This is the Truth Network. Welcome to the broadcast ministry of Finding Purpose with Russ Andrews, where we seek to glorify God by making him known and guiding others towards their true purpose in life. No one is here by chance. God put us here for a reason. And the most important thing we can do is discover his plan for us and commit ourselves to it.
Keep listening as we learn from the Bible how to live wisely in God's world. which is the first step towards finding your purpose.
Alright guys, take your Bible and open up to John chapter 7. We're going to be looking at verses 1 through 24, and I've entitled tonight's message, A Question. It's a very important question. Do you know God? One of the most anticipated feasts, by the way, there were seven feasts on the Jewish calendar: like Passover, Sabbath, the first fruits.
But one of the most popular ones And the most joyful ones was the Feast of Tabernacles, which is what we find here in John chapter 7. And for the Israelites. This feast was a week of celebration, a time of great joy, and the crowds came from all over Israel, excuse me, all over Israel, to come to Jerusalem for this special feast. And what I want to do tonight from these Twenty four verses. I sort of take an interesting tack because Jesus is going to say some negative things about his brothers, about the religious leaders, and So I flipped it around.
And what is the positive we can take away? What for every negative point he makes, there's a positive for you and me.
So I want to show you tonight. Three benefits. of knowing God. And the most important thing a man can do in this life is come to know God. And here's the first benefit: when a man knows God, and this is so important, and obeys his word.
His steps will be ordered by the Lord. In other words, God will direct your life. You young men need to hear that. Old men, too. Look at verses 1 through 9.
After this, Jesus went around to Galilee, purposely staying away from Judea because the Jews there were waiting to take his life. But when the Jewish feast of tabernacles was near, Jesus's brother said to him, You ought to leave here and go to Judea, so that your disciples may see the miracles you do. No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you're doing these things, show yourself to the world. For even his own brothers did not believe in him.
Therefore Jesus told them And here's the negative. The right time for me has not yet come. For you. Anytime it's right. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that what it does is evil.
You go to the feast. I'm not yet going up to this feast, because for me the right time has not yet come. Having said this, he stayed a little longer in Galilee.
Now, what's amazing to me that his brothers grew up in the household of Jesus. He was their elder brother. They were half-brothers. And they got to observe the uniqueness of his character and the man that he was. They witnessed some of his miracles and heard about lots of other miracles.
And yet, They did not believe in him, at least not yet. We'll see that changes when you get to the end of the gospel. They were so close to the truth, and yet they remained blind.
So when Jesus' brother said to him, No one who wants to become A public figure acts in secret. Since you're doing these things, show yourself to the world. It reminds me of the temptation that Satan put before Jesus in the desert when he said, Bow down to me, and I will give you the world. It's the same kind of temptation. You see at this point The brothers did not.
Understand Jesus. They didn't know who he was. They assumed that he wanted to be a popular figure. I think he'd become a powerful public figure to draw people to support him, maybe to become a king. And so, what they did, this statement was not, they were not encouraging him to go, they were mocking him, they were teaching him.
We know you want to be public, so just go into Jerusalem and show yourself to the world. Yeah. But Jesus was not going to be popular, was he? Jesus said, I have not come to bring peace, but what? Division.
Diversion, a sword. The world hated him. And this hatred we see building up here in John chapter 7. It began in John chapter 5 when he healed the paralytic on the Sabbath. That infuriated the Jews.
And this hatred is just welling up within them, and they are plotting this murder.
So Jesus says something very telling to his brothers, and then this is something you never want him to say to you. The time, the right time for me has not yet come. For you, anytime is right. Do you understand why you don't want Jesus to say that to you? What did he mean by this statement?
Jesus's brothers. did not No God They didn't believe in Jesus. And due to their unbelief. They did not have the privilege of God being their Heavenly Father. Therefore, they will literally own their own.
That's the worst thing that a person can do in this world, is on their own. And you think about all the people who go through such great difficulties. On the wrong. The vast majority of people in the world. And the vast majority of people that you and I know Do not know God.
Therefore, they're going through life on their own. They're following the only wisdom they know. And that's the wisdom of the world, which says that the message of the cross is foolishness. On the other hand, ma'am. If you know God personally, Because you have a relationship with Jesus.
You are indwelled by the Holy Spirit. And when you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, that means that God... It's your Heavenly Father. Did you know that? Romans 8:9 says, You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature, but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you.
