John 5:30-47

[0:00] Back in John chapter 5, so we'll go to the next slide. So quick refreshment. Rob did a little of this for me up front. So, it's always important to know your context, right, when you're studying scripture, free tip, right?

[0:14] It's particularly important for us today, because the last three weeks have been marching through the same scene, right? This scene started in Rob's text at the beginning of chapter 5, when Jesus heals a man who was an invalid for 38 years.

[0:26] The Jewish leaders were persecuting Jesus because he was healing on the Sabbath. They didn't like that. They told this man, hey, Jesus said, get up and walk.

[0:40] Pick up your mat and walk, right? So he picked up his mat and he walked, and the religious leaders were like, hey, you're not supposed to be working on the Sabbath, right? And so they came to Jesus and were like, why did you tell him to do this? And so Jesus, you know, has this opportunity, you know, he could teach them about the Sabbath, he could teach them about a bunch of different things, but what he does, he said, hey, my father's working, and so I am working, right?

[1:02] I think Rob kind of told us, but like, he's basically throwing fuel on this fire, right? So there's some controversy. They are frustrated with Jesus because he's not kind of stepping in line with their traditions, right?

[1:16] And Jesus is like, okay, you want to have problems with me about healing the Sabbath? Well, how about this? I'm from God, and I am people to God, right?

[1:28] And they went from wanting to persecute him to wanting to kill him, right? And so he actually, according to their value system, right, he had upped the charges they had against him, right? So breaking the Sabbath was kind of a minor thing in their minds.

[1:41] Claiming to be God, that's blasphemy, and that's deserving of death, right? And so Jesus willingly kind of walks into this controversy. Then in John chapter 5, 19 through 30, Jesus kind of continues this, and he makes a bunch of statements, crazy statements.

[1:58] This was Tyler's text, right? Some of these things that Jesus said are pretty wild if you kind of put yourself in the context, right? He says he's in perfectly in sync with God. He says he does the things that God does, therefore he's sinless like God.

[2:13] He is the means by which all people will be judged. He deserves to be worshipped by all. He has the ability to give life to whomever he wills, and he grants eternal life to those who believe in him.

[2:28] And these are some big things. Tyler walked us through it last week. It was good. He encouraged us to think about this. Think about what you would do if somebody walked up to you and said, hey, you should worship me. I am equal to God.

[2:40] I can do what God does. I can give eternal life to whoever I want. I think this might be a direct crew. I think Tyler said, bro, that would be cool, right? That's not cool, right?

[2:51] We would all be like, hey, who, what, huh, you know? And so this is kind of the scene, right? So they're upset because Jesus is healing the Sabbath. He's like, hey, how about this?

[3:01] I'm going to hit you with some big truth, and you're going to have to deal with it, right? And so that's kind of the context for our discussion today. So this conversation with these religious leaders in the temple after Jesus had healed this man continues into these next verses.

[3:20] And so that's what we'll pick up in the next slide, and we'll read the text together. All right. So I guess before we get into it, just pull this, it's kind of a, you know, a bit of a tight argument that Jesus is talking.

[3:38] It bounces around a little bit. So at any point you get confused or I'm being confusing, just be like, hey, what? You know, and we can go back and we can talk about it, right? We don't, you know. So let's read.

[3:51] Starting in John 5, verse 30. This is Jesus talking. He's talking to the religious leaders in the temple. I can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge. And my judgment is just because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.

[4:07] If I alone bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true. There is another who bears witness about me, and I know that his testimony is true.

[4:18] You sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth. Not that the testimony I received is from man, but I say these things so that you may be saved. He was a burning and shining lamp that you rejoiced in for a little while while in his light.

[4:33] But the testimony that I have is greater than that of John. For the works that the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I am doing bear witness to me about, bear witness about me that the Father has sent me.

[4:47] And the Father has sent me himself, and the Father who sent me has himself borne witness about me. His voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen, and you do not have his word abiding in you.

[5:01] For you do not believe in the one who he sent. You search the scriptures because you think in them you have eternal life, and it is they that bear witness about me. Yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

[5:15] I do not receive glory from people, but I know that you do not have the love of God within you. I have come in my Father's name, and you do not receive me.

[5:25] If another comes in his own name, you will receive him. How can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the only God? Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father.

[5:39] There is one who accuses you, Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?

[5:55] So one of the things that Jesus is doing, he's doing a few things, but we'll kind of break it up. One of the things he's doing in this text is he's providing evidence to the claims that he made back a few verses ago.

[6:07] He's basically saying, yes, these claims are crazy, unless they're true. And if they're true, then you ought to be paying attention.

[6:19] Then he draws the attention of his audience to evidences that his claims are in fact true. In verse 31, Jesus says, if I bear witness about myself, my testimony is not true.

[6:31] In other words, he's saying, what I say is only part of the picture. My witness must align with the witness and actions of another. Jesus refers to this other crucial witness in verse 32, saying that he knows that this witness's testimony is true.

[6:49] In verse 37, if you guys sum your Bibles up, we see that this other witness is none other than God himself. Jesus is basically saying, remember all that stuff that I said earlier, that I am the son of God, that I do what God does, and therefore I'm sinless like God?

[7:05] That I have been given the authority to judge, so you ought to respect, honor, and worship me? And that I have the authority to give life to whoever I please? Yeah, I know you didn't like hearing you say those things, but they are true, and God agrees, and that's what matters to me.

[7:22] He sent me, and he testified about me. And Jesus is like, I know this already, but it's important that you realize this. And it's kind of like Jesus is saying, I know you don't trust me, I know you don't believe me, but you say that you believe God.

[7:40] He is an authority that you do claim. And what I'm telling you is that God sent me, and I am his son. And so, you know, in Jesus' mind, that's really all that matters, right?

[7:53] And so you kind of see this in this text. He's like, but then Jesus goes on. He says, He's given me works to do, and the works that I do also bear witness to the truth that I am from God.

[8:05] The works that I'm doing are God-like works. I have demonstrated the power to heal, to give sight, and this is only the start. God has given me bigger works to do.

[8:16] Watch and see. The works that I do will testify to the truth about me. Then he says, John the Baptist, remember John the Baptist? He's talking to his audience, right? Remember John the Baptist, the guy that you were really excited about, that you all went out to see in the wilderness, right?

[8:32] Well, he testified about me too, right? And you basically, you kind of get this, like, in the text, you see his name is like, that, you know, it's kind of like the past tense. Like, you were excited about him, but you don't believe anymore, right?

[8:44] But he is testifying to the truth because he was also sent from God. He then goes on to say, Scripture testifies about him, and then Moses testifies about him. So, Jesus is kind of like, hey, bringing this evidence to his audience.

[8:59] So that evidence might not be as, like, relevant to us. Are you guys tracking this to make sense? Right? And that Jewish mindset, though, those were the important things. Scripture, prophets, God himself, and then he's saying, and my works, the things that I'm doing, the way that I'm talking, the wisdom that I have, right, these are all evidences of the fact that God sent me.

[9:23] And you see the crowds throughout Jesus' ministry kind of saying that to the religious leaders, like, how can this guy not be from God? Who else speaks with this kind of wisdom, right? And so Jesus is saying, hey, you don't believe me, you don't like the claim that I'm making, but consider the evidence.

[9:37] Consider all these witnesses that testify to the fact that what I am saying is true. We'll go on to the next slide. The problem, however, isn't that they lack witnesses.

[9:53] The problem is that they don't actually know God. Jesus makes this clear in verse 37, saying the reason that you don't accept God's witness is because you don't actually know God.

[10:05] You've never heard of him, seen him, or understood his words. Jesus keeps being more offensive to his listeners, right? The religious leaders that Jesus was talking to, they were the religious experts of their day.

[10:18] They were dedicated to their calling. They knew scripture better than anybody. They were the ones who taught others about God. They were the ones in charge of keeping the law. They were the ones that were supposed to know God better than anybody.

[10:31] They were the ones tasked to protect the rest of the people of Israel from walking away from God like previous generations had done. And they took this job very seriously. And here Jesus comes at them claiming crazy things, claiming to be God, and he's undermining everything that they held here.

[10:48] Right? Scripture, Moses, God's testimony, and basically saying, and by the way, you don't even know God because if you knew God, you'd believe me because I'm from God.

[11:01] It's a bit circular, right? But if you take the fact that Jesus is the Son of God, it makes complete sense, right? He has authority to speak into their lives and, you know, and they want to recognize that authority, right?

[11:14] And so Jesus is showing them and the reason why you don't know my voice is because you actually never knew God's voice, right? And that is identity-jarring to these individuals, right?

[11:25] Because they had spent their entire lives, they had dedicated their lives to knowing and following God and Jesus is like, oh, you missed it, right? You missed it. And evidence that you missed it is that you don't recognize me and there are so many reasons why you should see me, right?

[11:42] Okay, and then Jesus goes on. He doesn't just, so the problem is that they don't know God and so they don't know God's words. They can't really discern that Jesus is from God and so we're going to go on and he gives them a reason.

[11:54] Here's why you don't know God. Jesus goes on to tell them that the reason why they don't believe him and he says the reason is because they don't really want to know God.

[12:10] We see this in verse 44. There we go. How can you believe, Jesus is saying, how can you believe when you receive glory from one another and you do not seek the glory that comes from God?

[12:26] They thought that they knew God but what they knew about God was being filtered through their base desire to receive glory here and now from each other. We'll get back more to that.

[12:39] But Jesus illustrates this for them using two examples. Their use of scripture in verse 39. In verse 39, Jesus says, you search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life but it is they that bear witness about me.

[12:56] You see their desire to receive glory from one another here and now clouded how they read and understood God's word. They had reduced God's word to a means by which they could obtain eternal life.

[13:10] They placed themselves at the center of the biblical story saying that if I do this and this and this I can obtain the promises of God and receive eternal life.

[13:21] They had made God's word subject to their own accomplishments. And by doing this they missed Jesus, they missed the point, they missed that all of scripture was given to them to testify about the Messiah that they would come.

[13:39] And so when Jesus comes offering life they say nah we're good we already have the life that we want. Right? We can find it our own way and our own strength through our own pursuit of scripture.

[13:57] And so they had built a system surrounding their own honor and there was no room for Jesus there. So then we go on to verse 43.

[14:12] Has everybody fallen? Am I losing tracking? Okay. It's a little meaty I guess. We'll kind of go through it for the original context and we'll try to kind of bridge to our world and provide some application.

[14:25] So that's kind of where we're headed. Alright. So the other thing the other example that Jesus is saying hey you don't know God because you're seeking glory from man and how can you believe if you're seeking glory from man and not glory for God?

[14:42] Right? And so in one way they kind of missed the point of scripture and the other way they had missed their expectation for the Messiah of a whole lot. Alright. In verse 43 it says Jesus says I have come in my father's name and you did not receive me.

[14:57] If another comes in his own name you will receive him. In this Jesus is basically saying that you have become so comfortable with your way of thinking and with your way of doing life that you only have the appetite to follow a Messiah that comes according to your expectations.

[15:15] Alright. So hey if another person came the way that you'd expect you'd follow him anywhere right? But because I came in a way that you don't expect you're blind to me right?

[15:31] So they expected a Messiah that would restore Israel to his place of global prominence. But that's not how Jesus came did he? He came as a lowly servant.

[15:43] He came humbly. he did not seek recognition glory or glory from man. Rather he sought the often unseen glory of doing the Father to God. And this was foreign to them.

[15:56] And because of that they were initially excited about the message of Don the Baptist. The text says he was a burning and shining lamp and you were willing to rejoice for a little while in his light.

[16:09] At least until he pointed to them that Jesus did not meet their expectations John did either. And they kind of threw about that. So John came saying hey the Messiah is coming and all like yeah we've been waiting for him.

[16:23] And then Jesus comes and they're like that's not what we expected. And so then they kind of like alright well John must not have been that prophet we thought. But they couldn't actually say that because a lot of the crowd believed it.

[16:36] So there's kind of this weird interaction with the subject of John. right? Okay. Okay. However missing Jesus was only half of their trouble.

[16:51] Their unwillingness to let Jesus change their expectations concerning God's Messiah also meant that they would be prone to follow false Messiahs who would be coming according to their own ideas.

[17:03] Jesus says if another comes in his own name you will receive him. And this is a dangerous consequence of requiring to God this is a dangerous consequence of them requiring God to fit into their expectations.

[17:14] Because if you filter the truth about God through the lens of your own expectations then you'll go to Jesus and be prone to follow after false Messiahs who come preaching a message that you like.

[17:25] Right? And so we see not too much longer in Israel's history that there's a lot of false Messiahs that come and they lead uprisings against Rome and things like that.

[17:37] And so he's saying not only are you missing Jesus but you're also putting yourself in a really deadly spot because you're filtering the truth about God's word through what you desire and what you expect.

[17:50] And that is a surefire way to be following after something false. Right? The religious leaders that Jesus was interacting with in this passage were blind to the true Messiah because of the things that they wanted and the things that they expected.

[18:07] It is sobering and scary. They were the best of the best of this ancient Jewish society and they were missing the very person that they had been looking for. They were the ones with the most knowledge, they were the most dedicated, they were most consistent concerning the things of God and yet they did not recognize that God was standing there right in front of them talking to them.

[18:30] This should cause us to pause and question ourselves. Are we so much wiser than them? It's easy to look back in judgment on these past generations, but that's very dangerous.

[18:44] We are just as prone to miss the point as they were. It is possible for you to be here today, to sit week in and week out under the teaching of God's word, to participate in community group, to teach in shoreline kids, and to still miss Jesus.

[19:00] us. You are not wiser, smarter, or more educated, or more discerning than this ancient crowd. No, in reality, they probably had a leg up on you in all of these areas.

[19:12] Yet they missed the point, and we are also in danger of missing the point. But the beautiful thing about this passage is that his driving aim is not simply to highlight a problem.

[19:27] So Jesus isn't interacting and being like, hey, gotcha, gotcha, gotcha, you missed it. Jesus tells us what his aim is. Jesus wants to provide them with a solution. And this is where I love it. This is where the story comes alive to us.

[19:39] Jesus knew his audience to keep things messed. Jesus knew his audience, and he knew how prone to misunderstand they were. He knows us.

[19:49] He knows how prone to misreceive his truth that we are. And so he came, and he knew that they were blinded by their own desires to receive glory from men.

[20:01] And so what does Jesus do? Well, he first heals on the Sabbath, and he tells the man that he heals to pick up his mat and walk. In doing this, he was intentionally stirring the pot. He was intentionally throwing off the power dynamic in Israel.

[20:14] Right? He was saying his word and his power, against the religious leaders and their traditions. He was opposing them, and they didn't like it. Then he adds fuel to the fire by claiming to be God, and this all accomplishes the desired effect.

[20:30] It brings the most crucial elements of the conversation to this center. Jesus is making claims about his deity, and he's saying, will you believe me?

[20:41] If you believe me, you can have life. Right? And so, out of all the things going on in Israel, and all the works that Jesus did, and all the questions he had, and all the things that you're confused about, he's like, hey, send you your attention here.

[20:53] I'm either the son of God or I'm not. Right? And if I am the son of God, then you need to believe me, and you need to trust me, and you need to send it to me. You can't have it to go away. Right? You can't maintain your desire for power, for glory, for control, for anything that you desire, can't still put me in this center.

[21:12] He's like, no, no, no, no, no. I'm not going to let you do that. I'm going to throw fuel on this fire, so that we can focus on what really matters. I am the son of God. Right? And you need to deal with that truth.

[21:24] And you need to either come to me, and if you come to me, I have the power to give life. Tyler said this. What a beautiful thing. Jesus tells him, I have the power to give life to anyone. And I'm like, nah, we're finding scripture.

[21:36] Nah, we want it from you. Right? But Jesus, in verse 34, he says, I have right, Jesus knew that if they were to come to God, they must come through him, the son of God.

[21:50] He's clear. I have the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. And so he brings himself and his deity, and he has the path to the center of the conversation.

[22:02] In a controversial way, he's okay ruffling their feathers. He's okay stirring that controversy, because he's trying to draw them out because they were blinded by the things that they wanted.

[22:14] And Jesus didn't have any feedback. And so he's like, all right, I'm going to shake it up. I'm going to make you feel uncomfortable. Right? I'm going to make you feel like you're losing control. And you are, right? Because you're not in control.

[22:26] I am. I'm the son of God. Right? And so this reaction they have to Jesus, because they feel like they're losing control, is the exact reaction that Jesus wants. Because until they get to that point, they can't turn to him truly.

[22:39] Right? And that's the same message for us. Until we get to that point where we're willing to give up control and turn to him and trust him, we're not going to have him. He's the only way. We can't hold our lives and be like, yeah, Jesus, we're good over there.

[22:53] No. We come to God through him and through him alone. Right? And Jesus wants us to know that. And so he's making this passage for all of us. Hey, you, Shoreline, people, and southeastern Connecticut, religious leaders back in Jewish, in this time, you're prone to be blind and miss the point.

[23:12] So here's the point. Here I am. Right? Right? You know, and here's all these evidences, right? And so we'll get more into that. But I love this about Jesus.

[23:23] Right? I think sometimes we think, like, Jesus is really soft. And he is. He is tender and he is kind. But he's also okay with roughing our feathers and bringing hard stuff into our life to get us to recognize because he knows the blindness that we bring into everything we do.

[23:39] We can be so blind by the things that we desire and the things that we want that we just can't see Jesus. Right? And oftentimes the things are good. Scripture talks about this. I'm going to out the notes, but whatever.

[23:50] Scripture talks about this as ideology. Right? It is when we place anything in front of God. Right? So if you say something like, if only I had brain. If I lost that, I could have handled it.

[24:03] Right? Those are the kind of things that are dear to us. The things that we turn to for security. The things that we look to for significance. Right? So the people that day were trying to find more from each other.

[24:15] I mean, how full is our society of that? Right? We're always seeking, you know, like our society is seeking fame, wealth, success, ease, entertainment, fun, trips, all this stuff.

[24:28] And that is all an attempt to get glory here and now. And Jesus comes and he says, hey, you know what? I only do the will of my father. I walk in complete dependence on him and I seek his glory and his glory alone.

[24:42] And everyone's like, nah, we're not into that, Jesus. We want our glory. We want our cake now. We want, I mean, they wanted Rome gone. They wanted Israel to have its place of glory.

[24:55] And those are great things, right? But the fact is, they were blinded by the things that they wanted and they couldn't see that Jesus was here to give them life in a far more abundant way than they could have ever desired on their own.

[25:12] So, I don't know where we're at now. Is everybody tracking? We good? All right. Jesus isn't a tertiary thing in our lives, right?

[25:26] It is through him and him alone that we receive light and we receive God and we relate to God and we restore to God. We'll get more into that. So, oh, yeah, this is good.

[25:40] So, you say, okay, all right, so Jordan, a lot of this text is like combating the religious leaders at the time, right? Hey, there's a lot of that argument. But we see this purpose statement in verse 34, right?

[25:51] So, he's talking about John and he says, but I say these things so that you may be saved. Right? So, that's where I'm getting it. Jesus is in here. He's in the trenches. He's contending with his people because he wants them to see and he wants them to be saved.

[26:04] Right? And some of them see it and some of them don't, right? You know, we don't see it here, right? In verse 40, it says, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. You know, so on one hand, it's sad.

[26:17] It's like, he's there and they refuse to come to him. But on the flip side, he's like, come to me. You can have life. Right? You know, and so, you know, but we do know that there were religious leaders at the time that did turn to Jesus.

[26:30] You know, and they became the early church, right? And so, in this, Jesus is pursuing people. And I think this is way later in the slide, but this is like a free tip, I guess, right?

[26:43] When we're looking at scripture and we're trying to understand a passage, particularly a difficult one like this, right? One of the things we always want to do is kind of like step out into the context of the whole book. in the context of the Bible.

[26:54] It's called like biblical theology, right? We use the Bible to interpret the Bible, right? So, in John 20, verse 30, I love this.

[27:07] John 20, verse 30, it says, Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book. But these things are written that so you may believe that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

[27:22] So, if you're trying to interpret John 5, John tells you, I wrote these things, this story about the invalid being healed, so that you may know that Jesus is the Son of God, which is what Jesus said, hey, I'm the Son of God, and here's how I interact with the Father, here's where he's given me authority, here's where I submit, this is where I have glory, this is, you know, and he talks about this, and it kind of blows our mind.

[27:43] And what's the purpose? That by believing you may have life in his name, right? And so I just love how that kind of tracks the three sections of this text, you know, and it's just really beautiful.

[27:56] But you say, how do you know that Jesus was trying to get their hearts? Well, verse 34, and the purpose of John, right? John was ultimately written evangelistically, right?

[28:06] He's writing to Jewish believers, wanting them to see. And so he's compiling these different stories of Jesus' life and making these things so that they'll believe, right? And so in this story, Jesus' desire is that we believe, that we see him, that we turn to him, that we wrestle with who Jesus is, and that we submit ourselves to him.

[28:26] All right. All right. So I guess we'll get to application.

[28:37] Any questions? Sorry. All right. So I got kind of like some spitfire application type stuff. Maybe some of it I'll repeat myself, but hopefully it will be fruitful.

[28:51] Jesus is the only way to God. Something we believe here, something Jesus is clear about. And I think we all give that like our intellectual assent, probably.

[29:07] Maybe we don't. I don't know everybody here. Right. But there's a difference between what we believe here and what we do with our lives. Right. And so these religious leaders are saying, hey, we believe in God.

[29:20] We're staking our lives on that. We're seeking his word, doing all these things. But they were doing all of that for the wrong reason. Right. And it's the very same way. We can say that we believe Jesus and he's the only way to God, and then we can go kind of organize our lives independent of him.

[29:36] Right. And we can live according to our own strength, for our own desires, for our own successes. And we can actually miss Jesus, that we know about him, that we believe about him mentally.

[29:48] But on the ground level of our lives, we're living independently. And I think a good way to look at this is like, hey, in your life, are you willing to submit to his word? Right. Jesus says things that are hard.

[30:00] Right. Our culture hates it. Right. He says things that burst a bubble in every culture across this world. Right. And so are we going to come to those things as Christians, or as people that are claiming to be Christians, be like, well, I trusted Jesus, but not in that area.

[30:15] Right. It's like, no. Jesus is either the Savior or he's not. You either submit to him, or you maintain control of your life. Right. And these religious leaders, they said we follow God, but they weren't willing to submit.

[30:27] They still filter the things that Jesus says through the lens of their own desires. Right. And in the end, they filter out Jesus. Right. And we can do the same thing. We can talk about him.

[30:38] We can come to church. We can sit in the queues. We can sing. And we can do all these things. But when push comes to shove, where is our reliance? On ourself? On our money?

[30:48] On our job? On our family? On health? On whatever it is? Or is our reliance truly on him? Right. Right. And here Jesus is burning up the reliance of these religious leaders.

[31:01] Right. They're like, hey, we're the smart ones. We have power. You know? We have influence. And you're just like, well, there's your influence. Hey, control this. We can't. Right. And so he's kind of like poking at what's dear to them.

[31:13] Right. And I think Jesus does that to us in our everyday life. So then the question is, will we submit to him and will we come to God through him?

[31:25] It's the only way. And it's through full submission to him. Not half of us. You know? So idolatry is blinding. I think we talked about idolatry already a little bit.

[31:40] So idolatry is anything that you desire more than God. Anything that you look to for significance, meaning, help or protection. You say things like, if only I had, or as long as I had.

[31:53] What are the people and things that motivate you most? Or ideas or concepts. Those are the things that can become finalists in our lives. Right? They can be good things. Right? It's good for me to love my wife and my family.

[32:05] But can I put them? And for God, I sure can. Right? In my flesh. But that's idolatry. Right? Because now my world revolves around my family and not around Jesus.

[32:19] Who came to say, who is the son of God. Right? And so we can be blinded by the things that we want. And usually, it's those good things that we want.

[32:30] That can be so blind. Right? The religious leaders say, well, Israel, they want their nation to not be under the oppression of another nation.

[32:42] We don't know anything about that here. We've had freedom for as long as I can remember. They were under the thumb of another nation. That's great. Right? And they wanted for their nation to be restored, to be autonomous and to have freedom.

[32:58] The things that we love here in America. Right? Those are good things. Right? But that actually wasn't the most important thing to Jesus. Right? He wanted to free their souls. Right? He wanted to free them from their sin and give them life.

[33:11] Right? And so, they were at odds with what they wanted and what they expected and so they missed Jesus in the process. Right? And we can do the same thing where we set up things that we want and that we expect and there are odds with who Jesus is and we're unwilling to submit to you in those type areas of life.

[33:33] So, we talked about how Jesus is willing to kind of like throw gas in the fire to prod, to probe, right? To shake up right? So, just a simple question.

[33:44] It's God doing that in your life today. Right? Sometimes God, you know, allows suffering in our lives. We don't know why. Right? Sometimes He does it to get our attention. We see that all throughout Scripture.

[33:56] When He talks about the children of Israel in the wilderness, He says, I let you hunger and thirst in the wilderness so that you would learn to trust Me. That you would stop trusting in the things of this world and food and water.

[34:08] That's good things. And that you would learn to live by the bread of the Word of God only. Right? It's like, I wanted you to turn your reliance on having food and water and everything you wanted and trust Me.

[34:22] And so, I let you be hungry so that you would turn to Me. Right? And that's a hard thing to understand about our God, but it is a beautiful thing. He's not going to sit there idly and let us wander off into eternity away from Him.

[34:36] Right? He's going to pass into our lives. And so, I just want to ask you, is the Lord pressing into your life today? Is He shaking things up? Is He trying to open your eyes to see the areas that you're blind to hear?

[34:48] Right? We can do this in a grand way and miss Jesus all together, but we can also segment off portions of our lives and say, no, Jesus, that's untouchable. Right? I want that here. And He's saying, I came to give you life.

[35:00] Trust Me. And other places in John, He says, I came to give you life and give it abundantly. Right? And so, we are all asked with this question, do we trust Him to give us abundant life or do we think we have to fight for it on our own according to our schedule and time?

[35:13] And unfortunately, it doesn't always come easy. Right? And we should expect that. Right? I have this point here. Dependence and true glory. Right?

[35:24] What did Jesus come doing? He came humbly. He came as a baby. He came as a servant. He suffered in love and He suffered in obedience.

[35:36] Not many of us would picture that as the beautiful life that we want. Right? But this is a life of simple faithfulness that earned glory from God. He wasn't interested in glory from man.

[35:47] He wasn't interested in comfort in his life. He wasn't interested in himself. He was simply independent, following the Father. And that was beautiful. And because of that, the Father glorified him.

[35:59] Right? In Tyler's passage, it said, I gave you the right to judge so that the world will give you glory. Right? So, Jesus, if you have the right to judge the world and they must respect you.

[36:13] Right? And I, the Father, want to glorify you in that way. And Jesus is like, and I want to depend on you. I want to walk in complete dependence on you. I don't ever want to step away from where you're leading.

[36:24] Right? And so we see this beautiful dependence, this teamwork, this working, back and forth. And we, we're like, I got this. You know? I'm going to go make that decision all by myself because I study. You know?

[36:35] And we do that all the time. And we miss the fact that Jesus is beautiful. He lived the life of simple faithfulness and dependence. And he found the glory of God.

[36:45] And we sit here and we try to exert, exert ourselves and exalt ourselves and want to do big things, take this and that and do all this stuff by storm. And we're doing it all in our self strength.

[36:55] Right? And what Jesus is painting for us is this picture of like, hey, there's beauty and this simple faithfulness that following the Lord might bring you to suffering.

[37:10] And it might be hard, but guess what the prize is leading to that? God himself, his glory that he bestows upon you. Right? Jesus has called us into that.

[37:22] Are we willing to walk the path that he did? Is that what our expectation is? Or do we set our expectations based on what our world expects? Our culture expects everything to be easy and we run away from things that are hard and we try to plan out and de-risk and do all these things and we're pushing away pain and we're running from it.

[37:41] And Jesus is here in his ministry. He's running towards pain. He went to the people who are hurting. He went to the people who are going to reject him. He allowed himself to be mocked by the people that he came to save.

[37:53] Right? And Jesus takes this lowly path and he calls us on that lowly path that the pen is beautiful. But so many of us don't want that. And maybe we don't want it because our hearts are there.

[38:04] Maybe we just don't want it because we don't expect that. Right? Because we've been so influenced by our culture to think that no, life is supposed to be easy. We're supposed to find success. We're supposed to do these things.

[38:14] And Jesus is like, well, look at my life. Look at my life. What did I come to do? I came to die. I came to suffer. I loved so well that it took me to the cross.

[38:25] Right? And we're like, oh man, love's getting hard. I'm out of jail. Right? I can't give that person anymore. And Jesus gave his entire life all the way to the cross out of love for us so that we would trust him.

[38:38] Right? So, dependence and true glory. Jesus paints a picture that is so different than the picture that we expect as a culture.

[38:48] Right? And so, I've been asking myself, what does it look like to walk in dependence? Real dependence. Every day. Right? Not just the one that takes God to big questions, but the one that is walking in constant dependence and see Jesus.

[39:01] I do nothing that the Father isn't giving you to do. Right? Actually, I have a verse. Let me read it for you. In 519, he says, Truly, truly, I say unto you, the Son can do nothing on his own accord, but only what he sees the Father do.

[39:18] For the Father, and then, in verse 22, for the Father judges no one, but he's giving all justice to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as the Father. So, we receive Jesus depending, and God will stand in glory.

[39:29] Right? Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sends him. Right? That could be the Father. Jesus, in verse 30, he says, I can do nothing on my own as I hear I judge and my judgment is just because I seek my own, because I seek not my own will, but the will of him who sent me.

[39:45] He says, I do not, in verse 41, I do not receive glory from people. And then he says, how can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes only from God?

[39:56] So, having the Bible, having a high view of the Bible is an honor. I'm actually going to read this point.

[40:09] So, one of the guys in the church that I was kind of working through this passage with texted me this morning. It could have been a more organized point. It would have been before 9 a.m.

[40:19] but, it was good. Anyway, so I'm just going to read it for you. This is not my point. I may jump off of it, but it's not my point. He said, here are some late thoughts in response to what we were talking about the text, in response to the text above.

[40:37] He says, I guess this text has often really struck me. It has stopped me dead in my tracks on several occasions because I am someone who believes passionately that the Bible is the Word of God and so I hold it in a really high regard.

[40:54] And the Pharisees did too. And Jesus explicitly points out this seemingly very good thing and then he condemns it. For a church that prides ourselves rightly on making the Bible the center of what we do, this portion of the text should be striking.

[41:11] Having a high view of the Bible is an anomaly. In a sense, the Bible is just a guidepost pointing us to Christ. If we try to live in accordance with Scripture while keeping Christ at arm's length, we have simply made the Bible our idols.

[41:24] We believe that making our rule for living will bring us fulfillment without the need for a relationship with God. It seems from this text that the litmus test is whether we are seeking the glory that comes from God or the glory that comes from the enemy.

[41:38] If we are living our lives and are practicing spiritual disciplines with the goal of receiving the praise of men, then we better run to Christ. So we lose sight of why we are doing this.

[41:51] We are not in Christ. The litmus test is are you seeking glory from above or are you seeking your own glory? And we can use God's word to seek your own glory. I've got to be careful.

[42:02] So we at Shoreline, this is kind of just a practical thing. We at Shoreline, a couple of things that we believe is really important when it comes to preaching God's word.

[42:12] We believe that we ought to preach expository, which means we let the text set our agenda. We don't come up here and bring our agenda to the text. We go through the text and we try to preach the main point of the text that we're reading.

[42:24] So the main point of the text should be the main point of our sermon. So that's how expository preaching we're trying to exposit what's in Scripture. That's good. So a lot of you are transient. Maybe you're here visiting.

[42:35] Maybe you live here. Maybe you're in the Navy or the Coast Guard or whatever. You're going to be going to other churches someday probably. So looking for a church that lets God's word set the agenda, that's a good thing.

[42:46] Do that. But on the other side, we seek to be a Christ-centered church. We talked about this biblical theology. We let Scripture interpret Scripture. But what Jesus says Scripture is about is testifying to Him.

[42:59] So our view of Scripture, if we are exposing Scripture in a way that is silent on Christ, then we're probably not doing it right. And so we want churches here, shoreline, help us.

[43:10] We want to be a church that submits to God's word and exposes the world and always keeps Christ at the center of everything we do. The center of what we say and the center of how we live. We can say Christ is the center and then go out and work in our own strength.

[43:23] That's not being Christ-centered. Being Christ-centered means we rely on Him for everything. And we need to do that as individuals and as a church and from this pulpit. So when we preach, we want to preach God's word and we want to keep it centered on Christ.

[43:36] And when you find yourselves when God takes you to a different place, look for a church that does that too. We think that's a good thing. It's really important. Christ-centered expository preaching. Alright.

[43:53] I think that's all I got. Sorry for the lack of conclusion. We do.