I don’t feel that we need to spend too much time introducing the first epistle of John. Obviously, we have just finished the gospel of John which has taken us over a year and a half, and totaled some 70 sermons. Additionally, we are studying Revelation on Wednesday nights, which of course is written by the Apostle John as well. So we should be well versed with John by now and not need much introduction. But what I want to do is to fill in a few months before the summer season with a short book, and 1John seemed to be a good fit for a number of reasons. Other than the two I just mentioned, there is a principle which states that in the gospels the good news is proclaimed, and in the epistles the gospel is explained. So while John’s gospel was still fresh in our minds, I thought it a good idea to study John’s epistle, which might give us additional insight into both what we have learned from his gospel, and what we are still learning in Revelation.

John writes this letter possibly to the Ephesians, where he spent his later years. He writes as a father-like figure, probably due to the fact that he was quite old by this time. But as you study this letter, you recognize that he is very concerned about authentic Christianity. That the walk of Christians match the talk of Christians. He makes it clear you cannot have one without the other.

He was writing in an age when false teaching had crept into the church. Merely 50 years or so after Christ, and already the church was being corrupted by false teaching. In particular, there was the teaching known as Gnosticism. This false doctrine taught that the spirit and the body were independent of one another. Gnosticism taught that matter is evil and spirit is good. Therefore, the spirit of man is imprisoned in an evil body. The purpose of their teaching was to say it was possible to have a spiritual experience which was not dependent upon your physical actions. So the result was, they claimed to be spiritual, to be Christian, and yet lived in sin because they said the body was carnal. So there was this disconnect between what they believed and how they acted. And they had taken this idea to the point of even denying that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh. In their doctrine, He was a phantom, a spirit which took on the form of a man, but wasn’t really a man at all. So it was a very deceptive doctrine, which seduced men and women to resign themselves to living in the flesh in sin, and yet claim a spiritual experience which was acceptable to God.

John however, wants to establish the distinctions of the reality of the Christian faith. The gospel not just producing a spiritual life irrespective of how one lives, but an authentic spiritual life which is manifested in the physical. There is spiritual life, but it is revealed in the physical and flows from the spiritual and consequently your physical life is illustrative of the spiritual reality within. Gnosticism said that they were two planes of existence which did not connect. John makes the case that which is of the spirit will have a physical component, and if there is no physical component, then there must be no spiritual. The physical is evidence of the spiritual.

A good illustration of that is Jesus said in Matthew 9 it is easy to say your sins are forgiven. That’s the spiritual component. Who can argue with that since it cannot be verified with the eyes or the ears. But He said it is another thing to say to a paraplegic, take up your bed and walk. Jesus said so that you may know that the Son of Man has the authority to forgive sins, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” The gospel has then not only the power to forgive the penalty of sin, but to provide the power over sin, so that we might live sanctified, authentic Christian lives. It provides not only the spiritual benefit, but it’s manifested in physical deliverance as well.

So John is concerned with authentic Christianity. Authentic Christianity is living in truth, righteousness and love which we will see John develop as we go through this epistle. But as he begins this letter, he is careful to establish the basis for authentic Christianity, and that is a relationship with God. Without the basis of a right relationship, your life will not produce truth, or righteousness or love.

The most important things in life are not really things at all- they are the relationships we have. God has put a desire for relationship in every one of us, a desire He intended to be met with relationships with other people, but most of all, to be met by a relationship with Him. Unfortunately, people are always trying to fill this God sized hole in our hearts with everything else. But nothing can fill that emptiness but Jesus Christ. So John wants to establish right from the beginning of this letter that authentic Christianity is founded on a right relationship with God.

We are going to use the words relationship and fellowship somewhat interchangeably in this study today. But fellowship is the word John uses in vs 3,6, and 7. Fellowship is the primary subject of the whole chapter. The Greek word for fellowship is probably familiar to you all, which is koinonia. It means sharing, communion, participation, fellowship, or communication. You cannot have fellowship with God unless you have a right relationship with God. You cannot share in God’s life, unless you have as the basis a right relationship with Him. Fellowship is salvation in its widest embrace; includes justification, includes holiness, it includes being in the church of the believers.

So John’s prologue starts with establishing the basis of fellowship. Our basis of fellowship with God is a relationship with Jesus Christ. And John introduces Him in vs.1 as the Word of Life, “that which was from the beginning.” This is an obvious parallel to his gospel, in John 1:1 where we read, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made which was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of man.”

In a sense, John condenses that broader statement concerning the origin of Jesus Christ, and just says “That which was from the beginning, the Word of Life.” It includes of course, all that he has said in John 1:1. John is referring to the eternal nature of Jesus Christ. He was in the beginning, which is before anything was created. Jesus was with God, and He was God. He was the Word made flesh. He was the Life, by which all was created. He is the source of all life, even eternal life because He is God. He is the Way to God, the Truth of God and the Life of God.

But what he adds to those divine qualities is yet another dimension of Jesus Christ; that He was not only fully God, but fully man. He says, “what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands.” John speaks now of the physical nature of Jesus, born a man, born of a virgin, suffered in the flesh, made like us in every respect, and yet without sin. In John 1:14 we see the parallel statement, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

This is a tremendous concept, that the eternal God of the universe became man and dwelt among us here on Earth. And these disciples such as John were eyewitnesses to His glory, and they talked with Him, touched Him, saw Him, ate with Him and lived with Him. They knew Him fully as a man. And yet He was also fully God and they recognized that He was God. Peter said in 2Peter 1:16, “For we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.” They were eyewitnesses. Did you ever consider that a man could be sentenced to death on the basis of two eyewitnesses? Jesus had over 500 eyewitnesses to His resurrection. So the basis for our fellowship with God is our relationship with Jesus Christ. We believe in Him, that He is God who came in the flesh, and offered Himself as a propitiation for sin, and on the basis of our faith in Him, we are given justification. We have imputed righteousness by which we can be accepted by God, and have fellowship with God.

This desire for fellowship was initiated by God. He desired fellowship with us. So in order that we might have fellowship God sent Jesus to take away our sins. So John adds in vs.2, “and the life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us.” As John just indicated, Jesus existed prior to His incarnation in the flesh. He was from the beginning. He was the Word of Life, speaking all things into being. But the Word of Life became flesh and dwelt among us. He manifested Himself to the world, because God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him, should not perish, but have eternal life.

Manifested means that He made what was invisible, visible. The Way to God was hidden, but He became visible. The truth of God was manifested to man. Jesus, who existed eternally, became visible to man. The Light of God became visible. And we beheld His glory. And I submit to you it was because God desired fellowship with us. He loved us. We could not climb to heaven, so God descended unto man. He came down to our level, so that we might know the way to God. So we might have a relationship with God, and fellowship with God. He desired a relationship to us. Someone said, it is no surprise that men seek to have a relationship with God, but it is amazing that God should stoop to have a relationship with man.

And John witnessing this manifestation has to proclaim it. So next we see the communication of fellowship. This is the good news of the gospel. These disciples, these ordinary fishermen that Jesus revealed Himself to, are commissioned to be His apostles, to communicate the invitation of the gospel to the world, so that all who receive it are made part of this fellowship, even His church. Vs.2, “and we have seen and testify and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us—what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us, and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” This is the mandate and the mission of disciples, both then and now. To proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. To communicate the good news, that God has made it possible to have fellowship with Him, to have a relationship with Him. It is not just “for us four and no more.” But it is good news to all people, to all nations of the earth. We are His ambassadors, proclaiming that fellowship with God is available to all who believe.

Fellowship is salvation in its widest embrace; it includes justification, includes sanctification, or holiness, it includes being in the church of the believers. First John talks of having fellowship with us, then with God. Because you first became friends with someone who knew Jesus, and they introduced Him to you. John is introducing you to Jesus, inviting you to have a relationship with Him. And that is indicative of authentic Christianity; if you belong to Christ, you cannot help but to witness for Christ. To become friends with us, means you must become friends with Jesus. I cannot separate my Christianity from my relationships. I must say I find suspect those Christians who seem to maintain close friendships with those who are agnostic, or who are antagonistic towards Christianity. I don’t see how light can have fellowship with darkness. But be that as it may, our relationships should mirror our relationship with God. There should not be any disconnect between what we profess on Sunday and our profession on Monday.

There is another aspect of fellowship I think John is presenting here; a bit understated perhaps, but certainly implied. And that is the fellowship of family. Our relationship with Christ makes us children of God. Being born again of the Spirit He then becomes our Heavenly Father. That is the basis for our fellowship. We are the family of God. Vs.3, “and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” Someone said that Peter portrayed our relationship in the New Testament as the Kingdom of God, Paul presented it as the church of God, and John portrays it as the family of God. All speak of the same thing; the same fellowship. But John presents us as being born of God, becoming sons and daughters of God, and having that fellowship based on adoption as children, we have a special relationship of family, by which we can cry “Abba, Father.”

All of us are related to someone. We live in families. Children are related to their parents, and parents to their children. Why? Because they share the same life, the same characteristics and nature. And that is what makes a Christian, to share the life of God by relationship to a Person, the only Person who has that life, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. At the close of this letter John tells us, “He who has the Son has life; he who has not the Son of God has not life,” (1 John 5:12). It is that simple. No matter how religious you may be, you must be born again. You do not have life if you do not have the Son, you are not a Christian. John makes this crystal clear at the beginning of his letter, calling us back to these fundamental things.

Lastly, let us look at the joy of fellowship. Vs.4, John writes, “These things we write, so that our joy may be made complete.” Don’t misunderstand this; John isn’t talking about happiness, but he is talking about joy. There is a fundamental difference between happiness and joy. Happiness is based on circumstances which constantly change. Happiness is temporary. Joy is eternal. God never changes. The devil tries to seduce you with happiness. God woos you with the promise of joy. The result of fellowship with God is fullness of joy. This joy is an abiding sense of hope and contentment and satisfaction based on God, as opposed to happiness, which is a temporary cheerfulness based on circumstances.

I am constantly dismayed by the popular demand for happiness. Ask any parent what they want most for their children, and they will usually say, “I just want them to be happy.” Folks, I want to urge you to set the bar a little higher than that. A lot higher actually. Because sin will make you happy for a season. Alcohol or drugs will make you happy for a few hours. Immorality may make you happy for a few minutes. Money can make you happy temporarily. Actually, I think it is more true to say that the lack of money can make you unhappy. But irregardless, circumstances can make you happy for a while, but joy is an enduring condition despite circumstances.

Psalm 30:5 says, “Weeping may last for the night, But a shout of joy comes in the morning.” In other words, happiness and sadness are emotions that rise and fall with various circumstances. Sometimes you can experience both almost simultaneously, or at least one right after the other. But joy comes when you consider the future you have in Christ. Hebrews 12:2 says we are to “fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Joy is confidence in tomorrow; hope that is set before us, when God will make all things right, when God will answer every question, when God will wipe away every tear, when God will reward good and punish evil. And although our circumstances will change, and our emotions may rise and fall here on this earth, our joy is set before us, and it offers us contentment and satisfaction, and joy in knowing that we are known, and part of the family of God. Joy in knowing God has set His love upon us, and it will never change or fade away. Joy in knowing that He is keeping track. Joy in having fellowship, intimacy with God, being able to talk to Him 24/7, about anything, and knowing that He still loves me. He considers me righteous. He considers me His son.

This invitation to fellowship is open to all who will receive Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. It is open to all who want to have a relationship with God. It is made possible through faith in Jesus Christ. On behalf of God, I offer that relationship to everyone here today who will confess their sin and trust in Jesus Christ to forgive them of their sin. By faith in what Christ did on the cross you can be made righteous before God, and being made righteous, you are adopted into the family of God, that you may have fellowship with your heavenly Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ, and with His church. Examine yourselves this morning, and see if that fellowship is a reality in your life. Is it a fellowship based on a relationship? That relationship with God is possible through faith in Jesus Christ to all who confess their need for a Savior and trust in Him.

This is the last message I will preach in the book of John. I think, if I counted correctly, today’s sermon is number 70. I didn’t plan it that way, but if it’s true, I think it’s pretty cool we ended up with 70 exactly. The number 70 indicates perfection, by the way. (ha, ha)

But seriously, it is with a certain sadness that we finish this book today. There is no more satisfying sermon series in my estimation, than studying one of the gospels. I think we will be beginning the gospel of Mark sometime near the beginning of summer. That is the only gospel, in fact the only book in the New Testament, that I have not preached through.

John however, ends his gospel a little differently than some of the others. He doesn’t focus on the Savior ascending into heaven as one might expect, but rather he ends with a focus on Peter, the fallen disciple. He spends this last passage showing us Christ’s compassion and grace towards that disciple that needed restoration.

And I think that John chooses to focus on Peter’s restoration because restoration is really the purpose of the gospel. And to that purpose Peter is emblematic of all of us. He is the prototypical disciple. He is in this portrait a failed disciple. He has fallen, he has failed to live up to his promises, he has denied Christ on three separate occasions. Yet Peter is beloved by all of us because he is so much like us. He has all the failures that we are so familiar with in our own lives. He overestimates his strengths and underestimates temptation. He thinks he’s more committed than he is. He thinks he loves the Lord more than he does. He thinks he can face any trial triumphantly; but he finds out he can’t. By the time we get to this point, even though he has seen the risen Christ, he is really a broken man. In fact, it’s possible that even the triumph of Christ’s resurrection has accentuated Peter’s despondency at failing Him in some way.

So John focuses on Peter’s reconciliation as the last message of his gospel, perhaps because he knows that it will prove invaluable in the ages to come to so many other disciples, who like Peter, find themselves at some point in their lives having failed in their Christian life. And John wants us to know, that just like Peter, we can find forgiveness, reconciliation and usefulness again through Jesus Christ.

I don’t want to take the time to recap all the events that has brought them to this beach on this particular morning. But I would like to pick up where we left off last time, with Jesus appearing on the beach after a long night of fruitless fishing, and having breakfast waiting for His disciples, after instructing them how to catch 153 large fish.

Verse 15 picks it up after they have finished eating breakfast, probably lounging on the beach, talking with one another. And suddenly, Jesus speaks to Peter publicly, in a way to produce a public restoration, so that the other disciples would know that Peter was reconciled to Christ again. And this is important. Luke tells us that Jesus had already appeared earlier to Peter privately. So this is not just for Peter’s benefit, but for the disciples benefit as well, as Peter was their leader. And furthermore, it is for our benefit, that we might know the desire God has for us to be reconciled with Him, and to restore our usefulness to Him.

We see in this exchange between Peter and the Lord, three questions, three affirmations of love, and three exhortations. Three as a number, indicates divine completeness. But more importantly, I believe, three corresponds with the number of times Peter denied the Lord. I think what Jesus is doing here is purposefully asking Peter three times, in order to completely expunge the three denials. Christ isn’t so much rubbing Peter’s nose in it, as He is giving Peter a chance to fully repent. True repentance is essential to restoration. Partial or half hearted repentance will leave a bitter taste in the mouth that if not dealt with, will produce eventual bitterness. God wants full repentance so there can be full restoration.

Remember, Judas was also sorry for his betrayal of Christ. And that betrayal and Peter’s denial are only a handbreadth apart. The difference is that Judas was sorry and wept bitterly. Peter was sorry and repented. One was destroyed, and the other was restored.

I also think that there is an echo of a principle here that Jesus taught in Matthew 18. Where if a brother sins against you, you speak to him privately. If he rejects that, you take another person and go to him a second time. And if he rejects that, you take him before the church. Three opportunities for repentance. Because the purpose of church discipline is reconciliation, not punishment.

So Jesus has the opportunity to take Peter to task for his failures. He has the right to disqualify Peter from further office. But He doesn’t do that. Instead of asking Peter if he is really, really sorry, if he is willing to pay the penalty to be allowed back in good standing, instead of demanding that Peter do some sort of penance, Jesus just wants Peter to come to love Him more than anything else. That is really the full extent of the law, isn’t it? To love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, your mind and your strength. Jesus said in Matt.22 that is the whole law. So if sin is breaking God’s law, then the solution is to love God more, in order that we might fulfill the law.

So Jesus wants to bring that principle to bear in order to produce restoration. So He asks Peter, “Simon, son of Jonas, do you love Me more than these?” Jesus calls Peter by his old name, Simon, which meant shaky. Jesus had renamed him Peter, which meant Rocky, or the Rock. But now He calls him by his given name, his full name, Simon, son of Jonas. He called him by the name that signified his actions. Peter had gone back on his commitment to the Lord, he had even gone back on his ministry. He had gone back to his old career. And so the Lord calls him out in a subtle kind of way, “Simon, do you love me more than these?”

There is a lot of debate as to what is meant by “these.” I think the most straightforward answer is “more than these” represents the 153 fish laying on the shore. It was a mountain of fish. The other disciples were probably oohing and ah-ing over them, counting up how much a haul like that might be worth at the market. It probably represented a lot of money. So do you love Me more than these fish, more than your career, more than your the self sufficiency represented by his boat and nets and the large catch of fish.

But Jesus has also subtly used another word in His question, “do you love Me,” and that is the Greek word agapao, which means the highest degree of love. It means a sacrificial love – a love of the will. Simon, are you willing to love me sacrificially, even to the point of giving up this career, this source of income, this self reliance?

Well, Peter is still smarting from the fact that he had failed miserably to measure up to that kind of love as he had boasted of in the Upper Room on the night of Christ’s betrayal. So his answer, I think, reflects this new found humility. He says, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” Peter, however, uses a different word for love, the Greek word “phileo” which means brotherly love, or a familial type of love. It’s less strident than the sacrificial love Jesus is asking for. And I believe it’s because Peter has lost his confidence in the strength of his love. He knows that his love failed and so he offers a less strident promise of love.

