Today’s message is the continuation of a story that we began looking at last week.  I realize some of you weren’t here, but you should be able to catch up quickly – it’s the story of a man born blind, that Jesus healed.  We looked at the first seven verses last week.  Today we are going to try to finish this chapter which is basically a narrative of the people who are affected by this miracle.

And so I have titled today’s message, “Salvation in slow motion.” The idea behind that title is that this passage illustrates salvation in an expanded way.   What I mean to show in this message is the progression of faith as illustrated by this blind man.  I believe that is why we have this very long narrative in the scriptures.  I believe, as I said last week, that every miracle in the gospels is presented to teach spiritual principles by a physical parable.  So to just focus on the historical narrative here and miss the spiritual implications that are being taught would be a mistake.  I think the spiritual principle being taught here is the progressive nature of saving faith.  

Jesus said in the last chapter, chapter 8 vs.31, that “if you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of mine, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”  So Jesus is saying that there is a necessity to continue in the truth, to continue to follow His word, and  when you do that, the truth will make you free.  

That principle finds support in Psalm 119:105  which says, “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”  So to continue in the word indicates a desire to follow the truth as God reveals it, step by step, day by day.  When you do that, God will make you free.  Notice it doesn’t say, set you free.  It says make you free.  It’s talking about not just being set free from the penalty of sin, but making you free from the power of sin.  That’s an important distinction.

In the Emancipation Proclamation, Abraham Lincoln declared all slaves to be free.  But the war was still going on between the North and the South.  And it did so for quite some time after that declaration.  Even after the end of the war, there were many slaves that continued to live as slaves.  They had been set free.  But though they might have believed that fact,  they had not yet been made free.  Because they were still attached to the plantations, they had familiarity with that place.  For many of them, the plantation was all they knew.  They were made free when they acted on the declaration that set them free.  When they walked away from their home, walked away from their bondage, and started living as free men, then they were actually free.  

That’s the problem we still have today in the church.  Many people come to church and hear the good news that Jesus came to save them.  And so they believe in Jesus.  They believe that is true.  But effectively they are not made free.  They continue to live in enslavement to their sins.  They are comfortable in this world.  They are attached to this world.  And as such, they are not made free.  The way that they will be made free will be the day that the power of sin is broken in their life and they can begin a new life being free from the power of sin.

So this blind man illustrates that continuance in the truth, and the freedom that comes through salvation.  And as we will see, there is a progression to his faith.  At the beginning, he doesn’t know very much.  But at each step of his journey, his faith grows, culminating in worshipping Jesus as Lord in vs.38.  So this man’s salvation was given to us as an example.  And John reveals it in sort of like slow motion, an expanded process for this guy.  We don’t know how long it took, but it likely took all day, maybe longer to come to the full realization of what happened in his life.

Well, let’s jump in.  There is a lot to cover in not a lot of time, so we won’t  exegete every sentence.  But I do want to highlight each step of his growing faith.  First by way of review, we see the beginning of his faith as the result of divine action by Christ who came to him and selected him, chose him to be the recipient of His grace.  This man wasn’t really seeking Christ.  He doesn’t even seem to be too familiar with who He was at first.  But one thing this man does know; he knows he was blind.  Nobody had to tell him he was blind.  And one thing we can be sure of as well; he didn’t want to be blind.  

Now that is the necessary precursor to salvation.  Blindness is analogous to being in darkness, spiritual darkness.  That is, you are dead in your trespasses and sins.  That is necessary to understand if you are going to receive salvation.  Salvation is not because you’re a nice person, you are a good person, and if you believe in Jesus He is going to make your life really great.  That is no where taught in the Bible.  

Rather, in the sermon on the mount, Jesus taught that you had to come to God as a beggar, even as this blind man had been a beggar. Matt. 5:3 says “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  Poor in spirit is to admit that you are a beggar spiritually.  You have no means to buy your way into the kingdom of God.  And then Jesus added in vs 4 “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”  That means that you must come to a place of mourning over your sin.  That’s repentance, and when you come to God in repentance you will be comforted.  And then Jesus said in vs 6 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”  That’s the recognition that you need righteousness, and you desire to be made right with God.  You cannot supply that righteousness on your own.  That need is satisfied by Christ’s righteousness when He takes your sin upon Himself, and transfers His righteousness to you.  

So Jesus made clay out of spittle and dirt and rubbed it in this man’s eyes, then told him to go wash in the pool of Siloam.  And in this we see symbolized the man’s faith and obedience, we see the application of the Savior, and we see the forgiveness of his sins illustrated in washing in the pool of Siloam. 

But that was just the beginning of this man’s progress of faith.  His eyes were opened to the truth, his sins were forgiven.  But he still needs to continue in the word of Christ in order come to complete freedom.  Now in this process this man interacts with four groups of people.  We have the narrative before us, so I don’t need to belabor each part of the dialogue.  But each interaction brings this man further in his progression of faith.  

The first group he interacts with after having his eyes opened was his neighbors. Vs.8, “Therefore the neighbors, and those who previously saw him as a beggar, were saying, ‘Is not this the one who used to sit and beg?’”  Listen, when you get saved, people are going to notice.  Your neighbors, your coworkers are going to notice that something about you has changed.  I remember when I got right with God 40 some years ago, while living in California.  The next day I went by the restaurant where I worked to pick up my paycheck or something, and my coworkers thought I had been drinking.  I was sober.  But something about my demeanor was like a great burden that I had been under was taken away.  And so they noticed something different.  They didn’t know what it was, but it gave me the opportunity to tell them that I had gotten right with the Lord.

Well, that’s what we see happening here.  He has the opportunity right at the beginning to share what has happened to him.  And I will tell you an important principle here.  That is, the testimony of a changed life is the most effective testimony.  It’s not what you are like in church, it’s what you are like out of church that matters.  The testimony of a changed life is the most powerful sermon you will ever preach.

Now this is also the means of a step of faith for this man.  Jesus said, If you confess Me before men, I’ll confess you before My Father.  And when this man meets the skepticism, the questions of his neighbors, he confesses Jesus without wavering.  They could not help but notice that there was a tremendous change in him.  He had been blind, and now he could see.  So they ask him how were your eyes opened?  And his answer is “A man called Jesus anointed my eyes with clay and told me to go wash in the pool of Siloam, and I went and washed and received my sight.”  

Now that’s a good testimony.  Some of you say you don’t know how to witness for the Lord.  I would suggest starting by using this man’s testimony as a template.  You don’t have to know all scripture.  You can simply tell what Jesus did in your life.

Notice that at this point, this man only knows Jesus by name.  He’s not an expert in systematic theology.  He does know more than a lot of people though as we will see from some of his other comments.  But at this point, his faith is elementary.  He knows Jesus gave him his sight.  Jesus was a popular name in that day.  And the meaning of that name was also well known.  Jesus means Jehovah is salvation.  So when this formerly blind man said Jesus was responsible for his healing, he is professing faith in the name of Jesus as the source of  salvation from Jehovah God. 

Well, his neighbors are not really sure what to make of his testimony, so they take him to their religious leaders, the Pharisees.  And of course, the Pharisees are very familiar with Jesus.  They have been plotting to kill Him for some time and in fact just that day they had picked up stones to stone Him to death but Jesus had disappeared from their midst. This is the second group he interacts with, the Pharisees.  And they are defiantly a hostile audience.  They see this as an opportunity to build a case against Jesus.

You know, if you were to try to condense all the error of Judaism into one practice or one tradition, then that error would be best illustrated by the Jew’s practice of keeping the Sabbath.  The Sabbath requirements were the best example of all that was wrong in Judaism.  And the greatest proponents of Judaism were the Pharisees.  The hypocrisy of the Pharisees was best illustrated in their observance of the Sabbath.  

So I think that is why Jesus deliberately healed on the Sabbath. There are seven miracles of healing that Jesus did on the Sabbath recorded in the gospels.  So I would say He did it deliberately.   This idea of a mild mannered, weak wristed Jesus is not Biblical.  I think Jesus was deliberately confrontational to those who taught a false doctrine.  And conversely, Jesus was deliberately sympathetic to those who were caught up in that false doctrine and as such were still trapped in their sin.  But He is deliberately offensive to those who heaped heavy loads on others, but figured out ways for themselves to wriggle out of any burden whatsoever.  That’s what false religions do.  That’s why the scriptures are so damning towards false teachers.  Because it keeps people in darkness, and it keeps people from being made free.  That’s why sometimes I name names of certain false teachers, or call out certain false teachings.  I’m not trying to be mean spirited, but I hate to see people duped by self serving religious teachers. 

In fact, I’ll go so far as to say that the greatest opposition to true discipleship is often popular religion.  Because rather than continuing in the truth so that you become free, they teach traditions of men, which have no redemptive power, and those traditions end up enslaving people to repetitious ceremony that isn’t even founded on truth.

And that’s what the Pharisees did with the Sabbath.  Jesus said man wasn’t made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath was made for man.  It was to symbolize rest from your works, rest in what God has done for us through Christ.  But instead, they added ordinance upon ordinance until the Sabbath law had become this yoke that kept them in servitude to their religion.  

According to rabbinical law, there was a specific ordinance that prohibited using saliva to minister to a sick person on the Sabbath.  They had so defined every possible thing that could be construed as work that it was just insane.  For instance, they prohibited healing on the Sabbath unless it was a life or death situation.  So if you weren’t about to die, they could make you comfortable but not try to make you well.  This law of the Sabbath had evolved into something far removed from the original fourth commandment.  So I think Jesus healed on the Sabbath in order to confront their hypocrisy, and to expose their false teaching.  

So the Pharisees confront the man about his healing, but the miraculous part of it and the compassionate part of it goes right over their heads.  They aren’t concerned about a man suffering blindness from birth being healed.  They are interested in finding some way to convict Christ of wrongdoing. So their deduction is that ““This man [Jesus] is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath.” vs.16. Their reasoning is that their Sabbath law was true, but God’s Word was not true. 

Listen, that is the hallmark of false doctrine.  The hallmark of false religion is that they subject the word of God to the traditions of men.  You see that all the time with cults.  They will claim to believe the Bible, but then they say that their prophet had a dream and received new revelation.  And angels or someone told them to write it down.  And eventually, you find that their revelation ends up being the means by which they interpret the Bible.  And then finally, they ignore what the Bible says if their prophet or priest says something that is not supported or is even refuted by the Bible.  In effect they say their prophet or priest is right and the Bible is wrong. Many times they end up changing the Bible to fit their revelation. Now that’s the progression of false religion.  And that’s exactly what these Pharisees were doing.  They had added to the law, until their law superseded the law of God.

But notice the progression of faith of the man who was formerly blind.  Vs.17 the Pharisees ask him, “What do you say about Him, since He opened your eyes?” And he said, “He is a prophet.”  Now I don’t know if he was being obtuse or that simply was the limit of his knowledge.  But I will say  that even in the language of the ordinary people, the word “prophet” did not mean simply a predictor of events in the future, but one who spoke the words of God. He was not just  a “fore-teller,” but a “forth-teller,” declaring God’s truth, revealing His will and character, bearing the witness of divine works.  

Now that was a major claim of Christ Himself, that He spoke the words of God.  That His word was the truth of God.  At the beginning of the feast He said in John 7:16-18 “My teaching is not Mine, but His who sent Me. 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. 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.”

And as I said a few weeks ago, that is the way you can tell a true prophet of God, or a true preacher of the gospel, or a false teacher.  A true prophet speaks God’s word.  It’s just that simple.  That is why I preach verse by verse here.  It’s not that I couldn’t buy my sermons online like a lot of guys do, complete with sentimental illustrations and funny jokes.  That’s easy.  Anyone can do that.  But to preach the word of God is not always easy. It’s certainly not always popular.  But it’s what we are commissioned to do.  Not to tickle people’s ears.  But to teach the truth.  That’s the primary purpose for our church service.  It’s to meditate on the word, to be taught the word.  Everything else is just icing on the cake.  The music is icing on the cake.  Too many churches today only offer whipped cream icing, and there’s nothing substantial underneath.  So you get a sugar rush on Sunday morning, and then crash on Monday.

But I wouldn’t be surprised if this man didn’t know a fair bit of theology.  I wouldn’t be surprised if he wasn’t thinking of Moses when he said Jesus was a prophet.  Moses said in Deut. 18:15 “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your countrymen, you shall listen to him.”  Moses was talking about the Messiah.  So I wouldn’t be surprised if this former blind man realized at this point that Jesus was the Christ, that is the Messiah.

