Guest User 3/14/21 Guest User 3/14/21

The Convenience of Idolatry

My name is Jeff. I’m so excited to be back here in the Valley. We were here for 11 years. Then we were in California for the last 4 1/2 years and then we’ve now just returned three weeks ago. I’m so glad to be here.

I really love this series that you’ve been in.

Series: A Kingdom Divided
March 14, 2021 - Jeff Gokee

I really love this series that you’ve been in. If you haven’t listened to David, your pastor, his last three sermons, I can’t encourage you enough. I did listen to them. Powerful. So powerful. They’re going to give you an overview of Kings. First and Second Kings was actually one book that they cut in half because they were like, “I don’t know if people can get through the whole thing.” So the divided it into one narrative. And that narrative is really, really important, because it’s really about small amounts of success and massive amounts of failure.

That’s why, a lot of times as we look at the Old Testament, it’s kind of like, “Oh, let’s get to the New Testament, the good stuff.” No, no, no. We’ve got to learn about the failure part. There is success int here, of course, but the failure part helps us understand all the good stuff. It helps us understand why we need Jesus.

I’ve got three kids. One of them is a GCU student, whoo! So, as a father, I’m constantly telling my kids where I’ve made mistakes. The reason I do that is “Don’t do what I did. Don’t repeat those same mistakes.”

The Old Testament is like, “Listen, let me tell you why we need Jesus. Look at all the failure.” And it’s really important as we go through this, that you kind of sit in that a bit. Sit in how you’ve made mistakes. Sit in how you’ve failed. Allow yourself to receive the redemption that Jesus Christ gave to you, the grace you’ve received that you did not earn.

This is why the Old Testament is so helpful for us. It’s helping us bring into the New Testament where Jesus was the fulfillment of it all. You can’t separate these two. This isn’t old and new. This is wholistic way of telling the gospel narrative. It comes in its final moments in Jesus’ death and resurrection and his kingdom come and his will be done in earth as it is in heaven. That’s why it’s so important and that’s why I love this church, that we’re actually diving into the failures of the past to help us see where we need to go, and why we really need Jesus. So, I hope you face yourself today.

Much of what I’ve been doing in this last year has been facing myself, dealing with myself. A year and a half ago, I’ve been going to a counselor for the last three and a half years; and he asked me this question, “How do you care for yourself? How do you self care?” And I was like, “I don’t even know what that means.” And he said, “When’s the last time you went to a doctor.” And I was like, “I don’t know. Like ten years ago.” And he was like, “Yeah, maybe we’ll start there. Maybe go to the doctor. You’re forty-three, so it’s probably time to do that.”

So I walked into the doctor being that guy—you know, the guy who hasn’t been to the doctor in ten years. And they’re like, “Hey, that guy.” So I sit with the doctor and she has me go and do some blood work and she calls me back and says, “Hey, I need you to come back in. We saw some stuff.” So I sit back down with her and she says, “We need to send you to a hematologist.”

Now our family knows blood pretty well in this way. Our son was diagnosed with leukemia when he was eight (so nine years ago). So she sends us to a hematologist for me to sit through. We knew what that meant. So the hematologist says to us, “You have cancer.” Okay. “So, what happens. What’s going on?”

He asked me this question, “How do you feel anxious? How does that come out in your life?”

And I was like, “I don’t even know what you mean.”

And he said, “No, like, how often are you anxious?

And I’m like, “I never feel anxious. I’m that annoying guy that wakes up in the morning at 5:30 going, ‘This is the greatest day ever!’”

Right? I’m like lollipops and sugarplums. I’m like, “I’m so happy to be alive every single day.”

And he said this, “You have been anxious for a very, very, very long time. And this cancer is activated by anxiety.”

What I didn’t realize was I had a place of worship, a high place of worship, a different reality than the throne where God is supposed to sit. I created my own. It was wrapped around insecurity, power, position. I’m a 3 on the Enneagram. I want to get stuff done. And when I get stuff done, I feel successful. I want influence. I didn’t realize that over a period of time it actually triggered something genetically, biologically in me that caused cancer. It’s as if God was saying to me, “I want that place back. You keep filling it with all this other stuff, the approval of man, power, and that’s your reward. That’s all you get. But I want you. I’m a jealous God. I want all of you.”

This last year for me has been about repentance. And I resonate with Paul when he says, “I’m the chief of all sinners.” I stand before you today not as somebody who has it all figured out. I am broken and I am beautiful. Because the King of kings and the Lord of lords has rescued my life and he’s rescued your life.

That’s why it’s so important that we look at both the successes of the past and the failures of what we move forward. And because we look at King David, we go, “Wow, a man after God’s own heart.” Yeah, an adulterer and a murderer. Right?

And we move to Solomon. “Wow. Wisest man who’s ever existed.” Oh, a thousand wives. Idolatrous. He starts to divide the kingdom.

His son Rehoboam takes over for him and decides he wants to prove to Daddy that he’s a somebody. So he starts taxing the people so hard and grinding them down, that God as a result of the failures of Solomon goes to this man Jeroboam and says to Jeroboam, “Jeroboam, I’m going to bless you. You’re going to take these ten tribes. I’m going to bless you. Because of the failures of what’s happening with Solomon and Rehoboam.”

And listen to this in 1 Kings 11:38-39:

38 If you do whatever I command you and walk in obedience to me and do what is right in my eyes by obeying my decrees and commands, as David my servant did, I will be with you.

By the way, that’s the win. “I will be with you. My presence will be with you. My power will be with you. My influence will be with you.”

I will build you a dynasty as enduring as the one I built for David and will give Israel to you. 39 I will humble David’s descendants because of this, but not forever.’”

Here’s what I want to say. How gracious is God? He just lays it all out. Look what God is doing. God is not a cruel God who doesn’t set expectation for us. He goes to Jeroboam, “I want to bless you. I want you to take these ten tribes and I want you to lead them well by the power of God to be a light unto the nations for the world to see that there is a king who is on the throne. And I want to do that through you. But you need to be obedient. You need to follow after my laws. You need to obey in the same way that David did, repent in the same way that David did.”

He’s not cruel. He doesn’t make us guess. As followers of God, he’s not making us guess. He’s making it clear: with obedience and righteousness comes blessing. When we choose to do something different, there is a responsibility to that. He releases us. It’s terrifying. In Romans 1, he releases us to our desires. You want to go do that? Go do that.

What we find in Jeroboam is a significant problem. God has made everything clear. And maybe you find this in yourself. I would imagine you would. But what happens in Jeroboam is an individualism steps in. God has given the promise. God has made clear what he will do and how he will bless. But Jeroboam all of a sudden gets this individualistic urge in him that so many of us have and I want to go after this morning.

I did a lot of research on individualism. And honestly, the best thing I found was the Webster’s Dictionary definition and it is says this, “Individualism is a doctrine that the interests of the individual are or ought to be ethically paramount.”

It’s a doctrine. It’s a doctrine that the interests of me, what I want, what I desire are ethically paramount to anything else God included.

I was driving down the 10 there around University of Phoenix. If you go to the east Valley, you hate that turn, because it’s jam-packed So I’m on this turn this week, which I thought was kind of interesting. I’m on this turn and there’s a billboard for Gila River, and it said this: “Reclaim what’s yours. You do you.”

I was like, “That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. You do you?” Eh? You love money and want to be greedy? You do you. You like to sleep around? You do you. If you want to get ripped every weekend because you think it’s fun, you do you. You like to have affairs? You do you. Right? You don’t like your church? Don’t go! You do you.

This is the cancer that’s killing our culture. What’s more terrifying is it’s made its way into the church. It’s made its way into believers who profess Jesus as Lord and Savior, their King of kings and their Lord of lords. And where the angels lay down and say, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come,” and we’re like, “Yeah but that’s kind of inconvenient for me. That doesn’t really fit in my box right now. I just don’t have time for it.”

