Wednesday, December 30, 2015

We celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to rescue us from condemnation so that we could experience an eternity in relationship with Him...


This week we have been looking at an encounter between a man named Nicodemus and Jesus that is recorded for us in an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of John. Yesterday, we looked on as Jesus explained to Nicodemus that to experience a relationship with God, a person needed to be born again, or born from above. Nicodemus, however, was having a hard time understanding what Jesus was communicating.

We talked about the reality that to understand why Nicodemus was having such a hard time wrapping his mind around the significance of Jesus words here, we first need to understand how Nicodemus believed one entered into a relationship with God. You see, Nicodemus, and the Jewish religious leaders of Jesus day, believed that it was what you did for God that made you right with God.  They believed that it was your performance for God that determined whether or not you were able to have a relationship with God.

Nicodemus grew up and lived his entire life trying to do things for God. And now Jesus was telling Nicodemus that everything that he had learned, lived by, and was teaching others was wrong. Jesus was telling Nicodemus, and the Jewish religious leaders of the day that they had missed what it meant and how they could live in relationship with God. 

After blowing up all of the categories that Nicodemus had when it came to God, Jesus begins to answer the question that drove the religious leaders to send Nicodemus to Jesus in the first place. And that question was this: Who did Jesus think He was and what authority did He think He had to say and do what He was doing. We see Jesus answer that question in verse 13-15:

"No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man. "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.

Jesus explains to Nicodemus that He alone can speak authoritatively on how one is able to be brought into a relationship with God, because He alone is the Son of Man. Jesus here brings Nicodemus back to a section of a letter that is recorded for us in the Old Testament of the Bible called the book of Daniel. In Daniel 7:13-14, the prophet Daniel predicted and proclaimed that the Messiah would come from Heaven to usher in the Kingdom of God.

Jesus then reminds Nicodemus of a story in that is recorded for us in a letter in the Old Testament of our Bible called the book of Numbers. In Numbers 21:9, we read the story of an occasion where the Jewish people selfishly rebelled against Moses and God. God responded to their rebellion by sending poisonous snakes to kill those who were involved in the rebellion. The Lord commanded Moses to make an image of a bronze serpent and lift it on a standard so that it would be visible to all. Moses then explained to the people that those who trusted that God would heal them if they looked at the serpent would be healed. All those who trusted in God and looked at the serpent that was lifted on the pole were healed, while the rest of the Jewish people who failed to trust God but continued in their selfishness and rebellion died.

Jesus then took this Old Testament story and explained that this story was a foreshadowing of what would happen to Him. Jesus explained to Nicodemus that just like the bronze serpent in the wilderness, He would be lifted up on a pole and that everyone who placed their confident trust in Him would be brought into a relationship with God. Jesus then makes a statement that is probably the most familiar verse in the entire Bible. And it is in this single verse that we see the core message of the good news of the message of the gospel.

If you are not sure you buy the Jesus, Bible, church, thing; if you have had Christians share “the gospel” with you but found yourself walking away confused or found the message filled with big 50 cent theological words that you did not understand, I just want to let you know that I am glad you are reading this. I am glad you are reading this because, in this verse, we see the gospel most clearly and simply put. I am glad you are reading this because while you have the freedom to reject and walk away from the message of the gospel, I want to make sure that you walk away clearly understanding what you are rejecting. And this may be the first time that you have had the opportunity to clearly hear the good news of God’s message of rescue through the message of the gospel. So let’s look at this verse together:

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

In this verse, we see Jesus reveal for us we need to know and what we need to do in order to enter into a relationship with God. First, Jesus says for God so loved the world. You see, God sent His Son Jesus to earth not because He was mad at the world; God is in love with the world. Jesus then tells us that God did what people, who are in love, do. God gave. God sent His Son Jesus because He loved the world.

You see, while God created humanity to experience a relationship with Him and a relationship with one another, all of humanity selfishly rebelled and rejected that relationship, instead choosing to love ourselves and do things out of that selfish love that hurt God and others. That selfish love and rebellion is what the Bible calls sin.

God responded to that selfish love and rebellion by giving what was closest to Himself to rescue what was furthest away. God’s love and interest in us was made known and shown in the most powerful way when He sent His unique, one and only Son to earth, who allowed Himself to be treated as though He lived our selfish and sinful lives, so that God the Father could treat us as though we lived Jesus perfect life.

Jesus then explained that God loved and God gave so that whoever believes in Him shall not perish. Now this little phrase believes in, in the language that this letter is written in, literally means to entrust oneself entrust to someone with complete confidence. To trust is a lot like sitting on a stool; while I can say that I believe that this stool can hold my weight, it is only when I sit on the stool that I demonstrate that I trust the stool to hold my weight.

