If It's Not Jesus, Where Would You Go?

Thank you for being here.

I'm excited to do the pumpkin chunkin this afternoon, if I'm saying

it right.

But those of you who want to help.

We do.

We're asking that you could be here between three and four to help

us get set up and finish everything up.

And then also if you're making a dessert, if you can bring those

to the gym.

If you'd like to get involved, there's sign up sheets in the back.

And just want to thank the Scotts for heading this up and we

are so thankful that, that they're doing this also for our first

time visitors.

I'll say this before we get started, thank you for being here.

There's many other places you could choose to come, but thank you

for coming.

At the end of the service, I'll meet you at the back blue table

and exchange your connection card for a free gift.

Just a chance for us to get to know each other a little bit.

So thank you for being here.

If you would open your Bibles to John, chapter six.

John, chapter six.

This is a passage that's been very dear to my heart.

This is a message that has really helped me and I want to share

it with you today.

John, chapter number six.

We're going to be at the end of the chapter.

We're going to start the reading in verse 66.

And John is a, is writing to the world.

Okay.

Just as a reminder, John is writing the book of John and he is

revealing Christ as the God of the universe, the creator of the

world.

And Jesus Christ claimed to be God.

John is proclaiming it as well, saying, I've seen some things

and I want to let you know about it.

So we're going to pick up right here in chapter number six.

Jesus ministry is in full swing.

Okay.

It just got started a few chapters before.

And Jesus is doing things the world has never seen before.

Okay?

It's causing a stir.

And things are happening now once again that has never happened

before.

People are getting healed.

They're walking out of graves.

Jesus is walking on water.

He's feeding 5,000 men with two loaves or five loaves and two

fishes.

I mean, amazing things are happening.

So much so that now there is a following.

Jesus is attracting multitudes, the Bible says, and these

multitudes are coming to him to find out what is he all about.

Maybe that's why you're here today.

Maybe you've heard of Christ and you want to know a little bit

more about him.

Or maybe you've seen what he's done in your Life.

And you say, hey, I want more.

Well, these.

That's right where we're going to pick up the reading today.

Let's read these verses right here in verse 66.

The Bible says, from that time many of his disciples went back and

walked no more with him.

Hold on, something's happening.

Everyone was following him.

Now they're leaving.

So look again.

Verse 66.

And from that time, many of his disciples went back and walked

no more with him.

Then said Jesus unto the twelve, wilt thou also go away?

Then Simon Peter answered him, lord, to whom shall we go?

Thou has the words of eternal life.

And we believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, the son

of the living God.

Let's pray.

Lord, I need your help this morning.

I pray that you use me this morning.

Help us to see exactly what you'd have for us.

Help our ears to be in tune for the message that you have.

Help our eyes to be able to see it.

And, Lord, may our feet start to do it.

Lord, would you help me this morning?

Lord, would you help our congregation?

Help us.

I pray in Jesus name.

Amen.

All right, so we are at a point in the ministry of Christ where

he is sitting down in verse 66.

And from that time, many of his disciples went back or I'm sorry.

And walked no more with him.

They went back and walked no more with him.

So what happened?

Well, this was an eventful chapter.

In chapter number six.

I would encourage you this afternoon, go back and read chapter

number six.

Lots of things are happening.

And one of them is the feeding of the 5,000.

Okay, 5,000 men.

They estimate somewhere between 15 and 20,000 people.

Were fed by a small amount of food.

It's miraculous.

And then they had leftovers of 12 baskets that they carried home.

Then Jesus, after feeding the 5,000.

And by the way, this multitude that followed Jesus, they didn't

follow him into the town.

They followed him out into the desert place.

So they left the town.

They left everything that they knew.

And they started following Jesus into the wilderness.

Well, they're out there, and now they're hungry.

He feeds them.

It's amazing.

After they feed the 5,000, Jesus tells his disciples to get

in the boat and go across the Sea of Galilee.

And I will be there.

Go to Tiberius.

They were in Capernaum, or they were heading to Capernaum.

And so the disciples did that to the point where the people who

were sitting there after they ate said Jesus didn't get in the

boat with them.

And there's only one boat over there.

And Jesus isn't here, but he's over there.

How did he get over there?

Well, in the middle of the night, there was a storm that started

raging.

And Jesus came out to his disciples, walking on the water.

That's where he said, peter, why don't you come out too?

And Peter stepped out of the boat onto water and walked towards

Christ.