This is what happens to Jeroboam. All that God has promised him, all that God has laid out to him, all the blessing, Jeroboam is, “But I’ve got a plan. I’ve got a different thing.” And what he does is he creates his own religion of individualism. And I wonder if many of us have done the same thing. In 1 Kings 12:26, I want you to listen to all the personal pronouns here. It’s really important.

26 Jeroboam thought to himself, “The kingdom will now likely revert to the house of David.

So now he’s moved these ten tribes and he’s starting to think to himself. It’s a dangerous thing to go, “What about me?”

27 If these people go up to offer sacrifices at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem, they will again give their allegiance to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah. They will kill me and return to King Rehoboam.”

It starts to create this insecurity. “Oh my gosh, what about me? Oh my gosh, what if they leave?”

28 After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves.

This should transport you back to the exodus. This should transport you back to the mountain where Moses is up getting the Ten Commandments, and because the people are impatient, Aaron creates these calves. This should transport you back to that.

He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”

How wrong.

29 One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. 30 And this thing became a sin; the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other. 31 Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. 32 He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel he also installed priests at the high places he had made. 33 On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel. So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.

Where is God? He, he, he, me, my. This is the way that Jeroboam is deciding to lead the people of Israel, the people of God rescued out of Egypt for His names’ sake to be a light unto the nations. And what does Jeroboam do? He does what so many of us do. “Well, what about me? Me, me, me, me, my.”

This is a complete and utter rejection of all that God had promised, that all that God has promised us. As I was thinking of it, there are many things that individualism fuel, but in the context of this passage, there are two things that I think are core, that stand out in this passage.

I think number one is fear. Fear. Listen to that first part of that narrative. He’s like, “Oh my gosh. They’re going to go to Jerusalem.” By the way, the place they’re supposed to go to honor God—the system that had been established by God Almighty, carried out from generation to generation, he’s like, “Oh, I don’t want them to go there. Because they might follow that king.”

No, no, no. If they go to Jerusalem, they’ll try to follow God, not a king. “No, no, no. I can’t do that. The might dethrone me. They actually might kill me.” Jeroboam was more worried about the people not following him than following God. I think that’s true so often in our lives. But here’s what I’ve been wrestling with this week. That fear is always in conflict with faith. Always. Fear is always in conflict with faith.

What we fear we follow. I wonder what you follow. Because is about the things unseen, Hebrews tells us. It’s this mysterious moment when we stand on the edge of the boat of whatever situation we find in our lives, and God’s like, “Just trust me. I know physics says this is impossible. I know science says this is not possible. Trust me.”

And this is the movement of faith. We step into the water. But fear says, “You could drown. You could die.” I think in our culture, what I find so interesting that fear is doing, is we are so afraid, we are so fearful that we might offend people, that we are willing to offend God. We’re so worried, “Well, what if we offend somebody.” I’ll just make it easy for you. You will. You’re going to offend people if you follow Jesus.

But so many of us are like, “I can’t live that way. I can’t say that thing. I can’t really, truly abide by all the scripture is saying. I mean, bits and pieces of course. But not all of it, because, if do that, I’ll offend people.” And in that process I’m willing to offend God but I’m not willing to offend others. That is another altar at a high place.

That is the opposite of what God is inviting you into. Because fear is where false gods come from. It’s a false god in your life that you’ve maybe created, because instead of being guided by the Spirit of God who inspired the scriptures of God, we are led by the hand of a fearful culture that we were called to do a transformation over. Right? This is heavy stuff. But we have to face ourselves. We have to deal with ourselves.

This is why Isaiah 53:6 says, “We all, like sheep, have gone astray. Each of us has turned” – what? “To our own way.”

What I want to propose to you is this: Fear God and fear not. Fear God and fear not. Do you know this is a beautiful thing in scripture. This fear not thing is a gift that God gives to us. In fact, he gave it to us in the scriptures 365 times. Do you know why? Because he wants you to wake up every single morning reminding yourself that you were bought with a price. You are a precious son and daughter of the most high God. You carry the commission in your bloodstream, made to go help people come to see Jesus. Fear God and fear not in this world.

We are unstoppable in this world when we live this way. But when we become just like everybody else, because fear has emasculated the gospel, we miss out on the mission and the joy of what it is to join Jesus, his hands and feet in this world reaching. So fear not. Fear God and fear not.

I want this image in your head. Psalm 23. Say this with me. There are enemies all around us. And what are we doing? We’re at a table with the Good Shepherd. You can hear all the voices. “Don’t do that.” “You can’t do this.” “Go this way.” “Do you know that you could get this?” “If you don’t have this…” “If you don’t vote for this…” They’re all around you. You can hear all the voices. And it’s just you and God laughing hysterically and enjoying a meal. Because he makes a banquet table in the midst of our enemies, because he’s a good God, he’s a Good Shepherd and he’s leading his people into the Promised Land. Not just for ourselves, but for the sake of others. But if we’re so fearful, we’re going to miss out on the calling that he gave to us, which is to have life and life to the fullest.

The second thing that I see that individualism breeds, and what we see with Jeroboam, is convenience. He goes, “Don’t go all the way to Jerusalem.” Like it’s so far away. “Let me make it easy for you. Let me make it easy for you.”

You know what I have found that historically the easier things have become, the farther we have moved away from God; because we can get whatever what we want just like that. I can go on an app and I can order whatever I want whenever I want how I want it when I want it. And so I just went like this, “I bet God works the same way. I bet I can do that with my Christian faith. Just make it convenient. Because it is all about me.” And what we’ve done in the process is replaced our theology for me-ology, and made it all about us instead of all about God. Our lives, as Christians, are not about convenience. It’s about crucifixion. “I am crucified with Christ,” Paul says, “Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me. He’s literally doing the opposite of what Jeroboam did, where it’s like, “I did this. I made it. I happen.” Paul’s going, “I need to die to all that.” And dying is inconvenient.

Ryan brought this up and it triggered in my brain, I realize I really struggle with Good Friday. I’m trying to get past Good Friday as fast as I can to get to Easter Sunday. Because that’s where the party is. He is risen! Everything’s great now, right? But at Good Friday, I get to deal with what I did to Jesus, how I’ve betrayed God. And I don’t want to deal with. Are you with me? I don’t want to deal with my sin, my depravity. I want all the good stuff. I want convenience, happiness, all the good stuff. I don’t want to deal with the fact that my sin put him there. I don’t want to deal with that. So get past Good Friday and go to Easter. That’s easier, more convenient.

And I struggle with that. Maybe you do too. Because convenience will always be in conflict with the cross. Always. And it’s what we’re being invited, not only to die to ourselves, but also commissioned to help other people do the same thing. It crushes our evangelism. It crushes our calling in this life.

So what’s the answer? Matthew 6:33 says this. This is something I write in my journal every single morning because I have to because I might forget. “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you.” Make it all about Jesus. Make it all about his kingdom. Make it all about his power, his joy, his peace, his love.

Then what happens in that mistrial exchange? Everything we’ve been longing for, hoping for, desiring for comes to fruition. But it comes to fruition in the person of Jesus, not in what I want, how I want it, when I get it.

This is where Jeroboam fails. It says in 1 Kings 14:9, because he led the people astray:

9 You have done more evil than all who lived before you. You have made for yourself other gods, idols made of metal; you have aroused my anger and turned your back on me.

May we not do that, church. Because of our individualism, because of the fear that we feel so deep in our soul that Satan keeps sparking day after day, because of the convenience that we desire that’s become a part of our ethos, the way we think, the way we act.

Jeroboam’s legacy, as we talk about it thousands of years later, is that he led a people astray. He had an opportunity to call them to be who God wanted them to be, and instead he created a counter-gospel. He will be ever known as the man who led Israel away into conflict, not blessing, but curse. That’s what happens when we release God’s will and we take up our own.

