Testimony of the Savior (John 5:31-47)

John chapter 5, starting in verse 31.

John 5 · chapter mention

And if you're able, please stand for the reading of God's Word.

Starting in verse 31.

If I testify testify about myself, my testimony is not true.

There's another who testifies about me, and I know that the testimony he gives about me is true.

You sent messengers to John, and he testified to the truth.

I don't receive human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved.

John was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light.

But I have a greater testimony than John's because of the works that the Father has given me to accomplish.

These very works I am doing testify about me that the Father has sent me.

The Father who sent me has testified himself about me.

You have not heard his voice at any time, and you haven't seen his form.

You don't have his word residing in you because you don't believe the one he sent.

You pour over the scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, and yet they testify about me.

But you're not willing to come to me, so that you may have life.

I do not accept glory from people, but I know you that you have no love for God within you.

I have come in my Father's name, and yet you don't accept me.

If someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him.

How can you believe, since you accept glory from one another, but don't seek the glory that comes from the only God?

Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father.

Your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope.

For if you believed Moses, you would believe me because he wrote about me.

But if you don't believe what he wrote, how will you believe my words?

Lord, I thank you for this morning.

I thank you for your word.

I ask that you would fill me with your spirit to teach, that you would fill the hearers with your spirit to rightly divide and discern what's of you.

I ask, Lord, that we would draw closer to you as a result, and that you would be glorified in your name.

Amen.

Go ahead and have a seat.

Nice, light-hearted passage.

Super enjoyed.

What on earth is going on at this point?

We're jumping in part way into a discourse.

So, what has been happening here is that Jesus in Jerusalem sees a man who had been disabled for 38 years and he heals him.

Would sound awesome to a normal human being that that would be something like, wow, somebody was healed after 38 years.

But the religious leaders there see the man walking with his mat and then go, What are you doing?

This is the Sabbath, you can't do that.

And he says, I was told to do it.

Who told you that?

I don't know his name.

And then Jesus finds him, and he uh tells him, See, you are made well, don't sin anymore, so that something worse doesn't happen to you.

And so verse 16 in chapter 5 is kind of the crux before this discourse.

Therefore the Jews began persecuting Jesus because he was doing these things on the Sabbath.

They are coming at Jesus because he is healing on the Sabbath and also encouraging people to do what was considered in their system to be work on the Sabbath, that is, carrying their mat.

And so there is this back and forth, and this is part three of three of this back and forth.

In just verses 31 through 37, just this little chunk, the word for testify or testimony shows up nine times in just this little chunk.

And it is all over John's writings.

We talked about this at the very beginning when we did the intro to the Gospel of John, but testifying, testimony is a big deal throughout this.

And not just in the Gospel of John, but also in John's other writings as well.

We see in 1 John, when he starts out the whole book, it's that which we have seen, what we have witnessed, what we've seen with our eyes, and our hands handled concerning the word of life.

And here in John chapter 1 as well, he does the same thing, talking about the testimony of that.

John 1 · chapter mention

We're talking about John in 1.7, he came as a witness to testify about the light.

As a witness in 1.14, we see the word became flesh, dwelt among us.

We observed his glory, the glory as of the one and only son, full of grace and truth.

So there's this connection here of a testimony, a testament, a witnessing.

And the important thing about a witnessing is that they actually saw what happened.

So we've talked about this briefly, but if you imagine a courtroom scene, and you have someone coming up to witness, and they are very, very influential, and they can sit there and go, I know that person's guilty.

I know that, I'm sure of it, it's absolutely true.

And the defense says, Were you there?

And they're like, Well, no, but I know it's true.

It would be like, that doesn't work, that only works on social media.

And so it's not actually fact at that point in time, it's not a credible witness.

To have a somebody who has seen, experienced is what makes somebody a credible witness.

And so here, in this passage, Jesus is going to give the different witnesses to his divinity, to his messiahship, to him being the son.

Now, the weird thing about different Bible translations is that you can't change the words of the text, but you can have your little headings say whatever you want.

And so it is either the fivefold witness or the fourfold witness or the threefold, uh it doesn't matter, they're witnesses.

There's multiple witnesses to Jesus here, and that's the entire thing we are looking at.

So when Jesus leads off here, if I testify about myself, my testimony is not true.

It's an interesting thing to start with because uh think about different religious movements that have come and gone or have come and stayed and won't go away.