As soon as Christ got in the boat, immediately the storm stopped.

The waves calmed immediately, and the boat was at shore.

Miracle event.

We'll talk about it one day maybe, but we're going to keep going.

And now Jesus is on the other side of the shore.

And the people said, hey, we've got to go figure out what he

did.

So these people, this multitude that he just fed, pursued

after him.

And they are trying to figure out they need to talk to this man,

how did you get over here?

Well, he says, hey, you seek me not because I do miracles.

You seek me because you ate of the bread which I gave you and you're

full.

He said, you're satisfied.

You want full satisfaction, don't you?

And so they start asking him.

And Jesus starts to teach this lesson, this lesson of eating my

flesh and drinking my blood.

It was radical.

They had not heard of anything like it before.

And people.

It kind of.

It stopped the religious leaders of the day in their tracks

too.

And they.

They begin to question Jesus.

And.

And basically what he was saying is he was not speaking literally,

he was speaking figuratively.

He was speaking of a spiritual meat and a spiritual drink.

Well, that upset some people.

People got offended.

They wanted to follow Christ surfacely.

As long as everything's going good, I'm going to follow you.

But when you challenge the things, I'm going to step back just

a little bit.

Here we are.

Jesus says, will thou also go away?

Peter's response is amazing.

I want you to hear the tone in which Peter asked this question.

Jesus said, hey, are you also going to go away?

A lot of his disciples left him.

Peter says, to whom shall we go?

What else is there?

Let me ask you, sir, ma', am, if Jesus isn't the answer, where

would you go?

Is there anything else to turn to?

Well, the world has other options, I can assure you that.

But if it's not Jesus, then who would it be?

What would you turn to?

If you left Christ for something else, where would you go?

Peter says, I can't even fathom why you're asking me that.

He says to me, life won't even continue forward if I don't trust

you.

I know that you're the Christ.

We believe and are sure that thou art the Christ.

I. I've seen what you've done.

I've seen those.

I've seen that dead man or that lame man paralyzed from birth

get up and walk.

I've seen amazing things.

Of course we know.

Peter says we believe in verse 69.

We believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, the son of the

living God.

So this morning I'd like to speak for just a short time on the

topic of how do you know Jesus is who he claimed to be?

How do you know that?

Personally.

Do you know that Jesus Christ is who he claimed to be?

Jesus Christ claimed to be the sinless son of God.

Jesus Christ to be the very God who can forgive sin.

Well, today I want to go back to Peter's question and we're going

to look at why we can trust the claims of Christ, why he is who

he says he is.

So to back up, I'm going to go to his question and we're going to

get right into it.

I'm going to ask you again.

If it's not Jesus, where would you go?

What would you turn to?

One option is atheism.

That's an option, right?

It is the scientific impossibility, but it's an option

that everything came from nothing, that everything or nothing

plus nothing equals everything.

That's what evolution tells you.

That's what atheism tells you.

They say that everything doesn't just come from nothing, but

that nothing was the actual source, the driving force of everything

that we have.

No, I'm sorry that that's not the case.

Atheism is an option, but it is foolish.

You know that God doesn't even believe in atheists.

No, God doesn't believe in atheists anyway because he tells

them that they are without excuse.

Romans 1 tells us that every man is without excuse.

You can look outside and if you come to the conclusion as this

is a total accident, hundreds of millions of accidents, and we

live in perfect beauty, we know the exact precise time, minute

that the sun will rise 100 years from now.

Just an accident.

No, this is by design.

This is the Creator putting things into force.

That, and I will remind you again, you've heard this from this

pulpit before, but I'll let you know that there are not seven

different options for the.

For the origin of the universe.

There are not seven or three.

There are only two options for the origin of the universe.

It's either eternal matter or an eternal maker.

Something has to be outside of time, space, and Matter.

And it's not matter.

It's a God who created everything and we live in his creation.

So if it's not atheism, maybe you'll turn to philosophy.

Philosophy is an option.

If it's not atheism, maybe it's philosophy.

Here's a quote from Adrian Rogers.

He says philosophy is a system that tells us what we already know

in words that we cannot understand.

Philosophy doesn't satisfy you.

We talk about things.

Philosophers will philosophy and talk about all the things and

they'll politenticate of this, but it doesn't satisfy it.

If you read Plato and Socrates, they were miserable men.

They didn't believe in God and they believed in their philosophy

and they were miserable.

