Acquainted with Grief

John 11
David Stockton - October 4, 2020

Good to be with everybody. Thanks for coming. Thanks to all the online folks joining in. We need a “Hoo” and a “ho” for them. I don’t know if they could hear it, but I did. It was cool.

We’re trying to figure out how to go forward as a church. Actually, after September, Living Streams has officially been going for 36 years. That’s something. I started it when I was seven years old. No, obviously I wasn’t there at the start. 

Mark Buckley and Kristina Buckley started the church 36 years ago. They did so in their living room up near like 32nd Street and Bell. If anybody’s ever heard of that part of town. That’s where it started and it’s been 36 years and here we are today. Mark, who I still talk with all the time, he’s still a big part of the church here. He was saying he’s never seen church have to go through anything like this in his 36 years, or whatever. But this church was birthed out of a challenging situation, which is going to hopefully help unpack a little bit of where we’re going today with the message.

Mark and Kristina were loving life up in Northern California, Marin County. It’s where Mark had grown up. They had a church going and it was really great. But his son was having some severe asthma. So his son came to visit some friends down in Phoenix and his asthma cleared up. So they had a really, really challenging, disrupting, difficult, hard decision to make. Would they stay where they were, where everything was wonderful (so they thought), or would they completely uproot and change their lives for the sake of their son. And they did. They ent to Phoenix, to the desert, and the Lord was faithful to them. They ended up starting Living Streams and here we are today.

It’s a cool story. But again, it’s out of disruption, out of challenge, out of suffering, out of heartbreak, God was able to change the trajectory a little bit for their life. They would look back now and say it was great. So be aware that some of whatever you’re going through right now could be the Lord just kind of changing the trajectory a little bit, kind of getting us in a better trajectory.

We know that at Living Streams. That’s something we’ve been praying for. We want to follow God. We want to see where he wants to take us. We don’t want to go back to the way things were before this year. We want to go forward into whatever those new wine skins might look like. Because we want to catch every drop of the new wine the Lord wants to pour out. We don’t want to miss a thing.

So that’s what we’re doing. We’re doing a lot of that. And we have this Saturday this thing called an Explore Class. Normally it’s like an eight-week class. But we’re going to do it in one morning. 8:30 to 1:00 pm. We’re going to have all the sessions kind of jammed I not one. But we’d really like to invite you to join in with the church here. We’re trying to make sure we’re not a church where you can just come watch a show and go. 

We really do think that the only way we’re going to build something beautiful here is if everyone joins in. That we knit our lives together in some ways. That’s going to take some time together. It’s going to take some learning about each other. It’s going to take everyone caring for another person or two in the church. Because the pastors here, they’re awesome, but they’re not that good you know. They need some help. We all need help caring for each other. Let alone the challenges in the world that we’re dealing with and the people who are going through tough times.

One of the guys in our church, who’s been around a long time, his name’s Marty Caldwell, and he sent me this quote that I thought was pretty good at trying to put words to what we’re trying to do as a church here. It’s from this guy Trueblood, who was not writing in 2020, post-COVID or whatever—we’re not even post yet, we’re still like, I don’t know where we are. Nobody knows where we are.

He was writing about his time, but I think his words ring so true today. He says:

We cannot revive faith by argument, but we might catch the imagination of puzzled men and women by an exhibition of a fellowship so intensely alive that every thoughtful person would be faced to respect it. If there should emerge in our day such a fellowship, wholly without artificiality and free from the dead hand of the past, it would be an exciting event of momentous importance.

This is what we’re praying for. This is what we’re trying to live into. We know it can only happen if everybody joins in. We really have to believe in the priesthood of all believers. Everyone who comes to be a part of this church needs to see themselves as a full-fledged, qualified priest of the Lord, who is supposed to be taking part in building healthy local church or churches, and also creatively expanding God’s kingdom.

The way that we try and flesh that out, kind of our mission statement is we want to put God’s glory on display, both as an organization, as well as individuals within it. We want to build courageous people, both as an organization, as well as individuals within it. And we want to engage in society’s pain. This year we’ve had a lot of opportunities to engage in society’s pain in many different facets. It’s been challenging, but it’s been beautiful, because the opportunities have abounded.

And we also want to make sure that we help everyone understand that they have to take seriously their own spiritual formation. COVID, if it has taught us nothing else, it taught us that a basically we can’t be dependent on one hour a week type church. It’s just not the way it’s supposed to be. Never should have been that way. So you take that away and we’re left to say, “What does our fellowship look like? What does our Christianity look like?” I’m so glad the Lord did that because we get a sneak peek into it, to see what it’s all about. 

We have to take seriously our own spiritual formation. It is good that we have other teachers and other people that can help us. But at the end of the day, the responsibility is each one of ours to make sure our lives are taking in and receiving and practicing out what will make us more into the image of Christ. It’s our responsibility.

And, if we know that the scriptures are true and Jesus’ life is our example, we know it’s important for us to take seriously the spiritual formation of those the Lord is giving us. Right now, whether you like it or not, God is giving you at least one, if not two, maybe three people that he’s counting on you to shepherd, to care for, to help them form into the image of Christ. Jesus took on twelve. You’re not Jesus. I’m not Jesus. 

It can get so overwhelming, trying to take care of everybody all of the time. That’s not what God is calling us to do. I think the next big thing for the Church is trying to figure out how to do one-on-one discipleship again because that’s the way the kingdom really does it. So we want to get that figured out. We want to do that. We want to join in with that effort. 

We need to remember that Church is not what Christians do. What we’re doing right now is not what Christians do. This is just supposed to help Christians do what they’re supposed to do. This is just the little orange slice and Gatorade cup on the marathon. That’s all this is. You stop in, get a little orange slice and Gatorade, you get back out there, keep running. It’s so important that we catch that. 

God does not want to make you good at church. These are a couple of our sayings that we keep bringing up. God does not want to make you good at church. For some reason, as Christians, we think this is what we’re supposed to be good at right here. But God doesn’t want to make you good at church, he wants to make you good at life, because life takes up a lot more hours than just being at church. And I’m here all the time. I don’t live here. Some people think I live here. I don’t live here. That house over there that’s super nice—not my house. No way.

But God wants to make us good at life. He cares much more about the other hours, than just what we’re doing when we’re sitting in a pew at church. Not to say this isn’t important and good and great times, but we’ve really got to understand this if we’re going to get to that kind of vision that Trueblood was laying out or the vision that the book of Acts laid out, or the vision that’s in God’s heart for his people.

That being said, sign up for Explore Express on Saturday. I can’t promise you it will be the most exciting time of your life, but it will be rich, it will be good and maybe even help you get through some of that trajectory stuff that we’re talking about.

John Chapter 11. Let’s dig into this. John is basically Jesus’ best friend, would be a good description of him. He is an apostle and he walked with Jesus. Jesus left and he continued to walk with the risen Christ in spirit. Then, at the end of his life, he’s writing this book as an evangelistic effort to try and help people who read it, whoever might read this. Maybe ten people. Maybe twenty people. I don’t know what John had in mind, but he was writing this so that some people would read this and they would believe. Little did he know there’d be quite a few people reading it in quite a few different languages, including us in 2020 Phoenix, Arizona, who are reading this to try and figure out what he’s saying about Jesus.

So, I have five points I want to go through. Basically—I say this sometimes in our church, but it would be a good time to leave right now if you’re not wanting to get too serious about Jesus. We’re login to talk about suffering and God’s view of suffering, which is very different than an American view of suffering. Or fill in the blank view of suffering. So we’re going to look at suffering. 

These are the points that we’re going to bring out and unpack. First of all:

1. Being in love with God, being in the love of God does not keep you from suffering.

2. Suffering is one of God’s favorite environments to reveal his glory.

3. a. Jesus is not opposed to allow us to suffer or remain in our suffering on this side of heaven.
   b. Jesus is not opposed to lead us into challenging, difficult, and even life-threatening situations.

4. Suffering reveals and refines the quality of our faith.

5. Our suffering grieves Jesus. (In more ways than we’ll ever understand.)

So first one, being in the love of God does not keep you from suffering. 

1 Now a man named Lazarus was sick. He was from Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2 (This Mary, whose brother Lazarus now lay sick, was the same one who poured perfume on the Lord and wiped his feet with her hair.) 3 So the sisters sent word to Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”

And there you have it, right there. Jesus loved Lazarus very much. Jesus was very close to Lazarus, Mary and Martha. Jesus healed a lot of people, but these were Jesus’ people. These were the ones he spent time with day and night. When Jesus would come to the festivals, he would stay at their house, which was not far from Jerusalem. Jesus was very intimate in relationship with these people. He loved them with a natural, kind of humanistic love, not just the God agape love. He was friends with them. He enjoyed their company. They enjoyed being with him.

And there are a couple of kind of friends that are real important to have. It’s real good to have a friend who defends you, who never wants you to ever have to suffer. I have a couple of friends like this. One of my friends, I was on a basketball team with. We were playing this game and things were getting kind of hot. It was getting towards the end. I think it was a pretty close game. We were all down on this end and, I don’t know how, but somehow a guy got a steal. I can’t remember, it was probably I lost the ball and I just don’t remember. I blocked it out. Anyway, he gets the ball and this guy is racing down all by himself. Everyone’s over here and I take off running, I’m trying to stop this guy from getting a layup. He’s coming in and he comes in really hard. And I came in to kind of make sure he wasn’t going to make it. I stood in his way and did one of these. We collided and we both fell on the ground. 

