John 2021

We're going to have our reading now.

There's 2 readings. So please send your bibles to Jerusalem ironomy, chapter 18, and we'll start there first, and then we'll go on to John chapter 7. Starting at verse 14. This is Moses speaking. The nations you will dispossess listen to those who practice sorcery or divination.

But as for you, the lord your God has not permitted you to do so. The lord your god will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. For this is what you asked of the lord your god at Horeb, on the day of the assembly when you said, let us not hear the voice of the lord our god, nor see this great fire anymore, or we will die. The Lord said to me, what they say is good.

I will raise up for them, a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth He will tell them everything I command him. I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophecy speaks in my name. But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods is to be put to death. You may say to yourselves, how can we know when a message has not been spoken by the Lord If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the lord does not take place or come true, that is a message the lord has not spoken. That prophets has spoken presumptuously, so do not be alarmed.

And then our next reading is from John chapter 7 starting from verse 1. After this, Jesus went around in Galile. He did not want to go about and judea because the Jewish leaders where there were looking for a way to kill him. But when the Jewish festival of Tabernacles was near, Jesus's brother said to him, leave Godilee and go to judea, so that your disciples there may see the works you do. No 1 who wants to become a public figure acts in secret.

Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world. For even his own brothers did not believe in him. Therefore, Jesus told them, my time is not yet here, For you, any time will do, the world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that it its works are evil. You go to the festival. I am not going up to this festival, because my time has not yet fully come.

After he said this, he stayed in Galile. However, after his brothers had left to the festival, he went also, not publicly, but in secret Now at the festival, the Jewish leaders were watching for Jesus and asking, where is he? Among the crowds, there was widespread whispering about him. Some said, he is a good man. Others replied, no, he deceives the people.

But no 1 would say anything publicly about him for fear of the leaders. Not until halfway through the festival, did Jesus go up to the temple courts and begin to teach The Jews there were amazed and asked, how did this man get such learning without having been taught? Jesus answered. My teaching is not my own. It comes from the 1 who sent me.

Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. Whoever speaks on their own does so to gain personal glory, but he who seeks the glory of the 1 who sent him is a man of truth. There is nothing false about him. Has not Moses given you the law? Yes.

Not 1 of you keeps the law Why are you trying to kill me? You a demon possessed the crowd answered, who is trying to kill you? Jesus said to them, I did 1 miracle, and you were all amazed. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision through Though actually, it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs, you circumcise a boy on the Sabbath. Now if a boy can be circumcised on the Sabbath, so that the law of Moses may not be broken.

Why are you angry with me for healing a man's whole body on the Sabbath? Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly. Rory. Well, good evening from May. My name's Rory.

I'm 1 of the elders here at the church, and I like that new name for deuteronomy. Geruteronomy. Sounds like Jerusalem. It's lovely. It reminds me of the love of my life.

Hello darling? No? Okay. Great. Well, it's been a couple of weeks since we've been in John, but it's great that we can come back into it now.

But let's pray as we begin for God's help, as we seek to understand this, let's pray, Father. We thank you so much for your words. We thank you for this amazing book of John. We thank you that it shows us the Lord Jesus Christ. And we pray father that as we listen to him now, that you will challenges where we need challenging, but you will show us just how glorious our savior, our forgiver, our redeemer is in the lord Jesus Christ.

We pray for that you will lift our eyes away from our circumstances and that you will put them on the glorious savior. Jesus, and we pray in his name, amen. Well, I'm sure you would agree with me that we live in a world, and we live in a culture that has lots and lots of different opinions, has all sorts of speculations, has has always has something to say on a certain issue, a whole host of of issues. I just think if you reflect in the past few years in this country, you will have realized that lots of people had lots of things to say on on certain issues like Brexit, you know, let's not get back into that too much though, otherwise, there might be a riot. COVID, how should we deal with COVID?

What is COVID like? Should we wear masks? We probably got a lot of things to say about the war, maybe have things to say. About about how what the government is doing? Are they right?