Now there is another group that we see in the text.  And that is his parents.  The Pharisees go after this man’s parents.  They probably were disgusted with the former blind man’s answers, so they go to his parents to try to discredit him somehow.  And this is where I get additional support for my idea that the blind man was thinking of the Messiah when he said prophet.  Because it says in vs.22, that his parents were aware that the Pharisees had stipulated that if anyone said Jesus was the Christ, they would be put out of the synagogue.  And so they avoid that question.  They answer in the affirmative the Pharisees first two questions concerning whether or not he was their son, and if he was indeed born blind.  But the third question, “How does he now see?”  They didn’t want to answer that question.  And the reason is there was a good possibility that the son had said that Jesus was the Christ.  They want to avoid having to confess that for fear of being kicked out of the synagogue.  So they say, “he is of age, ask him.”  So we can assume that this man’s faith is steadily progressing throughout the day.  He has grown from confessing the man Jesus, to be a prophet, to be the Christ, which is the Greek word for Messiah.  And all along he is steadfastly refusing to budge in his faith in Jesus regardless of the criticism and the mounting hostility. 

So having got nothing from his parents, the Pharisees call the man back in for questioning.  They are like a bull terrier, they won’t let go until they find something.  This time, they ratchet up the indictments from saying Jesus couldn’t be of God because He broke the Sabbath, to saying that He was a sinner.  

So the former blind man at this point turns the tables and starts to teach the teachers.  And he gives a really great rebuttal to these Pharisees.  His greatest point is made in vs 25, as he replies, “Whether He is a sinner, I do not know; one thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”  This is the evidence that they were too blind to see.  This is the evidence that Jesus was who He said He was.  And this is the evidence that we need to show the world that does not know Christ.  Like the line from the hymn Amazing Grace, “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see.”  

That is the testimony we need to tell the world.  The world can’t refute the testimony of a changed life.  When you were living in sin, when you were a drunkard, when you were a partier, an adulterer, a fornicator, a liar, a thief, whatever you were, by the grace of God you are not any more.  You are brand new.  You are remade.  You are different.  You were once blind, but now you can see.  That kind of testimony cannot be argued against.  We can have a debate until the cows come home about evolution versus creation.  We can argue about the existence of God, and the existence of evil.  And there may never be any agreement, and there will probably never be anyone saved as a result of your apologetics.  But the transformation of your life is indisputable.  That is the trophy of grace that God holds up to the world.  That is why sanctification is an essential part of your progression of faith.  That is why renunciation of sin is essential in the life of a believer.  That is why it’s essential that though you come to Christ as you are, you do not stay as you are.  If you are in Christ, you have become a new creature, you’ve been made free.  Act as free men and women.  Free from not only the penalty of sin, but from the power of sin.  Then you will be free indeed and others will see that you are free.  

So in vs. 33, this man makes yet another step in the progression of his faith, he says, “If this man were not from God, He could do nothing.”  He’s teaching the teachers here.  And in the process, his own faith is growing exponentially.  That’s what happens when you start putting your faith in practice, by the way.  When you start teaching, or preaching, you start growing spiritually.  I don’t necessarily mean preaching professionally.  But when you start professing your faith to others, it serves to build your faith personally.  

Well, they kick this man out of the synagogue.  They excommunicate him. Listen, in that day that was a pretty serious deal.  That meant he might not be able to even find work in his community.  He was a social outcast.  His own family would not be able to communicate with him.  That was a very traumatic thing.  And I will just add that is something I see happen quite often.  Someone comes to Christ, and before the glow can start to fade off their face they end up getting sideswiped by someone.  They end up having to choose between a boyfriend or girlfriend or Christ.  They have to chose between family and Christ.  They have to choose between a career or following Christ.  And you know, we could blame that on the devil trying to trip them up.  But I think God wants us to make a decision to put Him first, above everything else.  I think God may sometimes put a choice in front of you.  Are you going to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and will all your might?  Or are you going to love the world and the things of the world.  If you chose the world, the love of the Father is not in you.  Choose carefully ladies and gentlemen.  What does it profit a man if he should gain the whole world and lose his own soul?

Listen, sometimes getting kicked out of your community is the best thing that can happen to you.  Like the slaves on the plantations, they weren’t really free until they left the place of their bondage.  Sometimes going back to what is familiar is just going back into bondage.  Jesus came to make you free.  And that was the case with this man.  He was excommunicated, and that was a good thing.  Because Jesus came and found him in his solitude.  And Jesus revealed Himself to him in a way that completed this man’s faith like very few had found.  Jesus said in vs.35, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” He answered, “Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?” Jesus said to him, “You have both seen Him, and He is the one who is talking with you.”And he said, “Lord, I believe.” And he worshiped Him.”

This blind man saw, and kept on seeing, until he saw the reality of the Son of God.  He saw Jesus for who He really was.  Lot’s of people in that day saw Jesus with their natural eyes.  But God gave this man spiritual vision.  He gave him the privilege of seeing who Jesus really was.  The Messiah, the Son of God, the Lord.  

That aspect of Christ’s divinity is one that is sorely lacking today.  Some think that Lord is a proper name of Jesus.  But actually it’s a title.  It means ruler, master, owner of all.  I believe in the necessity of the lordship of Jesus Christ. Where we bow our will to HIs will.  Where we stop serving ourselves and start serving Him.  This is an essential part of the progression of your faith.  You cannot stop with just believing.  You can’t stop with just forgiveness.  But if you continue in His word, then you are truly disciples.  And you shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free.  You cannot be truly a disciple, you cannot be truly free, until you bow to Jesus as Lord of your life.  All your life submitted and in subjection to the Lord of the Universe.  The Lord of Creation.  This man understood that.  And so he worshipped Jesus.  I believe that indicates that he bowed on his knees before Christ, maybe even prostrated himself on the ground in front of Christ.  And notice that Christ did not reject that worship.  Because He is God, and worthy of our worship.  

Listen, worship is not just singing or listening to music.  Worship is bowing before the Lord and doing His will, renouncing your will, renouncing everything and everyone for the surpassing value of knowing Jesus as Lord.  

Finally, notice Jesus last statement.  John 9:39-41  “For judgment I came into this world, so that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may become blind.” Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things and said to Him, “We are not blind too, are we?”  Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.”

What judgment did Jesus render? I’ll let His words speak for themselves.  Jesus said in John 3:17-21  “For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”

Today enough light has been revealed through Jesus Christ to expose your sin.  To show you your need for spiritual healing, to show you your need to be made free.  If you will but confess your sins, Jesus is faithful and just to forgive you of your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness.  He is able to make you free.  And if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.   But many of us are not really free. Many of us are still in bondage to our sin, still living under the power of sin. Today the invitation is given to be made free indeed.  Confess Jesus as Lord today  and He will make you free.  

Today is the Lord’s Day.  It is the day when Christians worship the Lord.  It is the day set aside each week to honor Jesus Christ, who laid down His life for us so that we might be truly free. Jesus Himself said, “Greater love has no man than this, that a man lays down his life for his friends.” The remarkable thing about Christ’s sacrifice is that He did not just lay down His life for His friends, but He laid down His life for His enemies.  Romans 5:8 says, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”Jesus said He did not come to save the righteous, but sinners.  Sinners are by definition the enemy of God who is holy and righteous.

The essential fact of the gospel that is so often missed however, is that all men are sinners.  Romans 3:10 says, ”THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;  THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS,THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;  ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS;THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD,THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.”  That’s the bad news.

The good news however, is found just a couple of chapters later in Romans 5:8 which I read to you a moment ago;  “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

But a lot of people are so offended at hearing Romans 3:10 that they never get to know the benefits of Romans 5:8.  They are so offended that the Bible says that all men are condemned because of their sinfulness, that they never come to know the salvation that is offered through Christ’s death as our substitute.  But the fact is, that if you do not acknowledge your need for forgiveness from your sins, and trust in Christ’s atonement on the cross as the propitiation for your sins, then you cannot know the freedom from condemnation that comes through salvation.

Now that is really the crux of the passage we have before us today. This exchange between the Jewish leaders and Jesus which is recorded here for us is due to the fact that the Jewish leadership trusted in their own righteousness and rejected salvation through Christ. As a matter of review,  Jesus had been preaching in the temple for a week at this point, during the weeklong celebration known as the Feast of Tabernacles.  And He has presented through many different messages the truth of the gospel.  That truth simply stated was that He is the Messiah, the Son of God, the eternal God come to Earth in human form, so that men might have the spiritual life that God offers to them that believe in Him.

And Jesus has used a couple of metaphors to illustrate that truth,  which we have looked at in detail in previous weeks. In the first metaphor He says He is the source of living water which if anyone drinks of, out of their innermost being will spring up living water. Then His other incredible claim is that He was the light of the world, and that the world was in darkness, but for those that follow Him, they will have the light of life.  In both of those metaphors, Jesus is teaching that He is the source of life, abundant life through the Spirit of God, and He gives it to those who believe in Him.

But at every point that Jesus makes in His messages during the Feast, the Jewish religious leaders want to find fault with Him and argue over some technicality.  And at the heart of their response is their fervent belief that they did not need a spiritual Savior.  They believed that they were inherently good people.  They were obviously very religious people.  They thought that they knew what the scriptures taught.  They thought that they had been given entry into the kingdom of God through their heritage and that they insured it by their adherence to certain laws such as circumcision and keeping the Sabbath. 

In many respects, they were not unlike many Americans today.  According to a recent Pew Research survey, 70% of Americans claim to be Christians.  They believe in God.  They go to church on somewhat of a regular basis.  They believe in the golden rule.  They have a few Bibles in their possession.  They are what we would call “good people.”  And the real danger for these people is that they have never come face to face with their sinfulness and as such have rejected the idea that they need a Savior.

This was the predicament of the Jews who listened to Jesus that day.  He had told them repeatedly that He had come from the Father in heaven and as such had been doing the works of the Father and speaking the words of the Father, shining the light of the truth unto the world so that men might have life.  But they had repeatedly rejected His claims. Therefore Jesus says in vs. 21, “I go away, and you will seek Me, and will die in your sin; where I am going, you cannot come.”

Their response is that of disdain, again missing the significance of what He is preaching, and focusing instead on trying to discredit Him.  So they respond with dripping sarcasm, “Surely He will not kill Himself, will He, since He says, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come’?”  I think there is even a hint in their response of their intention to kill Him, but they phrase it as if He will commit suicide.  Suicide by the way in Jewish culture of that period, was considered the most egregious sin, and they believed that the bottom level of Hades was reserved for those who committed suicide.  

The question must be asked – why do they have such hatred towards Christ?  I’ll tell you the answer. It’s the same answer that Jesus gave for their hatred in John 7:7, He says, “[the world] hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.” It’s the same hatred we see vented towards those who proclaim the truth today; it’s because of the conviction of sin.  If you dare call anyone a sinner today, or suggest that the Bible condemns certain activities as sinful, then you are going to be the object of intense hatred.  And by the way, this doesn’t just come from atheists, it also comes from those claiming Christianity.  The late Bishop Desmond Tutu said that he would rather spend eternity in hell than a minute in a homophobic heaven. Well, he just might have gotten his wish. Because that statement reveals his hatred towards God. Jesus said that God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.  That means that God gets to make the rules, not us.  We must worship who He is, and not who we want Him to be.  The world does not get to define God.  God has defined Himself in His word.  And we must love God more than we love the world. 1John 2:15-16 says, “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.”

The essential principle that Bishop Tutu fails to understand is that God’s law is a reflection of God’s nature. It is how He reveals His holiness.  I read another quote by Bishop Tutu in which he said, “We may be surprised at the people we find in heaven. God has a soft spot for sinners. His standards are quite low.”  I have news for him,  God’s standards are anything but low.  God’s standard is absolute perfection.  And there is only one person that has been able to meet God’s standard, and that is Jesus Christ.  All the rest of mankind is dead in their trespasses and sin. That is why Jesus says three times in this passage, “you will die in your sins.” Unless you repent and call in faith upon Jesus Christ – that is the only way for your sin to be forgiven.  

And listen, your sin is not forgiven because God just decided one day to get with it – just go along with the culture and forget about all that sin stuff,  just live and let live.  No, God still counts sin.  God did not do away with the requirements of the law.  Jesus kept every law perfectly so that He might be the blameless, spotless Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  No, God didn’t stop counting sin, He just counted it against Christ.  He transferred our sin upon Jesus and beat Him for it with a whip within an inch of death.  He transferred our sin upon His Holy Righteous Only Begotten Son, and pounded nails into His hands and feet and let Him hang on a rough cross for hours bleeding to death.  He transferred our sin upon Jesus and let Him die and descend into Hades to pay the penalty for sin.  He transferred our sin upon Jesus so He could pay the price of our sin, and only when His justice was satisfied could He transfer Christ’s righteousness upon us.  God’s standards are anything but low.  No one comes to heaven, to the Father, except through Jesus Christ and by His righteousness alone.

