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Andy Stanley - Bystander Part 3 Carry On · Andy Stanley Sermons

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Have you ever seen a situation, and I'm sure most of us have,
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but have you ever seen the situation where religious rules or religious laws or religious
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commandments get in the way or are given priority over compassion. Have you ever
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seen this? Maybe you've been the victim of this, where sacred men,
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it's always men, sacred men in sacred places with the sacred text, interpret
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the text in such a way that they actually take the text, and they
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take their traditions and they use them in such a way to withhold compassion or
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worse, to actually mistreat another person. You ever seen this? Have you
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ever been on the receiving side of this? Have you ever been guilty?
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I'm doing that because I have as a young seminary educated pharisee who got so
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focused on what the texts said that I lost sight of who the text was
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for that I got so focused on what the text said that I lost sight
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of the fact of why it was written and who was behind writing it.
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That I got so focused on the speck in somebody else's eye, or in
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some cases a whole group of people's eye, that I couldn't see the log
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or the log truck in my own eye. And then as they began to
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read the Gospels and understand the Gospels in a different way. I realized pretty
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quickly Jesus did not like people like that because they were not like him,
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and they were not Jesus' favorite kind of people. And I realized pretty quickly
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I'm not one of Jesus' favorite kind of people. And I had to learn
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some lessons the hard way. And that's what we're going to talk about today.
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Anyway, we're in part three of this series. It was getting kind
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of heavy there. We're getting part three of this series called Bystander, and
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this is the subtitle is John and the Rabbi from Nazareth, and we're tracking
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along with the gospel writer John as he journeys with Jesus. And the most
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important thing to remember for this series in terms of sort of the big macro
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lesson, is this that John in the first century did not choose to follow
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Jesus because of faith. He followed Jesus because of what he saw and because
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of what he heard, and because of what he saw and heard, he
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arrived at the conclusion that Jesus was his messiah. And once he acknowledged that
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Jesus was his Messiah based on what he saw and heard. At that point,
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he placed his faith in Jesus as his messiah and savior. But he
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did not follow Jesus because of faith. He placed his faith in Jesus Messiah,
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because of what he saw and because of what he heard. These are
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his words. They're way better than mine. This is what he says at
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the beginning of his gospel. He says that which was from the beginning,
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which we have heard. In other words, nobody told us about this.
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We didn't read this which we have seen with our eyes, we being the
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first century followers, which we have looked at. And by the ways,
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it wasn't a ghost. This whole thing of Jesus was a ghost. He
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says, that wasn't true. This was a real person who really came back
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from the dead. Our hands have handled him. He was back the life.
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And I guess I think John struggled with how to say this. We
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all do right, the life appeared? What do you mean the life appeared?
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I mean all I can say is that Jesus, my Rabbi, my
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friend, who I discovered, was my Messiah. And I discovered and I
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embraced him as my savior, It's like all I can say is he brought
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life. He just it was like he was life personified. I don't know
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any other way to describe it. The life appeared, and we have seen
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it and testified to it. We proclaimed to you not what we read about
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and heard about, what we've seen and what we heard from him. And
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then, as an old man, some people apparently talked John into documenting his
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time with Jesus. John, you know you're not gonna live forever. We
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hope you do, but you're you're you're an old man. Would you dictate
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your story to us? He was probably too old to write, too old
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to be able to see very well. So he probably dictates his life,
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his account his experience with Jesus, and it comes to us as the Gospel
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of John. But John doesn't give us his story so that we'll simply know
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what happened. He has an agenda. And the interesting thing is this,
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two thousand years later, he has an agenda for you, and he has
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an agenda for me. He said, The reason I'm taking the time to
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get my story out isn't simply that you'll know what happened. I want you
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to do something with what happened. These things are written, these specific things
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that I've chosen to select selectively put in my account. We're written that you
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might believe. I want you to respond to this, that you might believe
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that Jesus is the Messiah. I came to the conclusion that Jesus was the
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long awaitered upart Messiah that I'd been told about as a little Jewish boy growing
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up. But I never imagined it would happen in my lifetime that he's actually
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And I know you're going to have a hard time believing this, he would
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think, as he dictated this, But I'm telling you, I don't know
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any other way to describe it. My friend, Jesus, my Rabbi,
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he was God in a body. He was the Son of God, not
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like we're all children of God, like in a unique way, like the
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unique only begotten, he would say, of the Father. And I want
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you to believe what I I believe based on my testimony, so that you
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might put your trust in him and have the same kind of life in his
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name that I've discovered. So there's an agenda. But don't be confused.