And for the person who believes, trusts, and follows Jesus, Jesus explains that they shall not perish, but have eternal life. Now eternal life is not simply living forever. You see, everyone lives forever; we are created as eternal beings. The question is not whether or not you are going to live forever, the question is where are you going to live?

When Jesus uses this phrase, He is revealing to Nicodemus that the person who places their confident trust in Jesus life death, and resurrection will not be separated from God as a result of their selfishness and rebellion, but will experience the forgiveness of sin and the relationship with God that we were created for. And that is the good news of the gospel: God loved, God gave, so that those who believe and place their confident trust in Jesus would receive life in relationship with Him.

Now you might be thinking “I am still having a hard time buying that God is like this. I still see God as being like a cosmic cop around the corner waiting to bust me. The idea that Christmas is about God’s love for me and desire for relationship with me is hard to accept”. If that is where you are at, just look at what Jesus says next in John 3:17-21:

"For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. "He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. "This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. "For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. "But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God."

If Jesus was communicating this in the language that we use in our culture today, these verses would sound like this: Nicodemus, God did not send Me as the Messiah to the earth in order to judge all of humanity, but that all of humanity would have the opportunity to be rescued from their selfishness and rebellion. The person who places their confident trust in Me is not condemned. However, the person who refuses to place their confident trust in Me is already condemned because of their selfishness and rebellion. Everyone is condemned and the reason that they are condemned is because I have revealed Myself throughout all of human history and all of humanity has responded by rejecting and rebelling against Me. They want nothing to do with Me because I expose the selfishness and rebellion that is in the center and core of their being. Everyone is already condemned because of their rebellion and I have come to rescue those who place their trust in Me from condemnation. And everyone who places their confident trust in Me and live in relationship with Me reveal the reality of My transformational intervention and activity that has brought them into relationship with Me.” 

And with that, Jesus conversation with Nicodemus was over. And a little less than two and a half years later, Jesus fulfilled the prediction and promise that He made. Nicodemus watched as Jesus was arrested, tried, convicted, and handed over to the Romans, who lifted Jesus up on a pole, a cross in order to be crucified.

However it is here, in event from history involving a conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, that we discover a timeless answer to the question “Why Christmas?”And that timeless answer is this: We celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to rescue us from condemnation so that we could experience an eternity in relationship with Him.

You see, Jesus wanted Nicodemus to clearly understand that all of humanity stands condemned to an eternity apart from God as a result of our selfishness and rebellion. Jesus wanted Nicodemus to clearly understand that rescue from selfishness and rebellion was not based on what we did for God, but in trusting in what God was doing through Jesus, who entered into humanity as the culmination of God’s Divine plan to provide an opportunity for forgiveness and restoration.

Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity in order to provide humanity an opportunity to be rescued from the condemnation that flows from our selfishness and rebellion and that separates us from God. Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity in order to provide humanity the opportunity to experience an eternity in relationship with Him.

Christmas is about the reality that out of love God gave what was closest to Himself to rescue what was furthest away. Christmas is significant because God, loved, and God gave so that all humanity would have the opportunity to live for all eternity in the relationship with God that they were created for.

And because of the reality, we celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to rescue us from condemnation so that we could experience an eternity in relationship with Him.

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

A Conversation That Blew Up Catagories...


At the church where I serve, we have been spending the weeks leading up to Christmas by pausing from the growing expectation, anticipation, and intensity of the countdown to Christmas in order to ask a simple question. And that question is this: Why Christmas? Why are we counting down to Christmas? Why is Christmas celebrated? Why is Christmas so significant? And specifically, why would Jesus enter into humanity that first Christmas?

To answer these questions, we are going to look at five different passages that are found in the letters that make up the New Testament of the Bible. And as we look at these five different sections of letters that are found in the New Testament of the Bible, we are going to discover five timeless answers to the question “Why Christmas?”

This week, as we reflect on Christmas, I would like for us to look at a fifth passage that is found in a section of an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of John. And as we look at an event that occurred during Jesus life here on earth that is recorded for us in the gospel of John, we are going to discover another timeless answer to the question “Why Christmas?” So let’s discover that timeless answer together, beginning in John 3:1-2:

Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews; this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him."

John begins this section of his account of Jesus life by introducing us to a man named Nicodemus, who he explains was a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews. The Pharisees were a leading group of Jewish religious leaders during Jesus life on earth.  Nicodemus was also a part of the Sanhedrin, which was the Senate and Supreme court of the Jewish nation. John tells us that Nicodemus came as a representative of the Jewish religious leadership one evening in order to have a conversation with Jesus.