That you have somebody who has their epiphany.

They have their experience, and they bring it to the people and they declare it, and they have some amazing story to go with it, or this amazing thing that is just, well, there's no way this couldn't have been done otherwise.

Witnessing of themselves and no one else was there, and nobody else saw it conveniently.

So I'm not gonna pull that thread too far, except it's amazing how many different things in different uh religions, different cults, it all starts with somebody having an enlightenment or an epiphany that no one else was there for.

And here, it's interesting that Jesus, right off the bat, saying, Look, if I'm testifying about myself, if all I have is my words, my testimony isn't true.

Which is interesting because when you think about it, we've talked throughout this whole book about the concept of a rabbi.

They're kind of also testifying as themselves, in that they come and they teach and people follow them.

But he's saying, I'm not just here on my own accord.

So, how cool is it that the Lord set this up to have testimony of Jesus, not only throughout the whole body of Scripture, but to have a weirdo named John the Baptist come beforehand to point to Jesus directly before Jesus' ministry officially begins.

That's pretty cool.

How many other religious stories do you have where before the person is revealed and identified as the special person, somebody else is coming before them and saying, He's here, he's coming, get ready, that be him.

So that's what we're really looking at in this passage is that Jesus is not coming on his own words, on his own testimony, which we see throughout scripture the idea of the testimony of two or three witnesses, something being established.

So, who are these witnesses?

Verse 32 There is another who testifies about me, and I know that the testimony he gives about me is true.

You send messengers to John, there's the test, the first one who testifies, and he testified to the truth.

Looking just at the Gospel of John, here are some of the things that John the Baptist testified about Jesus.

We have a slide with very small print.

Okay.

I warned you.

So, verse 1, 15 and 30, there's the one of whom I said, the one coming after me ranks ahead of me because he existed before me.

So he is talking about Jesus' preeminence and uh authority in that.

John says, I am the voice of the one crying out in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord, hailing all the way back to prophecies in the Old Testament in Isaiah and Malachi, of the forerunner to the Messiah.

Someone standing among you is the one coming after me, whose sandal strap I'm not worthy to untie.

He's saying to the people, the Messiah is not only coming, but he's here among you right now, whose sandal strap I'm not worthy to untie.

And then in 29 and 36, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Big statement.

Who takes away the sin of the world is a little bit bigger than good teaching.

And then I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and he rested on him.

He's the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.

So he sees that symbol there, him, the one baptizing with the Holy Spirit.

And then 34, if it can't be any more plain, I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.

And then he has this final statement, 331 through 36.

The one who comes from above is above all.

The one who is from earth is earthly and speaks in earthly terms.

The one who comes from heaven is above all.

He testifies to what he has seen and heard, and yet no one accepts his testimony.

The one who has accepted his testimony has affirmed that God is true.

For the one whom God sent speaks God's words, since he gives the Spirit without measure.

The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hands.

The one who believes in the Son has eternal life.

But the one who rejects the Son will not see life.

Instead, the wrath of God remains upon him.

So ultimately, John the Baptist's testimony in the Gospel of John alone so far, is in excerpt or a few other things, but ultimately is Jesus is the Messiah, the one who was promised, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, that salvation comes through him alone, and rejecting him is rejecting God and ultimately accepting wrath.

That's a whole lot in the Gospel of John for this testimony.

So, witness number one, John the Baptist.

In verse 33, you sent messengers to John and he testified to the truth.

Verse 34 I don't receive human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved.

There's an interesting statement, but in the midst of this, it's important to know that Jesus is God.

Jesus is God.

He does not have a deficit of affirmation.

It's not like Jesus is like, I really need a few more people to believe in me so that I can do what I need to do.

We don't need to clap and say, I do believe in Jesus, I do believe.

It is bigger than that, and he doesn't need human testimony, but rather the human testimony is there for what purpose?

For the salvation of the hearers.

Verse 35, John was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light.

Okay, a few things in here.

Number one, John was.

Past tense.

He was.

This would lead me, it's a very, very splitting Harris things, this would lead me to believe that we've jumped ahead in the narrative in this section a bit, as we've talked about before in the Gospel of John, that it's not strictly chronological, because if you talk about somebody in past tense, usually they are no longer there.

So we can assume that John was not alive at this point.

So having that said, also, he was a burning and shining lamp.

And you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light.

So, a couple of different things about this idea of John being a burning and shining lamp.