I got up and he got up real fast and was coming at me, like he was going to, you know, whatever he was going to do. And I was standing up and was getting ready to brace myself, and all of a sudden, my friend was in between us. Just like, voom, standing there. He’s a big guy and, at one point he was very fast, he’s not as fast anymore, but this was lightning speed. He was not going to let anything happen to me at all. He’s a lot bigger, so this guy who was coming at me was feeling very strong, but then when the big guy came he wasn’t feeling so strong anymore and he just kind of walked on. Because I’m not big and my friend’s big. I felt loved. This guy, this dude’s got my back. The rest of the game, anytime anything would go down he would kind of stand next to me. He was just making sure his presence was felt. It’s good to be loved like that. 

But there’s another kind of friend, also, that loves you enough to kind of tell you when maybe you’re doing something wrong and suffering for it, they’re going, “Hey, I think this might be good for you. I think this might be a good wake-up call for you.” They’re able to tell you and kind of help perceive, “Hey this challenge that you’re going through, I think maybe this could end up being a good thing for you. And I’ll just kind of be here with you.”

And what you find out about Jesus is Jesus really is both. He’s both kind of friends. He defends us at every point. But he also loves us enough to every once in a while say, “Hey, I need you to know something. I need you to learn something. I need someone else to learn something or know something. And so I’m going to allow you to go through this thing.”

Just because you’re in the love of God doesn’t mean you’re not going to get sick. When I first started really following Jesus, those next two years were some of the most broken-hearted years of my life. But now, for the first time, I was going through a broken heart with the love of God and it was very different. Very different. 

Number two: suffering is one of God’s favorite environments to reveal his glory. So verse 4:

4 When he heard this, Jesus said, “This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.”

Now this is, again, kind of bringing us back to two weeks ago when we talked about the man born blind. And they said, “Is it this guy’s fault or his parents’?” And Jesus said, “No, you’re totally asking the wrong question. This suffering that this guy has gone through his entire life was all about this moment right now, where he is going to receive his sight, and you’re going to know the power of God, and I’m going to talk with him, and he’s going to learn about the Messiah.”

It was this beautiful, beautiful moment. You’ve got to understand suffering is sometimes the time where God loves to show up and reveal his glory the most. And so suffering and God’s glory go hand in hand. He is the Savior. His light and goodness and truth shine the brightest in a backdrop of darkness, evil and deceit. 

And in John 14, Jesus goes on to teach his disciples, just after this, He says, “Don’t let your hearts be troubled when you’re going through really hard times.” When you’re going through those 2020’s. I wish it was like John 20:20 because then I could post it and it would go so viral. But it’s like John 14:1. Nobody gets it. 

He is basically saying, “Don’t let your hearts be troubled.” Track with me. Don’t let your hearts be troubled when you’re going through hard times. But he says, “Believe in me and believe in God, and know that in my Father’s house there are many mansions. And I’m going there to prepare a place for you.”

So in this kind of way that John reveals what Jesus is teaching, Jesus is basically saying, “I want you to remember something when you’re going through suffering, when you’re going through hard times. Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Believe. Keep trusting. Keep hoping all the way until the end. And know that not only am I with you in that, and not only am I going to do good in that, but know that somehow in the way that you are faithful in your suffering now, it is resulting in some sort of building happening in the next life. What you’re doing in this life actually does impact what happens in the next life.”

Again, I can’t talk too much about that because I don’t know much about that except for the fact that whatever we experience in that next life is going to make the suffering we experience in this life something that we just laugh at or don’t even remember. Kind of like Jesus is risen from the dead and they’re like, “Hey,Jesus, remember that cross and all the suffering that you went through?” And he’s like, “Eh, kind of. But what I’m remembering more is all of the people that have been saved from the stain of sin and death. What I do remember is watching sin being peeled back, shriveled back. I remember all the undoing of all the injustices that have ever happened. It was for the joy set before him that he endured the cross. 

And that’s what we should do too is remember that in suffering, in some ways, and this seems a little strange—but Christians are strange—when suffering happens we should have a part of us that goes, “All right. Get your eyes open. Any minute now we’re going to see something beautiful.”

Now, that doesn’t mean then we say, “Oh and suffering doesn’t exist and you should never hurt.” No. I’m saying a little part of you should have that little bit of hope rise up. And in 2020, we are hurting. Some of you are hurting very seriously. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t feel that. That is reality. That’s okay. But as a believer, there should also be just a little bit of a silver lining. There should just be a little bit of a whisper deep inside your soul that says, “I know God’s about to do something awesome.”

Number three:
a. Jesus is not opposed to allow us to suffer or remain in our suffering on this side of heaven.
b. Jesus is not opposed to lead us into challenging, difficult and even life-threatening situations.

5 Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. 6 So when he heard that Lazarus was sick, he stayed where he was…

He didn’t go help. He didn’t run to their rescue.

…he stayed where he was two more days, 7 and then he said to his disciples, “Let us go back to Judea.”

8 “But Rabbi,” they said, “a short while ago the Jews there tried to stone you, and yet you are going back?”

9 Jesus answered, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Anyone who walks in the daytime will not stumble, for they see by this world’s light. 10 It is when a person walks at night that they stumble, for they have no light.”

11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.” 13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.

14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead, 15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.

16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

Now that sounds like Thomas, wait, he’s getting something right here. It’s not. It’s sarcasm—total sarcasm. Thomas is basically like, “Oh, yeah, this sounds so fun. Let’s go with Jesus so we can all die with him!” He’s not excited about it because he knows that going with Jesus back into Judea is possibly going to get them killed. 

So Jesus stayed when Lazarus, who he loved, and Mary and Martha, who he loved, were going through their agony and suffering. He didn’t rescue them. And he describes to the disciples, “And I’m even glad.” Like, “I was talking with the Father and it was hard for me to stay here, but now that I’m hearing where you guys are at, I’m so glad that this suffering has taken place and lasted, because I really am excited about what you’re about to see and who you’re going to become because of this.” And then he says, “Let’s go into this very dangerous place.” And they head in.

I want to share a couple of verses that, again, they’re troubling, but they’re beautiful.

Revelation 12:11 is basically talking about all kinds of apocalyptic stuff going down. It says that the believers overcame the evil one by the blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives so much as to shy away from death. There was something about this where they were saying so resolutely that, “Even if this costs me my life I’m going all the way.”

And then Hebrews 11 describes all these great heroes of the faith—like the hall of fame. It says this:

37 They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated— 38 the world was not worthy of them.

Basically, this phrase is just talking about how, in God’s perspective, the world was not worthy of them because these people were so willing to suffer for good.

Lastly, in the New Testament, Acts 5, John, among these other disciples and apostles, says:

41 The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.

This was John’s response based on watching what Jesus had done. When suffering came his way, there was a part of him that rejoiced because he knew what Jesus was talking about.

Number four: Suffering reveals and refines the quality of our faith, which again, is so precious to God.

17 On his arrival, Jesus found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb for four days. 18 Now Bethany was less than two miles from Jerusalem, 19 and many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to comfort them in the loss of their brother. 20 When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet him, but Mary stayed at home.

21 “Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.”

What is she saying here? I don’t know. But this is interesting. We’re going to unpack this and we’re going to try to do a little hermeneutics, a little exegesis to find out what is really taking place in this conversation.

She says to him, “If you had been here, my brother would not have died. I’m disappointed, Jesus. I’m hurting. I’m confused. Why didn’t you come? I thought you loved us. I thought you cared. I just knew if I sent word to you you would come and keep him from dying. And yet, now he’s been dead for four days.”

It feels like that, as Christians, sometimes for sure. Maybe you can feel that real strong right now as you’ve gone through this year. 

But then she says, “But even now, I know that God will give you whatever you ask.” I don’t know if this is her saying, “Can you do this, too?” I don’t know what she’s saying here. And I don’t know if Jesus did either, because he responds:

23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”

24 Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”

25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; 26 and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

Refining. Revealing the faith that is in her.

27 “Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”

Not exactly what he was saying. But I love it. He says, “Your brother will rise.” And she’s saying, “Let’s clarify this. You’re saying my brother will rise and I don’t want my heart to hoping that you’re going to resurrect him, because I don’t even know what that looks like or if that’s possible. But I know he’s going to resurrect in the last day. I know he’ll be risen up at the last day. I’ve got a theological framework for that. I’ve got a pat answer for that.”

And then Jesus says, “Martha, you’ve got to understand something. I’m going to teach you something right now that I don’t want you to miss, I don’t want Mary to miss, I don’t want the disciples to miss, I don’t want the Jews to miss, I don’t want the people sitting in a church in 2020 to miss: I am the resurrection and the life. I’ve been trying to teach you about a life that’s very different than the life you have known your entire life. All you have ever known of life is life can be killed. Life gets old. Life gets corrupted. Life has suffering. And what I’m trying to reveal to you, what I’m trying to teach you guys is that there is a resurrection life that death no longer has any say of. There is a resurrection life that cannot be corrupted. It does not grow old or weary. It’s a life that feels like being born again. It’s life that feels like never thirsting again. It’s a life that feels like torrents of living water gushing up and out of you. It’s a life that I’ve been trying to teach you about. And I know it’s so hard for you to understand, but I’m here to give a life that’s very different than the one you’ve known. Do you believe? Do you pistis,” [in the Greek]. “Do you receive this and hold onto this until the day that it shows up? Do you believe?”

And I love her response, because so often I’ve said things like this to the Lord: “I know who you are. And I know you can do stuff.” 

That’s basically what she’s saying. “I know you are the Messiah. I know you are the Son of God and that you came into the world. I know who you are, Jesus. And can that be enough? Because I don’t get what you’re saying. But I just know that you’re going to be able to do the right thing in the right way at the right time. And I just want to be where you are.

That’s the perfect response. If you’re here today and you’ve never really given your life to Jesus, and you’re hearing about all these different things, again, it doesn’t have to make perfect sense. As long as you take Jesus’ hand, that’s good. As long as you keep your eyes fixed on him, everything else will work itself out. 