You see, at this point in Jesus life, Jesus was viewed with an almost celebrity-like status. After all, Jesus had performed miracles; He had recently turned water into wine at a wedding reception. Jesus had also recently entered the Temple courtyards with a whip, turning over tables and driving out those who were financially exploiting people who came to worship God. And when asked about why He had drove out and destroyed all the kiosks where they were making money; when asked who He thought He was that He would even think to do such a thing, Jesus replied by saying that if they destroyed the Temple, that He would raise a new one in three days. 

For the Jewish religious leaders, Jesus was doing and saying things that were hard to understand and explain. They were having a hard time figuring Him out. And, worse yet, from their perspective, people were connecting with Him and His message. Jesus was becoming very popular. Large crowds were gathering around Him wherever He went. These religious leaders had questions that needed asking and answered. So these, leaders got together and decided that someone would need to confront Jesus and get answers to their questions. These leaders wanted to know who Jesus was and selected Nicodemus to go on their behalf to find out who Jesus was.

Nicodemus, wanting uninterrupted time with Jesus and privacy for fear of being embarrassed by Jesus, approached Jesus at night in order to get the answers to their questions. Nicodemus carefully approached Jesus with a very respectful greeting. This greeting, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: Jesus, it is a well known and generally accepted fact that you are a teacher that God has sent to us, because the miracles that you are doing could only be done by the power of God. We recognize that you have come as God’s messenger with a message from God”. However, before Nicodemus could even ask what that message from God was, Jesus takes control of the conversation with a statement that John records for us in verse 3:

Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God."

When Jesus uses the phrase kingdom of God, He is referring to God’s royal reign. You see, the Jewish people were looking for a rescuer, a deliverer, a Messiah who God had promised would someday come to bring the Jewish people back to God and back to prominence in the world. Jesus tells Nicodemus that, in order to be a part of this kingdom with the Messiah, one must be born again. This little phase, born again, in the language that this letter was originally written in, literally means to be born from above. We see John record Nicodemus response in verse 4:

Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?"

At this point, Nicodemus is totally caught off guard. Nicodemus had a list of questions that he was supposed to ask Jesus, but Jesus has just blown up that list of questions and replaced them with a whole new set of questions. And while Nicodemus asks a question about the improbability of a physical rebirth, Jesus responds by blowing up some more of Nicodemus theological categories in verse 5-8:

Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. "Do not be amazed that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' "The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit."

At this point Nicodemus was probably thinking to himself, “Why does He always have to talk that way? Why does He always say things like that?” Jesus statement, if communicated in the language we use today would have sounded something like this:

 “No Nicodemus, you cannot enter into the womb again, you cannot be born from above because of something you do. To be born from above is something that the Spirit of God does to you. In the same way that you have been brought into the world physically in a way that resulted in you entering into a relationship with your earthly parents, you also have to be brought into a relationship with God by the Spirit of God. Nicodemus, you should not be surprised at what I am telling you. It’s like the wind. The wind moves throughout the world every day. And no one has any control over the wind. The wind does whatever it desires. The wind starts when it wants to start; the wind goes where it wants to go; the wind ends when it wants to end. Just as no one can control the wind, no one can control the activity of the Holy Spirit and what He does in bringing people to the place where they are brought into a relationship with God." 

We see Nicodemus response in verse 9-12:

Nicodemus said to Him, "How can these things be?" Jesus answered and said to him, "Are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things? "Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony. "If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

In other words, Jesus asks Nicodemus “Are you not a pastor to the Jewish people? Are you not one of the most educated and powerful people in the Jewish nation? How is it that you are unable to wrap your mind around what I am saying? Nicodemus, I am telling you that this is what the Bible says and that we have been saying this all along, yet the religious leaders that you represent have missed it all along. And if you are having a hard time understanding the simple earthly illustration that I gave you so as to trust Me, then what are you going to do if I really start unpacking what the Bible and we have been saying?”

Now to understand why Nicodemus was having such a hard time wrapping his mind around the significance of Jesus words here, we first need to understand how Nicodemus believed one entered into a relationship with God. You see, Nicodemus, and the Jewish religious leaders of Jesus day, believed that it was what you did for God that made you right with God.  They believed that it was your performance for God that determined whether or not you were able to have a relationship with God.

Nicodemus grew up and lived his entire life trying to do things for God. And now Jesus was telling Nicodemus that everything that he had learned, lived by, and was teaching others was wrong. Jesus was telling Nicodemus, and the Jewish religious leaders of the day that they had missed what it meant and how they could live in relationship with God. 

Maybe you can totally relate to Nicodemus. Maybe you thought that a relationship with God was based on what you did for God. Maybe you thought that it was your performance for God that determined whether or not you were able to have a relationship with God. Maybe Jesus statement that a relationship with God is something that you cannot achieve apart from the Spirit of God has caught you off guard. Maybe you find that all your categories about God have just been blown up.