But Jesus is gracious, and He accepts Peter’s response without rebuke, and gives him an exhortation. “Tend My lambs.” The emphasis of the word translated lambs indicates a little lamb. I tend to think it has the quality of helplessness, or innocence. Feed or tend, my little ones. The exhortation is to take on the job of a shepherd. Rather than be a fisherman, it’s a calling to be a shepherd. That’s what a pastor is, by the way. He is an under shepherd.

Peter will say to the elders of the church later on in his epistle in 1Peter 5:2, “shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to the will of God; and not for sordid gain, but with eagerness; nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock.”

I will say this without any sense of arrogance, the shepherd is not a sheep. He is given responsibility for the feeding and tending and care of the sheep. He is given responsibility for the safety of the sheep. It is a serious charge, and one that should not be taken lightly. God will hold the shepherd to a stricter standard, and a greater condemnation. “Let not many of you become teachers knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment.”… says James 3:1.

But what is amazing here is that Jesus takes this broken, failed disciple, and He restores him, not just to reconciliation, but to usefulness. Not just to some behind the scenes position, but Jesus puts Peter at the fore front of His church, to be the leader again, not just as leader of this motley group of 11 disciples, but of the first church in Jerusalem. God uses the weak things, and the the foolish things, to shame the wise and the strong.

That offers hope for all of us broken disciples here today. God has a plan to restore you, to be reconciled to God, and to be used by Him for His kingdom. No matter how many times you have fallen, or how many times you have failed Him, Jesus stands ready to forgive and restore you. God loves you so much, He has already punished His own Son so that He might restore you to usefulness. Isaiah 53:5 says, “But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Whatever sin you have committed, Jesus paid for with His life, that you might have everlasting, abundant life, knowing that He loves you and wants to be reconciled to you. And if you will submit to that, He will use you and give you a purpose that has eternal rewards.

Well, you know the story. Jesus asks Simon Peter the same question again. ““Simon, son of Jonas, do you love Me?” Though Jesus accepted Peter’s answer the first time, He isn’t satisfied with Peter’s lesser degree of love. So He asks again if Peter agapao’s Him. Does he sacrificially love Him. Christ wants Peter to love Him with all His heart, all His soul, all His mind and all His strength. He isn’t satisfied with a sentimental love. He isn’t even satisfied with a passionate love. But He wants a love of the will. A committed love that will endure no matter the cost.

Why does Jesus make such a big deal out of love? Because love is the ultimate motivator. The motivation of money just makes you a marketeer. The motivation of popularity makes you an entertainer. But the motivation of love for Christ makes you leave everything, sacrifice anything, for His sake. And that is what God wants from us. He wants an unwavering love from His bride that will endure through sickness or in health, in poverty or in wealth, unto death us do part. He doesn’t want to guilt trip us into serving Him. He doesn’t want to legally require us to serve Him. He doesn’t want to force us to love Him. That isn’t real love. But real love is it’s own motivation. It’s a change of heart, a change of desires, and that is to please Him because we love Him. To die before we bring shame upon Him.

Maybe this time Peter tries to say it with more conviction in his voice, but he ends up saying the same thing. I am fond of You. I love you like a brother. You’re like family. “Yes Lord, You know that I love you.”

Once again, Jesus accepts Peter’s lesser response and says virtually the same thing He said before; “Shepherd My sheep.” Perhaps the emphasis on the commandment is somewhat stronger in this second command of Christ because you will remember that Jesus said if you love me you will keep My commandments. So maybe Jesus is saying, “Ok, Peter. You SAY you love Me, then keep My commandments, and that command is to shepherd My sheep.

It’s like Paul said in 1Cor, 9:16, “For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for I am under compulsion; for woe is me if I do not preach the gospel. For if I do this voluntarily, I have a reward; but if against my will, I have a stewardship entrusted to me.” True shepherds are not hirelings. They have a stewardship, and the love of Christ compels me to fulfill it. And I think that is what was being impressed on Peter.

A third time Jesus asks the question, ““Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” This time though, Jesus changed the word for love to that which Peter had been using. Jesus used “phileo”. He came down to Peter’s level. God knows that we can’t meet the level of commitment that we should meet. And so rather than making us climb up to heaven, God comes down to the level of man. But John says that Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, “Do you phileo Me?” Peter is grieved, because He knows that Jesus knows his heart – that he is less committed than he should be. And yet Jesus is merciful and gracious and comes to accommodate his weakness so that he might be reconciled to God.

Peter’s response shows that grief, saying, ““Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.” He still confesses a phileo love for Christ, but he confesses something more important than that; “You know all things.” The Lord knows our hearts. He knows our weaknesses. He knows if we really measure up to what we claim to be. The Lord knows our hearts and yet He still loves us.

Peter’s response is an echo of Jeremiah 17:9 which says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Well, we don’t really know our hearts, I’m afraid. We think more highly of ourselves than we ought to. But the Lord knows our hearts, and yet He still loves us. We are like Hosea’s wife of whoredom; lusting after the world and the things of the world. Never ceasing to have eyes of adultery. And yet God loves us, even sometimes from afar, taking us back and caring for us even when we are all used up and spent and no longer much good for anything anymore. Yet He still loves us, and reconciles us and restores us to usefulness.

Jesus repeats for the third time; “Tend My sheep.” Take care of that which I love. If you love Me, you will love your neighbor as yourself. Tend My sheep. Whether you are tasked with being a pastor, or a teacher, or just a disciple within the flock, we are all tasked with tending to His sheep. To love one another. Love is manifested in service to His church. Jesus said they will know you are My disciples by your love for one another, as you care for one another, and tend to one another.

Well, we could just stop there. But John makes two quick final points. Jesus not only calls us to love Him, but secondly He calls us to sacrifice and then finally He calls us to obey. The second point then is found in the exchange starting in vs 18, “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go.” Now this He said, signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He *said to him, “Follow Me!”

Peter had boasted before the crucifixion that he would follow Jesus to the death if necessary. He would die before denial. But of course, he failed that test when it came and he denied the Lord three times. Now after Peter’s confession of love three times, Jesus tells him that he will be called upon to sacrifice his life for the Lord.

Tradition tells us that Peter was crucified upside down on a cross, at his own request, so that he would not share the same type of death as Christ. He didn’t feel that he was worthy to die as Christ had died. But whether or not that is true, we aren’t sure. But we do know from what Jesus prophesied that Peter would die a martyrs death when he became old. And I read someone last week that said that he felt Peter would have been glad to hear that. To know that he would be given another opportunity to sacrifice everything for the Lord. I was sort of taken back by that statement, but the more I thought about it, the more I could see it as a possibility. Peter did love the Lord. And I believe that he had meant it when he said he would die for Christ. But when the moment of truth came he failed to follow through. And I’m sure that he wished he could go back and do it again, this time gladly offering himself as a sacrifice for the sake of the gospel. Now, Jesus was offering him the chance to make that sacrifice after all. To claim the victory over fear and selfishness. So I think perhaps it was a more encouraging statement to Peter than what we might think.

I don’t think that martyrdom is something most of us will ever be called on to do. But I do know that being willing to take up our cross and follow Jesus, regardless of how great the cost, is something all disciples are called to do. In fact, three times in the gospels it is recorded that Jesus said, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.” Matt.16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23. That’s what agapao love is, sacrificial love. Willing to lay down your life for HIs sake.

Paul defines such love in Romans 12:1, 2, “Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”

The final point John indicates in this passage is that we are called to obey. Regardless of what we see other’s doing. Regardless if it seems we are all alone in suffering, or how great the sacrifice. Just obey. If you love the Lord, you will obey.

Vs.20, “Peter, turning around, *saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them; the one who also had leaned back on His bosom at the supper and said, “Lord, who is the one who betrays You?” So Peter seeing him *said to Jesus, “Lord, and what about this man?” Jesus *said to him, “If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me!”

A life that is truly dedicated to the Lord is compelled by love for Christ, characterized by sacrifice for Christ, and content with following Christ in obedience. To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. (1Sam.15:22) Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” (John 14:15) Follow Me. That’s a pretty simple directive, isn’t it? Just keep on keeping on. Satan may get you to stumble, you may be a weak disciple, but if you fall, get up, brush yourself off, repent and keep on following Jesus. You may not have all the love that you know you ought to have for God. Just love Him with the love you have. Follow Him with the strength that you have. Jesus will take care of your sin, He will pick you up when you fall, but just keep on following Jesus until Jesus comes back or you go to Him. He is the way, the truth, and the life. Follow Him.

This is how you show that you love the Lord. This is how you grow your love for the Lord. You do as He did. You go where He went. You love as He loved. You imitate Him. You emulate Him. You follow in His footsteps. Peter said as much in 1Peter 2:21 saying, “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.” You pattern your life as He lived His. Follow Him. That’s what produces agapao love. Not conjuring up some sort of passion or sentimentality. But just follow Him. Don’t quit. Never stop. No matter the cost, no matter the sacrifice. Just follow Jesus.

In last week’s sermon, we said that the last section of chapter 20 taught five principles of the gospel. And one of them was the abiding presence of Christ. That is an essential doctrine of the gospel; that Jesus Christ is alive, that though He died on the cross, He arose from the dead, and ever lives to make intercession for us.

That’s an important doctrine, because it reveals that Christ has procured two essential things for the Christian life. One; that the death of Jesus Christ provided the payment for the penalty of our sins. But two, His resurrection has provided new life for those who have been forgiven. Jesus died on the cross that we might die to sin, and that our penalty for our sin would be paid. But Jesus rose from the grave to show that we have new life, a life free from sin and death, a life of fruitfulness and purpose and eternal reward.

The reason we are given new life is so that we may have a life of fellowship with God. Our justification is the beginning of spiritual life. But God desires not just that we have the forgiveness of sins, but that we enter into the relationship of communion with him, constant communion with him. True spiritual life is life in communion with God. That is what enables this new life to be the abundant life which Jesus promised. It’s abundant, because the Lord is with us, in us, and working through us. You cannot have more abundant life than that.

So that is what John is illustrating in this record of yet another post resurrection appearance of Jesus Christ. It is obviously additional confirmation of His resurrection, but even more importantly, it serves to teach us the presence and power of Christ that is available to us, even though He has ascended into heaven.

Now notice that John intentionally uses a word to describe Jesus’s appearance which helps us to understand this principle. Twice in vs.1 and again in vs.14 John uses the word “manifests” to describe Jesus’s appearance. On the one hand, we might recognize that means He suddenly appeared, as if to say He was instantly there. But more importantly than that, it means that He simply made what was there already visible. He made the invisible, visible. That is the important thing; Jesus is always there. He is always with us. We may not see Him, but like Thomas discovered in last week’s message, Jesus was aware of all that he had said to the disciples in Jesus’s physical absence. So as both Moses and David stated in the OT, the Lord will never leave you nor forsake you. He is always with us, whether we see Him manifested in presence or in power or simply known by faith, He will be with us always. Jesus said in Matt.28:20, “lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Now while it is easy to proclaim such principles in times of peace and plenty, it is another to hold to such belief in times of feeling abandoned, or discouraged, or frightened, or in persecution. I’m not sure what the disciples were feeling as we catch up to them in vs.2, but I assume it might have been a little bit of all of the above. The last time Jesus had appeared to the disciples was the second Sunday after His resurrection. Eight days after the resurrection, on a Sunday evening, Jesus appeared in the locked room to meet with Thomas who was disbelieving the disciples report of the resurrection. And so Jesus made a divine appointment to reconcile Thomas.

But now it’s probably been a couple of weeks or more since that day. Jesus was on the earth for a total of 40 days after His resurrection. And John tells us in vs.14 that this was the 3rd time that He had appeared to the 11 disciples. We don’t know how long had transpired between the eighth day and this day. But we do know that Jesus had told the disciples in Matthew 28 to go to Galilee and that He would meet them there on a particular mountain. And we can surmise from vs 14 that they had been waiting for Jesus to show up at the mountain as He indicated, but He had not yet appeared. It might have been a week or more that they had sat on this desolate mountainside waiting for the Lord. There probably wasn’t much to eat. It might have been the same mountain that Jesus fed the 5000. There were no supermarkets out there. And the boys managed for a few days, and then they began to get hungry, frustrated and tired of waiting.

So Peter wakes up one morning, looks down the mountain at the Sea of Tiberius below, also known as the Sea of Galilee, and says, “I’m going fishing.” And the other six disciples that were there with him said, “We will come with you.”

By now, we all should realize that Peter was a natural leader. If Peter said it was a good idea, then everyone else did too. Peter is always presented first in any list of the disciples. It was because he was a natural leader. He was probably a pretty big guy, a strong man. Verse 11 makes it sound like Peter pulled the net to shore all by himself. I’m not sure that’s what it means, but that’s a possibility. But no doubt he was a big, strong guy. A courageous man. He wasn’t afraid of too much. He hardly ever held up his finger to see which way the wind was blowing. He just jumped in. And the disciples followed his leadership.

But we also ought to learn a lesson from this. There are a lot of men out there that are natural leaders that have found their way into the pastorate across this country. They may have a natural talent for communication. They may be funny, they can tell interesting stories. They may have a natural talent of convincing people to follow them. They may be exciting to be around. It’s easy to follow charismatic people. But they may not always be acting on behalf of God. They may be acting on their ego, or on their appetite, or they may be on a power trip. And we need to be careful to discern whether or not such men are being led by God or not.

Well, it’s obvious to me that Peter was not being led by God. He was led by his appetite. He was led by his desire to do something, to make something happen. Nothing was happening on that cold mountain. And down at that lake he knew he had his little fishing boat docked and ready to go fishing.

Another lesson to be learned is that man’s timing is not always God’s timing. Peter was ready to get moving. It had been weeks since the crucifixion, Jesus hadn’t shown up again and Peter was restless. But to move when God hasn’t told you to move is a foolish thing. As a pastor, as the leader of this church, I can assure you that I constantly have to check my motivation. Is it God appointed, or man appointed? Is it God’s timing, or my timing? In my opinion, most of the time God seems to move really, really slow. And sometimes He seems really late. I hate hearing these self righteous types that always pontificate about how God is always on time. I don’t doubt that God is always on time. But I do believe that God has a different time piece than what we use. Peter said as much in 2Peter 3:8 when he said, “But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day.” I think it’s possible Peter learned that valuable lesson on this very fishing expedition. God’s clock looks a lot different than our clock. So learning to wait on the Lord’s timing is a difficult thing for us, as it was for Peter and the disciples.

Another lesson to be learned from this is that man’s talent is worthless in the new life of a Christian without God’s authorization. Peter and all of those guys with him were experienced fishermen. They were professional fishermen. They had made a career out of it prior to becoming disciples. But they were supposed to be fishers of men now. They left their nets, remember, and followed the Lord. That occasion was another fishing expedition when Jesus told Peter to cast on the other side of the boat and Peter said, “Lord, we’ve been fishing all night and caught nothing. And we are expert fishermen. But to show what an understanding guy I am, I will do it at your request. Just to show you I know what I’m talking about.” And on that occasion, they caught so many fish that the boat started sinking. So afterwards when Jesus said, “Come and follow Me and I will make you fishers of men,” they left their fishing business and followed the Lord.

But now here they are after the resurrection, obviously still not getting the connection as to what this post resurrection ministry is all about, and so Peter thinks he’s going to take matters into his own hands and get the ball rolling. He decides to go back to his old profession. After all, they are going to need to eat. They have to make a living. Jesus isn’t here to feed them, so they have to make a living. Makes perfect common sense. If we had of been there, we would all have said, “Wait for us, we’re coming too.” Especially Nick. He always wants to fish.(!)

And yet all the natural talent in the world couldn’t fill their boat with fish. They caught nothing. And they fished all night long. Not a bite. Nothing to show for it. I think the lesson is pretty clear. Our talents, our wisdom, our experience, are useless in the Christian life if they are not directed by the Lord as He would have us to work. I don’t care how much talent some musician may have. I don’t care how much ability to communicate a person may have.

You know, there is a worksheet that has found it’s way in many churches where you can supposedly discover your spiritual gift. And maybe you have done that worksheet. I did it once. Let me tell you something. That’s man’s approach. God doesn’t use a worksheet. He doesn’t look at your natural talents or abilities. He looks at your potential. He looks at your heart. He looks at your willingness to be used and to serve. He looks at what He can do through you, and not what you can do without Him.

Don’t misunderstand a very important distinction. Natural talents do not equate to spiritual gifts. Spiritual gifts are things that God wants you to do which you may not have any talent to do naturally. So God gives you the Holy Spirit to equip you and lead you and develop you to do what He wants you to do. It’s not of the flesh, but of the Spirit. God doesn’t look at your capability, but your capacity. Your willingness to be obedient to Him. Then He will fill you with the power to do it. A work of God doesn’t come from you, it comes through you from God.

A good illustration of that is found in the last chapter. In John 20:22, it says Jesus breathed on the disciples and *said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” So they received the Holy Spirit then, several weeks before Pentecost. Then on the day of Pentecost, in Acts 2:4, it says that they were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages as the Holy Spirit was giving them utterance. See, the principle is having the right capacity, and being yielded to the Lord in obedience, He is able to fill you to fulfill His purposes. He is able to give you the talent or wisdom or strength to do what He wants you to do. And as we see in Acts, this unlearned fisherman named Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, stands up and preaches from the word of God and has an unbelievable harvest of 3000 souls. That’s the secret of fruitfulness that is being taught here in this passage.

So back to our story, they worked all night but were unfruitful. They accomplished nothing because they were relying on their own experience and talent and wisdom. And then Jesus appears. He manifests Himself to them, standing a hundred yards away on the shore. They don’t know it’s Jesus at first. That’s been the typical response at all Jesus’s appearances. No one recognizes Him until He is ready to be recognized. But Jesus has been there all night long. Watching them, listening to them, waiting for them to get tired of doing it their way. Waiting for them to come to the realization that they had accomplished nothing. And then Jesus kind of rubs it in, just a little bit. He calls out to them, “Hey guys, do you have any fish?”

