Embark on a journey through the Gospel of John with us, as we grapple with Jesus's profound assertion, "Before Abraham was, I am." Our series 'Come and See' takes a closer look at the controversies and misunderstandings surrounding Jesus's identity, diving into what it means for Him to be both the light and the bread of life. We'll explore the immediate upheaval and historical repercussions of His claims, while wrestling with the confrontations they stir within our own beliefs. Together, we'll seek the grace to see the goodness in Jesus's challenging words, aiming to glorify God through a deeper understanding.
When foundations shake, there's a story to be told. This episode brings to light the conflicts that arise when our core beliefs are questioned, especially within the religious sphere. We'll discuss the human tendency to turn good things into the bedrock of our identity and the inflexibility that can ensue, particularly in matters of faith. Our guests will help unravel these complexities, engaging in a dialogue that suggests embracing imperfections in our foundations is a pivotal step toward growth and genuine stability.
Finally, we'll reflect on humility and the gifts of gratitude and competence. I share personal anecdotes about the challenges of accepting help and the realization that our competence isn't the sole measure of our self-worth. We'll contemplate the idea that true stability and fulfillment stem from accepting our limitations and embracing the teachings of Jesus. Concluding with a heartfelt prayer, this episode invites listeners to reconsider their own foundations, encouraging a transformative journey toward gratitude and acceptance.
Embark on a journey through the Gospel of John with us, as we grapple with Jesus's profound assertion, "Before Abraham was, I am." Our series 'Come and See' takes a closer look at the controversies and misunderstandings surrounding Jesus's identity, diving into what it means for Him to be both the light and the bread of life. We'll explore the immediate upheaval and historical repercussions of His claims, while wrestling with the confrontations they stir within our own beliefs. Together, we'll seek the grace to see the goodness in Jesus's challenging words, aiming to glorify God through a deeper understanding.
When foundations shake, there's a story to be told. This episode brings to light the conflicts that arise when our core beliefs are questioned, especially within the religious sphere. We'll discuss the human tendency to turn good things into the bedrock of our identity and the inflexibility that can ensue, particularly in matters of faith. Our guests will help unravel these complexities, engaging in a dialogue that suggests embracing imperfections in our foundations is a pivotal step toward growth and genuine stability.
Finally, we'll reflect on humility and the gifts of gratitude and competence. I share personal anecdotes about the challenges of accepting help and the realization that our competence isn't the sole measure of our self-worth. We'll contemplate the idea that true stability and fulfillment stem from accepting our limitations and embracing the teachings of Jesus. Concluding with a heartfelt prayer, this episode invites listeners to reconsider their own foundations, encouraging a transformative journey toward gratitude and acceptance.
All right, good morning everyone. Look at this neat little cup holder that Ben's gotten me. My name's Houston. I'm one of the pastors here, man. You heard it? Lori, read it.
Speaker 1:We're talking about John eight today and, yeah, I love this passage. It's a big passage, very big what he's saying. So I want to step back a little bit and recap where we've been. So we've been in this series in the book of John that we're calling Come and See, and I'm sure you remember the premise of this is that Jesus is arguably the most significant, the most influential and the most controversial person in history and despite all of that, or maybe because of the last one, he's one of the least understood people in history. And so what we thought was well, if we want to understand who he is, we're going to read a biography about him, the book of John, and we're going to read what he said to figure out who he is and what did he say about himself, so we can know who he is and what did he do, so we can know what he's about. So it's a little idea, but what we found, or what you might be finding, is that it's still he is still a very controversial figure. So, like you know, the modern idea, like our culture's idea of who Jesus is, is that he was a good person. Right, he existed, he was real. But I think if you asked, like the average person in America, they would say something effective yeah, he was a good person, a good teacher, maybe even prophetic, like a prophet, but he was definitely nothing more than that. Right, definitely nothing supernatural.
