"Peace Be With You" John 20:19-23

[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the preaching ministry of the Agopic Baptist Church in George South Africa.

[SPEAKER_01]: Good morning, church.

[SPEAKER_01]: You're visiting this morning, especially welcome to you.

[SPEAKER_01]: I pray that the Lord is speaking to your heart.

[SPEAKER_01]: and that you're able to rejoice through song and prayer in the Word and through the proclamation of the Word.

[SPEAKER_01]: In John chapter 20, in this gospel, according to John, we have seen that Jesus Christ is risen and that the tomb is empty, the tomb is empty and he is risen.

John 20 · chapter mention

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus has appeared to Mary Magdalene, instructing her to go and tell Jesus' brothers the disciples that he is risen.

[SPEAKER_01]: And the other gospels were told that Jesus also appeared to the other women who came to the tomb.

[SPEAKER_01]: As they came to the tomb and they saw the angelic messenger who announced the risen Lord, they fled from the tomb and fear and wonder and Jesus meets them as they're

[SPEAKER_01]: and he tells the go tell his brothers that I am risen.

[SPEAKER_01]: The inward told also in the other gospels that Jesus appeared privately to Simon Peter.

[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know anything about that other than that the Lord met with Peter privately.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then he appeared to Cleopis and another disciple on the road to Amaz.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we're told that,

[SPEAKER_01]: When Cliephus and the other disciple realized that they have been speaking with the Lord and he disappears from their sight they rush all the way back to Jerusalem that same night that first Sunday they rush all the way back and find the disciples hiding in a locked room and they are speaking to the disciples saying we have seen the risen Lord and as they are speaking to those disciples

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus appears in their midst in this locked room.

[SPEAKER_01]: As we read this passage together in John 20, remember that the disciples have just experienced to have just gone through three days of cowardice, horror, guilt, defeat, and doubt.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's where we're meeting them.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's where the Lord Jesus meets them in this locked room.

[SPEAKER_01]: They are filled with these things because they had abandoned their master to a brutal death and were in hiding from the Roman and Jewish authorities.

[SPEAKER_01]: And now there are rumors that Jesus is risen from the dead, but they can't believe it.

[SPEAKER_01]: When some of the women come, they say it sounded like a fairy tale.

[SPEAKER_01]: I just some room or something false, they couldn't believe it, some of them.

[SPEAKER_01]: And even if some of them wanted to believe, and even if some of them were beginning to believe,

[SPEAKER_01]: The question is, how can they face him?

[SPEAKER_01]: How can they look upon the one they betrayed and the one they allowed to be arrested and crucified and some of them denied them, others ran away and fear.

[SPEAKER_01]: Others simply watched, as he was crucified.

[SPEAKER_01]: How can they face the one they've abandoned?

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what we're going to read about.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is the temperature of the room when Jesus appears in their midst.

[SPEAKER_01]: So let's read the passage together.

[SPEAKER_01]: John 20, I'm going to begin in verse 19, read through 23 this morning, John 20, 19.

[SPEAKER_01]: On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, it's still Sunday, the day he was risen.

[SPEAKER_01]: The doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, peace be with you.

[SPEAKER_01]: When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side, then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus said to them, again, peace be with you.

[SPEAKER_01]: As the Father has sent me, even so, I am sending you.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you withhold the forgiveness from any, it is with hope.

[SPEAKER_01]: Until there, let's pray together.

[SPEAKER_01]: Heavenly Father, thank you for the risen Savior.

[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ,

[SPEAKER_01]: for all mankind to see and to know that there is a God in heaven, the Creator God, the one true God, and He is a saving God, a merciful, and gracious heavenly Father, Lord, I thank you for this good news and for the risen Christ who is alive today and is seated on your right hand, interseeding for us.

[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, I pray that if there is anyone here who has not experienced

[SPEAKER_01]: I pray that today would be that day that they would cast down all their resistance, all of their objections, all the false loves that the world offers, and that today would be the day that they experienced true peace and their own souls for the first time in their life.

[SPEAKER_01]: And for the rest of us, Lord, who are Christians, we are plagued every day with the temptation to give up our peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: in order to chase after these false loves that the devil is tempting us with.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that our own hearts are filled with Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: This heart that has not yet been fully glorified, fully sanctified yet, it still stirs up these lusts of the flesh, the lusts of the eyes and the pride of life Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: We are so enthamed by these things when we look away from you or when we treat you as a trifling matter

[SPEAKER_01]: or we begin to believe that the world is what is delightful.

[SPEAKER_01]: Forgive us, Lord, can vict us this morning if we have been dabbling in the world and Father, please grant us this piece that we're reading about and gonna study this morning.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please, Father, would you do this?

[SPEAKER_01]: Because we know that as Christians experience the peace of God in Jesus Christ,

[SPEAKER_01]: and our joy will drive us to praise Jesus Christ, which is the advancement of the gospel in this world for your glory in our joy, amen.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus steps into the locked room of the disciples guilt and doubts and fear and he speaks peace to them.

[SPEAKER_01]: Luke tells us that the disciples were frightened,

[SPEAKER_01]: But Jesus repeats the phrase, peace be with you, to assure them that they are in no danger.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then to prove that he is not a ghost, he shows them his hands and his side.

