Episode Transcript
WEBVTT
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So let's give our attention to John
Seven. I'm returning back to the Gospel
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of John John, Chapter Seven,
verses one through thirteen. After this,
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Jesus went about in Galilee. He
would not go about in Judea because the
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Jews were seeking to kill him.
Now the Jews feast of booths was at
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hand. So, as brothers said
to him, leave here and go to
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Judea that your disciples also may see
the works you are doing, for no
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one works in secret if he seeks
to be known openly. If you do
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these things, show yourself to the
world, for not even his brothers believed
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him. Jesus said to them,
my time has not yet come, but
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your time is always here. The
world cannot hate you, but it hates
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me because I testify about it that
its works are evil. You go up
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to the feast, I'm not going
up to this feast, for my time
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has not yet fully come. After
saying this, he remained in Galilee,
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but after his brothers had gone up
to the feast, then he also went
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up, not publicly but in private. The Jews were looking for him at
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the feast and saying where is he, and there was much muttering about him
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among the people, while some said
he is a good man, others said
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no, he is leading the people
astray. Yet for fear of the Jews,
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no one spoke openly about him.
The God bless his word to us.
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You may be seated. Thank you. Well, this passage we begin
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to sense that the tensions around Jesus
and his ministry, in the time and
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places in which he is ministering,
are growing. The tensions are growing,
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the conflicts are growing and, as
you will see as we move through chapter
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seven and aid as well, and
really through the rest of the book,
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that's going to just increase. The
clearer it becomes who Jesus is, the
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more conflict there is, and eventually
that conflict will result in a cross where
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Jesus will be murdered, nailed to
a cross, executed unjustly, unrighteously.
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This desire that the Jews have to
kill him will one day produce the fruit
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and they will accomplish their end,
least for a few days and hopefully you
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know the rest of the story.
But now we want to think about this
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conflict that John taught tells us about
here and in John Chapter Seven. It's
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a conflict between the Jews and Judea, the John Sells us that Jesus doesn't
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want to go there because they want
to kill him. This time is not
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yet come, but it's also between
his brothers. Reminds me a little bit
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of Joseph, Joseph who had been
given this task and calling these Viviasians and
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dreams of God, and it was
not going well with him and his family.
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Of course, the difference between Joseph
and Jesus is that Jesus is perfect
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in the ways that he dealt with
his brothers and the ways that he acted,
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and this is who we see here. Another interesting thing, as we
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come to this passage that we consider
the setting for this conflict, is there's
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this irony, an irony that we've
seen before and we keep seeing, and
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it has to do with this feast
of booths. This feast was one of
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the major feast, one of the
major festivals of in Israel. It's celebrated
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this time of harvest and it celebrated
the time in which God harvested his people,
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when which he brought them out of
Egypt and was taking them into the
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promised land. It's called the feast
of booths and has other names to but
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here are called the feast of booths
because it was the way these booths were,
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the way in which God protected them
in the Wilderness. It marks the
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period of time in which God brought
his people out of slavery, from Egypt
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into the Wilderness on the way to
the promised land. And if you go
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back and you read those sections in
the Old Testament, you'll know what happens,
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that during that wilderness period, God
took care of them. He protected
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them from their enemies, he fed
them water out of rocks, he gave
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them bread from heaven, he provided
them leadership, he provided them comfort,
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he provided them everything they could need. It was difficult at times, it
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was a struggle sometimes to believe,
to trust him, but he always followed
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through, as of course God always
does. This was their time in their
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wilderness, and that's what this festival
celebrates, the period of time in which
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God was taking care of them.
And so what would happen is the people
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would travel to Jerusalem, they would
celebrate, they would construct booths, they
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would offer tons of sacrifices and it
was supposed to be this time of great
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joy and of celebration of this past
work of the Lord and, of course,
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a minder of the Lord's continuing work. It's reminds me a little bit
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of perhaps you've had a situation where
you've needed to go to some sort of
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family celebration, maybe a wedding or
a birthday party or a Thanksgiving me or
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Christmas or something like that, and
you know this is supposed to be a
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time of togetherness and rejoicing and unity
and coming together, and yet there's bickering
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and squabbling and and these kinds of
things. And that's what's going on here.
