you see again here the two uses of scripture?

To let people know about Jesus so that they could have faith in him,

and to let those who know about Jesus know what it means to follow him,

to teach, to train, to correct those who serve God.

It's also clear that Scripture, in this case the Old Testament,

but for us also the New Testament, is all about Jesus.

And from reading and sharing the Bible, we see him, and we see God's plan to

redeem his people through his death and resurrection.

I'm going to get Leonie to put up the Great Commission from last week back up on the screen.

If you remember last week, we talked about this call of Jesus,

this Great Commission also has this twofold nature. It has the same twofold nature.

It's calling us to make disciples of all nations, baptizing in the name of the

Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

It's also calling us to teach each other to obey everything that Jesus commanded.

So in both 2 Timothy and in the Great Commission, these two points are being made.

Lead others to salvation through

faith in Jesus And disciple others in what it means to follow Jesus.

Evangelism and discipleship And that's what it means to share the gospel,

the topic of today's talk,

Share it with those who don't know Jesus, so that they come to know him And

share it with those who already know Jesus So they can follow him in obedience and bring him glory,

To show Jesus to each other and to the world,

Like I said earlier, chapter 4 is incredibly similar.

We'll work through it again quite quickly. But Paul continues to re-emphasize

his call for Timothy to discipleship.

And he continues to remind him what it means to be someone who follows Jesus,

and someone who shares the gospel to those who know Jesus as their king and those who do not.

Like I said, in many ways, it's almost a direct copy of the previous section.

He starts by calling Timothy in the presence of God and Christ Jesus to continue

his gospel ministry, to guard the gospel, to hold on to the gospel.

But he tells him to preach the word at all times and to use it to correct and

instruct with great patience and care.

If you remember last week, we talked about the soldier, the athlete, the farmer.

He uses those, he kind of reminds Timothy here about that part of this letter

that Timothy's already read.

He again warns of false teachers who will try and deceive and confuse,

telling people what they want to hear. That's interesting, isn't it?

The false teachers will tell people what they want to hear rather than what

they need to hear. And he again encourages Timothy to stand firm.

Like I said, he calls him again here to guard the gospel, live the gospel, and share the gospel.

To know Christ, grow in Christ, and show Christ to each other in the world.

It's what he's been doing through the whole letter.

Then finally, he reminds Timothy that Jesus is worth it and that the reward

for following him is great.

And Paul is assured of this reward. He says, if you look in verses 7 and 8,

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord,

the righteous judge, will award me on that day.

And this assurance is not just for Paul, but for Timothy.

Paul goes on at the end of verse 8 to say, and not only to me,

but also to all who have longed for his appearing.

It's a great assurance, isn't it? It's a great promise for those who follow Jesus.

That's kind of, as I said, a quick bird's eye view of this passage that we had read this morning.

I want to turn now to application. So I really believe in terms of applying

this passage to our lives, the gospel is key. The gospel is central to it.

I want us to think a little bit deeper about the gospel and how we share it.

I want to think about how we share it with those who don't know Jesus and how

we share it with those who do.

But I think before we get into that, let's just spend a little time understanding

an important aspect of what the gospel is.

We spend our whole Christian life reflecting and responding to the gospel.

That's what it means to follow Jesus and how to live our life in response to that.

So by nature, this will be small. This will be a small facet of the gospel.

It's part of our continual life as a Christian. But I think it's an important one.

So let me ask a question, and I want an answer.

So listening hard. If I stood here right now, if I was standing here today and

said to you, I'm going to talk to you about the gospel, the good news,

and that the gospel is all you need to do to be made right with God,

to have peace with God, is to do good things, just do enough good things.

If you could just be a good enough person, do good deeds, then God will see

that and he'll become your friend.

If that's what I said, what would you say to me?

It's not good enough sorry stone him yeah well Barry was kind up that's okay,

and look and I said here that's what I want you to say that's just wrong,

that's heresy right so that's okay John that's pretty good you're right stone

me it's wrong it's certainly not the gospel,

the gospel has nothing to do with the good things we do there's nothing we can

do no amount of good things we can do that make us right with Remember,

God, the Bible continually tells us and shows us that God is perfect.

The Old and New Testament continually remind us that He is perfect.

So there's no amount of or particular deed that we can perform that will make us perfect.

And it's only in perfection that we can be in right relationship with God.

So there's nothing, there's no way that we can be good enough,

do enough good things to meet that perfection.

The only way we can be made perfect is through the death and resurrection of

Jesus, and that's given to us as a gift.

