You Don't Need All the Answers to Share Jesus

Matt Mead: Thank you so much for joining us on the P S podcast. We're so glad to have you with us today. Wes, thank you for a great sermon on Sunday and you kicked us off in a new series. Come and see. Do you mind telling us a little bit about what this series is gonna be all about?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, happy to. But first, let me thank you for coming in on a holiday. The office is shut down, but you're here to record this podcast. So thank you for taking the time to do that, Matt. I really appreciate it. Yeah, we we started this new series and it's part of our Friends and Family Month. We in September the last two years now, we have really encouraged people to invite their friends and family. And so we really want to do a series that is accessible to everybody. And we're really just walking through the gospel of John. And there are several passages in John that encourage people to come and see, come and experience Jesus. And that's exactly what we want to do in this series. We want to just present Jesus and invite people to come and see him for who he is, because we believe that when people do, they'll come to the same conclusions that we've come to, that he is the the Son of God. And that's exactly what we talked about in John one yesterday.

Matt Mead: used a a really interesting word there, use the word accessible and you know, it's probably interesting to think through sometimes what we would assume is accessible, maybe isn't to others, or even what, you know, maybe Jesus the terms he was using and the stories he was using was accessible to his audience, but don't necessarily, you know, translate easily to ours. How do you think about accessibility?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, it's a great question. And John, as he's writing this book, is thinking about accessibility because he continues to explain terms that may not be understandable by his audience. So when he says Messiah, which means Christ, like he kind of parenthetically says, This means Christ. But even for our audience, when we say Messiah or Christ, neither one of those may be accessible for our audience. Like that means anointed one. So we need to explain it even further. So we could use a term like Messiah or Christ, and assume people know what we mean by that. But I think, especially when we're dealing with hopefully visitors, guests who may not have any familiarity with the gospel story, good news story, the good news about Jesus, the good news that he is the Christ, meaning that he is the anointed one, he's God's chosen king. Again, there's all of these terms that need to be unpacked a little bit. And it's really easy to just assume everybody knows that. But even a Christian audience, even people that grew up going to church, I think there are probably a lot of people I jokingly say Christ is not Jesus' last name. But I mean, there's probably a lot of people that kind of think that it is. They don't realize that's a title that means God has chosen, God has anointed him to be the king and rule over heaven and earth. There's a lot of people, churched and unchurched, that are unfamiliar with these ideas. And I think it's only fair for us to try to unpack and explain. But that's why we do this PS PS podcast. So that if we need to unpack further and explain further and answer other questions, that we can do that. But yeah, it's really difficult to know how much do I assume that somebody is familiar with this this text or these problems or these questions. And how much do I try to unpack that? Like yesterday I tried to say, you know. This is the gospel that we're going to be in. And you probably need to understand that there's two different Johns we're talking about. There's the John who wrote it, and also this John the Baptist that the first John is talking about in the text. In fact, first service, I have to apologize to the first sorry for first service audience because man, with all the names in the text, I was getting confused. Philip and Nathaniel and John and and the other John. And it's hard to to kind of navigate through all of that. And and I even got a little bit tongue tied.

Matt Mead: So if somebody isn't familiar with the two Johns, can you just do kind of a quick who are they and and and how does it set up our text for today?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, the the John who wrote the the book, John the apostle, is really important to understand because how he's writing the the text, he's very much involved. In fact, later in the book he will call himself the disciple whom Jesus loved, and that's how he'll refer to himself. But but he there is there there's a lot of himself in this text, and he explains at the end of the book why he's writing this book. He's writing this so that Even though we didn't see Jesus with our own eyes, we can believe that he is the Messiah, that he's the Christ. And so he's very much a part of the story that that is being told. But also John the Baptizer or John the Baptist, John the author, begins by telling us about John the Baptist, who is preparing the way for Jesus. So it's really easy to get those two Johns kind of mixed up as we're as we're jumping into this story.