[SPEAKER_01]: He allows them to touch him and to feel that he is truly bodily alive.

[SPEAKER_01]: proving that he's not a ghost.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, his body was different.

[SPEAKER_01]: It was a glorified body, but his natural body had been raised and then changed into something incorruptible, something internal.

[SPEAKER_01]: We've seen that in previous weeks, about the resurrected glorified body of Christ, which is our hope to one day have as well, to attain that the glorified body,

[SPEAKER_01]: on the coming at the coming of Christ.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus also speaks peace to them because they were ashamed for abandoning him.

[SPEAKER_01]: Especially Peter, think about his battle with guilt.

[SPEAKER_01]: He denied the Lord three times saying, I do not know the man while cursing.

[SPEAKER_01]: He denied him and he's still battling

[SPEAKER_01]: This phrase, peace with you is also a traditional greeting, which has a variation still in use today.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's this idea of shalom, shalom, which means peace or unity, completeness or wholeness.

[SPEAKER_01]: But I don't believe Jesus is simply using a traditional greeting and then repeating it three times.

[SPEAKER_01]: I believe John is repeating this record of Jesus saying this three times in John 20 to emphasize that his meaning is far greater, far greater.

[SPEAKER_01]: The biblical meaning of peace has now burst into creation, and has burst through the curtain of sin and death into the world that God has created.

[SPEAKER_01]: I think that's what Jesus is announcing.

[SPEAKER_01]: The risen Lord is announcing peace be unto you, or peace be with you, I have one.

[SPEAKER_01]: I purchased this piece on the cross, and now I'm here to deliver it to all those who believe in me.

[SPEAKER_01]: Think with me back, all the way to Genesis 1.

[SPEAKER_01]: There God created a world that was perfectly at peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: You realize that God created the world at peace, and He testified about everything that He had made and said, it is very good.

[SPEAKER_01]: The peace I have created on earth is very good.

[SPEAKER_01]: But with the temptation of Adam and Eve and the rebellion, their peace was shattered.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what happened at the fall.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace was shattered into pieces.

[SPEAKER_01]: They were no longer at peace with their own bodies.

[SPEAKER_01]: With each other, with the earth, or ultimately with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace was gone.

[SPEAKER_01]: But then in Genesis 15 verse 15, there is hope for peace.

Genesis 15:15

[SPEAKER_01]: When God makes a covenant with Abraham, and the word peace is used for the first time in our English Bible.

[SPEAKER_01]: In this covenant, God promises to bless Abraham's descendants, bringing them out of Egypt with great wealth one day, and giving them the land of Cainin as a possession.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's looking forward with his promise, this covenant.

[SPEAKER_01]: but then God promises that Abraham will go to his fathers in peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: So this is a promise that Abraham is going to die in peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: up into this point we just had list of generation after generation man after man after man who lived some even a couple hundred years one got close even to a thousand years i believe and that says and he died it is the testimony of sin and rebellion that brings death and death and death and more death but at abrum god says i will take you to your fathers meaning to

[SPEAKER_01]: in peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: The first time that words used in our Bible, because of Abrams' faith in the one creator God, God would permit Abrams to go to his death fully convinced that he was accepted by God and that there was comfort and belonging waiting for him on the other side of death.

[SPEAKER_01]: from this point on peace, this word peace ultimately begins to take on the idea of wholeness, soundness, or well-being in your own soul, because you know God is for you and no longer against you.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is the ultimate meaning of this word peace in our Bibles.

[SPEAKER_01]: but the Old Testament makes it clear that man cannot attain peace with God through their own good works.

[SPEAKER_01]: Even Abraham needed God to stoop down and call him out from being a moon worshiping pagan in Earth and Caldeans.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what Abraham was when God called him.

[SPEAKER_01]: The Old Testament tells us that

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what the Old Testament tells us, even about Abram.

[SPEAKER_01]: But when God called him out, he stooped down and he calls Abram out from being a pagan, idolater, and when Abram responds and sees and hears this God and responds with faith, God looks at his faith, he looks upon it, and he counts righteousness to Abram.

[SPEAKER_01]: Abraham did not earn righteousness and he was not righteous enough to be right with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: He was not.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yet God looked at his faith and counted righteousness to him.

[SPEAKER_01]: Who's righteousness?

[SPEAKER_01]: Who's righteousness was counted to Abraham?

[SPEAKER_01]: We're told that it was the Lord Jesus Christ.

[SPEAKER_01]: That the God our Father looked forward.

[SPEAKER_01]: to the righteousness of Christ and says, I will count His righteousness, that's coming to you, Abraham, Abraham, Abraham, that is how he received peace with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: The story of the Old Testament is that God must ultimately stoop down and provide peace for His people.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's the message of the Old Testament.

[SPEAKER_01]: God must do it.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're not doing it.

[SPEAKER_01]: We're failing miserably.

[SPEAKER_01]: God must do this.

[SPEAKER_01]: God is the only one who can restore and make whole that which was broken at the garden of Eden and every day since.

[SPEAKER_01]: And throughout the Old Testament, this theme of peace with God is developed through types and images.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to list some of them for you here.

