His Head and Eyes

Introduction: The Threefold Purpose of Academy Night

0:00 This sermon was preached on September 11th, 1988, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now, briefly, by way of introduction, let me say just a word about the focused purpose and intention of the ministry of the Word this evening. And what I say about that ministry this evening, at least in general, has pertained to the ministry of the Word on every such evening, when on a given Lord's Day in September, we have designated the evening worship service Academy Night. And the goals of the ministry in the Word are basically three this evening. First of all, to set before the ministry of the Word the purpose of the ministry of the Word. First of all, to set before the ministry of the Word the purpose of the ministry of the Word. Second of all, to set before the ministry of the Word the purpose of the ministry of the Word.

1:23 That is, to which they are pressing in the midst of their concentrated ministerial preparation. And then the second part of the goal is to set before the newer members of the congregation the rationale, the function, and the goals of the Trinity Ministerial Academy. For those of you who have come into the membership or begun to attend this congregation since, since last year's Academy Night, you have no doubt become aware that we have such a thing as a ministerial academy. You can hardly be here a week or two and not become aware of that.

2:07 In our prayers at prayer meetings several weeks ago, a good part of that prayer meeting was given over to praying for the days of orientation when the new students came in and the old students returned. Well, especially for the saints. In the wake of you newer members or adherents to this work, we feel it vital that you understand in some focused way the rationale and the function and goals of the academy. And then the third strand of the purpose of the ministry of the Word on these occasions is to address the more mature, the older, seasoned members among us in order that in the language of Peter, we might have our pure minds stirred up by way of remembrance. That with the passing of the years, when the novelty and something of the legitimate excitement of the newness of the academy has long since worn away, the substance of true spiritual understanding and true spiritual commitment will not wane, but rather grow by the cumulative pressure of the Word of God upon our consciences and our understanding.

The Spiritual Anatomy of a Man of God: Introduction to the Head

3:34 And so it is that threefold goal that has consciously molded my own judgment in the materials I have both selected and overlooked and which in the process of preaching I may even delete – because I addressed it. you tonight on the theme that I have not treated before. I'm riding the horse for the first time and I'm not quite sure the speed at which he will get to his assigned destination. And so I may have to delete some materials, but so be it. And I want to speak to you tonight as I announced this morning on the rather strange subject, at least in its title, on the anatomy of a man of God. And of course, I am not speaking of the physical anatomy of a man of God, for in terms of his physical constitution, a man of God is no different from any other ordinary man. But I am speaking, of course, of the spiritual anatomy of a man of God, using the imagery of the bodily parts in terms of the physical anatomy of a man of God. And so I want to speak to you tonight as I announce tonight as I announce tonight,

4:51 of their spiritual dimensions, even as the Word of God continually does. And as we attempt to set forth the anatomy of a man of God so that we may know what a man of God looks like, I trust that this threefold goal of the ministry will be realized by the help of the Holy Spirit, that the men of the academy will see, perhaps with clearer perception than they've ever seen before, what it is that they are striving to become by the grace of God and by means of the disciplines of this academy, that you who are new among us will understand that the rationale and the goal of the academy and the reason for which certain courses are included in the ministry will be realized by the help of the Holy Spirit. The goal of the ministry is that we may see the great head of the church form men into true men of God for the sake of those for whom Christ has died, and that we as the people of God, seasoned in these matters in one sense, may perhaps see, as we have never seen before,

6:07 the true goal and vision of this ministry and commit ourselves afresh to that prayerful environment. And the holding of the hands of the Holy Spirit and cross of the mina from the Sabbath shall make us a light by the chambers of the Holy Spirit may make us

The Head of a Man of God: Cognitive Faculty and Common Usage

6:40 immune like the bull bright red in the dark. Then, as I say, for the church to often ask, do you know that the chapter 48 and 50 show that the Holy Spirit is actually alive in our hearts and that we are an inborn being, In considering the anatomy of a man of God, let us consider the head of a man of God. And when speaking of the head, I am referring to that part of our humanity which houses our brains, that mysterious, knowing, cognitive faculty. We use it that way in common parlance all the time.

7:12 We say of a certain individual, well, you know, that guy's got a good head on his shoulders. And what do we mean by that? Well, we do not mean that we've taken calipers and measured the width of his cheekbones and the width of his chin and the distance between his eyes and it is a classically shaped face or one that is anatomically perfect. What we mean is the man has a good measure of gray matter and is obviously able and capable.