It's interesting because in chapter one of John, he specifically mentions John was not the light.

He wasn't the word, he wasn't the light.

He was the forerunner, the testifier, the witness.

And here he's a burning and shining lamp.

He is, for lack of a better way to say it, the shiny light for the moths to gather to.

The idea of an Old Testament prophet is very, very interesting because you kind of see categorically the Lord not sending the paradigm of an Old Testament prophet to people who listen.

Usually it's hard-hearted individuals, usually it's people who are astray, who are not listening.

And so in comes a weirdo who is so eccentric that it's hard to ignore him.

All through here, throughout the Old Testament, you see people who are very unique.

We'll say unique.

And they are very hard to ignore in their message because they're speaking to hardened hearts.

John the Baptist was the same.

He was a weird dude.

He hung out in the desert, he wore camel skin, he ate locusts and honey, and he called the religious leaders of the day broods of vipers.

Very specific person.

So with that, he was a burning and shining lamp, and they were the moths that were willing to come and see him.

You were willing to rejoice for a while in his life.

But the irony of that was they were not willing to accept his testimony.

They were just willing to show up and see what's happening.

Because John drew quite a crowd.

He drew quite a group of Jews who were being baptized.

And so it's cool to be a part of the group until you have to buy into what they're actually saying.

And here they were willing to be a part of that, just not actually to accept that he is telling them that Jesus is the Messiah, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Verse 36, but I have a greater testimony than John's because of the works that the Father has given me to accomplish.

These very works I am doing testify about me that the Father has sent me.

So you have your second witness here.

The works that he is doing.

Number one, greater testimony than John's.

As great as the testimony of John was, Jesus' works are greater.

We've talked about the signs, the signs of his messiahship throughout this book and how they are pointing to him as not just a cool guy who does tricks, but a one who is the Messiah.

So think about this.

We are often very fluent in scripture.

We can become a little bit inoculated to the miraculous because this is what Jesus does, right?

He heals people.

He raises people from the dead.

Sure, that's what he does.

It's a Tuesday.

He heals blind people, he makes lame people walk, all these different things.

This is not normal behavior.

And what he is doing, you think about his miracles largely in a few different categories, okay?

He raises people from the dead.

Those who are dead dead are no longer dead.

I cannot do that.

He heals blind people, people who cannot see can suddenly see again.

People who have leprosy are healed and can re-enter their community.

People who could not walk can suddenly walk and jump and leap and praise God.

People who are demon-possessed, who are the scary people in the town, who are outcasts, sometimes living among the outskirts in the tombs, are allowed to re- they re-enter their right mind and return into community.

All of these people are cut off to a certain extent, irreversibly to human ability, and he is able to roll back the effects of sin and death on the short term and actually restore them to right living.

And oftentimes it's the law is that which is actually preventing them from being a part of their community, being a part of their society.

If they're a leper, uh if they are blind and lame, they really can't do anything in that society, and so they beg.

And the demon possessed cannot be a part of the community in that sense.

Except for that one random one who popped up in a synagogue.

So it is interesting, though, that people who are cut off and people who are irreversibly removed from life are being restored to it, that those who have no hope are being restored to it.

This is an aspect of the Messiah, that he is rolling back sin and death in the short term, which will ultimately be culminated not only at the cross, but in eternity.

So his works are greater than that, and they testify that the Father has sent him.

He is not just doing miracles to gain influence.

In fact, usually what happens is he'll do a miracle, people will flock to him, and he has to leave because it becomes a circus, or because they try to make him king.

He's not actually gathering money while he is doing his miracles, as seems to be the case in all of the uh potentially, and so he is actually doing this for the purpose of human restoration, really to no benefit to himself, except because he is the Messiah.

So, and then in verse 37, the Father who has sent me has himself testified about me.

We got witness number three here.

How'd you like to be in a courtroom?

And it's like, I'd like to call God to the stand and be like, can we skip the whole you swear to tell the truth thing?

We think we're pretty good.

Okay.

So the father has testified about me.

You have not heard his voice at any time, and you haven't seen his form.

This comes up a couple of times.

This comes up as well, I believe, in John chapter 6.

John 6 · chapter mention

And this idea, and in John chapter 1, no one has seen the Father.

John 1 · chapter mention

Uh he is not visible.

He is there is basically there is a chasm between humans and the Father as a result of sin.

And we see that from the very beginning.

