The Gospel of John 10B and 11 LOVE GREATLY
Water is turned to wine
A sick child is healed of a fever
A man crippled for 38 years can walk.
5000 are fed on a hillside
A man born blind now sees
And as we will experience in the 11th Chapter of the Gospel according
to John,
A dead man will be raised back to life.
The Apostle John has chosen to arrange the material in his account of the Good
News that in the reading of the first 11 chapters you would become
convinced that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, God incarnate.
There is great opposition to Jesus message and methods—
Healing people on the Sabbath is religious heresy.
Insulting the clergy is outrageous
Reinterpreting scripture apostasy
Jesus has disturbed commerce in clearing the Temple
His teachings have polarized the people.
Asked repeatedly where He gets his authority to teach,
Asked repeatedly who He thinks He is—
Jesus points to the signs, the miracles He has performed.
John 10:24-25 & 38 (NIV)
The Jews gathered around him, saying, "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus answered, "I did tell you, but you do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father's name speak for me, … even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father."
Many still refused to believe.
So we come to the 11th Chapter,
What more can Jesus do to prove that He and the Father are one?
To validate what He is saying about Himself—
I am the Messiah (John 4:25-27)
I am the bread of life (John 6:48)
I am from Him (John 7:29)
I am the light of the world (John 8:12)
I am from above (John 8:23)
Before Abraham was born I am (John 8:58)
I am the gate of salvation (John 10:7)
I am the good shepherd (John 10:11)
I and the Father are one (John 10:31)
I am the resurrection and the life (John 11:25)
What more can Jesus do to prove what He is saying is true?
We’ll see the answer unfold for us as we watch Chapter 11.
Let me give one tid-bit that will make what goes on in Chapter 11
a bit more interesting.
Jesus close friends Lazarus, Martha and Mary lived in the town of Bethany,
Bethany and Jerusalem are very close in proximity about 2 miles
Jesus is on the other side of the Jordan, about 30 miles away from Bethany.
That’s a 2 maybe three day walk.
Word comes to Jesus that Lazarus is very ill.
From the text I estimate that by the time Jesus gets the message,
Lazarus has died.
Jesus waits two days before setting out on the trip.
By the time Jesus gets to Bethany Lazarus has been dead
and buried 4 days.
That Lazarus has been dead four days is significant in Jewish thought.
The Rabbi’s taught that the soul of the recently deceased stayed close to the
body for three days, on the fourth day the soul permanently left.
So Lazarus would not only be considered dead,
Lazarus would be considered dead and gone,
After 4 days.
Feel free to read along in you Bibles as we watch John chapter 11.
John points to this miracle of Lazarus rising from the dead as the definitive proof
that Jesus is exactly who He claims to be.
The miracles validate the message.
From this narrative I want to focus on one verse.
John 11:16 (MSG)
Come along. We might as well die with him
These words are spoken by Thomas
We often call the Apostle Thomas the Doubter.
But maybe we should reconsider.
It should be Thomas the Loyal,
Thomas the Courageous
Thomas sized up the situation,
The opposition was set on killing Jesus.
To return to Judea was to invite death.
Thomas says to the other disciples,
If Jesus is determined to go this way,
We’ve got to go and die along with him.
Thomas the Faithful
Thomas the Brave
Thomas the Courageous
Thomas knew that to continue to follow Jesus meant an encounter with death.
The threat was real.
Thomas had matured in his faith to the point that he was willing to follow Jesus
even if it meant that he would be executed along with Jesus.
Last week we learned that we are to follow our leader.
Let me lay this out to you as plain as possible.
To follow Jesus may just cost you your physical life.
We’ve talked about the crucifixion of the egoism driven self.
How we willing take on the form of a servant.
How we seek to serve rather than be served.
Disciples serve,
For by meeting the needs of others they become the glory of God.
You and I become the physical manifestation of who God is.
Our concern is for the welfare of every one,
And as long as it is in our power,
As long as God directs
We are to live for others.
The most amazing paradox is that by living for others,
We start living our lives to the full.
The scripture says what you sow you will reap.
It’s a scriptural proof text for the adage
What goes around comes around.
If we are too shrewd and we give in order to get,
The Lord sees through our charade.
If we give because love has motivated us to do so,
the one who sows to please the Spirit,
from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Gal 6:8 (NIV)
We must this path down to its ultimate question:
Are you willing to die for what you believe in?
I used to be astonished at the Islamic homicide bomber.
How can a human being strap explosives to his or her self walk into a crowd of
other human beings and detonate themselves.
The action is counter intuitive.
Human beings by nature tend to seek to preserve their lives.
In my cultural context it makes more sense to plant the bomb
walk away then blow it up and
live to blow something else up another day.
It was General George Patton who said the objective of war was not to
die for your country,
but rather make the other fellow die for his.
The reason the Islamic fundamentalist is willing to sacrifice his or her life is
because they believe that dyeing in the pursuit of killing infidels is the only
way you can be sure you are going to heaven.
To die in battle for Allah is Islamic eternal security.
Digging deeper there is not only a spiritual reason to give your life in jihad there is
also a financial reason.