Speaker 1:And so this is tough, because what we've read in John so far is we've seen Jesus make a lot of big claims. Right, jesus has said you know, I'm the light. If you have me, you won't walk in darkness. Or he said, I'm the bread of life. If you have me, you won't hunger and thirst. He said he's going to go on to say I'm the way and the truth in the life. You know he's made a lot of claims. And if we go far back, you know, remember, early on, you know there is his first miracle at the wedding. Right, we found that Jesus is like the master of the feast he wants to give us life, life to the fullest. For the next passage, you know, goes in the temple with some whips and it's wild. We see that Jesus is not only the master of the feast, but he's the master of the whips, he's disruptive in our lives in order to give us these things, and I think that if you're taking a certain lens to this, you could still maintain so far that Jesus was not God. I mean, it'd be tough, but people have. People have done that. You know plenty of people have said, oh, I'm the light, right. Plenty of people who have died have said I'm the light. Plenty of people who have claimed to know the way, have done terrible things. You know plenty of examples in history, people making claims like this.
Speaker 1:But in our passage today, jesus makes a claim that is by far his most outrageous claim, his biggest claim, and he claims to be God, not just any God, but the God, the one God. What we see is that immediately whips the crowd into a frenzy. They're going to kill him Like they're going to execute him, and that's the thing about Jesus. That's the thing that John keeps showing us is that there's a pattern. There's a pattern to people encountering Jesus and it's like without fail. This happens in the book and in our lives, where Jesus says something, he makes some claim about himself, something big, something bold, something kind of ugly for us, and the result is always that, to the degree that we understand his claim, we are outraged by it, and then we have to wrestle with it. We have to wrestle with him, we have to wrestle with ourselves, and some are going to go on to follow him and some are going to try to kill him, but without fail, there's this wrestling, there's this awful battle that we have to do with ourselves because of what Jesus said.
Speaker 1:And so today, what we're going to see is we're going to look at this claim that he made. He says, before Abraham was I am. So we're going to unpack this claim. We're going to unpack that he's claiming to be God and really what all of this means, and then we're going to see why each and every one of us inevitably have this reaction to this claim of anger lashing out. We're going to see why we hate this claim and then, finally, we're going to see why actually we need it to be true. So, again, we're going to see that Jesus claims to be the great I am. We're going to look at it in three parts. We're going to see what Jesus claimed, we're going to see why we hate it and we're going to see why we need it. But before we do that, let's pray.
Speaker 1:Lord, we just thank you for the stay and we thank you for your word. Lord, just on the outset, we thank you for your good word that challenges us, the things that you've said that make us wrestle with who you are and who we are. And, god, I just pray that, as we approach your word today, that you would just give us grace, that we would see your goodness and your glory in it, that we would make you out to be the most important part, the most important thing. I pray that we would glorify you, god, and I pray that the words in my mouth and the meditations of our hearts today would be pleasing to you, lord, our God and Redeemer. That's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen, all right, first let's understand what Jesus claimed. So if you have your Bibles with you this isn't all in the bulletin but if you have your Bibles, do a little following along with me.
Speaker 1:What we need to see first and foremost is that this passage that Lori just read is not a standalone. It is, in fact, it's kind of a climax of a scene, and the scene Ben kicked us off last week when he talked about the section where Jesus said I am the light of the world. And so what we find is that that kicks off this back and forth between Jesus and the crowds, and it follows this pattern, the pattern that I kind of talked about earlier, and it's basically this Jesus says something about himself that makes the people angry and they challenge him, and then he responds with another really big claim, and back and forth, back and forth, same pattern. And so, look, I'm not going to do this section justice. I suggest take some time, read chapter eight, follow along like chew on this back and forth. There's a lot of gold here and we're just skimming across the top. But so it starts with this In verse 12, your heading probably says something like I'm the light of the world.
Speaker 1:Jesus claims to be the light of the world. This is what Ben talked about last week. He says I'm the light of the world, and the people say well, we can see. So you're clearly wrong. And so then Jesus says well, no, actually, without me you're going to die in your sins. And the people say you're going to die in your sins.