If I have just described you I just want to let you know that you are not the first person to experience that because that is exactly where Nicodemus was at. After blowing up all of the categories that Nicodemus had when it came to God, Jesus answers the question that drove the religious leaders to send Nicodemus to Jesus in the first place.

And that question was this: Who did Jesus think He was and what authority did He think He had to say and do what He was doing. Tomorrow, we will see how Jesus answered that question...

Friday, December 18, 2015

We celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to give us spiritual sight...


This week we are looking at an event from history involving an encounter between Jesus and a man who was born blind that is recorded for us in an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of John. Wednesday, we looked on as a group of self righteous religious people questioned the man who had been miraculously healed by Jesus.

While this group of religious leaders viewed Jesus as someone who did not measure up to God's standards and wanted to draw the man who was born blind into a doctrinal debate, the blind man was not interested in having a theological debate. And the blind man could not answer their deep doctrinal question as to whether or not Jesus was an outsider who was opposed to God. All the blind man knew was what he had experienced and that is what he wanted to talk about. John then reveals for us what happened next in verse 26-27:

 So they said to him, "What did He do to you? How did He open your eyes?" He answered them, "I told you already and you did not listen; why do you want to hear it again? You do not want to become His disciples too, do you?"

As the self righteous religious people pressed the man who had been born blind, John tells us that the man responded by choosing to align himself with Jesus. The blind man chose to respond to Jesus miraculous activity in his life by taking His side. We see how the self righteous religious people responded to the man’s response in verse 28-29:

 They reviled him and said, "You are His disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. "We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where He is from."

Now the word reviled literally means to abuse someone verbally in a very insulting manner. And as they insulted this man who had been previously born blind, these self righteous religious people attempted to make themselves appear to be right by identifying and aligning with Moses.

The self righteous religious people basically say to the man who had previously been blind: “So you want to follow this Jesus, well we follow Moses. And we know that God was with Moses because of all that God had said and done through Moses. We know that Moses was on God’s team because of all the miracles that Moses did and how God gave Moses the Law. But the guy you follow, this Jesus, there is no evidence that God is with Him or that He is on God’s team”.

These self righteous religious leaders looked down and insulted this man as being inferior in education and intellect. What these self righteous religious leaders were not prepared for, however, was what the man who had been previously been blind had to say next, which John records for us in John 9:30-33:

  The man answered and said to them, "Well, here is an amazing thing, that you do not know where He is from, and yet He opened my eyes. "We know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is God-fearing and does His will, He hears him. "Since the beginning of time it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. "If this man were not from God, He could do nothing."

Now the man’s response if communicated in the language that we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: “Well it seems remarkable to me that you do not seem to know if He is from God or not after He has done something as miraculous as enabling a man like me who has previously been blind to be able to see. What is amazing to me is that even though I have never been able to read a Bible or go to Torah class so as to become a rabbi, one thing that I do know about God is this: What I know and what everybody knows is that God does not pay attention and respond to the requests of those who do not measure up to His standards and are outsiders that are opposed to Him. What I know and what everybody knows is that God pays attention and responds to the requests of those who place Him large and in charge of their lives and are walking in relationship with Him. And here is something else that I do know: no human being throughout history has ever done something like this without the intervention and activity of God. And I don’t even remember Moses healing a man that was born blind, do you? So it’s obvious to me that this man named Jesus is from God”.

You see this man, who had never read the Bible, had just theologically schooled those who considered themselves experts in the Bible. While the self righteous religious people were interested in doctrinal debates and aligning themselves with Moses, the man who was born blind was more focused on what Jesus had done that was otherwise unexplainable apart from God. John then reveals how the self righteous religious people responded to being schooled in verse 34:

 They answered him, "You were born entirely in sins, and are you teaching us?" So they put him out.

John tells us that the self righteous religious people, who were now embarrassed after being theologically schooled by an uneducated blind man, attacked the man as being blind as a result of being someone who, like Jesus, did not measure up to God’s standards and was an outsider who was opposed to God.

You see, just like the disciples earlier, these self righteous religious people assumed that bad things happened to bad people. And as a result of that assumption, John tells us that they kicked the man that had been miraculously healed by the Son of God out of the church that was supposed to point people to God. Because that is what self righteous religious people do, isn't it? We see how Jesus responded to what had happened in verse 35-40:

 Jesus heard that they had put him out, and finding him, He said, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?" He answered, "Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?" Jesus said to him, "You have both seen Him, and He is the one who is talking with you." And he said, "Lord, I believe." And he worshiped Him. And Jesus said, "For judgment I came into this world, so that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may become blind."