7:42 He is competent to use it well. If we say of someone else, well, you know, he's a woolly-headed thinker. We do not mean to make a comment upon his hair, its texture or its style. What we're saying is that his brain is all in a muddle.

7:58 He doesn't think clearly. His thinking process is like trying to see clearly through a dense fog. And so we say he is woolly-headed in his thinking. Or we say of another man, he's terribly thick-headed.

8:15 And what might we mean by that is his cognitive, his rational faculties are very slow to absorb concepts that are set before it. And so when we speak of the head of a man of God and refer the head to that faculty by which a man thinks, perceives, knows, comes to the recognition of concepts, concepts, concepts, ideas and standards, we are referring then to that part of the man that we call the head in that common usage in our ordinary speech. And I want to say three things briefly about the head of a man of God. Whenever you find a true man of God, there will be many things true about his head, but these three will always be there, whatever, whatever else may also be present. First of all, you will find that the man of God always has a head covering. Not the head covering of a veil or of long hair, but his head is covered with the helmet of salvation.

Characteristic 1: A Head Covered with the Helmet of Salvation

9:32 Will you turn please to 1 Thessalonians chapter 5. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, Paul, treating the subject of the head of a man of God, the subject of the second coming of our Lord, and the necessity of preparedness for that coming, writes 1 Thessalonians 5 and verse 8, But let us, since we are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. Now in the Bible, a hope is not a strong wish or desire. It is a certain confident expectation of promised redemptive blessings. And here the Christian is pictured as one who in his waiting for the return of his Lord, whose day and hour of return is veiled from all men, is found as a soldier equipped for battle with a helmet upon his head.

10:52 And the stuff of which that helmet is constructed, which protects this vital part of his anatomy, is called the hope of salvation. That is, the Christian waits with this vital part of his anatomy, protected by a well-groomed head, a well-grounded understanding and confidence in the nature of salvation by grace, through Jesus Christ the Lord. A salvation in which he knows and is confident that the best is yet to come. And whenever we think of the subject of what constitutes a man of God, we must always begin with this, this most fundamental premise, that no man is in any way competent to be a minister of the gospel to others, who has not himself come into the possession of a well-grounded scripturally based knowledge of his own acceptance in the beloved one. The man who is a stranger in his own spirit, spiritual understanding and experience,

12:17 to the throes of true Holy Ghost conviction, that horrors that I am nothing, and do I can be nothing in myself to commend myself to God. I stand naked and exposed and justly liable to the wrath and punishment of God for my sins. A man who is a stranger to that, can in no way, be an able minister of the new covenant, for the very genius of the coming of Christ is to save his people from their sins. And the man who has no heart acquaintance, and no true spirit wrought, Bible based understanding of his sinfulness, how can he minister in that which is fundamental to the very heart of the ministry? But he has gone further in by the word and the spirit, through the proclamation of the gospel. He has come to see that Christ is God's gift to needy sinners, and that in the person and work of the Lord Jesus, God has provided a salvation complete in all of its parts, and gracious in its very essence.

13:40 And having embraced the Savior and his salvation, every ordinary believer, who has a well, grounded scripturally based hope of forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life, has his heart and soul set upon the consummate glories and privilege of that salvation, which shall be his possession at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is only such a person, who has been delivered from the tyranny of human notions about life, and meaning, and standards, and goals, and the great problem of sin, and forgiveness, and guilt, and death, and the world to come. But blessed be God, everyone who has come to faith in Jesus Christ, and into the possession of the fundamental knowledge of the heart of gospel privileges, can be indeed found with a head covered, in the helmet of salvation. And surely, no man can be called a man of God, who is a stranger to those elemental realities of salvation in Jesus Christ. But,

15:05 God does not have a graduate school helmet for ministerial students. There is but one helmet for all, and the mark of a man of God, that no matter how deep may plumb, from the depths of revealed truth, no matter how high he soars into virage and acquaintance, from the central basic issues of his own identity of a sinner, Christ's identity as the savior of sinners, and the glorious confidence that the best is yet become. That's the helmet that's put on him as a babe, and that's the helmet he'll wear, if he is spiritually a gray-headed mature saint, with battle scars from no still ever, helmet of the hope of salvation upon his head. Much could be said, but I must pass on quickly. Secondly, if you examine the head of a man of God,