But here’s the beautiful thing that scripture always does. Scripture is always about redemption. And where Jeroboam failed, come on let’s preach, where Jeroboam failed, Jesus succeeded. Where our sin kept us in the grave, Jesus resurrected from the grave. Our eternity is heaven because Jesus, the King of kings and Lord of lords, loved us enough to lay down his life to come to us. Emmanuel, God with us, gave his life so that we could be set free, which has now commissioned us to be the people of God for the glory of God. This is what we’re being invited into. This is how beautiful, where mankind fails, Jesus wins. We are the people of Jesus, called to live this out in our lives.

I know it’s not easy. I want you to know, I know your pastoral staff here, it is so weighty to be up here. I have to deal with me first. Sometimes a bunch of people think, just because I get up here and speak, that I’ve got this all figured out. And I don’t. I don’t. I’m struggling so deeply to find the grace and mercy that covers a multitude of sins. It’s not easy. I don’t have it all figured out. But I am obediently, to the best of my ability, following after Jesus. And when I fail, I repent.

I would invite you into the same thing, invite you to the same journey that I’m trying to do as a believer in Jesus Christ, to the best of my ability. It’s not easy. And what David’s been talking about the last few weeks—not easy. But so important because this is a turning point for the local church, in my opinion. This is an opportunity for us to regain what it means to be a city on a hill for the world to see that he is the King. He is the King. All the power, all the glory, all the honor belongs to him. But we get to display that and live that in our lives daily.

I told you about my son nine years ago. He was diagnosed with leukemia as an eight year old. Walk into the hospital, and their marketing department must have done a whole rebrand. We walk in and the first thing is “It’s all about you.” That seems appropriate, right? You have a little kid that’s going through cancer. Like, “It’s all about you, buddy. It’s all about you.”

There’s nothing that could be more toxic to an eight-year-old heart, or to your heart or to my heart than to hear, “It’s all about you.” So we feel like we did everything we possibly could do. “Buddy, it’s not about you. It’s not about you.”

It’s not about you. I know it’s painful. I know it’s hard. It’s not about you. It’s about Jesus and entering into his suffering, in selflessly suffering to serve other people. Do what you’re going to do. It’s difficult. It’s not convenient. And it takes a whole lot of faith to go through. It was so painful. But we were doing everything we could to help him not believe it was all about him.

The thousands of children that have come before my son who have died so that he could have life, so he could have the protocol, the treatment, the chemo. Thousands of kids had to die. How dangerous for me to tell my son, “It’s all about you.” How dangerous for you, the carriers of the cross, the good news of Jesus Christ, for you to believe that it’s all about you, that life is all about you, your hopes and your dreams. It is all about Jesus. It will always be about Jesus. That will liberate you. It’s going to liberate you. It’s going to liberate you to live like Jesus.

As I sat in my home hospital room three weeks after getting a diagnosis of cancer, the doctor said, “I don’t use words like this. But you’re healed. It’s gone. As doctors we don’t have a lot of words for this.”

“I do. It’s a miracle.” Because he’s rescued my life. He’s trying to get my attention. “I want that altar. That’s my rightful place. You keep putting other people’s opinions and your lack of identity in that. I want you and I want all of you.”

He wants all of you. He wants all of you. He loves you so much. So I want to slow down and I want to invite you into something, something Joshua did before he dies. He was a father, he fathered these people. And he says this to them. And I want you to slow down. I know I’ve been ramping up. I want you to slow down and I want you to hear these words from Joshua, but I want you to hear them from theLord. I want you to trust the Spirit of God in your life right now that he is speaking to you.

Joshua 24:14-15 (ESV):

14 “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord

Put away social media, the fear of social media. Put away the fear of whatever the news is trying to tell you. Whatever political system is trying to tell you. Put away those fathers that you serve beyond the rivers and in Egypt.

15 And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites…

…or the gods of Hollywood, the gods of power and wealth in the institutions all across this world that tell you you need to achieve more, you’ve got to do more, you’ve got to be more…

…in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

We will serve the Lord. Choose today who you will serve. You can’t serve both. No man can serve two masters. Today is a day where we receive the gift and the grace that Jesus has given to us through his death and his resurrection. We say amen. We choose today to live in light of that. Don’t abuse it. Choose to live in light of the fact that he paid the price, the ultimate price, for you to be alive. He knit you together in your mother’s womb, not so you could have a good life, but so that you could have a God life. So that you could be his hands and his feet in this world, sharing this good news that will transform people’s lives. When people’s lives transform, cities transforms. And when cities transform, states transform. And when states transform, countries transform. And when countries transform, the world transforms. Right?

Because this is the work that Jesus has been doing, that God has been doing from the beginning of time and he’s inviting you into today. Choose today whom you will serve. But as for this church and the leadership here, we’re going to serve the Lord. May he invite you into that. May you be convicted by the Spirit of God, who today will you serve? Will you serve all the other gods? Or will you serve the King of kings and the Lord of lords for his glory and his honor, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And God’s church said, Amen.

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David Stockton 3/7/21 David Stockton 3/7/21

A Divided Heart

Series: A Kingdom Divided
March 7, 2021 - David Stockton

Good morning. It’s very, very, very encouraging to see people here after the last two weeks of messages. Uneasy laughter. It makes sense. It’s been a bit dicey the last couple of weeks. We’ve been going through First Kings. We’re getting a heavy dose of something. And I really am thankful that people are coming to hear God’s word. I’m thankful for the people who are encouraging me. Because you know that I’m just kind of trying to do my best. I’m not perfect in any way and don’t have all this stuff figured out. But I’m trying to really dissect what our cultural moment is describing to us as a vision for God’s righteousness; and trying to get into the biblical narrative and find out what is really a vision for God’s righteousness—against what is popular in our culture, and maybe what is against what’s going on in our own souls and minds.

I don’t claim to be good at it or perfect at it in any way. But I’m doing my best. And thankfully, we have the word of God. I have some people that I’m able to process with. I really do feel like the messages that I’ve been preaching really do represent our elder team and our leadership team here, our staff, all of those things. So I feel good about all of that. But I also know that words can go different ways and they can hit people in different ways. So I’m also thankful for all the people who have been engaging in some dialogue with me through email, saying, “I heard you say this. I want to unpack that a little bit and make sure I’m hearing what you’re saying.”

I know there are people who are deciding whether they really want to stick with Living Streams or not. Because we’re really kind of drawing some lines that are not super popular in society today. So some people are deciding to move on. And I don’t blame them, you know, if that’s what they feel; because we’re not going to adjust or budge or try and let the culture dictate what we preach or what the word of God says. We’re going to let the word of God interpret our culture for us. It’s interesting. I do feel a lot of encouragement. The most encouragement I feel is when someone is actually willing to dialogue. So if you’re thinking about leaving or thinking about saying, “I can’t be here anymore,” I totally understand. But I would like to be able to have a conversation before you go, just to make sure we are dividing over what we are actually dividing over, and not just that you heard something strange or weird that I was saying. Because I know I can mess up too.

That being said, thanks for being here. Hopefully we’ll see you next week. We’re still in First Kings. We’re going to be going through First Kings again, we’ve been looking at this super, super ancient, near-eastern document that’s been preserved for all this time. It’s very old. It’s very outdated. It’s a very different cultur. All of these things. And yet, we think it’s the inspired word of God and has a lot to say to us, because people really aren’t that different from the way they’ve always been. We have the same problems and challenges.

We’ve seen lots of connections from First Kings. There are uneasy transfers of power, which is something we’ve experienced in America. There are debates and divisions over taxes. Again, America. There’s lots of division over political issues. They’re building a wall, which is fun. And it’s a time in Israel’s history where there is tons of prosperity. Prominence, prosperity, world power, all of that is going on. And that’s what we’re experiencing.