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John didn't follow Jesus because of faith. John followed Jesus because of what he
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saw, and he says, now, I want you to see what I've
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seen, and I want you to hear what I've heard, and it's secondhand
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for you, but I want to write it in such a compelling way that
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you would arrive at the same conclusion I did, even though I was privileged
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to see it and to hear it and to touch it. And he creates
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this account around these seven events, these seven events that really served as seven
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signs because Jesus miracles. They weren't random acts of kindness. They pointed to
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something, and specifically, they pointed to who he claimed to be. Because
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Jesus made incredible claims about himself. I mean, he was crazy unless there
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was something to substantiate it. So John said, I'm telling you, I
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watched him doing after thing after thing, and I realized these weren't randomness acts
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of kindness, they weren't just you know, crazy random miracles. They all
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had significance. They pointed to something, and at the end, looking back,
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clearly, they all pointed to the uniqueness of Jesus. And it's why
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I arrived at the conclusion I hope you'll arrive at that. He was in
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fact, the Messiah, the Son of God, is like John saying this
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is what convinced me, and I hope it will convince you as well.
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And now we've already looked at two of these seven signs. Today we look
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at the third one. And if you look in your English Bible, sometimes
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these sections of the English Bible have headings, and so one of the headings
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you might find under this particular passage or over this particular passage is healing on
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the Sabbath. So if you haven't been with us and you're just catching up
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previously on bystander, Jesus is a several days journey north of Jerusalem. He's
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around the Sea of Galley in that vicinity and Cana actually off to the left
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if you're looking at a map from the Sea of Galley. So he's way
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north of Jerusalem, and he and his guys have just done this incredible thing
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where somebody who'd never met Jesus before it comes along and says, I've heard
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about you. My son is sick. Would you come to my home?
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Jesus says, just go on home, fine, And that nobleman had to
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make the same decision many of us have to make. Two thousand years later.
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It was foreshadowing. He had to decide whether he could trust Jesus even
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though he'd only heard about Jesus. And he went home and his son was
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healed. And then Jesus and his posse, for the next five or six
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days make their way down to Jerusalem. And that's where today's account picks up
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sometime later, because it took them a while to get there. Sometime later,
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Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Even though he went south, they went
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up because the city of Jerusalem's on a hill. You cannot get to Jerusalem
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unless you go up. They went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish
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festivals. And now there is in Jerusalem. John is giving this account.
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There is in Jerusalem, and this is important because it tells us about the
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time that John gave us his story, and when he gave us this story,
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this still existed, which makes it early not late. Many of you
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lost confidence in the Gospels because somebody convinced you they were written late. If
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you pay attention to the details, there's no way they were written as late
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as some want us to believe. There is in Jerusalem near the sheep Gate
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a pool which in Aramaic is called currently Beseta, which is surrounded by five
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five covered colonnades. So he describes this in detail because he'd been there,
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and he says, this here a great number, like a multitude of disabled
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people used to lie, the blind, to give us the specifics. The
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blind, the lame, and the paralyzed. These were the most desperate people.
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This was the most desperate group of people. Now you need to understand
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in ancient times, doctors were scarce and doctors didn't know very much. In
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fact, doctors didn't know much at all, and for one reason. In
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the first and second century, actually before and after, but in the first
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and second century, Rome had a law, and the law was a doctor
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could not examine a dead body. They could only examine living bodies. So
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one of the things that the doctors would try to do is to get to
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a dying body quick enough imagine this, to do a bit of an autopsy
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before the body died, because once the body was dead, they could no
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longer mess with a dead body. Imagine that world. So doctors were scarce
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and doctors were scary, so only rich people had doctors, and so most
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people had to depend on the temples and superstition temples of superstition temples, because
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maybe the gods would do something for you by accident, maybe the priests would
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have mercy on you, and superstition, and so this story actually hinges on
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a superstition. There was a legend that said that they're in this pool of
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water that every once in a while, an angel would show up and stir
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the water, and if you were the first one in, you would be
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healed. And this this pool has actually been excavated, and there was a
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reservoir that fed water into this pool, but they discovered there's actually a natural
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spring at the bottom. So what probably would happen is occasionally the spring would
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bubble up and when they would see the surface of the water disturbed for no
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apparent reason, they assumed it was an angel and it was first one in,
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you know, was going to be healed. Now you can imagine the
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chaos. This is the blind, this is the severely handicapped in the way
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we would describe it. These are paralyzed people, and these are lame people.
