I AM: The Way, The Truth & The Life

Want to welcome you to Venture Church. If you don't know who I am,

I'm Pastor Brandon. I'm the lead pastor of the church. I also

want to welcome those that are watching online. I'm glad that you've chosen to

join us here today. Tonight at five o'clock, we have what we refer

to as Discover one oh one, or dinner with the pastor. This is

your opportunity if you're new to Venture to hear about the vision, mission,

values and history of the church. We actually have some open space for tonight's

dinner. So if you're newer to the church you haven't been a part of

one on one, I'd love to have you come out. My wife and

I would love to hang out with you, get to know you better.

You can sign up with Pastor Cole in the lobby, or you can talk

to several of my staff out in the lobby and they can guide you to

the people that will sign you up with that. We announced at our annual

Vision meeting that we have changed some of our terminology because of new Washington state

law that was enacted this year. We can't use terms like owner, partner,

member anymore. In fact, churches around Washington and Oregon will be making

these same transitions. So I just wanted you to be aware. We are

gonna take those words out and use the word family instead. So when you

hear us talk about the family dinner with the pastor this is that, or

when we talk about family meetings, those will replace owner meetings. Good,

all right, grab your Bible. Turn to John fourteen. John fourteen,

I'm gonna read one verse. We'll pray together, and then I'll dive in.

John fourteen twenty seven says peace. I leave with you my peace I

give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.

Do not let your heart be troubled, and do not be afraid. I

want to ask everyone to buy your heads, close your eyes, repeat this

prayer after me. Everyone say, Dear Jesus, speak to my heart,

change my life in Jesus' name. Amen. If you were here last week,

I told you that this week I would tell you a little bit about

this trip to the Dominican Republic that Die and I went on. We were

invited by one of our church's partners, Compassion International. They ask us to

go on trips pretty regularly, and I go every two or three years to

see one of the bases Compassion International. You're familiar with it if you've been

around our church. But we will do another Compassion Sunday in September, but

you'll remember a Compassion Sunday is where you walk into the lobby or the auditorium

and there's pictures of kids everywhere. You can sponsor, and we encourage our

church to sponsor all of the kids that you see on the wall. I

love Compassion International. I love child sponsorship because it is a great way for

your family to fully participate in missions, because everybody can do forty dollars a

month and your kids get to write letters to the sponsored child, and it's

just really meaningful. We've done this multiple times over the years, and Compassion

has shared with me many times how Venture is now one of their largest sponsoring

churches in America that through our church over this period of time, we've sponsored

over eight hundred kids in that period of time, So Compassion has a special

place in our heart. Occasionally will travel to one of their bases. So

Diane and I got the privilege of going to the Dominican Republic and represent you.

This was for me significant because it was the second time I'd been to

the Dominican Republic. The first time i'd been there was a year after I

became a follower of Jesus. I was a seventeen year old and went on

my first missions trip ever to the Dominican Republic. And here I gotta go

several years later to the Dominican Republic again. Now I want to show you

some pictures and describe the story. But pop up this first picture. I

can't tell you the exact town, but I want to tell you what was

taking place. This is a town that was built by the local sugar plantation.

The sugar plantation is the major industry agricultural ministry industry in the region.

And they would hire employees and they would house the employees in their plantation owned

homes. Now, they wouldn't pay you enough to live anywhere else, but

they would pay you a very small way and let you live in one of

these houses on this road you can see. Go to the picture of the

house. This gives you an idea of what the house looks like. So

this house, which has basically a main meeting area, a kitchen, and

maybe one or two bedrooms, would house up to four families at one time.

And the stipulation to live in this home is that someone in your house

must work at the plantation. Now go to the next picture, the green

one. No, the green one there it is this is the only bathroom

for that entire street, entire road. So these houses do not come equipped

with toilets or bathrooms. So all of those homes share this bathroom right here.

Now go to that picture that you just showed of the family. So

this was the Compassion family that we visited. There were seven kids living in

the house, a mom, and that elderly gentleman right there. There was

one child in this house, a child maybe five or six years old about

this tall that was sponsored by Compassion, and we were visiting there. Compassion

didn't know what we were walking into. In fact, our translator was so

upset by the things that he was hearing from this man that our translator broke

down in this meeting that after we were done with this home visit, Compassion

actually met with those of us that had visited this house and apologized because of

how hopeless it was. Now, I want to be honest with you.

As a pastor, I have been on missions trips all over the world I've

seen everything. I've been everywhere in Africa, everywhere in Mexico. I've been

to Columbia, Argentina, Brazil, you name it. I've seen poverty,

but I've never seen anything like this. Like this was at a level of

hopelessness and desperation that I had never seen in my entire life. And here's

what happened. This was the end when we were praying for the person.