Matt Mead: And preparing the way for Jesus is kind of at the core of come and see. And also we talk about the way that Jesus used that as an invitation himself. So when we think about, you know, both the invitation to us and the invitation that we're supposed to give to others, how does that differ? How do you see it as the same? what is the whole giving and extending elements of of come and see?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, we talked about yesterday how following and inviting go hand in hand. And we see as Jesus is inviting his early followers to come and experience him and come and experience his ministry and follow him, learn from him, imitate him, they also invite others to come and see Jesus. We found the Messiah, we found the Messiah is the common refrain in that first chapter. And and I think that that still holds true for us today, that as we come and experience Jesus for who he is, inviting others to do the same goes hand in hand. And really it it goes hand in hand with anything that you're excited about. When you're excited about something, when you find something that's wonderful, especially something that turns your life upside down, you are naturally going to share it with other people. So I I don't want to come across as if this is something people are compelled to do, whether you want to or not, get out there and tell people about Jesus. That shouldn't be our attitude at all. When we find a restaurant that we love We can't help but tell people about it. I jokingly talk about Andy's frozen custard all the time. Man, I I can't help but talk about it and and be an evangelist for ice cream that I really love. I if that's true for for pizza or for ice cream, how much more true should it be when we found the one that we want to imitate and the one who has changed and saved our lives? W we should want to tell other people about him, and if we don't, if we aren't if we aren't just, you know, internally compelled to to share Jesus with others, that should make us kind of stop and think, you know, what is it, what is it that's stopping us from wanting to to share Jesus with others? And I think that's where a lot of Christians find themselves is they they want to want to, but they don't want to. And I think that that's that in and of itself should be something that we examine is why why am I not motivated to tell people about Jesus if I'm not?

Matt Mead: Before we drill down on that important public service announcement, this is the last weekend for the key lime pie concrete at Andes. That's my personal favorite. I hate that it's just seasonal, so you know, while we're talking about Andes, there we go. But when we think about, you know, wanting to tell, you started by looking at Andrew a little bit, who is one of the apostles that doesn't get a ton of coverage, but how is he introduced to us and and what can we learn from Andrew in in this particular text?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, even John, the author, John, calls Andrew Simon Peter's brother. And so he's assuming that his audience is already familiar. Even before they hear who is Simon Peter, he he says, This is Simon Peter's brother. So he's assuming that the audience is already familiar with who Peter is, apparently. And and that's really Andrew's claim to fame is that he's an inviter. He is someone who, as soon as he starts following Jesus, he goes and finds other people to to also follow Jesus. And he's the one. Who first invites Peter to come and and follow Jesus? And of course we we know Peter, the audience who's reading John, they they know Peter. Peter's really well known as an apostle, and like you said, Andrew less so. But how important it is that Andrew be the one to say, hey, we found the Messiah, brother. I love you, I love this guy, and I want you to to follow him the way I follow him.

Matt Mead: you talked about the introduction that Peter has to Jesus that's recorded here and kind of a unique part of that introduction around change and and name change in particular. Do you mind drilling into that a little bit?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, immediately he says, You're Simon, and I'm gonna call you Cephas, I'm gonna call you Peter, and he immediately changes his name, at least in in John's account. This is this is his first interaction with with Jesus in this account. And and I think that's significant. We talked about how discipleship is for people who want to or are willing to change. I think we all have to stop and ask ourselves do I want to change? Do am I willing to be changed by Jesus? Or Am I determined to stay who I am, believing what I believe and doing what I'm already doing? If we are that obstinate, then we really don't make very good disciples. A disciple is a learner, a student, an apprentice, somebody who is willing to be constantly and consistently transformed by their teacher, their rabbi, their master. And we have to have that attitude and that mindset that says, Change me, Lord. I'm not there yet. And not just a an initial change when we come to Jesus, but an ongoing change where we are constantly asking him, make me more like you. We've said at McDermott Road this year that that's our mission statement is to help people become more like Jesus, including ourselves. It's not just the world that we want to help become more like Jesus. We want, we want to become more like Jesus. And I'm not there yet, and none of us are, and we constantly want him to be transforming us. But that means we have to. We have to have that mindset that says, I need to change and I'm willing to be changed. Change me, Lord, change me through your spirit, and we constantly have to surrender ourselves to him.