Okay, atheism, philosophy.

What about materialism?

Do you think stuff will satisfy you?

Do you think if we can just keep gaining more stuff and bigger

house, better car, all the things, nice clothes, better status,

better job, do you think that will satisfy you?

That what you're pursuing, that's an option.

But I'll let you know, materialism will not satisfy the

deepest hunger of your heart.

Okay, if it's not materialism, it's not philosophy, it's not atheism,

the only other thing to turn to is false religion.

Would you turn to a false God?

That is an option.

If you leave Christ, if Christianity, if Christ doesn't have

the answer to your problems.

Men are incurably religious.

There's a story.

You all know Pastor Wiggins, right?

Brother Wiggins in seminary, he was teaching a class.

He was telling a story of him on a mission trip and down to Mexico.

And those of you who don't know, Pastor Wiggins was the associate

pastor here for a long time, great friend of this church.

And he was telling of this mission trip that they went to and

they were way down in Mexico somewhere and they had to take this

12 or 13 hour drive.

They drove and drove and drove through small towns and little villages.

And he says, we pulled up to this one and he says there was like

a 50s model Chevy truck with candles all around it with a Coke

can on the hood.

He says, I'm not sure if they were worshiping the truck or the

Coke can, but see, man will come up with something to give honor

and praise to.

That's our nature.

We want to give praise.

We know that we didn't do this ourself, so we are incurably religious.

You would turn to a false prophet now, a false religion?

Let me tell you something about Christianity.

Christianity.

Listen, please.

It's not a cause Christianity is not a code.

Christianity isn't even a church.

Christianity is Christ.

Christianity is a person.

And it is based off of the person, the life and the work of

the God man, of the sinless son of God, Jesus Christ, the one

who came born of a virgin, died a sacrificial life and victoriously

resurrected from the grave.

That's God, you say?

Well, how do I know?

We're getting there, we're getting there.

Let's keep going.

So let me tell you this.

Christianity is Christ.

You can take Buddha out of Buddhism and still basically have

Buddhism.

You could take Muhammad out of Islam and still basically have Islam.

But if you took Christ out of Christianity, everything falls apart.

Christianity is Christ.

Jesus Christ is the only one who has the answer for your sin problem.

He's the only one that can satisfy the deepest longing of your

heart.

It is Jesus Christ.

And Peter says, we believe and are sure that thou art the Christ,

the son of the living God.

Well, I want to remind you that in this time, they didn't have

news.

They didn't have a Facebook feed, they didn't have a newspaper

getting delivered.

They shared this word that Christ was doing all these things

spread so fast by word of mouth.

I can imagine there would be people who saw the things that Jesus

did and they would run through the town shouting down the streets

of what they just saw.

Probably like the woman in the well with.

After she met with Jesus, it says that she took off running, left

her water pots and came into the town and said, come see a man.

Which told me everything I ever did.

Is this not the Christ?

See the Christ, the chosen, the Messiah.

And so here's the question.

How do you know Jesus is who he claims to be?

Young person and of old.

Do you know personally that Jesus is the Christ?

Christ isn't Jesus last name?

It's a title.

Christ means that he is the Messiah.

He is the anointed one.

He is the one, the forgiver of sins.

He is the true fullness of God placed into a human's body.

It is called the hyperstatic union, where you have all of God

and all of man.

He's 100% man and he's 100% God.

And that is the person of Jesus Christ.

So how do you believe that?

Are we just supposed to follow this faith blindly out of empty claims?

No.

God does not want you to take a step in the dark.

He wants you to take a step in the light.

And that's what faith is.

Faith in Christ is a step in the light.

And I will show you here that our world is growing farther away

from God as we see the society turning its back on the things of

God.

And so we need to be rooted and grounded in the person of Jesus

Christ.

So you ask me, how do I know?

How do I know that Jesus is who he claims to be?

I want to tell you this.

The first reason is the historical reason.

Jesus Christ is a historical fact.

Rather, if you believe in him or not, it is an F, A, C, T fact

of history.

Even the secular scholars admit that there was a man named

Jesus born in Nazareth, who died on a Roman cross and who claimingly

walked out of the grave three days later.

It's a historical fact.

It is undisputable.

In fact, every time that you write your date, a date on a piece

of paper, on a check, as you sign your name, you are giving testimony

to the fact that a man named Jesus, life and death divides the

centuries.

It's all around us.

