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John 12, verses 20 through 36.
Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks.
So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, sir, we wish to
see Jesus.
Philip went and told Andrew.
Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.
And they answered them.
And Jesus answered them, the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains
alone.
But if it dies, it bears much fruit.
Whoever loves his life loses it.
And whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
If anyone serves me, he must follow me.
And where I am, there will my servant be also.
If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.
Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say?
Father, save me from this hour.
But for this purpose, I have come to this hour.
Father, glorify your name.
Then a voice came from heaven.
I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.
The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered.
Others said, an angel has spoken to him.
Jesus answered, the voice has come for your sake, not mine.
Now is the judgment of this world.
Now will the ruler of this world be cast out.
And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.
He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die.
So the crowd answered him, we have heard from the law that the Christ remains forever.
How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up?
Who is this Son of Man?
So Jesus said to them, the light is among you for a little while longer.
Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you.
The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.
While you have the light, believe in the light that you may become sons of the light.
When Jesus had said these things, he departed and hid himself from them.
Let's go to the Lord in prayer.
Gracious Father, we thank you so much for the sacrifice of your beloved Son.
We thank you that he was the propitiation, that he absorbed the wrath of God on account of
us.
And Lord, we just thank you for what a beautiful picture this is.
We're thankful, Lord, for your grace and your mercy.
We're thankful for the truth of the word of God.
And Lord, as we reflect upon the cross, as we reflect upon the work of Christ and what he's done,
we glorify you, we exalt you.
So Lord, help us to see your glory as we study this passage.
Help us to apply these truths to our lives so that we might live for your praise and your
honor.
We thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name, amen.
I'm always mindful of the limited time we have on the first Sunday of each month because of the Lord's Supper and the time it
takes.
So after I got up to about page 13 today on my notes, I realized there's no way in the world we'll get to that.
So I took off the last four pages and projected it to next week.
And so we have only nine pages before us, but it might be somewhat of a challenge for us to
get through these.
I'm finding John's gospel so wonderfully rich, I don't wanna deal with it in a rather
shallow, superficial manner.
And this seems like as we get farther into John's gospel, I need to shorten
the number of verses that we address each Lord's day.
But I wanna get as much benefit as we can from these words of our Lord.
So last time, two weeks ago, when we were examining this gospel of John, we were considering
John 12, 20 through 36, which Jason just read before us.
It speaks of Jesus soon being lifted up, which refers to as being
glorified, being inaugurated as the promised and enthroned messianic king.
This lifting up of Jesus is not to be understood, however, to be only of his resurrection and ascension
into heaven, to be seated as the promised king over Israel.
And remember, that's who he was declared to be the king of Israel earlier in this chapter.
But rather the glorification of Jesus Christ, the lifting up of Jesus Christ took place
with his suffering and dying, or began to take place with his suffering and dying upon his cross
that led to his having been seated on the throne of God in heaven, the right
hand of his father.
And so Jesus being lifted up speaks first of his cross, but also of his resurrection
from the dead and ascension to the throne of God.
And the man Christ Jesus, the God man, but the man Christ Jesus is sitting on the throne of God
right now, ruling over heaven and earth.
Jesus said, all authority is given to me in heaven and earth.
And so today we'll consider further the meaning and implications of his glorification upon his
cross.
We just read these verses, Jason did for us, so we'll not repeat them at this time.
When we began to consider this episode last time, we gave much attention to the inclusion of the Gentiles
into the kingdom of God through the death of Jesus on his cross.
We read in verses 20 through 22 that certain Greeks, and we should understand that
term Greeks as simply Gentiles, non -Jewish people, Gentiles
desire to see and speak with Jesus.
And yet our Lord had been principally sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, not to Gentiles,
although he was merciful and gracious to different Gentiles as
recorded in the Gospels.
The reason he was sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel is because God's covenant relationship through Moses
had been established with the nation of Israel, the Jewish people.
The Gentile nations after Mount Sinai had been excluded from any hope of
salvation.
That is apart from a Gentile basically becoming a Jew, a Jewish proselyte, not
fully a Jew, you had to be born that way, but kind of a half Jew when you became
a Jewish proselyte.
And so Gentiles had been excluded from God's promises.
God had favored the Jewish people, the nation of Israel.