Matt Mead: I was thinking, you know, as you're preaching on Sunday about, you know, it is a guest centric message, but it's also a message for those of us who need to come and see again and you talked about that sum in your sermon. How how do we begin thinking about coming to see Jesus again and and continually being in a posture in which we're checking our vision, checking our narratives about who Jesus actually is?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, yeah, so such a good question. So true. I mean, that's really why we gather every week, isn't it? That that we we have to constantly keep Jesus in front of us. We have to constantly keep the one we adore and we love in front of us. We have to we have to be intentional about remembering. Like we we take the bread and the cup every week and we do this in remembrance of him. Not because we've forgotten, but because we intentionally want to remember. We want to proclaim that we remember, not only for the sake of others, but for our own sake. We need to constantly keep a memory of him and keep our our eyes on him and our focus on him. Because in doing that, we that's the only way we that we can be transformed. If we want to become more and more like Jesus, we have to keep Jesus. constantly in front of us. But there are all kinds of distractions. Often Christians are really concerned about different threats, the threats to their faith or threats to their family or threats to whatever. And we we constantly are looking to one side or the other. You know, obviously we we look to the left and we say, the threats are coming from the left. Or we look to the right and we say, the threats are coming from the right. In w when we do that and our focus is on our perceived or real threats on the left or the right We have this tendency to go to the other extreme in order to defend against that. So if we think the the threats are coming from the left, we go to the right. If we think the threats are coming from the right, we go to the left. And either way gets us off track. The only way to stay on track is to not throw focus on the threats, but to th focus on Jesus, keep our eyes on him and keep walking in his steps and following him. If we do that, we don't have to worry about the threats either from the left or the right. We just keep our eyes on Jesus. But But again, it's really easy for us to create a Jesus in our own image. Create a Jesus that is not the Jesus of Scripture. He's not the the Jesus of God John's gospel account. He's a Jesus of our own making, a Jesus who looks like us. And that's not the goal. The goal is not to make Jesus like us. The goal is for Jesus to make us like him. And in order to do that, we constantly have to set the real, actual Jesus in front of us. and constantly be talking about who he is and what he expects of his followers. And and that's what we're trying to do, not just on Sundays, but throughout the week. That's why we do this podcast. That's why we do other podcasts. That's why we constantly are trying to encourage and and and lift up each other, spur one another on to love and good deeds by reminding us of who we're following.

Matt Mead: use the word convince a lot on Sunday talking about this idea that we feel like we have to convince others sometimes or argue others into faith. But before we get to that, you know, how much of what you were just describing do you think is a misguided effort to convince ourselves sometimes that we feel like maybe coming and seeing isn't enough and or we have to come and and make him our own, like like how can we tell that we're actually allowing the spirit to work and encountering Jesus instead of trying to convince ourselves? Does that make sense?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, I I mean you'll have to correct me if I'm if I'm misinterpreting what you're saying here, but but yeah, I think that that so much of what we do sometimes is we we we impose ourselves on the text, we impose ourselves on our gathering, and and maybe it is good for us to stop and ask ourselves, is Jesus enough? Like is Jesus enough to to change us, to transform us, or do we feel like, well, you you really need my help, Lord, to to to make this really clear to people about who you are and what you expect. And so we Yeah, we we talk in in preacher circles, we talk about exegesis, which is is taking the meaning out of the text. It's just trying to figure out what is the text saying and then exegeting it versus isegesis, which is and that's Jesus with a G, not a J, so it's not Jesus, but exegesis is taking the meaning out of the text and isegesis is putting a meaning into the text. And I think a lot of times that's exactly what we're doing. We are inserting our own opinions, our own traditions, our own customs, our own whatever into the text, into the sermon, b again, because we feel like it it needs our help or that Jesus needs our help. And really our goal needs to be get out of the way. Like I want to get out of the way and and not make a sermon about me or my thoughts or my opinions or my conclusions, but. Make it about Jesus and point people to him. That's true not just with preaching, but that's true in so many areas of our life. I mean, I'm thinking right now about grief and how sometimes when people are grieving, there'll be almost always a family member who says, I feel like I need to be the rock for my family. And I constantly encourage people, you don't have to be the rock for your family. We have a rock and his name is Jesus. Point people to Jesus and let him be the rock. And then that way you can be human. You can admit that you, you also are grieving, you're also broken, you're also hurting. And that is true in every area of our life. And we're talking about parenting. Like, don't try to be the rock for your kids. Don't try to impress them with how perfect you are, because they'll see right through that. They know that's a facade. They know you're lying. You're lying to yourself and you're lying to them. Point them towards Jesus. He is perfect and they can. Follow him, but so often in our own ego, we make things about ourselves and we want to be perfect, not just not just perfect morally, but we want to be without failure, without brokenness, without grief, without tears. And that's not who we really are. And it doesn't help anybody to pretend that we are. Point people to Jesus and let him be the rock, let him be the master, let him be the teacher. And that way you can be human and you can let Jesus help you with your weakness and you can let other people see your weakness. You can be vulnerable with your family and with others. And that's better for everybody involved.

