We Have Found the Messiah

When I am studying and preparing for a message, I like to try to read as broadly as possible, and this past week sent me to a blog that, well, actually reminded me of a movie. So let me begin with the movie clip. The movie clip comes from Napoleon Dynamite, one of my wife and I's favorite movies. The clip is Uncle Rico. He has arrived on the scene. He's a man in his early 40s. Still living out the dream that he might be able to go back in time and play for his high school football team and win the state championship. So that's an important context. He comes and he's going to watch his brothers, Napoleon and Kip, and he wants to show him a video clip. And so he puts in his video and it's Uncle Rico throwing the football. And Napoleon responds, this is pretty much the worst video ever made. Kip responds, Napoleon, like anyone could ever know that. Now, this great philosophical dialogue leads us to a very hopeful point. Kip is right. There's no way that Napoleon could know that that is the first, the worst video ever made. He's going to, Napoleon, Kip's brother, he's committed what I'm going to call the dynamite fallacy. He's pretending to stand in a position to know everything so that he can make a universal judgment when that position is actually impossible. In order to make the judgment, this is the worst video ever made, he would have to know everything about all videos at all times and all places and then be able to make that judgment. Now to the blog. The blog was written by John Shelby Spong. He's an Episcopal Bishop. He writes books like Why Christianity Must Change or Die. He's a big fan of Richard Dawkins, another atheist, and he writes very similar to these atheists who are attacking the church. However, I remind you he is an Episcopal Bishop by title. The article said these three things about the Gospel of John. There is no way that the fourth gospel was written by John Zebedee or by any of the disciples of Jesus. The author of this book is not a single individual, but is at least three different writers, editors who did not, who did later their layered work over a period of 25 to 30 years. Number two, there is probably not a single word attributed to Jesus in this book that the Jesus of history actually spoke. This includes all the I am things and all the farewell discourses. Pretty much the heart and soul of the gospel. Number three, not one of the signs. The four gospels made word for miracles recorded in this book was in all probability something that actually happened. This means that Jesus never changed water into wine, fed a multitude with five loaves and two fish or raised Lazarus from the dead to these things. I repeat. The words of Kip, John, like anyone could ever know that. John, the bishop, he's pretending to stand in position and say these things could never happen. He doesn't have the historical position to know what Jesus said, apart from the Gospels. He's making judgments that are just way beyond his pay scale and his ability. He's pretending to have a platform to determine what actually was said, what was recorded, and if it's true or not, from 2,000 years ago. The most concerning part of this article, and this article, this blog, it's a summary of a book coming out that I'm not going to read, and I do not recommend you read it either. This is the most concerning, the end statement. Christianity is not about the divine becoming human. So much as it is about the human becoming divine. That is a paradigm shift of the first order, he says. He's changed the message of Christianity. He is denied that it's God himself coming down because he denies miracles. I'm not sure how much you would even say about God. He has very little to say about God, but it's about man making himself better to come up to God. He is a classic liberal. It's about us doing what God says we can be better rather than what God has done and purifying us and declaring us righteous. I do agree with one sentence in the blog. This is a first order paradigm shift. He is changing everything with that statement. He's right. I hope one day that John Shelby Sprung would write a book If you change Christianity, it is dead, because that is what his variety of Christianity is. Now, why have we been reviewing John Shelby Spong's blog and this upcoming book? First, you need to be aware that these ideas are out there. Your neighbors probably think like this. Your neighbors are being are very aware of these kind of attacks with the popular works of a Bart Ehrman or the other atheists. So, we need to be aware of this and we need to be ready to give an answer. Secondly, it shows an arrogance here that we need to be aware of. He's contrasting the academics and the scholars over against the fundamentals in the church. We, friends, are fundamentals in the church, and at this moment, we are very proud to be fundamentalist in the church. We cannot and will not deny the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, the substituent atonement, the resurrection and the return. Finally, and most importantly, what we see him doing here is standing over God's word and he's making judgments about it. And this isn't just an intellectual thing. This is a heart thing. When we deny God, we look over his word and we make judgments about it when the only proper place for us to be is under God's word, letting it judge us and letting it tell us who God is and how he desires us to live. Now, before looking to the word of God of John this morning, I want to pray for John Shelby spawn, because I dare not criticize him without praying for him. Will you pray with me? Father, this this man, John, he has been a large influence on American Christianity. We pray that you would bring him to repentance. We pray that as he has studied your word, we pray that he would submit to it. I pray that the Holy Spirit would convict him and convince him and illuminate his eyes and his heart and his mind to the truth within. We pray that we would hear of him being converted and hear him rejoice in the Savior who died for his sins. We pray that we would also have your spirit illuminate us now. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. We're looking to John 1. We are going to finish John 1 this week. That's found on page 887. If you're using the Pew Bible in front of you, we'll be looking at verses 35 through 51. Now, John, we had verses 1 through 18. That was the prologue. The word, the word was there in creation. The word is divine. Now the word has become flesh. The word lets us see God. The word is Jesus Christ. We then transition very quickly to John the Baptist and John the Baptist is pointing everyone to Jesus, the Pharisees. And now we'll see that he is pointing even his own disciples. I want you to listen for a few things in our passage. First, we see a long train of witnesses. We see numerous people bearing witness of who Jesus is. And every time we see someone giving a new witness, bearing a witness again of who Jesus is, we get a new title for who Jesus is. We'll see that he's declared the Lamb of God, the Messiah, the promised one, the rabbi, the Son of God, the King of Israel. We learn a lot about Jesus because those are bearing. There's many people bearing witness to him. As we look at the story, we're going to try to follow the storyline. Most stories are built up around sin. There's a sinner in a story, and what we see is God having his redemptive power overcome that sin. If there's a sin in this story, it's really unbelief. The story is really more about Jesus building up his disciples. The story is about God transitioning from the old to the new, and Jesus being recognized as the Savior, the Redeemer, the Promised One. So listen now, John 1, verses 35 through 51. Listen for how the witness is being made and what they're saying about Jesus. The next day again, John has already said, behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. The next day again, John was standing with two of his disciples and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, behold, the Lamb of God. The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following and said to them, What are you seeking? And they said to him, Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? He said to them, Come and you will see. So they came and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour. One of the two who heard John speak and follow Jesus was Andrew, Simon's brother. He first found his own brother, Simon, and said to him, We have found the Messiah, which means Christ. He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, You were Simon, the son of John. You should be called Cephas, which means Peter. The next day, Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, Follow me. Philip was from Poseidon, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, We have found him of whom Moses and the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. Nathanael said to him, Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Philip said to him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit. Nathaniel said to him, How do you know me? Jesus answered him, Behold, before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree, I saw you. Nathaniel answered him, Rabbi, you are the son of God. You are the king of Israel. Jesus answered him, Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree. Do you believe you will see greater things than these? And he said to him, Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and ascending on the Son of Man." The big context of what John is doing here in chapter one and then also through chapter two. He's showing that a major paradigm shift coming. When Jesus comes, he changes everything. We already saw this in John 1, 17 through 18. He contrasts Jesus with Moses. No one has ever seen God, but Jesus, he has made him seen. The law came through Moses, grace through Jesus Christ. John the Baptist here is representing the old covenant prophets. He's the last old covenant prophets who's saying he's coming. He actually gets to say he's here. But now Jesus comes and John is pointing everyone to Jesus, not just the Pharisees, the religious leaders who come inquiring. He also is pointing his own disciples. There's a number of clues here in this passage that show that Jesus is the fulfillment of all things anticipated. Most of all of the testimony, we see the one of whom Moses and the prophets. He's the promised one, the one that they were speaking of. He's come. All these titles, Lamb of God, Messiah, King of Israel, Son of God. These are loaded expectations for Israel. We see it further in the wedding of Cana. We see a symbolism. We'll see this next week with the jars, the water jars that were meant for ceremonies. The water has changed to wine. That symbolizes a change is happening in the covenant. And if we miss it after that, Jesus says, I will destroy this temple and it'll be raised up again in three days. A