And there's an irony to that though, because Jesus will also say, I and my father are one.

He will say, If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.

He'll be talking to his disciples, and he'll be talking and all this really important stuff, and they'll be like, Will you just show us the Father and that'll be enough for us?

And he's like.

So, with that, there's a certain irony in that they haven't seen the Father and they haven't heard his voice.

Because, yes, while that is true, there is a chasm between humans and God that only Jesus can restore and rectify.

Jesus is God and is visible and heard, but they weren't willing to hear him.

So, intent statement in verse 38.

You don't have his word residing in you.

Because you don't believe the one he sent.

So, what is the father's if you can't hear him and you can't see him, what is the father's witness?

His word.

The scriptures.

To tell the religious leaders you don't have his word residing in you might possibly be construed as offensive.

Especially if they are of the order of the Pharisees, where from a young age they have, I don't know, memorized it?

And yet he's saying you don't have it living in you.

Why?

Because you don't believe the one he sent.

That is an intense statement.

Even more so.

You pour over the scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, and yet they testify about me.

They pour over the scriptures, they search the scriptures, diving through the scriptures is their life.

Think they have eternal life in them, and yet they are missing the one that gives eternal life.

A couple things about that.

Number one, uh, how can that happen?

How can somebody be so fluent in the scriptures and think they have eternal life in them and miss the whole point?

Well, if they think they are determining and finding their own righteousness through the law, that's a big problem.

They can have the whole thing set up, understand the law, have it internalized, have it memorized, practice every little thing and even beyond with all the traditions, and think that they are set, but if they are rejecting the Messiah, it's all for not.

The scriptures testify about Jesus.

We don't have time in the year to unpack how the scriptures testify about Jesus.

They do.

Go look for it.

That's as best I can do today.

The entire meta-narrative of Scripture is about Jesus from the very beginning to the very end.

The picture of humans and God in communion and right relationship, that being broken by sin.

We're at chapter three of the book, by the way.

And then, how do humans get reconciled to God?

There's the rest of the scripture.

So it is pointing to Jesus and about his messiahship, about him being the savior that can reconcile God and man.

So from the very beginning, all the way to the end, they testify about Jesus.

It's all about Jesus.

The whole thing's about Jesus.

Um, from the very beginning in Genesis, where you have the prophecy in Genesis 3, you have the seed coming from Adam and Eve, who, although the serpent will bruise his heel, he will crush the serpent's head.

All the way to the end, the revelation, revelation, by the way, is the testimony of what?

Jesus.

Jesus! Testimony of Jesus.

How many times have we read and studied and heard passages through the book of Revelation about things that are nothing having to do with Jesus because it's all about I have solved the eschatological crossword puzzle.

Not bad things as long as you lead to Jesus.

So here's what's crazy in here and what's sobering.

It is possible, according to this verse, to be fluent in the scriptures, to be immersed in it, to be immensely knowledgeable about it, and yet miss the point.

That is not just a first century problem.

May we always be led back to Jesus.

That's the point of that.

That is not a sobering, terrifying thought of, oh no, am I doing it wrong?

It's a reminder, always go back to Jesus.

You go back to Jesus, you're safe.

I mean, within reason.

You're in the genealogies and you're going, what does this have to do with Jesus?

Zoom out, please.

So, but with that.

The entire meta narrative of scripture is about Jesus.

The whole thing ultimately points to him.

So can imagine being so versed in this and so fluent in this and yet missing the whole point.

Verse 40.

You are not willing to come to me so that you may have life.

You pour over the scriptures because you think you have eternal life, and yet they testify about me, but you are not willing to come to me so that you may have life.

This is the key issue in this passage.

Everything goes through Jesus.

And if you can't, if you're trying to go around that, you're missing the whole thing and you have nothing.

This is painted in a situation that is ludicrous, where a guy sitting for 38 years in misery has been restored to walking, leaping, praising God by Jesus.

Why?

Because Jesus said so.

And then the religious leaders are saying, you can't do that, to the guy, because he carried his mat, and then turning to Jesus and saying, you can't do that because you did it on the Sabbath.

It is meant to be painted in a way that we are like, what the heck?

Because these people are so enveloped in their tradition and so enveloped in their interpretation and extrapolation of the law that they are trying to find their own righteousness outside of Jesus, and Jesus is threatening their paradigm.

So, because they're not willing to come to him so that they may have life.

Verse 41.

I don't accept glory from people.

