Talking Outrageously To Legalists, Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. By the way, please don't do what people try to do in our culture.

I think it's outrageous. Jesus never claimed to be God, just read the New Testament. And Jesus was just a really good teacher and he's a great moral example. But he's not God.

That's not an option. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Think of us. We we have someone we love and they become what we call terminally ill. We'll do anything, won't we? We'll send them anywhere we can for treatment. We'll do anything we can to help them. We'll give them as much comfort. We'll serve them. I mean, we'll devote ourselves to them.

But when they're dead. There's not a thing we can do. All we can do is mourn. We have no power.

There's nothing we can do about it. Jesus says, no, I can give life like that. I have the same kind of power that God has. He claims to have the ultimate resurrection power, creative power, underived and uncaused.

That's a staggering claim. Remember, when Lazarus had died, Jesus just simply walks up to a tomb and says, Lazarus, come forth. But he said something in that whole episode as well. He said, I am the resurrection and the life. These statements are so familiar to us, but they are staggering.

These are the most outrageous statements a human being can make. And Jesus Christ makes them. He claims to be equal with the Father in his essence, in his works and in his power, but also in his authority. Notice what happens here in verse 22. He says, for not even the Father judges anyone.

But he has given all judgment to the Son. I'm going to judge. This for the Jews has got to be hard. Let me explain why.

Again, hold your place. But this time, go back to Genesis Chapter 18 with me. Genesis 18. Because I want you to see something from the Old Testament.

Genesis 18 is that God is about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, so Abraham comes to God and says, let's make a deal. You know, now you're such a great guy and a great God. You wouldn't destroy Sodom if it had all these righteous people in it. God goes, no, no, I wouldn't do that. Well, would you do it if there were a little less righteous people?

No, I wouldn't do that. Well, how about, and he kept going with God in this. But he says something here that was all through the Old Testament, certainly believed by the Jews, not only of someone like Abraham, but of the Jews of Jesus' day. Verse 25, Abraham talking to God says, far be it from you to do such a thing to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from you, he says, shall not the judge of all the earth deal justly? What is God in the Old Testament? God the Father's judge? In fact, let's go back to what Jesus said then in John 5.

Jesus just said, for not even the Father judges anyone, he's given all judgment to the Son. You see, when you read in Genesis, who's the creator? God.

In the beginning, God created. That's God the Father. But when you read John chapter 1 and Colossians chapter 1, who's the creator?

The Son. In the Old Testament, God the Father's the judge. In the New Testament, God the Son's the judge. You see, and Jesus would say, that's right, because we're God.

You see, the idea that there's one God, three persons, that's the whole sense of the Trinity. Jesus Christ is judge. And who could judge but God?

Think of our judgment that comes ahead for us. If you're a believer in Jesus Christ, you'll never face that terrible judgment in Revelation chapter 20. You'll never face the great white throne judgment.

You'll never be there. That's a judgment only for the lost. But you will face the judgment seat of Jesus Christ. You will face what is called the bema of Christ. In other words, since we have become believers in Jesus Christ, we live our life for Christ. And Christ will judge how we've lived our life. Now, I'm not talking about our sin. Our sin was judged at the cross. He's talking about our service to God. He said, some of our service will be wood, hay, and straw.

In other words, it just becomes consumed. Some of our service will become gold, silver, and precious stones. In other words, it'll be a reward. That's why in the New Testament, you find out that there are certain crowns, but we throw those crowns at his feet.

But there's a reward. Jesus Christ says, I will judge every single one of us. What's amazing was when you read in Corinthians how the judgment works, what Jesus is going to judge is our motives. Not what we did for him.

Why did we do it? Now, I find that in my life extremely disturbing because I find it very difficult to even understand my own motives. For example, when I first started preaching and teaching the Word of God.

Now, I would want to do that for God's glory, but I'll be as honest as I can. I probably suffered from a little approbation lust. That means I love to be approved of.

And so if I would preach, especially even before I'd gone to seminary, only in my early 20s, and people would come up and just say, oh, that was just wonderful. That was just wonderful. And you're wonderful. Yeah, I guess I am, you know. And hey, who doesn't like to hear that?

You do something well and someone says, oh, you're just great at that. Yeah, I guess I am. So I kept thinking, what about the motives? And I struggled with that until I went to a men's retreat and talked to Earl Rodmacher. Dr. Rodmacher was the president of Western Conservative Seminary. And it was over at the Mississippi Gulf Coast that he was doing a men's retreat for us.

And we asked him particularly about this. And I can remember him saying, Bill, you'll never have anything you do for the Lord that has a perfect motive. You always have mixed motives.

They'll always be mixed, but Jesus Christ discerns the mix. Like he knows what part of how strongly motivated you were for the glory of God and how much you did it for yourself. He says, so you can rest in that. And I have ever since.