John tells us that Jesus, after hearing that the man that he had healed had been kicked out of the church that was supposed to point people to Him, responded by once again taking the initiative in order to pursue Him. Upon finding him, Jesus asked the man who had been born blind a simple but powerful question: "Do you believe in the Son of Man?" In other words, Jesus is asking this man if He had placed his trust in God’s promise that one day a rescuer, a deliverer, a Messiah, would come to bring the Jewish people back to God and back to prominence in the world.

 Notice the man’s response: "Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?" Remember, at this point this man had not seen Jesus. He had heard Jesus voice; he had felt Jesus hands upon his face, but he had not seen Jesus. But this man wanted to trust in the man that God had promised to send. This man wanted to trust in the man that he had not yet seen but that had done the miraculous to him.

And then this man, who had been blind, heard the following: "You have both seen Him, and He is the one who is talking with you." John tells us that the man who had been healed from his physical blindness responded by basically saying “I trust in you” and then fell to the ground in worship of God in a bod, who miraculously brought rescue and healing from a lifetime of suffering.

Jesus then proclaimed to the crowds that had gathered around Him that this was the reason why He came to humanity. Jesus proclaimed that He entered into humanity so that God would be revealed and proclaimed to those who had not previously been able to see God because they were spiritually blind. And Jesus entered into humanity so that those who thought that they were insiders with God through their own religious activity and had rejected Jesus would be revealed as being blind to the things of God. John then concludes this section of his letter by revealing the response of the self righteous religious people in verse 41:

Those of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these things and said to Him, "We are not blind too, are we?" Jesus said to them, "If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, 'We see,' your sin remains.

John tells us that the self righteous religious people responded to Jesus explanation for His entry into humanity with a defensive question: "We are not blind too, are we?" They basically asked Jesus “so are you saying that we are spiritually blind?” Jesus response to their question, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today would have sounded like this: “If you had been previously blind to the things of God, you would be without sin because would have received the forgiveness of sin as a result of trusting in Me. But because you claim to have spiritual sight when it comes to God but reject Me, you reveal that you are actually spiritually blind and remain in sin”.

Jesus point is that those who claim to have spiritual sight apart from Jesus will be shown up for the blind people that they are, while those who are spiritually blind to their selfishness and sin and need for forgiveness, will through Jesus receive the ability to see their need for forgiveness and the relationship with God that they were created for. And it is here, in this miraculous event from history that was recorded for us by Jesus closest friend on earth, that we discover a timeless answer to the question “Why Christmas?”

And that timeless answer is this: We celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to give us spiritual sight. Just as it was with this miraculous activity involving a man who had suffered his entire life without sight, just as it has been for Christmases throughout history, we celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to give us spiritual sight.

You see, Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to intervene and act in a way that overcomes suffering that comes as a result of us living in a fallen and broken world. And Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to give us spiritual sight.

Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to give us the spiritual sight to help us see our need for Him as a result of our selfishness and rebellion against Him. Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to give us the spiritual sight to help us see that He offers us the opportunity to experience the forgiveness and the relationship with God that we were created for through Him. And Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to give us the spiritual sight to see that it is through our response to suffering that we might experience, that we have the opportunity to make much of Him and point people to Him.

So here is a question to consider: How have you responded to the reality that Jesus came to humanity to give us spiritual sight?

Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Placed in the middle of some self-righteous religious people...


This week we are looking at en event from history involving an encounter between a man born blind and Jesus that is recorded for us in an account of Jesus life called the gospel of John. Yesterday, we looked on as Jesus and His disciples encountered a man who had been blind from birth. In other words, this man had never been able to see a single thing. And in the culture of the day, being born blind would result in a life of suffering that was totally dependent upon others. Being born blind would result in a life without hope.

After answering a theological question of the disciples in such a way that revealed for us the reality that there are times that bad things happen to bad people, there are times that bad things happen to good people, and there are times that God uses the bad things that happen to people to make much of Him and point people to Him by the way that people respond to the bad things that happen, Jesus turned His attention to the man born blind by spitting in the man's eye and commanding him to wash in the pool of Siloam.

 John tells us that the blind man responded by making the half mile trip to the pool of Siloam. By having to go wash in the pool of Siloam, the blind man had to demonstrate His trust in Jesus by obeying Jesus instructions. And the blind man’s trust in Jesus resulted in Him experiencing the miraculous in his life. Today, we see John record how those who knew the blind man responded to what had happened in John 9:8-12:

Therefore the neighbors, and those who previously saw him as a beggar, were saying, "Is not this the one who used to sit and beg?" Others were saying, "This is he," still others were saying, "No, but he is like him." He kept saying, "I am the one." So they were saying to him, "How then were your eyes opened?" He answered, "The man who is called Jesus made clay, and anointed my eyes, and said to me, 'Go to Siloam and wash'; so I went away and washed, and I received sight." They said to him, "Where is He?" He said, "I do not know."