[SPEAKER_01]: The types and images and the

[SPEAKER_01]: the one who brings peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: First, Melchizedek, who is called the King of Peace, the King of Peace, and priest of God most high.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then in the New Testament, we're going to be told about Melchizedek that he is a type of the Christ that would come, a foreshadowing of Jesus Christ, who is the King of Peace, and priest of God most high.

[SPEAKER_01]: Then Joseph,

[SPEAKER_01]: As ruler and savior of God's people in Egypt, he speaks the word peace, shalom to his brothers who sold him into slavery.

[SPEAKER_01]: His brothers who betrayed him, abandoned him.

[SPEAKER_01]: He says peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace brothers.

[SPEAKER_01]: Exodus then introduces the peace offering and the rest of Scripture references this peace offering 315 times the way in the Old Testament where you came to God through the sacrificial blood to gain peace with God but it was just a type of the blood that was coming the holy blood of the Lamb of God.

[SPEAKER_01]: God then grants his covenant of peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: He uses that phrase.

[SPEAKER_01]: I grant a covenant of peace to finnious because he was jealous for his God and made a tonement for the people of Israel.

[SPEAKER_01]: Numbers 25 or 12.

[SPEAKER_01]: Then Gideon, or told, is amazed that he has been permitted to look at the angel of the Lord face-to-face and has not died.

[SPEAKER_01]: Therefore, he builds an altar and calls it,

[SPEAKER_01]: the Lord is peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yahweh Salon.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yahweh Salon.

[SPEAKER_01]: Zion, we're told that is the city of David and is later called J. Rue Selam.

[SPEAKER_01]: The city of peace, the foundation of peace is another way.

[SPEAKER_01]: You

[SPEAKER_01]: And David then sings in the city in the songs of the peace that comes from God saying, in peace, I will both lie down and sleep for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, he's talking about our physical bodies and how the Lord had preserved his physical body through many trials and battles and by being chased around the wilderness in caves by salt.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, he's talking about that, but my friends look beyond that momentary answering a prayer for the physical body being saved and think about how we will dwell safely for ever through the Lord, the Lord, and therefore we can lie down in peace, every night, and in our death bed, we can lay down in peace because the Lord

[SPEAKER_01]: will make us to all safely forever.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's the message of the Old Testament about these types and images of peace, but the kings, priests and elders of Israel, though they knew these images and had seen these

[SPEAKER_01]: The King's priests and elders of Israel ultimately though rebel against the Lord and bring upon the city of peace, God's judgment.

[SPEAKER_01]: They bring upon Jerusalem and Israel the four judgments of misery that we're told about, which are sword, famine, wild beasts and plague.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it becomes even more clear that God must provide a Savior who will establish a peace that will last.

[SPEAKER_01]: What was happening is that Israel had peace for a generation with a specific, with just one King's lifetime.

[SPEAKER_01]: But then the next King that came, rebelled against the Lord and brought misery.

[SPEAKER_01]: And it is a back and forth with most of the King's bringing misery.

[SPEAKER_01]: and it becomes clear that these kings, these prophets, these priests, these elders, they're not bringing the peace God as promised.

[SPEAKER_01]: So we need a Savior that will bring an everlasting peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: And in the middle of this misery, and they rebellion of Israel,

[SPEAKER_01]: God gives promises to his prophets of a coming Messiah who would bring this everlasting peace, a peace without end.

[SPEAKER_01]: Isaiah tells us of a child that would be born whose name will be wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, Prince of peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: There will be no end.

[SPEAKER_01]: In his EQ, the Lord promised us saying, I will rescue my flock.

[SPEAKER_01]: They shall no longer be a prey.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I will judge between sheep and sheep.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I will set up over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them, he shall feed them, and be their shepherd, and I, the Lord, will be their God, and my servant David shall be Prince among them.

[SPEAKER_01]: I am the Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: I have spoken, I will make with them a covenant of peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Micah prophesies.

[SPEAKER_01]: that a ruler will be born in Bethlehem, whose coming forth is from of old from ancient days, and he shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord in the majesty of the name of the Lord, his God, and they shall dwell secure.

[SPEAKER_01]: For now he shall be great to the ends of the earth, and he shall be the peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: He doesn't just bring peace, where he is.

[SPEAKER_01]: there is peace because he is our peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Then in the New Testament, Zechariah the father of John the Baptist, prophesies that this Messiah is here.

[SPEAKER_01]: He has come and John will go before him, it prepare the way for him.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is Luke 1, 68 through 79.

[SPEAKER_01]: Zechariah prophesies blessed be the Lord God of Israel for he has visited and redeemed his people and has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David.

[SPEAKER_01]: As he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from of old, he's talking about what I've just read from the prophets.

[SPEAKER_01]: that we should be saved from our enemies or from the hand of all who hate us.

[SPEAKER_01]: To show the mercy promised us to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant.

[SPEAKER_01]: The oath that he swore to our Father Abraham to grant us that we being delivered from the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now he switches and looks at his newborn baby.