And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, He does not belong to Christ. I want you to notice here in this verse, Romans 8:9, that the Holy Spirit is called both the Spirit of God and the Spirit of Christ. Yeah. In fact, in Acts 16, 7, It says, and when they, he's talking about Paul and Timothy and Silas, when they had come up to Missia, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. Did you know that the Holy Spirit is also called the Spirit of Jesus?
You see, in the moment. That you Receive Jesus into your heart by faith. According to Ephesians 1:13 and 14, the Holy Spirit indwells you and marks you, seals you as belonging to God, and He becomes your heavenly Father. God Himself becomes your daddy, if you will, your Abba. Romans 10:14 through 16 confirms this truth.
Those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you do not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, Abba, Father. Listen to this: the Spirit Himself testifies with our Spirit that we are God's children.
So, how does this happen? Yeah. How does the Holy Spirit testify with our Spirit?
Well, in the inner man. You can hear his voice whisper to you, not audibly, not in these exact words, but he'll confirm in your inner being. You belong to God. You are God's son. How does he do this?
He does it when you take this book. The Book of God. And you open it up and you say, and you pray, Lord, help me to understand what I'm about to read. Speak to me from your word. And he will.
It's amazing how he'll do that. In the fall of, excuse me, in like July or September, I think it was July of 2003, I had graduated from seminary. Yeah. And I was thinking about, I told the story before, I know you all started. I was thinking about joining Kemp's Crucifix for Christ in a marketplace ministry.
But then I began to think about all the things I could do if I started my own ministry. And my wife really felt like that I should start my own ministry. But I went and interviewed with Camp Scruce for Christ, and they had to do due diligence on me for several months. And so I came back, and during that time, I was praying, I was talking to other people. And one morning, I got up very early in the morning.
It was dark outside, and I went and I opened up my Bible. to where I had left off the day before. To um second Samuel seven. Which is a very important chapter in the Bible. And I said, Lord, speak to me from your word.
Do you want me to join campus crucifix for Christ or do these things which I have in my mind? Because if I started my ministry, I wouldn't have to run the flag at the flagpole every time I needed to want to do something different.
So I started with 2 Samuel 7 because I finished chapter 6 the day before. I didn't play rush and roulette with the dialogue.
Okay, Lord, speak to me. I just picked it up and read it. When I got to the first verse 3, it says, Whatever you have in mind, go ahead and do it, for the Lord is with you. And I went and woke my wife up and said, guess what? We're going to start our own ministry.
Well, I don't know what we're going to call it, but we're going to start our own ministry.
So, that's, you know, God is not always that clear, but I knew in that moment, and see, what's good about that is if I had started this ministry and had some doubts along the way, I could go back to that verse and say, Well, I'm going to get rid of these doubts because He told me. I'll be with you. That's how God speaks to you. You pick up the Bible, you read it. And so the man who knows God walks by the light of his word and listens to the voice of his shepherd.
In John 10, 14 and 27, Jesus says, I am the good what? the good shepherd. I know my sheep, and my sheep what? Know me. My sheep listen to my voice.
I know them, and they follow me. That's right. Remember the page? When the Holy Spirit I wish my family had an aid like that. When the Holy Spirit lives in you, men, he will guide you through this life.
He will order your steps. A.W. Toza said, To the child of God, there's no such thing as an accident. He travels in an appointed way. An appointed way.
The man of true faith may live in the absolute assurance that his steps are ordered by the Lord. I told the leadership here tonight, when I get up in the morning now, I so believe that this is true that I asked, Lord, please order my steps today. Go before me, make the rough places smooth. Guide me, Lord, in what I think, what I say, and what I do. And he does.
Why would he ignore that prayer? He won't. He wants to see a man who believes him. Trust him. And it says, Lord, here I am.
Lead me. I don't want to get out of your will. And God's when you walk in the will of God, it's the safest place you can be, and it's the most joyful place you can be. In Psalm 23, King David writes, The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want.
Notice this. This other verse. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters.
What he's saying there is that he's going to take care of you. It doesn't mean your life's going to be perfect. It doesn't mean you won't have cancer. But he's going to be with you spiritually. And even when you're facing cancer, he'll lead you beside quiet waters.
In other words, he will give you peace on the inside. He restores my soul. He guides me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, which is what this world is, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, that they comfort me.