Now how dumb is this question? Where is He? I don't know, you see I was blind at the time. Seriously. The reason why the blind man did not know where Jesus was at is due to the fact that the blind man had no idea what Jesus looked like because he had never seen Jesus. John tells us that crowds were confused over the identity of the blind man because they could not wrap their minds around the reality that he was no longer blind.

And in their confusion; and in their search for answers in order to explain what seemed to be unexplainable, the crowds brought the blind man to the Pharisees, who were the self righteous religious experts. John then records how the experts responded to what they saw in verse 13-17:

They brought to the Pharisees the man who was formerly blind. Now it was a Sabbath on the day when Jesus made the clay and opened his eyes. Then the Pharisees also were asking him again how he received his sight. And he said to them, "He applied clay to my eyes, and I washed, and I see." Therefore some of the Pharisees were saying, "This man is not from God, because He does not keep the Sabbath." But others were saying, "How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?" And there was a division among them. So they said to the blind man again, "What do you say about Him, since He opened your eyes?" And he said, "He is a prophet."

When John explains that it was the Sabbath on the day that Jesus had healed the blind man, he is revealing for us the reality that Jesus had broken one of the religious leaders rules by doing a miraculous work on a day when no work was supposed to be done. John tells us that the self righteous religious leaders of the day responded to Jesus doing the miraculous by viewing Jesus as one did not measure up to God’s standards and thus an outsider that was not in relationship with God but was opposed to God.  The Pharisees believed that a man sent from God would not violate one of His rules, so then Jesus must be a false prophet and a sinner because He was breaking the Sabbath.

Others, however, could not understand how someone who was an outsider that was opposed to God could perform a miracle that only God could do. And as a result, John tells us that there was a division among the self righteous religious leaders of the day. You see, Jesus always divides people. Jesus is not the type of person that one remains on the fence about.

The self righteous religious leaders then turned to the man who had previously been born blind in order to get His opinion. By calling Jesus a prophet, the man, who had not previously known Jesus, responded to what had happened in his life by giving Jesus a title that seemed to fit Jesus and that others who had performed miracles had received.

You see, when placed in the middle of an argument and asked to choose sides; the man who was born blind did not hesitate, but was definite when it came to how he defined Jesus. We see how the Pharisees responded to the blind man’s’ statement in verse 18-23:

The Jews then did not believe it of him, that he had been blind and had received sight, until they called the parents of the very one who had received his sight, and questioned them, saying, "Is this your son, who you say was born blind? Then how does he now see?" His parents answered them and said, "We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; but how he now sees, we do not know; or who opened his eyes, we do not know. Ask him; he is of age, he will speak for himself." His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone confessed Him to be Christ, he was to be put out of the synagogue. For this reason his parents said, "He is of age; ask him."

John tells us that the self righteous religious leaders rejected the man’s opinion and called for his parents. You see, while they acknowledged that the miraculous had taken place, their focus was centered on who people thought Jesus was, not on the miracle itself. And the parents, who were people pleasers, were more focused on losing their status in the community than they were of defending their son and rejoicing in the miraculous activity that had occurred in his life. So they avoided answering the religious leader’s questions and put their son back in the spotlight. We see what happened next in verse 24-25:

 So a second time they called the man who had been blind, and said to him, "Give glory to God; we know that this man is a sinner." He then answered, "Whether He is a sinner, I do not know; one thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see."

Now the self righteous religious leaders question, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: “Tell the truth and stop lying, we know that this man does not measure up to God’s standards and is an outsider that is opposed to God”. The blind man, however, was not interested in having a theological debate. And the blind man could not answer their deep doctrinal question as to whether or not Jesus was an outsider who was opposed to God.  

All the blind man knew was what he had experienced and that is what he wanted to talk about. Friday, we will see John reveal for us what happened next...

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Why sometimes bad things happen to good people....


At the church where I serve, we are spending the weeks leading up to Christmas pausing from the growing expectation, anticipation, and intensity of the countdown to Christmas in order to ask a simple question. And that question is this: Why Christmas? Why are we counting down to Christmas? Why is Christmas celebrated? Why is Christmas so significant? And specifically, why would Jesus enter into humanity that first Christmas?

To answer these questions, we are going to look at five different passages that are found in the letters that make up the New Testament of the Bible. And as we look at these five different passages that are found in the New Testament of the Bible, we are going to discover five timeless answers to the question “Why Christmas?”

This week, we are going to look at the third of five different passages that are found in the letters that make up the New Testament of the Bible, which is found in a section of an account of Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of John. Now the gospel of John was written the person who had perhaps the closest relationship with Jesus while He was on earth, a man named John. John is referred to as the disciple Jesus loved. John was Jesus best friend. We see John bring us into his account of Jesus life beginning in John 9:1-2:

As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?"