Characteristic 2: A Head Filled with a Right Understanding of God's Word

16:30 you will not only find that it is a head, wearing the helmet of the hope of salvation, but if you could dissect it and lay it bare and materialize in terms of thought and perception and conviction, you would find it was a head filled with a right understanding of the word of God. It would be a head filled with a right understanding of the word of God. Turn please to the passage that was read in your hearing, 2 Timothy chapter 2. 2 Timothy chapter 2. As Paul is concerned with the perpetuity of apostolic doctrine, which is just another way of describing the word of God, notice what he says to Timothy in chapter 2 and verse 2. The things which you have heard from me among many witnesses, the same commit to faithful who shall be able to teach others also. The things which you have heard from me.

17:55 You see, Paul's theology was not like a wispy ephemeral puff of smoke or the vapor that comes from the exhaust pipe on a cold morning. It was made up of the stuff, of propositional truth. It was made up of the stuff of assertions about God, assertions about man, assertions about sin, assertions about grace, assertions about repentance, and faith, and justification, and adoption, and regeneration, and sanctification, and glorification. The things which Timothy had heard were not some nebulous notions that one day were in this shape and like a cloud never captured again, but something that had substance to it, so much substance that it could be grasped and having been the positive truth to another generation who, having grasped it,

19:14 would likewise commit those to others. Notice that the manner of committing them is not spirit-to-spirit felt experience, but he says, who shall be able to tip others nebulous notions. You ought to try to capture nebulous wispy notions. But it was solid apostolic truth, and therefore Paul in the chapter said to Timothy, in verse 7, consider what I say, and that verb consider is a verb form of the word, most often used and translated in the New Testament to describe the mind. Timothy, surcise the tease of your gray matter on what I have said. Timothy, take all mental energies and concentrate them upon the things that I have said. He didn't say go off somewhere and get mystical religious impressions.

20:41 No! He said, Timothy, take the documents I have given, pour over the words, and the grammar, and the connection, and the thoughts. Bring your noggin to bear upon the things I have said. And then he said this, and the Lord shall give you understanding in all things.

21:06 You see, the Lord alone can give spiritual understanding, but what he gives understanding of are things that are revealed, written, and deposited in the word of God. On these things, and the Lord gives the understanding in all things. The Lord alone gives spiritual understanding of spiritual truth, but that spiritual truth is deposited in an objective revelation, and the understanding which the Lord gives does not bypass the concentrated exercise of the mental faculties of the one who would understand them, but rather, the illumination of the Spirit comes in, alongside the endeavors of the sanctified mind, concentrating upon these things. Now this is why, in the academy, the men have in their curriculum such courses as Old Testament introduction, New Testament introduction, courses that take them down a winding trail of trying to understand the setting of the people of God in the time of, say, the Restoration,

22:34 when the books of Nehemiah and Ezra were written, and the prophets of the Restoration, Zechariah and Malachi and Haggai, and men have to wrestle with the periods and how they fit into the biblical chronology, and when they come, perhaps, say, to the New Testament, and are going to grapple with a true understanding of the Book of Romans, they have to try to understand the situation that existed in the Greco-Roman world, and wrestle with many things. You say, well, why do you need all of this? Just stand up and preach the Bible. Well, you see, that's just the thing.

23:12 The truth of God does not come to us in some kind of mystical way, but it comes embedded in the language and thought forms and historical and sociological and geographical factors, of the first century Palestinian Greco-Roman world. And God says that in the New Covenant the shepherds He gives, this is the mark of them, Jeremiah 3.15, I will give them shepherds who will feed them with knowledge and with understanding. Well, how can a shepherd feed with that with which he is unacquainted? No good shepherd, a shepherd of the sheep of Christ, is one whose head is not only clothed with the helmet of salvation, and whose life validates that he is indeed a recipient of the dynamics of grace, and there's no explanation for who he is as a man, but that he is a saved, regenerate, spirit-indwelt, spirit-filled man. May I say it reverently? Such a man could stand up in front of you and glow for a thousand years, and you might perish, and go to hell.

24:34 His glory of his salvation that causes you to grow in grace, but is when that man who glows with knowledge and with understanding, then and only then will 2 Peter 3.18 be true of you, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so, if you look at the head of a man of God, it has the helmet of the hope of salvation upon it. Secondly, it is filled with the right understanding of the word of God.