You might see die kind of in the background right over there, she was

praying for him. I snuck this picture because I wanted to remember this moment.

He's an eighty one year old man who has Parkinson's. He has been

fired by the plantation. He is not the father to these children, but

the three fathers of the seven children had abandoned the family a long time ago.

So this mom with her seven kids started living with this man because he

had a home. Well, he was fired by the plantation and he was

told he had thirty one days to vacate the place. The problem is,

all the land is owned by the plantation, all the homes are owned by

the plantation. And we are Americans, We're pastors of large churches with lots

of resources. We heard this and we thought exactly what you thought, Well,

we'll take care of this, and we were literally told there was nothing

we could do because there was no land we could buy, there was no

house we could provide, so we kept asking for clarifications. So you are

telling us these people, these children are going to be thrown out on the

streets in thirty days and there is nothing we can do about it. And

with tears in their eyes, Compassion said, I'm really sorry that we showed

you that, but this is literally the situation. There is nothing we can

do. So we prayed for this man. I want to show you some

glimpse of hope in the middle of this land that's owned only by the plantation.

The church property that is in the middle of this little town is owned

amazingly, it was just in the middle of nowhere in Dominican Republic. It's

owned by our denomination, smack in the middle. And they have a church

and a school there right here. So this is literally light in the midst

of the darkness. It is the only land that is not owned by the

plantation. It is the only ray of hope for these children and the people

that live in this area is this church and this school. It's so difficult

that to run power to it, the power lines go through the plantation own

property. Well, eventually the plantation had had enough and they cut down the

power to the school and the church. So then they started running it by

generators, and while we were there, two times the generators ran out and

the lights went off twice at the end of the entire trip. We are

trying as American pastors, we want to do something because this sense of helplessness

is driving us insane, and so we were like, there has to be

something we can do. What can we pray for you about? And we

asked the pastor and her response was, well, for us, we're raising

money to get solar electricity so that we can have electricity that isn't reliant on

gas or isn't reliant to go through the property that the plantation owns. And

I thought ventures buying solar electricity for them. So I'm waiting to hear back

from the church and the organization and our denomination how much solar electricity is going

to cost. But there's going to come a day probably next week week afterwards.

We're taking a special offering because I can't I might not be able to

help that family specifically. But we are going to do whatever we can to

help these kids right here, all of them. But I want to be

very blunt. It was the most hopeless situation. It was the most helpless

that I've ever felt my entire life. And my heart was troubled. Have

you ever been there before? Have you ever been in a situation where maybe

obstacles that you're facing, or someone that you care about is facing, where

you're troubled, You're worried, You're conflicted, frustrated, angry, feeling hopeless

and maybe a little bit helpless. This sixth im statement of Jesus. Jesus

gave this im statement smack in the middle of a time when this is how

the disciples were feeling. Let me give you the setting. So Jesus had

just finished the Passover dinner with his disciples and he drops this huge bomb on

his disciples. Now you remember, at this point in time, Jesus has

reached the peak of his popularity, Like it is everything that these men had

followed Jesus for. They are starting to see they'd been with him for three

years. They had seen his influence increase exponentially. He had accumulated hundreds of

followers. The movement was progressing. Now, the problem was many of these

disciples people still didn't know what the end looked like. They still thought,

many of them that Jesus was going to someday be a political leader, that

he was someday going to be king, that there was some sort of connection

to the future of Israel, and it centered on this man, who at

first they had a little bit of doubt with. They were a little bit

skeptical, but they'd seen him do things that convinced them there's something special about

him, and they were excited. This is the peak of the movement succeeding.

And then Jesus drops this bomb that he's about to leave, and we

see it in verse thirty three of chapter thirteen. He says, my children,

I will be with you only for a little longer, said you will

look for me. And just as I told the Jews, so I tell

you now where I am going, you can't come. So Jesus says,

I'm about to leave, and where I'm going you don't get to go with

me. Well, they were stunned. They didn't understand what he was talking

about. So they start asking him about this, and we see Peter's response.

Peter says verse thirty seven or thirty six, I can't see because any

glasses. That says, Lord, where are you going? And then Jesus,

in the cryptic Jesus sort of way, answers where I'm going. You

cannot follow now, but you will be able to follow later. Some of

you, you read the words of Jesus, you want to be inspired by

them, but you're like, what is he talking about? You have the

benefit of two thousand years of people studying this, You have the benefit of

Bible scholars teaching it to you, being able to google commentaries. They're hearing

this for the first time. You think you're confused by the things Jesus said,

you should be them. Well, what g Jesus was doing is he

knew their hearts were going to be troubled, and he was giving them assurance.