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So Jesus walks into this area that I promise you healthy people avoided like
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the plague, Because it was like the plague, it smelled horrible. People
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were brought and they would just lay there all day long. If they had
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someone that loved them, someone would take them home at night or take them
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home in the afternoon. I would imagine this is an area where every once
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in a while an official would have to walk through and find the dead bodies
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and cart him off. And Jesus goes to this area one who had been
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there for thirty eight years, one who had been an invalid there for thirty
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eight years, and Jesus sees him. The text says when Jesus saw this
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particular individual, he asked about him. And perhaps it was because he was
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the oldest one there. We don't know why. But Jesus asked about this
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one, and he learned that he had been in this condition for a long
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time. And Jesus decides this is an opportunity for a sign, so he
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leans down. I don't think anybody heard this conversation. He leans down,
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and he asked him the strangest question. And I'm going to read the question,
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and then I'm going to ask you the question. And it's not the
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point of the message, but it's such a powerful question. I just feel
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like we just need to kind of set it out there for some of us.
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Maybe this is why you're here today, or this is the reason you're
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watching. Jesus asked, it seems like a silly question. He leans down
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and I think he probably whispered. He didn't want a lot of people to
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hear hear this, and he said, do you want to get well?
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Do you want to get well? Do you want to get well? Let
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me ask you. Do you want to get well? Not everybody does.
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Some of you have been complaining and complaining and complaining, and you've not done
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what it takes to get well, because you know what, sometimes getting well
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is harder than staying sick. Sometimes getting help calls for more humility than staying
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sick. Sometimes, staying sick you get things that you won't get if you
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get well. So let me just ask you and we'll move on. Whether
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it's an actual physical ailment or it's that habit you keep going, yeah,
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yeah, yeah, it's your physical condition. Yeah yeah, I wanted the
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yeah yeah yeah, yeah. I need to. I need to. I
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need to come on, come on, you should at least answer this question
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in the mirror when you get home. Do you want to get well?
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And is the reason you haven't gotten well is because you aren't willing to pay
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the price. Because sometimes staying sick, staying in a habit become being,
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continuing to be a serial dater where every relationship ends up the same, is
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easier than getting help. This is a powerful question, Jesus asked, do
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you want to get well? And here's the thing. If you have the
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capacity and the potential and the resources, and you live in a world where
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you can get well as someone made in the image of God, you honor
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God, and you honor yourself, and you honor the people that love you,
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if you will just get some help and get well. Now back to
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the story, Jesus decides not to impose his will on this guy. He's
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not going to walk up and heal him whether he wants to be healed or
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not. So he asked, do you want to get well? And as
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it turns out, this guy he really wanted to get well. He doesn't
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know who Jesus is. I love this. Imagine staring into the eyes of
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the Son of God. It's just some guy, sir, he says.
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Sir. The invalid replied, I have no one to help me into the
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pool. When the water is stirred. While I'm lying here and I notice
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the water is stirred, and I'm trying to get in. Someone else goes
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down ahead of me, and this is terrible. But when I read this,
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here's what I picture. I just picture what it says. You see
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these, I mean, it's an awful scene. And someone finally rolls in
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or friend pushes them in, and they just they just go down. I
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mean, it's an awful thing. Perhaps people dry, I don't know.