So in spite of their unbelief and sarcasm,  once again Jesus shows compassion by restating His warning to the religious leaders. In vs.23 He says, “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.”  

Now what Christ has done is give a litmus test of sorts for belonging to the kingdom of heaven.  That was the primary message of Christ.  He was preaching about the kingdom of heaven.  And the Jewish leaders recognized that the requirement of citizenship was righteousness.  So Jesus is in effect giving a litmus test for righteousness.  He says they are of the world, and as such they are still in their sins, and they will suffer the consequences of that sin, which is death.  How do you know whether someone is of the world or of heaven?  How do you recognize those belonging to the kingdom of darkness, and those belonging to the kingdom of heaven?  I mean, anyone can claim to be of the kingdom of heaven, can’t they?  People all over the world claim to be of the kingdom of heaven.  We already said that 70% of Americans claim to be Christians, that is, belonging to the kingdom of heaven.  So how do you know? What is the evidence? 

Well, to find out the truth, I’m not going to quote Desmond Tutu, but instead quote the Apostle John once again.  As we read earlier, 1John 2:15-16 says, “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.”

And Paul says virtually the same thing, that those who are of the world set their mind on worldly things.  In Phil. 3:18-19 he says,  “For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ,  whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.”

That’s the litmus test.  If you love the world, if your focus is on worldly things, if your passions are in the world, if your pride is in the things of the world, then you are of the world.  You cannot serve God and mammon.  That’s why James says, show me your faith by your works.  Show me.  Don’t tell me.  You say you have faith, but show me your faith.  Faith is not an intellectual exercise, by which we gain heaven.  Faith is an exercise by which the will of heaven is worked out in my life.  Where God’s will supersedes our will.  Faith is praying, “Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

That’s the litmus test.  That is why Jesus was able to point to His works as the litmus test that proved He was sent from God.  Three times in this little passage He says that He does the works of God, as evidence that He is not of this world, but of God.  Look at vs.26, “the things which I heard from Him, these I speak to the world.”  Then again in vs.28, “I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me.” And third, vs.29, “I always do the things that are pleasing to Him.”

It’s noteworthy that Jesus categorizes things in threes. Three times He says “You will die in your sins.”  And three times Jesus says He does the works of God. The principle is clear; if you are of the world, then you will die in your sins.  If you do the works of God, then it’s evident that you are of the kingdom of heaven.

 Now I hope no one here today tries to weasel out of this principle of your works being evidence of where your heart is by saying that Jesus did the works of God, but grace makes us free to do whatever we want. Grace is the means by which our guilt and punishment are expunged. And grace is the means by which we are given the Holy Spirit to lead us in paths of righteousness. But all through the New Testament we are told to imitate Christ.   Peter said in 1Peter 1:15-16  “but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior;  because it is written, “YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.”  And again in 1Peter 2:21 he says, “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.” We are to follow the pattern that Jesus laid down for us. That is what it means to be a disciple by the way.  We follow the pattern of Christ. As He did, so do we.  That’s what Jesus is saying in vs.31, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine.”  To continue in His word is to continue in obedience to His word.

And Paul also makes it clear in Ephesians that we are saved to do the works of Christ. Eph. 2:10 “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” So the principle that Jesus is teaching is clear, how you live illustrates where your citizenship is.  Is your citizenship in heaven?  Then you will be about your Father’s business.  A ceremonial tip of the hat once every couple of weeks is not indicative of where your citizenship is.  Jesus said in Luke 12:34  “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

You know what disturbs me though is when Christians, who have been set free from the enslavement to the world by the death of Christ, try to keep one foot in the world and one foot in the kingdom of God.  They claim to be a citizen of heaven, but their priorities are all about the world. Everything seems to take priority over the things of God. I worry about such people. 

That reminds me of the prophet Elijah, who seeing the double mindedness of the Israelites, who worshipped the idols of the world while claiming to be the people of God.  And so he cries out to them in 1 Kings 18, “How long will you hesitate between two opinions?  If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.”  If you say you are the Lord’s people, then serve the Lord with your whole heart.  But if you are people of the world, then continue to serve the world.  But don’t think you can live in two places at once.

Well, back in our text, the Jews respond to Jesus’ words with more sarcasm, more condescension, saying “Who are You?”  In a more modern way of speaking they may have said, “Who do you think You are? We have to believe in You or we die in our sins?  Just who do You think You are?”  That question was obviously intended to be sarcasm as well, but nevertheless, Jesus responds to them by saying, “What have I been saying to you from the beginning?” 

What had He been saying from the beginning?  Well, let’s remember what Jesus has said so far;  that He was the Messiah, He was the Son of God, He was the resurrection and the life, He was the Temple of God, that God has given Him the power to execute all judgment, that He is the source of eternal life,  that He was the one of whom Moses wrote, that He was the bread of life which came down out of heaven, that He has seen the Father, that He had the words of eternal life, that He was the supply of the water of life, and that He was the light of the world.  I think it’s pretty clear who He was.

But since they asked, Jesus gives them another clue.  In vs 28 He says, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me.”  Now what is Jesus referring to in this statement?  I believe that He is speaking of going to the cross, being lifted up as the serpent was lifted up on the pole in the wilderness.  Jesus is saying, when you see Me lifted up on the cross, then you will know that I am He.  

What a tremendous statement.  Not only was His life indicative of His deity, and not only was His words indicative of His deity, but His sacrifice for sinners was the ultimate indication of His deity.  The crucifixion was the expression of God’s love for the world.  And the magnanimity of that act revealed a love that could only be that of God. I’m reminded of the centurion who seeing Jesus give up His Spirit on the cross said, “Truly this was the Son of God!”

But sadly, many of those who were debating with Him would still not recognize Him even when He was lifted up.  They should have seen the parallel with the serpent in the wilderness which Moses lifted up for the healing of sting of vipers upon the Israelites.  And they should have understood that the serpent on a pole symbolized that there would come One who would be lifted up on a pole for the healing of the sins of the world. And perhaps some did make that connection  during the crucifixion such as the centurion.  But as I have pointed out before, I believe that by the time of the crucifixion, the scribes and Pharisees and the priesthood not only knew that He was the Son of God, but they deliberately, purposefully put Him to death because they hated Him so much by that point that their hatred had blinded them.

And that is born out by the fact that He says, when I am lifted up, then you will know that I am He.  Now in the Greek there is not the pronoun He. It is simply “that I Am.”  And many theologians suggest that He is making a direct reference to the same “I AM that I AM” which spoke to Moses out of the burning bush.  This is the name that God gave Moses to tell the Israelites and Pharaoh who it was that gave him his authority.  It was the name of God that refused conventional definitions.  So in answer to the Jews question of “Who are You?”  Jesus  answered, “When you see Me lifted up, then you will know that I am the I AM.” He is telling them who He is in terms that they were very familiar with.  

See, for the Jews, Moses was their guy.  He was the greatest prophet.  In fact, the Sadducees only recognized the writings of Moses, nothing else.  So it’s interesting that in every evidence that Jesus gives to His deity He uses something that happened during the life of Moses.  He was the source of water from the rock.  He was the manna from heaven.  He was the pillar of fire over the tabernacle.  He was the serpent lifted up on the tree.  And He was the I AM from the burning bush.  Yet these champions of the law of Moses would not accept what He was saying, because they believed that  they were justified by the law of Moses.  

But Paul tells us that the law was not given to be a stepladder to heaven.  But the  law was given to be a tutor to lead us to Christ.  The law was given so that our sin became even more sinful.  Even more apparent.  But when Jesus showed them that, in the Sermon on the Mount for instance, then they became indignant, and rejected the idea that they were sinners.  And that disdain of the need for forgiveness would condemn them to die in their sins.

From our perspective though it should be clear, that Jesus was not only sent from God to be all the things that we stated earlier like the light of the world, and the source of eternal life, etc, but the characteristic that really completes the picture is that He is the Savior of the world.  This is the basis for John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.  “For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”  

Hebrews 1:3 says that Jesus is the exact representation of God. So as Jesus declares that He is Savior, it completes the picture. It completes the picture of God.  God is holy, righteous and just.  God is the judge of the earth.  God is the source of life.  And God is also the Savior of the world because God loved the world.  He loved His creation.  But for God’s love to be enacted, His justice had to be satisfied.  God’s law had to be upheld.  And so God sent Jesus to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God through Christ.  

Well, for a few people in Jesus’ hearing that day, the light suddenly came on.  They saw the light of the truth.  So it says in vs.30 that as He spoke these things, many came to believe in Him.  I can only pray that someone here today has suddenly had the light of truth dawn in their hearts.  You recognize that you are a sinner in need of a Savior.  And perhaps you have come to believe that Jesus Christ is the sinless Son of God who gave Himself in your place on the cross so that you might be saved.  If that is you, then simply call on Jesus to save you, believing in all that He says He is, and God promises that He  will transfer you  from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of heaven.  You will become a citizen of heaven, but even more than that, you will be made a son of God by adoption.  And as the result of that adoption, you are guaranteed an inheritance in glory and eternal life.  I pray that today will be the day of your salvation.   

In this section of scripture, John records for us the highlights of what transpired on the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles, and in that context, a few various remarks from those in attendance.  And though it’s possible to give a running commentary on those various statements and try to tie them together into a sermon of sorts, I wanted instead to focus on primarily one statement of Jesus found in vs.37-39, which I believe is the main point of Christ’s message.

In this declaration, Jesus stood up in the middle of the Feast of Tabernacles, also known as the Feast of Booths and shouted out this statement in a loud voice.  Now this was a shocking thing that Jesus did at a very strategic moment.  But in order that you might get the full import of what happened, let me tell you a little about the Feast of Tabernacles which will help us to understand the context.

There were three great feasts which were mandatory for every male in the vicinity of Jerusalem to participate in; the Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles.  The Feast of Tabernacles is described in Leviticus 23.  That feast occurred in the 7th month, and began on the 15th day, and lasted 8 days, from Sabbath to Sabbath.  In this feast, the Jews were required to make huts or booths or tabernacles from green leaved branches, and to dwell in them during the week, so that they might commemorate the deliverance of Israel from bondage in Egypt, when they wandered in the wilderness.  It was to be a joyous feast, a time of rejoicing.  

One of the special ceremonies involved in the feast was on the last day, the priest would go to the Pool of Siloam, and dip a golden pitcher in the water and bring it back through the Water Gate to the altar.  As all the people gathered together, the trumpets would sound, and He then would pour the water into a basin which would run down through pipes to the altar.  This was to signify the water which flowed from the rock when the Israelites suffered from thirst in the wilderness.  

It was at just this point, when all the people are gathered together, and the trumpets had just sounded, and the priest lifted the pitcher of water and the water gushed down upon the altar, that Jesus stood up and shouted in a very loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’”

Now that certainly was guaranteed to get everyone’s attention, wasn’t it?  I can imagine that everyone stopped and turned and stared incredulously at Jesus shouting out in the middle of this ceremony. So I want to examine this incredible declaration this morning and see what we can learn from it and how we can apply it to our lives.  Because, though the context of Christ’s statement was made during the Feast of Tabernacles, the truth of His words are just as pertinent for us today.  

The first phrase that I would make note of this morning is “if anyone is thirsty…”  The correlation between the murmuring of the Israelites in the wilderness when they became thirsty for water and Christ’s invitation at the Feast should be apparent.  God led the Israelites into the wilderness, and fed them with manna from heaven in the morning, and quail in the evening.  He provided a cloud to guide them by day and a pillar of fire by night.  He gave them victory over their enemies, and delivered them from slavery.  And yet He allowed them to become thirsty so that they began to cry out. 

Now why did God allow the Israelites to become thirsty?  I would suggest that it was to make them to look to God and to recognize their need for  God.  I would remind you that Israel is a picture of the church.  And sometimes God allows us to suffer thirst as well. I would go so far as to suggest that if there were not difficulties or crises in our life, then there would be little if any times of spiritual growth.  In fact, many people would never come to Christ at all if a crises did not first bring them to their knees. Though the grace of God provides all things for us to enjoy, and gives us life, and breath and health and many such things which we all too often take for granted, yet God causes us to become thirsty for that which satisfies the soul.  