John brings us into this section of his account of Jesus life by providing the context for this event from history. John tells us that as Jesus and His disciples left the temple after escaping the self righteous religious leaders of the day’s attempt to stone Jesus, they encountered a man who had been blind from birth. In other words, this man had never been able to see a single thing.

And in the culture of the day, being born blind would result in a life of suffering that was totally dependent upon others. Being born blind would result in a life without hope. After all, this blind man had never seen, so how could he ever hope to see? This man was in a hopeless situation. The disciples, upon seeing the blind man, decide to ask Jesus a theological question: "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?”

Now to fully understand the significance of this question, we first need to understand what the disciples believed that drove them to ask this question. You see, the disciples, along with many people who lived in Jesus day, believed that blindness, leprosy and other physical diseases were the result of sin in the person or the family. The disciples believed that bad things happened to bad people and good things happened to good people.

But, here was a man who was born blind. So, from the disciple’s perspective, how could this man be blind before he ever sinned? How could this man have experienced the bad things that he experienced in his life before he had done any bad things to earn such bad experiences? So, from the disciple’s perspective, it must have been the parents who had sinned. From the disciple’s perspective, since bad things happen to bad people, his parents must have been bad people, which resulted in their son experiencing bad things in his life.

Now here is something for us to consider: how often can we find ourselves thinking the exact same way? How often can we find ourselves assuming that bad things happen to people because they are bad people? How often can we find ourselves assuming that the bad things that happen in someone’s life is the direct result of the bad things that either they have done or that those who are close to them have done? How often can we find ourselves assuming that if I simply do good, then I will experience good from God? We see how Jesus answered the disciple’s theological question in verse 3-5:

Jesus answered, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him. "We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work. "While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world."

Jesus replies to the disciples question by explaining that this man was born blind so that his blindness could be used to bring glory to God through what Jesus was about to do in his life. You see, while Jesus was asked about the cause of the blindness, Jesus answered in terms of the purpose of the blindness.

Jesus here is revealing for us the reality that there are times that bad things happen to bad people. And there are times that bad things happen to good people. And there are times that God uses the bad things that happen to people to make much of Him and point people to Him by the way that people respond to the bad things that happen. Y

ou see, nowhere in the Bible are we promised a wrinkle free life. We live in a world that has been corrupted by selfishness and rebellion. And God often works through the corruption of this world to reveal His greatness and glory through our response to the bad things that may happen in our lives.

Jesus then explained to His disciples that they must be doing what God wants them to be doing during this period of time, because over the passage of time, the opportunities to be a part of what God is doing will pass them by. Those opportunities are going to pass by because Jesus is fully aware that He will soon be put to death. When Jesus states that He is the light of the world, He is revealing the reality that Jesus, in His very being and nature, is life and light that helps us see that there is a Creator who is light and life and there is creation that was covered in darkness.

Jesus is explaining to His disciples that, as the Light of the world, that He came to humanity in order to point people to God. While Jesus was on earth, He revealed and explained God to the world, and revealed and exposed the selfishness, sin and rebellion that was in the world. And in the same way today, just as Jesus was the vehicle that God used to point people to Him, as followers of Jesus, we are to be the vehicle that God uses to reveal Himself to the world. After answering their theological question, Jesus then turns His attention to the man born blind in verse 6-7:

When He had said this, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and applied the clay to his eyes, and said to him, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam " (which is translated, Sent). So he went away and washed, and came back seeing.

Now a natural reaction right about now is “well Dave that’s kind of gross. That brings new meaning to the phrase “here’s some mud in your eye”. And another question that arises here is “Why didn’t Jesus just heal the man? I mean why place mud in his eye and then tell him to go wash it off in a pool of water?” That just seems weird doesn’t it? I mean Jesus does not even tell this man His name. Instead, He simply goes spit. spit. Go wash. To fully understand what is happening here, we first need to understand where the pool of Siloam was.

The Temple in Jerusalem was located in the northeast corner of Jerusalem. The pool of Siloam was located in the far southeastern Jerusalem. The pool of Siloam and the Temple were on opposite ends of the town. The distance between the Temple and the pool of Siloam was approximately a half of a mile. However, the pool of Siloam was located at a much lower elevation than the Temple. And as you might imagine, the pool was a long walk for any man, let alone a blind man.

Now, I want us to take a minute and imagine ourselves in this event from history as the man born blind. You have spent your entire life suffering as a result of being born blind. You are sitting just outside the Temple panhandling because that is the only way that you can possibly provide for yourself.