But that was about to change.
That was about to be remedied through Jesus Christ.
He was going universal.
He was going to encompass the Gentiles as well as the Jewish people throughout the world.
And so at the death of Jesus, a great change took place in God's dealings with the world.
Gentiles were afterward after the cross granted free access to receive
salvation in Jesus Christ in the same way as the Jews.
And that is of course, through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul wrote of this in Ephesians 2, verses 11 and following.
And the church at Ephesus to whom he was addressing his epistle was primarily
Gentile Christians.
He wrote of them, therefore, remember that you once Gentiles in the flesh who
are called uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision made in the flesh by hands,
they were looked down upon, alienated from the Jews by the Jews, that at that
time you are without Christ being aliens from the Commonwealth of Israel.
See, at that time you were aliens.
He's going to indicate you're no longer aliens.
See, we are members of Israel, the Israel of God according to Paul.
Strangers from the covenants of promise having no hope and without God in the world.
But now in Christ Jesus, you once were far off had been brought near by the
blood of Christ.
And so again, the Greeks desired, the Gentiles desired to see Jesus.
And he immediately declared it was time for him to be lifted up on the cross that he might draw all people,
Jews and Gentiles to himself.
For as Paul wrote, he himself is our peace who has made both one, that's Jewish
and Gentile believer, one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation.
I would argue that was the Mosaic covenant, the 10 commandments that separated the Gentiles from the
Jews, the people of God.
So as to create in himself, in Christ, one new man from the two, thus making peace, that he might
reconcile them both, that is Jew and Gentile, reconcile them both to God in one body through the
cross, thereby putting to death the enmity between them.
And he came and preached peace to you, he's talking about Gentile believers who were far off, and
to those who were near, those would have been Jews.
For through him, Jesus Christ, we both have access by one spirit to the father.
And so in the Mosaic covenant, God has set apart the Jews of the nation of Israel as his people, his
covenant people.
And in doing so, God had barred the Gentiles from coming to know God covenantally
as the Jews had known him.
But because the Jews had broken that Mosaic covenant, showing themselves to be guilty sinners, just as the
Gentiles, God, through his mercy and grace, was now free to extend
mercy and grace to both Jews and Gentiles, since there was really no longer any
distinction between them.
They were all sinners, as Paul reasons in Romans one through three.
Again, notice in the words we read there in Ephesians two, Paul was addressing Gentile Christians.
But now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
Those Greeks who wished to see Jesus were far off.
They were excluded from the promises.
They were not citizens of the household of faith.
They were not citizens of the nation of Israel, but he brought them near by the blood
of Christ.
And so here Paul was declaring that it was the death of Jesus Christ on his cross that had secured their
blessed state of coming to God through Jesus Christ.
This is exactly what our Lord Jesus was declaring in John 12, 23 and following, when he
heard that certain Greeks wished to see him.
Jesus answered them saying, the hour has come that the son of man should be glorified.
Most assuredly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone.
But if it dies, it produces much grain.
And he had in view the Gentiles as well as the Jews coming to salvation through his death.
And so the Greeks wished to see Jesus, but before he could receive them fully into his kingdom,
Jesus had to die in order to bring a full end to the Mosaic covenant that had kept them
distinguished and distanced from the Jews.
And from this or through this inauguration of a new covenant centered in his shed blood, all people
everywhere could become citizens of the kingdom of God through faith in and submission to their King,
even the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, when we first began to look at these verses two weeks ago, we proposed an
outline of this passage.
And I had vain hopes that we were gonna get through this outline that first week, didn't happen.
And it's not gonna happen today, by the way, as well.
But here's the outline that we might consider these verses.
First, we have the desire and request of the Greeks in verses 20 and 21.
Secondly, we read that Jesus speaks of the necessity of his cross in order to inaugurate and advance
his kingdom.
Thirdly, Jesus's appeal for help from his father to endure his cross.
And then four, we have the father purpose to glorify Jesus before the people through his
And then lastly, Jesus exhorts those Jews who heard him to believe that which they had
been taught and had witnessed regarding him.
You've received some light, walk in that light while you have it available to you.
Again, we began to work through this outline two weeks ago.
We only covered the first one and a half points of these five points, however.