Are they wrong? What's actually happened? And I think you might also agree that there seems to be a whole lot of experts. Everyone seems to be an expert. I mean, you you you go on to a on a photo online, on social media, on a video, and you read the comments below, and everyone seems to know everything.

The you think that the majority of them, if it's a video about science or science majors, or if it's about sport that they are an expert in the field of sport. Whatever it is, there's a lot of experts or so called experts in the building. Although I think often with these experts, if you just push them a little bit, it soon transpires that they they don't know anything. They'd know very little about anything. They might have vague ideas, but really, there's not much understanding at all.

I I think you especially see for young people. Yes, students, students who know everything, sorry, students if you're here and you aren't so many things, they know everything, but you know very little. And I think the questions that we could ask is, how therefore do we understand then? How do we understand what the the truth is? How do we come to a place where we can actually believe truth.

What do we need to do to test and to examine and to find the evidence to come with the right answer. I actually think that this is the same with the subject of the Lord Jesus Christ. See, I'm sure that in this room, many of us have heard various speculations various opinions, various ideas about who Jesus is, and I can probably, you know, with confidence say, that they are all very much wide at the mark. You think about what people say. Oh, he was just a prophet maybe.

Or he was a good man, and he did some good stuff. Or maybe they say he was a liar. I actually I remember being in in the lesson when I worked in Chesington someone was like, Jesus is a creep. I said, oh, flipping heck. What's that about?

But, actually, if you if you go at them and you you you pick at what they're trying to say, often, you know, transpires that they have got a clue. I remember I was teaching a 1 class, and I said, put your hand up if you think that she that she's didn't exist. And a whole load of them put their hands up. I think the majority of the class put their hands up. And I said, really?

And then I said, okay. Put your hands up now if you believe that Jesus did exist. And because I put that little reason of doubt in their mind, suddenly they all believed that Jesus did exist. And so I said, really? They hadn't come to examine.

They hadn't found out if Jesus was real. It was it was just a speculation. It was an an exaggeration from the outside of maybe what other people have said, or, well, let's just follow the crowd. And that's kind of what we in this whole chapter that we've looked at today in in in 7. So we we we're picking up from where we left off a and John has been showing us through chapters 1 to 6 who Jesus is.

He's been showing us the unique nature of the Lord Jesus Christ, and we've seen these huge statements. Both in words and deed of Christ. But we came to chapter 6, and we ended with actually his teaching Driving away many disciples. Now, if you remember at the start of chapter 6, there was a crowd of around 15 to 20000 people. By the end of the chapter, he's looking at 12.

What a successful ministry? He's lost. I can't do the math. I should be able to do the math. Com.

And so we come to 1, to this, and and after just a short way of John saying a little bit of a a period of time on, Jesus is walking around in Galile And he's probably teaching his disciples at this stage. Anything it is not You're gonna see lots and lots of different types of people and very popular. It's a very much a sort of despised area. And and you can just know that by if if you flick over in chapter 7, people are like, there's nothing good coming out of Galileley. No prophet could come out of Galile.

If you remember, 1 of his disciples, Nathaniel was like, because Nazareth is in Galile. He was like, can anything good come out of Nazareth? So Galileo is not the most desirable of destinations. But you'll also see with me in verse 1 that he's not able to go to Judea. Why?

Because there's these people trying to kill him. There are these Jewish leaders who are looking for a way to murder Jesus, and they've been doing this since chapter 5. And in chapter 5, you'll remember that Jesus healed a man on the Sabbath and the Jewish leaders were furious. And now sometimes we might go, well, time is a great healer. It's been it's actually been 6 months since Jesus did that.

They might have got over it a little bit. But for other people, time is not a great healer. I think time makes things a lot worse, and I think that's definitely the case with these Jewish leaders. They are stewing in their violence. And they want to kill Jesus.

