The Contrast: Following Jesus better.
Today’s service wasn’t recorded. There was a glitch in the audio, so while we got the video, there’s no audio. Unless you’re a world-class lip reader and can zoom in with your browser, that renders the recording useless.
We’ve figured out the glitch and have resolved it for next week, but if you weren’t able to make it to church on July 20, and still want to stay caught up on the sermon - my sermon manuscript is below. It’s not the same as “live” - I don’t just read it - but you’ll be able to stay caught up in our series on John’s Gospel.
(Additionally - if you’ve ever wondered what’s on my iPad as I preach, and were at church today, you can see what I’m seeing. Warning: it’s pretty long - 6,042 words to be exact.)
The Contrast
John 8:22-30
Today’s sermon is titled “The Contrast.”
We understand the idea of contrast.
Black and white
Hot and cold
Light and dark
Sweet and bitter
Nice and mean
Funny and sad
Square and round
Sharp and dull
Of course, we could go on and on - but would be remiss if we don’t mention:
Heaven and hell
Today, we look further at the contrast that Jesus intended when He said “I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will never walk in the darkness, so that we can both see the distinct difference between saved and unsaved, and purposefully pursue the characteristics of walking in the light.
As you open your bibles to John 8:22, I want to tell you a brief story that, I think helps us find a starting point for our time here today.
In 1290, King Edward I of England’s wife Eleanor died. In her memory, he had an elaborate cross built to remember her. This cross and where it was built became very significant and came to be known as “Charing Cross.”
The spot where the cross was built has, since the 1800s been known as the geographical center of London. It’s the spot where all distances to or from London are measured. If you’re anywhere in England, and you see a sign that says, “London ____ km” it’s measuring from where you are to Charing Cross. Even today, it’s officially considered to be the center of London both geographically and administratively.
There’s a story that’s told in connection to Charing Cross about a young boy who got lost in the streets of London and couldn’t find his way home. A police officer saw him, could see he was very distressed about something and approached him.
The boy explained that he was with his older brother when they got separated and he couldn’t find his way home. After asking his name, he asked the boy - where do you live? What’s your address? He didn’t know it, but the officer tried help him find his way home, but no luck.
Suddenly the boy had an idea: If you can take me to Charing Cross, I can find my way home from there.
The officer took him to the cross, and the boy knew exactly how to get home from there.
Of course, the point is obvious - and this story, that exists mostly in oral tradition - and very likely not a historical account - but it exists as a reminder that when you find the center - you can find your way home from there.
The point for us today, is this: Start with the cross. The most fundamental reality in the world and the most important event in all of world history are the same thing:
The Cross of Jesus Christ.
The birth, life, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ stands as the very center of all reality.
And when you start there.
When you have, at the center of your life, the Cross of Jesus Christ.
Then whatever situation you’re facing
Wherever you’re heading in life
You can get to where you need to be, because you’re starting at the right point.
And - ultimately - at the end of the day - at the end of the your life - heaven will be your destination.
Because, as you know, there are only two ultimate destinations.
Heaven
or
Hell
As Jesus is going to point out in today’s passage, along with how to be sure that your final destination is heaven with Him.
So please stand with me
John 8:22-30
We’ll start by reading v. 12, then jump to 21 and read through to verse 30
READ
Prayer - show us Christ
Until every heart confesses you as Lord
There are four distinct characteristics of unbelief that Jesus highlights in this passage as He continues to interact with the Pharisees.
And as we look at each of these characteristics - we’ll also look at the contrasting characteristic so that we keep in front of us not only a tool for self-evaluation, but also understand what we should be pursuing - specifically as we strive to know Christ better.
Remember always - the goal of the Christian life is sanctification. Holiness. To be more like Jesus - and as Jesus teaches this part of His message on Friday of the Feast of Booths, following His statements of being the Living Water and the Light of the World, here He shows us how, in contrast to the unbelief of the Pharisees, we should be pursuing His righteousness. What specific characteristics should be present in us and growing.
They’ll never “get there” in this life, you’ll never fully eradicate sin from your life, but these contrasting characteristics will be present, and to the degree that you are pursuing Christ, they will be growing. They will be increasing. And your joy and confidence in the Christian life will follow that trajectory.
The first contrast we see is:
1. Self Righteousness vs. Humility (22)
Proverbs 3:34 – Though He scoffs at the scoffers, Yet He gives grace to the humble.