And so before we move on to the third, which we're not gonna do till next Lord's Day, let's say something more
about our Lord's words in verses 24 through 26.
And here, Jesus speaks of the necessity of his cross in order to inaugurate and advance his kingdom.
So after Jesus first declared that his time to be glorified had arrived, he taught that the
same principle that governed his life should govern everyone's life.
In fact, it must govern the life of one who desires to have eternal life.
We must follow in the steps of Jesus.
Jesus said, most assuredly I say to you, and by the way, that's just one more example in John's
gospel of the double word, amin, amin, verily, verily, truly, truly.
Here, I think unfortunately, the new King James translates it, most assuredly.
Most assuredly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone, but if it dies, it
produces much grain.
And then he speaks of a general principle.
He who loves his life will lose it.
He who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
And then verse 26, if anyone serves me, now he's talking about disciples specifically,
let him follow me.
And where I am there, my servant will be also.
If anyone serves me, him, my father will honor.
So I wanna look at these few verses in detail.
And if you look at verse 24, we see that Jesus first stated the principle that governed his life,
that directed him to his cross.
And then secondly, in verse 25, he applies this principle universally to all people everywhere.
And then thirdly, in verse 26, Jesus appealed to his disciples specifically to apply this principle
in the way they lived before him.
And so let's consider these matters.
First, the principle that directed Jesus in his life, verse 24,
Jesus said, most assuredly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it
remains alone, but if it dies, it produces much grain.
Our Lord had just declared that his hour had come.
This was his reaction in response to certain Greeks, Gentiles who wished to see him.
And so in order for Jesus to bring forth a great harvest of souls, even much grain, he would have to die.
He would have to be lifted up on his cross.
Now, Jesus had taught his disciples on several occasions that his death would be the culmination of his ministry.
It was a determined destiny of his life to die.
And actually there are three specifically recorded occasions when the Lord Jesus
made this quite clear to his disciples prior to their arrival in Jerusalem and the
final week of his ministry.
The first occasion was way up in Northern Galilee and near the Golan Heights
today, near the border of Jordan in Caesarea Philippi.
After the Lord Jesus had pronounced Peter as blessed, after he made his confession, you are the
Christ, the son of the living God, our Lord responded to his disciples with these words.
And then he commanded his disciples that they should tell no one that he was Jesus the Christ.
And then from that time, you see this was an initial beginning of clarity with regard to his destiny.
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 be raised the third day.
That was the first occasion where he very directly and specifically told them of his destiny to
die in Jerusalem.
The second occasion is recorded in the next chapter of Matthew, Matthew 17.
Jesus and his disciples were still in the region of Galilee but probably down by the Sea of
Galilee.
And so we read in Matthew 17, 22, now while they were staying in Galilee, Jesus said to
them, the son of man is about to be betrayed into the hands of men and they will kill him and the
third day he'll be raised up.
The third occasion that Jesus spoke directly to his disciples of his death that would take place at Jerusalem was
toward the end of his ministry, even as they were traveling to Jerusalem on that last occasion.
And so we read of this in Luke chapter 18.
Then he took the 12 aside and said to them, behold, we are going up to Jerusalem.
They were down in the Jordan Valley and they had to climb several thousand feet.
We're going up to Jerusalem and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the son of man will be accomplished
for he will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon and they will scourge
him and kill him and the third day he will rise again.
And so these were the three occasions in which our Lord spoke directly and clearly to his disciples
regarding his suffering and death on the cross that would take place at Jerusalem.
But apart from these three direct pronouncements, there were many occasions in which
Jesus intimated of his impending death.
He taught they, he taught the risen Lord Jesus, later after the Lord Jesus
had risen and he taught them after his resurrection and after they were illuminated by the Holy Spirit,
as they began to reflect upon their life with Jesus for those three years, they began to see that
Jesus was talking about his death throughout his earthly ministry, not just on these three
occasions.
Here's a good description of our Lord's many allusions to his death and then of his change to
more direct teaching, the matter after Peter's confession that Jesus was the Christ, the son of the
living God.
And so here's, listen to this word, not till an advanced period in his public ministry,
not in fact till it was drawing to a close, did Jesus speak plain,
unmistakable terms of his death.
The solemn event was foreknown by him from the first and he betrayed his consciousness of what was
awaiting him by a variety of occasional allusions.
