Sermon nuggets Weds May 28
Theme Light of the World
Verses John 8:21-27 Once more Jesus said to them, "I am going away, and you will look for me, and you will die in your sin. Where I go, you cannot come."
22 This made the Jews ask, "Will he kill himself? Is that why he says, 'Where I go, you cannot come'?"
23 But he continued, "You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am, you will indeed die in your sins."
25 "Who are you?" they asked. "Just what I have been claiming all along," Jesus replied.
26 "I have much to say in judgment of you. But he who sent me is reliable, and what I have heard from him I tell the world."
27 They did not understand that he was telling them about his Father.
God Knows
When Jesus spoke of going away He was speaking about His return to His Father and to His glory. That was precisely where His opponents could not follow Him, because by their disobedience, and their refusal to accept Him, they had shut themselves off from God. With that blindness, not only could they follow Him after His death, but neither after their death also.
God sees the beginning from the end. Jesus is equally aware of the hearts of his accusers. They do not desire to know God; they desire personal praise. They have no desire to confess sin, but cover up their plotting with clothes of self-righteousness.
Understand there was an attempt to arrest Jesus and this failed. Next there was the attempt to trap Him in the matter of the woman taken in adultery. Jesus showed Himself to be too smart for the rulers in this situation. Then there was the attempt to have His testimony discounted on the basis of a legal technicality. That didn’t work. Now they were seeking to making fun of Him personally. They are saying that if they cannot follow Him perhaps he will commit suicide. It was thought that anyone committing suicide was going to Hell. Since the rulers reasons that they would certainly be going to heaven they concluded that Jesus must be going to the other place.
As God in the flesh, Jesus in fact tell us that these people are not going to follow Him and they are the ones who will be going to Hell.
He calls us to follow Him by faith, not by sight. It is enough that God knows.
I read an interesting article awhile ago written by Mary Peterson telling us of an insect called the Processionary Caterpillar which feeds on pine needles. They move in a long procession through the trees, one leading and the others following eyes half closed and head pushed against the posterior of the one ahead. One scientist enticed a group of caterpillars unto the rim of a large flowerpot, getting the first one connected up with the last one so the procession had neither beginning nor end. To his surprise, the caterpillars did not grow tired of the useless circling. They did not set off in some new direction despite plodding around and around for seven days and seven nights. They would have kept that up until exhaustion and ultimate starvation overtook them, even though there was an ample supply of food visible and close at hand.
Sheer force of habit tradition kept the caterpillars from changing their direction even to their own destruction. That is not unlike the religious teachers and Pharisees who were blind to the light. They did not see, but they kept the eyes focused on the law without realizing what the law was trying to show them. around and around they would go.
God knows. He sees. Jesus is the one to be followed who will give life, not death. Another reason we can follow that Light is God knows what we do not.
Pastor Dale.