This is quoted twice in the New Testament as
James 4:6 & 1 Peter 5:5 – “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
In addition to this - there are more than 50 warnings throughout the Bible about pride.
Simply put - your greatest problem is pride.
I know that for three reasons:
1. The Bible says so
2. You’re human
3. I know it experientially - it’s mine too.
The more you think of yourself as a humble person, the more arrogant you reveal yourself to be. Mac Davis was singing all of our song when he recorded the words, “O Lord it’s hard to be humble, when you’re perfect in every way…
That’s the exact situation that’s going on with the Pharisees.
And they were ensuring their own tragic and eternal death with their prideful, arrogant attitude.
Their self-righteousness that we see in them is simply stunning.
Look at verse 22 – So the Jews were saying, “Surely He will not kill Himself, since He says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?”
This is a bit strange, so what’s going on here?What does this mean?
Remember - this is in the same breath as verse 21 – - it’s the response to when Jesus said to the religious leaders you will seek Me, and will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.”
Their self-righteous thinking was so powerful. It so saturated all of their thinking that they really couldn’t understand that He was saying that their spiritual condition wouldn’t allow them to join Him in heaven.
The only thing they deserved was eternal punishment, but that idea was far from their thinking.
2 Corinthians 4:3-4 – gospel is veiled… to those who are perishing, 4 in whose case the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
They didn’t understand because they were so steeped in loving and exalting themselves
The only response they could come up with was this hatefully sarcastic: “surely He will not kill Himself…”
Think about the irony - they’re literally plotting and planning how they’re going to kill Him. Frustrated they didn’t catch Him on His way into town. Angry that the Temple Guards didn’t arrest Him. And now they’re saying “surely He’s not saying He’s going to kill Himself….”
The only thing they can figure out is that Jesus is intending to commit suicide because in Jewish thinking - that’s a sin that sends you directly to hell, so that’s the only place He could go that we can’t follow. In their arrogance, that was the quickest solution to the problem He presented they could come up with.
Truthfully, this is sick and twisted - we really shouldn’t be surprised at their pride though - it’s been on display for a long time.
Remember: their system of salvation was this complex, intricate list and structure of do this, don’t do that. Do this precisely this way and you’re effectively earning your way to heaven.
They really did think of themselves as deserving heaven because of their works.
We have to have the contrasting mindset.
We don’t deserve heaven. None of us do.
Remember the Rich Young Ruler in
Matthew 16:20 – The young man said to [Jesus], “All [the rules] I have kept; what am I still lacking?”
Again - exercises in missing the point.
They knew the Old Testament.
Psalm 14:2-3 wasn’t unfamiliar to them
Yahweh looks down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there is anyone who has insight, anyone who seeks after God.
3 They have all turned aside, altogether they have become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.
You and I are very familiar with that passage as well, but we quote Paul’s quote that he wrote in Romans 3:9-11 – “There is none righteous, not even one; 11 There is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God; 12 All have turned aside, together they have become worthless; there is none who does good, there is not even one.”
Proverbs 16:2 – All the ways of a man are pure in his own sight, but Yahweh weighs the motives.
They clearly weighed their motives with a different scale than the Lord did.
Isaiah 64:5-6 tells us that we cannot be saved on our own we have sinned—We continued in them a long time—And shall we be saved? 6 For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment;
Again - the great irony with the rejection of the leaders of Israel is that the very ones who should have been the first to embrace Jesus and His message were the very ones leading the charge to reject and kill Him.
Of course, Paul, after the Lord graciously regenerated and saved Him - he saw it with great clarity.
All the things that He looked to as a Pharisee and righteous Jew - the things that were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 More than that, I count all things to be loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ
The first thing we must do to be saved is to acknowledge our great need for salvation.
We must be like the Tax Collector in Luke 18 not the Pharisee who, in his self-righteousness …stood and was praying these things to himself: ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other people:
Instead, we must have the attitude of the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his chest, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, the sinner!’
Jesus made sure we understood who was going where in that story: I tell you, [it was the tax collector who] went down to his house justified rather than the [Pharisee], for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Don’t ever forget:
You have to understand that you actually deserve punishment.
You have to hate your sin.
If you understand that you’re prideful, wicked, and drowning in your own sin - that’s a good thing to know that. You have to understand that. You need to get there before you’ll ever reach out to be rescued from your sin.
