The Real Thirst Quencher - [John 7:37]

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For this evening's message, originally titled
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The Real Thirst Quencher, now Spiritual Gatorade, it has to do with John Chapter 7 verses 37 and 38.
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That will be the main focus of today's message. But before we get to John Chapter 7, 37 and 38, we will walk through the planes of John Chapter 7 as a whole.
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But before we get into the text, I want to just ask a question and set our thinking about what
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Jesus is going to teach. Are you thirsty?
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Are you thirsty? You know, when I was a young child,
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I would always have difficulty with metaphors because, you know, I know the person up there is saying something, but it doesn't really mean what he's saying.
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So before we get into the text, I want to just kind of lay out the image that Jesus uses and then the reality that it is pointing to.
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So when I'm using water and thirst and satisfaction, you know how exactly to translate the image with the actual truth that Jesus wants to convey here.
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So we will get that cleared straight away. So especially the young ones, you're not wondering why pastors are talking about just drinking water.
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You know, that shouldn't be that hard. My mom and dad give me water when I need it. Okay, so what exactly is the term water used for in the scriptures?
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You know, there are at least two that I just want to briefly mention and then we'll focus in on one. There are two terms that we are commonly used to.
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One is washing by the word that refers to the cleansing that the word of God does in the life of a believer.
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I think this morning, in one of our messages, we heard about John 17, 17, about God's word and the purification that we have through God's word.
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But there's another aspect of word, of water in the life of a believer, and that has to do with the satisfaction or the quenching of the thirst that this water brings.
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And always this refers to the source of water being
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Christ and the water itself referring to the Holy Spirit who comes and indwells a believer and satisfies or quenches the thirst that this person has, everybody has.
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So, when we look at the term water, physically, we are made in such a way that we need water.
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We live three days without water and I'm told that you would die and it is an integral and essential need for the physical body.
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Without water, we just cannot live. And so we would thirst for water when we have not had water recently enough and we will go and find it.
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And when we drink water, we are, our thirst is satisfied. Likewise, while the water here refers to the physical body, you are not just a physical body.
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You are a person made of body and soul and you as a whole are created by God to worship him.
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So, just as a physical body has a need for water, so also you as a person have a thirst which needs to be satisfied.
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And that thirst is a thirst for God. Every creature has to depend on God for its life.
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And when it comes to spiritual life, we are all born separated from our creator and we will soon realize that there is something essential that is missing in our lives.
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And when God brings about that conviction and when he brings about the truth to bear on believers, your eyes just open and you say, yes,
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I know what I was thirsting for. I am in sin, I'm separated from God and I need to have this relationship restored with my maker.
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And when you have this relationship with Jesus, then you are satisfied.
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Your thirst, your longing for the ultimate satisfaction is fulfilled in Jesus Christ.
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So that's the image of water and thirst and that's the reality of how that thirst is fulfilled in Jesus.
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I'm done with my message. So now let's walk through John chapter 7 and we will see this very crucial event in the life of Jesus Christ and we will examine how
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Jesus addresses this thirst in 1st century Israel. In fact, when you look at the purpose of this message, my initial purpose will be to expose the text to show how
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Jesus, the prince of preachers, addresses this fundamental need to the 1st century
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Israelites. And as we examine that, you will also see how Simon prayed.
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If there's even one person here who does not know Jesus Christ, and I'm glad there's so many young ones here, you want to examine and see if you do really know
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Jesus Christ or not. If not, this would be a message that Jesus from the words of scripture will be speaking to you about how you can be satisfied of your thirst.
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But many of you here are braving the cold and coming here late and I know that you are believers who have known the truth.
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Like Pastor Steve mentioned, this would be a good repetition of what we already know. And there is also an element of sanctification here, more than the initial state of coming to a relationship with Christ.
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So we will spend a little time talking about how you can grow in this relationship with Jesus who gives us this water.
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And finally, I also hope that what you hear today will help you as you go out and speak to a world that is in thirst and point to the real and true and ultimately satisfying water.
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I began with the question, how thirsty are you? I think there are three responses to thirst, as far as I can break them up into categories.
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One is you are thirsty, but you are thirsty for the wrong things, not something that will truly satisfy.
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Or you are thirsty and you are thirsty for what truly will satisfy. But we also live in a world where people who may be thirsty are in a state of apathy.
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I'm thirsty, but I'm just not going to go and drink. You might have glasses of fluids here, water,
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Gatorade, some poisonous substance. You could have a lot of different glasses right in front of you, and you could have one of these three responses.
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One response could be, I know that is clear and smells good.
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This one is noxious, but somehow I think this would be a little more intoxicating to me.
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Satisfying than what is clear and pure. We live in a world where people would look for satisfaction in everything other than God.
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In money, basically in the satisfaction of the self, rather than looking for satisfaction in God.
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And that would be the wrong kind of thirst. We will see how even those people who have the wrong thirst can truly find satisfaction when they look to Christ.
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You have the true thirst where you have a quickening in your heart.
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You know that you need God, and God brings you this water that gives life, and you drink and guzzle this water down, and you have satisfaction.