That’s Martha. She’s like, “Resurrection life, I don’t know. But I know I want to be with you.” And Jesus takes that.

Then the fifth point: Our suffering grieves Jesus. It makes him mad.

Here we have verse 28:

28 After she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary aside. “The Teacher is here,” she said, “and is asking for you.” 29 When Mary heard this, she got up quickly and went to him. 30 Now Jesus had not yet entered the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31 When the Jews who had been with Mary in the house, comforting her, noticed how quickly she got up and went out, they followed her, supposing she was going to the tomb to mourn there.

32 When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

Again, grief, disappointment, frustration, confusion.

33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 

He wasn’t just sad. He was upset. And we’ll understand that a little bit more.

34 “Where have you laid him?” he asked.

You’ll notice something different about Jesus’ language. Jesus is resolute. He is all of a sudden focused in and his word seem terse. But I think you’ll understand why. 

34 “Where have you laid him?” he asked. 

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

35 Jesus wept.

Why did he weep?

36 Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”

37 But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

38 Jesus, once more deeply moved,

And the Greek word there has a connotation almost of like a bull getting read to charge, like breathing through the nostrils, angry, frustrated. 

came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. 39 “Take away the stone,” he said.

“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”

40 Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”

41 So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”

Not a very flowery prayer. Straight and to the point.

43 When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” 44 The dead man came out, 

Anybody heard that? Yeah. The dead man came out. He calls out to the tomb and a dead man comes walking out of the tomb.

his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

What I see in this is Jesus wept. Jesus was greatly troubled. Jesus was grieved. Jesus was once more deeply moved. And it’s not that he’s sad. He’s sad, obviously, because of the situation, but he also knows what’s about to happen. But he’s very, very upset. He’s grieved. He’s frustrated. He’s angry. 

He’s not angry at the people around him. What I think he’s angry about is he’s angry that sin and death have continued to rob humanity of so much. He’s face to face with the full hurt of what sin and death feels like and the agony that has troubled humanity for so long. And he’s very, very frustrated. And he says to the Father, “Let’s do this.” 

The book of John has given us seven signs to demonstrate who he is:

• The first one is when he turned water into wine.

• Then he healed the royal official’s son.

• Then he healed the paralytic at Bethesda.

• Then he fed the five thousand.

• He walked on water.

• He healed the man born blind.

• Now this is kind of like, that’s it. No more playing around. This is like the last straw. This is the nail in the coffin. This is basically Jesus saying, “All right. If you’re not going to believe because of this, you’re not going to believe. This is my final appeal to all of you to put your trust in me and I will lead you to resurrection life.

There’s this resolute, “I’ve had enough of this. Sin and death, I’m coming for you.” And he does this like many other things. He does something to prove something he’s trying to teach the people. 

For instance, when the four guys came and lowered the paralytic through the roof and Jesus is like, “What’s up, man?” And everybody’s looking on. And what did Jesus say? He said, “Your sins are forgiven.” He said, “My son, your sins are forgiven.”

And the guy is like, “Thank you? (I think). I don’t know.”

And the friends are all like, “Man, that’s not what we came for.”

And then it says, “Jesus, knowing what was in the people’s thoughts..” 

They were like, “Who is this guy who thinks he can forgive sins? Blasphemous!”

Or maybe they’re thinking, “Who is this guy? He says ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ Anyone can say that at any time. There’s no power.”

And he knows what’s happening and he says, “Because of your thoughts, I want you to see what happens next. So that you can know that the Son of Man has power to forgive sins, son, get up and walk.”

And the guy gets up and starts walking. And Jesus is like, “Hey, hold on. Take your mat, too.”

And the guy is like, “Okay,” grabs his mat and walks off.

And everybody in the room was left with this decision: Does he have the power to forgive sins? It sure looks like it.

Here Jesus is saying to Martha and Mary and Lazarus and the disciples and the Jews that were there, and to us today, “To prove to you that I am able to give resurrection life, Lazarus, come out.” 

The fact that Lazarus came out, and Jesus says, “Get those death clothes off of him. Get those things that are reminders of sin and death and the power they have had over humanity—get those off of him. I don’t want to see them anymore.”

Jesus was trying to teach people about this life that he had been trying to teach them all along. And he was using this as an example. But we all know that this wasn’t really the last sign. There was another sign far greater when Jesus himself had gone through suffering, crucified on the cross and died, laid in a tomb just like this. And on the third day, he came out. 

But Lazarus was not resurrected to resurrection life. Lazarus was resurrected to the same temporal life that he had experienced. Because Lazarus, once again got sick. Lazarus once again died. So Jesus was not raising him to resurrection life, glorified life; he was just raising him back to the kind of life that everyone knew and was familiar with. 

But when Jesus rose from the dead, he rose to resurrection life. He was the firstfruits of the resurrection. The fact that he came out and then lived a life—he would walk around and they would not recognize him but then they would recognize him. His body wasn’t in the tomb. It was all glorified up. He could eat and he could walk around with people, but then the next thing, he’d be gone and show up in a different place. 

Jesus was the firstfruits of the resurrection. So those who follow Jesus into death will be raised just like Jesus into resurrection life, which is incorruptible. Which is everlasting. Which does not have any suffering. There will be no more tears, no sorrow, no more darkness. 

This is the reason that Jesus came: so that you and I could know that kind of life. Without Jesus we can’t. There have been many people who claimed to know the way. Buddha thought he knew a way to escape. But guess what? He’s dead in the grave. Muhammed. He thought he knew a way to escape. Guess what? You can go visit his tomb. He’s still there. And on and on. Jesus is the only one to claim what he claimed and no one can find him. He’s alive.

If you will give your life to him, he will lead you into resurrection life forevermore. Let’s pray:

Jesus, I pray that you would help us to learn about how you see suffering. I pray that, in everything we do, Lord, we would be a church that has a very good blibical perspective, that all of these messages, all of these things being thrown at us, would have to go through the filter of your word before they land in our hearts and our minds. I thank you for this story, Lord, and what you did for Lazarus. Lord, I pray for the people in the room that they’re not following you, or the people online who aren’t walking in your ways. I pray that today they would make that decision and you would lead them to lead them to life, that resurrection life would begin, even now, until that day it begins fully. 

If you’re in a place where you do want to make a commitment to Christ, you do want to offer your life to Jesus, you’re tired of doing it in your own strength, your own wisdom, and you’re wanting Jesus to take the wheel, you can just say a real simple prayer. You can repeat these words if you want:

Jesus, I need you. I’m lost without you. I’m sorry for the sins that I’ve done. I ask that you would cleanse me, make me clean, and I pray that you would lead me to life. Amen.   

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Voices

John 10
Joel Fritz - September 27, 2020

Living Streams! This is going to be weird. I hope you can bear with me. It’s been sixteen months since my family’s been in this church. So I’m standing in worship right now. Man, it’s just like I’ve been wandering in a desert for sixteen months and then I finally come home—come to this sweet pool of water and get to drink.

I don’t know how to do this. I have a little intro to tell you a little bit about myself, because I know as I even look out today that I’m speaking to a lot of people who don’t know me. So that requires me to introduce myself just a little bit. Those of you online, this is just kind of a cool moment, to know that there is such a big group of people who are joining with us that aren’t here. 

But boy, what I’ve got to share is just this little sermonette before the sermon; and that is just that, man, it is a special thing to be together with you all. The body of believers is a powerful thing. We’re sitting here, worshiping together, singing those words out together, speaking out truth. We don’t always form words with our lips, do we? And the truth that we read maybe out of the Bible and the things that we want to believe in our hearts, we don’t always do that.

But then we come together on Sunday mornings, when we get the opportunity, you can now feel how special it is. For me, I’ve been in Italy for fifteen months. And we have a small group of people. But it’s not the same, right? You come into this big group of people and you all join in worship together, and you sing the same words, and you feel the power of the Holy Spirit move, and it’s an incredible thing.

And I know there are so many people who haven’t been able to come back to church. You’re maybe watching right now, and I’ve just got to tell you how special it is. When it comes around, it’s good. It’s just so sweet. So I’ve just go to start with that because I’m filled with emotion. In fact  I told Dave, “Okay, I’m going to work really hard and not just make this a therapy session for myself, where I’m talking about all the things that happened and all the difficulties we went through for the last fifteen months.” Because that’s not the point. The Lord has given me a word to deliver to you guys. It’s a special word. It’s in John 10. 

You guys have been in the book of John, right? You’ve heard David preaching. He did 8. I listened to that message. I didn’t catch his last message last week, so maybe I’ll say the same thing, who knows? Maybe the Lord wants to do that again. But I know he did John 9.

So let me just give you a little background. My wife and I started praying about what we should do, like, “Hey, Lord, you seem like you’re stirring something.” This was a couple of years ago. Here we are, I’ve been a pastor at Living Streams for about eight years. We’ve got a great group of friends and we feel like the Lord is saying, “I want to do something else for a season.”

So we made ourselves open to him. We prayed. He introduced us to some people in Italy. I stood up in front of the church and I said, “Who on earth is ever going to support a family to go to Italy in doing missions?” And, sure enough, the church wanted me to go, just like the Lord wanted us to go. And we went and we ministered to people. Some great things happened. Some difficult things happened. The COVID onset. The video camera of the world alighted on Italy and we sat there in our little three-bedroom apartment going, “What is happening?” Right?

It was a very strange moment. But we got to see the Lord work. After being locked in our apartment for sixty-two days, we got set free, I guess you’d say. And, boy, what a perspective we had on life. What an opportunity we had to be with people again. It was very special. And then we felt the Lord leading us back. I’ll get into that a little bit later. But I just wanted to give you a little heads up who I am.

