The True Jesus Church has 10 articles of faith. They tell us about God and the world. They are foregrounded because they have to do with salvation.

In this series of sermons, the speaker would like to highlight in each doctrine an aspect that will help us in our daily life.

This sermon will discuss the first AOF that is about the one true God and Jesus being that God. The aspect to be highlighted is authority.

Man today rejects the sovereignty of God. Things we see as God’s right is questioned today, and used as a reason not to believe in God.

For us the conquest of Canaan was a very thrilling war of good against bad. But the people in the world view it as a genocide. Because they see the people of Israel wiping out whole nations.

We see the Passover as God’s deliverance of His people; deliverance from slavery of hundreds of years, and punishment for Egypt being cruel. But the people of the word consider it murder.

Homosexuality is seen as an abomination. But the people of the world see it as an unloving God.

Eating of animals is sanctioned by God after the flood. But today, vegans say it’s usurping the equality of all living things.

Underlying this is the sense in the world that authority should always be questioned; that the power of the masses is correct. That means also turning against the authority of God.

So let us first talk about the authority of God.
1 Sam 2:6-7
This is the authority of God. He controls life. He controls fortune. But today some question this: what right does God have to control our lives? Why does God make my life so unreasonable?

Recently, there was somebody who sued his parents for bringing him into the world. That means: only I have authority over my life. This is the world today. But is this also the thinking along Christians? That matters because we come to church to learn the word of God. That matters also because it determines our world view.

Tonight we have to think again and renew our acceptance of the authority of God obey our lives. If we do so, we find that there are many things we won’t question God about.

We won’t ask God, “Why is my life so miserable? Why didn’t you make me richer or healthier?” Because we acknowledge the authority of God, we’ll ask Him to help us in our troubles. Questioning and murmuring are insidious ways of killing our faith.

Matt 28:18
It’s important that in our first AOF that Jesus is this God. The one and only God. Authority has been given to Him. It’s just an acknowledgement that Jesus Himself is God. When we believe in Jesus, we must believe that He is the only God. It’s very important. Again, if we look at the world, they want to make Jesus a man. A good man. And so they would only choose His teachings that suit their idea of humanism. Even among Christians of other denominations, it is hard for them to reconcile the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. So they cannot believe that this New Testament Jesus could punish people. That if a person had already accepted Christ, he would be rejected if he hasn’t received the Holy Spirit or had his feet washed. In our acceptance of God and His authority, it’s important for us to know that in the Old Testament and New Testament, it is the same God.

There’re more than a hundred mentions of the word ‘God’ in Job. In the book of Job, Job complains about the authority of God. Faced with the tremendous suffering that he had, he lapsed into murmuring. He questioned God. So God replied personally and through a young man called Elihu.

In Job 34 and 37, Elihu defends God. It is worth reading through in our times of trouble. We will read some parts of it.

Job 34:10-19
v10-13 (read)
Aren’t these questions people who don’t believe challenge God on?

v14 (read)
We challenge God. “God why you do this?” “God who gave you charge over my life?” This verse says that God we’re to suck back all the life; to gather the spirit in all the universe, we all pfft become dust like those movies where vampires disintegrate. Why does God have authority over us? Because He gave us life. Without Him we cannot exist. Can we accept that? Can we have a sense of humility towards our Maker? Because the alternative is that if God takes it away, we’d just disappear into dust. Instead if we acknowledge Him, we will know that life has a lot of good in it. There’s much joy God has given us even in our physical life. And best of all if you seek Him, He has prepared for us eternal life.

Accepting the authority of God is crucial. And learning not to murmur against God is very important for us to have a good perspective of a problem.

So God has the authority. God has authority over this world.
Rom 13:1-3
In v1, it says that authorities that exist are appointed by God. So the default situation for Christians is that we obey authority. But when we look at the West today, there’s a lot of anti-authority feeling. If they vote for a government they like, they’d support it. If they lose an election, somehow they feel it’s their right to protest, disrupt and cause trouble to the existing government. They just get this feeling it’s okay to go against authority.