His earlier utterances, however, were all couched in mystic language.
They were of the nature of riddles whose meaning became clear after the event, which before none
could or at least did read.
Jesus spake now of a temple, which if destroyed, he would raise again in three days.
At another time of lifting up the son of man, like onto that of the brazen serpent in the wilderness.
And on yet another occasions of a sad separation of the bridegroom from the children of the bride chamber,
of the giving of his flesh for the life of the world.
And for a sign like that of the prophet Jonah, which should be given in his own person to an evil and adulterous
generation.
At length after the conversation in Caesarea Philippi, Jesus changed his style of speaking on the subject
of his sufferings, substituting for dark hidden allusions, plain literal matter of fact
statements.
This change was naturally adapted to the altered circumstances in which he was placed.
Before the disciples were established in the doctrines of Christ's person, the doctrine of the cross might
have scared them away altogether.
Premature preaching of a Christ to be crucified might have made them unbelievers in the fundamental truth that
Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ.
And therefore in consideration of their weaknesses, Jesus maintained a certain reserve respecting his sufferings
till their faith in him as the Christ should have become sufficiently rooted to stand the strain of the storm soon
to be raised by a most unwelcome and incomprehensible announcement.
Only after hearing Peter's confession, was he satisfied that the strength necessary for enduring the
trial had been attained.
And that's a good assessment of how the Lord Jesus spoke repeatedly of his death and yet
became very clear and forthright after the disciples confessed he was the Christ,
the son of the living God.
And so the fact of his dying was before Jesus throughout his entire ministry.
He stated that this was what drove him.
He said in verse 27 of our passage, but for this purpose, that is to die, I came to this
hour.
And when we consider this statement, we may recall that whenever our Lord declared that his hour had not yet come, he was in
effect pointing to this time when that hour would finally come.
The hour has come, he declared in verse 23.
Jesus came in order to die.
This is what the father had sent him to do.
And this is what he was committed to do throughout his entire earthly ministry.
But it was necessary for his death to occur for again, we read in verse 24.
Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains
alone, but if it dies, it produces much grain.
As one wrote, if a grain of wheat be not put into the soil, it
will indeed not die, but it will then itself remain alone and produce nothing.
So will the son of man remain alone if he does not stoop to death on the cross.
But if the grain falls into the earth and dies and is consumed, it brings forth much fruit.
And so the son of man, God's incarnate son, by dying will produce millions of children of God,
fruit in most glorious abundance.
The death of Christ was the death of the most fertile grain of wheat, wrote Augustine.
And in the petition of these Greeks, Jesus sees the great harvest that will go on and on as a
product of the great grain of wheat himself, which fell in the earth.
Now, Jesus's mission as the promised messianic king of Israel, of course did not
conform to Jewish expectations.
To them, a king conquers through craft, cleverness, valor, and power.
But Jesus would come into his reign through suffering and death.
It seemed so incongruent, so unreasonable, and so futile to imagine such a thing.
No one thought in these terms, except the Lord Jesus himself.
How could this be so?
And in setting forth this truth, our Lord Jesus, as he customarily did, drew upon a common
illustration in the world.
A grain of wheat must go into the earth to die in order to bring forth life.
And so Jesus would need to die in order to bring life to all those who would be citizens of his everlasting
kingdom.
But throughout his earthly ministry, even on those occasions when he explicitly taught this truth to his disciples,
his disciples resisted and even rejected his words.
You recall Peter's reaction, his response when Jesus first drew from Peter his
confession that he was the Christ, the son of the living God.
And then Jesus told them that he must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, and
scribes, and be killed and be raised the third day.
What was Peter's reaction?
Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, for far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you.
And what was our Lord's response?
He turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan, you're an offense to me, for you're not mindful of the things
of God, but the things of man.
They did not receive his teaching about his suffering and death.
And even on the second occasion, however, that Jesus was rightly taught as disciples of his death at Jerusalem, we
read of the reaction of the disciples, and they were exceedingly sorrowful.
But what's suggested is that he didn't fully comprehend or take it to heart.
For we read on the third occasion that he taught his disciples of
his fate in Jerusalem, what's recorded is their response to his third statement.
And this is in Luke 18.