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It's just a terrible image of what happens here. These are desperate people,
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the blind, the laying, the paralyzed. And then Jesus, still kneeling
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down, I think again, whispers to him and he says, to this
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one person, why he chose this one person or not every person? I
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don't know. He says, to this one man, he says, get
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up, get up. The Greek is interesting, wake up. Sometimes it's
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translated, sometimes it's translated rise up. Sometimes it's translated come to life,
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Get up, rise up. But what he said next is what made this
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a sign and not just a random act of kindness. And he says to
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the gentleman. As the gentleman realizes that this man is serious, whoever this
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guy is, he says, And by the way, when you get up,
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pick up your mat and walk. And John says, as he's dictating
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this, he's like, I mean, he's remembering this. He was there
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for this, he said, And at once, like immediately, the man
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was cured and he picked he stood up, and he picked up his mat
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and walked. He rolls off his mat and he walks and he turns around
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to thank Jesus. And Jesus, we find out later, has disappeared into
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the crowd with his posse. But in asking this man to pick up his
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mat and walk, he has whacked the hornet's nest on purpose, because the
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day on which he cured this man was the Sabbath. Now, on the
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Sabbath in Jerusalem, specifically in all the areas around the temple, the Pharisees
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are walking around making sure nobody's violating the laws of the Sabbath, and they
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see this man carrying a mat. And not only is he carrying his mat,
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he's walking toward the temple. He's planning to go to the temple to
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give thanks to God. He perhaps has not been in the temple since he
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was a little boy. Maybe he's not been in the temple in years,
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and yet here he isn't the vicinity of the temple. He hears the music,
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he hears the sounds, he sees the crowds going back and forth,
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and finally he has an opportunity to give thanks to God and to offer a
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sacrifice if he can borrow some money from somebody. We don't know why he's
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going to the temple, but it's just the natural place to go. And
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the Jewish leader see him carrying his mat, and the Texas of the Jewish
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leaders said to the man who had been healed, it is the Sabbath.
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A law forbids you to carry that mat. Well, actually it didn't.
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The law didn't forbid him. Their tradition would forbid him from carrying a mat.
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It was called the tradition of the Elder. Sometimes it's called the oral
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Torah. And the theory was that when Moses came down from Mount Sinai,
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he came down with the written Torah, and he came down with an oral
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Torah that couldn't be written, and he passed it along to Joshua, who
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passed it along to the judges, who passed it along to the prophets.
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It eventually made its way to the Pharisees, and so the Pharisees had all
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these extra rules that were like a fence around the written law, so that
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nobody would disobey the written law. But the oral Torah, the law the
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tradition of the elders, had the same authority in their minds and had the
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same authority in culture as the written Torah. And in this non written oral
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Torah, there were thirty nine categories of things, not thirty nine things,
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thirty nine categories of things you couldn't do on the Sabbath, and one of
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them was you could not carry something from one place to another. So in
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their mind, he's violating the fourth commandment of the ten commandments. You may
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remember this one, Remember the Sabbath, remember the Sabbath day by keeping it
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holy. But the point of this commandment was to take a break from labor,
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not take a break from love. It was to take a break from
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your occupation. It didn't mean you were supposed to take a break from compassion.
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But this is what happens, This is what happens to all religious people.
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This is what happens to people in every religion when they or when we
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forget or when we ignore. This is what happens to any kind of religious
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person when we forget or we ignore the why behind the what. To be
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more specific, and to just kind of bother you just a little bit,
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give you something to think about, or hate me for, whichever way you
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want to go. This is what happens. This is what happens when defending
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a theological system. This is what happens when defending an ideology. This is
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what happens when defending a political agenda. This is what happens when defending party
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loyalty or embracing party loyalty takes precedence over the people these things claim to serve.
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This is what happens when embracing any of this becomes more important than the
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people these things were designed to serve and benefit. And it is very difficult
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to see in the mirror. And I can prove it because most of you
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agree with what I just said, but most of you immediately began thinking about
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that other theological system, that other ideology, that other political agenda, that
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other party. Boy, I wish there were more Republicans here in this I
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wish there were more Democrats here. And I wish my mother in law was
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here to this. I'm going to get my mother in law to watch this.
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I need somebody else to get her to watch it because I don't want
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her to know that I try to get her to watch it because if I
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you know, she won't to listen to me, because every time we get
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together we talk about politics. But boy, they really need to hear this.
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Amen, brother, Here's what Jesus would say. Before you amen,
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brother, and before you clap, we all need to look in the mirror.
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We must all be careful, and most importantly, we must all be
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honest. Because when what's best for people, when what's best for people is
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no longer what's most important to you, you are at odds with God.
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When what's best for people is no longer what's most important to me, I
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am at odds with God. And the reason I say that, the reason
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I say that is because John, who brings us this story, is also
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the person that interrupts an earlier story to say, I don't know if Nicodemus
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ever got it, but let me tell you what Jesus was trying to explain
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to him. For God so loved people, for God so loved the world.