At the same time this is going on, the writer, who most likely is Jeremiah, is recording for us a lot of the idolatry that was taking place in the midst of the prosperity. So I think we’re experiencing right now in America, that all of our prosperity has led us to some forms of idolatry in our nation, that displeases God.

So this prophet was writing to his people in his day to try to warn them to not fall into these traps. I’m using this book and we’re trying to warn ourselves from the same traps, so we don’t fall into some of those things. There was a continuous redefining God and what worship is to be. We’ve described that in our context, we have a cross up here. In their day, they had the worship of Yahweh, the God that brought them out of Egypt and made them into a nation, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and on and on. So they would worship Yahweh.

But over time they decided that they didn’t just want to worship Yahweh. All the other nations around them had other gods, as well. So they decided, “Maybe if we worship Yahweh and the other gods, we’ll get like double, triple love. We’ll get triple the blessings. We’ll get it all.” So they began to bring in things like Baal worship. They began to bring in things like Asherah poles. They never took down the cross, so to speak. They just started adding other things to their worship.

What they didn’t realize is that the God of the Bible, Yahweh, is a very jealous God. Not in the petty, junior high type jealousy. But in the idea of a woman who’s married to a man and all of a sudden he decides he wants to bring in other women to the relationship. The jealousy that she would feel for her husband would be righteous and right. Saying, “This is not right.” And God himself is the source of that righteous jealousy. God says, “No. I’m not going to stand here and let you add other gods to the worship of Me. You get Me or you get nothing.”

That’s ultimately what happened in Israel’s history. Jeremiah, as he was prophesying, he was called The Weeping Prophet because people kept going, “Eh, you’re annoying.” He kept prophesying and they were like, “Hey, throw him in prison.” He kept prophesy and they’d say, “Hey, put him in a pit. That way we can’t hear him anymore. Just leave him in a pit for a while.”

He was the weeping prophet because he was prophesying as he watched this unfold before his eyes, as people continued to practice idolatry and, ultimately the nation of Israel was completely destroyed, in just a few hundred years.

America, where are you? America, are you willing to listen? We’re coming up on a few hundred years. And where are we going to be?

I don’t know how to change America. I can pray for it, we can reach out, we can do all of those things. But what we really want to do is make sure none of those things show up inside our church, inside our fellowship and our family. So we’re going to preach about it.

Tim Keller wrote a book called Counterfeit Gods, as he was trying to help the church in America understand culturally what the idolatry of today is. Some of the things that he said is:

An idol is something we cannot live without. We must have it, therefore it drives us to break rules we once honored to harm others, even ourselves, in order to get it…

So it’s basically these things we used to hold as true and right, we now want these other things and these things are standing in our way, so we just kind of put those to the side. Maybe something like this right here (bible). It’s happening today. Sorry if that freaked you out super bad. Just trying to make a point. But it came out a little bit abrupt.

…An idol is anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give, anything that is so central and essential to your life, that should you lose it, your life would feel hardly worth living.

The first thing that came to my mind was the song “Driver’s License.” Sorry. If you don’t know what that is, good. You’re good.

…If I have that, then I will feel like my life has meaning, then I’ll know I have value, and I’ll feel significant and secure.

The “that,” which he is referring to are the idols in our lives. Some people that I’ve been asking recently, “What are you seeing as the idols of our day,”:

“Comfort, convenience, safety and security.” Tyler Johnson, who’s a pastor here in Phoenix. He says, “Those are the idols of our day.”
Tim Keller, in his book Counterfeit Gods, talks bout “Money, sex and power,” being the idols of our day.
Dan Riccio says, “Self,” (uh-oh, that one gets to the point), “Self is an idol in our day. Sex, money, power, acclaim, security,” are the idols of our day. We want those things even more than we want God.We’re willing to compromise even what God has asked of us in order to get those things.

Then one of the things that I feel has been important for me to bring out, and this is just me, I only came up with one, those other guys had a bunch of items, but our desires. I think that’s the idolatry of America today. But I think that’s the idolatry that’s sneaking into our churches. Somehow we’re allowing our desires to dictate what is right and wrong.

You hear it in society. “You do you.” You know, whatever you want, that’s what you should be, that’s who you should be. But our desires do not belong on the throne of our lives. That’s one of the reasons why we keep this cross up here. Yes, to remind us of what Jesus did for us, the sacrifice that he paid so that we never have to fear God ever again. We never have to fear death ever again. But also as a reminder to us that ninety-nine, (I’ve been saying ninety, I’m going up to ninety-nine now)—ninety-nine percent of following Jesus is denying ourselves, taking up our cross, and following him. Denying ourselves means: Do not give in to disordered desires. We are constantly battling between what is a desire that is within us that is of God, and what is a desire within us that is not of God. And we deny the ones that are disordered. And we live into the ones that are not. This is very hard stuff. It’s very hard stuff. I’m not saying it’s easy. I’m not saying, “Oh, just go do it.” It’s very hard stuff. And that’s why he was a weeping prophet.

So 1 Kings 11. Let’s jump in here:

11 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. 2 They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love.
Idolatry. He called it love.
3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. 4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done.
7 On a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable god of Moab, and for Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. 8 He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their gods.

Wow. We’re in a different place here. Last week we were reading 1 Kings 3, where Solomon prays this beautiful prayer. God is asking Solomon, “I’ll give you anything. What do you want?” And instead of asking for all the idolatry-type things, Solomon says, “God, can you give me a heart that listens to you? I don’t want to even have a heart that knows the truth, so to speak, because then I might put myself on the throne and decide what is true and right.” He said, “Could you just give me a heart that listens to you, that can hear you? Because you’re the only one that sees clearly. You’re the only one that should be on the throne.”

Hallelujah! It’s a beautiful, beautiful prayer. We should be praying it every day because we live in a crazy world.

And then we get to see the display of that, where Solomon was able to bring absolute justice, beautiful, righteous justice into a very troubling, street-level justice issue between two prostitutes and one baby. And it was just awesome. And everyone who got to see it was so refreshed that justice and truth could happen in our day. And it was just awesome.

Then, that’s chapter 3. Chapter 3 through 10 you just get to see that Solomon’s bringing out the wisdom. He’s executing justice. He’s ordering Israel in such a way that is causing the most flourishing and freedom for everybody there. The nations around them, instead of warring with them, they send delegations to sit at the feet of Solomon, just to listen to what he might have to say, so that they could experience a little bit of the freedom and flourishing that came through the Judeo ethic.

Solomon builds the temple for the Lord. Solomon builds a palace for himself. Solomon built a wall around Jerusalem. And it starts to describe all of the grain that was brought to Solomon every day because of all the fruitfulness of all the fields. Then it describes all of the flour that was brought in for his table as they made all the food for all the people. Then he talks bout all the gold that was brought in as tribute from other nations, and the wealth and the prominence and the prosperity. It was amazing. Actually, the title of the last chunk of scripture in chapter 10 is “Solomon’s Splendor.” It’s beautiful what the Lord had done, and what Solomon and the people of Israel were experiencing.

And then the weeping prophet, who’s recording for us a little bit of what happened, he says, “However, Solomon loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter.” There was a disordered desire within Solomon that was not in line with decrees and statutes and commands of God. And Solomon went for it.

Maybe he thought: I’m doing everything else the Lord is asking me to do. What’s the problem with this one little one? He wasn’t willing to deal with the “little foxes” like we talked about two weeks ago.

And I don’t think that when Solomon married Pharaoh’s daughter, the first one, I don’t think he thought, All right. One down and 999 to go. I don’t think that was the vision that he had. I don’t think he thought, I’ll marry Pharaoh’s daughter and then I’ll marry a whole bunch of others. Just like those who get married don’t come to the altar and profess their vows to each other thinking, Maybe. Even though half of them, so to speak, end in divorce. I don’t think half of them are going, Yeah, we’ll see how this goes.