Then he took the 12 aside and said to them, behold, we're going up to Jerusalem, all things that are written by the prophets
concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished, for he will be delivered to the Gentiles, will be mocked and insulted and spit
upon.
They will scourge him and kill him, and the third day he will rise again.
And here was their reaction.
But they understood none of these things.
This saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were spoken.
And so even though the Lord Jesus had spoken clearly to them on these three occasions, even though
he had alluded to his suffering and death throughout his ministry in many different ways, they were
clueless.
And when the cross happened, of course, they all forsook him.
The shepherd was struck and the sheep scattered.
And so this principle of Jesus denying himself characterized his entire life.
He was willing to obey his father's will in suffering and death as a pathway to his throne in heaven.
He lived a life of denying himself and his own will in order to serve others and do the will of his father
in heaven.
But his disciples either did not understand what he meant, or they seemed to push it out of their
thoughts.
But then notice, secondly, what Jesus said after he declared that this was the principle that
governed his thinking in his life and would direct him to his cross and thereby to his throne.
Secondly, we read this principle should govern all people in God's world.
Jesus said in verse 25, he who loves his life will lose it.
This is a great paradox.
For people assume that only if you love your life supremely, only then will you keep it or preserve it.
The world and our fallen thinking tells us if you seek what's best for you, placing yourself and your
interests above all others and others' wellbeing, you will do well in this world.
You have to put yourself first is what the world teaches and what you and I naturally think.
But this is actually the very essence of sin.
It in effect says I will do first and foremost what I want to do, what I prefer to do
and what I think will be best for me and mine.
It is this insistence.
I will be the Lord of my life.
You and I will get along as long as you go along with my interests and my concerns.
Otherwise I walk.
And that's the essence of sin.
The Lord Jesus declared, this is the prescription of a loser.
In the one eternal kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, there is place for only one Lord, one king, and it's not for you
or me to sit on that throne.
But what is amazing is that just as our Lord Jesus hated his life, that is he recoiled and
rejected any idea of being self -serving, insisting on his own way apart from the will of his
father.
So it is that every one of his disciples who orders his life as he did will
also one day share in his eternal reign.
And so Jesus said, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
That is the principle that should govern your life and my life as Christians.
I'm gonna deny myself and serve my Lord.
I'm gonna deny myself and serve others over my own interests.
That is the spirit and principle that governs a disciple of Jesus Christ.
If you go through life insisting on having your way because you've determined that you're the Lord of your own existence,
you'll be damned forever.
That is the attitude and principle that governs the life of a non -Christian.
If you go through life, however, denying yourself in order to do the will of God, to please him, this life
of faith will give way to eternal life.
And he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
You might respond, Pastor, you're speaking about impossibilities here.
That's not possible.
No, it's not possible unless you're born again.
The Christian life is impossible for an unregenerate person to live.
It's when a person experienced a new birth that their whole worldview changes
and they see things rightly and they desire to do the Lord's will rather than their own will.
They desire to serve others rather than serve themselves principally.
They don't go through life insisting it's my way or the highway, but they attempt to
serve their Lord and do the Lord's will and seek in serving others as well on behalf of
the Lord.
That is what should drive us as Christians.
And we should lament it when we fail to live in that way, which we frequently do, by the way.
But recognize this is not just counsel for the Christian.
This is counsel for all people everywhere in God's world, on God's earth.
The other gospel writers affirmed this very central teaching of our Lord Jesus to his disciples.
We can read in Matthew, this call to those who would be disciples.
Jesus said to his disciples, if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his
cross and follow me.
That's Christianity ABC, isn't it?
For whoever desires to save his life will lose it.
Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
And clearly he's talking about salvation here.
For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?
Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
We did not deny ourselves and follow the Lord Jesus.
The same principle that governed Jesus toward his cross is to govern you and I, you and me, as we
live in this world following him.
Mark and Luke expressed our Lord's words similarly.
And next Lord's Day, we'll speak more directly of our Lord's experience and his words expressed
in this on how we're to follow our master.
We touch on it here.
We'll speak about it more clearly and fully next Lord's Day, Lord willing.
But now let's look to the third word that Jesus gives here in verse 26.
And here he becomes more direct in speaking to his disciples specifically rather
than the world at large.
And so he appealed to his disciples to apply this principle in living for him.