But think of this. Who could actually judge your motives? Except God. Who could judge your motives? I can't even judge my own motives. How could I judge your motives? No human being can judge motives.

We can judge the facts of a case, but we can't judge motive. But Jesus Christ can. He said, not even the Father judges anyone, but he has given all the judgment to the Son. He claims to be equal with the Father in essence and in works and in power and authority.

And then the last claim. He claims to be equal with the Father in honor. He says, so that, in verse 23, all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. He said, I will be honored just like God because I am God incarnate.

You see, I deserve the honor. Since the Son is the reason that we exist, since the Son is the one who determines our eternal destiny, he is worthy of our honor. And that's what Jesus Christ said. And if you don't honor him, you don't honor God.

This is problematic for the Jews. Again, hold your place and go just a few pages to John 15 with me in verse 23. John 15 and verse 23. What a statement that Jesus Christ makes, especially the audience that heard it. He says, he who hates me hates my Father also.

Wow. By the way, the Jews hated him. The Jewish leaders hated him.

And the Jewish leaders would have said what? But we love God. We hate you, but we love God. Jesus said, if you hate me, you hate God.

I don't care what you say. You see, that's an interesting statement. The idea that somehow you can separate the two, but you can't. The Father and the Son are two thirds of the Trinity. You can't love the one and hate the other.

It doesn't work that way. But that's exactly what they did. They hated Jesus Christ. So Jesus Christ claims to be equal to the Father in essence, in works, in power, in authority and in honor. Now let's go back to John 5 and look at the implications of this.

The major implication is verse 24 that follows the section. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and does not come into judgment but is passed out of death and into life. Wow.

He says, you believe what I'm saying? You have eternal life. There's something great. In the English it's there, but you don't see it as well as you do in the Greek. He says, has eternal life.

It's a present tense. Keep on having eternal life. He who believes what I'm saying keeps on having eternal life and will never be judged. This verse speaks volumes when it comes to the eternal security of a believer. You see, Jesus said, when you believe me, you have eternal life and you will never fall into judgment. Now, this isn't rocket science, but if you have eternal life, you have eternal life. Jesus doesn't say you have the hope of one day maybe getting eternal life. You hope that someday you might have eternal life. You have an opportunity somewhere in the future for eternal life. Jesus doesn't say that. He says, you have, you possess eternal life. We're not eternally secure because of us.

We're eternally secure because of him and what he's done. And he says, and you'll never pass into judgment. Wow.

That's astounding stuff. The implications are amazing now from this truth, these claims, these outrageous claims that he makes. He makes one more claim in verse 36. We'll just drop down to there when he says, but the testimony which I have is greater than the testimony of John, for the works which the Father has given me to accomplish, the very works that I do, testify about me that the Father has sent me.

It's a sidebar. He says, by the way, not only am I claiming to be equal to God, but I want you to understand something. I'm superior to John. I'm greater than John, John the Baptist.

Now understand something. It says in scripture that when it came to John the Baptist, no man born of a woman was greater than John. The scripture itself says that John of all of us is the best of all of us. No man who was ever born of a woman is greater than John the Baptist. Jesus says, I am. I'm greater than John. My testimony is greater than his testimony. Yes, Jesus was born of a woman, but he's also God incarnate.

He is the God man. So he wants to make that clear. And now he wants to talk to them about the reason that they're going to reject these outrageous claims. I mean, Jesus, when he talks like this, there are Jews that want to pick up stones right there and kill him. That's the way they view what he's saying.

They know what he's talking about here. Jesus says, look, let me explain to you the reasons why you reject me. Verse 37, he says, and the father who sent me, he has testified of me. You have neither heard his voice at any time nor seen his form. You don't have a relationship with God.

You see, you don't. And that's why you reject me. Next verse, you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe him whom he sent. He says, you don't have the word of God abiding in you. Now, he's talking to Pharisees who have memorized the Old Testament because the word of God does not abide in you. He says, you search the scriptures because you think in them you have eternal life.

It is these that testify about me. You actually think that the word of God saves you. The word of God doesn't save you. The word of God testifies to me, the Savior.

I'm the one who saves you. Then he says in verse 40, and you were unwilling to come to me so that you may have life. You're unwilling. See, the life, you can see the life is offered to them.

I offer you the life, but you're unwilling. He said, I did not receive glory from men, but I know that you do, he says, who do not have the love of God in yourselves. Another reason you reject me is you don't have the love of God in you.

You don't. He said, I have come in my Father's name, and you do not receive me. If anyone, another comes in his own name, you're going to receive him. You won't believe me as the true Messiah, but you'll believe in a false Messiah. He says, how can you believe when you receive glory from one another and do not seek the glory that is from the one and only God.