Once again, Jesus is not lacking glory.

He doesn't have a tank that needs to be filled up enough for him to get enough glory XP to achieve Messiah.

He doesn't need this for them.

He doesn't need this for him.

They need this for them.

Verse 42, possibly the harshest indictment in this whole thing.

But I know you that you have no love for God within you.

You have no love for God within you.

How could people who are so intensely devoted, so deeply zealous, yet have no love for God within them?

That's pretty intense.

That's pretty uh pretty harsh, really, in that, that he's saying the core issue is they have no love for God within them.

I think of in Revelation, the first church in Ephesus, he knows their works.

He knows they can't tolerate these uh things, he he knows their zeal, but they've left their first love.

Checking all the boxes, doing all the things, but they forgot the whole point.

And so I hope you're hearing the broken record today.

It's all about Jesus.

The whole thing is about Jesus.

If they have everything except Jesus, they have nothing.

If they have Jesus, they have everything.

And so imagine having your whole paradigm be: I need to do these things, I need to observe these things and not just what's in the law, but further what's in our traditions, all these different things, doing it religiously, constantly, doing, doing, doing, doing.

And not only is Jesus saying that's not enough, but he's also saying the people who are not doing those things have access to God through Jesus.

That's pretty intense, as we'll see in the book of Acts, when it turns out that the Gentiles are they receive salvation.

And the very first thing that happens is the religious leaders go, hey, no, no, no, you guys need to observe the law of Moses and be circumcised.

And there's a big conflict within that.

So it is, I pity the religious leaders here because their whole life is built on something that they think they can satisfy God with, and it was not what he asked fully in the first place.

It was the whole point of the law.

Best way I can describe it, the best way I've ever heard it said was that the law is the MRI.

You go in, I've never had an MRI, but I would be so freaking out.

Um so go in, have the system, the machine, noises, the lights, all that.

And at the end of the day, you don't, they don't say, you're healed.

Cancer's gone.

They say, Yep, looks like you got cancer, uh, if that's the case.

That's what the law does.

It indicates the problem.

It is not the cure.

And so the law indicates the problem.

Jesus is the cure.

So it is intense for them to say you have no love for God within you.

But what does this look like on the street here?

This looks like them chewing somebody out who just got healed after 38 years because he's carrying his mat.

He's not punching babies that we see.

He is carrying a mat.

And they're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, that's work, it's the law, you're doing this wrong.

And he's like, well, I'm kind of new with this walking thing, so here we are.

But you have no love for God within you.

I have come in my father's name, and yet you don't accept me.

If someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him.

There's again the indictment of look, I've come, the scriptures witness of me, John the Baptist witnesses of me, my signs witnesses of me.

You're not going to accept any of that.

But if somebody comes who is going to expound upon your traditions really, really skillfully, you'll accept that guy, and he will be your leader.

How in verse 44, how can you believe since you accept glory from one another, but don't seek the glory that comes from the only God.

So if they are rejecting the divine messenger and they are exalting the one who is supposed to point to him, but not actually getting to him, that's the problem.

Imagine getting in a car, getting directions.

It's possible, guys, you can do it.

And you get directions, and you're gonna go there, and you never actually start the car.

But you go, yeah, I know how to, I know the I know the way.

That's good.

That's crazy.

You don't do that.

The whole point is getting to where you're supposed to be pointed to, and the whole point of that is Jesus.

They accept glory from one another, exalting the creation by receiving self-testifying teachers and accepting glory from one another, but won't seek the glory that comes from the only God.

And so, then we have our final spot here.

Don't think I'll testify, don't think that I will accuse you to the Father.

I don't have to.

Your accuser is Moses on whom you have set your hope.

They're the one who is accusing them in court in this situation is the one on whom they set their hope.

How brutal would that be to be in a courtroom situation, you are convinced you're innocent, and you are convinced you're innocent because you have your star witness, and your star witness turns and testifies against you.

Not a good day.

And here it's Moses on whom they set their hope.

So, how is that the Moses being an idiom of the law, being an idiom of that?

If you believed Moses, you would believe me because he wrote about me.

So, just one little snippet.

We see in Deuteronomy 18, 15 through 18.

The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers.

You must listen to him.

This is what you requested from the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, Let us not continue to hear the voice of the Lord our God, or see this great danger or this great fire any longer, so that we will not die.