And the disciples have to say what no fisherman ever wants to admit; they had caught nothing. I’ve asked Nick that very question many times before, and he never gives a straight answer. He always start talking about the one that got away. No fisherman likes to admit failure. So they said, “No.” I bet they said more than what John records for us. But maybe it’s better he didn’t record it. I’m sure they had a few choice words to say though when Jesus responded, “Cast the net on the right-hand side of the boat and you will find a catch.” But again, discretion being the better part of valor, John simply records that they cast their net on the other side and then were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish.

Listen, the point is not fishing on the right side versus the left side. It’s not one method over another method. It’s not one program over another program. The answer to fruitfulness is not a children’s ministry or a youth ministry or this program or that program. The point is it’s God’s way or no way. If you want real fruitfulness in God’s church, you need to do it God’s way. You may have a lot of activity, you may have a lot of enthusiasm, you may have a nice boat, and a lot of people rowing and shouting commands. But if it’s God’s church, you better do it God’s way. God has a blueprint for the church. And I got to tell you, most churches don’t have a clue what that is. But if you want your life to count for the kingdom of God, then you better find His blueprint and stick to it.

Isaiah 55:9 says, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” So also if we are going to see fruitfulness, we need to make sure we rely not on common sense but on uncommon grace. 1Cor. 1:27, “but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are, so that no man may boast before God.”

Now what does fruitfulness look like? Well, it may not look like what you think. Let’s notice what happens here when the disciples obey Christ. First, it produced recognition of Christ. John immediately recognizes when they start hauling in this load of fish that it has to be the Lord. He tells Peter, and Peter gets so excited he puts on his clothes and throws himself in the water and starts swimming to shore. He wants to be first to see Jesus. I will say that I love Peter’s enthusiasm. He may not have been the sharpest tool in the shed, but he was enthusiastic. And I think this shows how much he loves the Lord.

Listen, when real fruitfulness happens, it produces the realization of Christ likeness in His people. That is what fruitfulness looks like. It’s not just converts. It’s not members. It’s not the size of your building or your congregation. But people recognize Christ in your church. Fruitfulness produces the nature and character of Christ in the church which is recognizable. And secondly, it produces love for the Lord. You know how you can tell Peter loved the Lord? He left his boat, he left his nets, he left this incredible haul of fish. Peter didn’t care about fishing anymore. He didn’t care about his career anymore. He cared about being with Jesus.

Well, I’m sure some smart guy out there is saying, “Well sure, but fruitfulness is also defined by 153 fish.” But I would suggest that it isn’t the numbers that we should focus on. I’m suggesting we focus on the abundance that the Lord provides, and particularly the capacity of the nets. The text says that even though all those fish were in them, they did not break. In other words, the Lord increases your capacity. That’s the true nature of a spiritual gift. It’s not a natural thing, it’s not according to natural causes, but when you are yielded and obedient to what God wants you to do, He increases your capacity. Matt. 13:12, “For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him.”

When Peter got to shore, he discovered that the Lord already had a fire going, and fish and bread already cooked ready to eat. And the Lord told them to come and eat breakfast, and to bring some of their fish as well.

Listen, we can read a lot of things into this breakfast that aren’t necessarily there if we’re not careful. But what I can say with certainty is that the Lord wants us to bring to Him our contribution, but it is His grace that provides the resources that we need for our new life in Christ. He is the provider, He is the means of power, the means of provision. He wants our contribution, but mainly, I think He wants our fellowship. He wants communion with us. Jesus said to the church in Laodicea in Rev. 3:20, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”

We tend to use that verse as an invitation to unbelievers. But in reality it is an invitation to believers, to a busy, self absorbed church that has no time for real fellowship with the Lord. He is calling us, knocking on our heart’s door, wanting to have intimacy and communion with us. That is the purpose of the gospel. To restore us to the relationship man enjoyed with God back in the Garden of Eden. To restore us to fellowship with Him. And when we abide with Him in fellowship, we will have fruitfulness in the church.

Jesus talked about this relationship of fruitfulness and fellowship in John 14:15, and I will end with this passage as a summary of the message this morning. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments. I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. After a little while the world will no longer see Me, but you will see Me; because I live, you will live also. In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.”

In today’s passage, we are continuing to look at the first day of Christ’s resurrection from the dead. He arose early in the morning on the first day of the week, that is, of course, Sunday. Last week we saw Mary Magdalene and John and Peter’s response to the resurrection. But in presenting the chronology of the events on this most important of days, John does so in such a way as to teach a lesson. He is teaching, in this last section of chapter 20, the gospel, and he does so by showcasing for us the first Sunday church service in the New Testament period.

We meet as 21st century Christians on Sunday’s to celebrate the Lord’s Day, so named because He arose from the dead on the first day of the week. And so John is showcasing this first church service on Sunday, and he does so by giving us a classic sermon outline, featuring five principles of the gospel, followed by a personal illustration of the gospel, and then a closing synopsis of the gospel.

As we look at this passage, we see that the disciples are gathered together on Sunday evening, and they have locked the doors for fear of the Jews. This is a closed door church service. And John tells us why they have locked the doors, because of the fear of the Jews. What that means is that the Jewish religious leaders are incensed over Jesus having risen from the tomb, they have paid off the Roman soldiers to lie about it, and they might very well have schemed to arrest or even put to death the disciples so that they might not broadcast Jesus’s resurrection.

But I think that God has intentionally put the disciples there at such a time to set an example for generations of Christians yet to come that we might meet on Sundays to assemble together for fellowship and to worship the Lord, and to proclaim the gospel. The gospel, by the way, meaning simply the good news of God’s plan, the Way of life, the Way of salvation.

Now there are as I said five principles of the gospel that are being taught here. The first principle of the gospel being presented is the assurance of the presence of Christ. The whole premise of the gospel is that Jesus has triumphed over death, so that we might not fear death. He died on the cross, but He also rose from the dead. And so as the disciples have heard testimony earlier from Mary that she had seen the Lord, and heard from Peter and John that the tomb was empty, they were certainly talking among themselves as to what to make of all of this. And as they meet together, behind locked doors, suddenly Jesus appears in their midst.
Luke’s gospel tells us that the disciples were alarmed. They thought they were seeing a ghost. And so Jesus says to them, “Peace be with you.” And when He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord. (vs20).

This was a direct fulfillment of the Lord’s prophesy in which He said “If you destroy this temple, in three days I will raise it up again.” But it is also a fulfillment of the promise in Matt. 18:20 which says, “For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.” And while that was true for the disciples, that is also a promise for all who believe in the gospel even today. We believe that the Lord is with us today as we gather in His name. He is present with us when we have Bible study on Wednesday evening. He is present wherever and whenever we gather together as a church. And we can be assured of that because He rose from the dead.

Much is made by theologians over the fact that Jesus appears in a locked room without having to go through a door. They attribute this ability to the nature of His resurrection body, and offer us the hope that we too will one day have a body that can walk through doors. But I would say such a view is shortsighted. Jesus had power to walk through doors before His death. The fact that He appears in such a way is just further evidence that He is Jesus. I will say this about His resurrected body. He does not seem immediately recognizable in any of the post resurrection appearances unless He produces some evidence of who He is. In this case, He shows His wounds, which are unmistakably those of His crucifixion. They are convincing proof of His resurrection and identity.

And as modern day Christians, we are promised of His living presence with us, that He will never leave us nor forsake us. And we can rely upon that promise because He lives, because He arose from the dead, and was witnessed alive not only by the disciples gathered there, but Paul tells us in 1 Cor. 15;6 that He was seen by 500 people at one time after His death. The great principle of the gospel is that Jesus is alive, and He is with us, and because He lives He can assure for us the benefits and blessings of the gospel, and that one day we will be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is when we are resurrected even as He was.

The second principle of the gospel presented to us is that He gives us not only His presence, but His peace. Twice Jesus says, “Peace be with you.” Anytime you see something stated twice in scripture you can rest assured that it is a undeniable promise that will surely come about. The first peace that Jesus gave was to quiet their fear, to calm their alarm. The second peace is to assure them of their peace with God.

This great promise is reiterated in Romans 5:1 which says, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Men are searching today for peace – peace of mind, peace with men, peace from strife and war. “Peace, peace!” they cry, but there is no peace. But Jesus said in John 14:27, “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”

How can Jesus give this peace? Because He took the offense of our sin against God upon Himself. He bore God’s wrath towards our sins upon His shoulders, bearing our sins upon the cross, paying the ultimate price on our behalf. And His resurrection is evidence that God was satisfied by His sacrifice for sin, that we might be made right with God, justified by faith in Christ, so that we have peace with God.

So we might know that if God is for us, who can be against us? If God so loves us that He spared not His only Son, what have we to fear? We have an Advocate with God, even Jesus Christ our Intercessor, so that we need not be afraid of anything. God is for us. We have peace with God. What a great tenet of the gospel; the peace of God has been established for us through Christ.

Thirdly, we have through the gospel not only the presence of Christ with us, and the peace of God with us, but we are given the same purpose which God gave Christ. Vs 21, Jesus says, “as the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” Jesus Christ came to Earth with a specific purpose; that is that He might manifest to the world the truth of God. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father except by Me.” Furthermore, He said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it more abundantly.”

Listen, this is what the world doesn’t understand about the gospel. The gospel is God’s plan for man, to give him life, abundant life. It is God’s plan to restore man to the innocence of the Garden, to restore man to the joy before the fall. It is God’s plan for man to have a life of joy and peace and all the blessings which God originally designed man to have but were taken away by man’s fall into sin. The gospel is not just a list of what you can’t do. It is a list of promises of what God will do, when man comes under His plan of reconciliation.

2Cor. 5:17 says, “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.”

This is our purpose, having been reconciled to God, we become ambassadors of Christ to the world, so that we might announce to all men the promise of reconciliation. We are ambassadors. We have the same ministry that Christ had. We tell the world the truth of God, we tell the world the promise of the gospel, the hope of the gospel.

Listen, some of you are missing out on your purpose. And you wonder why your Christian experience seems lacking. Perhaps it’s because you are not recognizing that just as Jesus was sent to a lost and dying world to tell them the good news, so He has sent us also. We are not saved just so we may selfishly bask in the love of God for us, and reap all the blessings of God for ourselves, like the lepers in the OT that found the enemy camp deserted and full of food, knowing that their own people were starving. But it is better to give than to receive. It is better to serve than to be served. There are hundreds of men and women that you come into contact with everyday, and God has sent you to them to tell them the gospel of salvation. We have a commission to be ambassadors for Christ, to carry on His work, His ministry of reconciliation. I hope you take that commission seriously. I hope you understand your purpose is that Christ is sending you to tell your lost family, your lost friends, your lost coworkers, your lost neighbors about the good news of the gospel. If we would all take seriously this commission, that Christ is sending you, I think we would soon have to move to a bigger building to hold all the new converts.

Fourthly, the principle of the gospel presented here next is the means by which we are able to fulfill this purpose, and that is the gift of the Holy Spirit. John says in vs.22, And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Someone once said, I think it was Alistair Begg, that the difference between the OT and the NT is that in the OT we were given the law but we couldn’t perform it, but in the NT we are given the gift of the Holy Spirit that we might do the works of God.

It’s interesting that when Jesus gives them the permanent presence of the Holy Spirit to dwell in them, He breathes on them. There seems to be in the language a deliberate reference to Genesis 2, when God made Adam and breathed in him the breath of life, and man became a living soul. Paul speaks of this parallel in 1Cor. 15:45, saying “So also it is written, The first MAN, Adam, BECAME A LIVING SOUL.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.” Jesus breathed on the disciples, giving them the Spirit to dwell permanently in them.

It’s also interesting in light of what Jesus said earlier about us being sent as He was sent, to notice the parallels between Jesus’s ministry and the disciples’ ministry. Jesus you will remember, after coming up from the water of His baptism which symbolized the resurrection, had the Spirit descend upon Him in the form of a dove. And immediately He went out into the wilderness being led by the Holy Spirit and for 40 days He was tempted. It’s interesting that the disciples receive the Spirit through Christ breathing on them, and then they will wait for 40 days before receiving power through the filling of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. So again, we have the same benefit for our ministry that Christ had in His. After the forty days, Luke 4:14 says, “And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee.” And such power is given to us as well that we might fulfill the ministry of Christ.

The last principle of the gospel presented here is that of authority. Jesus says in vs.23, “If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained.” What Jesus is saying here is not that we have the power to forgive sins. The Bible makes it clear in many other places that only God has the power to forgive sins. But rather He is saying that as we fulfill our ministry of the gospel, to share the good news, that we have the authority to announce the forgiveness of sins for those that confess Jesus as Lord and have faith in Him.

We have the authority of the gospel to say that if you confess your sins He is faithful and just to forgive you of your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. But there is also the flip side to the gospel. If you reject Jesus as your Lord and God, then we have the authority to tell them that they are still in their sins.

That’s the message that Peter and the apostles had after Pentecost. They spoke with authority. They spoke with the authority of the Holy Spirit. They preached with the power of the Spirit, and through the authority of the Word of God. And we have that same resource. So many people want to focus on the apostles speaking in tongues as their manifestation of the power of the Spirit. But I would suggest that more significant was the message of the sermon Peter preached. Suddenly this backwoods, unlearned fisherman was preaching a message, quoting and interpreting scripture and people’s hearts were cut to the quick under conviction of their sins. People weren’t saved by hearing someone speak in tongues, they became saved by hearing the gospel preached. That is power. The Holy Spirit works through the gospel, works through the scriptures, to bring men under conviction that leads to salvation. That is edifying to the body, and not just self edification. (Romans 1:16) “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes…”

So those are the five principles of the gospel that John records for us here as he really begins to finish his gospel. And like any good preacher, he gives a personal illustration for his message; he presents the account of Thomas, who had been missing from the first service when Jesus appeared. And though Thomas knows well these disciples, having been with them constantly for three years or more, yet he rejects their testimony. When they tell him that they had seen the risen Jesus, he says quite callously that unless he sees the nail prints in His hands, and actually puts his finger in them, and unless he puts his hand into the wound in His side, he will not believe that they have actually seen Jesus alive.

Well, 8 days later, it’s once again Sunday evening. And the disciples are having the second Sunday service, and they have locked the doors again. But this time, Thomas is with them. And Jesus suddenly appears in the midst of them and says to Thomas, “Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing.”

Thomas is undoubtedly taken aback. For one because he sees the risen Savior. But also because he hears the Lord repeat back to him the things he said privately to the disciples. And so he understands in a special way what it means to have the presence of Christ in his life. Realizing that Jesus heard him when he said that must have had a major impact on him. I would to God that we might realize that Jesus hears everything we say. That He is watching us, and walking among us every day. Jesus told the Pharisees in Matt.12:36 that they would give an account on judgment day for every careless word that they spoke. And Jesus told the 7 churches in Revelation, “I know your deeds.” He is described as walking among the churches, watching and hearing all that they have to say and do. If we truly understood that it would be hard for us to continue living the way we do, wouldn’t it? We need to realize the presence of Christ 24/7, as we go through our daily lives.

Well, Thomas suddenly doesn’t want to put his finger in the nail holes. He doesn’t want to put his hand in His side. Instead, Thomas gives the strongest confession of any of the disciples up to that point. He says, “My Lord and my God!” That is the confession that John has been working towards in the gospel up to this point. It’s to bring the reader to the point of confessing Jesus as our Lord and our God. That we might come to the place where we are willing to accept Jesus as our Master and Lord, that He has the right to determine for us what we can or can’t do. Because He is also God. He is the Creator of all things. He has formed us for His glory.

That confession of Thomas is what is meant by believing in Jesus. It is to declare Him as My Master, and My God. And therefore, my allegiance and commitment is given completely to Him. And having faith in Him, we are made righteous, we have peace with God. We are given new life by the Spirit of God. We are a new creation. Old things have passed away and all things have become new. We have new life in Christ, and a new purpose in life.

Jesus accepts Thomas’s confession. But He gives a rebuke for his lack of faith. Jesus says, “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.” Listen, we need to guard against the fleshly desire of seeking of physical verification of the Lord like that which Thomas exhibited. We all get discouraged from time to time. We all may have doubts from time to time. To do so is human. But to stubbornly seek that is carnal. It is fleshly. It is to want special validation from God just for me, according to exactly what I think God needs to do. Jesus was gracious to Thomas. But that attitude is not what He desires.

A lot of Christians may feel like we are disadvantaged because we don’t have the physical validation that the early disciples had. We don’t have the physical signs of power perhaps. We don’t have the physical presence of the Lord. But Jesus is saying in this statement that not having Him physically here is not a disadvantage, but it is really a blessing. Blessed are they who did not see and yet believed. There is a special blessing for us Christians today that don’t have the physical evidence to validate or prove our faith. But then if we did, it wouldn’t be such great of faith would it? And we know that God rewards and blesses great faith. And that kind of faith is what is required. We believe the testimony of faithful men, trustworthy witnesses and the record of the scripture. God will bless you for it. Matt. 5:8, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”
And that brings us to the conclusion, or synopsis of John’s gospel. It comes a chapter early. But it’s really like the conclusion of John’s gospel. He says in vs.30, “Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.” 

Listen, these truths have been written that you might have life in His name. Abundant life. Real life. A life of joy and blessing. Jesus did not come to teach philosophy. He did not come to show us how to be prosperous or successful. He didn’t come as God in the flesh to make new inventions that would make our lives easier. He didn’t die to make us more comfortable. But He came that we might believe that He has come from God, to teach us the truth of God, that we might be reconciled to God, that we may have the new life which God has designed for us to enjoy, and that we might enjoy fellowship with Him forever. I hope that you have confessed Jesus as your Lord and your God, that you might have the life which He has died to procure for you. If you believe in Him, I announce to you by the authority of Christ that your sins have been forgiven you. But if you reject Him, I must tell you that you remain dead in your sins and will face the final judgment without Him. I pray you come to Jesus today and receive all that He has done for you.