And over this section he's sharing with them assurances when you are troubled,

when you are upset, when you are facing obstacles, when you are conflicted.

That should encourage you when you're facing these things. The same assurances that

Jesus gives the disciples are the same assurances that he gives you. And I

when we face troubles, when we're discouraged, when we feel hopeless or helpless.

So the same assurances that he gives them are for you, you with

me. So Jesus is describing the first assurance, which is heaven. He's

saying, your final destination is heaven. The problem is he doesn't say heaven,

he just describes heaven. So Peter is like, where are you going?

And Jesus says, well, you can't go there right now, but

you're eventually gonna go there later. And then Peter, here's this. That's

not good enough. So Peter says, Lord, why can't I follow you

now? Things are going great? We want to follow you now. Now.

At this point, amongst the disciples, Peter had kind of risen as

the leader. He was the strong one, he was the bold one,

he was the upfront one. And so Peter more or less was speaking for

them. Why can't we go with you now? And Peter makes this exceptionally

bold statement. He says, Jesus, I'm willing to lay down my life

for you. That's how much I love you, Jesus. I'd take a

bullet for you. Jesus, I got your back. Everybody else they might

talk smack about you, but Jesus, I got you. I'm your bold.

These other dudes, I don't know if they can stand the struggle,

but I got you, Jesus. This is what Jesus says. He says,

huh, will you really lay down your life for me? Peter?

Very truly? I tell you that before the rooster crows, you're gonna disown

me three times. He's the Peter. By the end of today, the

next twenty four hours, you won't even admit we're friends. You won't even

admit you know me. So, if you're a disciple and you're hearing this,

you're at the peak of the movement, you're shattered because your movement leader

says he's taken off. He will not tell you where he wants to go.

The person that would be next in line to lead Peter. You're basically

saying he's gonna struggle, he's gonna fail. So the disciples were immensely discourged

and disappointed, and then Jesus gives them this description of heaven. The same

assurance of heaven that he gives them is the same assurance of heaven that he

gives you. And he says this, Do not let your hearts be troubled.

Believe in God, believe also in me. He says, my father's

house has many rooms. If that were not so, what I have told

you that I am going there to prepare a place for you, And if

I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take

you to be with me, so that you also may be where I am.

And then he ends that discourse by this statement. He says, you

know the place where I'm going. So Jesus is saying your eventual destination is

Heaven. Now you and I know that. After the fact, they did

not have a clue what he was talking about here, but basically, Jesus

says, I'm gonna leave, but where I'm going you get to eventually come

too. And while I'm there, I'm gonna be with my father and I'm

gonna be doing expansions on his house. I'm gonna be adding rooms for you,

and I'm gonna be preparing away for you. And then once everything is

ready, I'm gonna come back and get you and bring you there too.

He is describing heaven, and he's describing heaven as a house that is a

house with unlimited additions made to this house that includes you and I. Church.

Heaven is a real place. It is a place where God dwells,

where Jesus sits at his right hand. Heaven is God's house, and it

is a home for his children. The Bible uses this incredible imagery in symbolism

to describe Heaven for you and I. Tewod Peter describes it as a kingdom.

First Peter says it is our inheritance. Hebrew says it is a country.

It also refers to Heaven as a city. And in John, heaven

is a home. Heaven is God's house, and it is a home for

his children. John, who is refers to himself as the disciple whom Jesus

loves, wrote the Gospel of John that we're studying right here. But he

later on wrote Revelation. And he wrote Revelation towards the end of his life,

and he was reflecting back on everything that he had seen in visions about

Heaven, that he had been taught about heaven. And at the end of

Revelation he's teaching about heaven and he referres Dude is a place of love and

joy, but eventually can't find the right adjectives to describe it. He can't

find the right symbols to describe it. So for John, the easiest way

to describe heaven was to describe it by what wouldn't be in heaven, And

he says, here's the things that won't be in heaven. He said,

there will be no death in heaven. There will be no sorrow, there

will be no crying, there will be no pain, there will be no

darkness. Describes heaven as this place that is a blessed assurance. Just as

it is a blessed assurance for the disciples, it is the blessed assurance for

you and I. What does heaven do? What does the promise of heaven

mean for a follower of Jesus? It means that you and I can joyfully

bear with the obstacles and struggles and battles that we face in this life along

the way because we know what our hope and our future is, this blessed

assurance of heaven. This is what kept Paul going. Paul said this in

Romans. He said, I consider my present sufferings not even worth comparing the

glory that is set before me. Jesus said it himself he said, for

the joy set before me, I'm willing to endure the cross scorning its shame.