I’m going to be talking in John 10 today. So, if you actually want to pull out your Bibles right now that’d be very cool. We’re all for digital devices because we know the Bible can be on there, probably just hit your “Do Not Disturb” so that nothing else interrupts you. But then go on there and find John 10 and we’ll read into it.

I want you to know what this message is about today, so I’m going to say it again and again. This message is about Voices. I think there is one thing that we can all agree about right now: it’s that there are a million voices clamoring for your attention. They are passionate voices that want you to listen to them. So we’ve got to filter through that. We’ve got this complex task. 

Before you run away because you’re thinking that I’m going to start preaching about which voices you should listen to and where you should follow them and exactly the right answers to all of it—I’m not. Stay with me. I’ll leave that stuff to Pastor Dave. Today I’m going to talk about one voice. One voice. And it’s the voice of the Good Shepherd.

You guys want to read a little bit with me out of John 10? We’ll start in verse 1

“Very truly I tell you Pharisees, anyone who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. 2 The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5 But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.” 

I’m going to skip down to verse 9:

9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

This is the word of the Lord. Would you bow your heads with me as I pray and invite the Lord’s presence?

You’re here today, I believe it. What a special thing, the people that are joined in presence with one another, get to experience this moment. Lord God, I pray that it would extend out past this room. There are many good reasons that people can’t be here today. Lord God, I pray that you would sit with them, in their midst in this moment. That you would connect us like only you can by the power of your Holy Spirit. And that we would experience you and listen to your voice today. There are so many voices clamoring for our attention, Lord God. But we want to be able to zero in, home in, acutely listen to you and your voice. We thank you so much for who you are, that you’re alive and that you love us. Now, Lord God, would you grant me the ability to speak your words and not my own, even if you want to change the direction. We love you. I offer myself to you in this place today. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

About two years ago, I remember something kind of funny happening. I remember my wife and I were having a conversation about something we wanted to buy. We were thinking about dinner plates. I think a few of ours were cracked. We’ve got little girls, you know, and things break over the years. So we were thinking, “Hey, we need to get some new dinner plates.” We had a conversation about it. And then, the next day, I was looking for a drill on Home Depot or something like that, and then, you know they’ve got that little column there on the website, like Home Depot and all these other places; and then, all of a sudden, these little pictures start popping up. But they’re pictures of plates. And I’m like, “Plates? What?”

Now, can you guys see this? I don’t know if the camera is good enough. I’m trying to Duane “The Rock” Johnson eyebrow thing. I love that quizzical look because that’s how I feel in my heart when I saw those pictures after saying it. “Who’s listening to me,” Is what I thought. “Who is listening to me?” Right? And then I think about it and I’ve got this thing called an Echo. My kids call, you know, saying, “Alexa, do this for me. Do this. Do a back flip for me, Alexa. Do you love me, Alexa?” All this kind of stuff. But Alexa is always listening. And if you don’t have your phone turned off, you know, like Siri, where I push the button first, Siri is listening.

So I don’t know how this all works. I am not a tech guy, and I’m not here to tell you the ins and outs of how that is all working. But what I do know is that people who are trying to get your business, not a bad thing, but they want your attention and they are more crafty today than they have ever been in the history of the world. They are somehow listening to you when you enter in a web address, when you enter in a search query, they are listening to you. Somebody is giving your information to somebody else, they’re landing that picture of that plate right there on that page where I’m searching. They’re crafty. Their voices want your attention today, and they’re going to do anything they can do to get it.

Some of the important things that I think we need to be asking are based around this one question. What are the motivations of the voices that are speaking to us? What are the motivations of the voices that we’re allowing ourselves to listen to today? This is it. The critical thing. It’s so important.

Now, when we look back on this John 10, and I’m going to do a little bit of what we call “exposition” here. I want us to be able to have a picture of what’s happening in this text of scripture, John 10. I’m going to dig in to it just a little bit.

When we look into it right, off the bat, I see three voices speaking. One: I see the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ. He is saying something. There’s a voice in that. And then he says there are these other voices that are speaking. There’s a hired hand. We’ll talk a little bit about that. And then there’s another voice. The thief. Or the word that I like better, the robber. It’s just fun to say. But there’s the Good Shepherd, the hired hand and the thief (or robber). 

These voices are real voices. And I believe that these voices are active today. But now let’s get back into Jesus’ day and think a little bit about what he’s talking about. Who is he speaking to first? 

Now if you’re a student of the Bible, you’re asking some simple questions on a regular basis when you’re reading the word of God. One of those questions is Who is speaking? Two: the question is Who is this person speaking to? Or who is the narrator speaking to. Right? So I want to answer those questions real quick. It’s very simple, but for four chapters actually, seven, eight, nine and ten, Jesus has been speaking with a particular group of people, and they are called the Pharisees. Now, when we hear the word Pharisee, I don’t know what it means to you. Maybe you grew up in Sunday school and you remember the flannel graphs, or you had these cute little videos that showed you these different pictures of Pharisees and who they are. But simply put, they are religious leaders. These were the authorities of the day in Jesus’ time. They held the structure in place. They were also the ones that had built the structure under themselves and they were on top of it. 

So Jesus is speaking to these guys, in this case, and he is speaking to them about all the different perspectives that he had on this authoritarian structure. He was sharing what he thought about it. And they were not happy about it, because he was also introducing other ideas that were very dangerous for these people. Ideas like, “I am the Son of God.” And they had these back and forth arguments. 

So when you think about teaching, and oftentimes you might think about something like this. Today we might think, was Jesus standing on a stage? Was he out on a hill? Was he speaking to people who were peaceful like you guys are peaceful right now? What was this context? What did it look like? What I want to make sure you know, I’ve heard David mention it in his sermons, but what I make sure you know is that this was not a peaceful circumstance. Jesus was saying things that were provoking the Pharisees and the religious leaders. So much so that  I remember David pointing out chapter 8, that they picked up stones to stone Jesus. In that moment Jesus had said a word that was very precious to the Jewish people: Yahweh. It’s a word that they didn’t even want to pronounce. It was a word that they wouldn’t even write out. It simply means “I AM.” Jesus looked at the Pharisees and said, “I AM.” That’s reserved for God and Yahweh alone. Nobody else is allowed to say that. But he said it. They picked up stones to stone him. This was an intense moment. 

And here we go, at the end of these four chapters, Jesus is having a simple exchange. But he’s sitting there and he’s telling the Pharisees who they are and who he is. So I need you to be able to see. To be able to get inside of this story, you have to be able to feel the context of what’s happening. People are listening. A crowd has gathered around. They’re watching as Jesus is speaking to these people. And he’s telling them their business. In fact, the very things that he’s saying are threatening to erode the foundation that they have built their entire lives upon. They have everything to lose in those moments.

So there is this one question, though, that we see. And it permeates this entire section and then transitions us into what we’re going to talk about with these voices. But this one question is a question that every person must ask in their life and have an answer for. It’s really a fascinating one, but it’s so simple. That question is this: Who is this guy Jesus? And that is the question of the day in which we find ourselves, as Jesus is speaking to the Pharisees about the Good Shepherd, the hired hand and the robber.

Hopefully that gives you the picture that you need. But now I want to pick up and I want to allow you to see a little bit of this and then transition into talking about the hired hand. John 10:27-33 says this:

27 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”

31 Again his Jewish opponents picked up stones to stone him, 32 but Jesus said to them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these do you stone me?

33 “We are not stoning you for any good work,” they replied, “but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”

Who is this guy, Jesus? 

The hired hand. Jesus says this in John 10:11:

11 “I am the good shepherd. 

You’ve heard that already. We’ve talked about it.

The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12 The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13 The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

I have these question I will ask multiple times today. What is the motivation of the hired hand? Because there are hired hand voices speaking into our lives today, just like there were hired hand voices, the voices of the Pharisees, many times some of the Pharisees speaking into the lives of the people in that day. What are the motivations of the hired hand? Personal gain.

Remember when I talked about Siri and Alexa? I mean, it’s such an interesting picture. But companies want your attention. Now listen to me closely, please. I am not against profit. I am not against sales. And I think that people need things like plates like I talked about, to eat off of, and that make their life better. Somehow I need to find the best ones for the best price and all of that. So in and of itself, advertising is not bad. We need to be able to see that. That’s not my point today one bit at all. I’m not thinking in that way.

What I am thinking about is you asking the question, myself asking the question, what’s the motivation of the voice? When the voice gets our attention, what’s the motivation? The answer is the motivation is for personal gain. Is it wrong, if you’re a salesman, to want to be able to feed your family or make a few bucks or do well at your job? No. No. No. It’s not. The thing is, for you, when the voice has your attention, you have to be able to pay attention and think “Is this is my best interest, or is this in the best interest of the person?” I can’t tell you. 

This is a lesson I want my daughters to understand, a lesson I want to live my life by. And I have a hard time doing it because the message that those voices, the hired hand, communicate are very slick. They make a lot of sense. It’s a voice that I want to hear because of the way they’re saying it. But what I have to do is to ask myself, “What’s the motivation?” 

Jesus says that the hired hand is out for themselves. And that’s what I find so interesting about this passage. The hired hand is about what? Getting paid. So when the wolf actually comes in this story, the hired hand flees and runs away. I think it’s the same exact thing when we look at the voices speaking to us about “You need this,” and “You need this.” We have to stop. We have to analyze. We have to think, “Who is this voice for?” If it’s not for you, then it’s for them. And if it’s for them, then it’s not necessarily always in your best personal benefit. That voice can lead you down a road that won’t take you to green pastures and abundant life. 