Men and women are continually seeking that which can never satisfy, which can never quench the burning thirst that all men feel in their soul.  We may try to satisfy our soul’s thirst with physical things, material things, but nothing on earth can satisfy the longing of our heart. Pascal, the French philosopher said there is a God sized hole in our hearts that only He can fill.  And Solomon in Ecclesiastes 3:11 identifies that emptiness by saying that God has set eternity in their hearts.

It’s interesting that when Jesus said “out of his innermost being,” or literally, “out of his belly” He used a word in the Greek which is “koilia”, from the root word “koîlos” which means hollow, or cavity.  St. Augustine spoke of this very thing, when he said, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”  

And yet still man does not seek for that which satisfies, but attempts to slake his thirst by things which can never satisfy.  In Isaiah 55, God says, “Why do you spend money for what is not bread, and your wages for what does not satisfy?”  The world today is desperately searching for something that will fill the void in their life, something that will satisfy the thirsting of their soul, and yet as the old country song says, they are “looking for love in all the wrong places.”  

I would suggest that is because man does not naturally seek the Lord. Romans 3:10-11 says, “as it is written,’THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;  THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS,THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD.’”  Unless God stirs the heart, unless God brings conviction, unless God brings a person to a place of hungering and thirsting for righteousness, then man will continually seek to fill that void with things that can never satisfy his soul, and if he should die without the water of life in him, then he will be forever spiritually dead.

In Israel’s case, they had known the goodness of the Lord, and as a type of the church, we might say that they were a picture of the saved.  But yet they turned back to the worthless and elemental things, they lusted after those things which they had been delivered from in Egypt, and as such God was not pleased with them.  

I cannot leave this first question, without asking you this morning – what are you thirsting for?  Does your soul thirst for God?  Can you say like the author of Psalm 42, “As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God;

When shall I come and appear before God?”  The answer to the question, “are you a believer” or “are you a Christian,” is much over claimed I am afraid.  I think the answer is better evidenced than spoken.  And if you are not thirsting for God, for the living God, the living water, if you are not coming to fellowship with God at every opportunity, whether corporately or privately, then I would suggest that the evidence shows your desire is set on things of earth and not things of heaven.  

Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are those that hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”  If you find yourself in that state of the prodigal son, having grown tired of the husks and pods of the world which cannot fill the need of your soul, then Jesus said, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.”  That is the next phrase I would like to think about for a moment.  Let him come to Jesus.  

Listen, all the thirsting of your soul cannot be slaked by anything, nor in anyone but Christ.  He is the Living Water, which as He said to the woman of the well in chapter 4; “whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”

Coming to Jesus is the same as believing in Jesus.  If the sovereign call and conviction of God causes the spirit of man to thirst for righteousness, then coming to Jesus is the response of man.  No man can come to God unless the Lord draws him, but yet man must come. He must believe.  This is the doctrine of both the election of God and the responsibility of man.  Both are necessary.

So if you are thirsty, you must come to Christ. The reason that nothing else can satisfy the longing of the soul except for Jesus is because He is the source of life; John 1:3 says, “All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.”  He is the sustainer of life; according to Hebrews 1:3, “And He is the radiance of [God’s] glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power.” And thirdly, He is the Spirit of Life; Romans 8:2, 9-11  “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. … 9 However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.  If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”

This is what Jesus had been trying to make clear to the people gathered in the temple that day.  He began by saying that He was teaching the word of God in vs.16, that He was sent from God in vs.28, that He knows God because He is from God, in vs.29, and in a little while He is going back to the Father in vs.33.  So to come to Christ is to believe in Him, that as John says in chapter 1, He was in the beginning with God, and He was God, and all things were made by Him, and He came into the world, and the world did not receive Him, and after He rose from the dead He ascended back into heaven to sit down at the right hand of God.  So in effect, Jesus is restating the same message He gave in Galilee in chapter 6, vs. 29 Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.”  And that believing in Him is equated to coming to Him. Vs. 37 “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out.”

This idea of coming to the Messiah as the source of life is found in the Old Testament in Isaiah 55:1 “Ho! Every one who thirsts, come to the waters; And you who have no money come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost.”  This is the invitation of Christ to all men everywhere and at every time as stated in Matthew 11:28-30  “Come unto Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”  

Let me ask you a question this morning – are you weary yet?  Are you weary of the rat race, are you weary of searching for peace, are you weary of searching for what might satisfy your soul?  Come to Jesus.  Unload your burdens at His feet.  Let Him have your sins and your sorrows.  Let Him bear your burdens.  And He will give you rest.  He will give you rest when you finally reach the place where you are ready to fully surrender  to Him.  Don’t hold anything back.  But lay it all down, all your sins, all your striving, all your works,  your pride,  lay it down at the cross and find that Jesus has paid it all, and provided all that you will ever need. And in Him you will find rest for your soul. 

There is one more important element though in Jesus’ invitation.  And that is drink.  Come to Him and drink.  And I suggest that to drink of Christ means to trust Christ.  That means to follow Him, to live for Him, to leave all that you have in order to be His disciple. You could realize this morning that you are very thirsty. And  I could offer you a glass of water.  You could believe that I have a glass of water in my hand.  But until you drink of it, you will not be satisfied.  Drinking of Christ is the same idea as we saw in the last chapter with eating His flesh.  It is appropriating the truth about Christ for yourself and acting upon it.  Listen, saving faith is active faith.  Abraham believed God so he left Ur of the Chaldees, not knowing where he was going, and he went out to the place God told him to go.  Abraham believed in the promise of God that He would produce an offspring from Isaac through whom the world would be blessed, and so he offered his son upon the altar. There is no separation between active trust and faith.  

In theological terms, there are three aspects of saving faith; notitia which means knowledge; assensus, which means assent or agreement; and fiducia, which means trust.  And we see all three in this invitation; knowledge that you are thirsty and cannot find satisfaction, assent is coming to Jesus, believing that He is the source of life, and trust, drinking from the fountain of life which is Christ, being willing to submit to His will and renounce your own.  That is saving faith.  Faith is not just intellectual.  Not just knowledge of a few Bible facts.  Not just believing that He lived 2000 years ago.  But believing that in Him is life, that His words are life.  And then entrusting your life to Him, even if that means forsaking all that you hold dear, all that you hold onto for security.  Trusting Him and obeying Him.

Then what is the promise for those that know that they are thirsty, who come to Jesus and drink of His fountain?  The answer is found in vs.38, “He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’” Now this is an interesting statement.  Jesus has just likened Himself to a stream of living water which gives eternal life to all who drink of Him.  And now He is saying, that to those who believe in Him, they also shall have living water springing up out of their soul.  Now how should we interpret that?  

Well, to start with look at the next verse.  John gives us some commentary in vs.39 so that we might know what He is speaking of. “But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”  So we know that the rivers of living water that flow from the believer will be of the Holy Spirit, which at that time was not known because Jesus had not ascended into heaven and sent to the saints His Spirit. 

In John 15:26 Jesus tells the disciples prior to His crucifixion, that  “When the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, that is the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify about Me.”  And Jesus elaborates on that statement further in the next chapter, John 16:13-14  “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you.”

So what Jesus is promising is that for those that believe in Him unto salvation, He will give them the Spirit to live in their soul, so that we might know the words of  Christ, that we might do the works of Christ, and so that we might be like Christ.  That is the goal of our salvation, is it not?  That we might be united with Christ, so that we might do the works of Christ, and that we might be conformed to the image of Christ.

Folks, do not be deceived by those that misrepresent the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  He came to give us life, and without His indwelling presence, we do not have life. Romans 8:9, “But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.” We cannot be saved unless we are born again by the Spirit.  We cannot have life unless the Spirit of Life gives us life.  And we cannot do the works of God unless we have the Spirit of Christ that flows from our innermost being. 

Listen to the prophecy of Ezekiel 36:24-27  “For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.” 

The Spirit of God not only is the agent of regeneration, but He is the agent of activation, whereby we desire to do the works of God. He is the power that enables us to walk in His statues, and keep His ordinances.  He is the power filling us and flowing from within us which empowers us to do the will of God. And so we become the channel by which the living water is offered to the world.  

The maturity of a believer is marked by becoming a channel by which the gifts of the Spirit are used for the edification of the body of Christ.  For the building up of the body.  For the water of life that flows from you to those who are thirsty, even to those who are lost.  

Listen, the goal of Christianity isn’t so that you are set up for success, and have all your material needs met, and fulfill all your physical goals, so that you are fulfilled and satisfied.  No, the goal of maturity in Christ is coming to a place where the fruits of the Spirit are utilized to bring life to the world around you. That you become like Christ, doing the work of Christ.  Reaching  the lost with the water of life, refreshing the body with the water of Christ which flows through you and out of you.  Jesus didn’t die on the cross so that you might dam up the water and keep it all to yourself, but so that it might flow from Him to you, through you, to another and so spread to all the world.  You are to be a conduit for the works of the Spirit, not a culdesac. 

I’m not going to prolong the sermon this morning expounding the remainder of the text.  I believe that it is fairly straightforward and as such should be easily understood.  But I do want to leave you today with an admonition – to examine what you are thirsty for.  What is your soul thirsting for? Is it thirsting for material gain, or for physical fulfillment, are you searching this world over for things that will never truly satisfy?  I hope not.  I hope that someone here today recognizes perhaps for the first time that they are thirsty for righteousness.  They long to be forgiven, to know freedom from the captivity of sin that they are held by.  And for that person I say, Come to Jesus.  Drink from the living water.  He will give you rest. He will satisfy your longing and give life to your soul.

And also a word to the saints, to those who already have claimed to come to know Jesus, and have believed on Him.  I would remind you of the Israelites who murmured and complained in the wilderness because they were thirsty.  God supplied all their needs, and delivered them from so much, and yet they found themselves thirsty because they turned back in their hearts to the flesh pots of Egypt, and so God brought them to a place of thirst.  

My question for you believers this morning; are you thirsting once again for things of the world?  Have you lost your first love, and turned back to those elemental things from which you were once delivered?  They could never satisfy you then, you think they will satisfy you now?  Are you not supposed to be growing in the grace of God so that the living water flows out of you and brings life to others who are thirsting?  Has your appetite for the world overshadowed your usefulness as a channel for God?  I hope that you will reconsider your appetites.  David prayed for the Lord to renew a right spirit within Him.  A broken and contrite heart He will not despise.  Present your bodies to God as a living and holy sacrifice, and He will once again cause your innermost being to flow forth with rivers of living water, that you might be the source of blessing to others, even as Christ is the source of all blessing for you.

I think that quite often, the greatest difficulty in living the Christian life is being able to distinguish between the physical and the spiritual realities of our faith.  By that I mean, how does God operate in the physical realm, and how does God operate in the spiritual realm, and by extension, how are we to operate in both?  I have said from this pulpit repeatedly, that every physical healing or miracle presented in the gospels, is given to illustrate a spiritual principle.  For instance, what I mean by that is  when Jesus healed the paralyzed man, spiritually speaking He was giving life to that which was dead, so that it illustrated spiritual new life in Christ.  I hope we can all agree with that.

But let’s take that principle and work it out more thoroughly and I think you will realize it’s difficulty.  Does that mean then that God is not concerned as much about the physical as He is the spiritual?  Does the fact that we do not see paralyzed people restored to full use of their limbs today emblematic of the fact that the blessings of the kingdom of God are primarily spiritual?  Is it wrong  then to expect to expect faith to produce physical healing? Are miracles something that we should expect in this new life in Christ?  Or does being a Christian mean we find spiritual life which transcends physical difficulties?  And even if that is true, does that mean that all physical difficulties must simply be endured in suffering until we one day die and then in the resurrection given a new body?  Is our hope only in the resurrection? 

I don’t know if I can fully answer all those questions in our study today.  But I will truthfully say that I ask myself many of those questions on an ongoing basis.  I am quite familiar with all the arguments and doctrines on both sides of all those questions.  But in practice, in day to day living, I still find myself asking where is the line of demarcation between the physical world we live in, and the spiritual kingdom we belong to.  And I must confess that for me it is a daily struggle to walk that line and live within it’s limitations.  

But I believe that this question of the spiritual and the physical characteristics of the kingdom of God is exactly what Jesus is teaching in this passage.  And yet it is still difficult at times to understand precisely the limits of what our salvation qualifies us to expect.  And to be quite frank, even Jesus Himself seems at times to deliberately leave us with some questions unanswered even as He is teaching us the principles.  