Jesus declared in verse 26, to all who were or would become his disciples, if
anyone serves me, let him follow me.
If anyone serves me, him my father will honor.
All true Christians are disciples of Jesus Christ.
It's commonly thought that his disciple is a super Christian a really devoted Christian, a special kind
of Christian but that's not true.
The disciples were first called Christians at Antioch.
A Christian is a disciple, a disciple is a Christian.
And so all true disciples are servants of Jesus Christ.
And he talks about servants here.
All servants of Jesus Christ are followers of Jesus Christ.
And he talks about that.
If anyone serves me, let him follow me.
That's what servants do.
But more specifically, what is a servant of Jesus Christ?
Well, when we describe ourselves as servants of Jesus Christ, we are saying that we are slaves of Jesus Christ.
That's what a servant is.
It's a translation of the Greek word doulos.
And it's commonly translated slave as rather than servant, but they're one in the same.
Now, of course, there are many words, various words that set forth our relationship with God and Christ.
We are described in the scriptures as children of our heavenly father.
And so we're set forth as brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ.
Jesus being the eldest son within the family, the firstborn son, the head of the family.
And so we're to think ourselves as children of God.
We anticipate a blessed state and glory when the full realization of our adoption of children of God will
be manifest.
Of course, all Christians are citizens of the kingdom of God.
All Christians are called priests and kings.
As well as ambassadors, we represent another kingdom in this world.
Every Christian, every true local church, and certainly the entire universal church is a temple
in which the Holy Spirit dwells.
There are many terms in the scriptures to describe the Christian that depict how they are to think of themselves and
live.
But when we speak of the nature of our Christian devotion to Jesus Christ, the Bible
frequently refers to us as servants, or we would argue even better, slaves of Jesus Christ.
And that's what the Lord Jesus is talking about here in this passage.
There is a book available entitled Slave of Christ.
It's in a wonderful biblical theology series.
The general editor is D .A. Carson.
There's about 30 of them.
I bought the entire set several years ago.
And one of the books in that set is entitled Slave of Christ.
And the subtitle of this book is a New Testament metaphor for total devotion to Christ.
If you're a Christian totally devoted to Christ, you are a servant, you are a
slave of Jesus Christ.
And in his book, after setting forth certain negative features that are commonly associated with slavery,
Harris wrote this of its use in the New Testament that describes Christians as slaves of
Jesus Christ.
In its description of figurative slavery to Christ, the New Testament has eradicated those negative
features that attach to the notion of slavery so that the metaphor has become wholly a positive
image depicting the believer's exclusive devotion to the Lord Jesus Christ.
As used of all Christian believers, the term doulos is not partially sweet and
partially sour, but totally sweet.
And so as a servant of Jesus Christ, as a slave of Jesus Christ, this is a sweet title and a
sweet description of what it is to be a Christian.
Nothing negative about it at all.
A few years ago, John MacArthur also wrote a book on this theme, it's entitled Slave, The Hidden Truth
About Your Identity in Christ.
I pulled this book off my bookshelf and I was reading the preface.
And interestingly, he said this metaphor for the Christian life is not
emphasized a great deal.
In fact, he said, I'd never seen it before.
Now this was back like in 2009, until I was on an airplane flying
and he indicated that he was reading that book by Harris that we just mentioned above.
And as a result of this illumination of what the scriptures taught about Christians as slaves of Jesus
Christ, he wrote his book, Slave, The Hidden Truth About Your Identity in Christ.
And he wrote this important metaphor that depicts the true Christian in this way.
Time and time again, throughout the pages of scripture, believers are referred to as slaves of God and slaves of
Christ.
In fact, whereas the outside world called them Christians, the earliest believers repeatedly referred to
themselves in the New Testament as the Lord's slaves.
For them, the two ideas were synonymous.
To be a Christian was to be a slave of Jesus Christ.
And that's exactly what the Lord Jesus is saying here in John chapter 12.
Actually, of course, the Bible teaches that every human being in this world that's ever lived
in this world is a slave of one form or another.
In fact, there's only two masters possible.
You're either a slave of sin or you're a slave of Jesus Christ.
There can be no third possibility.
The Apostle Paul wrote of this himself in Romans six.