Characteristic 3: A Head Furnished with Adequate Tools for Ministry

25:16 But thirdly, it is furnished with adequate tools for a lifetime of a fresh and sound ministry. You will not only find, if you dissect the mind of a man of God, that it is filled with an understanding of the word of God, that it is filled with an understanding of the word of God, that it is filled with an understanding of the word of God, a growing, expanding understanding, granted, but you will find in it what you would find when the Martin family, that's not these other Martins, I mean the real Martins from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. When the Martin clan gathers every Thanksgiving day, many of you know I'm one of ten children, and when all of the siblings and their wives, and their children gather, and a couple of them have six children, and my mother and father and a few of the other extended family will have 65 to 70 people. Well, obviously, you need a large home, have to be as big as Zacchaeus' house to do that. So what they do is they rent a little farm museum outside of the city or town of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a building owned by some Christians, and what's different with that farm museum is that all the implements, none of them are on the ground floor,

26:40 that's kept open for public meetings and for renting for such purposes as these, but all of the walls are lined right up along to the ceiling, right to the peak, with old farm implements that have been gathered from Lancaster County over the decades. And it's fascinating to look at all of the various implements that farmers used. I didn't know there were so many things that could use so many implements in farming. I knew farming was not a simple matter, but I didn't realize how complex a matter it was, at least before the days of the advances in mechanized machinery, etc.

27:19 And there, when you walk into that rented hall every Thanksgiving, you see inside that hall the implements, the tools, to do the work of a farmer over the long haul, year in and year out, with a diversity of crops. Well, if you get inside the head of a man of God, what you will find is a mind that is lined in its walls with the tools for a lifetime of a fresh but sound ministry. For a ministry in which a man has the tools to be continually digging into the bottomless pit of the riches of the Word of God. The tools to overcome and open up of these documents that we call the Old and the New Testaments. And this principle is emphasized in the very chapter read in your hearing. Look down at verse 15.

28:21 Paul tells Timothy, using a very strong verse, spudanzo, diligence, throw into presenting yourself, now look at the imagery, unto God, a workman, that needs not to be ashamed, handling aright, or holding straight course in the Word of Truth. Now if he is not to be ashamed before God that he has mishandled the Word, if he's not to be ashamed that after a year of ministry he's run thin at the edges and all he can do is repeat old sermons with different headings and different illustrations. If he's not to be ashamed that as the people of God grow and their spiritual appetites increase and they have an ability to go from milk to meat to strong meat, if he's not to be ashamed that he can still go to the kitchen which is his study and there prepare meals not just adequate for little kids just cutting their teeth, but prepare meals for those with all their second teeth and with a ravenous and well cultivated appetite. If he's not to be embarrassed then he must be a what? He must be a workman.

29:50 A workman has a handle on his tool and knows how to use them well that year in and year out, decade in, decade out, he may come before the same people growing and expanding, but some of them who form the heart of it there with him year out and wonder of wonders. Not only do they grow, but they see the growth in the preacher's understanding and knowledge and experience and he is not ashamed before God. They are not ashamed before him. He is not ashamed before them.

30:30 Why? Because he gave diligence to present himself a workman approved unto God. And basically that's what the academy is all about. We're not trying to pump in 1747 sermon outlines into the men hoping that if we figure they preach so many per year that'll do them for ten years.

30:53 We're trying to give them the tools by which for a lifetime they can dig and dig and dig and dig and dig again. And some of us who've had the joy of preaching for three and a half decades marvel. We come back to a passage we've read hundreds of times, preached on perhaps a dozen times and lo and behold, as we dig, we find fresh truth breaking out of the word of God that ravishes our own souls. And with that we come to feed the people of God.

31:30 That's what a man of God is. Away with this nonsense! The man with the gift of subscribe sermon outline for seven dollars a month and grind of someone else's labors. Such a man ought to be shamed right out of the ministry.

31:55 And he'll be horribly ashamed in the day of the Lord Jesus. No man who is set apart to labor in preaching and teaching is described as one who labors the word for our difficult manual labor in the word of teaching. But his labor is a delight. Why?

32:21 Because in the goodness of God by one means or another he has acquired the tools that enable him to have a fresh and sound ministry throughout all of his days. This is why the men have to learn Greek. This is why they have to learn Hebrew. That's the code language in which the word of God has come to us.