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And then, especially as you think of evangelizing, the sad truth is we have people who have all these different vials before them, and they would say,
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I am thirsty, but I don't need anything. I'm just going to sit there and stare and not reach out and drink.
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And yet the Bible says that you and I are salt and light, and our job is to make the people who think there is no satisfaction, who think they've tasted everything and found nothing to be truly satisfying, to show them the power of God and the true satisfaction that is in Jesus Christ.
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So we will look at all these different aspects of the true satisfaction. So let's open to John chapter 7, and beginning in verse 1, we will read verses 1 and 2 as it sets the context of this event in the life of Jesus.
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After these things, Jesus was walking in Galilee, for he was unwilling to walk in Judea, because the
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Jews were seeking to kill him. Now the feast of the Jews, the feast of booths, was near.
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When it begins with after these things, John is obviously talking about John chapter 6.
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In John chapter 6, if you remember, we have the feeding of the 5 ,000, a tremendous miracle, thousands of people fed in the wilderness, many more thronging after him.
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Jesus preaches the word to them saying, you know, you've seen a miraculous sign that should be pointing to me, and instead of using the sign and coming to me, you are just satisfied with the miracle itself.
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You're looking for food, not for the bread of life. And he says, I am the bread of life, and he preaches it in no uncertain terms that all the thousands pretty much depart, even his close band of followers are shaken.
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And here in Capernaum, in upper Galilee area, where Jesus has been preaching, you have a huge exodus.
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People who were following after him walk away when Jesus claims to be God and the only source of life for anyone who might believe.
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So that's the after these things that Jesus is talking about. But it also says here that Jesus was unwilling to walk in Judea, because the
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Jews were seeking to kill him. And that's referring to John chapter 5. We will see that later in chapter 7.
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Jesus there, Judea is just a geography lesson again. Israel has
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Galilee in the north and Judea in the south. So Jerusalem is right here in the...the
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temple is in the southern part of Israel. And that's where John chapter 5 happened, where Jesus actually healed an invalid man.
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He made this man who was, I think, 38 years, unable to move, raises him up.
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Remarkable miracle. But Jesus chooses to heal this man on the Sabbath. And that brings up a tremendous controversy,
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John 5 .18. You have the Jewish people looking to kill him because they think here is a lawbreaker who is here to destroy the
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Jewish faith. They do not realize that Jesus himself is the Messiah, the promised one who has come to deliver the people.
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And in the end of John chapter 5, Jesus actually makes the claims that he and the father have a relationship that's much closer than any human being can have.
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And there is a complete rejection in the southern part of Judea. So in the south, in chapter 5,
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Jesus has been rejected and the Jewish authorities, the leaders of the temple are looking to kill
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Jesus Christ. In the north, in Capernaum, after a great following, all the people have walked away from Jesus.
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So things seem rather bleak. In fact, in the timeline, if you look at Jesus' ministry, this is the fall before his crucifixion.
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He's here in the southern part of Israel and he's come here for a festival. The festival it says here is the
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Feast of Booths. For little ones, if you think of what booths is, this is like little shelters.
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You know, you make like a tent with leaves and the Old Testament. One of the three festivals that all the people had to come to Jerusalem, this was one of them.
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The reason they made these tents was, if you remember, the 40 years they traveled, the Israelites from Egypt to the
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Promised Land, they would live in tents. And this annual festival was a reminder that God had provided for them in the wilderness.
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And it's called the Feast of Tabernacles, which is again another word for tents, or the Feast of Booths. So that's the event, a very important event in the
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Israelite religious life, that Jesus is now...which
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is at hand, where Jesus is going to be participating in. So that's the general background as we get into John chapter 7.
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Now, we talked about thirst and you would think that the person who lived very close to the bottling plant of Polar Springs or Avian or somewhere else, they would be the ones who would want to go and get that product most.
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But you will find that Jesus' own brothers, who were living probably in the same house as Jesus, are belonging to that group that don't want this water.
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We're going to see that in verses 3 to 9, and I'm going to quickly read that so we know what's happening here.
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Therefore, his brothers said to him, Leave here and go into Judea so that your disciples also may see your works which you're doing.
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For no one does anything in secret when he himself seeks to be known publicly.
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If you do these things, show yourself to the world. And John says in verse 5, for even his brothers were not believing in him.
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And Jesus says something here. He says, My time is not yet here, but your time is always opportune.
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The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its deeds are evil.
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Go up to the feast yourselves. I do not go up to this feast because my time has not yet fully come.
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Having said these things to them, he stayed in Galilee. But when his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he himself also went up, not publicly, but as if in secret.
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Jesus says in verse 7, the world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify to it that its deeds are evil.
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John 5 and 6, clear proof of how there is a rejection by the world.
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John 1, 14, I think it says about how the light came into the world, but the darkness, but the world did not comprehend it.
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You know, the darkness did not want the light to come here. They don't want to be exposed by Jesus Christ, the light of the world.
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And here, his brothers are taunting him. They're saying, oh, you've been doing all these miracles.
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You know, why don't you just go down? Yeah, we all know that the people want to kill you, but if you want to be famous, that's what you got to do, right?