Christians are not supposed to do that. Surprisingly here it says ALL authorities that exist are appointed by God. Because no matter how bad an authority is, somehow, stealing and killing is still wrong. People who kinder are still caught by the police. Or course sometimes it’s the police who murder in some countries. The general idea of government is to do the right thing. But what to do if you’re born in a country like North Korea? Does this still apply? The speaker sees no reason why it doesn’t still apply. A government can be overthrown through democratic ways. But Christians are not supposed to take up arms. So what are we supposed to do?

This book is called the book of Romans. The Romans persecuted Christians. The Christians were told not to fight against the Romans. Just obey. They want to kill you? Run. That’s what we have to do.

When we obey authority, our lives our stable, because there’re many troubles in this world. The greatest troubles are those that happen spiritually. Our faith. Our emotions. Persecution because of our religion. We focus on this, and leave the running of the government to other people. So Christians are not encouraged to take part in politics. That’s what we understand by God has delegated authority on earth to governments.

We see another verse.
2 Pet 2:10
Despising authority is considered something bad. Christians are not to despise authority. When the speaker spoke this sermon in W11, after the service a brother told him that it was very hard to accept, because he’s Malaysian. Malaysians nowadays are very politically minded (laughs). They feel very proud that they managed to overthrow a corrupt Prime Minister, only to be replaced with another one (lol). He said it was very hard to accept. But that’s what the Bible says. It doesn’t say we cannot vote though. If the government is bad, we can always vote in the next one, we don’t need to fight. Let us understand this.

Authority of God in the church:
God delegates authority in the church. But it’s not absolute, unless it is DIRECTLY from God. How do we know it’s directly from God? When it can be found in the Bible, because the Bible includes the word spoken by Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

John 7:16-17
Jesus wanted to make it clear that what He spoke wasn’t on His own authority but from God. Many of us will take it for granted “it’s obvious what because Jesus is God”. But there’re people who distinguish the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. Jesus wants to make it clear that both are the same. “I didn’t come here and start something new. It’s the same!”

John 16:13
The Holy Spirit also is said to not speak on His own authority. He speaks whatever He hears. Again, to us it’s obvious because the Holy Spirit is God. So why the necessity to emphasise something we already know? Firstly, this tells us the Holy Spirit is God. Secondly, it also tells us that since many of us have the Holy Spirit, when we claim what we say is according to the Holy Spirit, we have to tie it in with the Bible. Quite often, when you have a charismatic leader who claims he has a special channel to God, and speaks something against the Bible, and claims he must be right because he has the Holy Spirit, we cannot accept that.

Some people will argue, “Who are YOU? This guy is so great!”
Then we turn to the Bible and say, “The Holy Spirit doesn’t speak on His own authority.” We can even use the Chinese saying: 3 guys are better than zhugeliang.
All of us have the Holy Spirit. All of us in this church cannot just lose to this guy who is charismatic. Because if all of us have the Holy Spirit, 3 of us are better than one zhugeliang. Because when 3 have the Holy Spirit, 5 have the Holy Spirit, 100 have the Holy Spirit, that’s the Holy Spirit speaking. Authority given by God through Jesus through the Holy Spirit. No authority is given to a particular person.

God has given authority to the ministers.
2 Cor 10:8
We don’t want anarchy in the church either. “Everyone has Holy Spirit. Every issue needs a vote.” God has set up a system in church; a system of ministers. Authority has been given to ministers to minister the church. We must accept that.

Mark 10:42-45
While authority is given to the ministers, this authority is different from that of other worldly organisations. There’s a distinctive feature of ministers being servants. Actually, many western and our government has taken the same word. “Civil servant”

In western countries with a Christian background, they understand the guys at the top are supposed to be servants. Correctly done, this is the Christian way. Ministers are given authority but not absolute authority, as long as it’s according to the Bible.

But there’re many issues that aren’t exactly from the Bible. For example, how to administer the carpark. Can’t find it in the Bible. But the principle of kindness and so on are there.

Ministers have a tough job. But God blesses them.

1 Tim 3:13
If you serve God, and serve God well, you’ll have a good standing before God; more importantly, before Man. And great boldness in the faith which is in Jesus. Because by serving God, you touch certain spiritual aspects other members do have. You’ll have some spiritual experiences others don’t have. That will strengthen your faith. But ministers need to be protected in two aspects.