And so Jesus is not going into Jude, he's staying in Galile. Now as well as that, this is all me setting the scene. I'll get on to my point soon. Don't worry. In verse 2, You see that this time of the month this is how I by the way, this is how I know it's 6 months later because in chapter 5, it was the Passover.

And now it's the festival of Tabanackles. That's 6 months in between the 2. It's been 6 months. It's the festival of Tabanackles And the festival of the tabernacles was a a week long celebration in which the people remembered when God rescued the people of Israel from Egypt. They rescued them out.

He brought them out, and he was with them in the wilderness. He was with them and he dwelt in a tent of meeting to say, I am with you, and as he was in this tent of meeting around him were all the people in shelters. And so every year, and the festival of tabernacles, people would make these these makeshift shelters to remember that God had been with them in the wilderness years. And if you read scholars of of the day, this is like the most popular of the festivals. This is the 1 that you wanna go to.

This is the Glastonbury of Jewish festivals. This is New Year's Eve on in London with all those fireworks. This is the platinum Jubilee of festivals. And so what you're gonna have in in in in due Jerusalem and in due days, you're gonna have a whole load of Jewish people from all over the place descending into Judeia. And so it's that in mind that the brothers of Jesus, his own Well, since his own flesh and blood.

Anyway, the ones that Mary's sons, they come to Jesus and they come within a suggestion. And this is my first point. Unbelief of brothers missing who Jesus is, It's just words. Unbelief of brothers, missing who Jesus is, probably should have had that in there, shouldn't it? Missing unbelief of their brothers would sound better, wouldn't it?

See, they come to him verse 3 to 4, and they say this, if you look down with me. Jesus's brother said to him, leave Galile, and go to Jude. So that your disciples there may see the works you do. No 1 who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world.

See, Jesus' brothers are coming to him and they're saying, look, if you really wanna be someone, Jesus, You've gotta you gotta get out of Galile and you gotta get to Jude. This is like, if you're in gallery, I looked up the most remote place in the UK. It's called Inveri in Scotland. Right? So Galilei is like Inveri in Scotland, and Judy is like London.

It's like, Jesus, if you wanna if you wanna be someone, you need to get out of him there and you need to go to London. You wanna get out of Galile, and you wanna get to Judia. If you wanna if you wanna do something here, go go where the people are. Do a little bit of networking. I hate that term.

I'm just gonna do a bit of networking. You know, get a social media campaign, you know, get on the TikTok Jesus. Panded to the crowds. Find the crowds. Listen to what they want.

Show them what they want. You've got these great works, Jesus. They wanna see all the amazing things that you can do. It's like, you know, with the politicians that that, you know, they fly around to all the different crowds, and they wanna show everyone how great they are. And that they they're gonna do things for each and every 1 of them.

And and and the brothers are like, that's what you should be doing. That's what the world does. Pander to the crowds. Let them have what they want. Build the following.

Now you might be thinking well Fair enough. That's quite nice of the brothers. You know, they're caring for his interests. But actually, we see what's wrong with them in verse 5. It says for even his own brothers did not believe in him.

See, his own family, the ones that have grown up with him, the ones who have seen the eternal son of god in flesh live and breathe and do all of these things with them, they don't believe in him. They don't get him. In fact, they don't get him until after his resurrection. That's when they believe in him. See, the and so, yes, they they they're amazed by us.

They think, oh, these works are fantastic feeding of the 5000. What a what a brilliant thing to do. Healing off of the the official son. But Although they're amazed by his words, they completely miss his identity. They they have not listened to any of his words.

And so they're just like the people in chapter 6 in verse 14 and 15 who are saying, yeah, this is a prophet. This is the Messiah. This is the 1 that we're gonna make by force. The king of this area. And so they're outside of Jesus.

They're not inside. They're not believing in him. And so therefore, They misunderstand who he is, and they reduce who he is and what he's about. See, they're so taken up with the external that they completely miss the very character of the lord Jesus. And so Jesus must expose their unbelief.

