“What Evil Hath He Done?”

The world has a natural dislike for so-called spiritually minded people; and for good reason. They are generally awful people. Hypocrites for the most part: self righteous, self absorbed, shrunken and too involved in their own little group, what they call church, to give a damn about anyone or anything else that is happening in the world all around them.

And that, as the tendency goes… is the best of them!

I remember my first year in Christ, a tumultuous year. Jesus had saved me: an abject miserable outcast of society; a worthless scum of the earth. Unwanted, unloved and yet God wanted me. God loved me. Jesus wanted me. Jesus loved me. Jesus found me and turned my eyes, my heart, my soul towards his and in that moment, he did do what the Archangel Gabriel told the Virgin Mary that he would come to do.

“And thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21)

“…From their sins.” From my sin!

Oh, a life, a life! I had Jesus! He had me! All was everything! All was him! All was joy and life and love and… Jesus!

And then – I went to church.

I had been saved from sin by the Savior on a cool balmy overcast late April afternoon. That first real Easter of my life found me in the back of car with a friend who had invited me to his church (one of the most famous churches in the entire city). There we were in that crowded car with other young men from his church. We had just left the Sunrise service and were on our way to the picnic which had been announced from the pulpit. They all spoke casually, and all seemed casual, until they lit up a mind-altering drug and began puffing on it and casually passing it around from one to another.

I had the window rolled down. I had to get out. What were they doing? What? The sermon had seemed so serious, and yet…

Suddenly my mind rolled back to what it had tried to ignore; the redness, the tiredness of the eyes of the preacher. The greatness of his words but the emptiness of spiritual impress, of power in himself. Could it be? He and these young men: the church members, the church’s pastor, the church: a fake, a show, not… truly… of… Christ.

The time would fail for me to try and tell this morning the rest of what I saw in two other churches that year. Of adultery documented, theft recurring, perversions seen, and congregations scattered back to the winds of the world to witness not of Christ but of the hypocrisies they had seen, detested and left.

“One church for one lifetime”, a preacher once phrased and repeatedly taught his people. No, not a verse in the Bible but certainly a contradiction to the morale and biblical morals of a Christian’s soul if what he finds there finds him doing the opposite of what he has been told to do in passages throughout the Word of God, such as 1 Timothy 5:22:  

 “Lay hands suddenly on no man, neither be partaker of other men’s sins: keep thyself pure.”

I. What evil has the world done?

     A. In the past, they have gathered themselves against God.

“And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.” (Genesis 11:1)

“And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.” (Genesis 11:3)

“And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

“Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.” (Genesis 11:6-8)

     B. In the present and in the future, they still gather themselves against God.

“Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six [666].” (Revelation 13:18)

II. What evil has the church done?

     Prediction:

“But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

     A. Jesus sent them outside their church, but they stayed in.

“And he called unto him the twelve, and began to send them forth by two and two; and gave them power over unclean spirits; and commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only; no scrip, no bread, no money in their purse: but be shod with sandals; and not put on two coats.” (Mark 6:7-9)

     B. Jesus sent them to “all cultures”, but they stayed in.

“And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, ‘All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.’ Amen.” (Matthew 28:18-20)

“And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration.” (Acts 6:1)

     C. Jesus sent them, and closed their church when they didn’t go.

“And Saul was consenting unto his death. And at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria, except the apostles.” (Acts 8:1)

“Therefore they that were scattered abroad went every where preaching the word.” (Acts 8:4)

III. What evil have you done?

     A. You tried to hide in the building of the world, but God found you out!

“And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.” (Genesis 11:4)

“So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.” (Genesis 11:8)

     B. You tried to hide in the rebellion of the world, but God found you out!

“Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, and Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, the son of Peleth, sons of Reuben, took men: and they rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel, two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown: and they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them: wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?” (Numbers 16:1-3)

“And Korah gathered all the congregation against them unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation: and the glory of the Lord appeared unto all the congregation.” (Numbers 16:19)

“And it came to pass, as he had made an end of speaking all these words, that the ground clave asunder that was under them: and the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and their houses, and all the men that appertained unto Korah, and all their goods. They, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them: and they perished from among the congregation. And all Israel that were round about them fled at the cry of them: for they said, Lest the earth swallow us up also. And there came out a fire from the Lord, and consumed the two hundred and fifty men that offered incense.” (Numbers 16:31-35)

     C. You are still trying to hide, even now, at the end of the world, but God has found you out!

“And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?” (Revelation 6:14-17)

Conclusion:

“Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die?” (Ezekiel 18:31)

You cannot hide! You cannot hide! You are sinful, you are a sinner! God is holy! God is pure! There is judgement all upon you, but there is no fault in Jesus.

“Pilate saith unto him, What is truth? And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find in him no fault at all.” (John 8:38)

All is pure in him, all is peace. He has suffered in your place. God in his mercy sacrified his own son upon a bloody splintery lifted mockery known as the Cross. Jesus paid for your sins. His peace, his joy in the midst and in the face of all judgement is yours for the taking if you will take it now!  Look to Jesus, now! Look to Jesus!

All is wrong without Him! All is right within… Jesus, the Son of God, the Son of Man, the Savior of the World. Look to Him!

 OUTLINE:

 “What Evil Hath He Done?”

(Matthew 27:23)

1. What evil has the world done?
2. What evil has the church done?
3. What evil have you done?

“I find in him no fault at all.” (John 8:38)