clear declaration of the old covenant. It is coming to an end. The old system. It is going to be destroyed. My body will be torn like a veil for you. And now a new covenant, a the kingdom of God. It will be here. Our thesis this morning, the main message that we will see from our text. Jesus is worthy of our worship and our witness. Jesus is worthy of our worship and our witness. The first thing we must see is that Jesus is worthy. He is worthy as God Almighty. He is worthy as the Lamb of God who takes away our sin. He's worthy as the Messiah, the anointed one. He's worthy as the Son of God, the one who seeks out sinners to die for us and call us to follow Him. He's worthy of our worship. We're going to see here the disciples, they followed Him. This was an act of worship. They followed him. They swore their allegiance to him. They obeyed him. And then finally, he is worthy of our witness, as we will see over and over again. Those who discovered who Jesus was, they told their friends, their neighbors and others. The way we'll outline our text is going to try to follow the narrative itself, the different parts first. John the Baptist, he bears witness to his disciples that Jesus is the Lamb of God. John the Baptist, he bears witness to his disciples that Jesus is the Lamb of God. This is verses 35 through 39. Secondly, Andrew bears witness to his brother that Jesus is the Messiah. That's verses 40 and 42. Andrew bears witness to his brother that Jesus is the Messiah. Third, Jesus calls Philip to follow him. Jesus calls Philip to follow him. That's verse 43 and 44. Fourthly, Philip bears witness to Nathanael that Jesus is the promised one. Philip bears witness to Nathanael that Jesus is the promised one. 45 and 46. And then Nathanael bears witness that Jesus is the Son of God, the King of Israel. 47, 49, and Jesus promises there is more to come in verses 50 and 51. Now you'll see there, the reason I've structured it thus is that we keep seeing a different witness and what he witnesses to is a different title of Jesus. So we see a development of the identity of Jesus through this adding to himself disciples. And so we'll see that Jesus is worthy of worship and our witness. John witnesses to his disciples that Jesus is the Lamb of God. Let me read verses 35 and 39 again. The next day again, John was standing with two of his disciples and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, Behold, the Lamb of God. The two disciples heard him say this and they followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following him and said to them, What are you seeking? And they said to him, Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? He said to them, come and you will see. So they came and saw where he was staying and they stayed with him that day for it was about the 10th hour. Now John the Baptist, he's a central figure here. He is the one that's pointing to Jesus. He's pointing everyone to Jesus. The previous day, you can see here, this is following a sequence of days. The first day, the religious leaders, they come and they ask, Who are you? And John says, You're asking the wrong question to the wrong guy. I'm the voice telling you who you really should be more concerned with. I'm going to tell you the next day. He tells him the next day, Behold, Lamb of God, this is the one that you need to be looking to. Here we pick up again the next day. John isn't pointing the religious leaders to Jesus. He's pointing his own disciples to him. He's the one who says the one who comes after me is greater than I because he was before me. He's wanting to declare I must decrease. He must increase. Therefore, he recognizes my disciples should leave me and follow him because he is the one that I am declaring. John declares again, behold, the Lamb of God. This is such a rich message throughout the Old Testament. Last week, we looked at Isaiah 52 and 53, maybe the Old Testament passage where you see the gospel the most clearly. We saw there that there was one who would come and he'll be wounded for our transgressions. There was one who would be crushed for our iniquities, by whose stripes we are healed. God was pleased to crush him for our guilt. The lamb was a substitute for our sins. We can look further and throughout the Old Testament, it would go back to Genesis 22, where Abraham is commanded to take his only son and sacrifice him on the mountain. Abraham knew God would provide and ensures he believed God, he trusted God as he's about to sacrifice his choice son, his first born son. God said, stop, I have provided a substitute. And there's a lamb caught in the thicket. We could go all the way back to the creation and the original fall. A animal had to die to cover the sins of Adam and Eve, so they would no longer walk around ashamed of their sin. We see the priestly sacrifice year after year, a new sacrifice had to be made. But here John's saying this is the lamb of God. Not one of the many lambs of God, all of those lambs, all of those prefigurements, all of those those pictures, they are finding the fulfillment in this one, the lamb, the true lamb of God, because he is the son of God who is pure and spotless. He is the true substitute. Because he became like us in every way, except for he's without sin so that he could die in our place, taking God's wrath that is due to us upon himself so that we can be free and forgiven. He's a true limb of God. He is the eternal once and for all sacrifice. There is no more need for