John Chapter 7:1-19

Jesus calls us to the reality of a life in God.

It is about relationship. It's not about religion. And it's about God being real. God is real. And you sit there, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But no, no. Is God real to you?

Or is it just something you do on Sunday morning because the game's hadn't started yet? Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David Magee. David is a senior pastor of the Bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today on our verse-by-verse journey through the book of John, we're in chapter seven with the message, Reality.

We also have DA Brown in the studio with us. Welcome, brother. Bob, I'm excited to be here. I'm excited about what God's doing through these teachings.

In our fast-paced world, we're often looking for an escape from our reality through movies and television. But Jesus calls us to the reality of a life in God. Pastor David's going to explain that today.

So here's David Magee with his teaching, Reality. We're in John, chapter seven, verse 13. It says, However, no one spoke openly of him for fear of the Jews. And speaking of Jesus, remember, Jesus is going up to the feast and are getting ready to go up to the feast. Right now, his brothers are up there and nobody's speaking about Jesus.

Why? Because there's a fear of the Jewish people, the Jewish leadership, if you will, not just Jews, because some of the people that were following Jesus were Jewish, most of them, not all of them. And this verse is kind of convicting, isn't it? Because let me ask you a question. Do you speak openly of Jesus? And if you don't, why do you not speak openly of Jesus?

We have opportunities in every week. Now, understand something. Some people go, yeah, you know, Pastor David, I'm not like you in that. I'm kind of afraid. I get fearful to speak about the Lord to somebody else. See, in our minds, sometimes we think, okay, if I'm afraid, then I'm not going to speak about Jesus.

Well, wait a minute, wait a minute. Don't assume that anybody that does speak about Jesus is not afraid, but they don't let that fear rule them. They don't let that fear keep them quiet. I can tell you sometimes one-on-one and situations like that, you can get anxious. And the Bible says, don't be anxious for anything, but you can be like, oh, here it is, here it is, here it is. And I still to this day, feel that sometimes.

As a matter of fact, to the point, I'll be transparent and let you in on something. Sometimes I feel that to such a degree, but I know I'm supposed to share that I do this little countdown thing. And it forces me into action. I go, okay, I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it.

Three, two, one. Have you heard the good news about Jesus Christ? Now, feel free to use that little thing because then you're like, one, I got to do something now. Don't keep quiet just because you're intimidated or afraid. Because let me ask you a question. If the enemy can keep you quiet by making you fearful, what do you think he's going to do?

He's going to make you fearful. And we come up with all sorts of, well, they might do this, they might do that, they might shoot me, they might hit me, they might call me a bad name or whatever. That's never happened to me. Well, I've been called bad names, but the other part about hitting and all that stuff. And it's interesting because it's like, well, they might think I'm weird. Okay, let me let you down easy on this.

They might already think that you're weird. So why not use that to the glory of God? Amen. Because you know what? And people, and I understand the term Jesus freaks.

And I understand that and that's kind of cool because we want to be different. But you know what my experience has been? Jesus doesn't make freaks out of people. He makes people out of freaks. Now, I used to be freaky. Let me assure you.

I used to be as freaky as freaky goes. But God has changed me into a person that loves the Lord and wants to glorify his name. Because see, here's the reality. If you fear man above God, that's simply wrong.

Brothers and sisters, that's just wrong. See, one day we will stand in front of the Lord, we will give an account of our lives. As believers, what will you be saying at that point? That day is coming. Let me encourage you to live for the Lord now.

And so you have to choose who you're going to fear. I have a reverence, an awesome reverence for the Lord. Because he's creator God, King of Kings. Do you understand? King of Kings.

Understand what? He is our King, all powerful, all knowing. And not fear as in running from, but fear as in a reverence for. And Proverbs chapter 29 and 25 tells us, the fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord shall be saved. So the question is, who are you fearing this morning? Are you fearing man? Are you fearing God? Is there a reverence for God that far outweighs your fear of man?

There should be. Because at no point in our lives will we really stand before a man and have to give full account of our lives. Now we're called into accountability at different times, but not on the scale that we'll be called in front of the Lord to be accountable. See, and I understand right now as I'm saying these, you're going, whoa, wow. Exactly.

Exactly. That's what we need to walk around with because here's another opportunity to glorify God to somebody. And the Bible has a lot to say about the fear of the Lord.

Job 28, 28. And the man, he said, behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom. And to depart from evil is understanding. Psalm 111, 10 says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and a good understanding of all those who do his commandments.