Many homicide bombers are Palestinians.
Iraq and Iran and some say Saudi Arabia will give the family of
a homicide bomber $15-25,000 dollars.
In Gaza and the West Bank the average salary is $1500 a year.
Unemployment is 80%
Many live in refugee camps that are worse than our worst
inner city slums.
It is desperate if not hopeless situation
So here is a man, a woman, a boy,
who because of what they believe are willing to die
so their eternity will be secure and
their families will have a huge financial windfall. .
They are willing to surrender their physical lives for their
beliefs.
As a disciple of Jesus, a follower of Christ--
Do you have a faith you’re willing to die for?
It is only when you have a faith willing to die for
that you are fully prepared to live for it.
This message is not only one we care not to embrace,
but one we don’t even want to consider.
Too many Christians have bought into the idea that God wants you
Healthy, wealthy, prosperous and happy based on the cultural values of life
in America.
Too many Christians put their faith in Jesus because of what they can get.
But Christianity is not about getting, its about giving.
The last vestiges of egoism is self-preservation.
Egoism, our old enemy, the sin nature,
Urges you to save your life.
The Spirit urges you to lose your life for the Kingdom.
This is a huge conflict.
I don’t believe a person in their right mind looks forward in eager anticipation to
martyrdom.
To die a martyr’s death is to die for what you believe in.
Martyrdom doesn’t rank highly on a person’s list of life aspirations.
What do you want to be when you grow up?
I want to be a martyr, is not your typical answer.
Thomas tells us what the attitude of a disciple of Jesus Christ is
“I will follow the leader even if following means my untimely death.”
If you are not willing to die for your belief,
How are you ever going to be able to live for your belief?
There is a new wave of LAST DAYS fervor starting to roll ashore again.
About every decade or so it’s like the Church says
“let’s get excited about the end times.”
I think it’s the hope of every disciple of Jesus that they are living in the end times.
That at any moment Jesus will return and bring justice,
setting the world right.
The last century and of course this first decade of this century have seen a
crescendo of end time signs.
Civil and World Wars, Regional Wars, Nation rising up against
nation,
Pestilence like AIDS.
Famine, Fear, Earthquakes
It seems like everything is accelerating to a dramatic climax.
Maybe we are the last generation before the second coming.
But one of the problems of the previous apocalyptic fads is that they teach
that Christians are spared from the worst of it.
Just before things get so terrible that nothing survives,
Jesus raptures them out.
So an attitude develops of “who cares”
Death and destruction,
Suffering and pain wont touch me because I follow Jesus.
So God bring it on,
Make em bleed for rejecting you.
Well if this is the end times, the last days before the return of Christ
Another book written by the Apostle John,
The Revelation of Jesus Christ tells us the stance we need to take.
Revelation 12:11 (NIV)
They overcame him [the Beast] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.
During the persecution of the church by Caesar Nero and Domitian,
Being a Christian was a death sentence.
IF you were accused of being a follower of Jesus,
All you had to do was denounce Christ,
And make a sacrifice at one of the Emperor Temples.
Those actions would exonerate you.
The charges would be dropped and you were
free to go.
True disciples of Jesus found something more precious than their lives.
It was their faith in Jesus.
And by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony,
Their properties were confiscated,
And they were thrown to the lions for sport,
Set on fire to light Nero’s gardens at night.
They died a martyr’s death.
They followed their leader.
The way Jesus went, sacrificial death,
Is the way his disciples are willing to go.
If you live your life as if it were expendable for the glory of God
then you will live your life to the fullest.
John 11:25-26 (NLT)
Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.
I’m not telling you to get yourself killed for Christ.
What I want you to grasp, to take to heart is that it’s costly to follow Jesus. Can you say with Thomas
Come along. We might as well die with him
Here in the USA it doesn’t cost much to be a Christian.
But in other countries faith is expensive.
Christians are persecuted and killed because of their faith.
Hebrews 11:36-38 (MSG)
Others braved abuse and whips, and, yes, chains and dungeons. We have stories of those who were stoned, sawed in two, murdered in cold blood; stories of vagrants wandering the earth in animal skins, homeless, friendless, powerless— the world didn't deserve them!—making their way as best they could on the cruel edges of the world.
Hebrews 12:1 (NIV)
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.
The race marked out for us is LOVE.
To run the race of love,
You have to follow the leader
As you pour yourself out for others,
Jesus will fill you with the glory of God.
John 15:12-13 (NIV)
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
This is your take-a-way—Love Greatly.
The ultimate cost of discipleship is an untimely death in service to Christ.
In your spiritual journey you may not have matured to the point where
you and Thomas can see eye to eye.
You probably will not be called to make the ultimate sacrifice.
It’s my prayer that we all slip into eternity
Surrounded by loved ones satisfied with the work of our
hands.
Still I want you to know the potential cost.
To follow Christ is to follow to the cross.
The cross means death.
But death is not the end for those who love greatly.
John 11:25-26 (MSG)
The one who believes in me, even though he or she dies, will live. 26 And everyone who lives believing in me does not ultimately die at all. Do you believe this?"
Do you?