Matt Mead: I think that's that's really really helpful and a lot to think about there. In fact, it it leads us to one of the comments we we got this week. Thank you for all the comments and questions that each of you send in every week. This is from Dwayne McNeil. He says, Knowing Jesus is not having all the answers, just having the answer of who is the Son of God. Just that one answer in obedient faith of that salvation is all man needs. Any any thoughts about that particular comment?

Wes McAdams: Just amen. Amen, Dwayne. That I I think that's exactly right. I mean, and it's okay that we spend a lot of time on Sunday talking about there it's okay to have questions. And I think sometimes we fear questions. We fear people coming to church or coming to Jesus or having a Bible study with someone, and we're afraid of all the questions they may have, all the objections they may have. We don't have to be afraid of those things. It doesn't mean that we have the answers. We don't have All of the answers for all of the questions. We just have the big answer. And the big answer is Jesus and point people to Jesus. And again, that doesn't mean that's not just a dismissive way of saying, well, just become a Christian and then all the answers will present themselves. I have more questions now than I've ever had, but I'm also more convinced now than I've ever been that Jesus is the Christ. And and just like Jesus asked his the twelve, do you want to leave when everybody else was leaving? Do you want to leave also? And they said, Where? Where else would we go? You have the words of eternal life. And that's where I am. Is like I still have a lot of questions. There's times where I have doubts. There's times where I have fears. And but I'm also more convinced than ever than that there's nowhere else in the world I'd rather be than with Jesus and following him. And if we believe that Jesus really is the one that he claims to be, the one the gospel claims that he is, then point people to him. And it's okay if they have questions that you can't answer. You don't have to be able to answer all of their questions. I think that we have built a culture in Christianity today where we think that we have to be equipped with all the answers for all the questions or else we shouldn't even be telling anybody about Jesus. And that's just nonsense. And and that's not helpful for for them. It's not helpful for ourselves. It's not helpful for the culture that we're creating.

Matt Mead: There's a a line at the end of John and and I don't know if he means it to apply to this necessarily, but you know, he basically says, There's so many more things I could have told you, right? There's so much more. Like the idea that, you know, even what we're being given isn't all there is, and yet sometimes we think we have to know all there is and and John is saying, Hey, this is enough, right? This is enough to come and see and and so much to dive into we did get a particular question about one of the verses that We looked at in John we were Going through the first chapter of John and around verse 50, there's a section that begins to talk about angels. And so I just want to go and read that section a little bit and introduce our question so that you can talk about it a little bit more. It's in the context of this come and see, these come and see conversations. And so starting in verse 47, it says, Jesus saw Nathaniel coming toward him. him and said of him, Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit. And Nathaniel said to him, How do you know me? And Jesus answered him, Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you. And Jesus answered, Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe you will see greater things than these? And he said to him, Truly, truly I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man. And so we received the question from Aurela Collins. It says, Hi there, great sermon, Wes. Can you touch on John one fifty one a little bit more, please, particularly about the angels? Thank you in advance.

Wes McAdams: Yeah, great question, Aurela. Thank you for sending this in. In fact, this is exactly what the PS podcast is for. This this is exactly, and I'm so glad that she sent this in because it gives me the chance to talk about something that I I would have loved to talk about in the sermon, but I didn't have the time, nor was it the place to really get into this detail. But I love this detail and I love being able to talk about it for just a second. I think that what Jesus is referring to, in fact, I like the idea of hyperlinking texts, like when you click on a a blue link or blue words on a website and it hyperlinks to somewhere else. I think what Jesus is hyperlinking here to, and that language comes from the Bible project, but it's Genesis chapter twenty-eight. And in Jap Genesis twenty-eight, Jacob has this dream, and it's this dream of a ladder or maybe a staircase where angels are Ascending and descending. So the idea of angels ascending and descending on a certain place comes from Genesis 28. And when Jacob wakes up, he says this place where he was sleeping, this place where angels were ascending and descending, it is, he names it Bethel, which means house of God. And and that that is this little clue about what Jesus is saying about himself. That I think he's saying about himself that he is the house of God. He is the place where heaven and earth meet. That's what Jacob was saying when he woke up. He was like, This is a place where heaven and earth overlap, where angels are ascending and descending. This is the house of God. Later on, Jerusalem and the temple would be the house of God. But Jesus would say about himself that his body is the real temple. Like, tear this temple down, destroy this temple, and I'll rebuild it in three days. And so Jesus refers to himself as the house of God, as the temple of God. He is the true Bethel. He is the place where heaven and earth intersect. He is heaven breaking into the world. And that's really the story of the entire Bible. The story of the gospel is that God is trying to restore this relationship between himself and humanity so that humanity can co- rule and reign with God again like they did in the garden before the fall. And Jesus is saying he is the human, the son of man. This is Daniel language, that that he is the son of man who is going to co-rule and reign with God. He is the place where heaven is breaking into the earth, where heaven and earth are overlapping. He is fully God and fully human. And through him we get to participate in this story, in this good news. We get to be Sons and daughters of God. We get to be new creation people where heaven is breaking into the world. And so Jesus is saying that the new temple, the new house of God, the new Bethel is Himself, that He is the place where heaven and earth intersect. And He's saying to Nathaniel, You're going to see all of this. You're going to see this reality revealed to you. And again, like I said on Sunday, I think the same is true for all of us. Like we We already believe. We believe b based on the testimony of this book. We believe based on the testimony of our parents. We believe based on the testimony of the church. But we're gonna see even greater things than this. We are going to see heaven breaking into the world. We've already begun to see it, and we will continue to see it until the Lord comes.

Matt Mead: It's a a beautiful claim. It's a rich, you know, theological truth and and one that frames our our faith in in so many ways. but it it's definitely an audacious claim too. It's definitely one that should you know make us sit up. I'm sure it did in the original encounter as well. But backtracking in that encounter just a little bit you know, Nathaniel makes a statement that is similar to assumptions that that we might make or whatever and and and he basically says, you know, how could this Messiah come from Nazareth? Do you want to spend just a few minutes on that?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, yeah. He's pretty cynical when he hears Philip say that that the Messiah has been found. And then Philip says, It's Jesus of Nazareth, and he's like, Nazareth, are you kidding me? And Nazareth was this tiny little nothing place. And he had all of these assumptions. Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Much less a Messiah, a king. What kind of a king comes from from Nazareth? Now in in John's account, we don't have all of the the details that we have in other accounts. Like we don't know the the aspect of Bethlehem, like that makes sense that the Messiah would come from Bethlehem because from Bethlehem, that's the city of David. Of course the Messiah would come from Bethlehem in Judah. But Nazareth in Galilee? Are you kidding me? What kind of Messiah comes from Nazareth? This is this is I I won't make any jokes about any states in the United States, but you can you can make up your own mind about what state that might be or what city or town that might be that somebody could say the next Leader is coming from this place, and you might think, come on, give me a break. But but again, the the point that I was trying to make on Sunday is that we all have questions and objections. We think, how can God work like this? How could God do that? I mean, even the cross itself is scandalous to think: how could God claim victory over sin and death? How could God defeat Satan and the demons through a Cross by dying? That doesn't make any sense. How could God bring all things under the rule and reign of King Jesus by having him die on a cross? How does that make any sense? That's so upside down and backwards. And and when we have those kinds of questions, that's not a bad thing. It's a good thing. This is not a bug. It's a feature. And so often we think we have to put those questions aside, but the Lord invites us to bring those questions to him. In fact, he says about Nathaniel. This is a person in whom there's no deceit. I mean, he tells the truth. He he tells he tells it exactly like he sees it. It's okay to bring those kinds of questions and objections. And the Lord meets us there. And because the Lord responded to Nathaniel with grace and with knowledge and understanding, then Nathaniel walks away saying, he really is the Son of God. He really is the Christ. And I think we need to be the same way. We need to receive people with all of their cynicism, with all of their questions, with all of their objections. And have room for that. Have room for those conversations. And again, it it may not mean that we have satisfactory answers to all of our questions. Jesus doesn't get into all the details about Bethlehem and Nazareth and and why Nazareth is actually a great town. Like he doesn't, he doesn't spend any time on that. He just reveals who he is. And whether that means that Nathaniel's question is answered or not, the big question of who Jesus is has already been settled.