His praise endures forever. Proverbs 1, seven, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Knowledge. But fools despise wisdom and instruction. You hear how wisdom and knowledge are tied to a fear of the Lord? See, when you begin to reverence God, things begin to change in your life and all of a sudden you begin to understand the deep things of God. But while you're not walking in that reverence of God, you can't understand the deep things of God. Proverbs 10, 27 says, the fear of the Lord prolongs days, but the years of the wicked shall be shortened.

Proverbs 14, 27, the fear of the Lord is a fountain of life to turn away from the snares of death. Now, perhaps you're going, yeah, I noticed that all those are from the Hebrew scriptures. All those are in the Old Testament.

Well, yeah, they are, but here's a couple of New Testament ones. Acts chapter nine, verse 31 says, then the churches throughout all Judea, Galilee and Samaria had peace and were edified and walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, they were multiplied. That's the church.

That's the first generation church there. They had a fear for the Lord. And Matthew 10, 28 says, and do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul, but rather fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

And perhaps you're sitting here and go, oh, wait a minute, wait a minute. I thought God was a God of love. Oh, God is definitely a God of love.

No doubt about it. That's an overwhelming characteristic of him. He loved us so much. The Bible says he sent his son to die for us. That's how much he loves us. But understand we need to walk in that. And for those who choose to reject Jesus, they should be afraid.

They should be very afraid. What a merciful God that allows us to define our relationship with him to a certain degree. Now, understand, I'm not saying we get to imagine who God is.

No, God tells us in his word who he is. But see, you get to pick and choose. You get to choose whether you meet him here for the first time.

Let me highly suggest that option. Or to meet him there for the first time. Do you feel that sense of awe and reverence? That should motivate you.

That should move you. That should drive you in our behaviors and the way that we proclaim the word of the Lord. Verse 14, now about the middle of the feast, Jesus went up into the temple and taught.

Here we go again. Jesus is teaching, teaching, teaching, teaching. Look, see, the whole gospel of John, what's he doing? Teaching. What's he doing in the gospels?

Teaching. So we should be doing the things that Jesus did. So how much are churches teaching these days? Not a lot. It's kind of sad.

Oh, yeah, you'll get a snippet here and there. But there's an integration of man's wisdom, man's philosophy with the truth of God's word. We focus on the truth of God's word.

And understand, you want to talk about a possible fear of people. This temple that he went up to, it was an incredible place. When you see pictures, not photographs of it because none exist, but when you see paintings and whatnot of this temple, it's just awe inspiring.

When you go down to the Western awe and realize that's just a small little portion, it goes much deeper into the ground. You begin to get a scope and a feel of how awesome a place that it was. It was huge. Herod built it for, had 18,000 people working on it for nine years and then continued building for the next 37 years.

This place was huge. And Jesus went right up in the middle of it and started teaching. Teaching was an important ministry of Jesus. And I believe it should be an important ministry of any church. Again, this is a teaching church and all over the church this morning, everybody's being taught the word of God.

You know, I think crafts are really cool with kids. I think games are really cool with kids, but are they receiving the word of God? That's the real question because that's what's gonna change your lives. Let me assure you, all the children that are over there and the children's ministries are being taught the word of God.

And they come to an understanding that Jesus loves them, Jesus died for them, and it's going to direct their life because no, the word will not return void. Reaching and teaching, that's what we're about. And we need to keep that in front of us. We'll be right back with more from David McGee on Cross the Bridge. Right now, here's a word from associate pastor D.A.

Brown. Hey, Bob, we want to pray for our listeners in these cities in Colorado, Sterling, and Yuma, and some cities in Florida, Eastport, Gulf Breeze, Jacksonville, Key West, and Largo. God, thank you for everyone listening today. We pray that they would look forward to hearing from you directly through your word. We pray that they would share this word that you give them with others in their life. And Lord, that they wouldn't fear that they're going to make too many mistakes to follow you, but trust that you're going to do the work in them.

And help them get plugged into a Bible teaching church. Lord, not one that's going to be full of hate or anger, but of love and compassion. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

Thank you, brother. And now, let's get back to David McGee as he continues teaching verse by verse. Verse 15, and the Jews marveled, saying, How does this man know letters, having never studied? Isn't it amazing how far from this statement we've come?

Now, let me say, as I've said many times before, I am not anti-education. And the Bible's plainest is study to be approved unto God. That's not just me, guys.

That's all of us. We should be studying the Word of God. But how did we get to the place where we think that a degree always has to come before people get into ministry? Many of you have thought that. Read this verse. Think about the fact that in the book of Acts, they said, Peter and John, they said, You know what? These are unlearned men, but they've been with Jesus. It makes all the difference.

It makes all the difference. And so, I've spent a lifetime studying the Bible and digging into the original languages. And what you're not going to hear from this platform is how deep my educational process was.