And he shows us the nature of unbelief in verse 6 to 9. He says this. Therefore, Jesus told them, my time is not yet here. For you anytime will do. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that its works are evil You go to the festival.

I am not going up to this festival because my time has not yet fully come. After he has said this, he stayed in Galile. He reveals stuff about their unbelief. The first thing that he shows about their unbelief is that that any time will do for these people. In other words, you're out of the sovereignty of God.

You just think I can do whatever I please whenever I want. You're not bringing yourself on the higher purpose. You're not bringing yourself under a greater plan. So you're working outside of the sovereignty of God. You're not considering what he wants.

You're considering what the world wants. And so, therefore, your your plans are insignificant or unimportant have nothing to do with God. That's what unbelief does. But not only that, but unbelief means that the world cannot hate them. And the reason the world cannot hate to decide the brothers, sorry, is because they're off the world.

They're just off the world. They're exactly the same. There is no difference between the world and Jesus's brothers. And you can see that by their plan. Their plan for Jesus is totally worldly.

It's it's sell your soul Jesus. It's do what the crowds want. It's It's compromise yourself, it's gain personal glory, it's gain a crowd, a following. And that is the fruit of unbelief. Now contrast Jesus and he's the very opposite.

See, Jesus is the ultimate believer, and Jesus is the ultimate model for believers. And he says, my time is not here yet. It's not yet fully come. My time to go to that that festival is not yet. I have to wait to be in line with God's plan and God's purpose.

I must work within the sovereign plan of gods. So, yes, I'm gonna go to the temple, but just not on your terms. Because we see he goes to the temple. He's not lying. By the way, he's not lying.

You might be thinking, wait. Just said he was not gonna go to the temple. Now he's gone. It's not that he's lying. He's saying, I'm going when God wants me to go.

I'm not obeying you, brothers. I'm obeying the father. I bring myself under a greater a plan. I have great significance in what I do. And I'm not going to show great works yet.

My time to show the greatest work is not here yet. That day is coming though. So he brings himself under the sovereignty of God, but not only that, but the world hates Jesus. Did you see that? The world hates Jesus.

Why? Because he's not off the world. And because he's not off the world and because of his words and his deeds, he exposes evil works. So it it should come to no should come no surprise to us that we hear of people in Maldiv's suffering for their faith. They hated Jesus.

They're gonna hate the believers. They hated Jesus because he was so pure and innocent, and he showed up people's evil intentions, and he showed up their unbelief. So they're gonna hate his believers. So that's what Jesus is about. And so if that's what Jesus is about, that's what his believers should be about.

The believers of the Lord Jesus Christ should be people that entrust themselves to the sovereign plan of god. So when you're trying to make a decision, who are you talking to? Seeking god's face in your plans? Or are you seeking your own? Are you hated by the world?

I I don't we've just we talked about it already today, but 1 Peter has just revealed so much to us, isn't it? Like, if we are gonna live for Jesus, then we should expect hatred towards us. But do we get that? And if not, why not? See, the contrast between the believer and the unbeliever And the question I suppose we can ask each other is which 1 is more like you?

Which 1 marks you out? Are you a friend of the world? Or you hated by the world? It's interesting. Jesus's brother James in his book after Hebrews says anyone who is a friend of the world is at enmity with God.

I wonder as he wrote those words, was he thinking about what Jesus said to him in chapter 7? So he exposes their unbelief and then he sends them off in verse 9. But that's the first point, unbelief of the brothers. But secondly, we see unbelief at the temple refusal to listen to Jesus' teaching. Unbelief of the temple refusal to listen to Jesus' teaching.

So we come to verse 10 And apparently, the time now comes for him actually to go down to the festival. And what you'll what you'll notice as well as you read that is he doesn't do as his brother asked him to. Deremma, his brother says, don't do it in Don't be in secret, do it publicly, but how does Jesus go down to the festival? Well, in verse 10, you'll see, he went also not publicly but in secret. He's not doing it like his brother says.