The question though which is quite clearly presented in this passage is – what constitutes the kingdom of God? How do we understand it, grab hold of it, appropriate it from the spiritual realm into the physical realm and what does that look like?  And I think we find a key to answering this question in vs.15, as the people wished to make Christ king in response to His miracles, and yet Jesus obviously does not want that to happen, and so He withdraws from the crowd and disappears to the mountain alone, only to remerge walking across the storm tossed lake in the middle of the night and then arriving at the opposite shore, leaving the multitudes to try to figure out where He went.  

Now that would be almost comical if it were not such a serious issue.  Imagine a preacher today becoming so popular that the people want to make him president of the United States.  Most of us would think that would be a great opportunity.  Christians seem to think that is the answer to our problems, to get a Christian into the White House.  And then imagine that this immensely popular preacher disappears from public view and goes into hiding right before the national convention.  It would go against all reason for a successful, popular Christian preacher to act like that, and throw away such a great opportunity to exercise his influence in the nation.  And yet that is exactly what Jesus did. He disappeared. 

Now though it is not stated here explicitly, we know why Jesus refused to be king of Israel.  We know that He came to establish a spiritual kingdom and not a physical one.  He said to Pilate in John 18:36 “My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm.”   But we might imagine that even after His resurrection He could have chosen to set up His rule on the throne of Israel and began to physically rule over the world.  But instead He chose to leave this world and send us His Holy Spirit to rule over our hearts.  So we know without a doubt from the vantage point of history that Christ did not come to establish a physical kingdom but a spiritual one.  We also know through prophecy that He will one day come again and at that time He will physically rule the world when the world will be spiritually and physically remade.

So there is this disconnect as Christians in determining how we live in God’s spiritual kingdom and yet live in the physical realm.  On the one hand, Jesus as God’s ambassador to Earth, reveals certain spiritual principles in physical manifestations of power, and yet on the other hand, He does not want to establish a physical kingdom by exerting His rule physically.  And as I indicated, not only was it difficult for the Jews to understand, but it is difficult for us to understand in this age.  On the one hand we read in Phil. 4:19 “And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”  And on the other hand we read in Phil.1:29 “For to you it has been granted for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake.”  It’s tough to make the right distinction sometimes as to what we are to expect in the spiritual life. 

And then to add even more confusion there are a lot of people out there which are teaching that as a Christian you never need to have to suffer at all.  But that we are to claim success or prosperity and God’s blessing on our lives so that we are able to live above the fray and have victory in all things.  They teach that the things which beleaguer the world such as sickness or hardship does not have to be the lot of people of faith.  If you have enough faith, you can create your own nirvana.  That is widely taught, and immensely popular, especially by certain preachers on television, but also in many churches throughout our country.  

So as I said, I don’t anticipate being able to fully answer all those questions and concerns here today, but I do believe that this discourse that Jesus engages in here is the beginning point for us to understand the distinctions between the spiritual and the physical.  So I want to look at five of those distinctions, in a sort of comparative manner, and I hope we will get some insight into understanding the difference between the spiritual and physical perspectives.  And so we are going to look at two types of appetites, two types of work, two types of signs, two types of bread, and two types of disciples.  

First two types of appetites.  Remember the context; Jesus had fed the multitude bread and fish on the mountain the day before.  Probably close to 15000 people had eaten dinner and been filled up from one little boy’s lunch of 5 loaves and two fish.  That was a dramatic miracle of great magnitude which 15000 people experienced.  The result was they wanted to make Christ king of Israel, but He disappears because that is not what He came to do at that time.  

So the next day the multitudes are looking for Jesus.  They can’t find Him, they know that He didn’t get in the boat with the disciples, and so eventually they get into boats themselves and go to the other side, thinking that somehow He will eventually go to His home to Capernaum and they will be there when He arrives.  Turns out, He is already there.  He walked across the lake in the middle of the night in the midst of a storm.  They don’t know that, so they say, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” 

This would have been a good opportunity for Jesus to put another feather in His cap, and tell them about how He walked upon the water and all of that story.  But Jesus doesn’t do that.  He instead discerns their motives for seeking Him, and so He cuts to the chase.  He says is in vs. 26, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal.”

So here is the problem.  These people are seeking Jesus.  Most preachers would think that is a good problem to have.  People want to come to your church.  They are seeking you out.  But not so much for Jesus.  He wants seekers who are interested in the truth, not just looking for a free meal.  See, the difference is that they had an appetite, but for the wrong things.  They wanted to eat.  They wanted to fill their stomachs again.  They were hungry again.  And their appetite for physical fulfillment was what was driving them to Jesus.  

So there is an appetite which is geared towards the physical.  It’s an appetite fixated on finding physical fulfillment.  On being physically satisfied.  And for those people, they will find that nothing physical really ever satisfies.  We are programed to eat three meals a day everyday, because everyday we get hungry again. And that is a picture of the food which perishes.  

Jesus is offering another type of food.  Spiritual food.  He says the Son of Man will give you spiritual food, which gives eternal life.  But they could not understand that. They could only see the physical bread. That is why He rebukes them by saying “you seek me not because you saw the signs but because you ate of the food.” In other words, the miracle of feeding the 5000 was not an end in itself, to quench physical hunger, but it was to be a sign.  And a sign points to something.  A sign advertises something.  And what that sign should have revealed to them was the truth about Christ; that He was the source of eternal life.  

In Matthew 5:6, Jesus speaks of satisfying our spiritual hunger, saying, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.”  So that is the comparison that I think Jesus is speaking of.  They were seeking satisfaction for their physical appetite, and consequently would not find satisfaction.  If they would have had a spiritual appetite, then they would have found Jesus, who can satisfy our spiritual appetite for eternity.

Then the second comparison He makes is two types of work. Vs.28, “Therefore they said to Him, ‘What shall we do, so that we may work the works of God?’”  Now obviously, two types of work refers to physical works or spiritual works.  The work that they are asking about is physical work, because they say, “what shall we do?”   This is really the quest of religion, isn’t it?  All religion is a system of works whereby man seeks to gain acceptance with God.  And that is what Judaism had devolved into.  A system of works, keeping the law, keeping the Sabbath, circumcision, sacrifices, etc.  This was the religion of  Judaism.  Remember what the rich young ruler said to Jesus in Mark 10:17, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” The Jews were conditioned to think in terms of works as a means of salvation.  

So when Jesus says that there is a work of God which results in eternal life in vs.27, they want to know what work that is.  Like the Jews that asked Jesus which is the greatest commandment.  And today in religion the question is the same; what must I do?  What work can I do to ensure my acceptance before God?  

Well, the answer to that question is that it’s not according to our works. Titus 3:5 says it’s “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.”  So on the one hand Jesus said in Matt.5:6 that we are to hunger and thirst for righteousness, but in Titus it says that it is not by our works of righteousness.  So then how are we saved?  Well,it must be by another’s work.  That is the answer.  By faith we appropriate Christ’s righteousness for ourselves.  

That is what Jesus is referring to in vs. 29 Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.”  Believe in Him.  What does that mean?  They could see Him, so it could not refer to simply believing that He existed. To simply believe in God does not save you.  Then what?  To believe that Jesus was sent by God, that He was God.  And if He was God, then He was righteous and holy.  That there is none righteous but God. Romans 10:10 says, “for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.”

Note the contrast in what Jesus says though in vs.29; He says that faith is a work of God.They had asked what work they could do, and Jesus responds by saying what work God has done.  Faith is not a work of the flesh, but a work of the Spirit.  Ephesians 2:1 in the KJV says, “And you hath He quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins.”  The idea behind that verse is that God must give us spiritual life; eyes to see, and ears to hear, and hearts to understand so that we might believe.  Faith then is a gift of God.  It says that very thing just a few verses further along in Eph.2:8, “For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.”  Neither grace nor faith is of yourselves.  But in the mystery of God He predestined us, and called us, and justified us, so that He might glorify us.  Salvation is a work of God from start to finish.  But the Jews thought that salvation was through their own work.  But like Jesus told Nicodemus in chapter 3, if you want to be spiritual, and receive spiritual things, then you must be born again spiritually.  So we are to trust in the spiritual work of God through Christ. That is faith, that is what it means to believe in Him.

Then they asked Him another question, and this one illustrates yet another comparison; the comparison of physical miracles or spiritual signs.  In vs. 30 they said to Him, “What then do You do for a sign, so that we may see, and believe You? What work do You perform?  “Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘HE GAVE THEM BREAD OUT OF HEAVEN TO EAT.’”  

This is the cry of the world, the cry of the unbeliever, the cry of the doubters.  Give us a miracle so that we might believe.   Jesus said to the crowds in Luke 11:29 “This generation is a wicked generation; it seeks for a sign, and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah.”  I have to interpret that as it is wicked to ask for a sign.  You can even go so far as to say that it is a sin to ask for a miracle, if you are asking as a precondition for faith.  Romans 14:23 says, “whatever is not of faith is sin.”  And remember what Heb. 11:1 says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

I will admit to a similar failure of faith, and that is to doubt or fail to trust the Lord because He does not act in a supernatural method when I ask Him too.  I will say this with some degree of admitted confusion.  Sometimes it’s difficult to know what we are at liberty to ask for, and what things we need to trust God in spite of. I will admit to often wanting God to act in a supernatural fashion and when He doesn’t do it as I wish, I find myself doubting the goodness of God, or the reliability of God, or perhaps my understanding of God.  And in such cases I would just say that we must be careful not to treat God like a genie, which if we say abbra caddabra, in just the right formula, He is obligated to perform our wishes according to our command.  God is not a genie, nor is He our servant, but He is Lord, and we are His servants.  So we must come to Him not with an air of entitlement, but of entreatment for His favor, if it is according to His will.

So what they were looking for was a daily supply of food, like Moses seemed to provide.  The Jews followed Moses because everyday there was manna from heaven.  That was the daily evidence that they needed to follow Moses, even though they did not accept all that Moses said, yet they followed him because of the miracles.  But Jesus corrects their thinking.  Vs.32, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread out of heaven, but it is My Father who gives you the true bread out of heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.”  

Now there is a lot in those verses which we don’t have time to expand on right now, but suffice it to say that it’s like what I said earlier; a sign points to something or someone.  And in the case of the manna from heaven, Jesus said Moses didn’t give them the bread, God did.  And the sign of manna from heaven was designed to point to the bread of heaven which God gave to the world, that is Jesus Christ.  They not only misattributed the miracle to Moses, but they completely missed the message of the sign.

That is I think the problem with the church today that is so taken with signs and wonders.  They point back to the signs of the apostles and say that since they had that power, then we should have the same power.  But they make the same mistake that these Jews made; they misattribute the power as residing in the apostles.  It was God who was working through them.  It wasn’t in the apostle’s power to perform miracles.  God had to do it, and He did it for a purpose.  And that purpose was to point to Jesus Christ.  The signs and wonders of the apostles was to attest to the fact that they spoke the life giving words of Christ.  And once that was established, and the Bible was written, then the signs and wonders ceased, even as the manna from heaven ceased. 

Jesus did not need to give manna from heaven everyday in order to prove He was the Son of God.  The life that He came to give was not physical, which is sustained by bread.  But the life He came to give was spiritual, and in that sense He gave Himself once and it was sufficient for all the world, for all eternity.

So that leads us to the fourth point, where we see that there are two types of bread. Vs. 34 Then they said to Him, “Lord, always give us this bread.”  Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst.”  I think that the Jews were still expecting physical bread.  I guess they could not really see what Jesus was talking about beyond what they could see, touch or taste.  They were sensual, physical, but spiritually dead. They desired an experience that they could feel or taste.  And so notice that they sound like they are asking for the bread of life, but the fact that they add “always” indicates that they still don’t understand the spiritual nature of what Jesus is talking about.  They are still hung up on the manna which fell from heaven every day for the life of the Jews.  That indicates they are still thinking about the physical.  That reminds me of those poor people that go to confession week after week, saying prayer after prayer, doing penance after penance, trying to find assurance of salvation.  Trying to earn their way into heaven by being good.  Instead of realizing that by one sacrifice their sins were put away forever they sacrifice Christ daily in an effort to effect their salvation.  But Heb.9:26 says, “but now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.”

So there is a bread of self effort that results in only sustaining the physical.  But there is another spiritual bread which gives everlasting life, abundant life, spiritual life. And Jesus says if you eat of this bread, you will never be hungry again.  He obviously is speaking of something better than manna, better than daily bread, but bread which is eternal, which satisfies forever. 