In contrast to the pride, arrogance, and self-righteousness of the Pharisees
Pursue humility.
Jesus goes on to point out the next contrast
2. Worldliness vs. Heavenliness (23)
Rather than responding to their mockery and derision about Him killing Himself, He simply moves on to further explain the warning about dying in their sins back in verse 21
The point here is the contrast between both origin and destination.
Jesus’ origin and destination are both the same.
And for the Pharisees, it’s no different.
Jesus came down from heaven
And He will return there after His work is done.
He will, when He’s completed His task, sit down at the right hand of the Father.
Jesus speaks here of “this world” and what He means by that is multi-faceted.
He’s referring not merely to the physical world, but the realm that they live in. It’s really the whole “system” of the fallen world.
Meaning the evil paradigm that opposes God and His kingdom.
2 Corinthians 10:5 – …every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God…
The world that is controlled by Satan
1 John 5:19 – the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.
The world that ignores the Holy Spirit
The world that doesn’t acknowledge Jesus
The world that loves darkness rather than light.
The world that - Romans 3 again - is full of those who are full of cursing and bitterness, and leave destruction & misery in their wake.
The world where every intention of the thoughts of the heart is only evil continually.
The characteristics of the world, as we all know - because we live immersed in this world:
materialism
false religion
immorality
pride
selfishness
the pursuit of all of that and more
1 John 2:16 – all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.
All of that stands in stark contrast to who Christ is - and, by extension, who we, as His followers, must be.
When we get saved, we are, according to Colossians 1:13-14 – rescued us from the authority of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of the Son of His love, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
John 15:19 – you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world,
As a result of what the Lord did for you when He chose you, and died for you on the cross taking the punishment for your sins - you now have a new destination. Because you too are now not of this world
This is why we are to
Colossians 3:2-4 – Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. 3 For you died and your life has been hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is our life, is manifested, then you also will be manifested with Him in glory.
There’s an old story, possibly an anecdote that during one of Napoleon’s battles, a young soldier was caught deserting the
He was brought directly to Napoleon himself to answer for this crime.
When he asked him his name, the soldier, terrified and trembling, replied: “Napoleon, sir.”
The emperor paused, staring hard at him.
The room went still.
Then, in a low voice full of authority, Napoleon Bonaparte said: “Change your conduct, or change your name.”
We simply must be in pursuit of heavenly characteristics rather than those of this world.
We’ll never do that with perfection, but that needs to be the direction.
and we all fail far more than we want to admit even to ourselves, but that’s always the goal.
Zephaniah 2:3 – Seek Yahweh,
All you humble of the earth
Who have worked His justice;
Seek righteousness, seek humility.
Perhaps you will be hidden
In the day of Yahweh’s anger.
So set your thoughts on heaven.
Because this world is not your home.
And while it has so many things you want.
It has nothing that you need.
As sad as we are about the passing of John MacArthur this week - we absolutely rejoice because He’s gone home!!
He’s more home now than he was for the vast majority of his life.
The next thing - and probably the central, most important truth of this particular passage:
3. Unbelief vs. Belief (24)
Verse 24 – Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins. For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.”
This really is the ultimate issue - belief.
In verse 21 - when Jesus said you will die in your sin this is the ultimate reason.
This is why that’s a reality - their unbelief.
Again - as with almost every passage we’ve looked at for the past few weeks - really more - Jesus claims again and again that He is God.
In the original Greek, the word “He” isn’t there. So when you read it as written:
unless you believe that I AM, you will die in your sins
Jesus confronts them with the truth over and over.
He’s sincerely making sure it’s abundantly clear not just who He is, but that we must
believe in Him in order to be saved.
The question here for us is: do you believe?
They didn’t
They had been in unbelief from the beginning.
Jesus was saying that He is the very God who said to Moses at the burning bush - I AM who I AM.
He is the living bread
He is the One who quenches our true thirst
He is the Light of the World
And He is the great I AM
Do you believe that?
If you don’t, you will die in your sins.
If you believe anything other than that about Jesus - you will die in your sin.
There’s certainly more to know - which we’ll get to shortly - but it’s not less than that.
It’s this statement that reinforces their hatred of Him and sparks what He’ll say in
Verse 40 – but now you are seeking to kill Me
And ultimately - verse 59 – therefore they picked up stones to throw at Him
We’ve got to do this now - we can’t take any more of this!
The word “believe” appears over 200 times in the New Testament.
It’s the central element of the gospel.
It’s so important that if you do not believe - you will die in your sin.
So: Do you believe?
Believe what you ask?
Believe that Jesus is God
Believe that He is the second person of the Trinity
That He has always been God and in the incarnation became a man and was born of a virgin
That He lived a sinless life
That He died on the cross and that He is the only saving sacrifice for sinners
Do you believe that
He was buried and rose again on the 3rd day
That He appeared to His disciples and others for 40 days before He went back to heaven where He sits at the right hand of God and prays for YOU - intercedes to the Father on your behalf.
Do you believe that He will one day return.
If you do not believe that - you will one day hear ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’
And you will spend eternity in hell.
But if you DO believe that.
And if you are trusting in His blood alone as your only hope in life and death.
In His finished work on the cross…
If you have repented of your sin
And the word repent is Greek: metanoia
It’s a word that means change.
A change of mind about sin
(seeing it as God sees it)
A change of heart
(sorrow or remorse,
but not just emotional regret)
A change of direction
(turning from sin to God)
That’s what it means to go from unbelief - where we all start - To Belief
Belief begins in your mind. You have to believe cognitively. Intellectually.
But it’s also relational. It’s belief and trust in God. In His goodness, His faithfulness, and His provision of salvation in Christ.
It’s also intentional, conscious, determined act of the will.
It’s centered on Jesus.
It really does mean to trust in who Jesus is and what He did on the cross.
we need to understand these things. But at the same time - it’s also abundantly simple.
Faith is also a gift.
It’s a gift of God, not something you conjured up in your heart.
The Spirit enables faith.
Believe that Jesus is God.
That He died on the cross for your sins.
Rather than trusting in yourself because you know that on your own, you’re toast.
And it’s all the result of the work of the Holy Spirit in taking your heart of stone and giving you a heart of flesh.
It’s not solving a complex formula.
Repent and believe.
Very Simple
The final Contrast Jesus gives us in this passage is
4. Ignorance vs. Informed (25-30)
The unbeliever also persists in willful ignorance rather than simple belief.
I’ve said many times, “exercises in missing the point.” - but let me expand on that by adding just one word.
INTENTIONAL.
It really is “exercises in intentionally missing the point.”
John MacArthur put it this way: The jailer holding them captive in unbelief was their own obstinate ignorance. The Jews incredulous question “Who are You?” Was amazing in light of all the miraculous signs Jesus had performed and the repeated claims He had already made.
There’s probably sarcastic mockery woven into this question as well.
I think it’s a combination of
who ARE You?
and
Who are YOU? to tell us we’re lost?
He’d given them an excessive amount of evidence.
He’s explained this
Literally everything about Jesus screamed Messiah. Everything about Him shouted I AM.
This is raw unbelief -
unwilling to even consider
Hatred and mockery are the outworking of it
And - because of the perfect alignment Jesus had with the Father - all that Jesus said was in perfect harmony with the will of God.
The God of Abraham
The God of Moses and Isaac
The Most High God!
Jesus is in perfect continuity with Him.
This is no minor thing.
You really couldn’t make a bolder, bigger, more expansive claim than this.
Their willful, intentional ignorance has completely blinded them to the truth.
And any assessment, any judgment, any observation or statement Jesus made is literally the same as coming from God the Father.
And verse 27, shows the practical results of unbelief. Where it left them. With all the amazing things Jesus had done. All of the incredible & powerful teaching. Because of their hardened hearts,
They did not know that He had been speaking to them about the Father.
It’s both sad, tragic, and many ways infuriating that the spiritual leaders of God’s chosen people were so willfully, intentionally ignorant of the truth?
They had no ears to hear.
They were fully, completely, and comprehensively blind, deaf, and self-deceived.
Jesus knew what He had come to do. He knew that He was headed to the cross.
And here’s one of the greatest things about Jesus
- every single prophecy
- every detail
- every nuance
- every scratch of pen on papyrus of the Old Testament scrolls
pointed to and was about Jesus.
And it all came together in a perfect, glorious comprehensive picture in Jesus.
Here’s something to know about the death and resurrection of Jesus - it vindicated everything Jesus ever said.
All of His claims.
All of the teaching.
All that the prophets of the Old Testament said. All that was written on every page in your Bible from Genesis to Malachi was proven to be absolutely true in the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
If you look at it openly, rationally, and objectively, it’s undeniable.
That’s what Jesus is saying here in verse 28 – “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing from Myself, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me.
Everything came together on the cross.
And three days later, when He rose from the dead - it was all vindicated.
Verse 29 – And He who sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him.”
We know about the Trinity - we affirm the Trinity - but the truth and reality of the Trinity is such an important, central thing.
It was the perfect unity of the Father, Son, and Spirit that not only created the plan to save sinners in eternity past, but to enact and execute that plan and then to go on to apply the results to the individuals chosen.
To you.
To me.
To us.
Hebrews 7:26-28 – For it was fitting for us to have such a high priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners and exalted above the heavens; 27 who does not need daily, like those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the sins of the people, because this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. 28 For the Law appoints men as high priests who are weak, but the word of the oath, which came after the Law, appoints a Son, who has been made perfect forever.
Jesus was pointing to the cross here.
You can’t not remember the snake lifted up in the wilderness - when the people looked to the snake, they were saved.
It’s a powerful story: Numbers 21
And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this miserable food.”
The rest of the story - this isn’t just some sort of punishment for complaining. This is pointing to Jesus on the cross.
Remember: every detail, every nuance, every event in the Old Testament points to Christ.
So Yahweh sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people so that many people of Israel died. 7 Then the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned because we have spoken against Yahweh and against you; pray to Yahweh, that He may remove the serpents from us.” And Moses prayed for the people. 8 Then Yahweh said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard; and it will be that everyone who is bitten and looks at it, will live.” 9 And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it happened, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived.
That story was about Jesus.
Jesus is making that abundantly clear.
And not everyone looked to the bronze serpent. Some continued in unbelief.
Only those who looked to the bronze serpent lived.
The parallels to the gospel are obvious
Many died - the time before Christ
Those who came in repentance - I’m a filthy sinner - I have spoken against Yahweh
This was a miracle of God
Just looking to the bronze serpent causes you to live.
Not - here’s the antidote…
No do this special procedure
Simply
And notice the language
When he looked TO the bronze serpent
Notice the language.
It wasn’t look AT - notice, be aware of.
I mean - you couldn’t not see this thing up on a stick in the middle of the camp.
Just seeing the serpent wasn’t what saved them.
Just like - simple knowledge that there was a man named Jesus who lived a long time ago won’t save you.
They looked TO the bronze serpent
They were looking in repentance and belief.
They were trusting in God
Just like today
You don’t just look AT the gospel.
It’s not merely interesting information - even REALLY interesting.
You must look TO the gospel. – Lean into it
Embrace the truth that the Bible teaches about God! About you! About salvation!
Do you believe that God is the Sovereign Creator? And that He created you to love, serve, and enjoy endless fellowship with Him.
Do you believe that He is holy and that, as
1 Peter 1:16 – You shall be holy, for I am holy.” Meaning He required holiness of you?
And that there is a day when He will hold you to account for that?
Acts 17:30 – because He has fixed a day in which He will judge [you] in righteousness
Do you believe that you’re guilty of sin?
1 Kings 8:46 – There is no man who does not sin.
It’s not that you can’t do kind, good, or nice things for people. You are, however, absolutely incapable of understanding, loving, or pleasing God on our own
Do you believe that it requires more than merely changing your behavior, but a change of thinking - a change of direction must happen?
2 Corinthians 5:21 – if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
That as a slave to sin, you must be
Romans 6:18 – freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
That’s why you hate your sin. Because you’re now a slave to righteousness.
Do you believe that the penalty for your sin is death and punishment in hell?
That you deserve that?
Because the wages of sin is death
Do you believe that Jesus is Lord and Savior?
That He has authority over your life and you owe Him absolute allegiance, obedience, and worship? (Even when you don’t do it, you still owe it?)
1 Peter 3:18 – Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, so that He might bring you to God,
Romans 10:9 – that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved;
And that
Romans 3:26 – He [is] the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
Meaning - He will forgive and save those who place their faith in Him
Saying, essentially, “I can’t do this - you’re going to have to do it for me!”
And when you’re willing to agree with God that you are sinful?
And to Confess your sins to Him, and strive to turn from sin, pursue Christ, and obey Him?
That’s what Jesus means when He says, BELIEVE!!
WE have to be careful to not overcomplicate salvation.
Or to try and add our works either before salvation as playing a part in earning it.