He's not off the world. And he goes kind of undercover, and I can't have this kind of vision of Jesus sort of, like, undercover. I don't know what that means. Like, a a CID agent. And he's listening all all mass observation who used to listen into conversations during second world water, see what was going on.

And Jesus is sort of a fly on the wall, and he's listening into these conversations. And seeing what's going on in this temple regarding himself, and you'll notice that in verse 11, he's got these Jewish leaders again, and you can even see their murderous intent as they look out for him and they say, where is he? Where is he? We wanna get him. We wanna we gonna get rid of him.

But not only does he have these people looking out for him to kill him because they don't believe in him, but he's also got these other people in verse 12. You see that some are saying, he's a good man. But then there's others going, no. No. He's not a good man.

He's a man who decease people. He's a Charlotte. He's actually false. So there's all these different opinions about Jesus going around. It's like what we talked about at the start, there's the opinions, there's the ideas, there's the speculations.

He's good. He's a deceit where is he so we can kill him? And they're all based on the external And because they're all based on the external, they're all wrong. And you and you can see what what people's motivation are in these conversations because they might have a little inkling, but in verse 13, they don't wanna speak out too loudly. Because their real fear isn't in what God thinks.

It's about what the Jewish leaders think. Those speak to Lally whisper. Whisper. Is he good? Is he deceiver?

Don't let the Jewish leaders hear us. The gatekeepers of the modern day culture of the day. They'll cancel They'll get rid of us. And so Jesus, in verse 14 to 15, I think his head's enough. He's seen enough, and his time has come to get up and begin to teach.

See, he's not going public with his works here, is he? He's going public with his words. Not doing as his brother says, not doing what the world says. He's obeying the father. And as he speaks, There is there is a certain cause of this.

In fact, in verse 15, the Jews are what. They are amazed Why are they so amazed? Because they say this question, how did this man get such learning without having being taught? How's how is this man so, like, clever? How does he know so much?

In other words, like, he's clearly had no teaching from a rabbi. That's how most people would have got a really good learning as if they were brought under a a rabbi. And so therefore, they would know lots of things. But This is just an ordinary carpenter bloke. How does he know?

How is he able to teach the way he's able to teach? This is like someone coming in and being top of the field straight away, but having no input from anyone ever. Like, someone had been a fantastic orator, but I've never gone to 1 of the top Oxford universities. Being a top scientist but not having learnt science in a in a in a formal setting. It's it it what's going on here?

How how can this man know so much? But actually, I think still, even in this, there is unbelief. And so he begins to answer the question in verse 16. What does he say? He says my teaching is not my own.

It comes from the 1 who sent me. So you wanna know where I got this teaching from? You wanna know where I got this teaching from? Got it from the father. Easy.

It's not I'm not like the rabbis says Jesus. I'm not like them who who the rabbi the way the rabbi's worked in these days is they would have messages passed down and passed down and passed down. And so you would say, well, this person said that it's like those, you know, those gossip stories actually going. This person said, Dan, like, person said that. And that person said, that person said, There's a long list of human tradition, but we're basing it on human voices.

But Jesus says no. No. I get mine from the origin. I get mine from the author. I'm the the son of god, and I'm teaching the very words that God has given me, it it it it reiterates what's already been said in chapter 5 that their that the son has always been with the father, and the heavenly father has sent him to teach people about himself.

That's what Jesus is saying. You wanna know where I got my teaching from? I got it from the father. Well, how can you know it from the father? How do you know it's from the father?

How can we how can we test whether or not it's from the father? Well, that's that's good because if we go to verse 17, Jesus tells us. Anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. In other words, if you're someone who is so committed to God, so committed to his ways, understanding his words, and his character, that you will come to Jesus, and you will listen to him. As you spend time with him, as you experience him and you experience his love, you will know that he comes from God because he will speak truth into your life, because he will make sense of your life.