But little foxes come in and then other little foxes, other little foxes. So Solomon basically made one decision of compromise, sexually. And it led to another and another and another and another and another and another and another. Because sin is never satisfied. Sex is never satisfied. And many of us sitting in this room or listening online can think about the one time we made a compromise and how many more compromises it led to, until, ultimately, you’re in bondage.

Solomon, the wisest person of all—he fell in this way. And he ended up with a thousand wives. Well, seven hundred of royal birth wives, and then three hundred concubines, which are basically illegitimate wives. Because he decided to go for one.

Not only that, but then he decided to keep those wives happy. He started building high places of worship. He built the temple for Yahweh and then he started building temples for all the other gods. Just in case you don’t quite understand historically what it means to build a high place of worship for another god, the gods that were described in here—basically what was happening was Solomon built the correct form of Yahweh and a temple for that. Then he built these other temples.

These other temples, a lot of them had to do with fertility, these gods. It was an agrerian society. So if you wanted your lands to be fertile, if you wanted your family to be fertile, your wives to be fertile, then you would pray to these gods and they would cause your lands to be fertile, which was a really important deal when you’re trying to grow stuff. And your wives to be fertile was really important if you want to survive—have people to work the fields, maybe.

So a lot of these gods had this kind of concept. “If you worship me then you will be prosperous. You’ll be fertile.” But what they required as worship was for you to give up your sexuality, to give up your virginity. Practicing worship for these gods, had oftentimes going and linking yourself with a temple prostitute of some sort. Or giving up your virginity to one of these priests or priestesses. And if you offer that sacrifice, then this god will bless you with fertility. Sex became rampant.

Then, sad to say, others of these gods were gods that actually required human sacrifice. One tradition talks about the god Molek described here as this statue of iron that had a head of an ox of some sort. He would have his arms out and then inside the belly was this hollowed out thing where they would build a fire. That fire would warm up the iron and warm up the hands until it was red hot. Then they would come and lay their babies on his hands and watch their babies burn up as a sacrifice so that they could be fertile.

This is what Solomon produced in Israel. And Israel never recovered until it was destroyed. And if we don’t think we have a sex problem in America, if we don’t think we’ve created an idol out of sex and the compromise and the giving of ourselves in all these different sexual ways, we’re so blind. And, sad to say, what Solomon probably didn’t even know until he saw it was the sexual kind of reality of all this idolatry ultimately led to the killing of babies. If we don’t think we have that problem in our society, we’re blind as well. Our lust, our giving over to sexual desires that are disordered and outside the context of scriptures, has not led to a little, it’s led to a lot of damage for our society. Sad to say, it’s led to a lot of damage for a generation of unborn.

And we get to see it in Solomon’s day and you get to hear the weeping prophet Jeremiah say, “Please wake up.” We get to read the scriptures and there’s so much detail about sex in the Bible. And whenever sex is done outside the context of one man and one woman, it does not lead to anything good. It leads to destruction. And most often it’s not even the destruction of the person, it’s the destruction of the people that come after them.

The scariest thing about sin is you get to choose your sin, but you don’t get to choose the consequence. And even scarier than that is you don’t get to choose who gets the consequence. Most often it’s the ones that go after you. It’s the ones who you love the most that suffer. That’s true in Solomon’s day, as well.

Now you see why I’m thankful that people keep showing up. I’m just saying things and…yeah.

This is our reality. This is us. We read about Solomon and you’re like, “Yeah, that’s me, except for all the rich and smart stuff.” The way Paul describes it in the New Testament, is he actually describes a war going on inside of us. He uses the word war when he describes the battle between our spirit and our flesh. Our ordered desires and our disordered desires. It’s a war. It’s a challenge. It’s a difficulty. It’s something that causes pain and frustration and agony and sleepless nights and prayers and groanings within us.

If we’re honest, we all know that war. We have a nature inside of us that was given to us from Adam that wants to go against the things of God. And those of us who have given our life to Christ, we now have the Spirit inside of us who is compelling us to go toward the things of Christ. But it’s a war. It’s a battle.

Just the other day I was with a family, and one of their daughters who is young, it was so funny because she wanted to say something that was going to be like gossipy. She wanted to say something about what everyone was saying about this person; and the mom was like, “No.” And she was like, “Well, let me just…” “No!” “But, what…” “No!” It was just like, what is happening here? She could not keep it in. It was like she needed to say this juicy morsel of gossip so bad. And her mom was just cutting it off. And I was like, This is so interesting. Then it was funny because she finally stopped and the mom was like, “As soon as we go inside later she’s going to still say it.” Like she can’t help it. It’s the way it is within us. It’s alive in us. It was alive in Solomon.

That is truth. All that we’ve been saying these last few weeks, this is the truth we need to hear. God is setting before us a blessing and a curse. If you walk in this way you will be free. You will flourish in the things of God, and you will be setting up your children and the generations to come for prosperity and goodness in the Lord.

This is true. We have to hear this. We have to know this. But, thanks be to God that there’s more to the story to who our God is. He’s full of truth and he’s full of grace. And as I was reading, I stumbled across something that I want us all to hear. It’s so important. I’m so excited about this.

9 The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. 10 Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. 11 So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. 12 Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. 13 Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”

So God visited Solomon again, finding him in all of this idolatry, going from a discerning heart to a divided heart, leading his people into all of this disgusting, detestable idolatry, paving the way for pain and agony for his children and the children of Israel. And God comes to him because he hates sin and what it does. He says, “Solomon, I’m going to have to punish you and I’m going to tear the kingdom away from you. Nevertheless, I’m not going to do it in your lifetime, for the sake of David. But I’m going to tear it from your son. Yet, I’m not going to tear it all from him, for the sake of David.”

If God was just all about truth, Solomon would be over. And to be honest, humanity would be over already, as well. But the God of the Bible is very peculiar. The God of the Bible is very scandalous, because there’s this razor’s edge to his character that’s described in Exodus 34. He is for sure not going to leave the guilty unpunished. But he is also abounding in mercy and kindness and faithfulness. And he loves to forgive.

In this chapter we get to see the nature of God. He’s disgusted and heartbroken over the idolatry and what it’s going to produce and what it’s going to cost—not just for Solomon, but for his children. And that stuff does play out. There are consequences to sin every single time. There is pleasure in sin for a season, but then it’s destruction. And sad to say, it’s not just destruction for you. It’s also for the ones you love. But, at the same time, God always is full of grace and mercy.

Here it is in the Old Testament. We see a little bit of a picture of a New Testament principle. When God says, “For the sake of David, Solomon you’re going to escape punishment. For the sake of David, Solomon, the promise that I made that David will always have someone sit on the throne will remain intact. And, sure enough, that promise did remain intact all the way until there was one born of the seed of David, or the line of David. His name was Jesus. He’s become King that reigns forevermore.

What the New Testament picks up right there is kind of bouncing off this. For the sake of David, Solomon escaped punishment and received the promise. And for the sake of Jesus Christ, everyone who believes in him escapes punishment and receives the full promise of God. This is the way Paul says it in Romans 5:

18 Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. 19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man…

Now, Paul’s talking about Adam, but you could also talk about Solomon—or you could put your own name in there.

For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous. 20 The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Message translation (MSG) says it this way:

18-19 Here it is in a nutshell: Just as one person did it wrong and got us in all this trouble with sin and death, …

That’s you and me and Adam and Solomon.

…another person did it right and got us out of it….

That’s Jesus.

…But more than just getting us out of trouble, he got us into life! One man said no to God and put many people in the wrong; one man said yes to God and put many in the right.
20-21 All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life—a life that goes on and on and on, world without end.