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The feast of Booth was at hand, and now we have this conflict
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between Jesus and his brothers. Jesus
is supposed to go to Jerusalem and eventually
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he does, just not in the
way they want. He's supposed to go
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to Jerusalem with all of the others, to come there to celebrate, to
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worship the Lord, but he can't, not the way they want. Why?
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Because the Jews want to kill him. This is not a mark of
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the feast, this is not a
mark of unity, this is not a
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mark of a togetherness. And the
same goes with his brothers. So here
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we have Jesus his brothers giving him
a hard time and perhaps even worse.
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Like Joseph's brothers. They seem to
be trying to push him into a situation
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that he did not want to go, not in the way that they wanted
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anyway. Where do we see that
conflict? Where am I getting that from?
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A few places. One reason is
that the way his brothers speak to
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him. In verse three, they
say leave here and go to Judea,
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and even that word go I usually
has this way of go away from this
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place. It's no way. It's
emphasized twice. Leave here and go away
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right there. They're sending him well, kicking him out, you know,
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rather than sending him off. They
want him to to leave them, leave
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and go to Judea. That's the
first sense in which we we sense the
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conflict. The second comes in the
next words that your disciples may also see
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the works that you are doing if
you go through. If that sounds like
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they're distancing themselves. Your disciples right, you'd be right to assume that.
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Every time this phrase your disciples is
used in the New Testament, it's used
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to speak of one group that does
not belong to that group. In other
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words, they don't count themselves as
Jesus, as disciples they're saying, Hey,
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look, if you want to do
this thing you're doing, which we
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don't really believe in, as John
tells us, you should go that your
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disciples, that those other people may
react in in this way. For example,
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in Matthew Fourteen, the Pharisees say, why don't your disciples fast?
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Right, they're talking about this group
that they don't belong to. Why don't
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your disciples wash their hands? These
kind of things. So his own brothers,
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they don't see themselves connected to him, to his mission. They are
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not following him and we see that
in their actions as well. They assume
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that Jesus is doing it wrong.
They look at Jesus and they look at
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the works. They're not denying the
works that he has done, on the
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miracles and things that have happened.
They've probably seen them firsthand, at least
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some of them, but they believe
instead of following Jesus, they think he
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needs to follow them, their instructions. They assume he's he's doing it wrong.
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One commentator notes that it's in some
ways similar to Satan's temptations of Jesus
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in the Wilderness. Jump off this
temple and I'll give you your your kingdom,
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but Jesus wasn't going to bring about
the Kingdom of God in any way
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other than the one that was according
to his will, which was according to
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the father's will. What did they
want? How did they think he was
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doing it wrong? Well, they
thought he should go big, take the
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show on the road, do your
tricks. Are you even who you are,
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who you say you are? Notice
what they say. Leave here,
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go to Judea that your disciples may
also see the works that you are doing,
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for no one works in the secret
if he seeks to be openly known.
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What's the deal, Jesus? Do
you care about this mission or not?
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Do you really want what you're after
or not? If you do,
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then you should go be open about
it. Why are you hiding? What
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are you hiding, Jesus? If
you do these things, show yourself to
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the world now. This, of
course, is a great idea. If
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Jesus is mission was to build a
name for himself so that people might follow
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him for generations, to for the
next generation or two, so that he
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could die a nice old age,
wealthy and powerful, with a few million
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followers. If Jesus wanted to achieve
that, then this would probably be a
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great thing to do. He was
capable of doing these good works. People
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were impressed, people were following.
It was time to scale up, it's
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time to go to Judea. There's
time to make it big time. But
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of course Jesus doesn't want any of
that. Jesus is not looking to establish
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himself in this world. Jesus is
looking to conquer the world, and he's
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going to do that not by doing
a bunch of miracles that people are amazed
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at. He's going to do it
by doing miracles that demonstrate the nature of
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his kingdom in a way that will
finally be accomplished on a cross, where
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he willingly goes to suffer this death
in order to establish an everlasting kingdom,
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the kingdom that we sung about,
and be still my soul, this kingdom
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where there is no sorrow, no
sins, no strife. They think Jesus
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is thinking too small, assuming they're
not just trying to set him up to
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be killed. We're kind of going
best possible scenario here, assuming the best.