I’m reminded of how back in the hippy movement, it was popular to use “bread” as the slang word for money.  I guess they were right to some degree.  Money is like physical bread.  It makes the world go around.  It really takes me back to the original statement of Jesus in vs.27, “Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life.”  I think of so many people today who are working for the physical bread which perishes.  They are working for what they call the “blessings” of God according to the American Dream.  That means a nice house, cars, vacations, entertainment, the latest technology.  I particularly see our Christian young people seduced into thinking that they have to acquire those things first, at whatever expense spiritually it may take, and then at some point in the future they think that once they have achieved the American Dream then they will be able to focus more on God’s desires.  But the truth is, they have believed the lie of the devil that there is satisfaction to be found in the physical bread of this world.  It will not satisfy, and so in their old age they will still be looking for more, more of what will never satisfy.  

I can only hope that such people become truly followers of Christ.  Because the truth is that there were two kinds of disciples there that day in Capernaum listening to Jesus. All of the people there that day were following Christ.  And John even goes so far as to call them all disciples.  But he was using the word disciples as a very general term.  It means followers, learners, students.  But some were following Jesus for the wrong reasons.  They wanted the daily benefits to their life that He seemed to be able to give. They were looking for a healer. They were looking for a political leader to deliver them from physical oppression.  There were probably as many reasons for following Him as there were people there.  But when Jesus really laid down the requirements for what constituted true discipleship, then it says in vs. 66 “As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore.”

Why did they fall away?  Because they did not believe His word.  Jesus said in vs. 35,  “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen Me, and yet do not believe.”  They believed in what they could see, taste and touch, what seemed good to them.  They did not believe in what they could not physically see, and so failed to appropriate spiritual insight.

Listen, we are going to continue this sermon of Jesus next week and we will look at all of this in more detail.  But I hope our study today has led you to examine yourself in light of the comparison between the spiritual and the physical.  What is your motivation for following the Lord?  Is it only in hope that He will fulfill your appetite?  Is your appetite for things of this world, for the physical, for the material?  Or do you hunger and thirst after righteousness?  How about your work?  Are you trying to work your way into heaven?  Are you hoping that in the long run your good deeds will outweigh your bad and so God will let you in?  Or is your work faith in what Christ has accomplished for you?  And how about your attitude towards the supernatural?  Have you found yourself trusting or not trusting God based on your efforts to manipulate God to do your will?  And then the ultimate question; have you eaten of the bread of life which satisfies, which saves forever?  If so, then you are truly a disciple of Christ.  But if you are seeking the bread of material gain, and trying to use Christ to fulfill that desire, then I’m afraid that you haven’t yet believed in all that Christ is, and came to be.  He came to be our substitute to pay the penalty for our sins, to be our Savior by His sacrifice, and our Lord and King when we surrender our will to do His will.  I hope that you are not one of those who turns away from the truth of Christ, but believes on Him unto salvation.

There are many degrees of faith.  Often, Jesus rebuked people for not having enough faith, or because they only had a little faith.  So as believers, it is important for us to consider our faith and examine it in light of what the word of God says. 

There are a lot of ecclesiastical statements out there which attempt to clarify what constitutes faith, but the best definition of faith is found in the scriptures themselves.  Several places in the scriptures speak of faith, but Hebrews 11:1 defines it very succinctly; “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  Faith then is believing in what is unseen, but hoped for.

Many professing Christians however, if questioned, base their faith not necessarily on the unseen, but on a tangible or physical experience that they had sometime in the past.  Perhaps they were going through some sort of crisis and they prayed to God for help, and He seemed to bring about deliverance in some miraculous way.  And so they believed in God and now consider themselves to be people of faith.  They believe in the existence of God because of something tangible that happened which established their belief.

That may be well and good up to a point, but I would suggest that the sort of faith which is founded on experience is what Jesus would speak of as “Oh, you of little faith.”  I believe God does sometimes work in visible ways in order to bring about the beginnings of faith.  So that may serve as a starting point in our faith, but I think that is not the kind of faith that satisfies God.  I think that God desires us to grow in faith so that we believe what God says without having to rely on substantiating evidence. 

A good verse which speaks of that kind of faith is found in Romans 10:17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”  This is the standard for faith in the scriptures.   The word of God speaks, and we believe it, and trust it, and then act in obedience to it.  So then our actions reveal our faith, and not waiting for God to prove it  before we act in faith.  That is the example we see throughout the scriptures, from Abraham through Moses, and on into the New Testament. God spoke, they believed and then acted in faith.  So faith that pleases God is that which trusts in God’s word and acts upon it.

Today in our exposition of this text we are going to see four examples of faith.  Two that were pleasing to the Lord and two that were not.  The Samaritan woman exemplifies the sort of faith that was pleasing to God.  You will remember she had a conversation with Jesus by the well, and though they started off by talking about Jesus being thirsty and wanting a drink of water, He skillfully turned the conversation around to spiritual things.  And in the process, He brought her under conviction of her sin.  She responded by trying to talk about religion and the difference between the way the Samaritans and the Jews worship God.  But Jesus continued to press her towards the goal of believing in Him.  And then Jesus made one of the most forthright claims to His divinity to ever come from HIs own mouth, He said in response to her statement about the Messiah, “I who speak to you am He.”

Now at that point is where she believed in the word of Christ and she was saved. She doesn’t have some out of body experience, she doesn’t walk down the aisle or repeat the sinner’s prayer, she isn’t baptized.  But the fact that she is saved by faith in Christ is evidenced by the fact that she leaves her water pot and goes back into town, telling everyone to come see the Christ.

There are a number of things that can be learned from this text.  But the main point which is brought out in this passage is that saving faith is believing in the word of God and then acting upon it. The Samaritan woman believes in the word of Christ, His declaration that He was the Messiah promised in scripture.  And she obviously believes Him and so begins to share her new found faith. 

Now much has been made by commentators about the way she phrases the question found in vs.29 as if she expected a negative response.  But I don’t think that’s really borne out by her actions.  I’ve looked at all the major translations of this phrase, and I think it is best understood as follows, “Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; is this not the Christ?” Now that question still lends itself to some ambiguity.  But I don’t think she is really being ambivalent at all.  I think it’s evident she believes that Jesus is the Christ.  And obviously that is not all that she said, as evidenced by the men of the cities answer to her in vs.42: “and they were saying to the woman, ‘It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves and know that this One is indeed the Savior of the world.’” Obviously she told them much more about Christ than that simple statement because what she had said was enough to make them believe in Him.  At least enough to be a starting point in their faith.

And there is another important aspect to her testimony.  She says “Come and see…”  Not go, but come.  She is inviting them to come with her to see Jesus.  I think she left her water pot by the well with Jesus because she was coming back. She was in a hurry to tell them, and didn’t want to be burdened by the water pot. She was bringing back something better – living water.  So she was coming back with her townspeople.  She was rejoicing in the news about the Messiah.  And she knew that her people would rejoice as well.  In spite of any flaws in the Samaritan’s theology they knew that the Messiah was the promised seed of Abraham, in whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed.  He was the Savior of the world, and so it was only reasonable that she would share it and rejoice in it.

What a contrast to most Christians view of sharing their faith.  I don’t know if it is a product of the PC culture, or just a reticence on our part to give testimony to our faith, but how many of us fall far short of the example given by this Samaritan woman.  She boldly goes back into town and begins to broadcast the fact that Jesus was just outside of town at the well.  And she invites them to come with her and listen to Him. 

Our lack of willingness to be a witness makes me wonder if we really believe what we claim to believe.  Do we really believe that Jesus is the only way to eternal life?  Do we really believe that our friends and loved ones who are without the Lord will end up being cast into outer darkness for eternity?  Do we really believe that there is coming a day when everyone will be judged by what they did concerning Jesus?  I’m afraid we must not really believe what the Bible teaches. 

You know, back to the Samaritan woman’s statement, I don’t think there’s a hint of unbelief in it at all, but she is issuing a challenge.   She is suggesting that they need to believe for themselves if Jesus is the Christ.  I know that some of you may feel intimidated about sharing your faith.  The culture is not very tolerant towards true Christianity it seems.  And maybe you feel intimidated because you don’t think you know enough to be able to answer people’s objections or questions.  But I would encourage you to consider this woman’s example as evidence that you don’t have to have all the answers to point people to Jesus Christ.  If you don’t feel adequate to explain everything, then simply invite them to “come and see.”  To come to church and hear the word of God for themselves. 

I will also suggest to you what else made her testimony effective.  And that is the transformation that she obviously exhibited.  There is no more effective testimony to the saving grace of God than a transformed life.  We don’t have a description here in the passage that describes her transformation.  But we do see the evidence of it.  When she began spreading the word about Christ through the town, all the townspeople started coming out to see Jesus.  Something about this woman was different than before she went to the well.  The transformation in her must have been very obvious.  And so people wanted to see this Jesus, since He had made such a change in this woman.  It’s evident from the text that she was a woman with a sordid past.  She would have been well known to everyone in a small town. But after being with Jesus, there must have been a noticeable change in this woman’s demeanor.  I believe she was rejoicing, for one thing.  And people took notice of that and wanted to examine it further. 

I remember when I got right with the Lord when I was living in California after years of being in sin and rebellion against God.  And the next night I stopped by the restaurant where I worked after the shift was over and all my coworkers were sitting in the lounge.  And when they saw me they thought I was drunk.  I wasn’t staggering around or acting boisterous or anything.  But I must have had a different demeanor than what I normally had. I guess I seemed happy.  And so they noticed it, and it gave me a chance to share with them about my faith.  It wasn’t too long after that my best friend who worked with me gave his life to the Lord as well, and he credited the change that he saw in me as a reason for him coming to the Lord.

So the first example of someone believing the word of God then is that of the Samaritan woman.  She believed, and was saved and she was converted/changed.  Consequently, she immediately began to confess Jesus as Lord in her community.  And people believed in Christ due to her testimony.  Vs. 39 says,  “From that city many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, ‘He told me all the things that I have done.’”  God wants to use your testimony to bring people to Christ.  That is our mission; to go into all the world and proclaim the gospel, starting in our homes, then our neighborhoods, then our communities, and then to the ends of the world.  This woman may not have been the best role model before she was saved, but she is a great example of the transforming power of faith after she is saved.

There is a second example of faith that is given in this text as well.  It’s sort of understated, and so we need to read between the lines so to speak.  But this one is not an exemplary example of faith.  It’s what we might call a lower tier faith.  And that is the faith of the disciples of all people. They have faith, but at this point it’s a superficial faith that can’t see the spiritual and instead focuses on the physical.  Even to the point of neglecting their commission.

The Samaritans were considered outcasts, half breeds who the Jews would not even speak to.  And yet their response to the news of the Christ from the Samaritan woman is to come out from the city in droves to hear Him.  In fact, some commentators have suggested that when Jesus told the disciples that the fields were white unto harvest, He was referencing the white robed Samaritan’s coming out of the village and walking across the fields the half mile or so to the well. 

Jesus uses that illustration as an encouragement to the disciples to be about the business of the kingdom.  It’s ironic that all of the disciples had just been in the very same village of the Samaritans buying food. And yet in spite of the fact that a dozen disciples of Christ descended on this little village in Samaria, when normally Jews would go miles out of their way to avoid Samaria, yet not one Samaritan was presented with the news that the Messiah was sitting just outside the town by the well.  The disciples were just too focused on buying food. They were hungry.  They were in a hurry.  They didn’t like those people anyway.  So they missed an opportunity.  And in reality, they missed the purpose of their discipleship. They missed the purpose of their faith.

The disciples came back from their mission with the food and saw Him talking to the woman.  They were surprised by that, but were afraid to ask Him why He was talking to a woman, much less a Samaritan.  So they just kind of ignored it, and when she left they offered Him the food that they brought.  But Jesus isn’t thinking about food at that point.  He says, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.”  And their answer is to ask did someone bring Him food while we were gone? 

You know, the disciple’s cluelessness would almost be funny if it were not so indicative of the way we are oblivious to the opportunities that God puts in our path to be about the kingdom of God. I’m afraid too many times that we can only see the physical, rather than the spiritual.  Our focus is on our appetites, our work, our little routines or duties that we do each day.  Instead of seeing opportunities to speak to someone about Christ. 

Jesus said to the disciples in vs.35 “Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, that they are white for harvest. Already he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal; so that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together. For in this case the saying is true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’  I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored and you have entered into their labor.”

Now there is a whole sermon in that which I don’t have time to delve into today, but suffice it to say that Jesus is saying that half of the work has already been done, all you have to do is reap the benefits of what other’s have done. Now that’s pretty amazing isn’t it?  That should encourage you to witness to people that God puts in your path.  He is saying, I have already begun a work in those people’s hearts, they have already had the sowing of the word into their hearts.  Now if you will just be willing to act in faith and speak to them, you will reap what other’s have sown. 

But as I said, many Samaritans believed in Him simply by the word which He was preaching.  He did not do any signs or wonders or miracles in Samaria.  But then it says that He went into Galilee, which was His own country.  And the people were coming out to Him, but not because they had believed in Him before when He was among them, but because they heard of the miraculous works that He did when He was in Jerusalem.  So Jesus quotes to them what was probably a well known proverb; “that a prophet has no honor in his own country.” 

I can attest to the truth of that.  I’ve lived in this area 24 years, but not all of that time I was a pastor.  And the result of that proves another true proverb which is; “familiarity breeds contempt”.  In other words, it is much easier to go someplace where you are not known and be received with a certain respect than it is to live around people who think they know you.  I think that’s part of the reason why our summer services on the beach are well received by out of town people, but the locals rarely come. 

So Jesus had grown up in Galilee,  and now the Galileans are coming out to see Jesus, but they are not  believing in Him the way the Samaritans did.  They don’t believe Him for His word, but want to see His miracles.  So Jesus rebukes them when He responds to the nobleman’s request by saying, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe.” I don’t think Jesus was necessarily rebuking the nobleman, but He was rebuking the Galileans who obviously were gathering together hoping to see a miracle.  Perhaps they would believe in Him if they saw some astonishing miracle, but not because of His word.

So the third group, the Galileans, receive a rebuke because they did not have the faith in HIs word, even though the Samaritans who were considered outcasts by the Jews believed in Him simply from His word. So the Samaritans were more noble than the Galileans.  And I’m afraid that most Christians today fall into that category of the Galileans.  We go from church to church, from concert to movies, to revivals, to conferences, all in the hopes of finding some new experience which is going to galvanize our infantile faith into something substantial.  But in fact faith comes by hearing the word of God, not by signs and wonders or music or concerts or movies or conferences.

And that leads us to the fourth group which is illustrated by the nobleman. He is from Capernaum, which is about 25 miles from Cana, where Jesus was at that point.  Cana, you will remember, was the site of the first miracle Jesus did in His ministry, in which He had turned the water into wine at the marriage feast.  Now Jesus has returned to Cana, and this nobleman, probably a member of Herod’s court, has heard that Jesus has returned from Judea.  So he made a 25 mile trip from Capernaum in order to come to Jesus and beg Him to come home with Him and heal His son who was at the point of death.

You know, when calamity strikes your child, there is nothing you wouldn’t consider doing to save them.  I would suggest that this example is given to us here for a number of reasons, but not the least of which is to provide a contrast between the apathy of the disciples who felt no pity on the Samaritans, and the anguish of this father for his dying son.  Would to God we felt the anguish over our brothers and sisters and loved ones impending death the way that this man felt over his son.  Perhaps it’s because we cannot see the cancer of sin which has condemned our loved ones to a certain spiritual death. 

So this man travels 25 miles in hopes of seeing Christ and convincing Jesus to come home with Him to heal his son.  And certainly, the Galileans who have gathered there are watching to see what Jesus will do.  Perhaps many of them would have followed Him to Capernaum if it meant they could see a miracle.  I’m not surprised that so many Christians will pay all sorts of money and travel great distances to see some supposed faith healer perform a miracle.  It was common then, it’s common today.  I had a business partner once who stole money from our business to fly to Charlotte NC to have a private meeting with Benny Hinn. It only cost him $10,000 to get a private audience and his blessing.  Didn’t do us any favors though.  Our business went bust 3 months later because of that kind of foolishness.

But Jesus is not going to go to Capernaum.  Not because He doesn’t commiserate with the nobleman, or because He isn’t compassionate. It’s noteworthy that no one ever comes to Jesus for help and leaves without Jesus helping them.   Jesus said in John 6:37  “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out.”

But Jesus doesn’t go to Capernaum with the nobleman because He wants to teach an important lesson.  And that is the lesson that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”  He wants this nobleman to believe in His word.  Jesus is going to heal his son.  But for 24 hours this man is not going to know that for sure.  He is going to have to take Jesus at His word. So Jesus said, “Go; your son lives.”

Now the rest of that verse is amazingly understated. It says, “The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started off.”  Let me tell you why it is understated. It’s understated not just because it took a lot of faith to believe Jesus could heal just by speaking a word from 25 miles away. But it is also understated because it doesn’t just mean that the boy was healed, but it also means that the nobleman was saved.  Jesus didn’t go with him because He wasn’t compassionate, but He didn’t go because He was compassionate.  Jesus wanted to give more than just the physical healing, He wanted to give spiritual healing as well. 

I have told you many times before that every miracle in the gospel is a spiritual parable which illustrates a spiritual principle.  And this one even more so.  Because as a result of this man’s faith, he was saved, his son was saved and healed, and his entire household was saved.

Vs.51-53 “As he was now going down, his slaves met him, saying that his son was living.  So he inquired of them the hour when he began to get better. Then they said to him, ‘Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.’ So the father knew that it was at that hour in which Jesus said to him, ‘Your son lives’; and he himself believed and his whole household.”

There are so many applications that we could take from this illustration.  But let me just try to leave you with a couple.  One, our faith is not founded on experience, but on the promises of God.  That is what we are talking about when we talk about the word of God.  We are talking about God’s revelation of Himself, what He has to say about Himself, and His plan and purpose for the world.  And He gives that to us in the form of promises.  He gives us His word, His promises, by which we may believe.  And when we believe in Him as He has revealed Himself through His word, He credits that to us as righteousness. 

Three times in the New Testament, in Romans 4:3, Galatians 3:6, and James 2:23, it says “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.”  This is how we are saved, by grace through faith in the word of God, which is written down for us.  Notice it doesn’t say Abraham believed in God.  But Abraham believed God.  The Bible says the devils believe and tremble. So believing in God doesn’t save you.  But believing God, believing His word saves you.

Another application we can take from these verses is that when we are saved by faith, God can use our faith to save our families.  We saw that with the Samaritan woman.  I believe she started witnessing to all her former husbands.  That was probably half the town.  But the whole village responded as a result of this woman’s faith.  And of course this nobleman’s faith resulted in his whole household coming to the Lord.  And we see other examples of that in scripture.  I think of the centurion who called Peter to come and preach the gospel, and the whole house was saved.  I think of the jailer who was saved when Paul and Silas presented themselves after the earthquake, and his whole house was saved.  

The point being that you can have a confidence that when you believe in the word of God resulting in your salvation and you share that with your family, then they can be saved through your testimony.  I’m not going to say it is guaranteed.  That is not taught in this text.  But I do think it’s a principle that we can use to reach our families and that God will bless when we act upon it.

Well, let me close by encouraging you today to make sure that your faith is grounded in the word of God.  If God said it, then trust Him and obey.  God may give you an experience, He may give you a miracle, but more importantly He has given you His word.  And that is the greater miracle, which produces a greater faith, and a greater work in you.  Because God’s word is sufficient for every circumstance, for every day.  We don’t need to wait for a sign, when we have the word made more sure, the written word of God, tested and proven for thousands of years.  And that is what John calls this miracle – a sign.  It points to something greater, and that is Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh. That was the purpose of the miracles Jesus did. They point to Him.

And then finally, don’t keep your faith to yourself.  God didn’t give your salvation to you so that you can say, “us four, no more, shut the door.”  God gave you your salvation so that you might be an ambassador of the gospel.  He has given you the good news to share with those with whom He has already started a work in their hearts.  There is no greater miracle on earth than leading someone to Christ.  As Jesus said in vs.36, there is reward in heaven for those that reap souls; “Already he who reaps is receiving wages and is gathering fruit for life eternal, that he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.”  We were saved that we might bear fruit for eternal life.  I hope that you will focus on the kingdom of God and accomplish His work in the time we have left here on earth. 

The other night as I was walking my dog after dinner, I was able to witness a particularly beautiful sunset.  There were these clouds that had reflections of all these colors in them and the sun’s rays shining through.  It was really amazing.  It’s almost sad though because it changes right before your eyes and soon it’s gone.  I can’t help but think that sunsets are kind of like life.  They are so beautiful, and yet so fleeting.  By the time you think it’s really going great it’s basically starting to dim.

But as tragic as that thought is, imagine what life would be like if you were only able to see in black and white. I couldn’t help but notice that my dog seemed oblivious to that spectacular sunset. From what I understand dogs are mostly color blind. But even so, they just don’t seem to appreciate things like the beauty of a sunset.  I would like to suggest that life without Christ is kind of like looking at the world in black and white and not realizing that there is so much more to it.  To live life without Christ is tragic because you are blind to the full life that God has designed for us. 2Cor. 4:4 says, “the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”Jesus said in John 10:10, “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” 

Last week my wife and I were in Pacific Beach in San Diego, visiting our daughter. We didn’t realize when we made our reservations that it is a big party town.  Being there on July 4th was kind of crazy. There were thousands of young people there for the holiday, most of whom seemed to be high or under the influence.  But seeing these masses of young people we couldn’t help but feel a sadness that most of them were unable to even comprehend the things of God. They were completely absorbed in trying to fulfill the desires of the flesh, and just as completely unaware of real life in the Spirit.  It’s like the Bible says in Galatians 6:8 “For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.”

The fact is, Christianity is not just a religion.  It’s life as God meant it to be lived. Prior to coming to Christ we are dead to all that God has designed us to be.  We think we are really living, but we don’t recognize that we are living in black and white, instead of living color.

Last time we looked almost exclusively at the most famous verse in the Bible, John 3:16, showing the universal predicament that all men are without hope, the universal love of God in reaching down to save sinners, the universal invitation that whosoever will may come, and the individual application of whosoever believes may have everlasting life.  But it’s a little bit limiting to focus on just one verse of scripture though and not consider the context in which it is found.  Today I would like us to consider the rest of the story, as Paul Harvey used to like to say.  But in doing so, I suggest that we will not find new truth, but we will find expanded truth.  In other words, verses 17-21 are just expansions on the principles found in the verses prior, especially vs.16.

But before I get started, let me say why this doctrine is so important.  On the one hand we need to know the doctrine of salvation so that we might have assurance of our salvation. Secondly, we need to know more completely the doctrine of salvation so that we might know God more intimately.  And third, we need to know the doctrine of salvation so that we might be able to share the good news with others. 

I am afraid that though most of us know the doctrines of salvation well enough, we do not put it to practice nearly enough in personal evangelism.  For instance, I think there is a tendency to kind of push away the idea that our unsaved loved ones might die without Christ and suffer the consequences of eternal judgment. I think that we have a tendency to push such thoughts to the back recesses of our minds.  We just try not to think of it.  We are glad we are saved, but somehow perhaps we either don’t really believe that God will judge the unrighteous, or we just don’t let ourselves think about it.  Otherwise, I don’t think that compassionate, loving people like most of you are could really sleep at night knowing that your loved ones stand on the precipice of eternity without Christ.  That at any moment they might pass away by some tragic circumstance and consequently spend eternity in torment, separated from you and from God forever.  I can’t help but wonder if we really don’t believe that.  Somehow we have deluded ourselves into thinking that one way or another, our unsaved loved ones and friends will escape the judgment. 

I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but there are no exceptions offered in scripture. Hebrews 9:27 says, “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.”  There is no consolation offered in scripture for those that reject the offer of salvation.  Today this passage of scripture is going to underline that truth.  And I would hope that it would compel you to witness more to those that are lost.  That it would move this reality of judgment from the back burner  to the forefront of your focus.

Let’s go back to the illustration that Jesus gave in vs. 14 for a minute.  Everyone in the camp of Israel had been bitten by the poisonous vipers.  They were dying. Unless they looked upon the serpent on the standard they would die.   There was no other remedy for their predicament.  There was no other prescription for their sickness. And that is the illustration Jesus uses to set the stage for Him being offered up on the cross.  All men have been bitten by the serpent’s sting of sin, and as such all are doomed to die. The wages of sin is death.  And all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  There is none righteous, no not one.  There is no other consolation, no other salvation, than to know Jesus as your personal Savior.  Otherwise you remain in your sins, and as such will stand before God a sinner, condemned to judgment.

So for those of us that know the Lord as our Savior, I hope that you will not push the thought of unsaved loved ones to the back of your mind.  But I hope this message inspires you to speak again to your loved ones about the urgency of their salvation.  Satan always tells us that there will be plenty of time.  But the devil is a liar and the father of lies.  Time is not your friend, but your enemy.