a lamb. The true limb of God. He has taken away sin once and for all, for all who believe. If you're not a Christian this morning, I pray that you walk away with two things. First, a recognition of sin. We are all sinners. Everyone in this room is a sinner. Everyone in this room is a liar. Everyone in this room has lust and anger and rage well up inside of us. We're all sinners against God and we're all worthy of His wrath. The second thing is that the only way you can have that wrath removed is if you believe in Jesus Christ who takes it from you. We are all sinners. We have all rebelled against God. The only way to be forgiven and have that wrath removed is to believe in the Lamb of God. Christian, if you're wrestling with assurance. The question of your assurance of salvation must begin and end with Jesus being the Lamb of God who died on the cross for your sins. It is clear in scripture that if you are proactively participating in sin and rejecting God, you shouldn't have assurance as a Christian. If you're proactively pursuing sin, the Bible says you should not have assurance. However, if you're a Christian, You cannot think about your sin apart from the cross of Christ when you're proactively pursuing sin. You see it in light of Christ. You see it in light of the fact that he died for that sin. Your assurance must be tied to the fact that he died for your sin. And that assurance should lead you to repent of sin. The way to overcome a love for sin is to see it as it is. It's destructive. It's what Christ had to die for. We must see Christ as more worthy of our love than our sin. I want you to notice how the disciples respond. They followed him. Now, this is in contrast to the day before the disciples, they heard this is the Lamb of God. They followed him. The religious leaders that before there's no action. It was interesting. They did not follow him. Now, the disciples, they appear to be walking behind him. They follow him, so they're walking behind him, and so Jesus has to turn around and ask, what are you seeking? At one level, this could be Jesus just saying, it's kind of weird, guys. Why are you just behind me? Why are you following me? What are you seeking? More so, I believe Jesus is actually wanting them to have to articulate, if you're following me, what are you seeking to find? Because as we're going to see throughout the gospel, his identity becomes more and more clear. His revelation is more and more clear. And so the disciples at first, they're not real sure of who he is and what he's doing. Even these great, bold confessions of faith, they're going to understand more so what it means that Jesus, the son of God and the king of Israel. I believe he's challenging them to ask, what are you seeking? And so they they answer rabbi, which means teacher or master. You see here, they've already transferred their allegiance from John the Baptist to Jesus by declaring that he is their rabbi. He's declaring they're declaring you're our master. You are the one we're going to follow. Jesus is better and more worthy of the allegiance of their allegiance than John the Baptist. Now, there's a real helpful lesson here for us. In order to go from John the Baptist being their rabbi, their master, their leader, in order for it to go to Jesus, they had to say, John the Baptist, you're no longer a rabbi. You only have one master. In order to confess that Jesus is a rabbi, they have to already have said, we're going to stop following John. We're going to start following Jesus. Now, the beauty of that transfer is that John the Baptist high fives him. Great. Go. He's better. Our master, before we come to Christ, is not like John the Baptist. Our master is sin. Our master does not want us to leave him. Satan does not want to leave, want us to leave him as our master, so that we follow Jesus. We have to find a master who's clinging to us, knowing that Jesus is greater, but does not want us to go. They asked Jesus, where are you staying? Now, they didn't really answer his question. He says, what are you seeking? They asked, where are you staying? Maybe they're wanting to know where do you live, so you can come and be with you, ask you questions of the future. Jesus invites them to come along. Come, and you will see. Now, what's interesting here is I believe we see here John the Evangelist, the writer of the Gospel. He is giving a testimony. He's giving some autobiography here. John the Evangelist, he never mentions himself by name. But we know he's in the story. He's giving an eyewitness account at some level. And I believe here we are seeing an eyewitness account. He knows what time of day it was. He's one of John the Baptist's disciples. I believe he is the unnamed disciple here. And I believe what we see here is he can't resist telling you about the first day he got to spend with Jesus. We see John the Evangelist telling us it's the 10th hour of this day, and this is what Jesus is saying back and forth to his disciples. We know one of them is Andrew. We'll see that in the next section. But here, I think we see John the Evangelist, and he's saying that we were with him from the 10th hour. Now, that could be 10 a.m., depending on if it's the Roman way of counting time that begins at midnight, so 10 a.m., or it could be 4 p.m. The Semitic way of counting time is from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., and so it would be 4 p.m. We don't know for certain what time it is, but we I believe that John is telling