So we have to beware of the voice of the hired hand. But there’s a more sinister voice out there. This one’s an interesting one for me to talk about. But it’s the voice of the thief. You know the voice of the hired hand is not necessarily a bad voice. It’s just a voice that we have to pay attention to and be cautious about. Understand the motivation behind it. But the voice of the thief, listen to this:

8 All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.
9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy;

So what is the motivation of the thief? We can all say it together. To steal, to kill and to destroy. Now, I don’t even know how to convey this. This is such an interesting thing to me. I think oftentimes in our society today we have kind of gotten to this place where we’re thinking that people who believe or let me see… people, when they speak to us, their motivations aren’t bad, I guess. But there’s truly an evil that exists in this world. Sin is still a part of this world today. Motivations from certain people’s voices, literally can be a voice of the thief in your life. And the motivation of the thief is not just to get something from you like the hired hand. It’s actually to destroy you. 

And that’s where I think, when I think about my daughters, or I think about people that I’m caring about, these are voices that we really want to warn our kids about, that we really want to warn one another about. But the truth is that the devil is real. There is an enemy that you have that is trying to undermine everything that you do, that doesn’t want the best for you, but wants the worst for you. A thief comes to steal, to kill and to destroy. I think about that voice. That’s the voice that I want you to stay away from the most. 

How can I illustrate this voice? When I was in Italy, I had to come up with these creative ideas to get to know people. I mean, here’s a guy that, we show up over there, I can’t speak Italian and I want to get to know people. Very few people speak English. This is not Rome or one of these tourist cities where people are speaking English because it’s part of their business. We were in kind of like the armpit, podunk town in Italy that you’re never going to see on the tourist map. Albeit, it’s beautiful. It’s in amazing country. I love it. But it’s not a tourist city. So nobody speaks English.

So how am I going to get to know people? I joined a bicycle club. I’ve been a bicycle rider for quite some time and I knew that Italians love road biking, right? So I thought, “Well, hey. That’s a way to get to know people.” So I get a bicycle, start riding with these guys. They’re serious, you know. They’re just going to leave you in the dust if you can’t keep up. So I had to do some riding out on my own. 

There were some great hills around there and I remember this one day in particular where I was riding up a hill. For you runners and cyclists out there, you understand this lingo, but I had already ridden about fifteen hundred elevation feet up. This is just a big mountain. I was climbing straight up this mountain. I probably still had another five hundred feet to go of elevation feet, so maybe another mile or two. 

When I get at this point and my heart rate is probably at 85-90% of its total capacity, and right at that moment, there are these sheep dogs everywhere, because there are sheep and there are cows, and the bells ringing on the cows—it’s surreal. It’s like something you never experience in the United States. But here I am riding in this serene environment, riding up this hill, heart’s pounding away and these dogs come out barking. 

And for the history of cycling, I know there’s never been a friendly relationship between a cyclist and dogs. So these dogs start chasing me. Think of what my heart rate is doing. Pow, pow, pow. It’s accelerating past the 100% and I’m going to explode. I’m going to die. I stand up on the pedals and I’m pedaling away from these dogs. You don’t know what to do. You just react. I presume the dogs were all bark and no bite. But I get past the dogs, my rate comes down and then I keep on riding.

The next time I go up that hill, wouldn’t you know what happens? I come to that corner and my heart rate elevates. Boom. I’m already at 85-90% of my maximum heart rate. And I just come around the corner and bam, bam, bam. It starts pounding. Why? Because the voices of those dogs were so acute, that I immediately recalled them as soon as I came to the same place that I was before. They weren’t there this time. And they weren’t there the next time. But the same thing happened the next time .

You know what’s fascinating to me is that I think the enemy puts these barking dogs in our own lives; because he doesn’t want the best for you. I was faced with a moment of anxiety when I came to that corner, and my heart started pounding again. And the thought crossed my mind, “Should I turn around and go back?” Thankfully I answered, “No, I’m going to press forward. I’m going to keep going up the hill. I need to accomplish what I set out to do.” 

But the enemy doesn’t want that for you. The thief comes to kill, to steal, and to destroy. And so my question would be to you then, what are the voices of those barking dogs? What voices are the thief using in your life to try to slow you down, to stop you from being all that God wants you to be, to stop you from finding the green pastures that Jesus talks about, the abundant life that Jesus talks about.

Let’s ask this question. What is the Good Shepherd’s motivation? What is the motivation of the Good Shepherd? John 10:9-11 tells us very clearly:

9 I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. They will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. 11 “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Jesus. What’s his motivation? The well being of the sheep. 

When we look at these three distinct voices that exist today, we see very clearly. The hired hand, out for personal gain. Not always bad, but definitely something we should be asking questions about. What’s the motivation? Is it in my best interest

To the thief. What does the thief want to do? Steal, kill and destroy. Those barking dogs in your life that just won’t let you go. Those things, those voices that continue to tell you you’re worthless. "Remember when you failed at that? You’re never going to be able to overcome." “You can’t move forward any longer.” Those voices of the enemy that don’t want good for you.

And then there’s the voice of the Good Shepherd. And truly he says, “The Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep because he wants the abundant life and to lead you into green pastures.” This is his motivation. We see this because Jesus actually came. He gave up his rights as God, lived among us, and did the hardest thing imaginable in order that we can experience life for ourselves. 

So I want to ask, how do we come to know the Shepherd’s voice? Let me ask. Are there any dads with daughters out here today? You can raise your hand at home, too. Dads with daughters, come on! Be proud. I’ve got three little girls. I have no sons to my name. I have three precious little girls. And my three little girls talk, talk, talk, talk…which requires a lot of listening, listening, listening, listening for me. I want to talk too. I have some things to say. But I don’t always get to say those things. 

And sixty-two days in lockdown with three little girls was an interesting experience. I found out that I can escape and I can go somewhere where I didn’t have to hear the voices all the time, and all the words that they have. But then, when you’re in lockdown and you’re stuck, I had to listen, listen, listen. And I prayed to God for patience. And he gave me patience much of the time. There were also times that I found myself locked in a room, curled up on the bed while my girls were actually outside heckling me. I mean, you get that picture in your head, standing at the door, “Daddy, daddy, daddy!” And they’re laughing! They’re like, “I can’t take it, ha, ha, ha!” 

Those voices. Those precious, beautiful, amazing voices. Those voices that sixty-two days in lockdown just made me more aware of the intonations, the tone, the personality, specificity, of each one of my precious little girls. I promise you, if I were in a dark cave filled with kids and I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face, if one of my daughters called my name, if one of my daughters asked for help, I’d know exactly who it is. 

I think it’s the same thing with God. If it takes sixty-two days, if it takes a hundred and two days, if it takes that time during the day that I’m going to talk about in just a minute, we have to figure out how to listen and hear the voice of the Shepherd. Because that’s the voice that will give you life. God has a voice. This may seem like a simple statement. And if you’re on board, I mean, great. But I don’t think everybody in this place today has really grappled with this question. God has a voice. 

When I first got to Italy for survey trip in January of 2019 I met a man named Pasquale. Pasquale—neat guy. A real brainiac. He could speak English, so maybe I just loved him because he could speak English, but he loved to talk about theology. Not so much religion, because remember, this is a very religious country, Italy is. But the young people don’t want to talk about religion. They want to walk away from anything that smacks of religion at all. Basically everybody under 40 would call themselves an aonteistic or an agnostic. Very few people would claim any sort of faith. But Pasquale was wrestling with these questions of theology.

We had these amazing conversations. And when I returned in June of 2019, we would sit down probably every week or every other week. And we would have these conversations. And my friend Steve who was there with us, we would have these conversations together. It was fascinating. Because during the time that I was there, Pasquale said he was an atheist, which if you don’t know, means don’t believe there’s any God whatsoever. There’s no creator, there’s no God.

Then he transitioned himself from saying that to saying, “No, I believe that there’s a higher power. I just can’t know that higher power,” which would be called an agnostic, if you’ve ever heard that term.

Then Pasquale goes from being an agnostic during our conversations, into saying, “I’m a Deist.” Now I don’t know if you know what a Deist is or not. But a Deist has this concept that God made the earth, wound it up, kind of like a watch, built the watch, wound it up, and it just ticks and takes care of itself. We do what we’re going to do, but God is off in the distance and he has no interaction.

And, finally, one day we were having a conversation and I’m pressing, pressing Pasquale in a very friendly way, because we had developed this great relationship. And I’m like, “Pasquale, do you believe that God is real?” 

And he goes, “I believe that God is real.”

I said, “But do you believe that God is conscious? Can you have an exchange with this being that exists out there?”

And he goes, “No, I don’t. I don’t believe that God has a voice and can speak to me because I don’t believe that God is conscious.”

I just have to say there are a few more things I want to mention in this sermon, but this may be the end for you. Does God have a voice? Because, until you answer the question, Does God have a voice, you can’t move on. Until you answer the question, Is God a conscious being? You can’t move on to listening, can you?

But today, this message is about listening. This message is about listening to a voice that I believe God has, and has used in the Bible for many years publicly, and uses often personally for each one of us.

So, finally, I want to ask for those of us who do believe, that have come to that place where we would say “God does have a voice, he is a conscious being, and I want to hear that voice,” I want to ask this: How do we hear God’s voice? And give you some simple steps. 

Number one simple step is this: Be a sheep. Now, I was going to go off on this because in Italy there are sheep everywhere. We actually had shepherds leading sheep and I told you about the sheep dogs and everything. But the point is, what do we simply know that sheep do? And it’s real! Sheep follow. They follow. That’s what sheep do. 

So my first thought for you is to be a sheep. And once you start thinking, “I can be a sheep. I can be like a sheep.” Then you have to ask, “Well, am I acting like one?” 