Now let’s look at the remainder of the passage, starting in vs.17.  Verse 17 is basically an explanation of the love of God.  It is expanding on the concept of God’s love.  And to do that, he says God did not send the Son, or give the Son to the world to judge the world but to save it.  Here is the situation;  the world was already judged.  God made His judgment concerning sin way back in the beginning of Genesis when He said whoever eats of the tree will surely die.  The sentence of death was already given before Adam and Eve ate of the tree.  But they rejected the truth and chose to believe the devil’s lie and as such they entered into judgment.  And that same judgment passed on to all men, all descendants of Adam are under the penalty of death, because all have inherited the same sin nature resulting in their sinful acts.  

And I’ll say more on the judgment in a moment. But John is saying that God loved the world so much that He sent Jesus to save us from our sins.  Jesus didn’t come to bring us what we deserved, which was death.  He came to bring us what we didn’t deserve, which is grace, because of His love for us.  He came to provide salvation from death.

We were all spiritually dead.  We had the penalty of death upon ourselves.  It’s like the man on death row.  Though he may be alive today, yet he is under the sentence of death.  But God sent His Son not to be our executioner, but to save us from death by taking our place as our substitute.  So verse 17 basically extrapolates on the love of God.  The motive of God sending Jesus to the world is love, not judgment. Jesus said, “greater love has no man than this, that a man lays down his life for his friends.”

Then verse 18 expands on the second half of verse 16, where it says, “that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”  So verse 18 expanding on that says, ““He who believes in Him is not judged.”  Believing in Him delivers us from the judgment of death which we had already received.  Therefore, if you don’t believe in Him, you remain in the same condition which you were in previously.  You remain under judgment of death.  18b, “he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

Going back to Jesus’ illustration, whoever looked upon the serpent on the standard would live, be delivered from death, but whoever did not look remained in the throes of death.  They did not believe or want to accept the fact that looking at the standard would save them.  It’s hard to believe that people would choose to remain under the curse of sin, but they obviously do.  And they do so because they don’t want to accept who Jesus is and what He came to do.  They would rather die than have to submit to Christ as Lord.

Why would anyone in their right mind reject salvation?  Well, to explain that, John changes his analogy.  He moves from the analogy of the serpent on a standard to another analogy –  a light in the darkness.  Remember back in chapter 1, Jesus was called the Light. Vs. 4-5  “In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.”

So in vs.19 of chapter 3 John goes back to that analogy of Christ is the Light in order to explain more completely the judgment due to those who reject salvation, and says,  “This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.”  Jesus is the Light, the Father sent Him into the world to save sinners, and yet when men saw the Light, they rejected it because they loved evil. 

I’ve said it before, people don’t really reject God because there isn’t enough evidence of God, or even because they can’t understand Him.  People reject God because they want to do what they want to do.  They don’t want God to rule over them.  Given the choice between good and evil we choose evil.  That is the nature of man.  That’s why Isaiah 53:6 says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way.” 

This is the judgment; that all men like sheep have gone astray.  They have turned away from God’s rule and turned to self rule.  Every man is like those in the days of the judges when there was no king in Israel, when everyone did what was right in their own eyes.  Men are like those who lived in the days of Noah, when every intent of the thought of their heart was only evil continually.  This is our nature.  This is the nature of man to love the darkness, because their deeds are evil.

You could make the argument that man is duped into thinking that such deeds do not really produce death.  You could argue that men think that what they are doing is enhancing life, embracing life, but that is even more reason for the compassion of God to shine the light of truth that leads to real life.

The key to life is seeing the truth, accepting the truth, and then practicing the truth. The truth is the light that shows us how to live, that distinguishes good from evil.  That is why it’s so important that the church proclaims the truth.  And truth is only found in one place – that is God’s word.  Only God’s word is the standard for truth.  And only the truth can set you free from death.  Jesus said in John 8:32, “you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

Jesus goes on to say in chapter 8 that the devil is the father of lies and there is no truth in him.  Remember back in the beginning when Eve was tempted by the devil, he said to her, “you shall not surely die?”  He appealed to her fleshly desires, her appetite and her pride, and offered an alternative suggestion which changed the truth of God into a lie.  In spite of what God had told them, Eve chose to believe a lie, and then acted on her desires.  And what resulted was the penalty of death.  Adam then chose to follow Eve instead of God, acting on his desires.  And what happened after that?  They tried to hide from the presence of God. Why?  Because their deeds were evil, and their conscience was awakened. They hid from the Light.

Coming back to our text we see that same scenario expressed in vs.20,21. “For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.”

Here is what he means.  Those that reject Christ love their evil deeds and so they rightly bring judgment upon themselves.  They hate Christ because He is the Light that enlightens every man.  In other words, His Light exposes the truth about themselves.  For the unsaved, their evil deeds are exposed when the light of God’s truth is shone upon them.  And so to protect their evil deeds and to keep on doing them, they reject Christ.  They hate the Light.  They love the darkness.

But those that practice the truth love the Light, come into the Light, which proves that their good deeds are the works of God wrought through them.  See, the Spirit of God in them has changed their hearts to desire the things of God, to desire good, to desire the truth.  I like how it says, he who practices the truth.  It’s not our nature to do good.  By nature we aren’t righteous.  As we already declared, our nature is to go our own way, do our own thing, and love the works of darkness.  But knowing the truth, we now practice the truth, following in the example of Jesus Christ we walk in His footsteps.  And as we do this, it illustrates to the watching world that we know the Lord, that He has indeed made us into His children, as we do the works of our Father in heaven.

Now the rest of the passage is really just using the discourse of John the Baptist to his disciples to illustrate the principle we just looked at.  That God sent Jesus to be the light of truth, which is given to every man that they may know the truth of God and be saved.  There are a number of sub points in there which could be stand alone truths in and of themselves, but the main thrust of the text is to show that Jesus is the source of truth, and therefore is the source of life.

Verse 25 provides a key to understanding how this text relates.  Notice they have a question about purification.  Now many commentators go off on tangents at this point trying to show that baptism is somehow the point of all of this.  But purification taken at it’s simplest meaning speaks of how a man might be made righteous before God.  How can man overturn the natural fallen state of sinfulness and become pure in God’s sight. 

Baptism never was given as a means to achieve righteousness.  But baptism is a public portrayal of an inward, spiritual transformation. Baptism symbolizes death to the old man and new birth of the new man.  That’s what baptism symbolizes, admitting you are dead in your sins, and that they only way to be made right with God is by being born again in the spirit.  Now that is exactly what Jesus was teaching Nicodemus.

So John the author picks up on that idea by going back to John the Baptist who introduced the baptism of repentance as a precursor to the gospel.  John the Baptist preached a gospel of repentance which was symbolized by being baptized.  But now his disciples hear that Jesus and his disciples are baptizing, and they are unsure what this signifies.

John the Baptist’s answer is to give preeminence to Christ.  There is no spirit of jealousy there.  He knows first of all that Christ’s ministry is from heaven.  That is what is under discussion here.  John’s disciples were comparing their ministry with Christ’s ministry.  So first of all John the Baptist says that Christ’s ministry is from heaven.  You know, only God can ordain a minister or a ministry.  There are a lot of so called ministers running around, and a lot of ministries on every other street corner, but not all are of God, and we know that because they do not practice the truth.  The truth is the plumb line; to teach and practice the truth of God’s word is the measure of a ministry as whether or not it’s of God.  Jesus manifested the truth of God. Jesus said in John 14:10  “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works.”  So He speaks the words of the Father and does the works of the Father.  And so John says he knows that Jesus is from heaven.

Then John says, you are my witnesses that I told you I am not the Christ but merely His forerunner. (vs.28) He says,  I’m just the friend of the bridegroom.  I’m not the bridegroom, Christ is the bridegroom.  And so because I am His friend, I rejoice to see Him come for His bride. The church is the bride of Christ – those that have been saved are the church.  So according to what has been ordained from heaven, Christ’s ministry must increase, but my ministry must decrease.  My ministry was to announce His coming.  Once the bridegroom comes, there is no longer a need for an announcer.

Now that’s my paraphrase of what John said.  And what he alludes to is the very well known analogy of a middle eastern wedding in which the bridegroom makes every thing ready, and when he comes to take his bride, his best man runs into the village before him announcing to everyone that the bridegroom is coming.  That was their custom and everyone would have recognized that.  So John is saying now that the bridegroom has come, his bride is coming out to Him, everyone has been told the news, and so his job is coming to an end.

But in vs.31 John the Baptist changes gears a bit, and returns to our primary subject, and that is the origin of the truth which Christ manifested.  He says He, that is Christ, is above all.  That is Christ is one with God and from God and is God.  That’s what was declared in the opening words of chapter one.  Now John the Baptist is validating it again.  His testimony and other men’s former testimony is earthly because they come from the earth,  but Christ is heavenly, because He came from heaven.

Vs. 32, Since Christ is from heaven, He speaks the truth of God.  He testifies the things of God, and yet no one receives His testimony.  Generally speaking, though the Jews came to Jesus to see the signs that He was doing, they did not accept Him as the Son of God.  Jesus’s testimony was that He was the Son of God.  He called God His Father. John 8:18-19, 28 “I am He who testifies about Myself, and the Father who sent Me testifies about Me.”  So they were saying to Him, “Where is Your Father?” Jesus answered, “You know neither Me nor My Father; if you knew Me, you would know My Father also.” … 28 So Jesus said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me.”

Now notice vs.33 in our text: John the Baptist says, “He who has received His testimony has set his seal to this, that God is true.”  So he says that whoever receives Christ’s testimony is agreeing that God is truth, therefore Jesus is the manifestation of the truth. In John 14:6 Jesus says, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.” 

This is the distinguishing principle of Christianity.  You can make all kinds of arguments concerning the similarity of religions.  You can make the claim that all roads lead to God.  Calling God “Allah” or Krishna or the Great Spirit, or any other name used for God may seem from a human standpoint to be so similar as to become indistinguishable.  But the truth of Christianity that sets it apart is that we confess and believe that Jesus is God in the flesh, and that no one can come to know God except through Him.  That is the claim of Christ Himself.  So Christianity is incompatible with any other religion in the world.  God manifested Himself in One person, that is Jesus Christ, and only by faith in Him and His redeeming work on the cross are we able to be saved and receive eternal life.

Vs.34, “For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for He gives the Spirit without measure.”  What John is saying is that Christ is from God, He speaks the words of God, and God has given Him the full measure of His Spirit.  In times past, prophets were given a measure of the Holy Spirit.  Elisha, if you will remember, asked for a double portion of the Spirit that was given to his mentor Elijah.  But in Christ’s case, He is filled with the Spirit of God to the fullest, so that as Hebrews 1:3 says, “He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature.”

Vs. 35, “The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand.”  That the Father God loves the Son of God being both God and yet separate and equal is a mystery that we must believe even if we cannot understand it.  But what we can know is that all rule and authority on earth and in heaven have been given to Christ.  He is the author and finisher of our faith.  He is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.  He is the Sovereign King of Glory, He is the Bridegroom coming for His bride.  He is the Creator of all life, and the source of eternal life.  All things are from Him and to Him and by Him all things exist and have their being.

So then, knowing these things, knowing who Christ is and His authority, John says in the closing verse of this chapter; “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” How can you resist Him?  To resist the source of life is to stay in the darkness and under the penalty of death.  To accept Him and receive Him is to be united with the source of life, even to receive eternal life. 

Now that’s the summation of a lot of theology and doctrine.  And hopefully, the truth of the gospel has produced salvation resulting in abundant life in all of you here today.  But now what?  What is the purpose of knowing all of this if we don’t share it with whoever we meet?  You know, I have an old high school friend who went on to be a state senator for Georgia.  And though he recently retired he is still actively involved in politics.  He recently posted on social media that he is committing to personally knocking on 15000 doors in his area to get the word out about his favorite presidential candidate.  He adamantly believes that the next presidential election is critical for the future of this country. 

And when I read that, I could not help but think of this passage.  If we truly believe that the truth of Christ is essential to being saved from the wrath of God and receiving everlasting life, wouldn’t we be as adamant in proclaiming it as my friend is in campaigning for his candidate?  I can assure you that the question of what will you do with Christ is of much greater importance than which candidate you are going to vote for.  Christ is the only hope for blind and lost people living in a colorless, dying world.  Our hope is not in a political system, but only in the One who is over all things, above all powers, above all dominions, in Him who is the glory of God and the Light of the world.  I pray that as His church we might start campaigning in earnest for the kingdom of God.