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And Jesus here makes a very sharp distinction, and he will continue to do that through chapter 7.
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He says, for you, the time is always right, but my time has not come.
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He makes a stark difference between his brothers and himself.
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He is on God's agenda. They are in the agenda of the world, and they can do whatever they want, whenever they want, everything is fine.
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But he has a specific purpose, and we will see later that he is following a plan laid out by his father to the toad.
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There is not one inch of deviation from the father's plan. Sometimes it would seem that there is great success in the worldly sense.
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Sometimes that would seem like there's great failure, but there's exactly one path that God had destined for Jesus Christ, and Jesus is going to walk down that, and that's basically what he tells his unbelieving brothers.
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Now, his brothers also reject him, and now Jesus is going to come down to Judea. As you know, the
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Jewish authorities have rejected Christ, and in fact, they're looking to kill him. But even in Jerusalem, there are people who are not so certain about who
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Jesus Christ is, and so we will examine what the mood of the town was as Jesus comes to Jerusalem.
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We see this in verses 11 through 15 as Jesus comes down to Jerusalem.
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So the Jews were seeking him at the feast and were saying, where is he?
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When the word Jews is used here, typically it refers to the Jewish authority, the leadership. You know, they are actually looking for Jesus because they are pretty sure
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Jesus will come. And in verse 12, there was much grumbling among the crowds concerning him.
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Some were saying he's a good man. Others were saying, no, on the contrary, he leads the people astray.
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Yet no one was speaking openly of him for fear of the Jews. So here's the crowds, the populace, the common man who have seen the miracles of Jesus.
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Jesus has cleared the temple. He has healed the invalid. He has done a lot of things in Jerusalem already, and they are all not so sure whether Jesus is truly a good man or not.
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There's ambivalence as Jesus comes. Is this the real water or is it something else?
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And that brings us to our first point of today's message in John chapter 7, verses 16 through 18, and that has to do with the authority of Jesus Christ in his teaching, the authority of Jesus Christ in his teaching.
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Let me read the verses first. I'm sorry, I actually skipped a section.
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Let me read verses 11 onwards, and then we will look at the first point. But when it was now,
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I'm sorry, verse 14. But when it was now the midst of the feast, Jesus went up into the temple and began to teach.
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The Jews then were astonished, saying, how has this man become learned, having never been educated?
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So Jesus answered them and said, my teaching is not mine, but his who sent me.
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If anyone is willing to do his will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from myself.
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He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory, but he who is seeking the glory of the one who sent him, he is true, and there is no unrighteousness in him.
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The question that the people ask, how is it that this man has learning when he has never studied?
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The understanding is, you know, Jesus never went to this rabbi or that rabbi. It's not that Jesus was uneducated in terms of not knowing to read and write, but he is speaking with such authority, clarity, and power that the people are just amazed.
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How can this man do this? He doesn't belong to this rabbi or that rabbi. Where did he learn all these things?
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And that's the question. And the question is very important because you want to know the basis of the teaching of Jesus Christ.
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Jesus has proved clearly by all his actions, all his miracles, that he is somebody, he is not just a liar or a cheat.
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He is doing things that nobody can do. And now he is teaching certain things that are extremely powerful, and you need to know on what basis this teaching comes from.
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You know, in the Jewish mind, there was one thing that was right. They would not go for innovations.
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Pastor Steve talked about it this morning. You know, sometimes, sadly, in the church today, people go just to get their ears tickled.
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You know, I know all the old gospel stuff. I need to hear something cool and fancy. How can my life just become a million -dollar
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Christianaire or something like that? You know, that's what people want. They want their ears tickled.
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But the Jewish people knew that everything should come from the scriptures, so that much they were aware of.
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Sadly for them, the scriptures, the Old Testament, got a little mixed up with all the additional writings that had accrued over the years.
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And so when the Jewish people were thinking of teaching and education and authority, what they were looking at was, okay, have the rabbis have agreed with the interpretation of the scripture as things have been said?
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So if somebody would come in first century Israel and teach, most of the time, all they would do is, this rabbi says about this text that this is what it is.
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So it would be mostly, you know, reading commentaries on various texts and saying this is what you should do.
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But here is a man who comes and says, you have heard it said, but I say to you. Pastor Mike's been preaching through Matthew 5.
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And so they want to know on what basis this man is teaching everything that he has to say. If he's going to come in verse 37 and say, come to me and drink, they want to know on what basis, on what authority is
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Jesus teaching these words. And Jesus says in verse 16, my teaching is not mine, but his who sent me.
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You know, for us as Christians, 2 ,000 years later, we might be wondering, what? Second person of the Trinity? And what is he saying?
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Not mine? In fact, in understanding the text, we want to make sure we don't misunderstand it.
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Jesus is not saying, oh, you know, this has nothing to do with me. I'm just a messenger sending things from somebody who sent me, and I don't care whether it's true or false.
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Absolutely not. What it means is, this is not something that I'm just cooking up and giving it to you fresh.
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I'm not an innovator. I am actually giving you something that God himself has given me to deliver to you.