Number two: listen to this. I hope all of us can hear this because this is one of the most difficult things in the world to do. Hit DND. Do you know what DND means? It’s an acronym for Do Not Disturb. Right? Every single phone has a Do Not Disturb button. But the question is, how often do we use that Do Not Disturb button. DND. Not to be confused with Dungeons and Dragons, which is another use of that acronym. But this is the number one way to use it. Do Not Disturb. 

Are you hitting Do Not Disturb on your phone at any time in your day in order to hear the voice of God? Are you hitting Do Not Disturb on life at any point in your day in order to hear and listen to the voice of God? I wish I had a more simple answer and a crafty way for you to be able to say, “If I do this thing, then I will carve out the time and be able to listen to the voice of God.” 

I don’t have that. It’s just hard. When you have kids, when you have a business, when you have a pain that you experience chronically on a regular basis, when you have all of these things that are screaming and yelling and trying to take your attention, it is difficult to hit DND on life and on the phone. 

But if you think about the phone, I have another question for you. Do you tell your phone when to talk to you or does your phone tell you when it wants to talk? It’s just kind of a funny way to think about it. Your phone, my phone tells me when it wants to talk all the time and then I just go running, “Okay okay, okay.” 

When I get out of bed in the morning, what’s the first thing that I do? Do I go to my phone and check the messages? Then somebody else has my attention. In those moments, that’s the time that I choose to hit DND and go to the Lord. For you, it may not be in the morning. But I ask is there a time that you hit DND?

We need to practice being silent. Number three: Listen to hear. Would you say that there’s a difference between listening and hearing? Listen to hear.

Finally, number four: Follow. It’s kind of where it begins. 

See yourself as a sheep. Hit DND. Listen to hear. And then finally, when the Lord speaks—because he will—it’s our role to follow. 

This message began with the word voices and finishes with the word follow. Have you heard the voice of the Lord recently? 

I wonder if you’ve been listening for the Lord’s voice. If you have heard it recently, more importantly, I guess, is to ask when was the last time you heard the Lord’s voice. Was it through a Bible verse this morning? Was it when you gave your attention to God’s word? You gave your attention to God’s written word. The Lord showed you something simple in scripture but profound, something so profound that not even death can shake it. 

Was it a few months ago when you found yourself alone with no job and were wondering what you will do? Finally coming to a point where you shut your mouth and say, “Hey, God, maybe you forgot about me, but if you have anything to say, this would be a good time.” And then something miraculous happened because, instead of moving on to the next thought or the next fear, or the next notification, you actually listened for a moment. 

And in that moment, God reminded you that he is for you and not against you. That he loves you and that he gave up all his rights as God to come and allow himself to suffer just so that you could be close to him, reminding you of your worth and value, and that he doesn’t need anything from you because he already possesses everything in himself.

Or was it last year when someone you trusted took a chance and shared something you needed to hear? Something that actually changed your relationship because it meant you were wrong. You ever been there? As you reflect on it now, though, you see it was not for selfish reasons that that person came to you and risked the relationship. They were risking and paying a cost because they love you and they want the best for you. 

When people speak to us, we need to ask the question, what’s the motivation? And even when people speak things to us that we don’t want to hear, if the motivation is right, true, pure and leads us into green pastures, it leads us into the abundant life—we don’t want to hear it even if it’s hard.

When Jesus speaks out and says these things, these voices that you hear and sound so good, they don’t have your best interest at heart. This one voice, it wants your attention and it’s not necessarily for bad reasons, but it’s not for you. It’s for them. Their number one motivator is for them. And if hard times come, if the storm of life comes, they won’t be there for you. Or is this the thief who wants to steal, to kill and to destroy?

The way we listen to these voices matters because it will influence the way that we respond. It will influence the situations of our hearts. It will influence whether or not we listen, we hear, and we follow the Good Shepherd. 

What is God’s motivation? He’s for you. I hope you can believe it. 

We’re going to do a baptism in just a minute and I was thinking about how I would pray at the end, maybe wrap it up and ask the Lord if we could hear him speak something. But I think this baptism is a pretty special thing; because when we’re listening to the Lord and we’re following his voice and he speaks, one of the things he speaks to us is about baptism. And he’s made it very clear, and it’s something that is so beautiful that the Church has done for thousands of years, ever since Jesus ascended into heaven. 

This beautiful baptism, we even saw John the Baptist doing it before Jesus, where you get dunked under the water and it represents the reality that Jesus Christ descended into the earth from heaven, and then went step further down into the depths of Sheol and into death, was buried inside of the grave, but did not stay there; but proclaimed and declared his power as God, which you have seen clearly in John, declared his power as God, and resurrected, overcoming death, back to life, which means he’s alive today, that he is conscious, he’s alive today, cares about you, and wants good things, even the abundant life here and for eternity for you.

One of the things then he asks is that you would follow him into baptism; and I think there are some people here that the Lord might be speaking to that haven’t signed up for baptism yet. I want you to come and I want you to talk to Kurt or maybe Ryan over here and maybe they can get another pastor or two, and talk to them about what the Lord is doing in the way that he’s been speaking. Because this is a step of obedience, and there are ten people today through the services that are going to take that step of obedience and follow like a sheep after Jesus Christ the Good Shepherd.

So I’m going to take just a moment and I’m going to pray for us and then during that time Kurt is going to come up and is going to share with you a little more and he’s going to celebrate with them because they’ve received that new life, Jesus Christ, and their following him into abundant pastures. 

Lord Jesus, I thank you for who you are. You’re incredible. I believe that you’re alive and that your voice is real and speaking. I’ve experienced it in my own life today. I’ve experienced it in my own life in the past, and Lord God, you have led us into green pastures, even sitting in the midst of Corona Virus. So many difficult things are happening in this moment in history, in this moment in our world, and yet, Lord God, you speak in the midst of it. You push aside the voices. You calm our racing hearts, and you take over and you tell us what is best for us. And I pray, Lord God, that your people would be able to hear you today. And for those that you are leading into baptism to follow you right into that, I pray that take that step in these moments. I thank you for them, Lord God, and that you called them. Let your blessing be upon them and in this first step into this new life, Lord God, I pray that it would be an abundant one, that you would show them clearly exactly where you’re leading them. We love you, Jesus. It is your day. It is your voice. In your name we pray. Amen.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Illumination: Guided by God

David Stockton
Series: 2020 Fasting Season

Good morning. Big time playoff game today. That’s why you came to early service. No, just kidding.

I feel like the Lord’s definitely wanting to give us what we need for the journey. I don’t know what 2020 holds, but I think there will be some battling going on. I think there will be some challenges. But I think there is going to be a lot of ground that the Lord is going to ask us to take for him in 2020. It’s really important that we get filled with what he wants to fill us, because you’re going to battle either way, right? So you might as well have what the Lord wants you to go into battle with.—otherwise, you’ve got to battle without it. He’ll be with you.

We’re trying to get filled up. The Spirit is important. This morning we’re going to continue to talk about our spiritual formation: forming habits that form us. We’re going to be talking about illumination and what that ultimately means. How we can be guided by God. It’s such a radical, strange thing.

But first, we have big news for you. It was about four years ago we made a transition and as we assessed what Living Streams was and where it was at, we had a good church family. Never, never not had a good church family. I’ve been here for almost twenty years now. See all that gray coming in? Watch out!

It’s been almost twenty years and this is a good church family. We also had a good staff and we had a good house, this house that we’re in right now. And yet, we had about 570 adults coming on a Sunday morning. And we just felt like there was more room for others. We felt like as we looked at the house, it’s like we’ve got two bedrooms full and there are four bedrooms sitting there empty. 

So we really prayed. We said, “Lord, we know that there are a lot of people out there who don’t know you and who don’t have a good church family.” And we really want to see this thing grow, this thing be maximized and used in that way. So we set a kind of vision statement for ourselves. We wanted to go from about 570 adults to 1,000 on a Sunday morning by 2020. And back then, we were like, “That sounds crazy. That’s almost doubling.” Last week we had over 1,000 adults on a Sunday morning. 

It was awesome. I didn’t even care if we got to 1,000. I just thought it was a good goal to shoot for. But that was really neat. Just so you know, I’ve said it a million times before. That number really isn’t important. It’s just a means to an end. The end is that the people who are joining us would actually knit their lives together with us. We know Sunday morning is good, but there’s so much more that can take place. There’s so much deeper, richer fellowship that can take place in groups where you can be known and you can know people.

I’m just asking. Obviously there are more of you coming than there used to be. And those of you who are newer to the church and are not plugged in in some other way, even if it’s at another church, I don’t care. Get into smaller communities because it’s so good. But we have some great opportunities here. We have Life Groups. We’re about to launch some new ones. We have mission trips that are coming up. We have an internship coming up. Next Sunday, for all the newer people who want to figure out what Living Streams is all about, we have a Starting Point Lunch after third service, which will then let you know about Explore Group—which is a nine-week track we want people to go through as they’re trying to get plugged into the church. All kinds of opportunities coming up. So please, if you enjoy what the Lord’s doing here enough to come on Sunday mornings, I would encourage you to take that next step and really get to know people in a deeper way.

And we have Wednesday night prayer night coming up. The next two Wednesdays we have Wednesday night fasting and prayer night. You can see information in the bulletin about that. Last Wednesday was awesome. The Lord always shows up. He spoke to me about a lot of things. Some of it’s even going to come out today.

All right. Christian Spiritual Formation. Let’s go through our slides to review, in case there are new people. also, it’s good for us to remember. Christian Spiritual Formation is defined simply as the process of moving from less Christi-like to more Christ-like. That is the goal of Christianity. God loves you the way you are. He died for you the way you were. He comes and wants to fill you with the Spirit the way you are, so that you will not stay the way you are. He wants to grow you, mature you, and make you more into the image of Christ. That’s the Spiritual Formation of which we are all a part.