Then some guy and His friends come up and start having a conversation about why you have been blind your entire life. Now, while you are blind you are not deaf, so you hear this entire conversation. You don’t say a word to Jesus or His friends.

Then as Jesus finishes His conversation, He turns to you, spits on the ground, makes a mud pie and places it on your eyes and tells you go walk a half of a mile down to the pool of Siloam. Jesus basically says to you “I am sending you to the pool of sent so that you might be able to see.” You’re the blind man. You did not ask for this. What would you be thinking? What would you be feeling? How would you respond?

John tells us that the blind man responded by making the half mile trip to the pool of Siloam. Can you imagine what that must have looked like? What would be running through your mind if you were the blind man? What would you be thinking as you arrived at the pool? What would you be feeling as you began to wash the mud off of your eyes? What would you be thinking and feeling as you began to see for the first time?

You see, by having to go wash in the pool of Siloam, the blind man had to demonstrate His trust in Jesus by obeying Jesus instructions. And the blind man’s trust in Jesus resulted in Him experiencing the miraculous in his life.

Tomorrow, we will see how those who knew the blind man responded to what had happened…

Monday, December 14, 2015

Experiencing humanity in its fullest sense...


Last week, we looked at a section of a letter that was written to those who had stopped growing in their relationship with Jesus and who were considering bailing on Jesus, and discovered a timeless answer to the question “Why Christmas?”in that we celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to free us from the power of death through His death. Just as it was for these early Jewish followers of Jesus who were experiencing persecution, just as it has been for followers of Jesus throughout history, we celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to free us from the power of death through His death.

We talked about the reality that Christmas is significant because Christmas is about God the Father providing us the opportunity to be brought into the splendor and radiance of being adopted as a child of God through the suffering of His One and Only Son Jesus so that we could be insiders and a part of the family of God. Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus entering into humanity to become “one of us” and to proclaim God to us before dying for us.

Christmas is significant because Christmas is about Jesus willingly entering into humanity so that His death on the cross would put an end to the power of the Devil to bring eternal death to those who were chosen by God to be rescued from their rebellion and become a part of the family of God. And Christmas is significant because Christmas is about God the Father demonstrating His concern to help those of humanity who He has chosen to experience the fulfillment of the promises that He made to Abraham to live in relationship with Him as part of the family of God that He would have His Son Jesus take on humanity and enter into humanity so that He could die for humanity.  Today, we see the writer of Hebrews then hammers this point home in Hebrews 2:17-18:

 Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.

Here we see the writer of Hebrews reveal for us the reality that for Jesus to free us from the power of death through His death, He had to be made like His brethren in all things. In other words, Jesus had to experience the human condition in its fullest sense so the He could demonstrate His connection, unity, and solidarity with humanity. The writer of Hebrews then explained that the reason why Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense was so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

Now to understand what the writer of Hebrews is communicating here, we first need to understand a few things. The first thing that we need to understand is what the writer of Hebrews is referring to when he uses the phrase “merciful and faithful high priest.” In the Jewish sacrificial system, the High Priest represented the Jewish people before God. It was the High Priest alone who entered into the Holy of Holies in the Temple on the Day of Atonement to offer a sacrifice for his sins and for the sins of the people.  This sacrifice atoned, or covered the sins that had been committed. God would see the atoning sacrifice rather than the sin so that the penalty no longer had to be extracted from the person who had sinned.

Now that leads us to the second thing that we need to understand, which is what the writer of Hebrews refers to when he uses the word propitiation. The word propitiation is a big, fancy, church mumbo jumbo talk word that refers to satisfying God’s right and just response to our selfishness and rebellion.

Now with these things in mind, we see that the writer of Hebrews is revealing for us the reality that Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense so that He could compassionately and reliably represent us before God.  Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense so that He could represent us on the cross in a way that satisfied God’s right and just response to our selfishness and rebellion. And Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense so that He could represent us on the cross in a way that removed the guilt that came as a result of the selfishness and rebellion of humanity.

And because Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense, the writer of Hebrews explains that since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted. Now the word tempted here literally means to discover the nature of something through testing. In other words, since Jesus experienced the human condition in its fullest sense; since Jesus character was tested through the suffering He experienced while here on earth; Jesus is uniquely able to render assistance to us in our times of testing and suffering.

You see, Jesus is fully aware of the testing that suffering places us through. Jesus is fully aware and is fully equipped to aid and assist us through the times of testing that suffering produces in our lives because Jesus has successfully passed the test of suffering. Jesus successfully passed the test of suffering in a way that put an end to the power of the Devil to bring eternal death to followers of Jesus who have been adopted into the family of God.

And that is why Christmas is significant. That is why we celebrate Christmas. We celebrate Christmas because Jesus came to free us from the power of death through His death.