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They think Jesus is thinking too small, but of course it's just the
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opposite. They are thinking way too
small, because he is going to do
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something that turns over the entire world, and perhaps they sense that and perhaps
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they don't. That's why they don't
trust him. As John says, they
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did not believe in him. They, like all sinners, were attached to
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this world, attached to the things
of this world. Sure, people who
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are attached to this world complain about
things and they don't like suffering, but
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they're not going to give it up, after Jesus, not for the things
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he's doing, because there's power here, there's strength here. Well so we
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think. Of course that's all an
illusion. Right. What does Jesus say?
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Don't store up your treasures here on
earth, because what happens? Moths
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eat it, thieves, steal it, rust destroys it. That's what happens.
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We always forget that and we pile
up and we pile up and we
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attach ourselves to fame and power and
money and all these things, but they
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all go away. Over and over
and over again, they go away,
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whether it's relationships or possessions or learning
or whatever. It read ecclesiastes, vanity
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of vanities. You attach yourself to
the world and the things under the sun
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and it all goes away. Yet
in our sinfulness we hang on to that
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because we don't want to give up
control because we want to stay who we
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are. We don't want to submit
our lives to God. We want to
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do things in our own way and
the ways that we think our best.
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We want to cling to our treasures. And of course that's all foolishness,
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and that's why Jesus says, as
we continue you on in this passage,
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my time is not yet come,
but your time is always here. I
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can't go to Judea right now in
the ways that you want and the ways
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that you're saying you can go,
though it's a perfect fit for you.
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The world cannot hate you. Sounds
like a good thing until you remember what
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the world is and how the world
doesn't last. But it hates me,
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he says verse seven, because I
testify about it, that it's works are
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evil, that it's works will perish, that it's works will be consumed in
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God's wrath and judgment. Nobody likes
to hear that message. Who is attached
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to themselves, who is attached to
the things of this world, who are
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attached to the powers that they have, and so they do not believe him,
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which is to say they do not
receive the work of God, the
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father and the son. They reject
the son, which means they reject the
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father, which means they are rejecting
God. They are opposed to God.
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This is the picture of unbelief.
This is what idolatry of the heart looks
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like and this is how it motivates
our acts. What does unbelief look like?
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It looks like sending Jesus away.
It looks like trying to lead Jesus
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instead of followed Jesus. It looks
like holding on to the things of this
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world instead of the things that he
is bringing the age to come. What
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does the opposite look like? We've
seen some examples of this already, and
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John, the woman at the well, for example, who sees her sins
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exposed, who sees the Messiah standing
before her and she runs away and tells
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her her fellow townspeople, he revealed
to me everything that I've done. Come
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and see. or The disciples who
heard his true disciples, who heard the
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preaching of John The baptist. Here
is the lamb of God who takes into
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the way of the sins of the
world, and they followed him wherever he
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was going. They were going to
follow him. Or the man by the
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pool and Bethesda. In a way, when Jesus says get up and take
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up your bed and walk, he
doesn't say now, wait a second,
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I've been here a long time and
I'm not really sure this is going to
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work and let's have a dialog about
this now. He just gets up his
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bed and he walks there. We've
had other examples it well as well,
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and hopefully you've had examples of this
in your own life, people that you
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see, and hopefully yourself to that
are following Jesus, drawing close to him,
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seeing things from his perspective, his
way, his truth. All of
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these things have in common. These
positive examples that I'm giving, positive examples
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of faith and that instead of pushing
Jesus away, instead of sending him off
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to do his own things so that
we might live our lives, they draw
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close to Jesus and then they act
in a way that assumes the truth of
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what he is saying. We draw
close to Jesus and we say what he's
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doing is true and then we act
in a way that is according to that.