The goal of the gospel is not just to provide us with an escape from hell. But to provide us with a new way of living, a new life. Jesus said, I came that you might have life, and have it more abundantly. Before we can have the life that Christ wants for us, we must be first justified, our sins atoned for, made acceptable to God, and that is only possible through faith in the cross of Christ. But the ultimate purpose of that atonement is that we become sons of God. As Jesus said in vs.17 of our text; “I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God.’” That we might have new life in Christ, as sons of God, doing the works of God. That we might be a testimony to the world of the power of salvation.

So in the gospel, the cross speaks to our atonement, our justification. And the resurrection speaks of our sanctification, our new life whereby we are given power over sin and over death, which we now live by faith to the glory of God.

As we look this week at the resurrection, I don’t want to focus merely on the chronology of the events and try to reconcile the various gospel accounts into one. But what I want to do is emphasize the new life that the resurrection promises. I would point out that on Saturday evening, as all the disciples went to bed, undoubtedly remembering the horrors of Christ’s crucifixion, undoubtedly despondent and without hope due to their Savior having succumbed to death, yet even in this darkest hour God was at work. God had a plan and in the deliberate sovereignty of God this plan was inevitably coming to it’s conclusion. As Jesus said in John 5:17 regards to the law of the Sabbath, “My Father is working until now, and I myself am working.” So even though His body was in the grave, even though it was the Sabbath, the plan of God was at work and succeeding.

Though in the minds of His disciples, and in the minds of His enemies, Christ was dead and buried on Saturday, little did they know that He was at that very moment taking captivity captive, that He had descended into the lower parts of the earth, triumphed over the very gates of Hell, and had taken the very keys of Hell and Death, “that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.”

The power of death and hell had to be broken, so that man might be able to truly live as God designed them to live. And for that freedom that was won at so great a cost, we celebrate the resurrection on the first day of the week. We celebrate the first day of being a new creation in Christ Jesus.

So it is with that sense of divine purpose we may view the resurrection. John says it was early on the first day of the week, that is Sunday morning, but while it was still dark. Jesus had said two days earlier on the night of His betrayal that the hour belonged to the power of darkness. And that darkness still covered the earth early on Sunday morning. Men were without hope, unaware that the Spirit of God was moving across that darkness, unaware of the great victory that had been won in the bowels of the earth as Christ took the keys of death and Hades. And since death could not hold Him, because sin had nothing on Him, in the first hours of a still dark Sunday morning, the Light dawned, Christ rose from Hades, and His Spirit returned once again to the lifeless body within the tomb. The wrappings of the grave clothes could not hold Him down. The heavy stone across the tomb could not hold Him in. According to Matthew 28 the earth trembled violently in a severe earthquake and an angel of God rolled away the stone and sat upon it.

Maybe Mary, having been shaken awake by the violent quake, comes early that Sunday morning while it was still dark to anoint His dead body with spices. She comes out of sorrow, without any hope, only despair. The early darkness reflects the despondency that gripped her soul. Christ had delivered her from seven demons. She had known the power of His life. But yet in the early morning darkness, doubt darkened her soul. She had believed on Christ for so much more than this. Her love for Christ had devolved to a sense of despair when she considered His body lain in the grave.

Finding the stone rolled away and the body of Christ not there caused her alarm and confusion. Her thoughts were that Jesus’s body had been taken. Mary’s thoughts focused on that which could be seen, verified. Someone must have taken His body, and so she ran and told Peter and John.

Mary’s faith, or lack of it, is so much like our faith. When the darkness pervades our lives, and our hopes are not quickly realized, we tend to look at what is visible. We tend to focus on the external circumstances and often misinterpret what is going on. We don’t see Christ working, we can’t see His power, or understand His plan. And in the darkness of our lack of faith we run to conclusions that are contrary to the promises of God. Christ had prophesied that He would die on the cross and after three days He would rise again, but Mary believed what she saw wth her eyes. She thought she made a rational conclusion from the circumstances which she witnessed, but she was in error.

Often events happen in our lives in a similar fashion. When darkness pervades our lives, God’s presence seems missing, God’s promises are forgotten, and we become confused, alarmed. We run away from the very place where God has brought us to show us His glory. We believe what our senses tell us, rather than have faith in that which is not seen. But Heb. 11:1 says, ”Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Mary’s faith was founded on what she could see, what she could touch. Her faith was founded on her 5 senses, on her feelings.

Peter and John’s faith was in turmoil as well. Though John had been with Jesus at the cross, he must have been hit particularly hard by the graphic torture of the cross, having witnessed first hand the death of Christ. He would have seen the life leave Jesus’s body as He gave up His Spirit, as the evidence of death was revealed in blood and water flowing out of His side. Though he would have been moved as others were at the way Christ died, yet he would have known with undeniable certainty that Christ was indeed dead. He too had forgotten that this same Jesus who gave up His Spirit, had said He had the power not only to lay down His life, but to take it back up again. Such promise had been forgotten in his grief which overwhelmed him. John, who loved Jesus much, would have been most forlorn and disconsolate at His death.

Peter on the other hand was also undoubtedly crushed, not only because of the death of His Lord, but because of his own failure in Jesus’s final hours. His grief over the death of Christ was made even more bitter knowing that he had deserted Him and even disowned the Lord in the hour of His greatest suffering. So the news from Mary at such an early hour must have startled them both. Here was something that they could do, some action that they could take. To what purpose, I think neither gave much thought, but at the report of Mary they began to run towards the tomb.

One cannot help but wonder why John reveals the outcome of the footrace that occurred between him and Peter. Many commentators have speculated about his purpose in recording it. John outruns Peter to the tomb, then peeking in, stays outside, while Peter comes huffing and puffing up and barges straight inside.

Perhaps John is not so concerned with the physical accomplishment of the race as we might think. Maybe John is revealing the character or nature of the individuals. Even perhaps the character of their faith. Peter’s faith is passionate, impulsive, bold. John’s faith is eager to believe, but not quite as courageous, needing the stimulus of Peter.

However, perhaps more can be discerned regarding the true nature of each person’s faith by examining John’s use of the word interpreted “saw.” John uses three Greek words in this passage for “saw.” When Mary looked at the tomb and saw the stone rolled away, he said she looked, using the Greek word “blepo,” which means to clearly see a material or physical object. Mary was focused on the physical. And what she saw in the physical determined her faith.

John as well, when he first comes to the tomb is said to see the linen wrappings, and John uses the same word, “blepo.” At that point, the physical is evident to him as well, but he doesn’t yet go in. He doesn’t act on what he sees.

Peter however, barges straight inside the tomb and he sees the linen grave clothes and also the head scarf rolled up by itself. And John uses a different word for Peter seeing. He uses “theoreo” which means to contemplate, to observe, scrutinize. Peter senses that there is more than meets the eye, but he is puzzled and he isn’t able to come to a conclusion at this point. Maybe the eyes of his faith are clouded by his conscience.

But after Peter has gone inside, perhaps having said something to John, John goes in to the tomb. He sees the same things that Peter has seen. But now John uses another word to describe how he sees. It’s not “theoreo,” as Peter was contemplating, but it is “horaō”, to know, to perceive, to discern. He sees the same things that Peter saw, and the same things that Mary had seen, but while they went away unbelieving, the text says that John believed. He believed in that moment that Jesus had risen from the dead. He believed in faith.

What difference does their conclusions mean though? Should we make so much out of their responses? I would suggest that it makes a difference to Christ. Next week we will look at the next passage as Jesus comes to the disciples and Thomas isn’t there with the others. And because he didn’t personally see Jesus with his own eyes, he will not believe the testimony of the other disciples. So 8 days later, Jesus shows up again and specifically appears to Thomas and invites him to put his fingers in the holes in His hands, and the wound in HIs side. And of course, at that point Thomas believes and says “My Lord and My God.” A great confession, no doubt, but one that in Christ’s opinion was lacking in faith. And so Jesus says in vs.29, “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.” And in that statement Christ reveals the nature of faith needed for future generations who will believe not on the basis of physical evidence, but on the basis of faithful testimony.

Mary, John and Peter all had the same experience at the empty tomb. They all saw the same things, but only John believes with the faith that God desires. John reveals the basis for that kind of faith in vs.9, which says, “For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead.” The point being that our faith is founded upon the Scriptures. This is the faith that God desires. And this is the faith which we are tasked with today. We don’t have the physical presence of God to bolster our faith. I would suggest that it is a failure of faith to seek after material manifestations of God. This desire to “experience God” while understandable from a human point of view, is not in accordance with the plan of God.

As we are told in 2Tim. 3:16, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” The Scriptures are the complete revelation of God, and it is able to thoroughly, completely equip you for every good work. The Word of God is more than adequate for our faith. Our new life is lived by faith in the Scripture, not by sight. 2Cor. 5:7, “for we walk by faith, not by sight.”

Now though Mary has not risen to that degree of faith, Jesus will reveal Himself to her to increase her faith. But we should not be too emboldened by His special appearance, nor deprecating towards Mary who needs it. Because Mary did not have the completed Scriptures as we have. None of the New Testament had been written at that point. And so Christ, the living Word, provides for her what the written Word provides for us.

So in vs.11, we see Mary, back once again at the tomb, probably after John and Peter have already left, and she is weeping. She is still mourning Christ’s death, weeping over the loss of His body. And when she looked again in the tomb this time she sees two angels in white sitting. This “seeing” is the same as Peter’s “theoreo”, scrutinizing, observing the two angels in white. It’s doubtful that she recognizes them as angels, perhaps just seeing two men in white apparel and doesn’t know what they are doing there. She is trying to understand, but not clearly discerning what is going on.

And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him.” At that point, she becomes aware of Jesus behind her, but she thinks He is the gardener. That’s a pretty good indication she didn’t recognize the men as angels. She hasn’t discerned anything abnormal.

Someone the other night at Bible study brought up the verse in Hebrews 13:2 about angels which says, “Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” And the point I made in explaining it, was the phrase, “unawares.” The verse teaches that most of the time when we might encounter angels, we’re unaware that they are angels. So many people running around today claiming visitations from angels. But if you count up the number of times recorded in the Scriptures you will find only a few accounts of them in 6000 years. So beware of those claiming angelic visitations.

In fact, Paul warns against giving angels more credence than preachers of the gospel, in Gal 1:8, saying, “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.”

So Mary didn’t recognize the angels, nor did she even recognize Jesus. “Supposing Him to be the gardener, she *said to Him, ‘Sir, if you have carried Him away, tell me where you have laid Him, and I will take Him away.’” It’s interesting that after the resurrection, Jesus is seen on numerous occasions (one commentator counted 17 times) and yet in every case He is not recognized initially. That should be a warning for those who suppose that they have seen some sort of apparition of Jesus. Unless He reveals Himself, we would not recognize Him in the flesh. Even those who had known Jesus in the flesh did not recognize Him after His resurrection unless He showed them His wounds, or in some other way manifested His identity to them.

How then does Mary come to recognize Him? When He calls her by her name. This is a direct correlation to what Jesus said in John 10:2, “But he who enters by the door is a shepherd of the sheep. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he puts forth all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.”

Last Wednesday night we looked at Christ’s letter to the church of Pergamum in Revelation 2. And at the end of the letter, Jesus says, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it.” The hidden manna refers to the word of God, and those who believe it receive a new name from God.

Some commentators say that Jesus uses the Aramaic version of Mary, i.e., Miriam, to address her, and she responds in Aramaic, “Rabboni,” which means Teacher. She recognizes Him when He calls her by her name. Rom 8:30 says, “and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.” No one comes to Me, Jesus said, unless the Father calls him. The election of God is specific. He calls us by name.

But though the calling of God is effectual, there is still the problem of Mary’s ineffective faith. It is the faith of feeling, of physical presence. There is almost an obsession with Mary over the physical presence of Christ’s body. Even when He was dead, she is focused on the body of Christ. She wants to anoint the body. She is alarmed when there is no body in the tomb. She is confused, concerned.

So now when she recognizes she is in the presence of Christ, she immediately grabs hold of Him, as if to say I will never let go of His physical presence. And in our humanness, that is understandable. Who among us does not crave the physical closeness, physical presence of the Lord? How many have not thought, “Oh, if God would just reveal Himself to me, every thing would be ok. I could take what I am going through. I could deal with things, if I could just see the Lord in some manifestation of power or presence.”

But Christ rebukes Mary for that sort of thing, calling it clinging. He says, “Stop clinging to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I ascend to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God.’” Jesus indicates the faith that is required in this new life will be a faith in Him who will not be visible, but invisible. Not a faith founded on a clinging, emotional, physical presence of God, but a faith founded on the inviolable promises of the Word of God.

Now much debate is given to this statement by Christ. First of all, the obvious meaning is that at that point He had just risen from three days in the grave, even from the depths of Hades, and He had not ascended to the Father. But it also means that the purpose of God was not that He would remain here in bodily form, but would ascend into heaven to stand as Mediator between God and man, our Great High Priest. He could not do that from earth, but His place was in heaven, far above all rule and authority on Earth.

But it also means that He would not be a physical presence here on Earth that we can see and hold onto, but rather our faith in what is not seen would be required in a life of faith. Thus, the just shall live by faith. And that which is seen is not faith, but that which is unseen. This will be the acceptable pattern of faith in this new resurrection life, that we might believe the testimony of faithful men, even the apostles, who would record their testimony in the gospels and epistles and that having believed the scriptures, we might receive the knowledge of God which leads to the full measure of salvation; not only justification, but a life of sanctification, culminating in our future glorification when we will be made completely like Christ at His coming.

So the testimony of faith is illustrated by Mary Magdalene, who comes afterwards to the disciples and says, “I have seen the Lord.” This is the basis for our faith. The testimony of faithful witnesses, who were willing to die for that testimony. And their testimony was accompanied by the signs of the apostles, with all miracles and signs and wonders, so that we might believe their word. So that by the testimony of the Scriptures, the nations of the world might come to know the knowledge of God that leads to salvation, that we might go into all the world and make disciples, teaching them to believe and observe all that Christ taught, as evidenced by the Word of God.

The resurrection teaches us that when we die to this world, we can live a new life in Christ. That new life begins at our justification, where we are declared righteous by the blood of Jesus Christ, and it continues through a life of sanctification, where we live righteously by the power of the Spirit of Christ, whereby we become conformed to the image of Christ, and ambassadors of the gospel to the world. But that new life is not automatic, it’s not being put into autopilot mode. It is a possible, though. When the just shall live by faith. And our faith is founded on the Scriptures, by which we may know God, and know the will of God. Don’t look for the physical to confirm your faith, look for that which is spiritual to inform your faith. The Bible says that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. That living, powerful source of faith is described in Hebrews 4:12, “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” Let us hold fast the Word of God, that our faith may be founded on the true and faithful promises of God.

We live in a society today when death is portrayed in movies and television with all sorts of blood and gore and people are unmoved by it. But on the other hand, in reality, in our day to day lives, we go to great lengths to avoid seeing death. If the average person even saw a steer killed and butchered they would probably be so sickened that they would swear off meat forever.

We have an unrealistic perception of death, and perhaps because of that, we have an unrealistic perception of life. Even in the death of a loved one, it is rare that we really see much of the person as they die, or after they are dead, but rather doctors and nurses and morticians whisk the body away as soon as possible and what we end up seeing eventually at the funeral doesn’t even look real anymore.

It must have been a tremendously shocking thing to witness the crucifixion of Jesus. The savagery of it is something that is hard for us to fathom. The suffering is something that would not be tolerated today even in the execution of the worst criminals. The Romans view of a merciful hurrying of the death of the victims was to break their legs so that they ended up suffocating due to the pain required to push their chest up enough to breath.

Christ, as we saw last week, gave up His life before the suffering or the soldiers finally took it from Him. But that doesn’t mean He didn’t suffer immensely. Not only did He suffer in His flesh, but He suffered shame that only a righteous God could suffer. To be holy and innocent of all sin and yet be stripped naked and condemned by your countrymen to death, and then have your mother and a few friends watch you in your agony is beyond our comprehension. But to have the wrath of God upon you as you take on the weight of the sins of the world is even more incomprehensible for our finite minds.

We are not given all the details of Christ’s crucifixion. Even if we piece together the four gospels there are still gaps in what God has given us. John says that there were many other things that he could have included, but that these were given that we might believe that Jesus was the Son of God and that believing we might have life in His name.

So as we come to this last section, the burial of Christ, it is important that we understand the full significance which John intends for us to gather from this passage. And I think that one of the main things that John wants to illustrate for us in the end of this chapter and the next chapter is the various responses of the disciples to the crucifixion and the resurrection. There are many different responses that are presented in chapter 19 and 20. And I think that John illustrates these various responses in order to show that salvation is an individual response to the gospel. Salvation did not come to all men simply through the cross of Christ, but salvation comes through man’s faith in what Christ did on the cross. Salvation requires more than a head knowledge, or an intellectual assent to the facts, but it requires a response of faith to the cross for it to be efficacious.

To become saved is to not only be justified by faith in what Christ has done for us, but to be saved is to become a disciple. To follow Christ, to follow His teachings, to be led by Him in all walks of our life. Jesus said in Matthew 28:19, “Go into the world and make disciples of all the nations…teaching them to observe all that I commanded you.” Discipleship then is the goal of evangelism. Not just to make converts, but disciples. Not just to have people raise their hand or repeat a prayer and then they have been saved from hell, but to have people become transformed into the image of Christ.