Matt Mead: Yeah, no, I think that's really helpful and I think sometimes we even feel that need about our own background as well, that we make the assumption that people will judge our message based on who they view us to be, and and that is true on some level. We're we're called to to be examples, but we can make it more about our own perceived ability to witness versus our desire for others to come and look at Jesus as is. And and to that note, you talked some kind of more or less about evangelism theory a little bit, you know, in in the sermon and do you want to kind of wrap us up with kind of a recap of what we can learn about evangelism from this week?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, and more than anything, it's what I can learn about evangelism. I I had a guy say to me one time that he was a student of evangelism, but not a practitioner. And and I I feel the same way. Like it's really easy for us to kind of get caught up in what are the best strategies and what are the best processes. The best evangelists I've ever known are people that didn't know anything about the theories, they didn't know anything about the strategies, they didn't have any curriculum. They just loved people and they loved Jesus and they wanted to connect the two. They they wanted to connect the people they loved to the Messiah they loved. And that's how I want to be. I just want to be a person who's willing and excited to tell people about Jesus. It's not wrong to have curriculums and pamphlets and strategies and theories. Those things aren't wrong. But if we become philosophers about what what is the best evangelistic strategy rather than just simple followers, disciples of Jesus, we've taken the wrong path somewhere. And we need to go back and remind ourselves of what's most important and just love people and help them to see Jesus the way we see Jesus. And again, like we said on Sunday, that's the way most of us became followers of Jesus. Most of us did not become followers of Jesus because some stranger knocked on our door or argued with us online or anywhere else. Like we became followers of Jesus because our parents just shared the same Jesus that was shared with them, or our spouse shared with us, or a friend shared with us. They didn't, they didn't have answers to all of our questions. They didn't try to argue us or beat us over the head. Most of us became followers of Jesus simply because somebody loved us enough to point us to Jesus because they loved Jesus and they loved us.

Matt Mead: I I love the fact that, you know, you even framed, you know, faith transfer from, you know, parents to kids that way too. It it's ultimately because of their love of God that they pointed us to him in the first place, no matter their flaws and, you know, ways that we can sometimes pick our families apart, but ultimately they gave us the greatest gift of introducing us to Jesus for sure. So this coming week we're in part two of Come and See. What are we gonna come and see this week?

Wes McAdams: Yeah, we're gonna talk about this Samaritan woman that Jesus meets at a well. And and I think the point of the text, spoiler alert for those who listen to the podcast and listened all the way to the end, I think the the point of the text is about assumptions that we make about people. And I think unfortunately we have also made a lot of assumptions about this woman. I think we have unnecessarily stereotyped her, and I think that we have placed a burden on the story that's not actually there. And I think we have a lot to learn, not only about this woman and Jesus' interaction with her, but also the assumptions and stereotypes that we play into and place on the people in our life.

Matt Mead: Looking forward to that. Encourage each of us maybe to spend some time in in John 4 this week as we prepare for that. But we want to extend the invitation to everyone who listens online. Anytime you're welcome, but especially this month, we would love for you to join us. You are our friend and our family, and we would love for you to join us at McDermott Road. but thank you so much for listening to the PS podcast and we hope you have a great Labor Day weekend.

Wes McAdams: Thanks so much for listening to P.S., the Post Sermon Podcast. To find out more about this podcast or about the Church of Christ on McDermott Road, you can visit our website at ccmcdermott.org slash P.S. If this has been an encouragement to you, we also hope you will rate and review the show wherever you're listening, as well as share it with a friend. Because we believe sermons are not just for Sunday, but for our whole week and our whole life.