Speaker 1:Well, who are you then? And Jesus says I am the one who pleases the Father, and so if you listen to me, you'll know the truth and the truth will set you free. And then they say no, we know the truth, we know Abraham was our Father, we're not enslaved. And then Jesus says no, you are. He says you sin, and if you sin, you're a slave to sin. And in fact you say your Father's Abraham, but he's not your Father's the devil. And of course this is it. This is like the Dei-nu-Mal, like they're outraged and they say now we know this is the passage of Lord of the Shred. Now we know you're demon possessed, you're Samaritan. They're basically saying like no, you. And that's where our passage starts and that's why, in verse 48, where we're at, the Jews answer him. Are we not right in saying that you're Samaritan and have a demon? Basically, they're saying what is the worst thing that we can accuse him of? Let's throw it back at him. We know you're crazy, dude, there's no question about it.
Speaker 1:And in our passage, jesus goes on and he says no, no, you're wrong, you don't know. He says I am the one who does good, I am the one who's right with God, I am the one who pleases the Father, he's the only one. So he claims. And he says that because it turns out, these people are as wrong as they possibly can be, because look at verse 58. He says to them, truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was I am. He's saying you have got it as wrong as you possibly could have it Before Abraham was I am.
Speaker 1:And now this is a very dense verse, very dense. We're just gonna unpack it a little bit. There's a lot going on here, but here's the deal. We should see one basic claim, we should one basic part of this. Jesus says I am God. He says he is God, not just any God, not just a God, the God, the creator, the one that they claim to worship. And now some of us are gonna intuit this, some of us are gonna understand from the context kind of what he's getting at here. But let's unpack what he's saying.
Speaker 1:See, we have to see that Jesus is claiming a handful of things here with this line. He's claiming to be God, but there's more to it. See his Jewish audience. They didn't like the kinds of things that he was saying. They didn't like that he was claiming these things. They didn't like what he was promising. They thought that he couldn't deliver on these promises.
Speaker 1:And in verse 52, Jesus says if anyone keeps my word, he'll never taste death. And that is like the kind of straw that broke the camel's back, right? Or the second to last straw that broke the camel's back, really, because his audience is hearing they make this claim that he knows the way like no one else has known the way before, right. He's saying they think that he's saying look, if you do the right things and I'll tell you the right things, you won't die. And of course that makes them angry because when they think back through their story, through their scriptures, what they see is that guys like Abraham, the father of their faith, guys like the prophets, they all still died, like they weren't good enough. And so it's like they're saying to him look, are you even implying that you're greater than these guys? And the irony is like that's not what Jesus meant, but it is very true, do you know? Like that's not what he was getting at, but yes, yes, in fact he is. It's true, because Jesus is claiming to be the I am.
Speaker 1:This is a very significant phrase in the book of John. It's a significant phrase in the Bible. It's a reference, remember, back in the book of Exodus. Moses is in the wilderness, he's just fled from Egypt and he has this encounter with God in a burning bush super trippy scene and he's talking and God says you're gonna go to Pharaoh and you're gonna tell him to let the Israelite people free. And in Moses says to him okay, a lot of questions, but first of all, who should I say sent me? God says he'll tell them that I am, that I am. He gives us name, like that's the first time in the Bible that God names himself, declares his name to people, and he says when they ask you who sent you, you say the I am sent you. And in fact the word Yahweh, the name Yahweh actually means in Hebrew he is Right. So what we call God his name is, is he is. Like we can't even really say his name because I'm not, I am. I can say he is, you know what I'm saying? And it's just like really powerful scene where God is declaring who he is, that he is existence, he is. I mean, there's so many things. We spend a year on it. Maybe we will one day.
Speaker 1:And so Jesus in the gospel of John. He keeps making these claims about himself and he doesn't just say I'm this, I'm that. He says very emphatically I am the bread of life, I am the light of the world, or here before Abraham was, I am, and this is not just a grammatically bad sentence. He's claiming to be that God that appeared to Moses in the wilderness thousands of years before. He's claiming to be the God that appeared to Abraham thousands of years before and, most importantly and most ironically, he's claiming to be the God that these people think they're worshiping. Say they're worshiping, and you can see why. The next response to that was stones. They pick up stones. They're gonna execute him, because the truth is that this is blasphemy, this is high blasphemy. This is the kind of thing that gets capital punishment on the spot, death sentence right. It's a big deal, unless it's true. And that's the tension. That's the tension in the book of John, because John keeps showing us this picture of Jesus. And Jesus you know what? He keeps making these outrageous claims. He keeps saying things that we do not like and, at the same time, man, the things that he does are so sweet, aren't they? He heals people. He claims to be the bread of life I don't know. But then he feeds tens of thousands of people, I don't know. Back and forth In the next chapter.