Now in this last section of chapter 19, we see two men, who are called secret disciples. I think that is somewhat of an oxymoron. But if we give them the benefit of the doubt, let’s say that they had come to a saving knowledge of Christ, but that faith had not become public, and therefore not transformative. I’m not sure such a thing is possible, but God knows the heart, not I, and He knows what are the intentions of the heart even before we act on them. So if John, under the influence of the Holy Spirit calls them disciples, then maybe they have been saved prior to the cross. However, I will remind you that in John 6, after Jesus said “my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink,” it goes on to say in vs66 that after this “many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.” So there is a sense in which you could be considered a disciple of Christ but not be saved and turn and walk away from the Lord. Not that you can lose your salvation, but that you never had it. You were considered a disciple because you were in the group, but you never truly believed unto salvation.

And I think that this is indicative of many in the church today. They have a head knowledge of Christ, they are following to a degree, holding on loosely so to speak to the things of God, but in times of difficulty they will expose their true nature; they will turn away and stop following. They will turn to something more palatable to their mind. Something not as demanding. And so we have churches filled with people who move from group to group, from church to church, always avoiding the rigors and demands of true discipleship.

So Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were secret disciples up to this point. Whether they had truly been saved or not we don’t know, but we do know that as they came face to face with the crucifixion of Christ they came all the way into discipleship. At the cross of Christ they faced the true nature of Christianity, and they choose to identify and suffer with Christ.

Now who were Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus? Well, I’m sure most of you are familiar with Nicodemus. We met him in the third chapter, he came to see Jesus at night. And we are told there that he was a ruler, that means a member of the Sanhedrin. Jesus calls him a teacher. John also calls him a Pharisee. That means that he believed in the afterlife, and he practiced the law to the nth degree. In that famous discourse in chapter 3, Jesus told him that he needed to be born again of the Spirit. And so we can assume that message resonated with Nicodemus, and eventually produced saving faith.

There is one other note about Nicodemus in chapter 7, around vs 50, we see Nicodemus coming to the defense of Christ that He should be given a fair hearing before they judged Him. And in that passage, the Pharisees rebuked him for that defense. So at that point there is an indication of the Spirit at work in him, but he has not yet come forward completely as a disciple.

The other man we know less about. Mark tells us that Joseph of Arimathea was a prominent member of the Sanhedrin as well. Matthew says he was a rich man. And Mark also adds that he was waiting for the kingdom of God. That means he was looking for the Messiah. Some traditions say that Joseph and Nicodemus were actually brothers. They both were rich men, they both were members of the Sanhedrin. They both were very prominent in Jewish religion and society.

And because of those things, they had a lot to lose for becoming disciples of Christ. John says that Joseph was a disciple, but secretly for fear of the Jews. He doesn’t mean just the Jewish people at large necessarily, but the Jewish leaders, the ruling party. There were 70 men that were part of the Sanhedrin. And there were undoubtedly thousands of Pharisees. These were the leaders of the community, and these two men were considered the most prominent of the leaders. And so to come out publicly as Christ’s disciples meant the possible loss of their positions in society, their careers, and their wealth. So up to this point they hid their growing faith.

I think that it’s obvious God does not save us, He does not shine His light in us, that we might hide it under a basket. Jesus said in Matt. 5:14, “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” So we are not saved to hide our discipleship, but to reflect the light of Christ.

The application to disciples today should be pretty obvious as well. Christ died to save us not just to escape hell, but that we might shine His light through us to the world by looking like Christ, by acting like Christ. That the world might see our good works, and bring glory to our Father in heaven.

What stops us from doing that? Well, it’s the same things that stopped Joseph and Nicodemus. They feared the excommunication of the ruling party. They feared what their community might say if they really stepped out and followed the Lord. They were afraid they might lose their friends. Lose their social standing in the community. And I’m afraid that the same concerns keep many of us from truly following Christ today. If we really gave Christ 100% it would cost us friendships or jobs or money or something that we hold dear.

You know, tradition says that these men did eventually lose all those things. Not as much is known about Joseph, but there are traditions about Nicodemus that say that as a result of his coming forward to claim the body of Christ and becoming a true disciple that he lost his position in the Sanhedrin, he lost his wealth, and one historian recounts one of his daughters being so destitute that she was seen picking grain from manure.

Jesus speaks of what it means to truly follow Him, to be a true disciple. In Matt. 16:24
Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.”

So I think that Joseph and Nicodemus were at the cross. They would have had to have been there, to be able to respond so quickly to Jesus’s death that they were able to appeal to Pilate for His body and prepare His embalmment before nightfall and the Sabbath began. It’s ironic, all His disciples save John had fled Him in the darkest hour. And yet in the providence of God, these two fearful, secret disciples are the ones who are there to take Him to a tomb and prepare Him for burial.

Somehow in the death of Christ, these men’s reservations fell away. When they saw the way that He died, they must have come to the same conclusion that the Roman centurion did, saying, “Surely this man was the Son of God!”(Mark 15:39) All their reservations fell away. And in that moment, they realized that they had participated in some way in the crucifixion of the very Son of God. They knew that their sin had caused the death of God’s Son. And in light of that realization, they knew that their lives meant nothing if they were not sealed in Christ.

I can’t help but think that Nicodemus remembered what Christ had told him back in chapter 3:14, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.” When He saw Jesus lifted up on the cross, I’m sure this statement came flooding back to him, and He realized not only the fulfillment of prophecy, but also realized that for the deathly sting of his sin to be removed, he had to look unto Christ as his Savior and Lord. That instead of death from the serpent’s sting he might receive the eternal life that God promised to those who believe in Him. And so I believe Nicodemus and Joseph came to complete discipleship when they saw Jesus hanging on that cross for their sins.

And that is where true discipleship starts for us as well. When we consider the horror of our sins, when we consider the Son of God taking my penalty by His death, when we consider the shame and suffering that we deserved, placed upon Him who did not deserve it, then the least that I can do is to follow Him in forsaking my sin, being willing to give up my hold on this life, so that I might have real life, even eternal life through Him.

So I think that Joseph and Nicodemus not only got a vision of the cross, but they considered the cost of discipleship in light of what Christ did for them, and they realized that whatever it cost them, He was worth it all. In Mark 15:43, it says Joseph went in before Pilate and gathered up his courage, and asked for the body of Jesus. I think it took a lot of courage to do that. Pilate had after all just condemned Jesus to death. What prevented him from doing the same to Joseph for revealing he was Christ’s disciple?

But it also took a lot of courage because it would have been known to all his colleagues in the Sanhedrin. With this one bold act, he pretty much sounded the death knell on his career. That kind of courage and commitment to Christ no matter how great the cost is what is required of disciples. Jesus said in Matt. 10:37, “He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.” So to take up your cross means to count the cost, and consider as Paul said the things I once thought valuable in this life as nothing but rubbish for the sake of knowing Christ. Phil. 3:8
“More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ.”

That kind of abandon in following Christ is illustrated in two sacrificial gifts that each man gave to the Lord in His death. First of all, Joseph gave Jesus his own personal tomb. If not for this act of love on the part of Joseph, Jesus’s body would have been dragged off to Gehana, a trash pile outside of town that was always burning. It was a picture of hell that Jesus had often referred to. But Isaiah 53:9 had prophesied that “His grave was assigned with wicked men,Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth.”

John gives us some information about this tomb. It was a tomb fit for a King. He says that no body had ever been laid in it. And he also mentions that this tomb was in a garden. It’s interesting that when the first Adam sinned it was in a garden, and when the second Adam atoned for that sin, He is laid to rest in a garden.The fellowship that had been broken by sin in the first garden was restored by atonement in the second.

So Joseph’s gift to Christ was fit for a King. A new tomb, in a garden. An extravagant gift to honor Christ as his King in death. And of course God used this gift of Joseph to prove conclusively that the resurrection of Christ had taken place. If Jesus’s burial had not been well known, there would not have been the numerous witnesses to His resurrection.

And then Nicodemus also gives an extravagant, sacrificial gift suitable for a king. John tells us that he brought a hundred pounds weight of spices, made from myrrh and aloes. Myrrh was brought at the birth of Jesus as well, by the wise men, who noted that a King had been born and came to worship Him. Now in Christ’s death, another wise man brought myrrh to honor the King. A hundred pounds weight would have represented a fortune in perfume. Much more than simply sprinkled in the folds of the shroud, it would have filled the tomb where Jesus’s body was laid.

And so I suggest that a true disciple is known by his extravagance, by sacrificial giving to honor God. Material things are recognized as merely offerings we give back to God. Whether it be our time, or treasure, we realize that no sacrifice is too great, when we consider the sacrifice He gave first for us.

When Joseph and Nicodemus stepped up to full discipleship, they claimed Christ’s body and boldly took on all the associations that came with that. So we too as Christians must claim His body, His church, and embrace all the associations that come wth that. All the stigma. All the social rejection. There is no cost too great for the sake of Him who suffered for me. It requires stepping out of our comfort zone. It requires fellowship in His suffering. It requires sacrifice of time, money and resources for the sake of the Kingdom of God. Being a true disciple requires that we lose our identity, and claim our identity with Christ. And when we give up our hold on this life and follow Him completely in true discipleship, then we will know the real, abundant life that God promises to those who trust Him.

I would ask you to consider your relationship to Christ this morning. Are you living in effect as as secret disciple? Are you trying to hold on to control of your life? Are you holding onto things that are keeping you from fully committing to the Lord? True discipleship demands our all, renouncing sin and clinging to the cross of Christ. And when that kind of commitment has been made in our life, then it will be revealed in an extravagant love for Christ that considers anything that was once considered gain as loss for the sake of knowing Him. I pray that today you see clearly what Christ did for you at the cross, and that you fully commit to take up your cross as well and follow Him.

For many Christians, the passion, or the events surrounding the crucifixion of Christ, are very familiar. We’ve heard countless messages on the crucifixion and even possibly seen movies or plays depicting it. Not to mention, there are four gospel accounts in the New Testament. However, not all the gospels offer the exact same details. One might include some things which others leave out. In John’s gospel, he includes some details which others have not, but at the same time, he has left out some events that others included. So the tendency among preachers and expositors is to fill in the blanks, so to speak, as if to make up for what John was lacking.

Now in the case of the other gospel writers, Matthew, Mark and Luke, that could be considered an appropriate method of exposition, since you could make the case that those three writers were not actually in attendance. However, that’s not the case with John. He makes it clear that He was there. He is the disciple whom Jesus loved mentioned in vs.26 and 35 who was there and witnessed himself the proceedings.

So then the question is, why did John include some things and not others? Well, the answer is that John is not writing a biography, but a gospel. He is telling and emphasizing certain events to present the gospel of Jesus Christ which leads to salvation. That’s what he says in chapter 20:30, 31, “Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.”

My dilemma then is to figure out exactly how to present this gospel message that John is endeavoring to give us. And as I prayed and studied this text, I came to a very simple conclusion; John is presenting the fact that Jesus gave His life to accomplish salvation, not focusing on the morbid aspects of the crucifixion, but on the aspects which teach principles of Christ’s atonement for us. So as someone said, Christ gave His life not to engender sentimentality but spirituality. Not that we might be mortified by the physical torture and bloody gore of the crucifixion, but that it teach us the knowledge leading to salvation. As another writer said, Salvation is based on believing. Believing is based on truth. And truth is revealed in Scripture. That believing we might have life in His name.

So then, we will examine this principle of Christ giving His life to accomplish salvation through four vignettes which John presents to us. The first is He gave up His clothes, then He gave up His mother, then He gave up His Spirit, and finally He gave out water and blood.

Now, I also want to add at the beginning that John correlates some of these events with Old Testament prophesies, showing that they were fulfilled in Jesus’s crucifixion. And I believe three of the references he mentions are found in Psalm 22, and one in Psalm 34. And I just want to point out that the Psalms was written 1000 years before Christ. There is absolute proof of that. It is indisputable. In fact, the enemies of Christ, the Jews, would have been very familiar with these Psalms. They probably did not consider these references as Messianic prophesies. So they would not have connived to correlate Christ’s crucifixion with the prophesies even if they had wanted to. The Romans did what Roman soldiers did, irregardless of what the Jews wanted. And those Jews would not have wanted to confirm Christ’s Messiahship. So these prophetic fulfillments are very important to John to point out, so that we might believe that Jesus is the Christ. And I don’t want to gloss over that. But now let’s focus on the four vignettes of how Jesus gave His life to accomplish our salvation.
First. Jesus gave up His clothes. We’ve all heard the phrase, “he didn’t own anything but the clothes on his back.” Well, that was especially true of Jesus. He had no possessions, no home, nothing of any value. All that He had were the clothes on His back. And we see in vs 23, that the soldiers took those clothes and divided them up between themselves. When Jesus came down from heaven’s glory to earth, He came all the way down to the bottom to accomplish our salvation. He let go of all His pride, all His clothes, becoming completely poor for us, so that we might become rich in Him. He became naked, bearing all the shame which that brings. It’s the same shame that Adam and Eve felt in the garden of Eden when they realized they were naked and hid from God. Christ became naked for us, bearing the shame, the scoffing, the stares, so that He might be our substitute for sin.

2 Cor. 8:9 says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.” Now how does this incident illustrate that we became rich? Because these four soldiers each received a part of His clothing. There were no more vile sinners than these soldiers who stripped Jesus’s clothes from Him and nailed Him to a cross. And yet we know that even as they did so, Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

What John pictures here is that the clothes of Christ were made available at the cross for the covering of sinners. Just as God skinned animals to make clothing for Adam and Eve, so also He skinned Jesus to make clothing for you and me. Isaiah 61:10 says, “For he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness.”

The hymn we sing, The Solid Rock, says, “dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne.” 2 Cor. 5:21 says, “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” There is no better picture of our sin situation than that we are naked and ashamed before God. Christ took that upon Himself, that we might become clothed in His righteousness.

But John adds that there is another piece of clothing there, which was not divided, because it was made in one piece. It was a tunic, worn under the outer clothing. And I find two pictures in this; first it is the inner garment, signifying the spiritual. And secondly, it was without seams. It’s not in part, it’s complete. The Spirit of Christ is not given piecemeal. Then thirdly, it is the garment of the High Priest, according to Exodus 28:31-31. Christ as our High Priest is described in Romans 8:34 saying, “who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.”

Now as we see this dividing of His clothing played out by the soldiers, it may seem that Jesus has no control over these events. Yet John informs us that the invisible hand of God guides all things, so that specific prophecy is specifically fulfilled. The fact that it was foreordained indicates that Jesus gave His clothing willingly, even as He gave His life willingly.

The picture teaches us that we need to be clothed in His righteousness if we are to be saved. It is the means of our justification; Christ’s righteousness given to us in exchange for our sin. And when we are saved, then we receive the spiritual covering of His Spirit, so that we might be like Christ. Then in response to Christ’s likeness we also are willing give up our possessions for the sake of the kingdom. Matthew 5:40 “If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also.” 45, “so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.”

Secondly, Christ gave up His mother. I know that heading sounds awkward. Maybe it would be more palatable to say, He gave up His family associations. But all we have presented here is His mother. There are indications from this text and others that Joseph was long dead and Jesus had, as the eldest son, taken on the responsibility of His mother and His brothers. His brothers at this point had not believed in Him. There is no evidence that they were there at the crucifixion. In fact, all his disciples had fled except for John and these four women.

Jesus would have been very aware of the pain that His crucifixion was causing to Mary. She was the only one out of His family that believed in Him. And now as Simeon prophesied to her 33 years earlier, a sword would pierce her soul. I’m sure in His humanness, Jesus would have loved to have used His divine power to come down from the cross and spare His mother this grief. But He was obedient even unto death to the will of the Father, knowing that in His death He would spare not only her soul, but millions more.

So John records here that Jesus gave up His mother, His family, and He gave over her care to John. He said to His mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” Then He said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” Not only was Jesus concerned about her physical care, but He was emphasizing also the nature of family in the kingdom of God. There is a new family dimension in the Kingdom of God. Our brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers are those in the kingdom. In Luke 8:21 Jesus said, “My mother and My brothers are these who hear the word of God and do it.”

He not only gave up His earthly family, He gave up His friendships. Note that John is always described as the one that He loved. This attitude of Christ also must be our attitude. This principle of consecration to God is stated by Christ in Matt. 10:37, “He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.”

Thirdly, He gave up His Spirit. Phil. 2:8 says, “And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” Giving up His Spirit means first of all, that He gave up His life. That is a tremendous thing. It was not an act of suicide. His hands are nailed to a cross. He can’t take His life by violence against Himself. But what He does is an act of divinity. He gives up His life willingly, of His own volition.

But before He acts in divinity, John shows His humanity. Jesus became thirsty and asks for a drink. So they give Him vinegar to drink. He suffered as all mankind would suffer the pangs of the cross. His divinity did not prevent His suffering. As a man, He thirsted. As God, He had the power over His life.

He gave up His life, voluntarily. As Jesus said, “I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.” (John 10:17-18)

The gospels record 7 statements or words of Jesus on the cross. John only gives us three. One was the statement to John and His mother. The second was He was thirsty. And now John records another statement that Jesus made as He gives up His Spirit. He cries, “Tetelistai!” it is finished. Tetelistai means it is complete, perfect. His life on earth as a man was complete. He lived from the first moment to the last, sinless, perfect. By the death of His perfect life He paid in full the debt of mankind who could never live a perfect life. And by dying, He paid the complete price which we owed; a life of perfection, righteousness, that God might place upon Him our sins as a substitute for the world.

1Peter 3:18 “For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison.” Not only did He give up His life, but He surrendered up His Spirit to death, to the abode of the spirits. Very little in scripture is given to us concerning the three days Christ spent in the grave. But according to both Peter and Paul, though His body was in the tomb, His Spirit was alive in the abode of the dead. I don’t want to speculate where the Bible does not indicate, but I cannot help but wonder if there was not an element of the punishment He bore for sins which was accomplished in the Spirit while He was in Hades. For it is certain, as the Apostle’s Creed confirms, that “He descended into Hell.” Though we are not privy to all that means, one thing is certain, He went to Hell, that He might triumph over death and Hell, that we who have faith in Him might never experience it.