Two aspects:

1. One aspect is from unfair accusations.
   1 Tim 5:19
   They’re protected in that you can’t simply accuse a minister. Because when you’re in the forefront, you’ll be attacked. So the standard is that there must be 2-3 witnesses then we’ll talk about it. Don’t bother if it’s just one person who always has problem who is always complaining, need to conduct meeting just because of him.
2. Second thing a minister needs to be protected against is himself
   Otherwise why do we even receive an accusation if there’re 2-3 ministers. There’re cases where ministers fall, because they’re human. So accusations against ministers or 2-3 witnesses need to be entertained. To protect the minister. We should not say, “Oh cannot touch us.” Because we care for the ministers, accusations need to be looked into. Why do we be a Christian? Because we want to go to heaven. Why be a minister? Isn’t it the same answer? Because we want to go to heaven. If becoming a minister caused us to fall, why be one? Why cling on to the status or title?

Sometimes it’s very sad. Our ministers are sent away from their families for a long period of time. Some commit adultery. If a preacher knows he’s going to country X, and there’s always a sister X waiting for him there. One day he’s going to fall. Isn’t it better not to be a preacher? We ought to save ourselves. We ought to care for our ministers.

Questioning authority is not a norm for Christians, whether out in the world or the church. We should not make it a norm to question this and question that, because God has told us to respect authority. Life is stable that way, and we can concentrate on controlling ourselves; to be better people. Rather than to control other people. “Authority no good. Mine better.”

But we should question authority when we care for others, and we think something is not right; when we’ve reflected on it and think there’s a better way. Because ultimately we’re guided by biblical teachings and the Holy Spirit. Remember behind all these authority is the authority of God. So we can question the intermediate authority if we feel it goes against the authority of God. This is what Jesus did to the Pharisees, and what the apostles did to the Jewish religious leadership.

It is sad that our True Jesus Church youths in western societies challenge the church. In one of the youth theological seminars in US, the preacher asked the youths, “How many of you believe that the True Jesus Church is the only true church? Please raise your hand.” The number of hands raised was zero. Not a single one believe. They challenged the authority of the church. They want to put their beliefs and sayings on Facebook and Twitter.

Once the speaker questioned one of them, “When you put all your teachings in Facebook, is it not the same as snatching opportunity of standing on the pulpit and speaking? Or putting a soapbox in the middle of the street like the old days and speaking your own sermon?” None of us would dare to do that because it’s an important thing to speak the word of God on the pulpit. So we’re careful in assigning who to speak on the pulpit. But on Facebook you make your own pulpit. Because it’s America. It’s free speech.

This comes from not understanding authority. The devil is the father of lies. He’s the first being to challenge authority. How could a created being challenge his Maker? How could he get 1/3 of the angels on his side? The thinking is very similar to today’s world, that is to ask God, “Who gave you the right to have authority over us? Freedom is above all!”

If we don’t understand authority, we may fall into the same trap.

Rev 13:4-8
When the people in the world reject authority, they think they’re free. But revelations says that have given authority to the dragon, the beast, the devil.

Today it’s like that. They despise authority. They say people who disagree with homosexuality are homophobic. They encourage people in countries like Singapore to fight against authority; to be activists. But in their hypocrisy, when they have the authority, they’ll stamp down on you. They won’t allow you to say or teach his in your churches. It’s a scary thing. When you reject the authority of God, you’ll devolve the authority to Satan. This is what will happen at the end of the world. They’ll make war with the saints and overcome the saints. All on the earth will worship him.

What are we to do? This is where the world is heading, giving authority to the devil. In the church, we must always remember authority belongs to God. Don’t take the easy way out, devolving authority to other people. “Oh everything give to this preacher to do, I just follow.”
Do not always everything quarrel with people and want to fight against authority.

What are we to do?
Rev 22:8-9
What are we to do? Worship God. Give Him the authority. Focus on Him. It’s so surprising John could do this to the angel after all those things. Suddenly giving authority to the angel who showed him these things. Focus on God, in our lives and in church.

239: Abide with Me
This hymn has been with the speaker all his life. He believes it is truth because God has not changed all his life. The speaker has changed, he hopes its for the better. But if the speaker or any of us have changed for the worst, let’s cling onto this belief that God hasn’t changed. We have to move forward. We have to ask God to guide us with the Holy Spirit. For those without the Holy Spirit, we have to believe He will give us the Holy Spirit, because the way is tough ahead. Let us worship God, today and all our lives.