Speaker 1:In chapter nine, jesus is gonna heal a man born blind, and it turns out that the aftermath of this miracle is the hardest for people to wrestle with. It's so this is such a big deal miracle that the Pharisees themselves started arguing with each other. They're like I don't know what to do with this guy, because the things he's saying can't be true. We can all agree on that, right. The things he's saying can't be true. And yet they say no one in the history of the world has healed a man born blind. We've never even heard of this before. So what do we do? What do we do with this guy? And look, that's the problem we all have with Jesus. Right, if we boil it down, that's what we're all dealing with. Is that? What do we do with this guy who makes these huge claims that we honestly don't like and yet does these incredible things?
Speaker 1:There's a magnetism about him. It says that the children loved him, people flocked to him, he did such great things, he taught such great things, and yet he claimed too much. He claimed too much, and the deal is that we just hate. We hate what he claimed to be, we hate who he claimed to be, because let's talk about that. Let's talk about why we hate who he claimed to be. Let's think back. Think back to. I just recapped this chapter.
Speaker 1:There's this back and forth in chapter eight of John, and the crowd's got a problem with what Jesus is saying, and their problem is essentially this their problem is that if Jesus is right about himself, then it means that they must be wrong about themselves. So if Jesus is right about who he says he is, then there's something that that says about them. And the deal is, it says something about us too, and this is the part that we don't like what it says about us. And it means something. It means something about us. It means two things. First, it means that it demands something of us. So if Jesus really is who he says he is, it immediately demands something of his listeners.
Speaker 1:So let's consider last week's claim, what Ben talked about. If Jesus really is the light of the world, then that means that we have to go to him to get light, we have to go to him to see, and that means that if he's really the light of the world, man, his assessment of what's right and wrong, of what is and isn't of this and that is absolute, it's definitive. We have to go with his assessment of things, right. Or let's consider Jesus says he's the bread of life. If that's true, it demands something of us. It demands that we have to go to him to be satisfied to live. And that means that if he says he wants something from us, like we have to do it Because he's the only way to live, right and we don't like this. And I think this is obvious, like I think me saying like, yeah, jesus wants things from us that we don't want to give him. Everyone here is like yeah, we know that, houston, like we get it totally. But here's the thing that I think really gets us the grinds, our gears is the second thing Jesus claims means something about us. They declare something about us and ultimately they declare that we're not good enough. And here's what I mean by that.
Speaker 1:See, the Jewish people. They're angry because Jesus's claim challenged claims plural, challenged the way that they viewed themselves and ultimately it challenged what they built their lives on, what made them okay. Because the theme of their arguments Jesus says something and the people say basically no, we're good. No, we know the one true God. No, no, no, we're Jewish, we have the right heritage. No, no, we do the right things, we're good, we're the good guys. That's our claim. We're the good guys. Jesus says no, no, you're not, because I'm the good guy and you hate me. So what does that mean? See, if Jesus is right about who he says he is, again, it means, by definition, that the audience is wrong about who they say they are. And again, it means we're wrong about who we say we are.
Speaker 1:Because when Jesus says that he's the only way to the good life, what does that mean? It means that we don't have it. It means that we don't know the way and and and when Jesus says that he's the source of light in life, what does that mean? It means we're in darkness, it means we can't see. And, worst of all, when, when right here, jesus claims to be God, that means we're not God. And boy, we hate that, don't we? You see, the, the things that Jesus claimed to be, show us that we're insufficient in our own, because we can't generate these things ourselves. We are not these things ourselves. And and man, they make us angry because they, they show us that we are flawed, finite people, right, and, and I don't about you, I Hate that. I Hate to be flawed, finite and needy.