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For God so loved the Jews and the Gentiles, and every race and
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every gender for every generation. He loved people so much he sent his son,
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my Rabbi, my Savior, my friend Jesus, into the world to
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pay for sins so that everybody could be reconnected with God. God's priority is
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the race made in his image. And anything I do, anything I do
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to hurt another person is the sin. And anything I do to distance another
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person from God is a sin. And any theological thing or even scriptural application
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that gets in the way of somebody being treated with dignity is a sin.
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And the reason this is so appropriate to me and for people who do what
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I do, is this, I know the Bible, Yes I do.
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I know the Bible. How about you? I mean I know it all.
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I mean, you find me something you want justification for and give me
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your whole Bible. I'll find you justification. I'll find you at least four
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verses. You can go back to the office and say it says right here,
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my preacher gave me these verses. Show your wife, show your head,
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whatever you want to do, it's in there. If you rip it
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out of context and line it up and Jesus came to close all those loopholes.
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That's convicting. Let's get back to the story. So the story continues.
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They said to this man who had just been healing, it is a
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sabbath. The law forbid you to carry your mat. No, their version
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of the law of the things they'd added forbid him kept him from carrying the
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mat. But he replied, I love this. This is so great.
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It's got the matter shoulder. I mean, he's just kind of getting his
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legs, if you know what I mean. But he replied the man he
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didn't even know who it is. This is what's so beautiful about this.
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The man who made me well said to me, pick up your matten.
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Walk. The reason I picked up my matt and walk, it wasn't like
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I was trying to violate the sabbath. You even know who I am,
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where I've been. But the reason I picked it up to walk is because
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a man asked me to pick up my mat and walk. And guys,
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while we're talking, I just want you to know I opted for the guy
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who chose to heal me, not the guys who've been ignoring me my whole
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life, condemning me my whole life and telling me I deserve to lay there
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for thirty eight years because either I sinned or my parents sin. So,
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you know what, if you're right and I was getting what I deserved,
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this guy gave me precisely what I did not deserve. So I chose to
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pick up my mat and walk. There was a theory that if a woman
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was pregnant and she went to a pagan temple, her child sinned along with
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her. If a woman was pregnant and sinned, the child was guilty of
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the sin because the child was in the mother's will, and the child may
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pay for the mother's sin his or her whole life. So we're gonna discover
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in one of our other incidentss with John later on, that they're gonna come,
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just the disciples, gonna come right out and ask him Jesus, this
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person who's blind. I mean clearly he's blind because somebody sin who sinned him
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or his parents. This is just how they thought. So his whole life,
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the religious system convinced him the reason I'm laying here is because I did
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something wrong, and I have racked my brains. Right, I've done I
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or my parents did something wrong and I've you know, when they come to
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visit me occasionally, we've had what have I done? And someone came along
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and just sort of ignored all of that and healed me. So, yeah,
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I did what he asked me to do. So then they asked the
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logical question, because they don't know either, who is this guy? So
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they asked him, who is this fellow who told you pick up your matt
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and wall? Who is this man who defies the law and defiles the Sabbath?
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Because if this man actually healed you you, then he defiled the Sabbath
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as well, because we have another rule. You cannot practice medicine on the
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Sabbath unless it's to save a life. So he could have waited one day
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to heal you. So not only are you violation of the Sabbath, he
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is in violation of the Sabbath. To give us his name, we're making
23:14
a list and the man text goes on. The man who was healed had
23:18
no idea who was for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd. I mean,
23:23
who could make this up? Right? Maybe? As John recounts this
23:26
story, he chuckles because what happens next, This is just my opinion.
23:32
What happens next? I think might be the funniest thing in the entire New
23:33
Testament. Now, what happens next? I've read so many commentaries, and
23:37
commentary is a book. We're smart people write on here's what we think the
23:41
scripture means. And you know I love reading commentaries. I've not read a
23:44
commentary yet that embraced the interpretation I'm about to give you. So this is
23:48
just the Andy Stanley interpretation of this passage. Okay. But the reason I
23:52
think I'm right is because every commentator on what happens next says, this is
23:56
complicated, it's difficult to understand. We're not sure what Jesus meant, and
23:59
they have all these theories, and I'm like, you know what, if
24:00
you would just read this like a human being and not a theologian, it's
24:03
very evident what happens next. So I'll just read it to you. You're
24:07
you'll get this. I think this is hilarious. I think this was anyway,
24:11
here's what happened later later, So this guy goes to the temple.