That's how you do sheep with a rod and a staff. Do you see why it's so important? He will order your steps as you humble yourself before him and walk in obedience to his word. Jesus' brothers were on their own. They were walking through life without God's government, and yet the truth was right there in front of them.
Jesus, on the other hand, was a divine schedule. His steps were ordered by his heavenly Father. He had an appointment with what? The cross. He did not want to get out of step with his father's will, which is why he said, For me, the right time has not yet come.
Are you living your own life? Was your Heavenly Father ordering the steps of your life? This is one of the greatest benefits of knowing God. He will direct your path. Here's the second benefit.
When a man knows God and obeys his word, notice it's always knows God and obeys his word. He discovers its truth. In other words, you discover this truth in the Bible, and your faith will grow deeper and stronger. Look at verses 14 through 19. Not until halfway through the feast did Jesus go up to the temple courts.
That's about the third or fourth day. And began to teach. The Jews were amazed and said, How did this man get such learning without having gone to Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary? Cheese answered. My teaching is not my own.
It come from him who sent me.
Now, listen carefully to verse 17. This is so important. If anyone chooses to do God's will, He's telling them. He will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. He who speaks on his own does so to gain honor for himself.
But he who works for the honor of the one who sent him is a man of what? Truth. Jesus said, I am the way and the truth. There's nothing false about him. Has not Moses given you the law?
Yet not one of you keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me? See, the heart of the Feast of Tabernacles was a daily ritual. Here's what would happen in the morning. All the crowds that came to Jerusalem, by the way, they built.
little huts or tents to remind them of the time they spent wandering in the desert for forty years. And so they would come out of the you know, they it was like the little ends while they were in Jerusalem. They would come out of these huts and they would they would um They would gather in front of the temple. And they would come bearing fruit in one hand, Which was symbolic of the beautiful land God had given them, the land full of milk, flowing with milk and honey, the promised land. In the other hand, they held three branches: one from a palm tree, one from a willow tree, and one from a myrtle tree.
And these represented the stages of their 40-year-long journey in the desert.
So you can see they all got something in their hands. This is a big deal. It's a big celebration. And so this great multitude would gather, and they would watch as the priest held up a golden pitcher. And he would begin to walk to the pool salon.
And they would follow him. When the priest reached the pool, he would dip his golden pitcher into the water, and the people would recite beautiful words from Isaiah 12, 3, which says, With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. And then the crowds would march back to the temple, entering through the water gate. As they entered, they would hear blasts from the priests' trumpets that could be heard all throughout the temple area.
So you see, it's a huge celebration, full of joy, probably laughter. Then the highlight of the day is when the priest would walk up on a platform and he would take that golden pitcher full of water and he would pour it out so everybody could see it, and he was poured it out onto the bronze altar in the inner court. And what they were doing, this symbolized they were praying for rain so that God would bless their harvest, their crops. And what we're going to see Next week. And what they, by the way, I missed left something out.
When he would come back, he would walk around that altar one time. But on the seventh day, we're going to see this next week, he'll walk around it seven times, like they did around the city of Jericho. And the moment that he's pulling that water. Jesus, you ought to stand up and shout. I am the living war.
How about that? You think that got their attention? For three days, Jesus waited in Galilee until the time was right.
Meanwhile, the Jews were watching for him and asking people, where is that man? Why were they watching for him so intently? They want to kill him. And it's not until halfway through the feast that he finally appears, and immediately he begins to teach. And the Jews were amazed at his teaching because he spoke with such knowledge and wisdom.
And they want to know where did he get this knowledge? And here's what Jesus said to them: He either heard them or he knew their thoughts. He said, My teaching is not my own. It come from him who sent me.
Verse 17 again: If anyone chooses to do God's will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. See, Jesus, he's claiming here to have been sent by God, which means he's the Messiah, and he's claiming to speak the very words of God. And this was blasphemous to the Jews. But all they had to do to see the truth of his claims was to do what he said. To a bare staging.
Here's a biblical principle man. Obedience to God's word. always reveals the truth it contains. In other words. If anyone, a skeptic, who wants to know if Jesus's teachings are true, If anyone wants to know if the Bible is true.
Just do what it says. Give it a chance. Try it. This you so what you do is You get a man to come here. He begins to read the Bible.
And if he will do what it says, this will lead him to the truth. And the truth will do what? Set him free. Set them free from what? Unbelief.