[SPEAKER_01]: And you, child, John, speaking of John the Baptist, will be called the prophet of the most high for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins because of the tender mercy of our God.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now he switches back and speaks about the Christ.

[SPEAKER_01]: The one who's come, he says, whereby the sunrise.

[SPEAKER_01]: John is the messenger that's running down the road saying, the sun is about to rise, the sun is about to rise and behind him on the horizon.

[SPEAKER_01]: You see the first glimmers, the first rays of the sun coming up.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's the picture in the sacrifice mind.

[SPEAKER_01]: He says, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.

[SPEAKER_01]: And hear this, to guide our feet into the way of peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that's exactly what Jesus did.

[SPEAKER_01]: He was the light of the world, proclaiming the gospel of God, saying the time is fulfilled.

[SPEAKER_01]: The kingdom of God is at hand.

[SPEAKER_01]: Repent and believe in the gospel.

[SPEAKER_01]: Turn from your sins and believe that Jesus is the anointed one of God sent to establish His kingdom of eternal peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: So that's what Jesus came announcing.

[SPEAKER_01]: He came announcing the promised kingdom of peace, then on the cross, he purchased our peace with God, with his own blood.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what was happening on the cross.

[SPEAKER_01]: It just wasn't an example of self-sacrifice that we can just follow his example, no.

[SPEAKER_01]: to bring us peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what was happening on the cross.

[SPEAKER_01]: He purchased our peace with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: And now, think about this on the resurrection morning, on the resurrection day on the Sabbath in John 20, he stands in front of his disciples and says, peace be with you.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is what we're reading about.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace be with you.

[SPEAKER_01]: On the cross, Jesus purchased our peace with God and rising from the tune Jesus delivers it.

[SPEAKER_01]: And becomes our eternal peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Christian, as long as Jesus Christ is alive, you have peace with God because He lives.

[SPEAKER_01]: John tells us that when Jesus speaks peace to His disciples that they were glad.

[SPEAKER_01]: I feel like it's a bit of an understatement.

[SPEAKER_01]: This word glad can be translated also joyful or joy filled.

[SPEAKER_01]: The other gospels tell us that they were amazed and stunned because of their joy seeing the risen Christ.

[SPEAKER_01]: They're guilt for abandoning Jesus, and they're fear the Jewish authorities, and they're doubts about the kingdom of God.

[SPEAKER_01]: All these begin to melt away as they receive the announcement of peace from the risen Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: And my friends, the same joy is for you and for me.

[SPEAKER_01]: The same joy is for you and for me, if we receive by faith the announcement of peace from the risen Lord every day of our lives.

[SPEAKER_01]: There was a first day that we received that, and we were brought into the family of God.

[SPEAKER_01]: But you and I both can testify.

[SPEAKER_01]: that there are days we do not feel joy filled in the Lord and our and it's because our peace we are letting it slip away or we've treated it as a light thing of little value to us by the way that we're living in this world or delighting in the false pleasures of the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: And that's what I say that by faith we must receive every day of our lives, this announcement of peace, valuing it as the sacred, holy, infinitely worthy thing it is of infinite value to us peace with God should never despise it or look lightly upon it by the way we're living our lives.

[SPEAKER_01]: But there are some sitting here today who have never experienced a single hour of true peace within their own souls because they have never let go of this world.

[SPEAKER_01]: and fallen before the risen Lord in repentance, which is a word which means to turn away from the love of the world and turn in faith to Jesus in your love for Him as the Savior.

[SPEAKER_01]: If that is you sitting here this morning, you have never truly experienced this peace with God in your own soul.

[SPEAKER_01]: Then Jesus offers to you his eternal peace if you will abandon your allegiance to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, in the pride of life.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you will abandon your allegiance to those things which belong to this world and the king of this world, which is the devil, that's what he offers you.

[SPEAKER_01]: and you must turn in a band in your allegiance to those things.

[SPEAKER_01]: Why would you do that?

[SPEAKER_01]: Let's just ask the question that's on many unbelievers minds.

[SPEAKER_01]: Why would I do that?

[SPEAKER_01]: Give up everything that is delightful to me right now.

[SPEAKER_01]: Why would I do that?

[SPEAKER_01]: The only reason you would do that.

[SPEAKER_01]: is because when you look at Jesus, you finally can see his infinite beauty and worth and power to grant you the thing your soul truly longs for.

[SPEAKER_01]: He's true peace and fellowship with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: Every human being has a God-sized hole in their heart if they are not born again.

[SPEAKER_01]: every human being does.

[SPEAKER_01]: Every human being desires peace, whether they know it, whether they can say it in those words, every human being desires to be at peace in their own soul.

[SPEAKER_01]: At peace with the Creator, through they know and their hearts exists, though they might try and play that down as much as they can.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace with their own bodies,

[SPEAKER_01]: Is that a true Christian?

[SPEAKER_01]: We all struggle at not being at peace in this body of flesh.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace with your neighbor.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace with your family members.

[SPEAKER_01]: How can we have that?

[SPEAKER_01]: Every human being desires that.

[SPEAKER_01]: And there is a God-sized hole in the heart of unbelievers that can only be filled.

[SPEAKER_01]: by abandoning your allegiance to the lust of this world and turning in a greater and better love for the Savior.