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It's not said here, but the implication is, of course, I'm preaching this to you, because this is true, and I believe it.
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But I want to make it clear to you, the source of this truth comes from God himself.
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It's not from this rabbi or that rabbi. It does have its roots in the Old Testament, but ultimately, my authority comes from him who sent me, and not myself.
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And then he says in verse 17 something extremely crucial. In fact, if any of you here does not know
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Christ, and you're wondering, okay, that's fine, Jesus, you're saying God sent you, but I wasn't there when
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God commissioned you and sent you out. How do I know that you are the one sent by God? In verse 17,
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Jesus gives the answer. If anyone's will is to do God's will,
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I'm reading the ESV here, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority.
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Very strange. You know, today, most of us in this, if you talk to anybody in the world, they would say, okay, give me all your arguments.
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I need to line them up, figure out whether logically they are consistent, whether there is, you know, matching up with reality or whether my own feeling is good.
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When I hear about whatever you teach, you know, we want to stand in judgment over what God has revealed to us and say, okay, passes my test, and therefore,
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I will believe we want to examine God's truth and approve of it before we would submit to it.
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But Jesus actually says something totally different here. He says, if anyone's will is to do God's will, then he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I speak of myself.
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He's saying, if you are committed to following God, then you will know whether what
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I'm saying is true or false. Very, very different. I mean, for us as reformed people, we can look back and say, wow,
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I understand that. That's a packed verse. Of course, if God doesn't turn on the switch, if God doesn't enable the person to actually follow after God, nothing that you hear will make sense.
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But from a human perspective, this is just as vital to understand. As much as God's sovereignty is undergirding everything from a human responsibility, the challenge before every single person in the world today is will you obey
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God? Will you follow after the truth? And it is not a question of, okay,
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I'm going to stand and judge and figure out and then decide who I'm going to give my allegiance to. But God, well, in Romans one,
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Romans two, Romans three, we talk about the revelation of God that is sufficient for all of humankind.
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Nobody can say, I don't know enough to obey God. That's a lie. They know who God is, but they would suppress the truth and unrighteousness.
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Jesus here is saying, if you would obey to what is revealed unto you, then you will know whether I am from God or not.
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My teaching, the basis of my authority and my teaching. And that's very crucial. And another term for that would be faith.
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You've got to believe before you can actually know everything there is to the truth.
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So going back to our Gatorade analogy, so you have a bottle of water that's pure and clean.
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And you don't need all the chemical tests and everything else to say, you know, the mineral content and everything to before you drink of it, take a sip and taste and see that God is good.
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And for those of us who are believers here, as you want to proclaim the truth to your friends, just remember the same precept that Jesus has here.
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Our teaching is not on the basis of our own wisdom. We do not cook up strategies to make people save.
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All we have to give is what God the Father has delivered into our hands.
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We have the scriptures, which is the truth. And all we do is because we believe in Jesus Christ, we know that this book is true.
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We say, I'm not going to teach you anything that I myself came up with. I'm going to tell you what the
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Bible says is true. That's the basis of our authority. And in fact, there's something that Jesus says here, which
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I think we also want to pay attention to. He says, my teaching is not mine, but his who sent me.
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Jesus knew exactly what he was doing was in line with God's call to him.
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He was obeying God's plan that was laid out for him. And you and I, no less with the spirit of God within us, we are to go out into the world, baptizing in the name of the father, son, and the
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Holy Spirit, teaching everybody to observe all that he has commanded. Essentially, we are to make disciples.
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That's our call. A mandate. God has asked us to do that. And you and I are sent. You can go forth with the same boldness and proclaim the truth with the same courage that Jesus did.
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And when you witness to your friends and your co -workers and your neighbors, maybe
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I'll just stop you for just a second and give you a quick illustration and we'll move on.
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You know, many a time, and we think of Jesus boldness when he preaches, we think, you know,
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John five, John six, he gets into a lot of trouble very quickly. And I'd rather not get into trouble very quickly.
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Pretty hard to keep a job as it is with everything else going on. And, you know, it is true that Jesus knows the heart and mind of man.
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You know, when he talks to Nicodemus, Nicodemus thinks everything he knows what's going on, but he doesn't.
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And Jesus knows the heart of Nicodemus because he was his creator and he knows everything you and I don't know.
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We don't know if the person is elect. He is non elect, whether he is telling you what he truly thinks, or he's just trying to say something to be smart.
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The person you're witnessing to and all we can do is take what the person says at face value and and proclaim the gospel in a kind and gentle way.
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And the other day, about a month ago, I was talking to one of my coworkers and a very strange because I thought when the conversation conversation started that this was going to be more of those.
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Okay, let's analyze everything to your claims and and we'll let this I'll break your arguments very quickly.
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And it was just a nice conversation, which I thought was a five minute conversation, but it was an hour and a half later.
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And the conversation just went great. You know, we were not a we were not talking about.
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Okay, what is this world? We are against that world view. It was more about who are you?
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And what are your needs that the Bible says is necessary? Will you be examining your life in the light of what the scripture says?