32:47 And you who sit here week after week know how time and time again wonderful jewels have been plucked out of the word of God and turned until as we gazed upon them and from their sparkle we saw us of the glory of God. We weren't impressed with the wealth of learning of those who taught us. We were impressed with our Savior and his truth. But I tell you we're thankful they had their tools when they prepared.

33:25 Aren't we? We thank God they are well furnished workmen. We have to go to the Waldron's courses in historical theology and learn all about ancient heresies and the monophysites and they've got to learn about Eutychianism and Sabellianism and a whole bunch of other isms and wade through reams of reading. Why?

33:51 Because we ain't the first ones who ever opened the Bible and as God's people have opened the Bible and sought to dig into it there have been perverse men who have perverted it. And so the quality control upon the independent discovery of every faithful minister is the historic witness of the church to the truth of God. Truth often hammered out and articulated in its essence in the crucible of controversy from heresies on the left and heresies on the right. And if a man is to have great usefulness over the years there must be that check of the quality control on the one hand and a well-grounded grasp of systematic theology on the other so that he never expounds any one of the parts in contradiction to the whole. You say, oh, now it's beginning to make sense. Well, I said that's what I'd hoped you'd see. That's the purpose.

34:54 I'm not up here filling time. I want you to understand why it is the men are subjected to this four-year what some would call torture chamber of having to learn and having to study historical theology and the many other disciplines that are far from sending tingles up your spine while you're learning them. But I tell you the tingles come later when using your tools God's truth breaks open. And there are times when I sit at the study and I say, Lord, I feel guilty getting paid for doing this.

35:28 I feel guilty. I'd pay a man every last dime in my savings account to do this. Now there are other times what in the world am I doing here when the word of God doesn't seem to yield and you've taken all the tools you have and you've worked away and packed and pounded on the text and prayed and drilled and chipped and it doesn't seem to open. And through that discipline God reminds you of who you are and what you are and your dependence upon him.

36:02 But it doesn't make you throw your tools away and say they don't work. You just keep chipping away. And that's what you'll find. So that's his head.

36:13 And I fully intended to spend the majority of the time there because in a very unique way you see the academy is a concentration of those disciplines meant to furnish the head of a man of God with that helmet of the hope of salvation. That's why we do not detach the academy from the life of the church in which the very lifeblood of the people of God is sustained as they feed upon Christ their savior and understand more and more of the glories of his salvation. But it's a head also filled with the right understanding of the word of God and furnished with adequate tools for a lifetime of fresh but sound ministry. Will you pray for the men in the academy that God will furnish their heads. And when you pray you've got three points now take one one week one the next week one the next week work these into your prayer list that they may have the head of a man of God. Now let's move down from the head in general to the eyes in particular.

The Eyes of a Man of God: Introduction to Spiritual Vision

37:28 And what are the characteristics of the eyes of a man of God? Well it's not their color brown or green that they are languid or lively. It's their spiritual eye. And let me again set before you much more briefly three characteristics of the eyes of a man of God.

37:50 Number one. You will find that they are fixed on the unseen world of spiritual reality. Have you ever noticed that the mark of a determined man set out on a mission from which he will not be deterred and often and I don't say this for laughs of demented men but you meet a person who when he walks by you his eyes are not showing that anything is registering around him. You look at him speak his eyes are fixed.

38:24 You say one of two things. Either that man's got something on his mind that is obsessing him and he will not be deterred or you say he's out of touch with reality. Well you see the mark of the eyes of a man of God is that they are fixed. Not because of any kind of spiritual imbalance.

Characteristic 1: Eyes Fixed on the Unseen World of Spiritual Reality

38:42 He is determined to stay in touch with the only reality that ultimately matters. And I want you to turn to 2 Corinthians 4 for the pivotal text. Speaking as a minister of the gospel listen to the great apostle. Here he says in chapter 4 verse 16 after describing his acute awareness of his mortality knowing that in a sense he's a living reproduction of the whole motif of death and resurrection Jesus died and was raised he said in a sense I am cast into the mold of that redemptive motif always bearing about in my body the dying of Jesus I'm as good as dead day after day and yet wonder of wonders I live by the power of his resurrection life and in the midst of that suffering and opposition and stoning and beating and scourging and imprisonment listen to what he says in verse 16 wherefore we do not faint but though our outward man is decaying yet our inward man is renewed day by day for our light affliction which is