The human body is spirit, soul and body. Our spirit is the spiritual part of our being that is connected to God, which then rules over the mind and the body. That is what it means to be born again. We must be born of the Spirit, if we are to be spiritual. And then we must give up our self rule to the rule of the Spirit if we are going to live as God would have us live, to be obedient to death, even as Christ.

Finally, the last vignette John presents for us is He gave up water and blood. The soldiers, in order to hurry the death of the crucified, broke their legs, which would cause them to suffocate. But coming to Jesus, these executioners realize that He is already dead. So one took his spear and stabbed Him in the side, presumably to prove He was dead, and John tells us that blood and water comes out. Now doctors have said that this clear liquid was from the pericardium surrounding the heart and partly coagulated blood. That’s the physical explanation. Other, more sentimental explanations have said it was a sign of a broken heart. I’m not sure that such a thing has been established as physically possible. But there is no doubt that there is a symbolic reference in the blood and water coming out of His side. And perhaps it is best stated in the old hymn, Rock of Ages, which says, “Let the water and the blood, from thy wounded side which flowed, be of sin the double cure, save from death and make me pure.” The blood therefore representing justification from sin, and the water being purification from sin.

Matthew Henry, the great theologian said it like this; “The blood and water that flowed out, signified those two great benefits which all believers partake of through Christ, justification and sanctification; blood for atonement, water for purification. They both flow from the pierced side of our Redeemer. To Christ crucified we owe merit for our justification, and Spirit and grace for our sanctification.”

Therefore, we can say that He gave His life to save us not only from the penalty of sin, but the power of it. As I have said numerous times, there are three phases in salvation. All must be accomplished for salvation to be complete. Justification is deliverance from the penalty of sin. Sanctification is the deliverance from the power of sin. And glorification is the deliverance from the presence of sin. The last phase will not happen until the resurrection when we will be given a glorified body. But all three phases are necessary in our salvation.

John has given us these vignettes of salvation tucked into the greater story of the cross, so that we might get a better understanding of what Christ gave His life for. Salvation must be more than just believing intellectually in Christ’s existence, otherwise everyone attending the crucifixion would have been saved that night. But we know that is not the case. Salvation is more than just some sort of superficial belief in the historicity of the events. And I will add something else that you may find disconcerting; salvation is more than just what Christ did on the cross. If salvation was accomplished for men by what Christ did on the cross, then all men have been saved. There is no need to evangelize. Christ has done everything. We do nothing. Well, we must do something, we must believe. But we must believe with saving faith. And faith is not merely intellectual, but it is also a matter of the will. Romans 10:10 says, “with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.” Faith is a matter of both the intellect and the will. And in those two aspects of faith are couched justification and sanctification. So that James may rightly say, “show me your faith by your works. Faith without works is dead.”

Listen, the water and the blood streaming from the cross of Christ destroyed the enslavement to sin that the devil has held all of mankind in for all who believe. The symbolism of the blood and the water is the crux of the gospel, it is powerful for the destruction of fortresses. And it provides complete salvation. It is able to justify us, to deliver from the penalty of sin, but it is also powerful to sanctify us, to deliver us from the power of sin. Sin no longer needs have dominion over us. The truth will make us free when we embrace the whole truth of the gospel. Let us take up our cross and follow Christ, dressed in His righteousness, our justification. And being made free from the penalty of sin, let us live as free from the power of sin as we yield to the Spirit who lives in us and rules over our will.

In the last few weeks we have been looking at the various aspects of apostasy. Apostasy, as you know, is the act of turning away from the truth. We started out examining the apostasy of the church in the example of the disciples at the arrest of Jesus. Peter’s denial of Christ exemplified the apostasy of the church.

Then last week we looked at the apostasy of the world, particularly as evidenced by religion and politics. The Jewish religious leaders under Annas exemplified apostate religion, and Pilate illustrated apostasy in politics.

Today we are going to look at one last example of apostasy, and that is the apostasy of government. Government is a divinely appointed institution, which God uses for HIs purposes. Romans 13:1 says, “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.” However, even though God has established government, and has given it the authority to govern, we will see in this passage how as an institution it has turned away from the truth of God, or become apostate.

We might further define those three categories of apostasy as follows; Religion is man’s attempts to reach God; attempting to administer divine truth by mans methods. Politics is the art of compromise; attempting to manipulate truth to reach a consensus. And government is the rule of the people (the rule of law); attempting to enforce man’s truth through law. In each case, truth is subservient to man and not vice versa, as God intended it.

Now as we go through this passage, we will see seven ways in which government has turned apostate. As I have previously pointed out, Truth is on trial. Jesus is the embodiment of divine truth. And He is on trial for that truth which He represents on behalf of God.

So in rebellion against the Truth, Jesus is arrested and put on trial. And we see seven aspects of this apostasy on the part of the government which I have categorized as follows to help us see how this apostasy on the part of government is played out; they are exchanging the truth, mocking the truth, rejecting the truth, examining the truth, judging the truth, killing the truth, and rewriting the truth.

First let’s consider exchanging the truth. In chapter 18 Pilate declares, “what is truth?” And ironically, Truth is standing right next to him, and yet he does not recognize it. So Pilate does what people have done for centuries, what people do even today. As the representative of government he offers the people a choice; man’s version of the truth versus God’s designation of the Truth. He offers them either Christ or a man called Barabbas. Now John tells us that Barabbas was a robber. He was a convicted criminal. And yet when faced with the choice of choosing a criminal or an innocent man, they chose the criminal. So basically, they chose to exchange the truth for a lie.

Paul in his letter to the Romans, says the world is condemned because of that very thing. He says in Rom.1:25, “For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.” Paul isn’t just talking about pagan idolatry here, he is talking about serving the devil himself, the father of lies.

I want to point out an interesting feature in the name Barabbas. Barabbas means “son of a father”. So we have here son of the father, Barabbas, and on the other hand Jesus whose name means Jehovah is Salvation who claims to be the Son of God the Father. So here is the choice that Israel is faced with. Will you release Barabbas, son of the father? Or shall I release to you Jesus, Jehovah is salvation, the Son of God the Father? And of course we know that they chose the creature, rather than their Creator. So given a choice by government, the people chose to exchange the truth for a lie.

But in this travesty of human justice, let us not miss the picture of divine justice presented for us here. In God’s court of justice, mankind stands before God as Barrabas, guilty and condemned. But God offers His Son, Jesus Christ, to die in our place, so that we might go free. It is the divine principle of the just dying for the unjust, the innocent taking the place of punishment for the guilty pictured in the law as the innocent, spotless lamb slain for the sins of the people. And this principle is stated succinctly in 2Cor. 5:21, “ [God] made [Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

Secondly, in it’s apostasy, government mocks the truth. As we look at the beginning of chapter 19, we see Jesus mocked by Pilate and his soldiers. Pilate is almost obsessed with this concept of Jesus as King. Pilate of course is only a governor of Judea. He would have to bow to a King. So when He asks Jesus in chapter 18 if He was a King, Jesus asserts that He is in fact a King, but not of this world. He is really saying “I am a King, but not of this government.” He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords reigning throughout the world spiritually. But rather than that statement denouncing Christ’s authority, in reality it means that Pilate’s authority is subservient to Christ’s authority. But perhaps Pilate fails to comprehend this principle in entirety, or perhaps he does comprehend it, but instead of bowing to Christ as Lord, he mocks Christ’s rule.

So Pilate takes a man who is innocent by his own admission, and has Him scourged. John doesn’t give us the details of this scourging, but typically it was with a whip called a cat of nine tails, whose lashes were tipped with bits of glass or steel. The law had limited the number of strokes to 39, because 40 were known to kill a person. So they scourged Jesus, probably to within an inch of His life, though He was innocent of any wrong. Pilate reveals how cruel and evil he is, being willing to scourge an innocent man for the sake of appeasing the Jews and perhaps satiating his own jealous hatred of anyone challenging his authority.

Their mockery though is even more revealed by the crown of thorns and the purple robe the soldiers placed on HIm, and then parading the bleeding, lacerated Christ before the mob pronouncing “Hail, King of the Jews!” and slapping Him in the face.

The mockery of apostasy as revealed in this example shows that it’s possible to espouse the truth and yet not really believe it. It’s possible to proclaim Jesus is Lord and yet live for the devil. It’s possible that one’s actions can make a mockery of their professed faith in God. 2Peter 3:3 says, “Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts.” Truth is made a mockery by living in sin. Faith must be more than just lip service. As James said, “show me your faith by your works.”

Thirdly, the apostasy of government rejects the truth. Vs.4, Pilate came out again and said to them, “Behold, I am bringing Him out to you so that you may know that I find no guilt in Him.”
Jesus then came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Behold, the Man!” So when the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out saying, “Crucify, crucify!” Pilate *said to them, “Take Him yourselves and crucify Him, for I find no guilt in Him.”

Pilate asserts again and again that Christ is guiltless of any crime. Yet in spite of that, the Jews still reject Him. This rejection of Christ really began a long time before this trial. Jesus spoke of this rejection in a parable found in Luke 19:14, in which the citizens of the kingdom say, “We do not want this man to reign over us.” Jesus was speaking allegorically of the citizens of Israel, who would reject God’s reign. And as Christ prophesied in yet another parable, they would kill the Son in order to try to thwart God’s sovereignty over them.

Government either recognizes God’s rule over the world, and they are merely stewards of that responsibility given to them by God, or they have rejected God’s rule, in order to rule themselves according to their lusts. And far too often in our society today, we see government capitulate to protests, to mob lust for blood, in spite of whether or not the placards and slogans of the crowds are true or not. As Isaiah 59:14 says, “Truth has stumbled in the street, and uprightness cannot enter.”

And I would suggest that this is the crux of man’s rejection of salvation. Man rejects the idea that Christ should rule over them. They may not dislike the idea of Christ dying in their place, but they reject the notion that they give up their right to self rule. Most people reject salvation because they want to live their life by their standards, by their rules, and as such reject the rule of Christ as Lord of their life.

That brings us to the fourth aspect of apostasy in government, and that is the examination of the truth. When Pilate has said they should crucify Him themselves, they respond, “We have a law, and by that law He ought to die because He made Himself out to be the Son of God.” This accusation strikes fear into the heart of Pilate. Pilate was more than willing to punish an innocent man who claimed a spiritual kingdom, but the thought that Christ was actually God in flesh concerned him greatly.

So Pilate brings Christ out to the Praetorium, his private residence, in order to examine Him. In effect, Pilate had already examined Christ by scourging, a method used to soften up the criminal so that he would be ready to confess. But at that point, Pilate had no charge to condemn Him with. Now he has this assertion by the Jews that Christ had committed blasphemy by declaring Himself as the Son of God.

But the Jews appeal to their law, probably referring to the law of Moses concerning blasphemy. However, they do not examine Him according to truth. Truth affirms that He is the Son of God. He was foretold by the prophets, heralded by angels, acknowledged verbally by God in the heavens, transfigured before His disciples, and He had performed hundreds of miracles that could only be of God and which served to validate the truth of His teaching. All of which, if they would have considered, would have eliminated the charge of blasphemy and caused them to fall on their knees in worship. But they aren’t interested in the truth, only in finding fault.

For Pilate, however, the possibility that Christ was the Son of God was alarming, and he takes Jesus privately into his quarters and begins to question Him saying, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer.

Listen, God is not obligated to answer man’s questions as to where He came from, or how or why He does certain things. Job became angry with God and asked God for answers on the assumption that God wasn’t fair and just, and when God finally did respond, He did not answer the question “why”. God is good and just and merciful, but He is God. He is sovereign, and finite, mortal man cannot ascertain Him. So Jesus did not answer Pilate.

Vs.10,11So Pilate said to Him, “You do not speak to me? Do You not know that I have authority to release You, and I have authority to crucify You?” Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.”

As we looked at earlier, Romans 13:1 says, “Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God.” Pilate thinks that he has authority to judge, but he fails to realize that actually the great Judge of all the earth is judging him.

I find it ironic that just this week we had a decision by a panel of judges that rendered the Presidents order as unconstitutional. I don’t want to make political statements here, but I will say that judges do not have unilateral authority to determine truth. Judges have to be accountable to the truth, and as the law is the expression of truth then they must judge according to the law. Judges cannot legislate; they interpret and apply the law.

Thomas Jefferson wrote that the the General Government has no powers but such as the Constitution gives it. And as I said last week in regards to the American Constitution, the founders recognized that certain truths from God were evident, from which they established certain laws.

That principle is expounded in Jesus’s statement which is that government’s authority comes from God and God alone. Without such truth as a foundation, there can be no justice. But in the case of the government under Pilate, we see that truth is rejected for what is considered popular and expedient. And so he judges Christ according to the dictates of a mob, and the pressures of the moment.

And by the way, we see that being played out today as well. Society is trying to change laws and influence government by protests, by mob violence. And as we have seen it is effective to a great degree. That method has been used with great effect since the 60’s to change American policy, to make the general populace and particularly the politicians think that it is the majority opinion, when in fact many times it’s just the louder opinion. The silent majority suffers injury from a more vocal and violent minority.

That leads us to the next aspect of the apostasy of government; judging the truth. Vs.13, “Therefore when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha.”

John’s gospel is full of irony. And the height of irony is that Pilate sits on his judgment seat to cast judgment upon the Son of God. This same Jesus, whom Pilate and worthless men put to death, will one day sit on the Great White Throne. And all judgment will be given to Him to judge every man according to his deeds. John writes in Rev. 20:11 “Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, [that includes kings and governors and celebrites and all who are considered great in this world) standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead which were in them; and they were judged, every one of them according to their deeds. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.
And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”

So here is the puny prefect of Judea, sitting in judgment of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Judge of the whole earth. What irony. Who is man that dares to judge God? And how will God judge him that has passed judgment on Christ by refusing to submit to Him as Lord and King?

Vs.14, “Now it was the day of preparation for the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, ‘Behold, your King!’ So they cried out, ‘Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered, ‘We have no king but Caesar.’ So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.”

In their judgment of Christ they sealed their own judgment. Here is the nation designed to be a theocratic nation. Here is the nation that claimed Jehovah as their God and King. But here they renounce their theocratic relationship to Jehovah God, by saying, “We have no king but Caesar.” And so Israel, guilty of blasphemy in the denial of the Son of God, and guilty of apostasy in turning from God as King to Caesar thus denounces the theocracy, their own unique position before God, and in a few years they will receive their judgment and be scattered to the four corners of the earth, until there is no longer any Israel at all.

God is patient with the government of mankind, not wishing for any to perish but all to come to repentance. But one need only look at history to see the long line of governments that have abandoned God and become apostate, and as a result are no longer a power any longer on the earth to be reckoned with. The great Egyptian empire is no more. The Roman Empire has crumbled. The Greek Empire is no more to be found. England’s once grand empire is no longer. Nazi Germany’s empire was destroyed. And America, as the modern world’s greatest superpower, is on the brink of imploding under the weight of it’s own corruption. But the truth of God endures forever. God’s empire is increasing and will never end.

So the apostasy of the government results in killing Truth. That is the only solution to a world who hates the truth. That is their only way they think they can silence the truth, and thus silence their consciences. So they crucify Christ. Vs.17, “They took Jesus, therefore, and He went out, bearing His own cross, to the place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha. There they crucified Him, and with Him two other men, one on either side, and Jesus in between.”

And governments have been killing Christians ever since, trying to silence the gospel. Trying to silence the truth of God. Christianity Today magazine has put the number of Christian martyrs since Christ walked the earth at 70 million people. And the persecution has not slowed down. Many sources say that Christians are the most persecuted group in the world today. Jesus said in John 15:20, “Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.”

There is one final aspect of apostasy in government that we will look at today, and that is rewriting the truth. Vs.19, Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It was written, “JESUS THE NAZARENE, THE KING OF THE JEWS.” Therefore many of the Jews read this inscription, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Latin and in Greek. So the chief priests of the Jews were saying to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The King of the Jews’; but that He said, ‘I am King of the Jews.’” Pilate answered, “What I have written I have written.”

Pilate wished to frame the argument his way. His argument was that Jesus was a Jew, and his death was a result of Jewish law. He wanted to absolve himself of any responsibility in the matter. He wanted to wash his hands of the whole affair. But Jesus did not let Pilate off so easily. Jesus made it clear that He was a King, but not of this realm. However, He also made it clear to Pilate that His realm superseded Pilate’s realm. He said Pilate would have no authority if God did not give him that authority.

So Pilate in one last desperate brazen act, writes a sign to be placed on Jesus’s cross, “The King of the Jews.” In one sense it was true. But it was only part of the truth. The full truth was that Jesus is King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. He was the very Son of God. And as is so often the case, a half truth is little more than a full lie.

Pilate writes his version of the truth. And says, “what I have written, I have written,” as if to say that his word was law. But as we have already stated, God’s law is the final authority. Man may write enough books to fill up the Atlantic Ocean, but all of them cannot equal the truth of God’s Word, the Bible. It is the sola scripture; the sole authority for life and practice. It is the source of truth, regardless of the revisionist historians, regardless of the scientists, regardless of the consensus of the courts of men.

The question for Pilate is the same for men today. What will you do with Jesus? If he was just the king of the Jews 2000 years ago, that was martyred, then we can write him off as inconsequential to 21st century Americans. But if He was the Son of God who gave His life as the Passover Lamb for the sins of the world, so that we like Barabbas might be set free, then we must fall at His feet and worship Him as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Do not turn away from the truth. Everyone will one day stand at the Great White Throne Judgment and answer this question: “What did you do with Jesus Christ?”