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You know, your fight is not with me. I'm just telling you what the scripture says, and we do it nicely because, like I said,
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I don't know if he's elect or not. And even if I knew, thank God, I don't. My job is to deliver the good news in a good way.
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And it is amazing how God can use us when we are willing servants in his hands to to convey the truth.
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Let's move on. I think I'm kind of slow here, so we'll pick up pace a little bit. But Jesus has just said, you need to be doing
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God's will in order to know whether what I'm saying is true or false. And then in verse 19 through 24, we have an interesting response of how people try to do
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God's will. Did not
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Moses give you the law? And yet none of you carries out the law.
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Why are you seeking to kill me? The crowd answered, you are a demon. You have a demon who seeks to kill you.
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Jesus answered them. I did one deed and you all marvel. For this reason, Moses has given you circumcision, not because it is from Moses, but from the fathers.
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And on the Sabbath, you circumcise a man. If a man receives circumcision on the
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Sabbath so that the law of Moses will not be broken, are you angry with me because I made an entire man well on the
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Sabbath? Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.
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Jesus, again, obviously is referring to John chapter five, where people were trying to kill him and talking about the heart, the intent of their hearts as they try to judge and act upon their judgment.
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And he says, you need to be judging with truth. Let's now move on to the second point, and that's found in verses 25 through 29.
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And we saw the authority of Christ teaching. Now we're going to look at the person of Christ. Who is this
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Jesus as an individual? And the question will center around his origin. Where did
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Christ come from? And Jesus will reveal more about himself as a person. Let's read these verses 25 through 29.
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So some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, is this not the man whom they were seeking to kill? Look, he's speaking publicly and they're saying nothing to him.
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The rulers do not really know that this is the Christ, do they? However, we know where this man is from, but whenever the
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Christ may come, no one knows where he is from. And verse 28, then
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Jesus cried out in the temple teaching and saying, you both know me and know where I am from.
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And I have not come of myself, but he who sent me is true.
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Whom you do not know. I know him because I am from him.
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And he sent me. Jesus crying out. This is, he raises his voice.
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He is loud. He wants everybody to hear. He is emphatic about his proclamation.
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This truth that he's going to say, and he is the word used that he'll use it again in verse 37.
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It is his heart is filled with compassion for a people who are stubborn and rejecting the one who can save them.
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He is empathizing with the people that he wants to save. And that's the, that's the fervor with which
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Jesus cries out this truth in verse 28. So where did
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Jesus come from? In verse 28, it says, you both know me and know where I am from. In the
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ESV, you have a question mark after that. More like, do you really know me and where I am from?
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There was no punctuation in the Greek, so that's a valid way of translating it. In the NAS, you have a semicolon.
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Basically, sure, you could still say, you know me where I am from. You think I'm from Galilee, which is partially true.
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And you think I'm the son of Joseph of Nazareth. Again, partially true.
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And the, for us looking back, the irony is, Jesus could have just stopped there and said, oh, you thought
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I wasn't from Bethlehem, the son, you know, I'm not the son of David. In fact, I think in verse 42, yeah, it says that one of the questions that the people had was dissonant of David from Bethlehem, where David was, you know, that's where he should come from.
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Jesus could have very clearly stopped and said, hey, I'm from there. You want my birth certificate? They took a census. You can see
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Joseph's name on that list, and he could have proved all those things. But the irony again, going back to the authority of Christ is it has nothing to do with, you know, clearing all their arguments and and trying to pass the judgment that man has placed upon the
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Christ. He basically says something that's even more important for them to grasp. And basically, he says,
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I'm coming from God. God is the one who sent me.
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Don't worry about Galilee. Don't worry about all your superficial judgments that you're trying to pass on me.
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I'm coming from God himself. I'm from heaven. And he talks more about the one who has sent him.
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He says, he who sent me is true. In fact, that's why
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I use the word real in my title. He is the real deal. He is he is the he is reality.
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If you would will, you know, he's talking about, you know, this is what it is all about. He God himself is the one who is sending me.
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And then he says something very pointed. He says, you do not know him. That's why you cannot recognize whether I'm from God or not.
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You are of the world, but I know him. I have come from him and he sent me.
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That's all the certification that you need to know. I am from God. That's my origin. I am God sent.
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And the response in verse 30 is predictable.
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So they were seeking to seize him. And no man laid his hand on him because his hour had not yet come.
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But many in the crowd believed in him. And they were saying, when the Christ comes, he will not perform more signs than these, which this man has.
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Will he? Verse 32. The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about him. And the chief priests and the
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Pharisees sent officers to seize him. The initial seizing was by the crowd because Jesus had told them, you do not know
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God, the father. And this seizing is by the leaders because they want to arrest him again. Therefore, Jesus said in verse 33, for a little while,
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I'm longer. I am with you. Then I go to him who sent me. You will seek me and will not find me. And where I am, you cannot come.
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The Jews then said to one another, where does this man intend to go? That we will not find him. He is not intending to go to the dispersion among the
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Greeks and teach the Greeks. Is he? What is the statement that he has said? He will seek me and not find me.
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Where I am, you cannot come. For us, looking back, it's very obvious. Jesus is not talking about some physical location.