Speaker 1:And Jesus comes into our lives and and he tells us that, hey, these things that you have built your foundation on, they don't work, they're crumbling, they're, they're deteriorating in front of you. And Then we lash out at him, we say, we say how dare you say I am not okay. But man, why, like? Why do we get so mad at that? Right, have you ever thought about why do we get so mad when someone challenges these things that we hold core to ourselves and man isn't? It isn't it because we know already that these things are not supporting our weight, right, like, don't, don't, we'd know that these things are not working. Like we're going down to our basement and we're seeing the cracks in the walls, like, like, we know, right, and the problem is that we are fighting so hard to keep this thing from crashing down around us when in reality, that's also what Jesus wants, right, like, like, it's like.
Speaker 1:It's like your house has a bad foundation, it's damaged, and the contractor comes in and said looks at it. And he says, yeah, this is damaged, but here's the deal, I can fix it. And it's like we get angry at that guy. How dare you say my about that foundation. It's like no, this, this guy can fix it. This is the answer right here. This is what we do with Jesus, right? This is what we do them all the time, but it's hard because it requires that we admit that we had a bad foundation in the first place. That's hard.
Speaker 1:See these Jewish people. They were so confident because they had built their lives on a foundation of being morally upright, a foundation of knowing the scriptures, a Foundation of their heritage, of faith and you know what. These are all good things, they're good things, but they're not suitable material for a foundation. It's like, you know we, this is hard, this is hard, but it's like Wood is great material to build houses out of right, so it's great for framing your houses, but we would never, never, lay down. Wood is the foundation for our house, right, it just does not support, it is not meant for that.
Speaker 1:And so, in the same way, you know, we have the same experience with Jesus, where all these good things in our lives we hold is good, and that's good, until they become ultimate, until they become the foundation, and and for those of us here sitting here today, there's all kinds of things that we do that with. We do that with our morality. We do that with, with the things that we know about our faith. We do that with the things that we do, all these things that we think make us okay. They don't. Here's the deal. Everyone does this. Everyone. Every human does this naturally.
Speaker 1:I was listening to a sermon by Tim Keller recently and he talked about the state of our hearts, the natural state of our hearts, and and you start about something else. But he talked about coming to God and and our hearts get hard. They're like a bucket of ice out in the winter here in Wisconsin. How often do we have to keep coming back and breaking that ice Constantly? Right, because our natural inclination is towards that hardness. Our Our natural inclination is people is to take these good things and to bury them and be what make us okay. And they don't work. You don't work. But here's the deal.
Speaker 1:You know, in Christianity, those of us who are Christians, we see this in All kinds of things. But but here's an example. Do you know? We all know the people who have put their understanding of the faith as their foundation For being good, people who put their knowledge of doctrine or their biblical knowledge as the foundation of their faith. What happens when you challenge what they know? Oof, yeah, exactly, thank you. Well, oof, exactly right, like, like we've seen, good Christian men and women get into knock-down, drag-out fights over things that Don't matter so much. Why? Because these ideas have dug their way down into the basement and they're part of the foundation. Now, right, we see this all the time. And here's the deal this is not just a Christian thing, this is everybody thing. Like I said, you know, we see that.
Speaker 1:I actually think we see this really clearly right now in our culture. We have this in our culture, this like high value on being just, right and and amen, good, we should, this is good, but we have a high value on being just and doing the right thing, you know, being on the right side of history that you've. You hear that. We hear that phrase a lot again. Yes, amen, I'll say again. But here's the deal. That is not a stable thing to build your life on either.
Speaker 1:And here's the perfect example baby boomers. Right, baby boomers. If you call someone a boomer now okay, boomer, what are you saying? You're saying you're out of touch. You don't know what is it. What are the implications? You're probably racist. You're definitely bigoted in some way, right, like like I'm not saying these things about anybody, but like that's the connotation, right, okay, boomer is an insult, that means those kinds of things, but here's the deal. Do you understand? Do we understand that the boomers, the baby boomers, were the ones who brought us the civil rights movement. They brought us the sexual revolution, which you know, not gonna get there. They brought us the drug revolution Not gonna go there. Or two. They brought us second wave feminism, all these things that our culture now Says, yes, these are the good things, these are right, we're champions of these things. That was the boomers who brought those into our culture. And now it's an insult, call someone a boomer.