Hillary Clinton achieved a great measure of notoriety during the Benghazi Hearings for her response to questioning regarding what really happened during the massacre, by asking her accusers, “What difference does it make?” Some would say that this statement of seeming indifference at the loss of the US Ambassador’s life and three embassy personnel’s lives was a key factor in her recent loss in the election.

And while that incident has very little to do with today’s message, as I studied the text this last week, and considered the importance of the truth of Christ upon our lives, I found myself hearing that shrill question repeated in the back of my mind. What difference does it make? Is the truth really that important? That is the subject we have been looking at for the last couple of weeks as we have studied the arrest and now the trial of Jesus. The subject has been the contrast of truth versus apostasy. Remaining stedfast in the truth, versus caving in to natural wisdom or human preferences which subvert the truth.

And for the last couple of weeks we have looked at various responses of the church when the truth engaged with the hostility of the world. The disciples initial response when Jesus was arrested was the fight or flight syndrome. Most of them fled into the darkness, Peter tried to fight. Both responses were natural, but both were the wrong response. The truth as evidenced by Christ’s response is stedfast, it is grounded in the word of God.

Then last week we looked more closely at the denial of Peter, his attempt to fight in his own cunning and strength resulted in eventually blaspheming and denying the Lord. That action is what is called apostasy in ecclesiastical terminology. And we looked at four steps by which the church – not the world, but the church – can turn from the truth to apostasy as evidenced by Peter. They were reliance upon your own wisdom and strength, a distancing of oneself from God, a desire for friendship and acceptance by the world, which finally culminates in blasphemy and denial of the Lord. And we often see this apostasy mirrored today in the church.

Now this week, as we follow the events recorded by John, we see another view of apostasy, the apostasy of the unsaved, or the apostasy of the world. Christ manifested the truth of God to the world, but the world turned away from truth, deliberately choosing apostasy. Truth is what was on trial then, and it is what is on trial in our modern culture as well. And we who love the truth find ourselves on trial as well. As Jesus in vs.37 says, “Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” You are either of the truth, or you are in opposition to the truth. And I believe the world who is antagonistic to the truth has echoed the question made by Hillary, “What difference does it make?” Truth is under attack. Apostasy is championed, in both the religious and political realms of this world.

Even a cursory look at the problems headlining our society today reveals the dilemma of our modern culture, which is summed up in Isaiah 59:14 which says, “Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands far away; for truth has stumbled in the street, and uprightness cannot enter.” Today truth has stumbled in the street. Apostasy seems to hold sway in the world and it threatens to overwhelm the church. The world loves darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil, they hate righteousness, and they love wickedness.

But while we can expect such a sentiment from the world who is in rebellion against God, it is even more disconcerting that the same question is asked by the church at large, if not directly, then indirectly. Is truth worth standing for? Does the truth really matter? Is the truth worth dying for? Is the truth worth separating over? Or do we just throw up our hands as Pilate did and say, “What is truth?”

I would submit to you that the truth is all that there is. It is the most important thing. Not conformity to religion, not conformity to the status quo, not conformity to political correctness. Jesus said, “you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” So truth is important.
Even the founders of our country understood that our heritage as Americans depended upon the truth. The Constitution begins, “We hold these truths to be self evident…” They acknowledged that truth was derived from our Creator. But I’m afraid that though they made a good start, they stopped far short of the truth. True life and freedom can only come when we believe and accept the gospel which is the truth of God given by Christ Jesus. As Jesus said, “you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

So as the church, we must believe all the truth, and nothing but the truth. It’s so important that as a church truth must be paramount in our focus. We cannot allow false teaching to creep in. Because like leaven, a little leaven leavens the whole lump, a little falsehood dilutes the truth so that it loses it’s power to set you free. A little lie serves to keep you in bondage.

The truths or doctrines of our faith are like railroad ties, underlying the steel rails of the track. If you start removing some of the ties, soon the rails are no longer able to keep the train on track, and you end up with a train wreck. But the world doesn’t see truth like that. They see it as a restriction on their freedom. They hate it because it makes them feel guilty. They want independence from God, even though such freedom leads to destruction. So they want to overthrow the truth, and are hostile to the truth. The world is at enmity with God.

In our text today we see this attempt by the world to subvert the truth concerning Jesus Christ. Truth is on trial, as I said previously. And the world is characterized by two entities in this passage; religion and politics. Those are the two elements of the world we are looking at today in this story. Religion and politics. First let’s consider religion. Not the church(the true believers) but religion.Religion is man’s attempts to reach God. Christianity is God reaching down to man through Jesus Christ.

So in this passage, religion is identified with Annas, the father in law of the high priest, who was Caiaphas. John doesn’t tell us much about Jesus’s trial with Caiaphas, but other gospels fill in those blanks. However, as I said in previous messages, John isn’t interested in a chronological biography here, he is giving us his gospel. And so the message I believe he wants to get across to us is not necessarily every detail of Christ’s trial, but the overarching view or goal of the religious bureaucracy, which was their animosity and hatred of the truth of Christ.

John focuses on Annas, because he is the real manipulator behind the Jewish religious facade. Caiaphas, who is the high priest that year is his son in law. But Annas, who had once been the high priest himself, is the godfather so to speak. Annas is the one who is in charge of all the concessions which were in the temple; the money changers and the sellers of doves and sacrifices. All of that was known as the bazaars of Annas. He was the godfather of what Jesus referred to as a “den of thieves” when He made a scourge of cords and cleaned out the temple.

And remember, Jesus did that twice. At the beginning of His ministry and then after His last triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Jesus cleaned out the temple. And that operation had exposed and called out the corruption of the religious system of the Jewish temple and the priesthood which was complicit. See, what they did was they fleeced people who came into the temple to present their sacrifice. Annas had inspectors there who inspected the animal or birds that the person had brought to be sacrificed. And of course, the law required that such had to be without spot or blemish. So when the inspector would look it over, he would find fault and say that it had some sort of defect and could not be sacrificed. So then the only real option was for the person to buy one of the “perfect” specimens that the bazaars offered, which of course cost much more money than what you could buy the same for elsewhere. And to make it even more odious, these theives had another aspect to their racket that included money changing. They said you couldn’t buy the sacrificial animal with Roman money, because it had Caesar’s image on it, and that amounted to idolatry. So you had to exchange your money for Jewish money, which again cost you a hefty commission. So they had quite a racket going on, enough to make the Mafia jealous.

Caiaphas, being the High Priest, was complicit in this scheme of course. It was a family business, after all. They were made extremely wealthy by it. But the High Priest was by this time a political appointment. The Romans recognized the degree of control and authority of religion in Israel, and so they had taken over the appointment of the High Priesthood in order to make sure that whoever was in that position followed their wishes and worked with them. And Caiaphas and his father in law Annas had managed to ingratiate themselves to the Roman authorities through graft and behind the scenes deal making. So that’s who these guys were. They were using religion for personal advantage. Truth had stumbled in the streets, because there was no righteousness in the leadership. They cared more about political correctness, about keeping the powers that be happy, and about garnering wealth than they did about truth. In fact, Caiaphas was the one who had said in vs14, “It is expedient for one to die on behalf of the people.” Unbeknownst to him, God was prophesying through him that Christ would die for the sins of the poeple. But from his perspective, what he was really saying, was it was expedient to sacrifice truth, to murder Jesus, for the sake of their religious enterprise.

So Annas, starting in vs.19, begins a mock trial of Jesus in the middle of the night. It was totally illegal and improper. There were no witnesses there to bring charges against Him. And as you look at his line of questioning, you notice that he doesn’t accuse Christ, but that He wants to get the Lord to say something which they can use to incriminate Him. They ask Him about His disciples and about His teaching.

It’s almost as if they are more concerned about how many people Jesus has in His church, and how many services they are holding, than whether or not Jesus is speaking the truth or not. So Jesus answers him saying, “I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing in secret. Why do you question Me? Question those who have heard what I spoke to them; they know what I said.”

Here is what is happening; the ruling party of the Jews have already issued a verdict upon Jesus. He is to be killed, to be crucified. They have already determined that He has to be done away with. They have no charges in regards to Him teaching anything that isn’t true, or scriptural, but their issue is that He challenges their authority and their ability to exert financial gain from their religion. So there is a conflict between their religious traditions and Christ’s teaching of truth of God and their only solution is to silence Christ by killing Him.

Listen, there are similar conflicts going on in the church today. There are traditions, practices, that have been passed down from generations and are considered essential to church health and wealth. And if you don’t conform to the country club mentality, then you are ostracized and even sometimes attacked. You are put on trial by the religious community because you don’t conform to the church paradigm which is practiced by most churches. Truth is sacrificed for the sake of continuity, for the sake of conformity, for the sake of prosperity. And when you don’t adhere to that template because you don’t see that specified in God’s blueprint for the church then you are subject to hostility and denunciation.

And as we see in the case of the High Priest’s appointment, there is a similar situation in the church today over leadership that is not according to the calling of God. I read a blog the other day from a pastor, lamenting the number of pastors he knew that had recently quit the ministry. They talked about things like burnout, and lack of appreciation, or conflicts with membership or committees. I don’t deny that pastors can get burned out, or that they can suffer from loneliness or depression just like any other person does. I am sometimes a victim of such things myself from time to time. But what I think is perhaps the root of the problem is that there are a lot of pastors today that have been called by churches, but not necessarily called by God. They may have been appointed by a seminary, but not appointed by Christ. If a pastor has a clear call of God to preach the gospel, and pastor the flock of Christ that Christ has given him, then I think that such a man will not likely quit the ministry due to feeling under appreciated. I think far too many men are called according to a popularity contest held by the church’s pastor search committee, and in order to maintain that approval rating, they have to conform to what the people want them to do, rather than their first priority as to what God would have them do. And that lack of a divine call upon their lives is equivalent to what Jesus referred to as a hireling, and not a true shepherd, who abandons his sheep when trouble comes.

I will say this as well, when the church starts to dismiss certain truths of scripture in favor of cultural preferences, then you should expect a continued decline into apostasy to follow shortly afterwards. For instance, when churches opt to disregard the clear teaching of the Bible in regards to women in ministry because it is no longer fashionable, then it should come as no surprise when those same denominations eventually move to include homosexuals into the clergy. One need only look at the predominate Presbyterian and Episcopal denominations to see how one denial of truth soon leads to another and so on until it is completely corrupted. A little leaven soon leavens the whole lump.

Well, the response to Jesus’s rebuke of the High Priest earned Him a slap in the mouth. Vs22,
When He had said this, one of the officers standing nearby struck Jesus, saying, “Is that the way You answer the high priest?” Jesus answered him, “If I have spoken wrongly, testify of the wrong; but if rightly, why do you strike Me?”

Jesus comes back to the truth. If I’m telling the truth, why do you strike Me? The reason is that they hated the truth. They didn’t want to hear the truth. And I believe that is still the prevailing sentiment today in organized religion. People don’t want to hear the truth, if it opposes what they want to believe. We have seen that lately in the political arena as well, haven’t we? The riots the other day at Berkley University. They don’t care about the truth. So they strike out, they riot, they break things and cause damage in order to prevent or intimidate people from speaking the truth. And as Jesus indicated, they break laws in order to try to convince others that they are unlawful.

We have seen such attacks even here in this church. We speak the truth, and eventually someone gets their pet principles stepped on, but rather than seriously seek to know the truth, they go out of their way to attack the pastor, and demean him to as many people in the community as they can. Such is the nature of apostasy. But Jesus is the example of how we are to react to it.

There is one other aspect of the apostasy of religion that is illustrated here in vs 28, “Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and it was early; and they themselves did not enter into the Praetorium so that they would not be defiled, but might eat the Passover.” What this indicates is a commitment to ceremony at the expense of truth. The hypocrisy of these Jews is really astounding. They don’t want to be defiled, and so they will not enter into the hall of judgment because the hall of judgment is in the hands of Gentiles. God hadn’t told them to do this, this was their tradition. So in their minds, to enter into the hall of judgment will bring about the possibility of defilement. It’s ironic that they are so scrupulous about the little details of tradition, but totally unconcerned about the vast sin of the murder of the Son of God.

Now, what makes it even more significant is that John says they didn’t enter into the hall of
judgment that they might not be defiled, so they might eat the Passover. Now, isn’t this amazing? Think of the irony of it. Who is the Passover lamb? Well Paul says in
1 Corinthians 5: 7 that Jesus Christ is the Passover lamb. He says, “Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed.” So they continue in their sin of murder, but publicly adhere to ceremonial cleanliness, in order that they might eat the Passover, while putting to death the Passover Lamb.

And as a modern application of that, let us be careful in the church if we accommodate sin, in order to not offend the world, so that we might practice our religion. Remember that Christ suffered and died for those sins. And when we wink at sin, we embolden the practice of those sins, and cheapen the grace of God through licentiousness, disregarding the fact that God crushed Jesus to pay the penalty for those sins so that we might be set free from them.

The second aspect of the apostasy of the world that is illustrated here is the political realm. Pilate is a prime example of the political aspect of the world. Let me give you a little background on Pilate. First of all, he married well. He married Claudia, who was the daughter of Tiberius, the grand daughter of Caesar Augustus. As a result of that marriage, he was appointed prefect of Judea, or what we might call the governor.

Pilate was a politician, trying to please the Emperor of Rome on the one hand, and to placate the Jews on the other. Yet Josephus and other historians tell us that he repeatedly irritated the Jews, and had more than once been rebuked by Rome for his treatment of the Jews. So perhaps that is an indication of why Pilate seems to try to accommodate the Jews desire to crucify Christ, even though he found no fault in Him. Even his wife urged him not to have anything to do with crucifying the Lord. He was trying to please people, even if it meant he would have to sentence to death an innocent man.

I’ve come up with my own definition of the word politics. Politics is the art of compromise. It means one will jettison truth in order to reach a consensus. Politics is in opposition to the truth. Now in Pilates case, you get the feeling that he wasn’t happy being political, but he felt he had no other alternative. Look at the predicament he found himself in.

Vs.29, “Therefore Pilate went out to them and said, ‘What accusation do you bring against this Man?’ They answered and said to him, ‘If this Man were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him to you.’ So Pilate said to them, ‘Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law.” The Jews said to him, “We are not permitted to put anyone to death,’ to fulfill the word of Jesus which He spoke, signifying by what kind of death He was about to die.”

The predicament is this; Pilate is summoned to court to condemn Jesus, whom I believe it would have been next to impossible for him not to have heard of to some extent, and the judgment, crucifixion has already been determined, and yet there is no charge that they prove is worthy of death. The religious leaders have put Pilate in a box. They know Pilate has been in trouble with Rome over his treatment of the Jews in the past, and he cannot afford another incident. So in order to appease the Jewish rulers, he must condemn Jesus to death. But in his heart he knows that Jesus is not guilty of death.

I think a lot of people in the world find themselves in a similar position today in regards to Christianity or the church. They recognize something about it which seems true and right, but the acclaim of the culture is that they condemn Christianity. And at that point they have to make a decision; to please the world, or to please God. Since they haven’t yet chosen to believe in God unto salvation, it is very unlikely that they will do so under duress. They make the same mistake that Pilate did. They try to escape making a decision at all.

vs.31, “So Pilate said to them, ‘Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law.’ The Jews said to him, ‘We are not permitted to put anyone to death.’ But the world will not let you off the hook so easily. The world requires allegiance to it’s doctrine, just as God demands allegiance to His doctrine. In the words of Bob Dylan, “you got to serve somebody.” You have to make a choice.

So Pilate asks Jesus directly, “Are You the King of the Jews?” That was a start towards the truth. But let’s see if Pilate is seriously seeking the truth, or if he is just seeking a way out. Jesus answers him curiously; ““Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about Me?”

Jesus doesn’t need to ask Pilate questions, as He knows the thoughts and intents of the heart of man. But what He is doing is asking a question to prompt Pilate to ask himself the right question. So Jesus says, Do you say this yourself, or did others tell you that about Me? Are you repeating what you have heard, or are you seriously inquiring to know if I am King of the Jews?

Note Pilate’s response; Pilate answered, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests delivered You to me; what have You done?” So he at once removes himself from the equation, putting Christianity aside as a nationalistic thing, something that has nothing to do with himself as a Roman. And yet he cannot sweep this question of what to do about Jesus aside. It is a question that everyman and woman must answer at some point in their lives. Is He King of Kings, and Lord of Lords? And if I say He is, then I must bow to Him and worship Him. If I say He is not, then I will suffer the eternal consequence of my decision.

Jesus then answers in a way that does nothing to absolve Pilate of guilt. But rather includes everyone regardless of his nationality. “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.”

Note that Jesus does declare that He is King, but not just of the Jews, but of a realm which is outside of the geography of nations and kingdoms of this world. It is a spiritual kingdom as opposed to an earthly kingdom.

Therefore Pilate said to Him, “So You are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” Here is the purpose of Christ’s coming to earth as declared by Jesus Himself; to testify to the truth. And here is the means of salvation; everyone who is of the truth hears My voice. Hearing indicates more than listening however. It indicates receiving, believing, and obeying the truth of Christ with all your heart and soul.

Folks we need to understand this. Jesus testified to the truth of God. God is life and they that believe in the truth of God receives that life. The very life of God; spiritual and eternal. The truth has been given to you and now the choice of receiving it is up to you. Jesus is the way of life, the truth of life, and the source of life, even everlasting life. But you have to receive Him and by extension His truth, and walk in it.

But the politician Pilate was still trying to duck the question. And so are many in the world today. The world echoes the disillusioned cry of Pilate; “what is truth?” Truth was staring him in the face, and he would not receive it. Oh, I believe Pilate saw it, just as clearly as Annas and Caiaphas saw the Passover Lamb standing in front of them. But like them, Pilate cannot afford to receive it. He loved too much the favor of this world to become an outcast with Christ.