Church. Heaven is a real place. Heaven is a loving place.

When we see places like the Dominican Republic where we see poverty at a level

that our minds can't even comprehend, and we say is their hope? Well,

bottom line, our blessed assurance is Heaven. Heaven is our home.

Heaven is a loving place. But I'm gonna warn you Heaven is an exclusive

place. We hate this in America today, like the word exclusion is a

bad word, but it is an absolute accurate word when it comes to Heaven.

Jesus looks at them after describing this house that he's adding additions onto,

and he says, you know where we're going, you know where it is,

and the disciples are we don't know what you're talking about. You make

no sense. Finally, Thomas says, Lord, we don't know where you're

going. How can we know the way if we don't know where you're going?

And Jesus answers with the im statement. So your first assurance is Heaven

is promise, Heaven is your destination. Your second assurance is Jesus has made

it bluntly clear the way to heaven. He says, I am the Way,

the Truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except

through me. I love the fact that Jesus doesn't simply teach the way,

doesn't just teach these concepts about heaven. He doesn't try to describe where heaven

is. He doesn't like do the Heaven is up and Hell is down.

He doesn't do that. He says, I'm the way. This is the

way to heaven. No one comes to the Father except through me. Church.

I'm sorry your kids do not get set because of your relationship with Jesus.

Heaven is not your promise because your grandparents served Jesus. Jesus in this

move moment, removes any other possible way to Heaven other than through him.

Good works do not get you into heaven. Other gods, other religions don't

lead you to heaven. Religious ceremonies don't get you to heaven. You can't

buy or give your way into heaven. Jesus is the way. Jesus is

the only way. That's why we adventure. We say Jesus is period the

hope of the world. We need to tell everyone, because he's the only

way. They don't stumble into it. They can't meander accidentally find their way

there. They can't get their way there. You can't pray someone else's way

there. They have to find and know Jesus. And then Jesus makes his

I Am God's statement, So he's dropping bombs on the disciples. First he

tells them that he's leaving, and then he informs them that he's God.

Verse seven, he says, if you really know me, you will know

my father as well. He said, from now on, you do not

know him. For now on, you do know him and have seen him.

There's one hundred and forty one different references to the word no in the

Book of John. Now, the problem is we have one word for the

word noh in our English language, but there's multiple different translations of the word

know in Greek. I tell you all the time that there is a huge

difference between knowing about someone and knowing someone. It's not good enough to just

know about Jesus. You have to know Jesus. You can know facts about

him, you can know well he is Mary's son. Joseph was his dad

before he had his itinerant ministry. He was a carpenter. You can know

as a fact he died on a cross. You can know facts about him,

but you have to know him. And knowing is a deep intimate relationship

with him. And Jesus says, if you know me, you know the

way to heaven. So he is describing now the Father, and he's basically

saying, if you know me, you know the Father. And the disciples

they knew what Jesus was talking about because they'd studied the Torah, they knew

the Old Testament, they knew Father God. They in fact, they honored

him so much that they wouldn't even say his name out loud. And now

Jesus is declaring that we are one and the same. And so at first

Philip's hearing this, and he's still trying to think, Jesus, you're leaving.

I don't get what you're saying. You're never talking about the Father.

And Philip asks what seems silly to us but made a lot of sense to

them. He said, Lord, show us the Father, and that'll be

good enough. Since you're not gonna give us any other hints on what's going

on. Just show us who the Father is and that'll be good. Enough,

and Jesus says, don't you know me, Philip, even after I've

been among you for such a long time. Anyone who has seen me has

seen the Father. If you've seen the things that I've done, you've seen

the things that the Father has done. The Father is in me, and

I am in the Father. If you've heard me, you've heard the Father.

And he's basically saying we are the same. And then at the end

of all of this, he's like, and guys, if that hasn't convinced

you, that I am the Father and the Father is me, that I'm

in the Father, the Father's in me, that I represent the Father and

the Father represents me, he says. Do you at least believe the evidence

of the works themselves? He says, Guys, you've seen me do things

that only God can do, like only God has authority over death. You

just saw me raise Lazarus from the grave. Guys, You've seen me speak

to a storm and calm it. You've witnessed me walk on water. You

saw me feed five thousand people from a couple loaves of bread and some fish.