24:15
He's carrying his mat. You know, later this is so cool. Jesus
24:18
finds him, he's looking for him, or he just bumps into him.
24:21
I don't know. Later, Jesus finds him at the temple and he says,
24:25
see you are well again, And the guy turns around and he's surprised.
24:29
He says, it's you. But who are you? You know?
24:30
He doesn't even know, and Jesus tells him. And then here's the funny
24:34
part, because Jesus knows he's been accused of sinning. He's been accused of
24:41
sinning. So Jesus smiles, I think, puts his hands on his shoulder,
24:45
maybe the shoulder with that has the mat over it, and says,
24:48
stop sinning, get it? No, okay, stop singing. Better go
24:55
stop carrying that mat around you evil sinner. You. Okay, here's the
24:57
thing. Not only has this guy not done anything wrong, this guy hasn't
25:03
done anything for thirty eight years. What a joke that he's being accused of
25:08
sinning. You better stop sinning. And so all of you loogers try to
25:11
figure out what sin is Jesus talking about it. There's no sin. It's
25:15
a joke. He's kind of making fun. You better stop sinning otherwise,
25:18
you know what. Anyway, they're gonna come after you. And this is
25:22
what Jesus says next, and this is the other thing to get all can
25:25
you know again they may be right and may be wrong, but this next
25:27
line is hilarious. So let me catch you up. You better stop sinning
25:30
carrying that matt around ha ha ha, or something worse may happen to you.
25:36
And I think they just are laughing out loud, like what could possibly
25:40
be worse? Oh no, here come the Pharisees. We're gonna punish you.
25:42
We're gonna throw you out of the temple. Hey, I've been to
25:45
the temple in thirty eight years. Well we're gonna I mean, how do
25:48
you punish a man who's been laying on his back for thirty eight years?
25:51
It's a joke, now, listen, there's the punchline. For some of
25:55
us, though, when you recognize who Jesus is, when you recognize again
26:03
you just follow Jesus and John through the Gospel of When you recognize who Jesus
26:07
is, when you recognize who John, recognize that Jesus is, you will
26:12
lose your fear of religion and you will lose your fear of religious people when
26:18
you recognize who Jesus is. And for some of you, you need to
26:22
hear this. You are so bound up by guilt. You never ever ever
26:26
go to church, but you are still living with the guilt of a religious
26:30
system and you can't get past that. I'm telling you, when you discover
26:33
who Jesus is, you will lose your fear of religion and religious people.
26:38
When you choose to follow Jesus, religion will lose its grip on you.
26:47
Just follow John. See follow Jesus follows Jesus. So they have this little
26:52
moment at the temple, you know, and the guy is like, well
26:55
that you know, Pharisees and the leaders to teach the law. They want
26:57
to know who the guy is. So with his matt I think, still
27:00
over his shoulder. See if you get this, he works his way over
27:03
to them. Get it? No, okay, so he's got the mat,
27:07
he's working on the Sabbath. He works his way. Okay, you
27:08
didn't get that. Okay. So here's what happened. The man went away
27:12
and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who made him well, which
27:17
you know, with his mat draped over his shoulder. So the text goes
27:19
on, So because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath. He's violated
27:23
the Sabbath as well. Now, according to their laws and their oraltrition and
27:26
the tradition of the elders, these treuths on the Sabbath. The Jewish leaders
27:30
began to persecute Jesus as well. In his defense, Jesus throws it right
27:33
back at him. This is brilliant. John must have loved telling the story.
27:37
In his defense, Jesus said to them, Hey, hey, hold
27:40
on there. You know my father he's always at his work to this very
27:44
day. In fact, my father's working on this day, and I too
27:45
him working. You know, God doesn't take a day off. I'm just
27:49
being like God. Hey, you know, God actually violates your version of
27:52
the Sabbath, doesn't he. In fact, he could say, guys,
27:56
if you got in trouble, would you ask for help or would you say
27:59
it's a Sabba? I thought the way for tomorrow to pray for No.
28:00
No, no, isn't God always at work? Yeah? Well, I'm
28:03
just being like my father, like father, like son. For this reason,
28:07
this is amazing. For this reason, they tried to kill him.