[SPEAKER_01]: For others here today, you're Christian.

[SPEAKER_01]: You are.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know you've been born again, born of God, that you've repented and believed, that you were justified in the courtroom of heaven and that you began to follow him.

[SPEAKER_01]: You know that, you have memory of that, and you have a faint memory of the peace you were experiencing at that time.

[SPEAKER_01]: But because of the way you are living right now or have lived in the recent past, you are now filled with shame, because you have lived shamelessly before your master.

[SPEAKER_01]: and you are currently filled with shame, guilt, and maybe even fear like these disciples in this locked room.

[SPEAKER_01]: I know what it feels like to see my peace with God and my peace and my own soul slip away and fade.

[SPEAKER_01]: Because I distanced myself from Jesus because I was feeling ashamed.

[SPEAKER_01]: So filled with shame because of my own moral or spiritual failures that I didn't really want to talk to him.

[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't want to face him.

[SPEAKER_01]: Part of me loved the immorality or the failure in my own life and my own heart.

[SPEAKER_01]: It still loved it and didn't want to give it up even as a Christian.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I know what it is like to see my peace fading.

[SPEAKER_01]: But my fellow Christians, stop and look at this room where the disciples have locked themselves and barricaded themselves in this room.

[SPEAKER_01]: Stop and look with me and think about their guilt and their fear and their shame.

[SPEAKER_01]: Sit in this room and consider the words of Jesus as he appears in this locked room and says peace, peace, peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: Three times he repeats it in John 20.

[SPEAKER_01]: Therefore, as we consider the peace of God and how Jesus Christ offers it to us, even though we have abandoned him at times.

[SPEAKER_01]: Even though we have lived shamelessly before him, even though we feel dirty and unclean, he comes and says, peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: My brothers, my sisters, repent and believe the good news that I am your peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: You don't earn peace with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: I offer you peace despite the wickedness of your works and your failure.

[SPEAKER_01]: I offer you peace, repent and receive it by faith alone.

[SPEAKER_01]: Therefore Christian reject whatever shameful behavior is in your life.

[SPEAKER_01]: like your body rejects bad sushi.

[SPEAKER_01]: We all have that mental picture.

[SPEAKER_01]: We have all probably experienced something along those lines.

[SPEAKER_01]: And I call you Christian spiritually, reject shameful behavior like your body rejects sushi.

[SPEAKER_01]: name it for the app harrant rebellion it is and cast it out from your heart from the loaves in your heart cast it out please do not explain it away don't say things like yeah I've been a bit of a bad boy I've heard that don't say things like oops yeah I did

[SPEAKER_01]: name it for the apparent rebellion against the king who saved you.

[SPEAKER_01]: Name it for what it is, and then fall on your knees, cast yourself upon the mercy of the risen Lord who died to wash you from that very sin, and you will receive His peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is how Christ grants you His peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: is when you name sin for sin and you turn your back from it and cast yourself upon his goodness, not your own.

[SPEAKER_01]: Cast your hope on his goodness and he says peace to you, my brother and my sister, peace with God, peace in your own soul, peace with fellow believers,

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace, knowing that you are loving your neighbor as yourself.

[SPEAKER_01]: Peace, even with your own body.

[SPEAKER_01]: How can I have peace with my own body?

[SPEAKER_01]: How is that possible?

[SPEAKER_01]: Well, we can have peace with our own bodies because we accept that it is decaying and is fading and is going to get old and get hurts and pains and aches and it's going to die if the Lord doesn't return first.

[SPEAKER_01]: I accept that.

[SPEAKER_01]: I receive that as the truth and I'm not going to fight against that as if to save my physical body is how I'm going to have peace in this life and no, no, no, no, my friends.

[SPEAKER_01]: If that is your goal, you will have misery in this life.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you're trying to save your body.

[SPEAKER_01]: except the truth that it is fading and will perish and will die and be put in the ground.

[SPEAKER_01]: While rejoicing in the hope that one day God has promised that he will raise it and glorify it to be incorruptible, never experiencing pain again.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not another tear will be shed from those eyes and you will have a glorified body that is able

[SPEAKER_01]: worshiping Him, delighting Him for ever.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is how we find peace with our own bodies.

[SPEAKER_01]: This peace in and through Jesus Christ brings the Christian great joy and this joy in Jesus' peace drives us on a mission which is what we're going to look at next in John 20, 21 and these points

[SPEAKER_01]: I just needed to lay the foundation of what he's talking about about peace so that these other things make sense.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus said to them again, peace be with you as the Father has sent me even so I'm sending you.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus first grants peace to His disciples.

[SPEAKER_01]: They are filled with joy and then he commissions them to go on mission into the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: His peace produces our joy, which drives his mission.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you love to take notes, please write that down.

[SPEAKER_01]: His peace produces our joy, which drives his mission in the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: One of the most ridiculous things I can think of is someone sharing the good news of peace with God when that person

[SPEAKER_01]: is an experiencing peace and the subsequent joy in their own soul.

[SPEAKER_01]: Think about that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Think about how ridiculous that is for someone to run around saying you also can have peace with God, but man, this world is miserable isn't it?