Do you not know that to whom you present yourself slaves to obey, you are that one slaves whom you obey,
whether of sin leading to life or of obedience leading to righteousness, two options.
We're all slaves.
But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, that's who we were, yet you obeyed from the
heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered, that would be the gospel.
And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
You're either a slave of sin or you're a slave of righteousness.
If you go through life doing as you think you please, what you want foremost, you're a slave of sin.
And your soul is going to encounter full damnation one day.
If you live as a slave of Jesus Christ, which is a delightful occupation, everything positive,
you will inherit eternal life.
You will be with the Lord Jesus, your master.
Paul wrote, I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh.
For just as you presented your members as slaves of uncleanness, that's when you were unsaved and of
lawlessness leading to more lawlessness.
So now present your members as slaves of righteousness for holiness.
When you were slaves of sin, before you were a Christian, you were free in regard to righteousness.
What fruit did you have then in the things which you are now ashamed?
For at the end of those things is death.
But now having been set free from sin and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit in
holiness and the end or the outcome of that life of holiness, everlasting life.
I paraphrased a little bit for explanation and clarification.
And so you're either a slave of sin, sin is your master, or you're a slave of God, Jesus Christ
is your master.
The servitude to sin results in death and damnation, servitude to Christ to serve righteousness,
a life of faithful obedience to Jesus Christ results in everlasting life.
Of course, our slavery to Jesus Christ is a pleasant voluntary submission to him as our master.
And so Jesus says to us, of course, come to me all you who labor and are heavy laden, I will give you
rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn of me for I am gentle and lowly of heart, and you will find rest for your
souls.
The slave of Jesus Christ experiences rest in his soul.
And then he declared, and this is servant language, my yoke is easy and my
burden is light.
Just a few weeks ago, we went out west to the funeral of our good friend, Doug
Vickers, who was in NERF, and it was recounted that he was converted hearing that verse
back in the 1940s when he heard it in London, hearing D. Martin Lloyd -Jones preach the
message.
I remember about a year ago, Doug Vickers said, every Sunday night, he listened to
a sermon on D. Martin Lloyd -Jones, who died in 1981, but he heard a message
every Sunday evening on the internet by Lloyd -Jones.
And about a year and a half ago, this message that he heard, under which he was converted in the
1940s, he heard again as he's 90 years old,
bringing back this message that the Lord used to convert him to faith in Jesus Christ.
And he became a servant, a slave of Jesus Christ.
Now, there is a sense, and we have to close here shortly, we didn't even get through our nine pages, but there is a
sense in which you were saved, you were set free.
The Bible speaks of that.
There is a prophecy of the coming Messiah that he would set the captives free.
We read in Isaiah 61 .1, that when he came, he would proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of
the prison to those who are bound.
That's prison language, slavery language.
And the Lord Jesus, commencing his ministry in his hometown of Nazareth, declared after he opened up the scriptures to Isaiah,
he read it, he sat down, he said, this day, this prophecy is fulfilled.
The very word redeem or redemption carries the idea of being purchased out of slavery.
We had sold ourselves under slavery to sin and Satan.
We were his possessions and his servants when we were living according to our own wills.
The reason that we had become his slaves is because we'd become debtors to God who had broken his law.
We owed God retribution for his honor, having been denied him and for having stolen from his
possession, his right of creation, that is ourselves.
And because we had nothing for which we could repay our God for our offenses, we were sold into
slavery as debtors, sold into the slave market.
But Christ, through his death, satisfied the debt we owed God's holy justice.
Our sins had been paid for.
We were redeemed with his blood.
We were purchased out of the slave market of sin, as it were, and we were set free.
But then learning and hearing that we were set free, we voluntarily
indentured ourselves to our master, Jesus Christ.
We were as that slave in the Old Testament after being a slave for perhaps years.
And the time came when he was set free.
He didn't wanna be set free from his master.
And so he went public and he went down and they bore a hole in the lobe of his
ear.
And by that, he was showing himself to be a permanent slave of a master whom he loved.
We won't read Exodus 21, but that's essentially what we do when we're set free.
We voluntarily indenture ourselves and become slaves to our master, Jesus Christ.
Charles Spurgeon once gave a sermon entitled, Freedom at Once and Forever.
And what stimulated his message was news from Brazil in 1988, the last nation in the
Western world to abolish slavery.