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He was going to be crucified, dead, resurrected. And he's going to be at the right hand of God, the father. And he was the one who sent him.
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But now let's come to our final point. The gift that Jesus has to give.
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We saw the authority of Jesus Christ in his teaching. We saw the origin of Jesus Christ. Who he is?
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He is the one sent by God himself from heaven. And now finally, the gift of Jesus Christ.
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What is it that Jesus has to offer? We see this in verse 37 to 39.
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Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.
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He who believes in me, as the scripture said, from his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.
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But this he spoke of the spirit, John tells us, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for the spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
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And John here is referring to the cross. Jesus has the best gift ever to offer humanity.
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What exactly does Jesus offer here in John chapter seven verse 37?
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If any man thirsts, one of the commentators takes this to its fullest extremes in talking about the universal offer of salvation.
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We talked earlier about how you and I do not know the elect and the offer of salvation is to every single person.
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Anyone from a human side of things, anyone, everyone is open to come and drink of the fountain that is given freely to all.
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There is absolutely no one barred from here. So, it's an evening service.
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I don't expect too many skeptics here to judge this sermon. But if anyone were to come here and say, maybe it's for all you special folk,
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I'm just here just to look and see these things. And maybe there's somebody listening on the internet. It's for those people as well.
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Every single person is required of God to come and drink of this water.
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There is no exemption at all. Everyone is freely welcome to come and drink.
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In fact, one of the qualities that Jesus talks about here, if anyone is thirsty, we already saw earlier, we can have different kinds of thirst for the truth, for what is false, and for a lack of thirst as well.
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But this particular commentator, it's actually Boyce. He basically says, you know what?
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He's addressing his congregation. He says, maybe you are here because you want to, you're really suffering in life.
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You don't have money. You are out of a job. You have no other recourse. You've come here because you say, hey, what's the can't lose to be in church.
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At least it keeps me warm in winter. That's fine. You have some thirst. And you think that getting the job or getting your money will satisfy you.
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But that's not true. You will be warm for another winter or a couple of winters, but ultimately you will find that your money and your job and everything else that you think will satisfy you will ultimately fail you.
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There's only one thing that can ultimately satisfy. And that's what Jesus Christ is talking about. So that particular thirst that you have for the wrong thing, this is a good news for you that you can direct that thirst from the wrong object to the only object that can ultimately satisfy your thirst.
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And all these things, why do you think people are in apathy? Because they've tried all these different things that the world sells.
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They think, okay, I've tried this pleasure or this venture. And I thought that these things would keep me satisfied, but been there, done that, doesn't truly meet my needs.
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And that is true. These were given by your creator in order to enjoy this life in the context of a right relationship with God.
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Have no relationship with God? None of these things can satisfy you. And so whatever your thirst might be, come to the
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Lord, anyone, everyone, and you will find the true real thirst quencher which will satisfy all of your needs.
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Now let's, I wanna just say one more thing before we get into this text a little more deeply.
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Jesus says, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.
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It is Jesus Christ who is the source of this water that satisfies.
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If you look at, you don't have to turn, I'll just read it for you. In 1 Corinthians 10, four, it talks about the satisfaction that the believers in the
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Old Testament had. It talks about all the people then drinking the same spiritual drink, for they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was
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Christ. Christ alone is the source of every single person's ultimate satisfaction.
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If anybody wants to be satisfied, there's only one person who can satisfy it, and that is Jesus Christ, nothing else.
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So you and I, when we go to preach the gospel or people see us and they think, oh, you know, look at that man, he has his life together, comes and talks to you and say, oh, okay, somebody, you believe something and so your life is good.
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You want me to believe this gospel, I wanna be like you, so I wanna do this. You and I are channels of God's grace.
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They get to see Jesus Christ through us, and they will ultimately have to have that same relationship with Jesus in order to receive the satisfaction that is lasting.
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If people would just imitate us without knowing the source, that would be of no use. But you will also see,
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I wanna say this as a disclaimer because what I'm gonna say is going to make you think a little differently as well, because you're gonna see that the person who is satisfied becomes a source of blessing.
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What does it say in verse 38? He who believes in me, the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.
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Not only is the thirsty person gonna be quenched of his thirst, satisfied, filled to the brim, his cup is gonna be overflowing.
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It is gonna be a source of blessing to all those around.
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And we will study that a little bit more deeply as we get into the text.
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So let's look at the quality of this spiritual
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Gatorade that God has left before us. When we look at that term stream, you see in John chapter four, when the
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Samaritan woman came to Jesus and Jesus says, if you knew who I was, you would ask me and I would give you living water and you will never have to come back to this well and draw it because it's a one time satisfying source of water, of satisfaction.
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And there is a sense in which when you come to Jesus Christ, you no longer thirst because your ultimate relationship with God has been restored.
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The one thing that you lacked, you have received. The moment you are justified, you have come into the kingdom, you are no longer an alien separated from the kingdom.
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You are now a child of God who you realize this universe is
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God's creation. You realize your place in this world, why
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God has put you here, what you are supposed to do and what one day you can look forward to when you die.
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You have everything you need to live your life here on earth when you have come into the kingdom as a child of God.