And if only you could get as deep, then you might get as far with the Lord as I am. Now, let me ask you, has that ever encouraged anybody? I mean, most people sit out there and go, Oh, bummer, man.

If I got it, you know, if I really want to know the Bible, I got to go to school for seven years, nine years. Oh, okay. Well, praise God.

That doesn't encourage anybody. But in a twisted sense, when I talk about sometimes what an idiot I used to be, and now that God's using me, you know, there's people go, Wow, he was, he was a real idiot. You know, and yet God is using him.

Man, there's hope. If God can use him, maybe, yeah, God can use you. He sure can.

He can use everybody in this room. What an awesome thing. What an awesome thing. And again, I'm not at, I'm not anti-education, but I do think sometimes we over value that educational process.

I think we do. In terms of ministry. Acts 4, 13 says, Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus.

See, this is the bottom line. It's not education or no education. It's has that teacher been with Jesus? And see why I can't sit up here and tell you I've got my doctorate in this and doctorate in that. I can tell you I spent a lot of time with Jesus. I can tell you I've been broken more times than I care to remember at the feet of Jesus.

I can tell you those things. Now it's possible that there's also an insinuation that they're surprised that Jesus knows Hebrew because he knows letters and he's possibly speaking to them in Hebrew. But verse 16, Jesus answered them and said, My doctrine is not mine, but his who sent me. My doctrine is not mine, but his who sent me.

You know what this tells us? People say, Well, I believe in God. I just don't believe in Jesus.

Oh, wait a minute. If you believe in God, this verse is saying you need to believe in his doctrine and his doctrine includes Jesus. So that's not really an option for you to say, I believe in God, but I don't believe in Jesus. I believe in God, but I don't believe Jesus was the Messiah.

That's not an option to you. Now, certainly you can say I don't believe God, but you can't pick and choose which parts you believe because to reject Jesus is to reject God's mercy. To reject Jesus is to reject God's mercy. This is Jesus is the personification. He's the expression of the love of God and the mercy of God. And if you reject that, what you're saying is you're willing to stand on your own righteousness in front of a holy God.

Don't do it. Verse 17, if anyone wills to do his will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on my own authority. I think when he's talking about doctrine, he's not just talking about a mental sense or intellectual knowledge.

He's talking about a heart sense. The New Living Translation, I think says who wants to do his will. See, when we open up and say, Lord, what do you want to do with my life? God will tell you. But so many times we didn't do the last thing he asked us to do.

And we're trying to move on to the next thing. And God says, well, you know, you didn't yet do that that I asked you to do before. Some of you may need to revisit that place, the place where the Lord asked you to do something, and you've not yet done that.

I've had times. There was a time in my life when I went, had this spiritual retreat, took the family up into the mountains of North Carolina, and I was going to be up there a few days to go up there to hear from the Lord and spend time with the Lord and just to get away. And, you know, it was awesome. Everybody went to bed and I got a piece of paper out and got something to write with. I was going to hear from the Lord and write down some things of vision and what the Lord was going to speak to me, you know, and sat down to write, you know, and I heard the, you know, the still small voice of the Lord and the Lord said, you know what, I'm not going to tell you to do anything until you do the last thing I told you to do. And that was it. Now I enjoyed the next couple of days, but my purpose had kind of been thwarted in that I was wanting to hear from the Lord. And see, that's what goes on in our lives sometimes. Oh, Lord, tell me more, tell me more, tell me more. Well, what have you done with what He's already told you?

Are you walking in that? And I'm not talking about never failing and walking in perfection, but I'm talking about applying the truth of God into our lives. Because if you have a knowledge of Jesus, if you have a love for Jesus, then you should understand Jesus has called you to be a servant, to be in ministry, to be a part of what He has for your life. And are you being obedient to that?

Let me just put it real frankly. We don't need any more arms or quarterbacks. We need people to get involved, people to do stuff, people to become not part of the problem, but part of the solution. See, that's what the Lord calls us to as part of the body. We're all supposed to be working together. It's a wonderful symbol. And man, it is beautiful when it works. And when it doesn't, it's tragic.

It is tragic. You know, I've used the analogy before, but you know, sometimes when I'm sitting there and I'm studying or I'm doing something, you know, seems like more and more, but you know, my leg will go to sleep. And that just, I don't know if that bothers you. That just, that really bothers me.

It just bums me out. Because then you go to, you know, you go to do something, you go somewhere else in the building and you're like, hey, how's it going? Are you doing all right? Yeah, no, I'm fine. What's wrong with your leg?