For the sake of David, Solomon escaped punishment and the promise stayed intact. And for the sake of Jesus, you and I, who have the same heart as Solomon, you and I who have stories of divorce, you and I who have stories of sexual immorality, you and I who have story after story of compromise, of little foxes, you and I that can think of all the times we blew it, which led to all the times we blew it, you and I who have no right to escape the punishment for our sins, and you and I who have no right to the full promise of God, which is that we are co-heirs with Christ of everything.

The promise of God is that you and I get everything that God wants to give Jesus. You and I get to experience the full realization of the promise of God, which comes in “kingdom come.” You and I get to know the resurrection life that Jesus brought into our world. And you and I also get to know the redemption that God can do, where he even takes our most heinous and disgusting sins and produces something good through them.

This is the scandal. The more you sin, the more God’s grace comes to you. The more you sin, the more God’s forgiveness is for you. In fact, God, in some ways Paul is saying, go ahead and try him if you want. Go ahead and test it if you want. You cannot outdo God’s love, grace and forgiveness. Even the sins you haven’t committed yet God has already provided grace and forgiveness for that. Your unrighteousness, no matter how hard you try, or no matter how badly you fail because you’re trying to do right, will never be more powerful than the righteousness and forgiveness and grace of God.

The very next thing Paul is saying after this is: Should we sin that grace may abound? God forbid! But he has to say that because, basically, he was saying the more you sin the more grace will abound. But he said don’t go that way because you also need to understand that your righteousness can produce life just like your wickedness can produce death. So be about the righteousness.

But when you fall and when you fail, and all of us sitting in this room or sitting at home, we are right now before God sinners. We are right now before God facing the wrath that he has against sin because we’re sinners. Yet, if we link ourselves to Christ, then he will come and, instead of giving us the punishment, he’ll apply it to the cross where Jesus took it. Instead of disqualifying us from the promise, he’ll apply the blood of Jesus to us, which includes us into the promise. This is the scandalous mystery of God’s grace that is for you and me, no matter what we have done, and the truth is, no matter what we’re going to do.

Paul, in 1 Corinthians 6, says, Don’t you know that you are temples of the living God? His Spirit is inside of you. And if you were going to go join yourself to a prostitute, in some sick way you would be joining together God and the prostitute. You need to understand this is what you are doing.

As I was kind of unpacking that in my mind, and as we were singing that song about Egypt today, I just felt the Lord was saying, “David, the ones you’re praying for, the ones you know that are filled with my Spirit and yet they’re kind of going off,” he said, “I want you to know that I’m going with them.” It broke my heart. Not because of what these people are doing in their foolishness or deception, but because of how much God loves them. That he’s willing to even go into the sickness, into the depravity, into the detestable things in order to be one step away from them, so that the minute they turn around like that prodigal, he’s right there with open arms.

Basically, he was saying, “Hey, David, my holiness can handle whatever sin someone might throw at me.” There is a lot more to unpack there and we don’t have the time. But I just want you to know that God is with you, and he will go to the ends of the earth. He will go into whatever you take him into in order to be one step away from your salvation and your redemption, and to get you back into the promise that he so longs to give you and the generations after you.

Let’s pray. It’s always important for us to remember that when we say, “Let’s pray,” at Living Streams we don’t necessarily mean let’s say some more words. Prayer really is more about listening than talking. So I want to create this time of response right now where we can listen to the Spirit of God and see what he’s saying to the church today. His Spirit alone knows how to make correct application in each of our lives. The Spirit alone knows how to bring conviction instead of condemnation into our hearts. So please don’t hear anything I have to say. Just listen to what the Spirit is saying.

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You Don't Have to Stay in That Pit

Series: John

John 21 - David Stockton

John was written by John. I figured that out all by myself. John was a human. John was writing toward the end of his life. So John was a guy who spent time with Jesus in the flesh. He was there three years. He spent time with Jesus in the flesh every day. Then after that, Jesus ascended into heaven. And John spent the next sixty years of his life hanging out with Jesus in the Spirit. To some of you, that might sound crazy or whatever. But we’ll explain more about that. But for those three years in the flesh he got to be with Jesus.

After spending sixty years being with Jesus in the Spirit, he’s about ninety years old or so, and he decides it’s time for him to write about his experiences for those three years with Jesus in the flesh. That’s what he’s doing.

In the book of John he doesn’t use his name, he just says that he’s the one that Jesus loved. Not saying that he’s the only one that Jesus loved. But that’s what he really felt. He really felt Jesus’ love. He’s the one that leaned against Jesus chest at at the last supper.

John is the only male disciple of Jesus who was there when Jesus was on the cross. At one point we know Jesus had about one hundred and twenty people who called themselves disciples. At one point there were seventy and he sent them out. At one point he said, “Eat my body and drink my blood,” and then he only had twelve. That was kind of an eliminator there. That’s funny, right?

Then he had twelve. But even those twelve didn’t all pan out quite right. But John was the only one out of all of those who was at the cross. There were some women because they figured things out better than men, but John was the only male disciple at the cross.

John has written all of these, he told us, so that we would believe in Jesus. So if you get to John 21 and you haven’t been encouraged to believe in Jesus, you didn’t believe it right. Maybe I didn’t teach it right.

He wants you to believe in Jesus. And when John says the word believe it’s different than Paul. Paul kind of uses the word belief or faith as kind of a pledge of allegiance. John uses it more as trust over time. He is basically telling us the story how one day he met this guy named Jesus and he began to trust him a little bit. And Jesus proved himself trustworthy so he began to trust him more. Jesus proved himself trustworthy so he began to him more.

At one point he turned water into wine and John said at this point the disciples began to believe in him, they began to trust more in him. Then they saw him heal people from diseases that couldn’t be healed and they trusted him a little more. They saw him walk on water, saw him feed five thousand, all these different things. They heard some of the things he said and they began to trust him a little bit more.

So John, at the end of Jesus’ life on earth, at the end of his life, he’s just saying he completely trusts in Jesus. And as he writes, what is happening is that we’ll begin to trust more and more in Jesus, so that we’ll begin to sing out songs of faith from the places that used to be so full of despair, fear, pain and doubt. We’ll sing that old song, “Jesus, Jesus, how I trust you. How I’ve proved you over and over.” If you’re going to kind of say what hymn you would attach to what apostle - it’s a weird Christian game that no one’s ever played before. I just made it up. But whatever. I think that would be the song that John would love to sing. “Jesus, Jesus, how I trust you. How I’ve proved you over and over.”

So, in John 21:1. You ready? Man, there is like nobody here today. But there are so many people here. Who’s ready? We’re in church, man. There’s a lot of people here. It should be fun!

1 After this Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he revealed himself in this way. 2 Simon Peter, Thomas (called the Twin), Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together. 3 Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

A lot of events have transpired. A lot of stuff is going on in the disciples lives. And Peter is just like, “Forget it man. I’m going fishing.”

4 Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5 Jesus said to them, “Children, do you have any fish?” They answered him, “No.” 6 He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, because of the quantity of fish. 7 That disciple whom Jesus loved therefore said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he was stripped for work, and threw himself into the sea. 8 The other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hundred yards off.
9 When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire in place…

Because, you know, grilling with propane is not really grilling. They’re going to keep coming, you know? So you might as well just get used to it.

…with fish laid out on it, and bread. 10 Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” 11 So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn. 12 Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. 13 Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish. 14 This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

Awesome story. Jesus shows up on the shore. His guys are out in the boat. Peter, that’s where he found Peter the first time was on the boat. He said, “Cast your net on the other side.” Peter was like, “Psh. You’re some like rabbi guy. I’m a fisherman. Don’t tell me what to do. All right. Whatever. I’ll do it.” He catches a bunch of fish.