That's the gospel. We are given, through Jesus, perfection in God's eyes.

We are brought into a relationship with him, a relationship where we are considered

his children, and we only need to submit to him and accept this gift.

Acknowledge him as the Lord of our lives. Stop trying to be our own God.

In doing that, we put him and us in our proper places and live to serve him.

So let me ask you another question.

How many bad things do I need to do in order to be sent to hell?

It's nothing to do with that, right?

It's not whether we do good or we do bad. Our salvation, the difference between

a future in heaven with God or hell without him, it's nothing to do with the

things we do, good or bad.

It has everything to do with who is the king of our life.

Who are we submitting to, Jesus or ourselves?

Following Jesus leads to heaven. following ourselves leads to hell.

So that's the aspect of the gospel I wanted us to concentrate on a little bit this morning.

And let's think about that in terms of what does that mean if we're sharing

Jesus, if we're going to share the gospel with people who don't know him.

So understanding that the gospel is a gift and has nothing to do with our deeds,

good or bad, is vital when it comes to sharing the gospel.

Here are three key ways I think this plays out.

One, hopefully, if you can remember back, what is it, three or four weeks to talk one in this series,

we remember that the gospel is the testimony about jesus we're telling people

about jesus who he is and what he has done that he is the son of god that he

has paid the price that we should have paid for our sin meaning that we have

an eternal hope of life with him,

instead of a fear of death when we share jesus with those who don't know him

we need to share this who jesus is and what jesus has done but make it even

more specific tell people what he means to you.

How has knowing Jesus made a difference in you? If you like,

tell your testimony about the testimony of Jesus in your life.

How has your relationship with Jesus changed your life?

Tell them how Jesus is worth everything and how following him has made a difference.

Tell them about that difference.

So that's the first thing we can remember from 2 Timothy is that the gospel

is the testimony about Jesus and we should tell it.

I think the second thing is that this gospel, Well, it's good news for everyone.

Remember Helen's quote? Jesus is the medicine of the world, and he must be shared.

Everyone who doesn't know Jesus needs to.

The only answer to the greatest need of all humanity, to know their God.

When Paul is reminding Timothy of their ministry together, it would remind him

that their ministry was to everyone, Jews, non-Jews, people who had some knowledge

of God, people who had none, Romans, Greeks, pagans, even atheists.

The gospel was and is for everyone.

Everyone needs the gift offered by God through Christ. We don't have secret

news, we have news that must be shared.

And then thirdly, the gospel is unconditional. So let me put it this way.

Say there was a friend of yours who didn't know Jesus and you really wanted

to share the gospel with them, but they're a compulsive liar.

How would you approach that? Would you expect them to solve their problem with

lying before you told them about Jesus?

No. The gospel is unconditional. It's a gift.

It's nothing to do with making ourselves better or even starting to make ourselves

better. God makes us better.

So we don't take baby steps towards him for him to save us. He just saves. Totally saves.

Now, that's probably a relatively easy example.

But let me ask you, the person you were wanting to share Jesus with,

what if their problem was drug

addiction or a sexuality issue or excessive anger. It's the same, right?

They don't need to start change before they can be shared Jesus with.

Jesus is the answer. It's a gift. It's nothing about the good things or the

bad things we do. It's a gift.

He accepts everyone as they are, makes them perfect in the eyes of God.

In the end, remember, we don't need to be better. We need to be made perfect.

Sharing the gospel with those who don't know him? What about sharing the gospel

with each other, with people who do know Jesus?

There are some implications here, and I think it flips around a bit here.

Think about the second part of the Great Commission that we looked at earlier.

It's teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

For those who do know Jesus, who have decided that they will live their lives with him as their king,

there is a requirement for them to do all that Jesus commands,

to make sure their deeds are good, not in order to be made right with God, remember that's a gift,

but as a response to that gift.

Because of the grace and mercy they have been given, live a life that glorifies him.

We saw it here in this passage in 2 Timothy. We saw it twice.

If you've got that still open, have a look at chapter 3, verses 16 and 17.

It says, All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching,

rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of

God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

And then again, in chapter 4, verse 2.

These are Paul's instructions to Timothy on how he was to lead and shepherd

those who were already followers of Jesus.

Help them understand the scripture so they can live lives that bring glory to

God in accordance with his word and in response to his great love in sending

his son to die for them and for you.

Also, if you think about the two mentions of false teachers in chapter 3 and

chapter 4, they're not leading people astray who don't know Jesus.