He said, another reason you don't believe me is you're man pleasers. By the way, that's what religion always does. Religion always receives glory from one another.

And you can always see it. There's always a hierarchy in religion. There's always people with bigger robes and bigger hats, and everybody has bigger, everyone has a hierarchy.

And they all, in a sense, defer to one another. But there's only one Lord. That's it.

We have a faith that has a hierarchy of one. That's it. See, that's what Jesus Christ is saying. As I've said in the past, there's only one celebrity in the universe. It's not you. It's Jesus Christ. There is only one celebrity.

You can't make a celebrity out of someone else. And then he says, verse 45, he said, do not think that I will accuse you before the Father. The one who accuses you is Moses.

Now that's fighting words. They love Moses. Moses wrote the law.

We love the law. We took this much law that Moses wrote, and we made it this much law. Moses is our hero. He says, do not think that I accuse you before the Father. The one who accuses you is Moses.

In him, you, he said, have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?

You don't believe Moses, the one who's your champion. And so they rejected him. They rejected him because they didn't have a relationship with the Father because his word didn't abide in them because they thought the Scriptures could save them. They were unwilling to come to Christ. They didn't have the love of God in their heart. They wouldn't receive Jesus Christ. They were man pleasers, and they didn't believe Moses.

That's them. What about us? And what about you? What are the implications to us about what Jesus Christ just said? I think you only have three options, just three.

The first one would be this. He claims to be equal with God, but he doesn't know it. He really doesn't know it. He's just claiming to be equal. In other words, he's delusional. He claims to be equal, but he doesn't really know what he's doing. By the way, has there ever been human beings who claim to be God?

Sure. What do we say? They're nuts. I mean, that's what we say. They're crazy. Delusional. You see, they're delusional.

That's possible. Jesus Christ makes it clear, I am equal to God in essence and in works and in power and authority and honor, and he may be completely delusional. Secondly, his claims to be equal with God, he claims that and he knows he's not. He's a deceiver. He is claiming to be equal to God, but he knows he's not.

He's a deceiver. By the way, that's exactly the option that the Jews took. That's the exact option that the Pharisees and the Sanhedrin took. Remember, they said, he said, I am God incarnate and what did they say? You are Beelzebub. You are the devil. You see, you're a deceiver. You're a false messiah.

That's an option that's open. You see, you could say he's delusional or you could say he's a deceiver or he claims to be equal to God and he is. He's exactly what he claimed to be. You see, he could be a lunatic or he could be a liar or he's the Lord. See, that's the room you have. And by the way, please don't do what people try to do in our culture.

I think it's outrageous. No, Jesus never claimed to be God, just read the New Testament. And Jesus was just a really good teacher and he's a great moral example. But he's not God.

That's not an option. The things that he said, he has to be a lunatic or a liar. No, no, he's just a wonderful example. Think of anybody in our culture who would in a sense take our national media and come on and say, I'm God incarnate and I'm going to tell you why and say it over and over again. Who would come on and say, isn't he a wonderful moral example?

That's not an option you have. When someone is making the outrageous claims that Jesus Christ has, you can't say he's just a wonderful moral example and a good teacher. There's no room for that on the basis of what he says. You see, Jesus Christ claimed to be equal with God, in essence in works and power and authority and honor. And he is who he claimed to be.

His statements are outrageous, but they're true. I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me.

Let's pray. Father, sometimes I think it's very hard for us to contextualize these conversations that Jesus had and the claims that he made. As believers in Jesus Christ, these claims to us make a great deal of sense.

But to the unbelievers in his world and the unbelievers in our world, they make no sense at all. But at least the unbelievers in his world had the courage to say that he was a deceiver. And the unbelievers in our world try to make him out to be something else, some kind of pacifist, some kind of person who is just simply a wonderful, warm, spiritual and moral example for the rest of us.

But that's not what Jesus said. Father, I also thank you that Jesus Christ had the courage to speak the truth about himself to a hostile audience. Father, I pray that we have the courage to speak the truth about Jesus Christ in a world that's becoming more and more hostile to him and his claims. Father, I thank you that Jesus Christ is exactly who he claims to be, that he is God incarnate. I thank you, Father, that Jesus Christ took on flesh and he lived among us without sin.

He went to the cross and he died as our substitute for our sins and that you were satisfied with his sacrifice because he was raised from the dead. Father, I pray that we spend all eternity honoring you as Father and your son as our Savior. In his name we pray.

Amen. At that website you will find not only today's broadcast but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word, 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org.

That's fbcnola.org. At our website you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for you can listen online or if you prefer you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember you can do all this absolutely free of charge. Once again our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word. .