It is a historical fact that Jesus walked this earth, not just

that he lived, but that he died and came back to life again.

Kind of a big deal.

I don't know.

I'm going to say this.

Do you know man's biggest problem is death.

Man's biggest problem, no man has ever figured it out.

But there's one man who's come back to life and who offers you life

as a free gift.

Accept him upon his, on his terms, and he will forgive you of

your sins and take you to heaven when you die.

And there's no, there is no explanation of the Christian Church.

You're thinking of the historical fact.

Study the Christian Church and you will find out that these men

not only believe that he lived, but that he walked out of

the grave.

And there's men throughout all of history, men and women who have

gone to the burning of the stake, who have been drowned in water,

who have been killed, martyred because of their belief in Jesus

Christ.

And that I'm telling you, there may be some men that live for

a lie, but there are no men that would willingly die for a lie.

These men saw the resurrected Christ.

They say, ah, they were probably just hallucinating.

They, they didn't see him.

He appeared to over 500 at one time.

You say it must have been a ghost.

He ate with them.

They touched him.

They felt him.

They touched Thomas, touched the nail prints in his hands.

Are you telling me, sir and ma', am, that Christianity is just

a blind faith?

No.

We have historical evidence.

Do you know that there is not one archeological finding that disproves

any aspect of the Bible.

Hello, you say, well, there's some that they haven't found any

record that any of this exists.

You know what I tell them?

Keep digging, keep digging.

You say, well, hey, did they find Noah's Ark in Turkey?

I don't know.

That may be it.

That may not be it.

You say, well, does that help strengthen my faith?

Not in my Bible.

Help strengthen my faith of the scientist, but.

But not of God.

I don't need these.

There is archeological findings that can reestablish and

ground your faith.

And you and I need those.

And I'm telling you that it's a fact.

And I want to share this with you.

And is in Acts, chapter one, verse three, it says that he showed

himself alive, Jesus after the resurrection.

He showed himself alive by many infallible proofs.

Many infallible proofs doesn't say.

Some translations translate that to convincing truth.

But infallible means that it cannot be proven otherwise.

They've seen them.

They talked with this resurrected Savior.

And I want to just ask you this.

If you were lost and you come down a path and there's a fork in

the road, there are two men there, one is dead and one is alive,

who would you ask?

Who would you ask?

Jesus has come back from the grave.

He has solved your biggest problem.

He has conquered death, hell and the grave.

And so the historical reasons.

And then secondly is the biblical reasons.

Peter says, here thou has the words of eternal life.

This is John 6:68, it says, then Peter, then Simon Peter answered

John 6:68

him, lord, to whom shall we go?

Thou hast the words of eternal life.

Now I want you to know that the Bible is the word of God.

You say, how do you know?

Well, 300 unique fulfilled prophecy on the person of Jesus Christ.

300 fulfilled prophecies on who he was, where would he be born,

when would he be born, by what family, in what situation, how would

he die?

What would happen after 300 unique prophecies fulfilled?

These are prophecies so precise that writers, skeptics say

there's so much detail in that it had to be written afterwards.

No prophecy is speaking beforehand that this is 300 unique

fulfilled prophecies.

That he would live this sinless life, that he would perform

miracles, that he would die a crucifixion, a cross, or I'm sorry,

a death on a cross, which by the way, they described David in

Psalm 22.

He describes the death of crucifixion Christ on the cross 700

years before they invented the crucifixion.

It was before they never put anyone to death by a cross when David

wrote Psalm 22.

This is unique, fulfilled prophecy.

Another thing that I believe the Bible to be true is the complete

unity of the Bible.

I wish I had a photo for you, but you can look it up.

National Geographic did a study on the Bible and its cross

references.

I would encourage you to look it up.

They put it on a display and it was absolutely astounding.

This was several years ago, but it showed every verse in the

Bible as a line.

And then it had arcs of connections from Old Testament to

New Testament, from Old, from New Testament to Old Testament.

63,000 cross references to be exact, 63,779 cross references.

Where the Bible is saying the same thing, just in a different way.

It doesn't contradict itself.

And just to hear this down, these writers did not have access

to the other writers.

They didn't have access, they didn't have email, they didn't have

a post office, they didn't have a way to communicate.

And in fact, they didn't even live at the same time.

These writers, 40 different writers, wrote the book of what we

call the Bible.

There's 66 books in the Bible.

40 authors, writers, one author, which is God.

Over 1500 years, took to write this Bible.