Less Christ-like we described as the broken heart—the fallen, deceitful, restless, unwanted longing heart that needs to be refined. It needs to be healed and all of that. We talked about that a few weeks ago in a sermon. You can check that out.

The beautiful heart. We did a whole sermon series on it last November. Talking about the heart of Christ, the beautiful heart and what it looks like. You can check that out later.

We also have been talking in this series, the stages of the journey. We’re not the first ones to follow Christ. Did you know that? This is not the first generation. We’re not the only church that loves Jesus. It’s not an. American thing. (gasp) What? Yeah! This has been going on a long time. As we’ve gleaned from church fathers, church mothers that have come before us, obviously we have the scriptures. But people have been trying to apply the scriptures in all different aspects of culture, of society, for a lot of years. They’ve come up with some things that are helpful for us.

They say there are about five stages of the journey. These are our words. They’re stolen words, but we’ve put them together this way. So you’ll find different versions of this. But basically, all people at first are walking in darkness. They don’t have the light of Christ and they are walking in darkness. John 1 talks about that. At some point, God interrupts the darkness with light. That’s a moment of awakening. 

We go through seasons of darkness before we know Christ, but even after we walk with Christ we still kind of go through seasons where we feel like we’re in the dark again. Then a new form, a new aspect of the light of Christ begins to move on us. But it happens for those who are new to Christ, the first time around, Then what also happens is we keep going around in this formation cycle.

Darkness, awakening, and that moves us into seasons of purgation. Purgation is a horrible, fun word. Basically it’s just horrible and not fun at all when you’re living through it. It’s that process where God is now trying to refine your heart, refine your soul—to burn out the love of the world, to burn out the fleshly desires so that he can establish a heart for the things that are beautiful, the things that are right, the things that are good.

And we go through these seasons that are hard. But it’s all God trying to form us into his image.

Then, after that, there are seasons in our walk with the Lord that are illumination. That’s what we’re going to talk about today. You can pop up the illumination slide.

Here’s a scripture. We did a scripture with each one of these stages. This is the one we’re going to be talking about today.

Illumination - Jesus was teaching his disciples. This was right before he went to the cross in John 16:13

But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.

Jesus was teaching his disciples. The disciples were people that walked in darkness. They fished in darkness. They tax-collected in darkness. They did all those type of things. Then, at one point, Jesus, the light of the world, literally the exact replication of God Himself in flesh, walked up to their table or their boat and said, “Hey, come follow me.” He interrupted their darkness. And they, for whatever reason, were compelled to follow him.

As they followed him, they walked with him for three years, they had the actual light of God there, next to them. And then, Jesus was always saying certain things about how he was going to have to leave. That he was going to die and he was going to go away, and where he was going they could not come. And they kind of never really understood it. 

But this is where he’s unpacking all of this. He said, “Don’t worry. When I go there is One that will come.” And he calls him the Spirit of Truth. “And he will guide you into all the truth. And he won’t speak on his own. He will speak what he hears the Father telling him. And he will tell you about things that have not yet come. Or things that are coming to pass.”

And Jesus began to introduce, and you can read about it in John 14, 15, 16, a little bit in 17, Jesus was kind of teaching about this new relationship with God that his followers were going to have. It wasn’t a flesh to flesh relationship like they had with Jesus. But it was going to become a spirit to spirit relationship. That they who were flesh for sure also had a spirit. And that spirit inside of them was longing and restless until it could connect with God,who is spirit. And Jesus was actually saying that this Holy Spirit would come.

Then, sure enough, Jesus ascended into heaven. And the disciples were all sitting, not just the eleven, but also the community of people that had followed Jesus—his mother, the other Mary, and all of a sudden, as they’re waiting on God, it said that the room began to shake. There was a sound of rushing wind and in came—it’s got to be one of the strangest things of all time. Gonna watch the DVD in heaven, or YouTube it. But it says there were things like cloven tongues of fire that came and rested on their heads. Illumination.

They began to speak in tongues that they didn’t understand. But they were tongues that other people could understand—other languages. As there was this moment of confusion, excitement, whatever it was, some people started asking questions about it. And yet, the disciples who had not experienced this prior, but had the instructions of Christ and the scriptures, enough to say, “I think this is what was talked bout in the Old Testament in the book of Joel, where God is pouring out his Spirit upon us.”

So there it was! This new relationship. This new phase of Christianity. This new covenant promise, where the Spirit now came and illuminated things and then began to guide the disciples. They were actually living in very precarious times. One false move and they could be killed. And yet, the Spirit was guiding them and began to guide them in the way that they would walk and the way that they would lead the Church.

They were shocked because, all of a sudden, they would go to a different place where they weren’t people who knew Jesus. But then they would pray for them and the Spirit would come upon them. And then, what was crazy was they even went to people who weren’t Jews and the Spirit came upon them. They were like, “What is going on around here?”

From then on, people who were following Christ were trying to figure out what it means to receive the Spirit of God, to be baptized or filled with the Spirit of God and to be guided by the Spirit of God. Illumination.

Because I love stories so much, I want to go back to the life of Moses as we begin to unpack this. We’ve talked about how Moses is a good example of these stages. Moses was in darkness, for sure. He didn’t even know who he was or where he came from. He was raised in Egypt, but he was a Hebrew. Then an awakening began in him. The way it was expressed was he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew, when he began to realize who he was. He was going through an awakening. But that awakening wasn’t that one moment. It was lots of moments that ultimately led to a burning bush. 

This burning bush moment wasn’t the first time he had this uncertainty, or this tremor going on inside. But this is the first time he actually encountered the presence of God. God was speaking to him about what was already inside of him, and connecting the dots and making it make sense that God had put all of that in there, to lead him to this moment.

Then, the very first thing God does now that Moses is saying, “Okay. I believe you are God. What do you want me to do?”

God says, “I want you to go back to Egypt where it’s going to be hard for you.”

He leads him right back into the most difficult, challenging thing possible. Purgation. You guys tracking with me? That’s what we talked about last week. Now we’re going to talk about this stage of illumination. I want you to pick up in Exodus 4:18-3. This is right after the burning bush:

18 Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, “Let me return to my own people in Egypt to see if any of them are still alive.”

Jethro said, “Go, and I wish you well.”

19 Now the Lord had said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead.” 20 So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand.

21 The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. 22 Then say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son, 23 and I told you, “Let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’”

So Moses is getting all these instructions. We who know the story know the way it all plays out. But this what the Lord is telling Moses, and it’s all vague for Moses at this point. But there’s a connection between the firstborn son. 

24 At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him.

What? 

25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. 26 So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said “bridegroom of blood,” referring to circumcision.)

27 The Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the wilderness to meet Moses.” So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him. 28 Then Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say, and also about all the signs he had commanded him to perform.

29 Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, 30 and Aaron told them everything the Lord had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people, 31 and they believed. And when they heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped.

The Lord is speaking to Moses. So he’s left the burning bush. Now, somehow the Lord is continuing to speak to Moses with the burning bush. I want you to catch the significance of that. As Moses is moving into this new mobile relationship with this burning bush God. In the process of doing that, God is telling Moses a little bit more detail. He’s talking about how he’s going to go and he’s supposed to say these things to Pharaoh. But Pharaoh is going to refuse to let the people go. But then God is basically going to convince Pharaoh. And Moses is supposed to say, “And if you don’t, God is going to kill your firstborn son.”

The very next thing that happens, Moses gathers up his family. He’s got his son Gershom, we talked about that last Sunday. He’s got his firstborn son and they are getting ready to go to Egypt. Then out of nowhere it says that the Lord was standing and was going to kill Moses. But Zipporah—not Moses—somehow figured out, “The Lord is going to kill Moses if I don’t circumcise our son.”

How? I have no idea. But maybe there had been talk. I mean, you can imagine Moses was probably circumcised. And Zipporah knew about it. And there was probably a debate in their household. Moses was probably saying, “You know, I wonder if I should. I don’t know.” 

There was a covenant established with Moses’ people. God said, “This is the covenant I’m establishing with you.” 

The covenant was established with Moses, but Moses’ son had not entered into that covenant. And yet, God was serious about it. In some way there is a connection to the firstborn son of Pharaoh. It’s almost as if God is saying to Moses, “If we’re going to go do this thing, we’ve got to get your house in order first.”

But the thing that is so amazing to me is that Zipporah figured it out. God helped. Zipporah figure it out. God spoke to Zipporah. How? Again, I don’t know exactly. But it’s an amazing thing. She doesn’t quite understand all of this, but she calls him a blood husband because she doesn’t understand who this God is—why he would require this. Moses might not fully understand all of this stuff. And yet, Moses was saved from God because God communicated to his wife about this thing. So God can speak to us. God can communicate to us. 

Let’s continue. They go into this time, and you guys know the story. They go into Egypt. Moses talks to Pharaoh. They go back and forth. Ten plagues. God is showing his power over all of the gods of Egypt. At the end of it, the last plague was death of the firstborn sons of Egypt. Yet all of the Israelites were saved, not only from that, but all of the other plagues, which is fascinating.

Finally, Pharaoh says, “Okay. Fine. Go.” And Moses leads all of the people out triumphantly. They go out there, but all of a sudden Pharaoh’s army is coming after them, because he’s having second thoughts. Red Sea parts. All of that. Red Sea falls on the Egyptians. And basically, the people are delivered forever.

Now they’re in the wilderness and they’re heading this way. God had guided Moses through all of that. Moses didn’t have to go find that same burning bush every time he wanted to hear from God. Somehow God has continued to communicate with Moses on the fly as he’s moving in and out, even in Egypt, now in the wilderness. So Moses is beginning to understand this relationship with God. 