And we're gonna close with his words.
I do not know whether you generally read the daily newspaper.
I think we might get up a society for the suppression of useless knowledge.
I thought of the internet when I read that.
A great deal that appears in the newspapers amounts only to that much time is wasted there on, but sometimes
we get a gem amongst the news.
And to my mind, there was a gem contained in a Reuters telegram, this was 1888, from
Rio de Janeiro, May 10th, the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies has voted the immediate
and unconditional abolition of slavery in Brazil.
My heart rejoiced as I read that paragraph.
I hope it does not mean that this vote can be defeated in some other chamber or the abolition be prevented
by some other power.
But if it means that slavery is to be immediately and unconditionally abolished in Brazil, I call upon you
all to thank God and rejoice in his name.
Wherever slavery exists, it's an awful curse and the abolition of it is an unspeakable blessing.
All free men should praise God and especially those whom Christ has made free for they are free
indeed.
But then in his application of this news, he pressed upon his hearers that if there were
any enslaved to sin, they could be immediately set free by Christ.
So the proclamation which I have to make tonight concerns immediate liberation.
You've been the slave of sin long enough.
You need not be sin slave any longer.
Christ has not come to work out for you a deliverance which will take hours, days, weeks or months to complete.
He has come to knock your feathers off with a single stroke and to set you free at once.
If his gracious power is manifested in this assembly, the former slave of sin will go out of the tabernacle door
free, not half free with one or two of his feathers broken but there shall be for him
immediate liberty.
It does not take any time to work in the human heart the great change which is called regeneration.
There may be a great many things going before it and coming after it which take up much time but to pass from death to life is the
work of an instant.
It must be so.
If a man is dead and he's made alive, there can be no interval between the state of death and the state of life.
There must be a second in which the transition takes place.
When a blind man's eyes are opened, it may be that he does not see for some time very clearly but there's an instant
in which the first beam of light enters the eye and falls upon the retina in which the eye becomes conscious
of the power of light and so in a moment while I'm speaking, the Lord can save you.
In an instant, ye slaves of sin and Satan, he can make you free.
It's the immediate abolition of slavery that I have to proclaim to you.
Wonderful news.
But again, when we're so freely set forth out
of slavery, we see our master who accomplished that through his life, his
suffering has been lifted up and we desire and again willingly
enslave ourselves to him because servitude to him is a pleasant
occupation, a pleasant task.
We're like the demoniac of Gadara.
Change could not bind him but the Lord set him free and he begged Jesus that he might
be with him and so it is.
It's the heart's desire of the Christian.
Our Lord denied that man on that occasion.
No, you stay here and you go out to your family and your friends, your neighbors and proclaim the good things that God has done
for you but our Lord Jesus declared here this passage, John 12, that is not
true for every slave of Jesus Christ.
He declared, if anyone serves me, him my father will honor.
He declared there, if you serve him, if you follow him, you will be where he is.
Wherever he is, my servant will be also.
We will be with him and then he promises that even the father is gonna honor that
slave.
You serve Jesus Christ and God the father is gonna honor you when you stand before him one
day.
What a great prospect.
Why wouldn't we trade quickly, you know, the shackles of sin to be set
free so we can willingly serve as servants to Jesus Christ, our Lord and
Savior?
It's a pleasant life, is it not?
Not being bound to your own desires and inclinations and the lusts
that formerly governed your life and now the Lord has set you free from that and you willingly
desire to walk with him and serve him.
Amen?
May that be true of each of us.
May it be renewed in each of us today.
Let's pray.
Thank you, Father, for your word.
Thank you for the glorious liberty that we have in Jesus Christ and we see this liberty
is experienced and exercised most fully when we serve you, our Lord Jesus.
We pray, Lord, that you would set your people completely free from sin.
We thank you, our God, for the complete deliverance from condemnation when we first believe on
Jesus as our Lord and Savior and we thank you for breaking the power of sin on that occasion
that we no longer want to live in it and serve it and yet we still struggle with it, our God.
The devil would try to enslave us and recaptivate our hearts and minds and we pray that
you would deliver us.
Help us to go forth from this place refreshed and renewed and resolved to live for you, our Lord
Jesus.
We ask these things, Father, in your son's name, amen.