Speaker 1:I mean what's happening to these people who went from being social Activists on the right side of history, people, and now, every time they leave their house, they're being told that they're inherently wrong for who they are. What happens to them? That's destructive, that is degrading to the self. Why? Because these people have built their lives, their, their foundation of being okay on being morally good. Just people and culture saying now, nope, you weren't. And here's the deal. All those of us millennials, some Gen Z, some Gen Alpha in the room. Look, one day it's gonna happen to you too. It's gonna happen to us. One day, in 20 years, someone's gonna read something that you wrote or a picture of you, and they're gonna be appalled. How could grandpa have ever? I can't believe grandma. It's not sustainable, see, and this draws us back.
Speaker 1:By making these claims about himself, by eliciting our responses, jesus is showing us. He's showing us that these things that we've built our lives on, they don't work. They will not hold your weight, and there's only one thing, only one person that will hold the weight of our lives, and it's Jesus. It's him. The great I am, he is the only alternative. See, jesus is offering himself as the only the only surefire thing to build our lives on, and that's why we need his claim to be true. That's why we need it, and what we see is that this guy, abraham, the guy that they're lifting up, he was a good man.
Speaker 1:He knew Abraham knew it, he understood it. See, look at verse 56. The people ask him do you think that you're better than Abraham? And Jesus says your father, abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad. Jesus saying that, abraham, thousands of years before the father of the Jewish people, the first of their faith.
Speaker 1:He understood something. He understood that he was not good enough. And you know what he also understood? That God made a promise, that God promised that his brokenness, that the brokenness of the world, that all of our sin would not have the last word, that God would. God promised to come and fix the world. And here's the deal.
Speaker 1:Many people throughout history have thought that that meant that the Jewish people were gonna do the right things and be the right kind of people and that if enough people were doing the right thing all the time, the world would be fixed. But Abraham knew that wasn't true. Abe knew he couldn't stack up, that he wasn't gonna make it, that his people were not gonna make it. And what Abraham got a glimpse of was that one day God himself would come, that Jesus would come, that he could do it. And what Abraham understood was that Jesus is the solid rock that we can build our lives on. And the irony here, guys, the irony is that the people thought they were good, they thought they were okay, but they weren't, because they had taken these good things and they had made them the foundations of their lives, and the result is like shifting sand, like the expression goes. But here's the deal.
Speaker 1:Jesus was good. He was good, he did it. He was the light. He is the light. He actually knew the truth. He was the genuine Son of God. He lived a perfect life. He did all those things. He had all of the things that the people thought they had. He actually had it. He had all the things that we think we have. He actually had it.
Speaker 1:And the twist is that he gave it up. He gave it up for us, gave it to us. See, he was the light of the world, and what did he do? He plunged himself into darkness. Why? So that we could have light. Jesus was the truth that sets men free. So what did he do? He subjected himself to bondage and chains and imprisonment so that we could know freedom.
Speaker 1:Jesus was the perfect Son of God, who never sinned. And yet what did he do? He took on all of our sinfulness. He took it on himself and he paid the consequences for it. Why? So that we could have his status as sons of God Instead of our old status, serving that old master who is destroying us.
Speaker 1:And that's the thing. That's the thing we have to keep remembering All of these things that we think we have, all these things that they thought they have, jesus had, he has, and he trades us. He trades us for the nothing that we have and he gives it to us and friends. This, that truth, that is something you can build your lives on. That is something that will hold the weight of our lives. So I want to end with this this is another good reminder of every good thing in our lives can take a place that it shouldn't.
Speaker 1:We talk about that a lot. It's so true. It's just such a core, fundamental thing to our experience, and so what we have to see from a passage like this and from Jesus' claims, is that all of these good things have to have the right place in our lives. Specifically, they need to flow out of our relationship with Jesus. They are not the foundation of our relationship with him. Okay, they need to flow out of our relationship with Jesus. They're not the foundation of our relationship with him. And so I've got there's lots of examples of this. I don't know what it is in your life, but I'll give you two from my life.
Speaker 1:Okay, two things Our righteousness, my righteousness and our competence. First, our righteousness. Isaiah 64-6 says this we've all become like one who is unclean and all of our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. That's fun. This is saying that we, as humans, we're so fundamentally messed up that, apart from Christ, even the best things that we do are also messed up right. And so the picture here is that, like like we're coming for God you know, we're saying about God as a king. It's like we're coming into the court king's court, there's throne room and it's like we're bringing gifts to him and these gifts are going to say how valuable we think God is, and they're going to say something about who we are, that we can give these gifts right.
Speaker 1:And the picture is that we come to God and we got this nice box and what we've put aside are our nice clothes, like an outfit fit for a king, right, and the box is tied beautifully, there's a bow, and we give it to God and we're very proud. We say, yes, I've done a good thing. God opens it and it's like immediately the smell fills the air. Immediately, it's like people are reeling because when he pulls it out, it turns out it's not this fine clothing that we thought it was. It turns out it's soiled rags. It's disgusting.
Speaker 1:And we have these options. We have this option here and we can say to God, yes, no, this is good, this is a good thing, this is finest clothes. And what's God going to do? He's going to say, no, this is disgusting, get out of here, you have not given me a good gift. Well, the other thing is that he opens it and we say, god, this is nothing, I don't have anything to give you. This is garbage. You're right, but I just I wanted to say thank you somehow. And, man, what's it going to do then? Like he's going to open it, like a parent opens a gift from their kids. Guys, parents, you know how my daughter, stella, she loves when she spills her milk on the floor. She loves to go get the cloth and wipe it. And, man, when she gives me that dirty milk cloth, it's a great gift, isn't it? It's beautiful. That's how God looks at these dirty rags that we give him when we say this is a meager thank you, feeble, thank you inadequate. Oh, he loves that, it's a sweet gift and he cherishes that.
Speaker 1:So we have to think about is it our good works, the good things that we do? We know they're not the foundations of our faith. But we have to understand they are so inadequate, right, they don't even come close. But when we do them out of love for God, out of appreciation, they're a sweet gift that he receives. And when we do them as a means to be okay, they're foul, they're disgusting, and so we have to think about that. These good things, we do have to be in their place. And the last thing, the second thing, we need to think about our competence, like our ability.
Speaker 1:I, when, when Kenzie and I we worked at the shelter in Joplin, you know we would give people advice all the time. We would often give people advice. I, I sat for hundreds, you know hundreds of hours total talking with people, hearing their stories, like listening to what worked for them, what didn't, reading. You know all these things, right, and I would give people advice and invariably I would always get the same response it's like you've not been where I've been, you can't tell me, and, and that's true, that's true. But it always made me mad, right, because I was like, no, I didn't make this up Like these, these people who have been where you've been said this, and, and I thought that it made me mad because people would not take help.
Speaker 1:But it turns out it made me mad for a different reason, because, because what I found in the years following is that I couldn't accept help from anyone because I had to prove that I knew the right way. Right, like, like if we were ever in a financially tough spot, like I could not, would not get help from friends, family, church, like nobody. Because I had to know the right way, I had to be right, I had to be capable. I couldn't accept the fact that, like the difference between me and that person was chance, was circumstances it had. I had to be where I was, I had to be okay because I was better. Right, and it's terrible, but, man, that's what came out over time. And the truth is that I had built my okayness, my foundation of being who I was, on being competent or being capable. Lord knows Kings will tell you I still, I still struggle getting help today. So this is a long battle, not over yet. Lord willing, it will be soon, but it's not over yet. And Tim just shook his head no.
Speaker 1:And so what this does is it challenges, like I said, my self view, like what I put my, built my foundation on what I had built my foundation on was being competent, being able, not needing help, but man, anyone who's lived for any amount of time. You know that's not true. It's not true of me, that's not true of any of us. We are needy people. We are needy, we were made needy.
Speaker 1:I'm coming to learn, and so we all struggle in one way or another with with these kinds of things. We all struggle with putting things in the right place. You know, for me it was what I know, what I do, what I can do, and it is different for all of us. But but this is the deal. Jesus challenges. Whatever you put there, it's not good, it's not going to work. He challenges, he's the only thing that can work to be there. And the truth is is that if we can accept what Jesus claimed, if we can accept what he said and if we can accept what it says about us, then that is the only surefire way to have the stability that we're all looking for. So let's pray Amen.