Guys, there's a difference between knowing about me and knowing me whoever knows

Jesus knows the Father. So Jesus says, believe me, believe in me,

and then I love how he always ends it by saying, don't you

believe? Do you believe? Paul referred to this moment in Colossians three ten

when he said I want to know Christ. I don't just want to know

about him. I want to know him. Said yes, to know the

power of the resurrection and participation in his sufferings, even becoming a like him

in his death. Jesus is saying, you're right, I'm leaving, but

your destination is heaven, and you know the way to heaven through me,

So don't be discouraged. Don't be troubled. Your future destination is heaven.

You know the way to get there. I am the way. And in

the meantime, don't be discouraged in your waiting, because this movement that I've

started it's not ending when I leave. In fact, it's gonna get better.

It's gonna get bigger. Because I am going to the Father. I'm

sending the third part of myself to you, the Holy Spirit. So when

I leave, the Holy Spirit is gonna come and dwell inside of you.

And then he's looking at them and said, these things that you've seen me

do, you will do even greater things than these. Because I have stepped

aside, my spirit resides in you. You are gonna do even greater things

than these. He said, Anything you asked for in my name, that

I will do. And what was he saying. He was saying, if

I stay here, if I'm always with you, you're always gonna defer to

me. This entire movement, this entire ministry, is just gonna be me

doing it, he said. But I'm leaving so that it'll be your turn

next, he says. But the best part is you don't have to do

it in your own strength, because my spirit is gonna reside inside of you,

and you gotta have the anointing in the spirit, Holy Spirit power inside

of you to do the things that I'm doing, so that when you step

out in faith, you don't do it on your own strength, but you

do it on mine. And when he talks about these greater things, he's

not talking that you and I'll do greater miracles. I know, crazy charismatics

like to tell you that it ain't true, like nobody's risen somebody from the

grave who's been dead for four days. Only Jesus does that. Only Jesus

walks on water. Only Jesus calms storm. Only Jesus can take a small

lunch and feed five thousand people. The greater things that he's talking about is

our sphere of influence will be much greater than Jesus ever was. Jesus ministered

in a very small region to really when all things are considered to a very

small group of people. I was thinking of it this way as I wrote

this message, that in the twenty year history of venture, we have seen

more people saved at this church than Jesus saw saved when he did three years

of ministry. That is the greater thing that he's talking about. Your sphere

of influence will be much greater than his, because His spirit has empowered you

to do it. Are you with me? I close with this. David

can come on out. I sort of changed my third point on them,

so they're all wondering when my Q is, David, when you come,

when you leave today, I want you to take one of these So I'm

talking about you will do even greater things than these that when we give you

invite cards to hand out to people. You don't do that on your own

strength. Like God anoints you as you hand those invite cards out. God

anoints you as you put things like this in your yard. So the movement

did not end when Jesus left. He passed the baton to us, but

he didn't say do it on your own strength. He gave us his spirit.

These yard signs are silly. I realize it. I want to show

you a picture. Three Easters ago, Jen and Jim are meant put a

yard sign in their yard in Snohomish. Now, Jen and Jim live in

the middle of nowhere in Snohomish. They get no drive by traffic, but

they took a yard sign placed it in their yard. You don't know who's

going to see your yard sign. You don't know whose heart the Holy Spirit

has been working on. You don't know who this could impact. Well.

Unbeknownst to Jen and Jim, Alison and kai Van and the Holy Spirit was

messing with their lives, shook up their entire life to the point where they

thought, we've never gone to a Christian church before. Let's go to a

Christian church this Easter. And they saw a yard sign in the middle of

nowhere in Jen r Men and Jim r Men's yard. They come to church

on Easter Sunday three years ago. It took about a year. Sean knows

we were involved together for Kai to eventually submit his life to Christ. But

over the last three years we've had the privilege of baptizing this entire family,

and it started with a yard sign it's your turn. Jesus has passed the

baton to you, and as an encouragement to you, he reminds you that

through all the obstacles and struggles of this life, remember you will eventually be

with me. And as we close the service, I want you to hear

this song that reminds you what is your blessed assurance? Blesses shure Jesus is

He's fine? Oh a four yes, glory vine Era, solvation, purchase

of born of his speed, Washington is a love, perfect so bition,

perfect delt, visions of rib I'm sure now burst on my side, angels

is say read from Ba bachoes of birdscye whispers of this is my soul.

Read this is a crazy message all the day long. This is a sort,

this is a song. I'm crazy, nur say all the day long.

This is my sort. This is a crazy message all the day long.

Oh, this is our sort read this is our song. M hm.

Praising my save your authent lo. Praising my save you authentd lo