28:11
Not only was he breaking the Sabbath, now he's even calling God his own
28:15
father, making himself equal and equal with God. Who does he think he
28:18
is? Exactly? That is the question, who does he think he is?
28:22
When he cleanses the temple? They don't say, you know, what
28:26
do you think you're doing? They say who do you think you are?
28:30
And John, who gives this this gospel, would say to you, as
28:33
twenty first century seekers and thinkers and coming back and never believe in first time
28:37
you've heard this, He would say, come on, if you're going to
28:37
wrestle with anything, don't just wrestle with this question. Who do you think
28:41
he is? Because that's the issue, that's the point of the science.
28:45
That's why Jesus did what he did so people would arrive at the conclusion without
28:48
him forcing them into his answer, who do you think you are? This
28:55
guy's making himself equal with God? Exactly? Who would do that? How
29:03
would you substantiate such a claim? John says, just keep following me on
29:07
this journey. Jesus, very truly, I say to you, the son
29:12
can do nothing by himself. He can do only what he sees the father
29:18
doing, because whatever the father does, that's what the son does. Also,
29:22
my friends, this is an extraordinary statement by Jesus here's what he's saying.
29:30
He said, Hey, twenty first century people, seventeenth century people,
29:34
fourteenth century people, ninth century people, everybody in every generation, every age,
29:40
every language. Hey, do you want to know what God is really
29:45
like? You know how confusing that is? I mean, how do you
29:48
figure it out? Do you look into outer space? Do we look at
29:51
nature? Do we look within? You know? How do we know what
29:52
God is like? And Jesus is saying, it's simple. Just watch me.
29:56
Do you know what God would actually say a circumstance like this? Just
30:02
listen to me. Do you want to know what God would actually do when
30:07
confronted with a circumstance like this, jesuys would say, I know it's been
30:11
complicated in the past. Just follow me. And then he says to them,
30:18
and he says to people like me, He says, gentlemen, I
30:22
understand why this is confusing for you, because your whole life you have searched
30:27
the scriptures what we would call the Old Testament, the Law, and the
30:30
prophets. You have searched the scriptures diligently because you think that in them you
30:36
have eternal life. But there is no eternal life in the text. These
30:41
scriptures, these very scriptures that testify about me, Yet you refuse to come
30:47
to me to have there's that word again, to have life. Gentlemen,
30:51
I understand the confusion. But you have opted for the written over the living.
30:56
You have chosen your interpret over a living demonstration. And to which he
31:04
said, and gentlemen, I understand. Up until now you had an excuse.
31:10
Up until now, all you had was the text. Up until now,
31:12
all you had was the prophets. All you had up until now were
31:15
all the stories up and to now all you had was the wisdom of Solomon
31:18
and the sayings of David. And all you had up until now are the
31:21
promises to Abraham and the Sinai Covenant. I understand, but no more,
31:25
because, to use John's words, he could have said to them, guys,
31:29
look, the word has become flesh. The scripture pointed to me.
31:34
I'm here, I'm standing in front of you. The word is standing in
31:38
front of you. And John would say, and that's why I followed,
31:42
and that's why I believe. And that's why, in this moment that I'm
31:45
even dictating this story, all of my life is upside down. My friends
31:49
are dead. I don't know where half of the apostles are. The city
31:52
of Jerusalem is either under siege, or the temple's been destroyed, or it's
31:56
about to be destroyed. Nothing in life is good. But I'm telling you
32:00
I gazed into the eyes of life, and Jesus would say, the guessing
32:07
is over, the mystery is almost completely solved. I am a living commentary
32:14
on everything that has come before. It all pointed to me. This is
32:22
your sign and for us today. This is why the Gospels Matthew, Mark,
32:28
Luke, and John are so important in a world, our world,
32:34
in a world filled with political and moral and religious and ideological ideas and assumptions
32:42
and tention. God made it easy. God made it simple. He showed
32:49
up, he spoke up, and he was clear. And here's what he
32:57
was perhaps most clear about. Some of you are going to love this,
33:00
and some of you are going to hate this, and some of you are
33:04
going to argue with this, and some of you are going to try to
33:07
find exception with this. And I understand that because of the way that some
33:09
of us were raised in the religious circles we were raised in. But as
33:14
it relates to this particular piece of narrative, as it relates to healing on
33:20
the Sabbath, as it relates to the religious tension and the ideological tension and
33:25
the Rome versus Jewish tension in the first century. The point is so clear,
33:32
and if we get this right, the world changes. That's not hyperbole.