So Jesus is there once again on the shore. John and Peter and the other disciples are in the boat. They caught nothing. They’re frustrated because they caught nothing. They’re frustrated because they’re totally confused. They’re frustrated because Jesus is not there in the flesh anymore. They’re confused about all the stories they’re hearing. Jesus has shown up to them twice already, mind you. This is the third time. And they see this guy on the shore. He’s made a fire and he calls out to them, “Cast your net on the other side.” There’s probably something inside them that says, “Maybe.”

They cast the net on the other side and catch all the fish. And they’re like, “Maybe?” And John was like, ‘Yeah. It’s the Lord.” So Peter jumps in and runs over there. And they have this little time with Jesus around the fire.

There are a couple of things I want us to draw out of this chapter. The third one is the most important. We’ll spend the most time there.

I want us to understand resurrected life. It’s a very, very important thing. This is one of the tenants of the Christian faith. We believe in the resurrection life. And resurrection life is not kind of like life that you get back. So Lazarus, when he rose from the dead, did not get resurrection life. He resurrected to normal life. He didn’t resurrect to resurrection life. Which means that he died again. It’s not like a cat, you get nine lives. You keep dying, or like re-spawning in a video game or whatever.

Resurrection life is different than that. Jesus is the first fruits of resurrection life. He is the first one to enter into resurrection life. It’s life that is not limited anymore. Not limited by the laws of nature. Not limited by sin and the battle there. Not limited by the curse that sin has brought. Not limited by death. It’s not that, if you die again you rise again. No. It’s that you don’t die anymore.

So we get to see this little glimpse into what that’s like for us. It’s little and it’s small, for sure. But Jesus, when he rose from the dead, his body was not in the tomb. His physical body was somehow part of his glorified state. So much so that these people, when they see him, they see him as human. They’re not like, “Is that an alien on the shore?” They see him and see it’s a person, but they don’t recognize that it’s Jesus until they recognize that it’s Jesus. Do you get how confusing this is?

There’s something so unique about this resurrection state. First of all, freedom from all the limitations, which is so awesome. But then also there’s this uniqueness to it where, you’re still recognizable as you do the things you do or say the things you say, but you’re not really recognizable because you look different.

So you have the disciples sitting there with Jesus around the fire. They just caught the fish. They know it’s him. John says it’s him. And they’re all sitting there going, “Somebody needs to ask. Is it him? Is it really him?”

I don’t know if that’s more that they’re so challenged with the reality that Jesus died and how he can be sitting here with fish? It’s just so hard for their mind to get around that. Or if Jesus just actually looked different enough that they’re like, “I think it’s him. But I don’t know it’s him.”

So they’re just sitting there like the disciples always did, thinking among themselves, It’s got to be him. Is it him? No, we shouldn’t ask. We should ask. Is it okay to ask? I don’t know if it’s okay. That’s what they’re doing because that’s the state.

But one of the things that is also important about resurrected life—and this is one of my favorite things about it—is that every time you see Jesus, he’s eating. Right? That’s good news. So the eating game will continue past this. You can eat fish. You can still catch fish. I like fishing, so those are big deals for me. It’s usually fish and bread, so I’m hoping that that’s just all they had. That’s not all we will have. But whatever. I’m sure it will taste good at that point.

The next thing. So that’s resurrected life, glorified life, something to look forward to. It’s a hope that we have. It’s beautiful. It’s awesome. I love songs that sing about it as well.

So the other thing we have is a transitioning between the covenants. So here, for the Bible students in the room, if you love this type of stuff, basically we have the old covenant, Old Testament. We have the new covenant, New Testament. They are all the same covenant. It’s all God wanting to bring salvation to people through justification by faith. So the Old Testament, basically what they were supposed to do was believe that God would provide a sacrifice for sin, that God himself would provide a sacrifice for sin. It’s actually words that Abraham spoke to his own son. So they believed that God would. Now, the new covenant, we just believe the same thing. We just believe that God has, if that makes sense. It’s the same.

I actually wrote an essay in seminary, in bible college. I called it the Covenant Mountain. It’s all the same substance. It’s all the same mountain - justification by faith. Same God, same people, same problems, all of that. And the same solution is Jesus. It’s always Jesus. It always will be Jesus. He’s the solution.

Now here’s the trick. When does the covenant reach its pinnacle of the old and begin the new? That’s not such an easy question. You think the cross, right? Jesus purchased the new covenant. He purchased with his blood the new covenant, he said. So you think the cross is where that happens, we’re beginning a new covenant. But without the resurrection, the cross really is meaningless. It’s just another guy dying. So then he resurrection becomes super significant, so maybe it’s the resurrection. But without the resurrection, Jesus said there was something else so important, when the Spirit would come.

So in Acts 2, the Spirit comes. And when the Spirit comes, that’s the guarantee of the new covenant. Now we have proof that the new covenant has come. Some of you are like, “What is he talking about?” That’s fine. Don’t worry. This is extra credit stuff. It won’t be on the test.

But basically what we’re experiencing in John 20 and 21 all the way through to Acts 2, we’re experiencing these 40 days of plateau on top of the mountain. I didn’t say this in my paper because I didn’t know this yet, but if I was going to rewrite the paper I’d write it this way. I don’t remember what I said, I was trying to fill up space so I could get enough words or something like that. But anyway, the top of this mountain is like this forty day plateau from when Jesus died on the cross to when he ascended and the Spirit came. It’s basically this transition between the covenants. It’s the time between the times.

And Jesus is showing up not in the flesh, he’s showing up in the resurrected state in between the time where he was in the flesh and the Spirit comes. So it’s just interesting, fascinating thing. Not a lot to draw out there, just want you to be ahead of that. Basically the Father gave the Son, and the Son gives the Spirit, and then the Spirit gives us the love that we need and the power that we need to love God and people the way we’re supposed to.

So the last thing I want to emphasize is the redemption of Peter, the restoration of Peter, the reinstating of Peter. We get this in this next chunk, starting with verse 15:

15 When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?”

Another good question for bible students is what is the word these? What’s he referring to? Is he talking about the other disciples? Is he talking about the fish? Is he talking about, “Do you love me more than these other disciples love me?”

He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my lambs.” 16 He said to him a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Tend my sheep.” 17 He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?”

Because Peter, real fresh in his mind is that in John 19, Peter denied Jesus three times at Jesus’ real moment of truth.

and he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. 18 Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” 19 (This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this he said to him, “Follow me.”

The very first words that he said to Peter. “Follow me and I will make you a fisher of men.” It’s a really important moment that John makes sure. The other gospel writers didn’t include this. John is saying, ‘Hey you’ve got to know about this story.” The story where Jesus showed up to Peter.

What he gave us in chapter 20—I loved what Ryan shared last week on chapter 20. But basically Jesus shows up to Mary and Mary was locked up in this frustration and anger at injustice. Mary basically was so upset she was distraught. Because they had taken the body of Jesus and she was yelling at the gardener and yelling, “Who took him? Where have you taken him?”

She was once again stung with that pain of powerful men and what they have taken from her. We don’t know all the details of her story, but we know that she ended up being a prostitute. And how you get to that point, and Ryan talked a little bit about that. How powerful men had stolen from her enough to where now she found herself as a prostitute and even demon-possessed. And then the most powerful man comes along, Jesus, and he calls out to her and saves her. And healing has begun. And yet, now powerful men have killed Jesus and not only that, but they have taken his body. And she’s so distraught because it once again reopens all of that wound.

Yet there, in that moment, she sees the gardener, not knowing, not recognizing that it’s Jesus, and she says, “Where have you taken him?” And the garden, Jesus, says, “Mary!” And she hears that same voice. That same name spoken in his tone and, all of a sudden, she’s undone once again. The healing gets a little deeper into her soul.