Do you see that? In John 8, Jesus says, If you hold to my teachings, that means if you believe my word and you obey me, you're really my disciples. That's the test if we're really walking with him, if we really belong to him, if you're walking in obedience. That means perfectly. But the general direction of your life is one of obedience.
He says, if you hold to my teaching, then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. How do we hold those teachings? We first pick up this book and read it, and we obey it. And in our obedience, we will discover the inherent truth that it contains. It's like learning to ride a bicycle.
Remember those days? I remember my first bike, sort of, but I remember I remember that I was on the road right in front of my house. No, there's no traffic in Bethel anyway, so it didn't matter. And my dad said, You could do this. And I said, okay, I didn't know if I could do it or not, but I believe my dad.
So he just said, get up on the bike, start pedaling. And I'm going to push you. And you'll gain momentum and you'll be able to do it. Just trust me.
So I trust my dad. I got up on the bike. He began to push me. And next thing you know, I'm going along pretty good. And I think, look, dad, look how, and he's back there 100 yards.
I could do it. And see, the more I practice that day in and day out, The more I realized I could do it, my faith grew. And this is how faith works, man. You see, the world says Show me. Seeing is believing.
The Bible says believing. is seeing. You'll see the difference. You've got to take a step of faith. And every step of faith that you take, God will support you with the truth.
And the more steps of faith you take, the stronger your faith will become. Anselm of Canterbury, I learned this in seminary, and I just never forgot what he said. He was the Archbishop of Canterbury. Um Back around 1077 AD. And he said, This: Listen carefully, I do not seek to understand so that I might believe.
But I believe so that I might understand. For this also I believe, and unless I have believed, I cannot understand.
So, guys, there are two things to remember about faith. First, faith always precedes understanding. And second, Understanding is the reward of faith. If you want to know if this book is true, pick it up and do it. Back to chapter seven.
Jesus did not speak on his own. He humbled himself in heaven and became obedient to his heavenly Father's will. He was sent to this earth with the very words of God in his mind and in his heart.
So when he spoke to the people, The people heard whose voice? God. When you and I read God's Word, we are hearing the voice of God. And this brings us to the third benefit of knowing God. When a man knows God's word and obeys his word, His heart and his mind is filled with wisdom.
Look at verse 20. The crowd said, You are demon-possessed. Who is trying to kill you? You see, the people could not stand up against Jesus' authority and the truth of his accusation.
So they just called him a name, they called him demon-possessed. That's how a lot of unbelievers respond. They just start calling you names. And he's responded with the truth. Look at verses 21 through 23.
Jesus said to them, I did one miracle, and you all astonished. Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision, though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs. You circumcise a child on the Sabbath.
Now, if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath, so that the law of Moses may not be broken. Why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath? See, they were all upset about the fact that he healed that paralytic on the Sabbath. They could not get over it. And from that point, they began to plot to kill him.
But see, they were blind. They were blind to their hypocrisy. They were ever seeing but never perceiving. They were forever hearing but never understanding. And that's because they were spiritually deaf, they were blind, and their hearts were hard.
In Isaiah twenty nine, the Lord says, These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men. Has anything changed in the last two thousand years?
So it's just a sad, but it's hard to Figure out. Why are so many religious leaders blind? They're so so close to the truth, but they can't see it. And this is a picture, by the way, of mainline denominations throughout Europe, England, and America. This that's why they're in decline.
They're collapsing. And I hope they totally collapse. To the point where nobody goes to them.
So you need to make sure that you're in a church that is worshiping in spirit and truth, as Jesus told the woman at the whale, and where the man, it needs to be a man, by the way, stands up in the pulpit, and when he opens the Bible, he begins to teach the way I'm doing here tonight. Verse by verse, he explains it to you, and you can tell he really believes that this is the book of God. Are you going to a church like that?
Well, guess what? You go to a Bible study like that. See, here's the problem. God actually gave the covenant of circumcision to Abraham. And then it's recorded in Leviticus 12:3: on the eighth day, the boy is to be circumcised.
But the Pharisees had added all kinds of laws, man-made laws, like 600 laws to the Ten Commandments, to the law that God gave to Moses. They just added more laws to it. It became a ritual of legalism. And the Sabbath became a burdensome day rather than a day of rest and joy and experiencing God's mercy. They took the Sabbath.