33:39
If we get this right, the world changes because once upon a time,
33:45
a group of disenfranchised Jewish people who had nothing but a dead messiah that
33:49
they said rose from the dead, got this right. And this is no
33:52
exaggeration. Every skeptic agrees. And the idea I'm about to share it shaped
34:00
Western civilization. And it's simply this that the you beside you, the you
34:09
beside you at work, the you besides you in traffic, the you beside
34:15
you at home, the you beside you in the neighborhood, the you besides
34:19
you right now on both sides of you, in front of him, behind
34:22
you, the you beside you must take priority over the potentially flawed view because
34:30
we are all wrong about something. In fact, I can prove it.
34:37
If you're over forty, you held some flawed views in your twenties, didn't
34:40
you. It's like, oh, my goodness, gracious, yeah. And
34:44
if you're in your twenties, you're like, not me when I'm forty,
34:45
I'm holding my same views. No, let me explain it to you.
34:49
I want you to think about now, that's okay, I'm not being critical.
34:51
I want you to think about middle school. Now, well, I
34:54
was a middle school er exactly. Now you're a twenty year old, and
34:57
then you'll be a thirty year old, and then you were in high school,
35:00
and you think about your views you held in high school and you did
35:01
have some what of an excuse? You did not have frontal lobe development?
35:04
That makes such a big deal. Every parent knows that, right, that's
35:07
a real thing. My point is this, Come on, let's just be
35:10
honest. This isn't a Christian thing. This is just a human thing.
35:14
Haven't your views changed? Haven't your prejudice has changed or adjusted? Haven't you
35:20
changed your attitude about some things because of some experiences. You didn't like that
35:22
group, and you met this guy, you met this Girl's like, you
35:24
know I've been wrong, and you know haven't. Don't we all carry some
35:28
flawed views about a lot of things. The answers yes, And here's what
35:35
John would say on behalf of Jesus. I think this is what Jesus would
35:38
say on behalf of his Father for your benefit, that you, the living,
35:44
real, flesh and blood person beside you, has to take priority over
35:50
the potentially flawed view that you carry around inside of you, because your views
35:58
are gonna change. People are people and they're made in the image of God,
36:02
and they have to take priority over our ever changing views. You say,
36:08
Andy, but you know it, aren't there absolutes? Yes, God
36:12
is an absolute and this is what makes it so powerful. Here's the thing.
36:15
See, I don't always know what to believe, and either to you.
36:17
In fact, our beliefs change. I don't even always know who to
36:21
believe in. You don't always know who to believe. But you read the
36:23
Gospels and here's what's incredibly clear. We almost always know what love requires of
36:30
us. That's enough. So I want to leave you with a question.
36:39
Does your version of religion or politics get in the way of loving people that
36:46
God loves? If so, you are at odds with God. Let's get
36:54
more specific, does your version of Christianity get in the way of loving people
37:01
God loves? If so, you have the wrong version. And here's why
37:06
I say that. And I don't blink, and as the convicting is that
37:08
is to me. Here's why, Because John, this is so amazing.
37:10
I know I've told you this before, and I'll wrap up because John is
37:15
the person that brought us this idea that no one had ever put to paper
37:17
before John came along. John again, everything around him is falling apart.
37:22
Things are as bad as they could possibly be. And John says, to
37:27
the person writing all of this down, write this down in a letter to
37:30
the church. He says, hey, write this down. God is love.
37:40
God is love. So when you get on the wrong side of love,
37:50
you're on the wrong side of God. And if your version of religion,
37:54
or politics or anything else gives you from to mistreat a person, you're
38:01
on the wrong side. Does your version of Christianity get in the way of
38:10
loving people that God loves? Because the power of the Gospel is this.
38:19
Jesus said, I've come to show you how to get it right. But
38:22
here's the deal. When you don't get it right, I'm going to pay
38:27
for your sin of not getting it right. Now followed me. What an
38:34
invitation. It's so powerful. Here's the thing that I'm done. We should
38:37
want it to be true before we're convinced it's true that God is love and
38:46
Jesus was God in a good