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We go tell people about it,
we get up out of our sin
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and our misery and we start walking
in freedom. We stopped trying to lead
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Jesus or tell him what to do
or judge him, but instead we let
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him judge us. We follow his
lead. What does that look like for
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a church, for covenant? It
means that we want to get really,
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really close, as close as we
possibly can, to Jesus and his words
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and his teaching. Means that we
come to church and we hear his word
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and we we want to hear it
proclaimed and we join ourselves together in groups
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where we study the Bible and we
hear about him and we learn about him.
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We want to under stand more and
more and more of who he is,
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what he did and what he's doing
so that we can build up a
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great body of knowledge and impress people. Oh so we can follow him,
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so that we can follow him,
because Jesus takes us to the Cross and
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through death and into eternal life.
That's what he does for his disciples.
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We trust him, we trust his
ways, we trust his truth, and
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the world will say, why waste
your time with these things when you could
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be making a real difference? And
we have to learn. If we know
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who Jesus is, we have to
learn to look at that and go whatever
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or know or walk away. Depends
on the scenario in the context, but
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we have to learn to distance ourselves
from that and say I'm not going to
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follow that way. My Life is
not I'm called to live in this world,
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but as citizens of another world,
another kingdom. And so we stay
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close to him, we see ourselves
attached to him and his life and his
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successes. We live our lives according
to the citizenship that we have under him
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as our king, and it also
means beloved that the conflict Jesus has with
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the world means that we too will
be in conflict with the world. We
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don't want Jesus to say of us
what he said of his, his brothers.
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You'll be fine, the world's not
going to hate you. We don't
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want that to be said of us. It's not like we're looking to enter
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into conflict. The Apostle Paul tells
us to do our best. We live
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at peace with our neighbors, to
live quiet lives, but when it comes
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to a conflict between this world and
the next, between this kingdom and that
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kingdom, there's no middle ground.
You're either on his side or not.
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You're either his disciple or is not. You follow him or not. Now
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I'm not saying we don't struggle and
fall, I'm not saying we have to
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work through things sometimes, but I
am saying there's only two ways and that
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we need to learn to see our
lives in this way. And the conflict
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that we have here in John Seven
points us to these two sides, to
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two choices, to trusting and serving, and we have to pick. That's
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the big idea here. We have
to pick sides and live on that side,
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and that message is I'll circle back
to something I mentioned in the beginning.
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Is Not just something for people out
there in the world, it's for
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us right here. Remember that the
there were people who were going to this
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great festival with murder on their minds. Just because we're coming to church,
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just because we're here to enjoy and
celebrate the things of the Lord, doesn't
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mean that there's not evil in our
hearts, and we have to be honest
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with ourselves and with the Lord with
that. Jesus and the Jews and his
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brothers were all going to the same
religious feast, but not all we're going
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for the same purpose and for the
right reasons. Instead of celebrating the past
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and looking forward to the future,
when one day all the Wilderness Times would
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end and God's provisions would be consummated. They were going about, they were
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going there to bring about the death
of the one who fulfills all of these
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things. Jesus had come into this
world not merely to enjoy the religious feasts
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and participate in the culture and take
alongside of them or come alongside of them.
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Jesus came into the world to fulfill
them. He came to take us
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through the Wilderness and even death itself, so that we might always and only
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have life. And he establed wish. Is this not by fancy magic tricks,
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though he certainly did powerful, miraculous
things for which we ought to praise
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him for, but these things pointed
forward to the work on the Cross and
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the benefits that would come as a
result of that. Through the cross,
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Jesus takes away struggle and suffering and
death. He removes the barrier between us
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and God and US and heaven.
He takes us through those baptism waters of
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Jordan so that he might establish us
in Canaan, though the warld, though
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hated by the world, he came
to save the world. He became a
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new Moses, a new Joshua,
the new seat of Israel, the King
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of the Kingdom established forever. That's
why we hope in him, that's why
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he is our savior from our sin, and so, instead of rejecting him,
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instead of pushing away from him,
follow him, trust him. He
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is the consummation of all the things
in the old and he brings about all
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the things that God has promised for
the new and the time to come.
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Let's pray and ask that God would
bless us in these words and help us
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to do as we ought