That's how you know that he is from God because he makes sense of it all. It's like 1 of the the most lovely stories in the gospel of Luke, isn't it when Jesus's parents take him to the temple and who comes out, but simeon and praises God because this is the this is the 1. Tee, if you're spending time with Jesus, you will see that he is the 1 from God. He's not someone who's come off his own accord with his own teaching. You will see that his teaching matches up with that of God the father.

But you must come inside. You must believe in him. You can't just stay on the outside and intellectually examine and go well. He might be this, he might be that, because you're never gonna experience who Jesus is and what is like, what what he means for you. Because you're gonna have these other other ideas that conflict and you have these other things in your mind in your head that get in the way of believing in Jesus so that you're not gonna listen to who he is.

You're not gonna be able to properly test whether it is true that is teaching us from the father. And I think that's why we come into verse 18 because he says whoever speaks on their own does so to gain personal glory, but he who seeks the glory of the 1 who sent him is a man of truth. There is nothing false. About him. See, the reason why people stay on the outside and don't understand who Jesus is is because they have pride, they have ego, and they're all about their own honor.

And that is evident in this whole chapter. Why wouldn't they believe that Jesus is from the father where you turn over, he's from Galile. Stinking place. Can't be anything good coming out of Galile. Can't be anything good coming out of Nazareth.

Their pride gets in the way their commitment to external stuff gets in the way, and so they're not willing to listen. And because they're not willing to listen, because they're all about their own pride and their own ego, they're actually false. They're not about God's glory. They're the Jewish people at this time probably would have thought, yes, I'm committed to god. I'm committed to keeping his laws.

I wanna do what God wants me to do. But, actually, because they're all about praise and honor for themselves, They're divided. They're not about God. And then again, if you contract Jesus with the unbelief of these people. He's the opposite, isn't he?

He's not self seeking. She says it's not someone looking for the praise of men. She says it's not looking to honor himself. In fact, solely, his purpose is to glorify the father. That's what he's saying he's gonna do in verse 18.

I'm not here for you just to say what a great human being, I am. I'm actually here the god man to glorify my father. I said, because I'm all about 1 who is who who's in heaven, who the the the father, that means that I'm a man of truth. I'm single-minded. I'm a man of integrity.

I'm not lying. I'm not someone who's trying to do it in the human way in a worldly fashion. I'm not of the world. If I was of the world, I would have come in here, storming at the start of the festival, going public with a social media campaign. I didn't do that.

I came to teach you the very words of God, the father. He's so unlike the opposition In chapter 5 in verse 44, he says, how can you believe since you accept glory from 1 another, but not do not seek the glory that comes from the only god He's there all about glory from each other. Jesus is all about the glory of the father. How we're created to be to glorify him with all of our lives. And so what does it mean for the believing person?

On belief means we don't listen. The believing person listens. On believer, is about their own personal glory. Believer, you should be about God glory. And if you're about God glory and about God's word, You're gonna recognize the man of truth because you will be a man or woman of truth.

So being a believer means Live for his glory and listen to him. But he goes even further in verse 19. Has not Moses given you the law? Yet not 1 of you keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?

See, in these days, the Jewish people would have said, we are all about the law. We love the law. We love Moses. We saw this in chapter 5. That's how good is Moses we love him.

He gave us the more. Fantastic. We're so committed to following it. And Jesus says, no. You're not?

You claim to have the law and have the blessing of Moses, but you don't keep it. You don't keep the law. How do we know? Because you're trying to kill me? Jesus is like, if you were keeping the law, you would probably, you know, take seriously that that that commandment that says do not murder.

And especially, you know, murdering an innocent man Your intention intentions are murderous, and so you break the law, in which you get the response, another response of unbelief in verse 20. You are demon possessed. The crowd answered, who was trying to kill you? I guess some people who had come down to the festival didn't know. That people were trying to kill Jesus.