[SPEAKER_01]: Today is a terrible day.

[SPEAKER_01]: I can't believe how miserable I am, but you too can have peace with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: How many opportunities are wasted?

[SPEAKER_01]: and how many people laugh at the gospel and think it's ridiculous because Christians are mucking around in the sewage of the world, finding themselves despondent, wondering why God hasn't granted me joy, hanging on to the world and the things of the world and say,

[SPEAKER_01]: world in one hand saying, God grant me joy in the other, if you find it hard or impossible to praise the peace you have in Jesus to other people, then maybe may I suggest it is because you are not delighting in Jesus' peace as you should.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's not the great and wonderful thing in your sight

[SPEAKER_01]: You're not delighting in this piece.

[SPEAKER_01]: There are other delights that blind your sight of him.

[SPEAKER_01]: Your taste buds are distracted by the world's candy floss.

[SPEAKER_01]: I love using that spoke awesome or candy floss illustration.

[SPEAKER_01]: It paints a picture in my mind because it looks so good.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when it's rolled up on that stick, it's huge.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's the size of a soccer ball.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when you buy into it, you're like, wow, that is sweet and then it's gone and if you eat a lot of it, you feel sick afterward.

[SPEAKER_01]: So many of our taste buds are distracted by the world's candy floss.

[SPEAKER_01]: And many of us are blasting the world's song into our ears, while Jesus stands in the room saying, peace.

[UNKNOWN]: Peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: But we've got those bows, head sets on.

[SPEAKER_01]: Blasting the world's message.

[SPEAKER_01]: the world's song, if you will.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not talking about ungodly songs.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, don't listen to songs with cursing and immorality in it.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please don't do that.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's not what I'm talking about.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm talking about the message of the world with its music.

[SPEAKER_01]: It's so filling our minds and our ears that we cannot hear the words of Jesus saying peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm bringing you my peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: We do that through movies and the news.

[SPEAKER_01]: Through music, yes, it comes as well.

[SPEAKER_01]: Through the friends we spend time with and allow to influence our thoughts.

[SPEAKER_01]: Your, we can have friends with, we can be friends with unbelievers, but please don't let them be the kind of friend that actually influenced you, and that's really hard.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is really hard to get right.

[SPEAKER_01]: They should be your friend.

[SPEAKER_01]: because you want to see them saved.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not because you get something from them.

[SPEAKER_01]: Friends, please be careful of looking to get something from an unbeliever.

[SPEAKER_01]: They will end up influencing you and you will begin listening to their song, their message.

[SPEAKER_01]: As Christians, we can either discipline ourselves to reject the harmful distractions of the world

[SPEAKER_01]: That sounds judgmental, but in fact, it is the love of God to do so.

[SPEAKER_01]: For He disciplines every child that He loves, so that we will not go on half blind, tasteless in heart of hearing to the joys of our peace with God.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is a loving, heavenly Father.

[SPEAKER_01]: But He does say, examine yourself, discipline your own heart and life first.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is my, that's God's desire for us.

[SPEAKER_01]: But if that fails and we fail to do that, he says, but I will come and discipline you for my glory and your joy, because I am a loving Heavenly Father.

[SPEAKER_01]: And when the beauty and worth of Jesus' peace breaks into your soul, filling you to overflowing with joy, then you will praise Him.

[SPEAKER_01]: You will praise Him.

[SPEAKER_01]: You will praise His peace, His kingdom, His promises, and His laws.

[SPEAKER_01]: You will praise Him in your home, at your work, to your family, in the streets, and with your church, like we're doing today.

[SPEAKER_01]: Just as Jesus experienced the joys of heaven and came to earth to praise the God who saves, just so Jesus is sending us into the world to praise the God who saves because we have experienced His peace and rejoice in Him.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is not a guilt trip, my friends.

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, there, there is convicting words.

[SPEAKER_01]: There is a rebuked, any Christian who is dabbling in the world in these words, but I am not sending you on a guilt trip so that you'll go evangelize.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please, no, that is not what I am attempting to do this morning.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please do not go out from here and praise the God who grants peace and joy and eternal life because you feel guilty.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please, don't do that.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is something that would be such a sad sight for a bunch of guilty Christians to go around saying, praise the Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm praising him because I feel bad because I feel guilty because I'm not obeying the commands of Christ.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please don't do that.

[SPEAKER_01]: Get right with the Lord first.

[SPEAKER_01]: The light in him first

[SPEAKER_01]: As you're praising him in your prayer life and song in your home, then you are ready to go to others and say, praise the Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: Praise the Lord.

[SPEAKER_01]: He has saved me.

[SPEAKER_01]: I was dead and blind.

[SPEAKER_01]: Now I see and I'm walking with my God and has great brought me great joy and peace in this world and the one to come.

[SPEAKER_01]: For a Christian to go out and evangelize out of guilt,

[SPEAKER_01]: far closer to hypocrisy.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what it looks more like.

[SPEAKER_01]: Is evangelism difficult?

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_01]: Is it terrifying, at least at first?