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The moment you are justified, your thirst has been satisfied. You know who you are in Christ.
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There is also another aspect to this quenching of our thirst and sanctification.
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And what happens the moment you get saved is the complete satisfaction of your inner longings.
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But as you grow in your walk as a believer, you realize there is sin, you have to deal with sin and you realize that God has given you everything to live a life of godliness.
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You realize what it takes to please your God, the father and you come here this evening, you hear a message, you hear
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God's word expounded and the word does its cleansing, washing on your lives and you go home and you internalize the truths, you live that out and you grow in purity, you grow in greater reflection of God's glory as you yourself are being transformed from glory to glory into the image of Jesus Christ.
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So how does this all begin? Let's go back to the basics. When you were an unbeliever, you live for your own self.
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God quickens you, you realize that you are missing something essential, you realize you are a sinner, you are a rebel, you know that there is a
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God who is holy and righteous and you need to deal with him. You realize how sweet the source of satisfaction in Jesus Christ is, you have tasted him and you are enjoying this new relationship that God has given you.
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In verse 37, verse 38, Jesus says that you come to me you believe in me, you will receive this quenching, this water that ultimately satisfies you.
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The Bible talks about every single believer receiving the
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Holy Spirit the moment you are saved. So we have the spirit of God indwelling the believer from the moment we are saved.
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We have God himself living within us from the moment we are saved.
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That ought to boggle our minds, God living within us.
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When we talk about this river that is flowing out from you, you know, if you are like me, you can check yourself and I'm sure there are no valves that you can turn open and floods go out.
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So what is this flowing out rivers that Jesus is talking about? The moment you become a child of God, you are like a magnet for those of you science buffs.
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You know, you have your polarities all in all different waves. Now you are all aligned with the purposes and the plan of God.
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You used to live your life for yourself running helter skelter. Now with Jesus Christ as your savior, as God, as your
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King, as the Holy Spirit, as indwelling in you, you live a life that is aligned with that of God's ultimate purposes.
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In fact, you are like, you are representing
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Christ and you live out the life as ambassadors of Christ while you're here on earth. Your life now gets transformed from being slaves of sin to become instruments of righteousness.
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You are now representing God and you are living out that life that God has called you to do.
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So you are living out the life that God has called you to do and how do you do this?
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The Bible says that the spirit of God who is within you, he enables you, he enables you to know the truth, he enables you to obey the truth, he enables you through his gifts to serve
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God here on earth. Every single one of us has some spiritual gift that God has given you in order to live out what
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God has enabled you to do here. And you would do that in many ways. The first thing is you would grow yourself.
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You yourself as you drink of this water that satisfies, you grow like someone, you are that righteous person that someone talks about.
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Your walk becomes more and more like Christ. You please, your walk is pleasing to God and God enjoys the life of his son.
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You are ministering to others within the body. That's why spiritual gifts are given to build one another up.
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You thought you had nothing to give when you were an unbeliever to the church. Now you are able to serve, you are able to love, you are able to minister, you are able to do things that help one another to live out the life of the church here on earth.
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And you are the source or rather you are the channel of God's salvation to a thirsty world.
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And as you live your life out as salt, as light, you are doing the work of quickening.
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Those of you who have lived long enough as believers, you know this light will come in confrontation with darkness.
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But also you know that the saltiness of your life produces thirst in the life of those around you.
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And God is the one who uses you, the rivers that flow out from you to minister to those who are yet to be saved.
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One last thing I wanna say before we close, you know, some of you here may be thinking, you know,
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I was, I am saved. I got saved 10 years ago, five years ago. If you looked at my past week, it was pretty weak.
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I, yeah, I know what you mean about that stream of living water and flowing and for myself, for the believers, for the world.
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But I was pretty dried up. You know, I didn't really have much flowing going out this last week in my life or maybe it's last month, maybe much longer.
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There are two things that you wanna think about. One is, in 1
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John, the Bible talks about the life of a believer. We see the anointing that we just saw here in 1
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John as well. But you do wanna make sure you are in the faith. Is your life becoming more and more like Christ?
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The Bible talks about, Pastor Steve spoke last week about the tests of faith.
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Is your life becoming more and more like Christ? Is your life being transformed into this image over time? Maybe not last month, but think of yourself two years ago.
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Maybe think of yourself before you were saved. Is your life becoming more and more like Christ? If so, that is the work of God in you.
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However, are there times when believers don't look like believers?
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One of the painful jobs of, not job, painful duties of a preacher is, as you examine the text, you come to realize very quickly that God works that text in your life before you actually go out and preach it.
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And last three weeks was horrible. I could not preach this text.
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I'm so glad God sent that storm and stopped me from preaching last week. That is the truth.
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Are there times when I struggle? Absolutely. And could there be reasons for it?
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Sure, there are some reasons which are normal. You could be physically ill and on your bed or deathbed and yeah, not very productive.
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Are there times of intense stress? You burnt yourself out and you just can't do much.
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Are there times of where God just puts you on the stretcher and says you need to kind of relax a little bit?
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Are there times of emotional strains? You've gone through some really difficult relationships and things are just haywire and things are out of control.