Rest. Excuse me, they took these laws, they defined work in ways that God did not intend. For example, Medical activities like setting bones, certain forms of bandaging, and preparing healing medicines were not allowed. Unless they're necessary to save a life. In other words, wait till the next day.
Don't sit that guy's broken leg.
However, if the eighth day fell on the Sabbath, the Jews allowed for circumcision.
So they they cared more about They're low. Then they did the fact that Jesus healed the whole man. As Charles Sabin hasn't said, they care about more about one part of the body than the whole man. They were hypocrites. And so Jesus showed, pointed out their hypocrisy, and they just became even more angry.
So here's what Jesus says last to them. He judges them with this statement, verse 24. Stop judging by mere appearances and make a right judgment. That's again, this is another one of those negatives, and I want to flip around and show you a positive. The what they lacked, man.
Was wisdom. And yet they were the judges of Israel. The Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the scribes were the legal scholars, the religious scholars, and they were the law when it came to moral practices, to religious practices. They knew the Old Testament backwards and forwards. But they had their wisdom.
Because they didn't really believe there was God's word. Jesus condemned them in John 5 when he says, You diligently study the scriptures because you think that by them you possess eternal life. These are the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life. Listen, you can sit in a church for your entire life and hear the Bible read, say the Apostles' Creed. You could come to a Bible study like this, and it goes in one end and out the other.
You can read God's Word. And think that it inspired, but refused to come to Jesus. Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. They do not believe men.
That their Bible, which was the Old Testament, today You'd be amazed at how many Leaders in seminaries and churches don't believe that this is the inerrant and infallible word of God.
Okay. Let me tell you how Charles Spurgeon lived during the 19th century, had a massive church in London. 6,000 attended every Sunday, from poor people to royalty. In his booklet entitled The Bible, he writes, This volume. Is the writing of the living God.
Each letter was pinned with an almighty finger. Each word in it dropped from his everlasting lips. Each sentence was dictated by the Holy Spirit. It is God's voice, not man's. The words are God's word.
The words are the eternal, the invisible, the almighty, the Jehovah of this earth. This is God's Bible. And when I see it, I seem to hear a voice spring up from it saying, I am the book of God. Man, read me. I am God's writing.
Open my leaf where I was pinned by God. Read it, for he's my author, and you will see him visible and manifest. On every page. Jean-Reign you vavel. Like that.
See, the only way to gain God's wisdom then is to be indwelt by the Holy Spirit and then read God's Word. And God's spirit inside of you will teach you all things. I'm going to close with this. 1 Corinthians chapter 2 is one of the greatest chapters in the Bible about wisdom. Listen to what Paul writes.
Beginning with verse 10. But God has revealed it. What is the it? His wisdom. Exactly.
His wisdom. He's revealed his wisdom to us by his spirit. This way, you have to be indwelled by the spirit. The spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him?
In the same way. No one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.
So think about this when you're indwelt by the Holy Spirit The mind of God comes with the Spirit. We have not received the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. He's freely given us this book. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they're foolishness to him.
And he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
Now listen to this. The spiritual man makes judgments about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's judgment. That's because he's subject to God's judgment and God alone. For who is not the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him? But we have what?
The man of Christ. What does it mean to have the mind of Christ? It means that you have the mind of God. You see everything from heaven's perspective. You look at the world through the lens of Scripture.
And the more you read this book of God, the more you take on the mind of Christ. And this is what it means to gain wisdom, guys.
So if you know God, you read his word and obey it. He will direct your path. You will know the truth of the Bible, and you'll spend more time in it and gain more wisdom. And then you will be a wise man, and men will come seek your counsel, and you'll be able to make judgments on how many things. Oh, thanks.
Do you believe that? Do you know God? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for your truth.
Lord, help us to. We love you more than we love the Bible, but we've come to know you more intimately through the Bible. And as I was talking to Grant Casaber the other day, we both believe that when we get to heaven, we will continue to study the Bible. Because your word says that heaven and earth will pass away, but your words will never pass away. The Bible is how we get to know your mind and your heart.
And so we will have your word of God forever. Even in heaven.
So, Lord, help us to love it now and to digest it like it's spiritual food because it is spiritual food. In Jesus' name, I pray. In that. You've been listening to Finding Purpose with Russ Andrews. This broadcast is made possible because of the prayers and financial gifts of listeners like you.
If you want to learn more about our ministry or support us as we reach others with God-centered Bible teaching, please visit us at findingpurpose.net.