Then the Lord said to me, You They have spoken well, I'll raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers, I'll put my words in his mouth, and you will tell them everything I command him.

Prophecy leading to Jesus, all the way back in Deuteronomy.

It's an intense, intense statement, they don't believe Moses, so they don't believe his words.

How do you think they would receive that statement?

To be told, if you believed Moses, you would believe me, because he wrote about me, but you don't if you don't believe what he wrote, how will you believe my words?

Very blunt, obviously.

And it's ironic, something to keep track of throughout the Gospels.

The religious leaders seem to be the only people who actually understand what Jesus is saying.

They're the ones who actually get what he's talking about, who he's talking about, that indictment, when his disciples are like, I don't know what they're talking about, or he didn't bring bread.

And uh the people are like, ah, I don't know what's going on, but there's a big crowd, so I'm gonna keep going until John 6.

Stay tuned.

And so, in that situation here, he's very clearly stating this.

He's gonna be very clear with them throughout the whole of the gospels.

There's gonna be a point where they pick up stones to stone him, and he says, So I've done lots of miracles in my father's name.

Which one are you trying to kill me for exactly?

And uh, in that moment, they are very clearly saying, We're not trying to kill you for a miracle, but because you claim to be God and that God is your father.

So they are not confused about this point.

So this is a very sobering indictment wrapping up this whole situation.

A guy was healed, he was restored to life, and they immediately told them, You're guilty.

And he said, Jesus told me to do this, and then there is this discourse of the religious leaders and Jesus back and forth with that.

And so, what are we picking about out, picking up about this?

Jesus is not here just peddling his own product, the whole of scriptures testify of him, including the law, of which they set their hope.

The works that he does testify of him.

John the Baptist testifies of him, all in this package, and the whole thing is so that they would come to him and receive eternal life.

But the indictment is that they are not willing to, so because they miss him, they miss everything.

And again, that's not a first-century problem.

It is very, very possible to be fluent in scriptures, to be very fluent in there, to have the culture down.

We all got our churchiness down coke, right?

We got the words, you know, bless you, bless you, thoughts and prayers, you know, got all of that down, and yet be more motivated by other things, by temporary things, by earthly things as the core of our focus, or by things in the future, honestly, that were missing Jesus and Jesus now.

And so, what's the remedy for that that we see through this whole thing?

Well, we see here in verse 40, then Diamond, you're not willing to come to me.

Verse 43, accept me.

Um the uh verse 41 47, believe my words.

When hearing that statement, we don't go, gosh, am I blowing it, am I doing it wrong?

We go, hey, maybe I should get closer to the shepherd.

That's the whole point.

The whole point of this is to remember what is the focus and to draw closer to Jesus, the shepherd.

It's that simple.

That's the beauty of this.

And so the beauty of this too is we see an actual play-by-play here for those who uh have not put their faith in Jesus, of what it looks like that Jesus is carving through the steps and the rules, and you have to do this and this and all these different things, and going, come to me and receive life.

That's the message of Jesus in the Bible.

That makes us a little nervous as Christians because we're like, yeah, but it's not that simple because sanctification, sanctification comes after salvation.

So, having that said, coming to Jesus is the whole crux of this and the whole uh the whole point of this.

Whether we have followed him our whole lives or whether we have not, it all comes back to him.

So may we search the scriptures for Jesus.

May we live our life looking for him.

May we just stay close to him and then trust that he is shepherding us and have peace in that and have hope in that and have joy in that.

Just staying right by his side.

Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you so much for today, and I thank you for your word.

Even in intense passages like this, I thank you that there is a great deal of hope to be had.

I thank you that everything comes through you.

I thank you that we are not lacking when we have you.

And I ask, Lord, that you continue to quicken our hearts, to stay close by your side and rejoice in that and be at peace.

That we would not be obsessed and distracted by peripheral things and miss you in the whole point.

That just like the religious leaders, we would not build a house of cards, a tower upon which to place our own righteousness and understanding and obsessions, but rather may we just be excited to be your kids.

And for those who are hearing this, who haven't placed their faith in Jesus, it is as simple as confession and belief, simple as saying, I want to follow you.

And I believe that is you are the one who can restore me to God, and I want to uh give you my guilt and take your innocence.

Have me now.

And Lord, I ask that you would work on people's hearts that you by your spirit would be working to convict in that way and encourage people, and Lord, I ask that we would ultimately draw closer to you in all things.

In your name.

Amen.