They're misleading people who profess to know Jesus. So again,

it's just clear that what Paul is talking to Timothy here is for those who know

Jesus, share the gospel, share what it means to follow the commands of Christ.

Share what it means to be his follower, what it means to live up to that.

Sharing the gospel to those who already know Jesus means constantly reminding

them of all that Jesus has done for them and their responsibility to continue

to put him first in all they do.

Not themselves, their own desires, but Jesus.

Our actions show who is the king of our lives, Jesus or ourselves.

So I think we've seen the importance of sharing the gospel, both to those who

don't know Jesus and those who do.

But let me work towards the conclusion of this talk and this series with another story.

The story of Peter and Hugh Chamberlain, father and son, and both medical midwives.

So Peter Chamberlain was born in 1601, a long time ago.

He was the son of another Peter Chamberlain and the grandson of William Chamberlain

and all three men, and Peter's son Hugh, who I'd mentioned before, who was born in 1630.

All these guys were doctors, four generations of doctors.

The older guys fled France in the great Huguenot persecutions.

They were Huguenots who fled to England.

Peter and his son Hugh specialised in midwifery in a time when midwifery was

being taken from women who had traditionally performed this role into the hands

of doctors, all of whom were men, and there was a lot being written by men about how to give birth.

It was totally crazy, but that's what was happening in the 1600s.

Sometime during the lives of these men, it's not known exactly when,

one of them invented a device that would change the successful rate of childbirth all over the world.

They had invented the obstetrical forceps. You know, it's the device that cradles

the baby's head, pulls the baby out. You won't do too many actions with that.

But it seems most likely that the inventor was Peter, the one who was born in

1601, because in 1813, about 150 years after he died, they discovered his original

forceps in a secret compartment in his house.

A lady found this, like, screw hole in the floor and wondered what it was and

then found it more and when they pulled the floorboards up, they found these

instruments from the 1600s.

Yeah, he's behind me.

Can you see a resemblance between me and him?

If I grew my hair, maybe? Well, he's my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather.

My ninth-great-grandfather probably invented, well,

him or one of his father or his son invented the obstetrical forceps so i read

about this all online and then i found a copy of this little book claire's not

here so it was really expensive but anyway i found it in the second hand shop

in london it's called the secret instrument,

and it's their story it's the story of the chamberlains there's his picture

and there's even a probably can't see this the back but anyway you can have

a look later there's the forceps that he created.

Anyway, this book's called The Secret Instrument because both Peter and Hugh

kept the invention of the forceps secret.

Tell anyone. It seems weird, right, in the 21st century, and I'm really trying

not to be harsh because it's different times, right? But they kept it secret.

They kept it secret because it was incredibly lucrative for them.

They became the midwives to the absolute upper echelon of British society,

including Queens of England.

Peter was the surgeon and midwife at the birth of Charles II, as an example.

And they were present at different queens.

Queen Anne, for example when she was a princess they were present

at her birth or her giving birth

so they went not only did they

keep it secret they went to great lengths to preserve the secret

they would carry this machine in a great big chest and they'd hide the machine

and and everything from the patient they put a curtain up around the patient

so they couldn't see what they were doing and they had another machine that

would make lots of noises to create the impression that this thing they invented was mechanical.

They wanted to preserve their monopoly and their access to that lucrative, wealthy client base.

Does that make you feel strange? Makes me feel strange. My great,

great, great, great, great, great, whatever, grandfather.

Anyway, here are people, they have a life-saving invention and they kept it

to themselves for profitable gain.

Like I said, I don't really understand it. Things were certainly different 400 years ago.

But But the big point is, they had life-changing news, incredible good news,

and they kept it to themselves.

So we also carry good news. In fact, we carry the greatest news in the history of the world.

News that doesn't just save lives now, but saves lives for eternity.

Other news, including the invention of forceps, in comparison to the news that

we have salvation given to us by God through his Son, is nothing.

So my question is, what do you do with this news? Do you keep it just to yourself,

like my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather,

with his good news, or do you believe, like Helen,

that Jesus is the medicine of the world and must be shared?

So I hope today and I hope this series on 2 Timothy has provoked you to think

about the gospel, but also to act on the gospel.

We have the medicine that the world needs, the medicine to cure man's greatest need.

The need is not to be better people. It's to know Jesus and to know him as Saviour

and Lord. So do you get it?

I hope so. And I hope you are more encouraged, but not just encouraged,

you are moved to share the gospel, both to those who don't know Jesus and with

each other who do. Remember Helen.

Remember Paul. Remember Timothy.

Remember that Jesus must be shared. Let me pray.