1500 years.

And it connects.

There's great unity in the Bible over three continents and three

different languages.

And these are men.

The writers of the Bible are men from all walks of life.

They are fishermen, doctors, lawyers, tax collectors, shepherds,

kings.

Astounding.

Astounding.

The longevity of the Bible, the Bible has lasted through the

centuries where men, just by the way, there are laws.

I'm thankful that we live in America, but if you go to other countries,

there are laws against you owning a Bible.

Men have made laws against it.

They have burned Bibles, they have tried to produce laws against

it.

But I'll remind you that the Bible is the best selling book of

all time.

It's the first Bible, first book ever printed.

And the scientific and historical accuracy of the Bible

is confirmed day by day.

Just keep reading, just keep digging and you'll find it.

And I just want to tell you that the central theme of the Bible

is Jesus Christ.

He is the author and the finisher of our faith.

The Scriptures describe his miracle birth by a virgin.

They described his family, his upbringing, his life as totally perfect.

Do you know Jesus never had to withdraw any statement that he ever

made.

And he was misunderstood constantly.

He never had to apologize.

He never had to withdraw anything.

He was Totally and perfectly complete.

This is what the Bible presents himself.

And then lastly, so we have the historical reasons, the biblical

reasons, and I'm going to finish with.

Here is the personal reason.

The reading of God's word has transformed my life.

It's changed me.

My desires for me as I was growing up was to pursue something

this direction.

And God changed my heart.

He changed the things that I desire.

He didn't just say, no, you shouldn't do that.

You should do this.

He changed the actual, the heartbeat of my life to wanting something

that I didn't want.

Has he done that for you?

He's wanting to do that for you.

He wants you to get to know him.

He wants you to have a deep relationship with him.

He wants the word of God to become a part of who you are.

He wants it to be in your mind.

He wants it to be in your heart.

He wants you to be able to speak for him.

That's why he left it.

You are a treasure trove waiting for God to reveal who and

what he is to you so that then it will help you, it will save your

marriage, it will help your kids, it will help you in your job,

it will help you in every aspect of life.

And then you can tell somebody else, you can tell somebody else,

and then you can see it work again in their life.

I'm telling you today that Jesus is who he says he is.

He is exactly who the Bible claims him to be.

He is the truth, the way and the life.

And no man cometh unto the Father but by him.

The Bible says that neither is there salvation in any other fort,

for there's none other name under heaven given among men whereby

you must be saved.

And I don't know about you, I don't know where you're at in your

stage of life or where you're at with your relationship with God.

But wherever you are, God was wanting you to take the next step.

He wants you to see that he is who he says he is and that he has

all of the evidence to support it.

But he wants that evidence to be a part of you.

He wants you to not just be a witness.

You know, God has called us to be a witness to the world.

God hasn't called us to be a prosecuting attorney.

We don't shove this down people's throat.

We just tell people what we have seen and heard.

And then, you know what makes a witness even more effective is

when you're part of the evidence.

And you can say, it's helped me.

It saved my Family.

It strengthened my marriage.

It's helped me love people who are unlovable.

It's real.

Is Jesus Christ real to you today?

There's no one that has the answers to your problems.

There's no one that can give you peace, that passes understanding.

There's no one else that has the words of eternal life.

And I want to ask you, if you do not know for sure that Jesus is

the Savior and that you are the sinner in need of a Savior and

he is the only one eligible to take your place.

You know that Jesus is the only one in history to choose to

die.

You say, well, what about a suicide?

No, he just chooses to die sooner.

He's going to die eventually.

Jesus Christ never had to die.

You say, why?

Because he had no sin of his own.

There was nothing causing him to have to die.

The Bible says for the wages of sin is death.

Well, he had no sin.

He didn't have to die, but he chose to because he knew you'd be

sitting here today.

He knew that you'd be in the walk of your life and where you were.

And he said, I have got to do this.

This will solve the problem and not treat the symptom.

If you've never accepted Christ as your Savior, do it today.

Would you all stand with me as we have a time of invitation?

Lord, thank you so much for your word, your goodness to us.

Lord.

I pray that something that was said would resonate, Lord, that you

would be able to use something today to help someone in here.

I ask this in Jesus name.

Amen.

As the piano begins to play, the altars are open.

Maybe you have questions.

Maybe you'd like to know a little bit more about our church.

Maybe you'd like to know a little bit more about how to be saved,

how to have your sins forgiven.