But it does seem like some people know, because if you look at verse 25, they say, isn't this the man they're trying to kill? So Well, okay, who's trying to kill you? But Jesus isn't gonna go into more and more about how you break the law. He's gonna go and press home what this issue is. And so he says, look, the miracle I did in chapter 5, the healing of that man on the Sabbath, you are amazed for the wrong reason.

They were amazed for the wrong reason. The reason they were amazed was not because Jesus had just healed a man physically, his whole body. He was now able to walk. They were amazed that Jesus had told him to pick up his mat. I mean, missing the, what's it called, forest of the trees, got there in the end.

That's what they're doing. And so he goes to expand on this, and he and he and he opens it up in verse 22 to 23. Yet because Moses gave you circumcision, though, actually, it did not come from Moses but from the patriarchs, you circumcised a boy on the Sabbath. Now if a boy can be circumcised on the Sabbath, so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing a man's whole body on the Sabbath? See, he he he he argues that what he did is absolutely and fundamentally right because he takes the issue of circumcision.

Now he says, actually, listen, circumcision, not from Moses. I know you have the law, and it mentions circumcision, but listen, Lads. Circumcision was given to Abraham. Right? It's way before then.

So it precedes the mosaic law. Because before Moses gets the law. And so that means it takes precedence over keeping the Sabbath. It came before, so it takes precedence. And so by that standard, it meant that Jewish boys could be circumcised on the Sabbath.

So technically, you could say, well, you're breaking the law. But because the circumcision became before the law, it was okay to do this. Right? Every following me? Yes.

Good. You are alive. Thank goodness. Brilliant. So that means it was the right thing to do.

It was the right thing to circumcise boys on the Sabbath. So if they were born the Sabbath before, it's good to circumcise him on the Sabbath. Now what is Sabbath? Well, Sabbath, as many of you will know, is the sign of faith. It's a sign of God's covenant promise of redemption to his people.

It's a sign that you are gonna be marked out as a person God that you're in God's people in his family. It's a sign that says, you now have a perfected body. Right? Before before the circumcision, they weren't perfected after the circumcision, they're perfected because they're known as God's people. So this is Jesus' argument.

If it's right to circumcise a boy on the Sabbath. How much more right is it for me to heal a whole man's If it's right to perfect a little young boy's 8 year old boy's body and perfect it, why is it wrong for me to perfect a whole body. And the problem is is that they're missing what circumcision is about. And Jesus is saying, I'm the fulfillment of circumcision. I'm the pointer to redemption.

I'm the pointer to what faith actually should be in, and the pointer to a perfected body, and the pointer of a perfect a perfect body in eternal rest. So circumcision points to the redeemed people of God, and and the Sabbath points to the eternal rest that can be found in the lord Jesus Christ. And Jesus says, that's who I am. That's what I'm doing here. And so he concludes in verse 24, stop judging by mere appearances, but in their judge correctly.

See, the heart of their unbelief and I've tried to mention this throughout is is that they on on the inside, they're on the outside and they're judging by external standards. The brothers are judging by worldly standards, aren't they? You need to do what the world does. The religious leaders are judging by the law standards and the misinterpretation of the law, the same Well, you you you've broken our convention. So therefore, you must be a heretic, a false prophet.

See, they're so caught up in their their misunderstanding of the law. They're so caught up in their commitment to it and trying to make sure that everyone follows it that they actually aren't able to judge correctly. They're not able to judge in a righteous fashion. They're not able to judge properly. See, we've seen in verse 20 verse 19, that they don't follow the law because they wanna kill the lord Jesus, but they also don't recognize who this Jesus is.

The reason I asked Tom to read not Jirutoronomy, but deuteronomy, is because that is the promise that there is a prophet to come who's gonna be greater That is the promise that there is 1 to fulfill the law. That is the promise that says, there is 1 that you need to listen to, listen to his teaching, I'm here. That's me says Jesus. I'd say we're not gonna listen. Because they're too busy with the external, the outward, and they need to be thinking about the internal, and the bigger truths that Jesus points from the old testament to himself about.