Nothing's wrong with my leg. You know, the body. Some of us are asleep and need to wake up. Some of us are asleep and need to wake up. We need to be part of the body. Because if we're not, other people are dragging us around and there's too much to do.

There's too many people to reach to do that. Verse 18, he who speaks from himself seeks his own glory, but he who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is true and no unrighteousness is in him. He who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is true. You understand that what Jesus is doing is he's calling us to a reality of a life in God. Jesus calls us to the reality of a life in God.

It is about relationship. It's not about religion. And it's about God being real. Do you understand God is real? Amen? God is real. And he said, yeah, but no, no. Is God real to you?

Or is it just something you do on Sunday morning because there's the games hadn't started yet? God is real. God wants to become real to you. And it's interesting because, you know, history reveals that religious systems always persecuted the person who came in talking about the reality of the life in God. Why?

Because it kind of toppled their kingdom. And this is what's going on here. Jesus is coming in. He's being radical and he's, you know, hey, this is a different thing going on. Calling us to a reality in him, just like he was then.

Calling people to a reality in him. And the sad thing is that's not always received well, but that's okay. That's okay.

History set the precedent that it won't always be received well. Verse 19, did not Moses give you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law? Why do you seek to kill me?

Man. So here's Jesus being seeker friendly again, I guess, huh? Don't get me wrong. When I say we want to reach people, there's certain things that the church has done that makes it difficult for them to reach people. Now, the wonderful thing is understand when I say teach, that's also important.

And why do I say that? Because churches have, some places have emphasized reach so much, they forgot to teach. They emphasize reach so much that, you know, their whole Sunday morning is built around seeing people get saved.

The only problem with that is 80, 90, 95, 98% of the people that are listening are already saved. What are you giving them? If you're just giving them the gospel, they're not getting milk. They're not getting meat. And so it's important to have that balance and things that are getting, that are non-essentials that are in the way of reaching, they got to go guys.

They got to go. And I don't want any walls built. So, you know, I want comfortable chairs or good coffee or whatever the thing is, but I'm not going to water down the truth. I'm not going to make it, well, you know, if I put it just like such a certain way, it'll be easier to swallow.

Can't do that because then it'll be easier. I've betrayed my King. Jesus says here, none of you keeps the law.

He said that to people who were very, very, I understand very religious, very devout, but Jesus said, you know what? None of you guys are keeping the law. You understand the same word applies this morning?

None of us are keeping the law. None of us, all of us are missing it or messing up in one area or another, every one of us. And I don't understand, well, I do understand, but how did you go from what Jesus said to people thinking that it's about their goodness? That if they're good enough for long enough, they get in.

And if you think this is a misconception, ask people around you. Ask other people who go to church, hey, do you think you're going to heaven? Oh, you betcha.

Why do you think that? Well, you know, because I'm a pretty good person. That's very unbiblical or, but yeah, well, I go to church. Oh, okay.

My goodness. If you go to church, you must be a Christian. You know, the analogy, if going to church makes you a Christian, then I guess going to Krispy Kreme makes you a donut.

It doesn't. Well, I've kept most of the 10 commandments. Most of them. It says that if you've offended, if you've broken the law in one place, you've broken every place. Romans 3 10 says that as it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one. Nobody in here, guys, is righteous.

Nobody that you can think of, not even men of power in ministry, not one. Romans 3 23 says for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Now look at the word all. Do you know what the word all means in the Greek? Means all.

That's right. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Understand that. Understand that every single one of us under the law stands condemned. Now you're sitting there going, that's not very affirming, Pastor David. I'm not feeling good about me right now. That's the bad news.

See, the good news has to start with the bad news. If you don't realize you're condemned under the law, you won't realize you need a savior. But if you realize that there's none righteous, no, not one that you need a savior, then you begin to look, okay, who can save me? Well, there's only one, and that's Jesus.

And you know what's awesome? He's willing. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking Him to help you to live for Him. Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me, that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead, that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned.

And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. And, friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. Jesus said He would not turn anybody away who comes to Him.

And He came for those people who knew they needed forgiveness, those who were sick, not the righteous. So congratulations, friend. You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit crossthebridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to Cross the Bridge at P.O. Box 12-515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. Well, DA, before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day, you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee. That sounds good, Pastor DA.

And again, it's been great to have you with us on the program today. But tell us, what else can our listeners find on crossthebridge.com? If you're not able to make it to your home church this Sunday, why not join us for our live stream at 10 a.m. Eastern Time, or on Thursday nights at 7 p.m. Eastern Time? Just visit crossthebridge.com and click on our live stream link. There, you'll experience a live service from David's home church, The Bridge, in North Carolina. Again, that website is crossthebridge.com. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the Gospel of John.