John: Answering Misperceptions
Pastor Fletcher preaches from John 5:18-47 about Jesus’s discussion with the Jewish leaders about who he is. Discussion points: Our misperceptions of who God is obscures the beauty of his love, God is a good father who loves and wants us, the point of reading our Bibles is to know God himself rather than just knowing more facts about him.
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Scripture Reader: [John 5:18-47] This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill Him. Because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own father making himself equal with God. So Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the father doing for whatever the Father does, that the son does likewise for the father loves the son and shows him all that he himself is doing in greater works than these will he show him so that you may marvel for as the Father raises the dead and gives them life. So also the son gives life to whom he will for the father judges no one but has given all judgment to the son that all may honor the son just as they honor the father. Whoever does not honor the son does not honor the father who sent him.
Truly, truly, I say to you whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life. He did not come into judgment but has passed from death to life. Truly, truly, I say to you an hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live for as the Father has life in himself. So he is granted the son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment because he is the son of man. Do not marvel at this for an hour is coming. When all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and come out. Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment. I can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge and my judgment is just because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.
If I alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true. There is another who bears witness about me. And I know that the testimony that he bears about me is true. You sent to John and he is born witness to the truth, not that the testimony that I receive is from man, but I say these things that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light. But the testimony that I have is greater than that of John for the works that the father has given me to accomplish the very works that I'm doing, bear witness about me that the father has sent me and the father who sent me has himself born witness about me, his voice.
You have never heard his form, you have never seen and you do not have his word abiding in you for you do not believe the one whom he has sent you search the scriptures because you think that in them, you have eternal life and is in it is that they bear witness about me. Yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. I do not receive glory from people. But I know that you do not have the love of God within you. I have come in my father's name and you do not receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive Him. How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you Moses on whom you've set your hope for. If you believe Moses, you will believe me for He wrote of me, but you do not believe his writings. How will you believe my words?
This is the word of the Lord.
Preacher: Throughout the advent season. Uh Churches typically go through four different themes and they do this together uh throughout the season and, and the themes are uh hope, peace. Joy and finally love. And this is the week that we're emphasizing joy, the joy of the Lord, uh the joy of the Lord is our strength, uh joy to the world all about joy. And I want to just pose this question for us as we consider joy. What are the things that made Jesus most joyful? What made Jesus most joyful? And as you read the scriptures, you see one topic far and beyond all the other topics that brings Jesus joy that he talks about all the time that he's absolutely obsessed about. And it's the love of the father. He's just always talking about his dad. All, I don't know if you have that friend that's always talking about his dad. And maybe you haven't had that friend since second grade. Ok. But Jesus is just obsessed about talking about his dad when you read it. That's what he's absolutely delighting in the love of the Father. And in fact, he says that he wants to share the joy of the love of the father with us that he wants to share the joy of the love of the father with us friends.
The father's heart is for us. He desires to be near to us. He desires for us to delight in him and to take joy in him yet. That is not the way that we generally think about God. That is not the way that we generally think about God. When we think about God, the Father, especially God, the Father. We might think about Jesus in such a way, Jesus might be the nice one. God, the Father might be the kind of stern one, right? Uh Jesus is kind to us and he says, wait until I tell your father about this and then we know what's coming for us. We think about God, the father like this. We find the reality that His desire is to flood us with forgiveness, mercy and kindness. We find this reality difficult to believe. We find it very difficult to believe. And it's because the Father's love has been obscured. We're more likely to think of God, the Father as a morally demanding tyrant than we are to think of Him as a loving and kind, compassionate father back on the fourth of July.
You know, not that long ago, six months ago, we had a um we had a big, a big party over at our not, it wasn't actually that big. I think there were like 20 of us. You know, anybody, anybody come to the the city on a hill party over at the community space on the fourth of July. There were a few of us over there and uh but it was welcome to All. Ok. But we had a little party over there at the community space. There's a nice view of downtown from our community space. It's kind of nicely situated on a hill with a, a very nice, uh, view. You can see most of the buildings down there and we knew that we'd be able to see the fireworks from there without having to go into the city and deal with all the traffic and everything. So, we had a fire, uh, a firework party over at the community space and, um, the weather wasn't great. It was pretty me, but we decided to go anyways and the time came for the fireworks and we were all looking for the fireworks. We kinda knew generally where they would be in the sky and we were looking, the kids were starting to get upset because it was late and they weren't finding the fireworks and we just couldn't find them anywhere.
And then suddenly we looked and you could kind of see what looked like a child playing with a flashlight underneath a sheet. That's what it looked like. The fireworks looked like just a child playing with a flashlight underneath the sheet. It, you couldn't see anything. They, the fireworks were completely obscured by this thick fog that had hung over the city. And what I actually found out is this wasn't just our view, this was the view that everyone had. Did anybody see the fireworks in Boston this year? It was just terrible. It was like fireworks straight into a cloud. And if you want to see a cloud lit up, that's what this was and what broke my heart about it.
The most is I got home and I was uh surfing online and someone had written a story or commented on something saying, hey, I'm actually friends with the guy that designed the fireworks show and he was heartbroken because he said that this was the best work of his entire career that got shot up into the clouds and no one got to enjoy completely obscured by this thick fog that had fallen over the city and friends. I think that that's what's happened to our hearts many times that the father's love is bright and joyous that he wants to share it with us. But it has been obscured by our misperceptions of who he is that we have these misperceptions of who he is. And so it obscures our ability to appreciate and to enjoy the love that he has for us.
Today, Jesus is teaching in response to what he did. Last week, we were going through a series in the book of John. And last week, uh Jesus healed two different uh people. He healed a child, an official's son was, was hurt and uh dying ill and he healed that child from far away. And then he found a paralyzed man uh by the pool of Beth Bethesda and he healed that man. And he told him to stand up, pick up his mountain to walk. The only tricky part was is that it was the Sabbath. And so the Jewish leaders didn't like that Jesus told this guy to walk with his bed on the Sabbath. And so they started to get upset. And so when they finally found Jesus and were upset at Jesus for healing someone on the Sabbath, which is just crazy to me. They're talking to God himself and they're like, you broke the rules. God, how could you ever know God if you break the rules? And he's like, I am God, you do.
But they find Jesus and they're like, why did you break the rules? Why did you break the Sabbath? And he's like, well, my father's always working and so am I and friends, Jesus is good at many things, but he's not always good at de escalation. Uh This did not calm down the, the situation. Uh He made an even stronger claim about being equal with God about being God himself. And so the Jewish people from there were really upset. They said, how dare you claim, not just you see to us, it, it sounds like he's claiming to be a child of God, but Jesus is not claiming to be a child of God. He's claiming to be the child of God. And so they were quite upset with Jesus claiming to be the child of God. And so this, that Jesus teaches today is in response to them being upset about what he just said. And what he does is he actually clears up several misperceptions that the Jewish leaders had about who he was and about who God is.
There's a lot going on in this text. I'm not going to be able to explain every verse. Although I would love to explain every verse. Do you want to set up a time? Talk over coffee? We'll just say, well, I'll explain every verse that I can, I'll also give you a book or something uh to help you with that. But um we're gonna look at three different misperceptions that the Jewish people had, the Jewish leaders had of who Jesus was, that was obscuring their idea of who the father was and who Jesus is. And I think that these are the same misperceptions. You know, Satan doesn't get very many new tricks. He's using many of the same tricks that he has been for thousands of years. And I think these are many of the same misperceptions that we have about God that mi that obscure our ability to enjoy and to appreciate his love.
So let's dive in here. OK. Uh Three different uh misperceptions. The, the three misperceptions are this that obscure the love that God has for us. First, the misperception about the nature of who God is. Second, the misperception of how to relate to that God. And third, the misperception about scripture that obscures our ability to, to enjoy Him. Uh First, our misperceptions about the nature of God obscure our experience of his love as I was mentioning earlier, we have this misperception that the father is mean and the son is nice. You might be one of those people that are like, I like Jesus. I like the New Testament. But, you know, I don't jive with that old Testament. God, that's not something I'm down for. I don't like him. He seems mean and spiteful miserly stingy. Maybe you have a better per uh perception of that God. And you, you know, God, the Father is actually good, but you still see Him as distant and holy while Jesus is kind and near, you might think of that God as someone who might tolerate us merely. I, I like how one author puts it in uh gentle and lowly, which is a book that we've given away a lot and I have many more copies of that. I'd love to give away. But he says that we think about God reaching out to touch us like a young boy might reach out to touch a slug for the first time with a crinkled up face and not really feeling like he can actually uh not, not too sure about this. And that's how we think about God reaching out to us. But yet that is not the picture that we have in scripture. These misperceptions are natural, these are the misperceptions that will happen because Satan's ploys have always been to lie to us about who God is.
Look back at the garden when Adam and Eve are in the garden. How does Satan convince Eve to eat of the fruit? He doesn't just say do it like the emperor in Star Wars or something, do it. Um He, he says, he says, God, God doesn't love you. He doesn't want what's good for you. You should do that. You should, you should do it yourself. You have to take care of yourself. You're the only one that's gonna take care of yourself. He's been using these same lines about the nature of who God is to trick us to live for ourselves. And so these are misperceptions that will cloud our ability to enjoy his love.
In contrast. Look at how Jesus describes, the Father. Look at how Jesus describes the father verse 19. So Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what He sees the Father doing for whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. You cannot have an old testament, mean God and a new testament. Nice God. When Jesus is saying, I'm just doing what I saw my father doing. He's saying if you've seen me, you've seen the father, we are one and of the same. It's not that Jesus is a chip off the old block. He is the old block in the f in the form of human flesh. Jesus is fully God relates with God. The Father completely reflects what he's observed. The father doing just as you reflect your own parents in many ways. And I see this with my kids, they observe my best and usually my worst uh at attributes and uh and reflect those things.
And so Jesus is saying, if you've seen me, I'm not all that different than the father. In fact, I only do what I've seen the father do when Paul is writing about God, the father, he gushes with love and kindness and joy because he understands the nature of who He is. If you look at second Corinthians, OK. The, it is a letter that Paul is writing to the Corinthian Church. The Corinthian Church is a mess. OK? Co Corinth in general made Vegas look like a monastery. Uh It's just not a very like warm and family friendly type of place. Um And so he's writing to the Corinth Church and he, in the very first verses, he starts talking about who God is. He wants to communicate the nature of who God is. And by verse three, you can just hear what comes out most naturally when he describes God, you know, A W Tozer has this famous quote. What comes in your mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you. What comes into your mind when you think about God is the most important thing about you? That's what A W Tozer says.
And I think he's right and listen to what Paul says He says, blessed be the God of all mercies and all comfort. The father of mercies and the God of all comfort, blessed be to Him. He doesn't say blessed be to the God who is holy and above all who is just and righteous and will smite those who deserve it. He says blessed be to the God of all comfort and the father of mercies, that is who He is. The God of all comfort and the father of mercies. What a joyful reality. If that is let this reorient your misperception about who He is. He does want the best for you. He is a good father.
And secondly, I wanna talk about another misperception about the nature of who God is. And it's the nature that we're not real Children of His, that he might be the father. But I am like the stepchild. OK, that he keeps me around a lot like Cinderella's mom kept Cinderella around. You know, he'll let me scrub the floors and he might provide for my basic needs, but I'm not getting the best. All right, he's, he's just merely keeping me around, not actually loved friends. This is not Christianity and I know that it's natural for us to think this way, but it's not the message of Christianity. Jesus emphasizes that He is the son of God and the only way that we might be called Children of God is to be united with him. And so what I want you to see here. I'm gonna share a few verses with you, which I, what I want you to see here is that everything that Jesus says about his relationship to the father is true for you Christian, that you are now a son of God. And I'm putting that very specifically a Son of God that is not some form of first century sexism. OK. That is an important thing that is caught in these verses.
Let me share with you just a little bit. Galatians chapter three for in Christ, you are all sons of God through faith. Romans eight chapter four, verse 14, for all who are led by the spirit of God are sons of God quite opposite from sexism. This is actually very, very inclusive language because he's saying everyone who believes in Christ is a son of God. What he's trying to communicate is that every right and authority that Jesus had as the Son of God belongs to you Christian, that you get to call on God, not just as a mere child of God, not as a stepchild of God, you get to call on God as the Son of God. You are united with Christ and everything. That's true of Him in the heavenly places is true for you that He loves you. Actually, not just kind of like, but actually like you are in Christ, like you are his son. It's not just that we do a great disservice.
When we call all people, the Children of God, we are all made in God's image. We're all loved by God in, in a way. But those who are in Christ are specially uniquely loved by God as the Father loves the son. And that is where we are church to be a Christian means that the Son of God shares his sonship with us. Verse 20. For the father loves the son. Let every time you hear the Son, thank me. If I'm in Christ for the father loves the son and shows him all that he himself is doing and greater works than these will he show him so that you all may marvel one author put it like this. And I think that this summarizes the incarnation, the idea of Jesus being born uh a as a human. I think that this summarizes it better than any quote I've ever heard the Son of God became human so that humans may become the Son of God, the Son of God became human so that humans may become the Son of God. And we gotta let that reality sink in and change our misperception about how we relate to God, the Father.
And let's talk about that more. How do we know Him? Our misperceptions about how we become that Son of God obscure our view also because the natural misperception that we have is that I am more loved by God when I'm an obedient child. Of his, that if when I do the right things but friends, I don't know if there have been two more powerful lies in the history of the world given by Satan than these two. That God is not actually kind. He's not actually loving. He's actually a mean and, and stingy God that the lies about his nature.
And this the second lie is that he loves me less when I do bad and he loves me more. When I do good, very natural misperception, we fall into this all the time, but it's just not true. John chapter five verse 24 Jesus says this truly, truly, I say to you whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life, whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life, simple hearing the word of God, believing the word of God eternal life. There's nothing about responding. There are in other places and, and the response and the repentance is necessary. But he makes it really simple here, whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me or trusts in Him, who sent me receives eternal life. He does not come into judgment but has passed from death to life. I love that has already passed from death to life, meaning you receive that eternal life now that you, it starts in this life and it goes on throughout eternity. But you have already passed from death to life. You've been given new life in Christ and this eternal life.
What is this? It's nothing other than the love of God. Heaven is not primarily a place that you go to heaven is not primarily just something that happens after you die. Heaven is primarily God sharing himself and his own love with us. Now, uh Jesus says a lot of things in this passage and I just want to point out one that doesn't sound like this. There's like an apparent contradiction in this passage. Just a few verses after this one, Je Jesus is continuing to teach and this is what he says, verse 28 and 29 he says, do not marvel at this for an hour is coming when all who are in their tombs will hear his voice and come out. Those who have done good to the resurrection of life and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.
Well, that sounds very different than what he just said with whoever hears my voice and believes in me and believes in the father gets eternal life here. He's saying if you've done good, you go to you, you have eternal life, resurrection life. If you've done bad, you re receive the resurrection of the evil of judgment. How do you work these two? In fact, this sounds opposite to what I preach every week when I just explained the vision of our church, which is like it, it's not what you do that makes God love you more. I say that every week, I hope that you guys, I hope you get it. Ok. I hope you really get it.
That is Christianity is that it's not what you do that makes God love you more. But this sounds like it is what you do because he says if you've done righteous, you go to the resurrection of life. If you've done evil, you go to the resurrection of judgment. And so what's he talking about? Well, one, I think that you could easily say that, you know, a tree bites fruit and that when you know Christ, you will yield good fruit and you will do good. And that is true. But even more than that, you just go, what about one chapter later to John chapter six verse 29? And this is what Jesus says, this is the work of God that you believe in Him whom he has sent. And so if you're to do good, what is the work of God, what is the good that you're to do? But to believe in Him, whom He has sent? That is what Jesus defines as the work of God. And so if we do that, we receive the eternal life that God has for us. Frans.
All this is to say, God loves to draw near to centers that He does it through Christ and that He would love to draw near to you today. And that it's not that you have to get your act cleaned up before you come to him. But it's that He has already done all the work for you and that He wants to be near to you. He cares in that kind of way. He is not ashamed of you. He is not grossed out by you. He would not be ashamed of you coming to him for the 15th time this week, struggling with the same old son. We feel like we just can't, we can't do that. But God is delighted to welcome sinners. He is delighted to forgive us of our sin because we are already declared clean, we're already righteous, we're already alive in Him. We have already been made united with Christ.
And so we are the sons of God in that way. He is not ashamed of us. And the last misperception about uh about God that clouds us from truly enjoying his love is, is an important one. The last misperception is about scripture. And Jesus addresses this really clearly with the Jews at the time. He ends his response to the religious leaders by asserting that they've misunderstood the scriptures. If they had properly understood the Old Testament, they would receive him as Messiah and King. That's what he tells them. Verse 20 verse 39 he says this, you search the scriptures because you think that in them, you have eternal life and it is and it is they that bear witness about me yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life verse 46. For if you believe Moses, you would believe me for. He wrote of me. Now, what's going on is that the religious leaders thought that the scriptures themselves themselves brought eternal life that by following the rules of the scriptures, that you would receive eternal life.
And what Jesus is saying is that the scriptures aren't meant to bring you life in and of themselves. The scriptures are meant to point to Jesus point to the Sun. Francis is all too often. How we read the scriptures as well. Uh I bet you've had the same type of conversation. I have this conversation regularly. It is my job. Uh Hey, how's your relationship with God going? How's your relationship with Jesus? Nine times out of 10? The response I get to that is, is good or bad. Well, 10 times out of 10, good or bad. Um But then after that, the description is this is how much I've read my Bible almost always. It's like, how's your relationship with Jesus? Good. I've been reading my Bible every day this week. Bad. I've only, you know, it could be, actually, it's never bad. It's like, could be better. That's could be better. That's almost, that's nine times out of 10. Right. There could be better. Um I've only been able to read my Bible a little bit lately.
Is that not very similar to the way that the religious leaders thought about the scriptures, that the scriptures themselves bring eternal life. That if we read it more, that He loves us more and if we read it less, then maybe he's kind of disappointed in us. But what Jesus is trying to say is this, that the scriptures don't function that way. Instead what the scriptures are meant to do are to point us to Jesus himself and through the scriptures, you get to know God himself. You get to hear the words of God that God wrote a book and that his very words are in the Bible. The Bible is not just a book telling you about God or telling you the things that you have to do so that God will love you more.
The Bible is a book of the words of God Himself to you, the words of God, he has spoken and we get to know Him through the Bible. What Jesus is saying is that there's a way to read your Bibles and to carefully read your Bibles and to diligently read your Bibles, that's actually worthless. And that will actually drive you away from God himself completely miss the point. If you read the Bible just to prove your own righteousness, or you read it, just looking for ways that you can alter your own behavior, you're gonna miss the point. The Bible is meant to lead us to a sincere affection for Christ and allow us to experience his embracing love. Now, a simple question. Um Do people in our church read the Bible? I think. Thank you for the response. Yes, I appreciate that. Uh my dear, my, my dear. OK. I'm not sure if this is true. I, I think that most statistics are wrong on this because I, some statistician can tell me what type of bias this is. I probably should have asked my wife, uh, she could have told me this. But, uh, when people take surveys in church and the question is, do you read your Bible? You know, they're gonna fudge that up a little bit. All right there. It's just like, uh, I'm gonna tell you how much I want to read my Bible. Not how much I actually do read my Bible. I think that the statistics have to be wrong on this. I don't think that people actually read it as often as they say they do, but I do hope that there are people in our church, my guess is that like, 30% of the church reads the Bible, which is better than most churches. I think that that's higher than, than most churches. But I, I hope that it's higher than that.
I hope that I could be pleasantly surprised but a survey wouldn't tell me one way or the other. I wouldn't believe you all. Um, and here's the reality, I think that the reason why we have a hard time reading our Bibles is because we have this misperception about what the scriptures are. We think about the Bible reading in our life, almost like a child might think about a sticker chart. Right. Like, oh, I get to check another day off or I get another sticker on my chart. And if I get enough stickers, I get a prize and you think about it like that. But we know that we, if we know that God really wants us to read our Bibles and we should read our Bible. We know that as Christians, that if, especially if you grew up in youth group at all. Ok. If you're in youth group, you learn this thing called a quiet time and I'm a big fan. All right. I like those.
Here's the problem with reading your Bible. I'm just gonna speak openly. Ok. Um, it's really boring. Right. Uh, everybody's like, uh, what do I do? Do I shake my head? Yes. Do I shake my head? No. Uh, gotcha. Uh, that, it's really boring. It, for the most part. It is, uh, it's an ancient piece of literature. The newest part is 2000 years old. Ok. It's, it's an old, what, what else do you read? That's 2000 years old. You know. And if you did, how exciting do you think it would be very few of us do? There are parts that are more exciting than others. The gospels can be very exciting. The epistles can be great, so much. Good theology. There are stories in the Old Testament that if you can get into them can be really exciting and, and encouraging. But it also has things like pages and pages and pages of genealogies. Yeah. Exciting. It has pages and pages of laws that we don't keep anymore because they've been obsolete by Jesus. It has so much in it that is hard to understand. I have a hard time. I've read the Bible probably, I don't know. Uh, how old am I? Uh, maybe, uh, maybe 16 or 17 times. Don't be impressed. It's my job. All right. Um, and, um, I try to read it every year. I don't always make it through all the way through the Bible every year. But there are certain books in the Bible. I've read many, many, many more times than that. Um, I still have a really hard time getting anything out of Ezekiel because I read that and it's just weird, like there's just weird things in it. I don't know what's happening half the time. Uh, if I, if I did the work I could be encouraged by it and all the work is, it's like I, I have books on my shelf called a study Bible. It wouldn't actually be that much work or I have an app on my phone called youtube. Um, and you gotta be careful with youtube. Ok. There's lots of bad stuff on there too.
But, uh Bible project, it's great. All I would have to do is open up the Bible project. Watch their little video on Ezekiel, probably watch it several more times and then I would get it and it would suddenly point me to Jesus and I would kind of understand because the Bible is not meant to be self help. We go to the Bible and we think about the Bible is like, what can I get out of this today? That's applicable to my life. Well, friends, the Bible wasn't written about you. The f the Bible is a story, but it's the story of God. It's the story of the world. It's the whole thing is cohesive. There's all kinds of different literature in this thing that they all are this, this story. And if you read it, you see the redemptive art and it is beautiful and it can become exciting as you dig into it and you see it, but it does take work.
You guys are smart, stop complaining about the amount of work that it takes, it takes a little bit of work. You're in Somerville because you're smart probably. And you can do this. Even if you weren't that smart, you can still do it. There's lots of smart people that have done it for you and you can read, you can see it, but I understand why it's easy to tell yourself that you don't have time to read your Bible because it is really hard. Sometimes. Sometimes it's easy if you want an easy one, just keep reading John. If you want an easy one, go to Matthew, you'll find something fun. Easy one. Ephesians super easy, really great. Read it over and over again. I don't care. It's great, but the Bible is there for you to enjoy. I know a lot of us are getting ready for our yearly plans. We're getting ready for the disappointment of only making it to February once again, uh as we get our yearly bible reading going.
But friends, you can do it. And as you do, you actually get to know God himself, as you're reading the Bible, it is not just a chore that good Christians do. If you see it as a chore, it'll never stick. You'll never do it unless you see the point behind the scriptures. Unless you read the scriptures and say, what is God trying to get me to know about Jesus? How do I find Jesus? How do I trace those lines to find who Jesus is? You'll never have the motivation to stick with it. And if you do, you'll be getting the wrong things out of it. But Jesus says that the point of reading our Bible is not that we would just know more about God, but that we might actually get to know God Himself who sent his son to live the life that we should have lived to die, the death that we deserve to die so that we through faith in him might receive eternal life.
Look friends. The Bible. You have to think about it like this. It is a gold mine. Now, if you find a gold mine, it's not like you walk up to a hole in the ground and there's just gold lying there, ok? It requires work. You have to chisel, you have to get your hammer, you have to work on it. But seriously, the Bible says that it's worth more than gold. And so as we work on this thing, then you pull out this nugget and after you've worked, there's nothing like working hard and then getting the thing that your work is delivered for me. This is so hard because I'm a pastor and I rarely get to see the results of the work.
Those of you who tell me that you know God's work through me, so encouraging, so helpful. But one thing I love to do is just mow my grass so that when I'm done, I can look at it and be like I did that, you know, less grass. Yeah, let's go. Michael, don't mow the grass. I'm mowing the grass. That's like what I've been doing all the time. I need to see the the results. But friends when you work hard and you study the scriptures and then Jesus reveals himself to you and he will, it is like finding a nugget of gold. It is a gold mine. There's so much to be found. It's endless. Like I said, I've read the Bible a lot every time I find new things and it gets better because this is what I do. I sit down and I open the Bible and I don't just say, OK, I'm uh I don't just sit down to read about God. I sit down to listen for God and I say my ears are open. Would you help me to hear from you this morning? I want your word to live in my heart. I want to hear from you, father. I need you. Would you speak to me? And as we go to Him and we say, would you speak to me? Would you help me to cherish Christ? There's nothing more applicable in your life than a greater love for Jesus.
That's why we preach the Bible, the way that we do where we go verse by verse and not topic by hot topic. I'm not here just to give you seven tips to make your marriage more spicy. Ok. I'm here to, to give you the word of God. And the word of God is pointed to the Son of God who is Christ, who shines in every scripture. And as your eyes see Him, your heart is filled with awe and it reorients your life appropriately and it changes you. There's no better self-help than Jesus. Jesus is all we've got and we need him. And so we go toward his scriptures to get him not to just get eternal life from the scriptures themselves. We go to his scriptures to get him. And that is the way that we have to read these so that we might receive the very words of God.
Friends. Jesus has revealed himself and we can find him in the scriptures and he wants to reveal himself to you. I want to give you courage that you are a son of God and he wants to reveal himself to you. And as you read His word and study it diligently that He will move in your life in a powerful way. And that is, that is a promise that if you read it looking for Christ and you say God reveal yourself to me, you will find gold. There are, there is gold in those hills. There's no doubt about it. I'm 100% confident and I can't wait to hear what you find. Can't wait to hear how much you enjoy it. And I am here to help you that that's my job. I'm here to help you if you need help um that you're not gonna like this though. Ok? Um Just come to the prayer meeting. Uh This is what we're doing in the prayer meeting is we're opening the word and we're praying the words from the scriptures and that's the first way to do it. But I I'll meet with you at another time. A more godly hour than seven am I understand.
But, um, someone, someone said I was like, why don't, why don't you think that people read their Bible? And they said, I think that people don't think that they have time to and I'm like, what, they have time to be on their phones for seven hours a day and they're like, yeah, but, you know, they don't think they have time to in the morning. And I'm like, you realize that the morning starts whenever you want the morning to start, like you just set your alarm and the morning starts. It's like, ok, morning started. You can make the morning longer. It's this thing that's like infinitely longer that you can make it sorry. Sometimes I, I just am snarky. OK. Um Friends, I, I want us to go and to delight in God in the same kind of ways that Jesus delighted in God. And I see these misperceptions that religious leaders of the day had and that we still carry. And I want to encourage you to allow the, the fog to lift and to enjoy who he is. All right.
We're gonna now turn our attention to a time of communion. We celebrate a communion meal every week in our church. And with this meal, we Jesus inaugurated it on the night that he was betrayed and he took the bread and he said this is my body broken for you, do this in remembrance of me and he took the cup and he said this is my bloodshed for you, do this in remembrance of me. And so um as believers, he invites us to come to the table and to receive this meal that represents his, his body, broken his bloodshed. And so if you're a Christian here this morning, if you know where you are with Christ, I would encourage you that you are welcome to come to the table, evaluate your own self. Are you living in a way that brings God glory or are you living in a way that's selfish and repent of those self seeking ways and go back to Jesus and you can receive this meal. With that being said, I invite you my friends to receive uh this meal from the Lord and that you might enjoy who He is. Would you stand with me as we prepare to respond to him?
Now, father, as we come to your table, we pray that you would come alive for us, that we would receive this meal uh with thankful and joyful hands and that you would give us the joy of the Lord that you would speak to us and that you would open our hearts to hear from you. God would we put forward the work to hear from you? But God, we want to hear from you. We want your word and we want you to be true in our hearts. Uh So God, we pray that we pray that anyone here who doesn't know you, that you would be moving in their life. Now that they would say I really have had a misperception of who Jesus is. But I'm seeing who he is for the first time and I want to love him with all of my heart. So would you give them that gift of eternal life today? Uh God prepare us to receive this meal. And we ask this in Christ's name. Amen.