Pilate thought he could please the world and still please God. He said to Christ what is truth, thus hopefully excusing himself from receiving the truth, and then he goes out to the crowd and says I find no fault in Him. He doesn’t want to make a decision either way. But either you accept Christ as your Lord and King, or you condemn Him along with the world. Undecided is not an option in the Kingdom of God. You are either for Him or against Him. You either believe Him, or you reject Him. Pilate would ultimately find this to be true, and though he would wash his hands for eternity, he would never wash away the blood of Christ upon his hands.

Listen, don’t die with Christ’s blood on your hands. Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost said in Acts 2:23, “this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.” It was your sins and mine that put Jesus to death. And only by repentance and faith in Him can we be forgiven of it, and given a second life.

Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Believe the truth today and be saved. Hold onto to the truth today and be set free. Walk in the truth and have life more abundantly. Today you have seen the truth of Christ. What will your response be? Will it be the response of religion? Continuing to practice expediency at the cost of truth? Will it be the response of political correctness, at the expense of truth? I pray you hold fast to the truth, no matter what the world or religion or political persuasion says.

As I have previously pointed out, John isn’t presenting a blow by blow account of the arrest and trial of Christ. By the time he is writing this epistle, the other three gospels have already presented all of the chronological events in detail. Instead, what John is doing is specifically highlighting certain events in order to illustrate particular principles which he is attempting to teach. And as we have seen from our previous studies, John is very focused on presenting the gospel as the truth of God. He quotes Jesus reaffirming this principle again and again in statements such as “God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” And “I am the way the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father except by me.” And another, “You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.” Finally one more, “Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth.”

In fact, 83 times in his writings John writes about either truth or what is true. I firmly believe that for the apostle John, truth was the preeminent theme of the gospel. So what I think he is doing here in addition to presenting the events leading up to Christ’s crucifixion is he is including a sub plot, which is contrasting the truth with the dangers of apostasy. The truth of Christ is contrasted with the apostasy of Peter. And Peter is representative of the church. Remember, Jesus had said in Matt. 16:18 “I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it.” So the apostles, and especially Peter, are emblematic of the church because they are the foundation of the church. And in this passage we are looking at today, John is highlighting the dangers of the church slipping into apostasy.

Apostasy means the abandonment or renunciation of belief, particularly religious belief. So to become apostate is to abandon or renounce your faith, or the principles of truth which undergird your faith. In 2Thess. 2:3, Paul speaking of the second coming of Christ says, “Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first.” The Bible teaches that in the last days there will be a great falling away from the truth. False prophets and false teaching will fill the church to the extent that Jesus said if it were possible even the very elect would be misled.

And we know from church history that in fact happened. When Jesus speaks for the last time to the church in Revelation 2 and 3, which was also written by John by the way, He speaks to the seven churches in Asia, which were symbolic of the church universal, and in practically each of His messages to the churches, He emphasizes their need to stay true to His word, and warns them to repent of their apostasy, lest He remove their lamp stand from the Earth.

Now last week we looked at the first part of this passage set in the Garden of Gethsemane where the mob came to arrest Jesus along with the Pharisees and the Roman cohort. And particularly we focused on the response of the disciples as an example of how the church often responds to a hostile world. We talked about the natural response of the human psyche to fear or intimidation known as the fight or flight syndrome which was exemplified by the disciples fleeing, and Peter swinging his sword and cutting off the ear of the High Priest’s slave. And if you will remember, my application contrasted the church’s natural response to the world as opposed to what should be the true response of the church as identified by Acts 2, in the first church of Jerusalem immediately following Pentecost.

In a similar fashion, I want to show a subsequent application to the church through the events recorded in this passage that may not at first be apparent from a superficial study of the chronology of events. But if you will bear with me, I hope to show you how the denial of Peter and the trial of Christ mirror the choice confronting the church today, namely, remaining steadfast in the truth, and on the other hand, denying the truth, or becoming apostate.

So what we see from the passage is that really what was on trial was the Truth. That becomes apparent in Jesus’s response to both Annas and Pilate later on in the chapter. It was all about the truth that Jesus taught and represented. Jesus was the Truth personified. That is what the Pharisees and Sanhedrin hated. They weren’t interested in the truth, they were interested in the law. The law was their religion. They had learned to manipulate the law. They could take advantage of the law. They could enrich themselves through the law, administered through religion. But Jesus focused on the truth. The truth trumps the law because the law comes from the truth. However, as I said, they were not interested in the Truth, they were interested in law, which was administered through their religion. And sadly, we see today in the church that there is an emphasis on religion as they define it, but there is very little emphasis on the truth. Truth is relative today in our culture, and the church in it’s efforts to be relevant to the culture has become a mirror of the culture, rather than a reflection of Jesus Christ who is the Truth.

So John’s record at this point doesn’t focus so much on the illegality of the trial or on the Pharisees, but he seems to deliberately juxtapose Peter’s denial with Christ’s affirmation of Truth. Twice John shows another side of what was going on, that which was happening in the courtyard below with Peter. And I am proposing that his intention is to show the counterpoint to the truth of the gospel, which is apostasy, and how easy it is and possible it is for the church to fall into it.

So without further introduction, let’s look at four steps to apostasy as illustrated in this text. And I will give you each step in advance; First, the steps to apostasy begins with acting in your own wisdom, which leads to # 2, distance from God, which produces #3, a desire for acceptance from the world, and #4, results in blasphemy and denial. That’s the four steps to apostasy.

Let’s consider how this is illustrated in the text. The first point, acting in your own wisdom we pretty much covered last week. When confronted with the hostility of the mob, Peter did what he thought was right according to his own wisdom, according to his own strength. When he should have followed the Lord’s example and looked to him as to how to respond to the attack of the mob, instead he acted in his own strength, according to his own wisdom, and it resulted in disaster. He pulled his sword and whacked off the High Priest’s servant’s ear. That was a bad move. It could have been even worse had not Jesus healed the man’s ear. Because as we see later, Malchus’s kinsman was sitting at the fire later in Annas’s courtyard, and he recognized Peter and called him out in front of the soldiers.

We see this same attitude played out today in the church all the time, though perhaps in a little less dramatic fashion. More and more we see the church relying of philosophy, psychiatry, science, survey’s, and business practices in order to achieve their goals. The average sermon today is an impotent mixture of pyscho-babble and sentimentality, with a few jokes and a poem thrown in for good measure. Rather than looking at how the Bible says we should approach things like marriage, or sexuality, or church organization, etc, we follow what science or business or common sense tells us to do. But we need to remember that God has given us a blueprint for the church, and when we deviate from it to follow our own wisdom, we do so at our own peril.

I want to point out another contrast inherent in this scene. Peter decides to fight with his sword against the forces of darkness that are arrayed before him. And though he manages to wound one out of possibly 50-200 armed men, it was not a very effective strategy. And as I said earlier, if Jesus hadn’t stopped it and healed the servant, it would have probably ended badly for Peter. But then notice the contrast of the truth. In vs. 4, it says, “So Jesus, knowing all the things that were coming upon Him, went forth and *said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered Him, “Jesus the Nazarene.” He *said to them, “I am He.” And Judas also, who was betraying Him, was standing with them. So when He said to them, “I am He,” they drew back and fell to the ground.”

Here is the irony of the contrast. Peter takes his sword and wounds one man, and potentially sets up a disastrous situation. Jesus uses the sword of His mouth, the very word of God, and 200 men are knocked flat on the ground. I believe that John shows us this contrast to illustrate that even the foolishness of God is greater than the wisdom of men. We must not neglect the word of God. It is powerful even to the destruction of fortresses. 2Cor. 10:3 says, “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses.” The efforts of our flesh in our wisdom and strength fail to make a difference for the kingdom. Whereas God’s word is powerful and sharper than a two edged sword. Because it is the truth of God.

Well, as we see in Peter’s case, acting in your own wisdom leads to the second step towards apostasy, which is distancing yourself from God. It’s really amazing that Christ demonstrates His divine power even in this hour of darkness, in both knocking the mob on the ground and healing the man’s ear, and yet the mob is unmoved. They are resolute in their hatred and determination to put Jesus to death. Their hearts are hardened.

But what’s even more amazing is that the disciples, also seeing these things, and having seen so many other miracles that Jesus had done over three years, are unmoved as well. They run away. You would think that they would have recognized that the safest place for them to be was with Jesus.

I have said that from this pulpit many times and I will say it again this morning. There is no safe place outside of the will of God. And there is no safer place than to be in the will of God. Yet how quickly we forget that. The disciples thought that it would be safer somewhere else. So they ran. Peter, I will give him some credit, doesn’t run. Instead he follows from afar, according to Matthew 26:58. And so when Jesus is in the house of the High Priest, Peter is hanging around outside in the dark, outside the courtyard door.

Over the last couple of months or so, I have had a number of people tell me that they felt as if they were far from God. They didn’t feel close to God anymore. They feel like God didn’t care, or didn’t love them anymore. They felt distant. And I will tell you what I tell them every time. It’s an alternate version of the old adage; sin will keep you from God, or God will keep you from sin. When you feel distant from God it’s usually because you have moved away from God, not vice versa.

It’s like the couple that had been married for 30 years, back in the day when cars had bench seats, not like the bucket seats we have today. And the couple were driving down the road, and the wife looked over at the husband who was driving and said sort of reproachfully, “Remember when we used to take a drive when we were dating, and how you used to put your arm around me, and hug me close? Don’t you ever miss that kind of closeness? And the husband looked over at her on the passenger side of the car and said, “Well, I didn’t move, you did.”

God doesn’t move to distance Himself from us. Even when we are in rebellion against Him, He pursues us. The Lord is like the husband of Hosea, who watches and provides for his love from afar, waiting for her to return to Him, and never stops loving her. James gives us the prescription for a healthy relationship with God in James 4:8, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

Distance from God usually happens as a result of a lack of dependence upon God. You stop reading His word. You start skipping your devotions. You hardly pray. Start missing church services. It’s usually characterized by a desire to keep a comfortable distance from God, while all the while claiming to be in fellowship with Him. You want to be free to make your own decisions, and then that leads to neglecting the word of God so that you can operate independently without a guilty conscience.

Thirdly, distancing yourself from God leads to a desire for acceptance by the world. We see this illustrated in Peter’s example. There is an unnamed disciple in the text, who John says was known by the High Priest’s family. Most commentators believe that this is John himself. And so John realizes that Peter is outside the door, and he speaks to the girl watching the door so that Peter can come inside. I’m not sure that Peter really wanted to come inside. But nevertheless, he more or less had to come in when John came to the door.

But where he ends up is not back beside Christ as you might think. He hasn’t felt enough remorse over his earlier actions so that now he just wants to be next to Christ again. No, he just sidles over to the fire where the enemies of Christ are hanging out getting warm. So it’s apparent where his sentiments are at this point. There are two sides in this mock trial. There is Jesus all alone, and there is everyone else. Peter gains entrance to the house, but he chooses sides with the enemy. He wants to keep his distance from Christ.

We see that in Christianity all the time. There is a crisis in one’s life, and so they feel remorse that they were caught up in some crime, or put in jail, or totaled the car, or messed up their marriage somehow, but rather than come all the way to Christ, the natural tendency is to come only so far. To hang on to their autonomy, to hang on to their sin. The choice Peter should have made was to come all the way to Christ, even to the death if necessary, which was what he had boasted earlier that he would do.

So of course in our text we see that the enemy recognizes Peter as having been with Christ. So they start to call him out. First the slave girl says, “You are not also one of this man’s disciples, are you?” And He said, “I am not.” He denies being a disciple. He doesn’t deny knowing Christ at this point, just denies being a disciple.

I don’t think that Peter was afraid of this slave girl. I think Peter suddenly is getting a clearer understanding of what Jesus has been saying all along about what it really means to be a disciple, to suffer for Him. I think it was easier being a disciple when they had this miraculous power to call down fire from heaven or cast out demons. But now this hour belonged to the power of darkness. And in this hour he begins to remember how Jesus had just told them they would be persecuted and killed for following Him. It suddenly is no longer theoretical, but an immediate possibility. And maybe he realizes at this point that this being an outcast from society, being persecuted, being publicly ostracized was going to be part of what it means to be a Christian. And at that moment, he wasn’t sure that he really wanted to commit to that.

So he chose friendship with the world, which Paul tells us is enmity with God. He found himself at odds with Psalm 1:1 which says, “How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked,Nor stand in the path of sinners, Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!”

Acting in your own wisdom results in distancing yourself from God, which leads to a desire for acceptance from the world. And we see that all the time in the church today among Christians. Who at some point, come to realize that following Christ completely and being stedfast to the truth of God puts them in opposition to the world. It’s makes us an outcast, a fool for Christ. So to appease the world we want to soften our stance on things that the Bible speaks clearly about. We start to accept the dictates of the culture, because if we spoke out about adultery or homosexuality or evolution or a host of other subjects then we would become ostracized in our communities. We could lose our job. We might get “unfriended” on face book. We might get laughed at in school.

And before we know it, we have moved from walking according to the counsel of the wicked to standing in the path of sinners, and before we are done we end up sitting down with the scoffers. We find ourselves like Lot, who moved from living in the country near the city of Sodom to living next to it, to finally moving downtown. On the road to apostasy you get comfortable with the world, and uncomfortable with discipleship. So you move further and further towards apostasy. When you start to accommodate the world’s views in one area, it leads to another area, and soon it like yeast in a lump of dough it corrupts completely.

That takes us to the final point, which is a desire to be accepted by the world leads to blasphemy and denial of the truth. Peter finds himself getting warm by the fire. Notice that John repeats that twice in vs 18 and 25. That accommodation of Christ’s enemies leads to Peter denying the Lord three times. You will remember that Jesus prophesied that before the night was over Peter would deny Him three times. Peter had denied such a possibility vigorously. Once again you see this disregard of God’s word. We think we can disregard God’s word with impunity. But we cannot. If the word of God convicts you, then you need to repent and ask God to forgive you. Because when you disregard the conviction of the Spirit of God through the word of God your heart becomes hardened, and you give the devil an opportunity to destroy you.

In his later years, Peter illustrated that he come to appreciate the schemes of the devil and how he uses such things to take you down. Peter writes in 1Peter 5:8, “Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” But at the point in our story, Peter had not learned that lesson yet. He thought he was good, he was strong, he could handle things himself. But in fact, Jesus had warned Peter earlier that Satan had demanded permission to sift him like wheat.

Peter didn’t believe that he was weak, however. He was confident that he could stand up to the devil’s temptations. Peter exhibited overconfidence in himself, and a lack of confidence in God. It would have been good for him to know 1Cor. 10:12 which says, “Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall.”

Well, as we see here, one denial of the truth leads to another lie, which leads to yet another lie. That’s the way sin is. A little leaven soon leavens the whole lump. And so we see Peter get deeper and deeper into sin, until he ends up not only denying Christ, but blaspheming and cursing in order to prove himself not a friend of Christ. It’s really just incredible to watch the fall of Peter.

John 18:25 “Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. So they said to him, “You are not also one of His disciples, are you?” He denied it, and said, “I am not.” One of the slaves of the high priest, being a relative of the one whose ear Peter cut off, *said, “Did I not see you in the garden with Him?” Peter then denied it again. (Matthew 26 tells us that Peter denied it with an oath, and then when asked again he resorted to cursing,) and immediately a rooster crowed.

Most of us when confronted with the possibility that we would deny Christ would protest as Peter did that we would die before denying Him. But that is in theory. In actuality, it doesn’t often go the way we think it might. Satan gets us to deny Him first by denying the Lord’s power in favor of our own. We do it our way, kind of like Frank Sinatra. We try to make it look like we are doing it for the Lord, but the bottom line is we want to deny Christ control over our lives and want to exercise our will and wisdom. That leads to further distance from God, as we think we are doing fine, and don’t really need to depend daily upon God. Skipping devotions or prayer time or church time becomes more commonplace as everything else starts to take precedence over the things of God. And that distance from God leads to a desire to find acceptance from the world. Maybe that is even our original motivation. We like the acclaim of men, so we seek out ways of pleasing the world, rather than pleasing God. And then finally, that leads to down right denial of Christ.

Oh, we may not be cursing God, or uttering blasphemies directed towards Christ directly, but in many ways I’m afraid we deny Christ in our relationship with Him, in His Lordship over us, we deny Him control over our lives, and we don’t trust Him to take care of us. And if we don’t turn and repent of such things, it can lead us into outright apostasy. We end up denying the truth of God. We deny the truth of God’s word. We fail to stand up for Christ when He is attacked by the world.

I think the lesson to be learned from this story is that if apostasy can happen to Peter it can happen to the best of us. Because, contrary to the way many portray Peter, I believe Peter was the best of us. I believe he was passionate about following the Lord. He loved the Lord. He was faithful to the Lord. He was an intimate friend of the Lord. And yet, he fell from faith in denying Christ three times on the night of His crucifixion. It is a tragedy that is possible for all of us. And many of us have already done as bad if not worse at some point in our lives. I know I have.

But like Peter, I am a child of God. Thank God my disobedience and denial of my Lord does not negate the fact that I am His child. God is a God of restoration. He came to seek and to save those that are lost. And just as Christ made a point to meet with Peter specifically after His resurrection and reconcile Peter to Himself, so He will do with you and with me if we are truly His people and we are willing to repent. If you don’t repent, Satan will use your rebellion to try to destroy you. But if you turn back to God, He will heal you and restore you.

In Peter’s case, not only did Christ reconcile with Peter, but He still used Peter to be the foundation of the church. Peter’s past mistakes did not disqualify him, but once he was reconciled to Christ he was used as the chief apostle of His church. God has a plan to use us, even when we have been broken and beaten up by the devil and by failures. The key is we learn to trust God, to let Him have control of our life, and we don’t trust in our own strength or wisdom, but trust in the word of God.