40:10 for the moment the moment he's already gone through years of affliction he says light affliction for a moment works for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory now notice here's the secret to all of this condensing of the weight of the affliction the duration of it we'd say heavy affliction over a lengthy period of time Paul says no when I measure it it's light affliction for a moment that's such a measuring device he tells us verse 18 while we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal he said all of this perspective grows out of the vision of his spiritual eyes and he said the eyes can be fixed upon two sets of realities there are things that can be seen with the physical eyes such as pulpits and microphones and children who have an arm around people

41:38 and others who are trying to look around the head of the person in front of them and some who have their hands folded and some who sit with their hands these beams are things that car is a thing your home to which you retire tonight that's a thing that can be seen and Paul says we do not look at the things that are seen now did he mean that he put on blindfold and just chanced it that he wouldn't bump his head on a beam on the way out here did he chance it that he could make it home of course not what does he mean we do not look on the things that are seen the eyes of the soul is not upon that which can be seen with the eyeballs but there's another whole set of realities notice what he calls them in the text they are things not notions not ideas they are things they have substance they have reality and he says the eyes of our soul are not locked impressions made

43:06 by the eyeballs in their sockets no the eyeballs in their sockets do their service while I'm here and I will look to make sure I don't bump my noggin on a beam or bang my car into a telephone pole on the way home but he says the eyes of my soul are not fixed upon the things that can be perceived with the physical eyes but those which alone can be perceived by spiritual eyes opened by the Holy Spirit face of Christ that God the certain hope of seeing that God before that God and he says we look on the things that are not seen and why is he so determined to keep that perspective he says for the things that are seen are temporal there is not a reality that can be perceived with these eyes that will not be consumed in the fire of the returning Lord I agree apart from the bodies of living saints there ain't a thing your eyes can see that is not temporal

44:29 not a thing fire judgment of a returning Lord but the things that are not seen his second coming the day of judgment the consummation of all things will not obliterate them it will bring them forth into their apex of glory the things that I've seen with the eye of faith the physical eyes will now catch up with the spiritual eye and we'll see the Savior whom having not seen we love we'll see in a way we cannot conceive of now the glory of God seated upon his throne and we'll see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Moses and the host joined to their glorified bodies dear people do you see what the apostle is saying as a minister of the gospel this was as it were one of the major secrets of his utter indifference to the things of this world to men's opinions of him to the accumulation of stuff and money

45:55 or to himself he was indifferent to these things why? they were things that could be seen the gaze was upon the things that could not be seen because they and they alone were eternal my friend I won't give you a nickel for a so called man of God who may be well furnished with a head knowledge of this book if he's not a heavenly minded man he'll speak of eternal and spiritual realities in such a manner as to send the chill of death to the very things that ought to throb with life there's nothing more deadening and damning than a man ministering truth with a heart wedded to this present world what's in the eye of a man of God what's the mark of his eyes they are fixed they are fixed not with the fixation of a demented man but the fixation of a spiritually enlightened man upon the world of spiritual reality secondly they are focused upon the same time and I wrestled with this in my preparation someone's going to ask me now wait a minute pastor if your eyes are fixed both of them on one object they can't be fixed on another

Characteristic 2: Eyes Focused on the Lord Jesus Christ

47:23 physically no but spiritually yes because the Bible shows us that this was true so if the Bible says it's true I don't care what the ophthalmologist says so secondly they are focused upon the Lord Jesus Christ and the true glory of the cross so I want you to listen to this chapter and listen to the same apostle speaking of the privileges that are ours in the new covenant the apostle including himself with all believers says in verse 18 but we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are transformed image from glory to glory even is from the Lord the Spirit. Here's the picture of a man whose eyes are focused upon the Lord Jesus as he is revealed in the way of God's appointment. And there is this holy fixation of the spiritual eyes upon him. And what was true of the apostle is set forth as the duty of all believers in Hebrews chapter 12 where here the Christian life is likened to a race

48:48 and you'll remember many of you the admonition of verse 1 and 2 verses 1 and 2. Therefore let us also seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily beset us and let us run with patience. For endurance steadfastness the race that is set before us looking off unto Jesus the author and the finisher of our faith. Looking off unto Jesus in this matter of the Christian life likened to a race in the games. Though the stands are filled with eager men and women of the church, we are not alone. We are not alone in the struggle of life. We are