Or add them after playing a part in maintaining it.
Our efforts matter - they greatly affect our sanctification - but when it comes to
getting saved
being saved
staying saved
The question is exactly what Jesus asked
Do you believe that I am He?
The final verse:
As He was speaking these things, many believed in Him.
What did they do?
They believed what He said?
Well yeah - but there’s a little more.
They believed IN HIM
They looked to the bronze serpent lifted up.
That’s salvation.
THat’s what we’re talking about here.
The True contrast between a believer and an unbeliever is this - do you believe in Jesus?
Not just the facts - it starts there, but it doesn’t end there.
Do you believe IN Him.
That’s what we’ve been looking at all morning.
Confess with your mouth “Jesus is Lord"
Believe in your heart God raised Him from the dead
That day - as He was speaking - some believed in Him.
There’s no special process or sequence of events that you have to go through to be saved. No test.
No special formula or prayer pattern.
It’s simply repent and believe.
John 6:35 – “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me will never hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.
But - as this passage tells us - it’s possible to seek Christ in vain.
Remember Jesus said, You will seek me and you will die in your sins.
In Matthew 7 - many will say to me….
… depart from me… I never knew you…
Those are the scariest words in the Bible.
Remember:
Every word in this book has been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.
Life - begins with salvation.
Simply give up keeping the focus on yourself and turn to Christ.
And believe in Him.
And then - I want to ask a two part question: related to this passage
Q: How does this passage help you know and follow Jesus Better?
How does it help you follow closer?
More dust
More light
Less Darkness
Don’t miss the clear contrast that Jesus paints.
With salvation - there is distinct contrast.
There is a saved/unsaved line that must be crossed at a definite moment.
You don’t drift into salvation
You don’t slowly become saved
It’s not a puzzle that requires a certain %
of the pieces to be in place.
It’s not a process that you have to go
through and at some point you fade in
It’s a moment in time.
It creates a stark contrast.
It’s not the instantaneous eradication of
all sin in your life. Or sinful inclinations and
desires.
It’s the start of a journey that will literally
take the rest of your life to complete.
I starts with the light/dark thing
It’s either light or dark.
Getting saved isn’t like walking into the room and slowly turning up the dimmer.
It’s Jesus turning on the lights.
It’s going from dark to light.
But - you can sit over in the dark corner and wallow.
As a believer, you no longer walk in the darkness, but we live in a very dark world.
We’re surrounded by dark.
And we must be intentional to pursue the light.
To bask in the light.
To tune our hearts to delight in the radiance of the brightness of His glory.
And then, to to reflect that light like the moon reflects the light of the sun.
How do you do that?
How do you know Jesus Better?
How do you walk in the light?
Well according to 1 John 3:10 - it will be obvious
How will it be obvious?
You’ll see the fruits of the spirit.
The results.
How do you know it’s an peach tree?
It grows peaches.
Now - we have a peach tree that hasn’t given us a peach in years, but it’s still a peach tree - but not a very good one.
But it seems that the tree has forgotten.
2 Peter 1 gives us a list of things to try to get better at.
Areas we must strive to grow in.
Faith - simple trust in God
Moral excellence - just doing good stuff
simple basic morality
we know - pursue moral living
shun immorality
Knowledge - you’re doing that now
Self-control - that’s a big deal
Perseverance - things will get difficult
There will be difficult, stressful, painful
things that happen your life. Over and over.
Godliness - be holy - be like Jesus
(no one exhibited the fruits of the Spirit
more)
Be kind to others
Genuinely love people.
When you’re doing these things
You’re walking in the light
And when you’re walking in the light
You’ll shine that light on others.
Don’t panic if you’re not doing all of these things all the time.
Just pay attention.
Be aware of them.
Think about the list. Remind yourself of those things.
Ask yourself how am I doing?
How can I do this better this week?
What can I do to improve this thing?
Take a post it note - write these things on it - put it in your wallet - on the dash of your car - where you’ll see it often.
And see what God will do if you think about, and make effort toward those things.
The more you walk in the light
The more you strive to know Jesus
The more light you’ll be to others
And the closer you walk to others - the more their light will help you as well
Again
Walking in the light
Or walking in the shadows
If you’re in the light - get int the middle of the room where its’ light. Get out of the shadows
If you’re in the dark - turn on the light
Get out of that dark room and join us here where it’s light.
Let’s pray….