And so we think about this world today. And they refuse to recognize the lord Jesus. They wanna put other external things in the way, but, really, they just don't wanna trust in Christ. They will set up barriers to believing in Jesus and the fact that he is the eternal son of god sent from the heavenly father with the teaching of the heavenly father. And all of this, comes to a head at the cross.

See, Jesus' time comes about on the cross. Jesus' is our they talked about in John comes about at the cross. Jesus fully puts himself under the sovereign plan of God so much so that in the gone of gethsemane, he says, not my will, but your will be done, not my will, but your will be done, and he sweats blood droplets of sweat so that he can complete the great and almighty plan of the Father upon a Cross. But it's not only where we see Jesus fulfilling the plan of God, but we also see unbelief, don't we? Is there any better place to see unbelief in the heart of these people, then on the cross no longer are their whispers, there are shouts of crucify him.

That is the evil intentions of unbelievers. No longer is there just a slight mum murmurings about them that there is full blown hatred as people mock and sneer at the Lord Jesus on the cross. There is no goodness here as they slay as they sling on across the innocent pure lamb of God that we've read about in chapter 1. There is unbelief, and we're all implicated in this. For it is our sin, mine and yours, that he is sent to that cross for.

It's my unbelief. It's my rejection of the father. It's my rejection of the son that he hangs on a crosswalk. And that is the greatest work that he does. He's not doing his works in this passage, but he is gonna do the greatest of works.

Why does it why is it the greatest of works? Because in that moment, as he hangs in the cross, and he declares that it's finished, and he raises from the dead. He's bringing healing. He's bringing salvation. He's bringing redemption, he's bringing us into a family, and not just a family, but a family of believers.

A family of believers who follow in his footsteps, who will go into this world and should live as he models in this passage. So where are you in all of this? Maybe you're maybe you're not a Christian here tonight. Maybe you're not a Christian. Maybe you've never Listen to the Lord Jesus.

Maybe you've always viewed Jesus from the outside and said, oh, is he right? Is he this? Is he that? Let's speculate a little bit more about him. Let's bounce off ideas of who Jesus might be.

And is he the greatest or is, you know, someone else better than him? What can I urge you, look, come inside, examine Christ? Look at him, experience him, experience his love, experience, his character, test his words, see that his words are the very words of gods and know that the reason that he's come is to bring healing to you today. Will you do that? Will you come and know Jesus, the son of God, the Him The heavenly 1 who was with the father in all times and now tells us about the father.

Will you come? And Christian, Are you believing? Are you believing? See, belief doesn't just start with once. Faith is persevering.

Faith that saves is persevering faith. And so maybe we need to ask ourselves the questions. Are we bringing ourselves under the sovereign plan of God? Are we Are we hated by the world because we put on the lord Jesus Christ? Are we seeking his glory or someone else's glory, our own glory?

Are we listening to the very teaching of the lord Jesus Christ, and by listening to him, are we living as believers in this world? Are we people of truth? Are we people of falsehoods? Can I urge you to keep on coming back to the Lord Jesus? To keep on reflecting and experiencing and knowing Jesus said that we may live in this world as believers.

Always grateful for what he has done on a cross to bring us into his family. Let's pray. Father, we thank you. For your word again. And we do confess that there are times where we are lacking in our faith, where we live for ourselves, where we seek our own glory, where we don't listen to you, and we pray that you will forgive us for these times.

And we pray father that you will bring us back to you that you will revive us as Tom told talked about this at the start of this service that you will show us how glorious the lord Jesus is that he was not a self seeking, self honoring self glorifying 1, but he was 1 who was all about you. And we pray father that as we reflect on the lord Jesus and His work on a cross to bring us back to to back to you, to bring us into your family that we will be people that go. In faith and live in this world for you. And so we pray this in Jesus now, our man.