[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_01]: Do you have to be courageous to look at another person and say, my friend, I am afraid you are going to hell and I would save you if I can through the blood of Jesus Christ and the message of that, I would have you repent and believe the gospel so that you can experience the peace and joy I have.

[SPEAKER_01]: And yes, my friends, it might hurt.

[SPEAKER_01]: Evangelism hurts.

[SPEAKER_01]: And yes, your body will be screaming at you to just sit on the couch and keep scrolling on your phone.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you feel tension about telling other people about the gospel, that's not a problem.

[SPEAKER_01]: There will be tension in your own soul until the day you die, about telling other people about Jesus.

[SPEAKER_01]: There will be tension because we're not glorified yet.

[SPEAKER_01]: The Spirit is willing.

[SPEAKER_01]: Our flesh is weak.

[SPEAKER_01]: Accept the tension and determine to praise the God who is the saving God because of the peace and joy you have been granted.

[SPEAKER_01]: The Christian who has peace with God and is overflowing with joy, that Christian leaves the

[SPEAKER_01]: that is the reason you evangelize, not because the unsaved are worthy of salvation, not because they are worthy of your love, not because they are good people or have been kind to you or because they're the type of person you want to see in heaven one day.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is not why we evangelize.

[SPEAKER_01]: We evangelize and praise God before others because our Lord is worthy of praise.

[SPEAKER_01]: He is worthy of my praise and of the praise of the billions of souls that are one step from the fires of hell.

[SPEAKER_01]: It is an insult, a spit in the face and an abomination for the saving God not to be praised, worshiped and delighted in by the people he made, that's why we evangelize.

[SPEAKER_01]: People must be saved so that the Savior will be praised.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus encourages his disciples by anticipating the coming power of the Holy Spirit and the effectiveness of the mission.

[SPEAKER_01]: Verse 22, John says, and when he had said this, Jesus breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.

[SPEAKER_01]: I believe Jesus breathing on the disciples and saying, receive the Holy Spirit is in anticipation of pentacost that's coming in 50 days from this day, when the Holy Spirit would come upon them in power.

[SPEAKER_01]: But Luke 24 verse 45 also tells us that at this appearing Jesus opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, helping them to understand that the Christ had to suffer

Luke 24:45

[SPEAKER_01]: and rise on the third day from the dead.

[SPEAKER_01]: Clearly, the Holy Spirit was at work opening their minds to understand things previously hidden.

[SPEAKER_01]: And then, at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit would calm and power as promised.

[SPEAKER_01]: I believe that's what's going on here.

[SPEAKER_01]: In anticipation, opening their minds and in 50 days later, with power, the Holy Spirit would calm for this mission.

[SPEAKER_01]: But John is emphasizing the Holy Spirit in this chapter, being granted to the disciples, in order to show by what power the followers of Jesus would praise the glory of the saving God.

[SPEAKER_01]: How are we gonna do this?

[SPEAKER_01]: How are we going to go to our enemies into those who would wanna kill us?

[SPEAKER_01]: Those who are gonna be insulted.

[SPEAKER_01]: Those people we know, they do not want to talk to me.

[SPEAKER_01]: I can look people in the eye and I make eye contact and I know,

[SPEAKER_01]: He doesn't want to talk to me.

[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe I have that kind of face where he's like, I don't want to talk to that guy.

[SPEAKER_01]: Or maybe they know I've got an agenda, which I do.

[SPEAKER_01]: I've got an agenda.

[SPEAKER_01]: How do we do this?

[SPEAKER_01]: And how will there be any effect?

[SPEAKER_01]: It is through the power of the Holy Spirit of God in us.

[SPEAKER_01]: who is working through us as we speak and live holy lives.

[SPEAKER_01]: We speak the praises of the saving God while living a holy lives in this world.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is the means.

[SPEAKER_01]: In Christian you can know that when you are praising the God who says from joy that is bubbling up out of your

[SPEAKER_01]: then you can know for certain that it is the Holy Spirit of God working in you and through you and that there will be an effect.

[SPEAKER_01]: The words of God will never return back to Him void.

[SPEAKER_01]: They will accomplish what He has sent them out to accomplish.

[SPEAKER_01]: The hearer will either be drawn closer to God or he will be pushed further away into hardness of heart and the will of God will be accomplished when his words are spoken.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is God's means for reaching the world with a message of peace for all who repent and believe.

[SPEAKER_01]: He is sending peace, loving, joy filled, holy spirit and power Christians.

[SPEAKER_01]: who speak this good news as they live holy lives in this world.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is how people get saved.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is how God is ordained for rebels to be saved and become worshipers of God.

[SPEAKER_01]: My friends, I have no power in it of myself to convince a rebel who is dead and blind spiritually that they should become a worshipers of the unseen God.

[SPEAKER_01]: The one they can't see or touch.

[SPEAKER_01]: The one who dwells in unapproachable light, how am I going to convince a dead man spiritually of that?

[SPEAKER_01]: that they should turn and worship.

[SPEAKER_01]: I cannot, in neither can you, yet Jesus promises that His Spirit can and will, as His gospel goes up.

[SPEAKER_01]: That is why John is emphasizing the empowerment of the Holy Spirit as they are sent on mission.