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Are there spiritual deserts where you just find it so hard to take your scriptures and read it?
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These are things that happen to men. In fact, I was counseling somebody who was struggling with the same questions.
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And I said, oh, I'm supposed to be able to tell you all these things don't happen, but they do.
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In fact, I'm going through one right now. But the truth is for a believer, you want to question what a life of a believer is.
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You know, many a time we talk about the joys and the successes that a Christian has. And we often confuse the happiness that comes from the victories that we have in Christ with the inner complete joy that every moment of your life you will have that undergirds you, strengthens you and enables you to live your life out.
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Will you have times of physical, mental, emotional, even spiritual trouble and trials?
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Absolutely, yes. Will you feel unhappy, thinking that as a child of God, as a heir of the king, as the one who's gonna inherit heaven that shouldn't
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I be victorious on a white horse, destroying the enemies and instead, what is happening to me right now?
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You know, when we think of happiness and success in the earthly terms, we are thinking totally different from the truth of scriptures.
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Think about Jesus Christ, John 5, John 6. Things were not successful in the earthly sense.
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There were difficult, difficult times that Jesus himself had to endure. And you and I are promised trials and tribulation as we go through this earth.
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If you become a believer, one thing you can be certain of, trials, you will go through them.
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And that is God's purpose of refining you, making you more like Christ. It's not gonna be a red carpet, just turn on your jets, no birds, keep flying up.
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You're gonna hit some birds. You're gonna make some crash landings. And, but the truth of a believer's life is you have the spirit of God within you.
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You have everything, everything you need to life and godliness in the word of God that has been given to you, revealed to you.
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And you know who you are as God's own child. And these moments of trials will come and go.
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In fact, some of these trials could be self -inflicted. One very sure way of getting into trouble is sin.
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And which of you do not sin? And if you stay and sin longer, you will receive more than just the natural consequence.
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You will receive the chastisement of God, pretty painful. But that does not stop this stream of water that goes out from you.
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God has given you everything that you need to live out this life in the full measure that he has called us as his children.
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So as we close, let me just finish up with the rest of this passage. And we will conclude.
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In verse 40 of John chapter seven, some of the people, therefore, when they heard these words were saying, this certainly is the prophet.
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Others were saying, this is the Christ. But still others were saying, surely the
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Christ is not going to come from Galilee, is he? Is not the scripture said that the
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Christ comes from the descendants of David and from Bethlehem? The village where David was.
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So a division occurred in the crowd because of him. Christ brings division.
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As you do proclaim this truth, as the streams go out from you into the dark world, you will see divisions.
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There will be some who will believe. And that's why divisions are there. If nobody believes, everybody would be going headlong into hell.
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But praise God for divisions that God would call and choose and save some. And John uses a lot of irony in his text.
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You have to be very careful when you read it. It's very simple, but the language is so powerful. Just listen as John concludes this passage.
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Verse 44, some of them wanted to seize him, but no one laid hands on him. The officers then came to the chief priests and Pharisees, and they said to him, why did you?
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And they said to them, why did you not bring him? The officers answered, never has a man spoken the way this man speaks.
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The Pharisees then answered them, you have not also been led astray, have you? No one of the rulers of Pharisees has believed in him, has he?
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But this crowd, which does not know the law is accursed. You and I can look back and see the judgment that God has passed upon these blind
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Pharisees and the authorities. They thought that the crowds were the ones who were accursed who had followed this maverick, but instead they themselves were the one who have rejected the king and will face
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God's judgment. And in verse 50, we have our friend Nicodemus. He said to them, our law does not judge a man unless it first hears from him and knows what he's doing, does it?
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They answered him, you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and see that no prophet arises out of Galilee.
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It's another couched irony here because they were wrong.
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We did have prophets from Galilee and these men were so against Christ, their wills were not to do with the will of God, but their own, that they would come up with this excuse and make fun of Nicodemus who was one of those anyone, anyone who does.
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He said, based on what I know, this is what we should do. And these men were so against Christ and so blind in their hatred of Christ that they said, no way, this cannot be the
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Christ. We saw the authority of Jesus Christ. My teaching is not my own, but his who sent me.
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So if you do not know Jesus Christ, you have the teaching that you heard from God himself that Jesus declared to us.
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If you are a believer, you go out teaching not what you want, but what
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God has revealed to you. We saw the person of Jesus Christ.
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Who is he? Where did he come from? He was sent off God from heaven and he knew the one sending him.
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You and I, when we go out, we are ambassadors sent by our great God and we need to go forth with that same confidence in proclaiming the truth.
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And finally, we saw what the real thirst quencher has to offer, true and complete satisfaction, overflowing, not only to satisfy yourself, but also those around you.
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And as you go out from here, my prayer is that God would fill your cup to overflowing, that you would minister
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God's grace and his goodness to those around you. Let us pray.
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Dear God, our heavenly father, we thank you for your son, the greatest gift.
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Lord, we thank you for your work of redemption and we thank you for your spirit that you have given us.
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And oh father, we pray that we would be faithful servants, fully submissive, willing to do your will here on earth.