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Areas where Protestant missionaries had a significant presence in the past are on average more economically developed today, with comparatively better health, lower infant mortality, lower corruption, greater literacy, higher education attainment (especially for women), and more robust membership in non- governmental associations.
Are You Looking for a Sign? Matthew 12:38-42
What is a Sign? • “A miraculous act produced to authenticate its agent and to induce faith in God on the part of the observer.” • (Eugene Merrill, JETS, “The Sign of Jonah”)
People Desire Signs • Luke 11:16 “Others, testing Him, sought a sign…” • John 2:18 “What sign do you show us, since you do these things?” • John 4:48 “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will by no means believe.”
Signs Don’t Guarantee Belief • Mattthew 12:22-24 “Then a demon-oppressed man who was blind and mute was brought to him, and he healed him, so that the man spoke and saw. And all the people were amazed, and said, “Can this be the Son of David?” But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, “It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this man casts out demons.”
Signs Don’t Guarantee Belief • John 12:37 “But although He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him.” • Luke 16:31 “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.”
If Fact, if You’re Looking for Signs, it Probably Indicates a Poor Spiritual Condition • evil and adulterous generation • Evil, bad, unprofitable • Spiritual adultery • Departure from God Indicates a hard heart and a closed mind
Resurrection of Jesus is the Greatest Sign of All • Sign was foreshadowed • “sign of the prophet Jonah” • Matthew 16:21 “From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
Resurrection of Jesus is the Greatest Sign of All • Sign is Historical • 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 • Eyewitness testimony • Contemporary collaboration • Change in the Disciples
And Yet People Don’t Repent • Nineveh repented at Jonah’s preaching • Jonah 3:4-5 “Jonah…called out, ‘Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!’ And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them.”
And Yet People Don’t Repent • But most people don’t • John 3:19-20 “And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. All who do evil hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed.”
And People Don’t Listen • Queen of Sheba came to hear Solomon • 1 Kings 10:1-7 • But Jesus is greater than Solomon • “This is my beloved Son – hear Him!” (Luke 9:35)
And People Don’t Listen • And yet most people don’t listen • John 6:66 “And many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him.” • 1 Corinthians 1:18 “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.”
And People Don’t Listen • 1 Corinthians2:14 “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them…”
And People Don’t Listen • Which is why God takes the initiative • John 15:26 “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.”