Then the very next thing John tells us is don’t forget about when he showed up the first time to the disciples. It literally says they were shut up in fear. They were locked up in a room. They were locked up in fear. And Jesus meets them in that space and says, “Do not fear.” And he actually breathes on them. He does something so personal, so tangible. And that would be weird if I breathed on you. I won’t do that. Don’t worry about that. But if Jesus does it it’s super cool. He breathed on them and they received some peace.

Then shortly after that he shows up again to the disciples, because Thomas wasn’t in that group. And Thomas was saying, “Yeah, that’s great. I’m glad you guys all had this experience. But I’ve always thought you guys were a little weird. So I’m not taking your word for it. I need to see his wounds. I need to touch him. I need to put my hand into his side if I’m going to believe.”

So Jesus shows up a second time to the disciples and Thomas is in the room. He looks around and he says, “Hey, Thomas.” Thomas is like, “Me?” And he’s like, “Yeah, Thomas, you. Come here.” So Thomas comes up and he says, “Go ahead. Go ahead, Thomas.”

And Jesus is giving them something so supernatural, but so natural. He’s meeting them right where they are, locked up in these things. Thomas is locked up in doubt and confusion and Jesus comes in and he gives him something tangible, something practical, something in the natural to help him get released and unlocked.

Now we have this story where Jesus is doing the same thing. But now he’s calling out Peter. And John doesn’t want us to miss it. So Jesus calls out to him and says, “Peter, do you love me?”

In the Greek there’s a little trick in here. Basically it’s, “Peter do you agape me?” It’s, “Do you sacrificially love me? Do you unconditionally love me?” And Peter, knowing what he had just done, still feeling the shame now of sitting with Jesus after he denied him and heard that rooster crow, he says, “I phileo you.” He doesn’t say, “I agape you.” He says, “I love you like a friend, like a brother, and it’s very conditional and I’m sorry.”

Then he says, “But Peter, that’s good enough for me. Will you feed my sheep?” Then Jesus says to him, “Do you agape me?” And Peter says, “You know that I love you. You know that I phileo you.” And Jesus says, “Then feed my sheep.” Then the last time, a third time, Jesus says to Peter, “Peter do you phileo me?”

And Peter is hurt. All that shame of what he had just done, of how often he had failed in all of his life is weighing so heavy upon him as Jesus asks him a third time, “Peter do you love me?” Peter says, “Lord, you know everything. You know I phileo you.” And Jesus says, “That’s good enough for me, Peter. Feed my sheep.” Then he begins to tell Peter all of the hard, hard things he’s going to go through. Basically, “Peter, if you thought that was hard, it’s now your turn to go to the cross. And all I’m asking is that you k eep following me because I’m the one who’s going to make you a fisher of men. Will you follow me?”

And Peter’s response is so beautiful.

20 Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, the one who also had leaned back against him during the supper and had said, “Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?” 21 When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about this man?”

Jesus is having this moment. He’s drawing Peter in. He’s saying, “Peter, we can do this. Take my hand. Follow me. Feed my sheep. I’ve got a massive calling for you. And if you let shame take it away from you right now you’re going to miss everything. But I’m here Peter and I’m praying for you. The devil desires to sift you like wheat. But I’m praying for you. And Peter, I’m here giving you fish!” Saying, “I want you to do something for me, Peter. I want you to represent me, Peter. I’m going to give all the people, on you I’m going to build the church. All of the little lambs are going to need you, Peter. I want you to fight for them. I want you to care for them. I want you to tend them.”

Peter’s like, “Well, what about John? What about John?”

Then John kind of inserts a little bit of his own thing:

22 Jesus said to him, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me!” 23 So the saying spread abroad among the brothers that this disciple was not to die; yet Jesus did not say to him that he was not to die, but, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?”
24 This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things, and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true.
25 Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

So John is here just kind of putting his seal, his signature on the end of this thing, saying that this is what it said. And John is now maybe wondering that, Did Jesus mean that I would be alive, that I wouldn’t die? But now he’s ninety years old and he’s going, “Nah. I’m pretty sure I’m going to die. Pretty sure I’m going to die and that’s okay, because that’s not really what Jesus said,”

But in this moment I want us to really pay attention to what Jesus is doing here. And what John is wanting us to see. That Jesus was meeting with all of these people individually, in a very practical way. He was giving them something to hold on to. He was reinstating them. He was reconnecting with them. He was doing it in a very supernaturally natural way—not in a supernatural wild way. But in a supernatural way that made perfect sense to them personally.

Honestly, that’s what I think the Lord wants to do right now for each of us. We had a really. Neat time first service. We had a lot of people come forward for prayer and get to hear a rhema word—a word from heaven about their earthly situation.

What I sensed as I was preparing this message was that this message was just a setup. It wasn’t really something to stand alone. It was just to set up what we’re going to do right now. We’re going to have a time of waiting on the Lord to see if he would meet us who are locked up in despair, anger at all of the injustice and disappointments. He wants to meet us who are locked up in fear after a year of constant uncertainty, where we can feel our feet begin to slip, and our relationship with the Lord begin to waver. To free those who are locked up in doubt and confusion, who just can’t seem to get their mind around why God would allow certain things to happen. What they really need to do is to touch his scars and feel his heart.

We’re going to spend some time praying for those who might have become so identified with all of their weakness and shame that they don’t even know what God is calling them to. Or maybe they’ve forgotten what God has called them to. Or maybe they’ve stopped really believing that God could be calling them to anything, and they’ve disqualified themselves like Peter.

Those things are not supposed to go with you from this room. Those chains, those things that are binding you up.

As Jesus is talking to Peter it reminds me of this song that a guy named Jon Foreman wrote. This song hit me the first time I was listening to it because I was in Dangriga, Belize, because I was working with a bunch of kids with my wife. And these kids all came from real broken homes, real troubled situations.

I remember we were trying to do church one night, and a fight broke out, which was not that uncommon. It was an interesting church time we were having. And these two kids, they were probably twelve years old and they were going at each other. I didn’t know what was going to happen. My default move in that regard was to go, “Oh, look how much they love each other!” Then it usually is enough of a little embarrassment that they go, “I don’t love him!” And they stop fighting. So that’s kind of my trick.

So it worked and I was like, “Oh and he loves me, too!” And I just kind of hugged one of them, which was again, just trying to get them out of the situation and kind of deflect some of the anger of the moment. I was hugging this kid and he was hugging me and I didn’t want to embarrass him, so I started to release. And when I started to release, he grabbed me so much tighter. And then I looked down and he was just weeping. He was totally weeping and I was thinking about these words and how this kid doesn’t want to be like this.

The more I got to know this kid, he was sweet and he was kind. But he had been taught that this was the way he had to go, this is the way he had to live, this was the only thing he could do when he was in those situation. These words so powerful at that time. It says this:

We learn to wear these masks so young
Like a prison that keeps joy from gettin’ through
And an angry silence grips our tongues
These weapons and our walls become our tombs
Yes, we’re the kids who’ve seen the darkness
Always looking for the light
You fall in love and then the rains come down
And only part of you survives
Come surrender your hidden scars
Leave your weapons where they are
You’ve been hiding
But I know your wounded heart
And you don’t know how beautiful you are
–by Jon Foreman, from “You Don’t Know How Beautiful You Are” (Switchfoot)

And then this guy, Galway Kinnell was writing about St. Francis of Assisi and what he was able to do with the people around him.

Sometimes it is necessary to reteach a thing its loveliness,
to put a hand on its brow
and retell it in words and in touch it is lovely
until it flowers again from within
–by Galway Kinnell, from “Saint Francis and the Sow

And this is what Jesus is trying to do. And I don’t know your stories, I don’t know your situation. I don’t. And I don’t really care that much because I know what God is telling me, what your Father in heaven is telling me he wants to do for you right now. If we’re faithful to do our part—just surrender and show up—he’ll be faithful to do his part.

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