[SPEAKER_01]: But then Jesus also promises effectiveness,

[SPEAKER_01]: He sends the disciples on mission, empowers them by the Holy Spirit, and then says, in verse 23, if you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them.

[SPEAKER_01]: If you withhold the forgiveness from any, it is withheld.

[SPEAKER_01]: Not first glance, this doesn't sound right.

[SPEAKER_01]: This feels like it's boxing up against some other doctrines we know are in scripture.

[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to be the person who can choose, I can just pick or choose whether I want to grant someone forgiveness or not.

[SPEAKER_01]: I believe that would be a terrible mistake to interpret this passage that way, as we read alongside the rest of Scripture.

[SPEAKER_01]: We know that only God can ultimately forgive sins.

[SPEAKER_01]: And we also know that we have been commanded by God and required by God to forgive the sins which are committed against us.

[SPEAKER_01]: We don't have the right to pick or choose whether we forgive another person who comes to us in repentance and said, please forgive me.

[SPEAKER_01]: God says, you will forgive them, or I will not forgive you.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus has just announced, remember the context.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus has just announced that He is sending His disciples on mission with the message of peace with God through Jesus Christ, and this message will be empowered by the Holy Spirit.

[SPEAKER_01]: In that context, we can see that the forgiveness He's talking about, and the forgiveness being granted or withheld, is talking about the forgiveness that we've been studying

[SPEAKER_01]: That's the forgiveness he's talking about, and it's dependent on whether or not a person receives the message of the gospel spoken by the Spirit filled messengers.

[SPEAKER_01]: So let me break it, say it to you this way.

[SPEAKER_01]: If rebels, these are the two possibilities, the granting and the withholding.

[SPEAKER_01]: Repenting and believing, then they will be announced for given by human messengers of the gospel.

[SPEAKER_01]: Which reflects their condition before God in heaven?

[SPEAKER_01]: If you announce a repentant sinner who believes, it begins following me if you renounce them for given, it is so in heaven.

[SPEAKER_01]: That's what he's talking about.

[SPEAKER_01]: Human messengers.

[SPEAKER_01]: We have the scary yet God ordained right to say to someone who repents and believes you can know you are right with God, you are forgiven, as he has promised to forgive those who repent and believe.

[SPEAKER_01]: But if rebels reject the message of the gospel, then the messengers of the gospel must

[SPEAKER_01]: And instead must proclaim that those rebels remained condemned by God, which reflects their condition before God in heaven.

[SPEAKER_01]: This passage serves as John's record of Jesus sinning his disciples into the world after the resurrection.

[SPEAKER_01]: And here is how his logic flows.

[SPEAKER_01]: And as he grants it to us, it is our joy.

[SPEAKER_01]: Jesus' peace is our joy.

[SPEAKER_01]: Our joy drives his mission.

[SPEAKER_01]: His mission is empowered and effective.

[SPEAKER_01]: So we know Christian that our evangelism truly does impact the outcome of who is forgiven and who is not forgiven by God in heaven.

[SPEAKER_01]: He is saying there is a real and true sense as we go out into the world and proclaim this gospel of peace, if someone receives it and accepts it, they are forgiven in heaven.

[SPEAKER_01]: But if they reject it, there is a true and real sense where we must warn them, my friend.

[SPEAKER_01]: You are still condemned by God.

[SPEAKER_01]: God's peace is not over you.

[SPEAKER_01]: Please, my friend, repent and believe.

[SPEAKER_01]: So this is John's sending record.

[SPEAKER_01]: The other gospels will record the Lord's words right before He ascends into heaven.

[SPEAKER_01]: But as we've been studying through the gospel of John, we have really been coming to this point.

[SPEAKER_01]: or Jesus says, it is finished, it is delivered.

[SPEAKER_01]: I am going back to my father, but before I do, I leave you now with my spirit to be the light of the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: Well, he walked here on earth, he says, I am the light of the world.

[SPEAKER_01]: But as he leaves, to go to his father, he says, I leave you as the lights of the world, reflect me, reflect my love, go with my message in the power of my Holy Spirit, and there will be effect, an effect in heaven, from your gospel witness.

[SPEAKER_01]: Let's pray together.

[SPEAKER_01]: Heavenly Father,

[SPEAKER_01]: thank you for your goodness and kindness to us.

[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, I cannot explain why you chose frail human beings to be your messengers of peace.

[SPEAKER_01]: The only reason I can think of from your word is that you desired to have all the glory in this mission, all the glory,

[SPEAKER_01]: in seeing thousands and millions of people from every tribe nation and tongue coming to worship.

[SPEAKER_01]: A poor Jewish man who didn't have a place to lay his head, who died as a cursed criminal

[SPEAKER_01]: come to love and worship this, this God meant.

[SPEAKER_01]: How did that happen?

[SPEAKER_01]: It certainly wasn't us.

[SPEAKER_01]: It certainly wasn't because of our wisdom or wealth or power or ability to convince others.

[SPEAKER_01]: This is a work of God and I praise you for it Lord and I ask that you would make this church

[SPEAKER_01]: the saving God to our friends and family and neighbors.

[SPEAKER_01]: Make us that church Lord I ask in Jesus name.

[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.