49:40 not alone in the struggle of our lives. We are not alone in the struggle of life. We are not alone in the onlookers, some who would cheer and others jeered, some wishing for us to break the tape, others wishing we'd break a leg and be disqualified. He says you do not grandstand it. You don't hot dog it, play into the crowd. In the running of this race, laying aside every impediment, you look off, you look away unto Jesus. You keep your eyes upon him who is the goal of the race. For ultimately the great passion of every true Christian who's been placed into that race by the grace of God is not just to escape the damnation of hell. It is not just to know the glories of a perfected body and the absence of sorrow and pain and suffering. Heaven would be hell were he not there. Heaven itself without thee, the hymn writer says. As dark as night would be. And ultimately the great passion of the heart of every Christian

50:48 and how much more of a Christian minister is in the language of John, the longing to see him. We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. And the last words of John in the book of the Revelation, even so come Lord Jesus. That was his response to the words of the exalted Lord. I come quickly. He says, even so come Lord Jesus. That's why our Lord said, if I go to prepare a place for you, he didn't say, I'll come and usher you into the place. He said, I'll come and take you unto myself. That where I am, there you may be also. And the heart of every Christian says, well, Lord, I'm so glad you put the emphasis there. What would a beautiful description of the Lord be? I'm so glad you put the emphasis

51:42 there. What would a beautiful description of the place be without the promise that you'd be there and I'd be with you? And when you look at the eyes of a man of God, you will find invariably, given all due diversity of gift and temperament and manner of expression, that his eyes are fixed upon the unseen world of spiritual reality. They are focused upon the Lord Jesus.

52:12 We read in Colossians, Christ is our life. He is our way. He is our Lord. He is our example.

Characteristic 3: Eyes Sensitive to the True State of Men

52:21 He is bread to eat. He is water to drink. He is our advocate. He is all. The mark of a man of God is the fixation of his eyes upon Jesus as revealed in the scriptures. Then thirdly, and it looks like we're just going to get as far as the eyes. They are sensitive to the true state of men. And if I'm going to close, this is where I want to close. And perhaps we'll deal with these other characteristics on another evening. They are sensitive to the true state of men. Now, what do I mean by that? This, again, is the most amazing thing. While they are fixed on the unseen world of spiritual reality, and at the same

53:10 time, don't ask me how, one set of eyes can be fixed upon two equally possessive objects at one and the same time. They are fixed upon two equally possessive objects at one and the same time. I don't know, but the Bible says it. And the heart of every true Christian knows to some degree it's true. You'd think that would make a man utterly indifferent, insensitive, and oblivious of what's going on around him. But just the opposite is true. The man whose eyes are fixed upon the unseen world of spiritual reality, whose eyes are fixed upon the Lord Jesus, is a man whose eyes are sensitive to the true state of men. I give you two texts.

53:47 First one in Matthew chapter 9, where a description is made of the eyes of our Lord Jesus, and how they became the inlet to an appreciation of the true state of men. Familiar passage. Matthew chapter 9, and we read in verse 36, But when he, that is our Lord, saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion for them. Why? Because they were. Now notice, they were. Their true condition is what our Lord saw.

54:32 They were distressed and scattered as sheep not having a shepherd. Well, did he come into towns and villages where there was political tumult, where there had been a total breakdown of law and order, and everyone was running around, helter-skelter, all order and symmetry, of social cohesion coming apart at the seams? No. Look at verse 35.

54:57 He went about the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues. Synagogue worship was going on as usual. Come the Sabbath day, everyone was going up to synagogue. The reader read, the exhorter exhorted, the scroll was brought out, the bazaars were opened. Day after the Sabbath, people bought their oranges, sold their wares. Everything was business as usual. He went about. He went about in a very orderly way because there was stability and order at that time secured and maintained by Roman emissaries. He went about preaching the gospel of the kingdom, healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease. But when he saw the multitudes and snooze, you see any tourist in Palestine, what would he have seen? He would have seen this bustling of activity. He would have seen the bright colored garments of the peasants. He would have seen the white gowns of the Pharisees and the scribes who

56:01 dressed with distinctive clerical garb in order to draw attention to themselves. He would have seen enough to have blown twelve. That's all they would have seen. But Jesus' eyes saw the true condition of those around him, saw through their brightly colored garments, saw through their business enterprises and success and religious forms.