In Exodus 33, I want to pick up. This is now when they’re in the wilderness. This is how it describes the relationship between Moses and God. 

7 Now Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the “tent of meeting.” 

He doesn’t need a burning bush anymore. He just needs a tent.

Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp. 8 And whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose and stood at the entrances to their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent. 9 As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance, while the Lord spoke with Moses. 

Kind of representing God’s presence. There was a cloud by day and fire by night. It would come and rest on the tent. 

10 Whenever the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshiped, each at the entrance to their tent. 11 The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.

Here’s this description. Whoever is writing this—it could be Moses, it could be somebody else—they’re describing what it was like when Moses would meet with God. 

I want to read a few other descriptions of this same thing. Numbers 12:8 (NASB):

With him I speak mouth to mouth,
Even openly, and not in dark sayings,
And he beholds the form of the Lord.

We’re talking about something very significant. Something very strange, especially in that day and age. The gods of Egypt were not gods that were kind and nice. They were gods who needed to be appeased, otherwise they would bring great judgment. That was basically the religions of all the nations around and tribes around there. It was basically, you did whatever you could to appease the gods so they’d send some rain. And anytime there was no rain, it means the gods were mad at you.

Here’s this new kind of different thing emerging in this part of the world, where God is speaking to this person, Moses, face to face, mouth to mouth. In Psalm 119:104 and 105, there’s another way that David describes this same kind of illumination stage:

I gain understanding from your precepts [words];
    therefore I hate every wrong path.
Your word is a lamp for my feet,
    a light on my path.

Talking about how God illuminates the directions that he’s supposed to go. Isaiah 30:

20 Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. 21 Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.” 

Then in the New Testament—2 Corinthians 3:

13 We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing the end of what was passing away. 14 But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15 Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. … 18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

He’s alluding back to this—Moses had this relationship with God, and yet, there was still something lacking because Moses would have to go and meet in the tent and would have to do these type of things. But he’s saying that, now, in this new covenant, ever since Christ has come, there is no veil between us at all. There is no need for a holy of holies. We are always in the presence of God. We have constant access to the fullness of the Spirit to behold his face, to hear his voice. 

For some of you, you’re saying, “Yeah, that’s where I’m at.” Where you actually begin to have confidence that you can hear from the Lord. When you go to pray, you actually are praying and thinking, “I’m going to get something out of this.” 

And there’s definitely, even though I’ve walked with the Lord for a long time, and many people have walked with the Lord long enough, you’ll go through times where you don’t feel like the Lord is so accessible, or it’s harder to hear from him. Because you’re going through those other things. 

But there are those seasons of our lives where we finally arrive at this place where we really do feel known by God. We can feel like he hears our voice and knows our hearts.

It’s described this way in another place:

Illumination refers to a process of continually and increasingly becoming aware of the presence and care of God.

That’s illumination.

It’s the idea of perfect love casting out fear. Apart from God I’m driven by fear. 

As God comes in, I increasingly become driven by love.

Illumination.

When the love quotient in my life becomes greater than the fear quotient, purgation moves to illumination.

When you realize that God loves you so much whether you’re getting it right or wrong that day, and you can come boldly into his throne, instead of being so afraid that he’s going to condemn you or judge you in some way. 

When the love quotient increases and is greater than the fear quotient, it’s illumination.

t’s the place where my ego, my choices, my sin and my guilt no longer create distance between me and God.

There’s no distance anymore. And not only can you say that theologically, but you actually experience that, the closeness of God. And it is true that sometimes it comes and goes. But once you’ve been there enough, you realize it’s not because God is actually far. It’s because he’s taking me through another season of refinement. So that ultimately we can be even closer.

I want so badly to talk about union. But that’s next week. It’s going to be so good. I picked Moses, not for these other ones, but union, in Moses’ life—oh, it’s going to be so good. But illumination, that’s what he’s talking about. 

As we close, I was trying to think of how the Lord has spoken to me most in my life. Like Zipporah, somehow she knew this strange thing. Moses, it said, “And the Lord said to Moses.” Zipporah—it seemed like every chapter started with, “And the Lord God spoke to Moses,” and there you have a chapter. God’s just constantly talking to Moses. We know he goes to the tent of meeting. We know he talked with the burning bush. We know he stood still and saw the salvation of the Lord. We know he goes up on the mountain to talk to God. 

But it’s like God was communicating to Moses and we have the whole Torah, the first five books of the Bible—the Pentateuch. The Bible is story after story of God interrupting into a person’s life, speaking to someone and then them walking in obedience—or not. Right? But how is God speaking to me? That’s a vague thing to say to someone: “God wants to speak to you.”

I wrote these things down. I’m going to focus on one of them:

He guides us with the commandments and scripture. 

No doubt about it. If you want to hear from God, read the Bible. For two reasons: one is this really is God’s word spoken to you to guide you. But then, also, the more you get to know this, the easier it is to pick up when the voice of God is speaking to you outside of this. Because you learn about his nature. “Oh, that sounds like something God would say.” “That does not sound like something God would say.” That’s why this book is so important. Not only can it teach you God’s word, but it can make you familiar with God’s voice. So he guides us with his commandments and scripture.

He guides us with the community of saints. 

This whole thing that we’re unpacking is not in the scriptures, per se. It’s supported by the scriptures. But it’s language and stuff that’s helping us unpack our walk with God outside of just what the scriptures have. So church history is helpful. But also the community that we have. That’s why you’ve got to get into a small group. We have curriculum. Every one of these messages, we create a little curriculum that goes out to all the Life Group leaders. You go to a Life Group, then you’re going to be able to unpack this stuff a little further and deeper. Because some of this, hopefully, you question. You’ll say, “He didn’t say that quite right.” And you might be right. 

But you can start to unpack it in a smaller group of people who also want to know the word of God. And it can flower and get bolder and broader and it can get more precise. So the community of saints is so important how the Lord speaks to us. Other believers have spoken into my life and guided me so much. Sometimes they knew what they were doing. Sometimes they had no idea.

This last one is huge:

He guides us with the convictions of his Spirit. 

Conviction is a horrible sounding word. On Wednesday night, Ryan actually talked a little bit about it, how we should be praying for conviction. Because conviction is actually a beautiful thing. It means you have a Father who loves you and doesn’t want you to go off a cliff or end up in a ditch. So he comes with his conviction. But conviction does not feel nice. It feels horrible. 

I was thinking back towards the end of 2019, these times when I was at a crossroads and I didn’t know what to do. I was like, “Okay, Lord, I want to do this.” In particular, before I moved down here in 2001. I was in Oregon. I loved Oregon. I really started following the Lord in Oregon. It’s Jesus’ country. They’ve got rivers. They’ve got big fish. Not these little tiny fish. All my friends were there. All my Christian friends, literally, were there. 

And yet, Mark Buckley, the founding pastor of Living Streams, he’s kind of been our family pastor forever. He knew that I had done some ministry. He said, “Why don’t you come work with our high schoolers at Living Streams.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s funny.” I didn’t want to do it. And yet, in Oregon, it was like everything was drying up. You know, like the picture of the cloud would every once a while lift up and go and that meant the people were supposed to go. Slowly but surely, it felt like the glory was departing. And yet, I didn’t know that. I just thought, “Oh, I just haven’t got the job I want yet.” 

But Mark kept saying, “Why don’t you come down here?” And so he said, “Well, we’ll just fly you out. You could just come check it out.”  Which was not a good decision, because I flew in and checked it out. Then I said, “Now I will never go down there!” Literally. That’s what I thought. I thought, “No! No! No!” 

But I remember my soul had no peace in Oregon. I was at my mom’s house. There was just no explanation. I couldn’t sleep at night. I started to feel depression start to settle in. No peace. No peace. No peace. I remember waking up one day and I said, “Maybe I should go to Arizona.”

It was so amazing. It was like a flood of joy and peace kind of just hit me all of a sudden. I thought, “No. I still don’t want to do it.” I wrestled with it. I kept fighting it. Sorry. I’m not great at a this. But it was a wrestling match of conviction. It was like God was guiding me. Even though he wasn’t speaking to me, inside I just knew. No peace—stay here. Twinge of peace and excitement there. So, ultimately, I went for it. 

I can’t tell you the depth of layers of the goodness of the Lord that’s been revealed to me in this place. And he was the one that guided me. And I have lots of other stories like that.

I hate it when the peace goes away. It’s miserable. But I’m so grateful that the Lord leads us in that way. 

Illumination.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, I ask that you would guide us. Lord, we’re so desperate for your guidance. We’ve got politicians that don’t know what’s up or down. We’ve got media shouting and screaming at us what we need, what we don’t need, who’s cool, what’s not. We’ve got our own hearts that are so confusing and restless, and they want this thing today and they don’t tomorrow. They want that thing that’s not good for us. Oh, we’re so lost. But I thank you so much that you know the way. 

And, Lord, I do pray that you would convict America. I pray for a great wave of conviction to wash over us—rich, poor, Democrat, Republican, Christian, non-Christian. Just let a great wave of conviction wash over us. Take away all of our peace in all the places that we’re headed in the wrong way. And give us peace in the right direction.

Your word says we should go out with joy and be led with peace. I pray that we would be a people like that. That we would trust you, trust that still, small voice, trust your fatherly guidance. 

Right now, Lord, if there are some people in this room who are saying, “Aw, man, why did he have to say that?” Because they know you have been convicting them about a relationship, or a job, or something they are doing in their life, whether it’s sin or not. Lord, I pray that you would give them the courage to trust you. And that, as they step toward where you are leading them, your peace would flood them, and they would sleep so good, and they would have joy fill their hearts.

Thank you, Lord.

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture marked NASB are taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission