Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/Sermons/zz20060604.htm

JOHN: TRUSTING JESUS AS MESSIAH AND GOD
Part XXXIX: Enjoying God's Parenting In An Evil, Perilous World
C. Part III - Living Above Evil By FOCUSING On Heeding God's Word
(John 15:1-17 et al.)

Introduction: (To show the need . . . )

Last Sunday's message out of John 15:1-17 on handling powerful evil influences in the world through heeding Scripture met a need as several listeners responded by claiming it was good to "get back to the basics" of the spiritual walk.

However, huge sections of Christendom, and believers I know who speak with me about it regularly experience failure in gaining God's blessing NOT because they don't know about obeying the Lord, but because they find heeding Scripture a strangely elusive goal:

(1) After our last Sunday morning service, a believer told me she knows various believers who have not experienced God's fulfilling joy in their lives as they have found that to be an elusive goal!

(2) A quick perusal of a Christian book catalogue I was mailed that advertises books on the Christian walk confirms this is an abundant in evangelical circles:

(a) Linda Dillow has a book out entitled, Calm My Anxious Heart with the promotional ad reading: "Women worry a lot. We worry about our children, our friends, our careers, our spouses . . !"

(b) Juanita Bynum's book, The Threshing Floor: How to Know Without a Doubt God Hears Your Every Prayer is self-explanatory, for the title sells the book to an apparent abundant audience that has trouble getting answers to prayer!

(c) Joyce Meyer's book, Battlefield of the Mind (Updated Version) runs a promotional ad that reads: "Like a chessboard, your mind is a battlefield. And doubt, worry, confusion, depression, anger and condemnation are the enemy's pawns."

(d) Ann Graham Lotz wrote the book, I Saw the Lord in which she notes the emptiness believers see in their walk with God as can be gleaned from the book's ad: " . . . Lotz invites us on a journey to seek the close presence of God -- an important relationship that can often be shut out by the busyiness, pressures, and problems of life."



So, when a believer wants God's blessing in his life, and he knows it takes obeying God, but he finds even such OBEDIENCE to be an ELUSIVE goal, IS there a PRACTICAL SOLUTION?!



(We turn to the sermon "Need" section . . . )



Need: "I know that I must obey God's Word for Him to bless me with His edifying involvement in my life, but though I want this to occur, I find it is usually an elusive goal! What is the solution?!"
  1. Jesus knew His men would sin though they wanted to heed Him, so He revealed God's parental oversight that addresses this need:
    1. Jesus knew that it was an elusive goal for Peter constantly to heed Him: when Christ predicted Peter would deny Him before the cock crowed in John 13:38, He was RESPONDING to Peter's futile pledge to be willing to lay down his life for Christ, cf. John 13:37!
    2. To address this need, Jesus expounded on God's parental oversight:
      1. In John 13:33, Jesus called them "little children", i.e., "teknia," "a diminutive expression [of] . . . affection . . . like a father to his little children;" strikingly, this term appears only here in all of the Gospels, Leon Morris, John (NICNT), p. 632, ftn. 67.
      2. Later in that conversation, Jesus said He would not leave His men "as orphans," ['orphanous] (John 14:18; U. B. S. Grk. N. T., 1966 ed., p. 388; Arndt & Ging., Grk.-Engl. Lex. of N. T., 1967, p. 586).
  2. That Divine Parental Oversight is taught in John 13:33-17:26, and we view that part where God urges us to obey His Word by FOCUSING AS A WAY OF LIFE on HEEDING SCRIPTURE:
    1. In a brief review of our last message on John 15:2-17, we found that a believer's "remaining" as a figurative "branch" in Christ, the figurative "Vine" involves that believer's OBEYING God's Word, John 15:3, 7.
    2. However, the Greek verb in John 15 for "remain" (meno) is not really a full synonym for "obey"; rather, viewing what meno meant in Jesus' era reveals it points to a focus as a way of life on applying Scripture:
      1. E. M. Sidebottom's, The Christ of the Fourth Gospel, 1961, p. 37 noted the term, "'abide'" was "'a technical term with the rabbis'" in Jesus' time that was explained in the saying: "'When ten men sit together and occupy themselves with the Torah, the Shekinah abides among them,'" cited in Morris, Ibid., p. 670, ftn. 13.
      2. [Now, "Shekinah" is not in Scripture; it was coined by the Jews to depict God's presence on earth, Zon. Pic. Enc. of Bib., v. 5, p. 388.]
      3. Thus, though Jesus referred to this rabbinic concept in John 14:21, 23 and John 15, He developed it MUCH FURTHER as follows:
        1. Though the rabbis held that when ten men sat together being preoccupied with Scripture, they experienced God's presence in that meeting, Jesus in John 14:21, 23 and John 15 held that if a believer became so preoccupied as a way of life with using Scripture, He and His Father would make their abode in that LIFE , not JUST as he was involved in a Bible study!
        2. Thus, if a believer is FOCUSED AS A WAY OF LIFE on USING Scripture in ALL of his LIFE, God the Father and God the Son, Jesus Christ, will make their VISIBLE and EDIFYING PRESENCE SEEN IN that party's ROUTINE!
      4. Likewise, John's use of meno ("remain") in contexts on fellowship with God in John's writings reveals the same need for believers to FOCUS as a WAY of LIFE on God's Word so as to APPLY it in ALL of their LIVES to enjoy God's fulfilling JOY in LIVING:
        1. 2 John 9 alluded to those who failed to focus on the truth only to go into error: (1) John warned of those who did not "remain" (meno) in the belief that Christ is God in the flesh, cf. 2 John 7. (2) They had "gone too far" (proago), Ibid., Arndt & Ging., p. 708-709. Instead of FOCUSING as a WAY OF LIFE on the TRUTH, they had LEFT it, GOING TOO FAR into error!
        2. John then often used the term, "remain" (meno) to urge believers to STAY FOCUSED on Scripture: (1) in 1 John 2:14 he spoke of "young men" who were so focused upon and used Scripture in everyday events that they defeated Satan in their walk, Ibid., U. B. S. Grk. N. T., p. 815; (2) in 1 John 2:24 he urged believers to focus continually upon applying God's truth that they not slide into error, Ibid., p. 816; (3) in 1 John 2:27-28 he urged us to stay focused on the doctrine of the incarnation that we not err and be ashamed at Christ's coming, Ibid., p. 817!
Application: To know JOY in seeing GOD'S EDIFYING PRESENCE at work to BLESS us in our DAILY ROUTINE, we must (1) trust in Christ as Savior to become a child of God (John 1:11-13) and become indwelt by the Holy Spirit, Romans 8:9b. (2) Then, we must rely on the indwelling Holy Spirit to FOCUS as a WAY of LIFE on APPLYING Scripture to see God enter our EVERYDAY ROUTINES with CONSTANT blessing to our JOY!

Lesson: Since even our GOOD INTENTIONS of OBEYING God can fail as Peter's good intent not to deny Jesus failed, WE BELIEVERS need to FOCUS as a WAY of LIFE on SCRIPTURE'S USE in our LIVES by relying on the power of the Holy Spirit to know JOY in living, Gal. 5:16!

Conclusion: (To illustrate the sermon lesson . . . )

 The Lord has applied this message in a wonderfully rich way:

Dave Hunt's May, 2006 issue of The Berean Call, a newsletter seeking to guard God's Bible truths, claims on page 4 that when Jesus in Luke 22:15 said, "I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer," He did not eat the real passover, but "something new."

I was astounded to read this! Oh, I knew Dave wanted to make Luke 22:15 where Jesus ate the passover the night before He died agree with John 18:28 where Israel's leaders ate it the next day, but his explanation came at the cost of having the candid claim by Jesus to eat the passover mean He was not eating it -- an intolerable stretch!

The solution came when I recalled what we have found from our current Sunday evening Bible expositions on "Profitably Learning >From The Errors Of The Cults"! We learned that several major cults went into error by relying on the King James Version and not viewing the Bible's original text(s) and setting! Thus, I did some research and found there were two ways of telling time in Jesus' day: Galilean Jews felt a day was composed of a sunrise-to-sunrise where Judaea's Jews held it was a sunset-to-sunset event; Jesus, a Galilean, ate the passover the night before He died where the Judaean Jews ate it the next day, cf. Harold Hoehner, Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ, p. 75-90. So, (a) Jesus did not institute a "new passover" as Hunt claims, but the Lord's Table at the passover, (b) and Luke does not conflict with John!

This brought great relief! Also, (1) I saw that from now on, I must CHECK Dave Hunt's newsletters by my own exposition of God's Word as he like some of the cults is vulnerable to falling into error by failing to use adequate Bible study tools! (2) (Though Dave does not hold to it), I was also impressed by our need to be strongly opposed to the [errant] "King James Only" view as it can tend toward cultism! (3) I also see the need to FOCUS on ALL our SCRIPTURE EXPOSITIONS in our Adult Sunday School Classes, Sunday Evening Services, Wednesday Prayer Meeting Services or Sunday morning services! God wants me to keep that a KEY priority to sustain our joy in Him! (4) Finally, I again see the Lord confirming what I informally reported to you before last Sunday's morning sermon -- He is leading me A-LESSON-AT-A-TIME!

May we FOCUS as a WAY of LIFE on the EXPOSITION of SCRIPTURE to enjoy God's sustained JOY in ALL of our LIVES!