56:30 But when they had they were in thejection of their own mind. The Christian system that was so strong. The Christian system that had the capacity to control all things, was based on their own thinking. Their own thinking was based on their own ideas. The Christian system, the Church is set upon the world that is physical reality. God is fully visible in the eyes of the brothers. The Church is based upon the world of the spiritual reality. Because his own eyes were fixed upon his own will and pleasing the heart of his Father, our blessed Lord was sensitive to the true state of men. They were. That's what they were. This soul would have been to penetrate through the shell. And he would have been the one. He would have been the one. He would have been the one. He would have been the one.

57:10 And God had said that if all works were successful and that God had put them together, God would of the externals that's the mark of a man of God when he looks out upon affluent and in terms of the rest of the world politically and economically stable United States in North Jersey what does he see at a stock market holding its own a soft real estate market losing a little bit he doesn't see the man stability of US a trying to fill that God-shaped hole with their houses and their in-ground pools and snorting coke up their nose and belting booze down their bellies and having multiple orgasms in illicit sexual relations and he sees they are distressed he sees they are scattered he

58:21 seems into God go to mass go to church church may come away worse than when they went in and paul had that same ability as does every man of god to see with spiritual eyes the true state of men and this is my last text act 17 coming to that great impressive city of athens that great center of philosophy of rhetoric of learning filled with impressive temples people would come as we would say on their holidays or vacations to see marvelous athens the triumphs of the human spirit its near deification of the human body as we see a repeat in our own day with health and fitness clubs being one of the most sure investments in our day with our body worship in direct proportion to our laws

59:41 of grasp upon the worth of a soul now when paul comes to that impressive city he doesn't come with his minolta slung over one shoulder and his sure shot cannon on the other running around oohing and awing notice what he saw verse 16 now while paul waited for his companions at athens his spirit was provoked within him as he beheld the city full he saw their true state beyond the external refinery and the impression of architectural grandeur beyond the rhetorical art polished to the place where men could hold other men spellbound by the sheer force of their words he sees a city seething and rinking and to reeking and to change the imagery reeling through the heavy winem up but spirit's preaching close all spirit's third by can well that's one of the marks of the matter

61:09 person that's why you can to a congregation lowly well-dressed plexiglass like this it looks into the for k children coming from well-ordered homes who are polite and neat they're not a bunch of little brats and they know how to say all the books of the bible and quote verses and yet he'll stand in a pulpit like this and plead with such children to run to jesus to get cleansed from their sins to go to the lord jesus and ask him for a new heart to believe on the lord jesus that you might not perish in your sins why because the man of god sees that all of that privilege and all of that restraint and all of those wonderful gifts that our children have until they personally embrace the lord jesus they'll go to the same hell as the hitlers and the stallions yes there will be degrees of judgment and theirs may be greater because the scripture says it will be more than that and it will be more than that and it will be more than that and it will be more tolerable in the day of judgment for Sodom and Gomorrah, all of those aggressive, heartless homosexuals, than for those polite religious people that heard Jesus Christ say,

62:36 the kingdom of God is at hand.

62:40 And you're not fooled by externals. That's why some of you can never quite feel comfortable in this place. Try as you may, you sense an uneasiness of conscience whenever the essence of true spirituality is highlighted, because you know your religion is just a little bit more than skin deep. It's never penetrated into the deepest, darkest regions of your heart.

63:10 And the mark of a man of God is that he has eyes not only fixed on the unseen world of spiritual reality, he has eyes that are not only fixed on the unseen world of spiritual reality, He has eyes that are not only fixed on the unseen world of spiritual reality, but sensitive to the true state of men. That's why John Newton said, only the God who made the worlds can make a minister. Dear people, we can't give these men hearts that see and feel and yearn and are broken for the souls of men. But God can.

63:52 God is able. Pray that we who have an intensified, unified contact may exemplify these realities that by a kind of holy contagion, we may never lose that fixation upon the unseen world, that fixation upon Christ, that sensitivity to men's true state. May God help us. May God send His Spirit among us.

64:28 And may He make men of God. And as I've indicated, perhaps when seeking the counsel of my fellow elders, on another occasion we'll look at his ears, his mouth, his heart, his hands, and his feet to get the picture of the man of God.