us we got to spend the day with Messiah. Can you imagine what that would be like that first day? True wisdom himself speaking to us. True love, giving care and comfort, the one true almighty God sitting at table. Sharing with us, caring for us, someone you can completely entrust yourself to because you know that their love is great. Their words are wise. How many of us would long to have that opportunity to sit with Jesus face to face, side by side for a day? Now, as we're all wishing that we could see Jesus face to face, we're all wishing we could we could spend that kind of day with Jesus. I want to actually assure you, you can. One of the most amazing declarations that Jesus makes in the Gospel of John that we'll see months away is John 16. There, Jesus says, it is to your advantage if I go away, because when I go away, I'm going to send the Spirit. He's telling the disciples, it's to your advantage if I'm no longer with you, hand in hand, foot in foot, face to face. It's better for you if I send the Holy Spirit. Because in the Holy Spirit, we will see Christ truly and perfectly by the power of the Holy Spirit. He illuminates our minds, our hearts, our eyes, so that we can see Christ and all of his glory now exalted to the right hand of the Father. If you're not growing in your knowledge and your love for God, it's not the Spirit's fault. The spirit longs to exalt Christ, the son of God, that is his primary and most precious mission. So it keeps us from knowing God more. Our sin. Our sin is what keeps us now from knowing God and having that that intimate connection with him and speaking to him as if face to face, if you long to know Christ more intimately and intensely repent. As John Calvin says, all true knowledge of God is born out of obedience. All true knowledge of God is born out of obedience. If you want to grow in your knowledge of who God is and who he calls you to be, it's found in obedience. Knowing God is not an intellectual pursuit. It's a purity pursuit. Blessed are those who are pure in heart, for they shall see God." The second thing we see in our text, our second step in the building up of the witness. First, we saw that John the Baptist declares, he is the Lamb of God. And then Andrew, the one who heard him, he witnesses to his brother that Jesus is the Messiah. Look at verses 40 through 42. One of the two who heard John speak and followed Jesus was Andrew. Simon Peter's brother. He first found his own brother Simon and said to him, We have found Messiah, which means Christ. He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, You are Simon, son of John. You shall be called Cephas. Now, Andrew is the first named disciple here in John's gospel, and it's interesting. He's actually named alongside Simon Peter to begin with. It's as if John is writing to a church that would already know who Simon Peter is. That's possible that John's gospel here is intended to already complement one of the synoptic gospels that would have made Peter very clear. He was the first great church leader in giving the first sermon to the church. What I appreciate this passage is John is making it very clear. Andrew first found his own brother. There's a great modeling here. This is a great model for us to think about. He first found his own brother. Why wouldn't the first person he would tell the best news be the person he is closest to? Now, they think about that. Are we sharing the gospel with those we love? That's the first question I think we have to ask as we think about the fact that Andrew bore witness, Jesus is worthy of our witness. Are we sharing the gospel with those we love? Now, if you just found out you could win a million dollars, if you just found a way that you could get a brand new car, who would you tell first? There's a number of ways that you could, there's other people who can win a million dollars and you know how, who are you going to call first? Those who you love. Well, friends, Winning a million dollars or a new car, that's a great earthly ambition. That's what our world sees as the highest honor, the highest gauge of success. Friends, we have the good news that takes people from death to life. Who would you tell first the gospel of Jesus Christ? We see here a great application for fathers on Father's Day. The first level of your responsibility is your own family. your wife to build her up in the gospel and your children to share the gospel with them, to be a model of God's love, to be a model of the Father's love, and to share with them the gospel of Jesus Christ. But it's not just those who are in our families. It's not those who are the most closest to us we're supposed to share the gospel with. It's to everyone. Something that's always bugged me is that churches love to do missions out there. Churches love to evangelism out there. I love what Jim Kiner said during Mission Sunday. We're doing missions out there and here. It's not either or. It's both and. And the reason I think churches love to do missions out there is because when you start doing evangelism. It introduces folks that aren't churched, it introduces sinners to the body, it introduces people who are coming in and they're confessing their sin and they're not like us. who have grown so accustomed to hiding our sin. It's actually refreshing for a new believer to come into a body because they're so open and clear about their sin. They're so open and clear about their zeal for the gospel. We need to stop thinking about just evangelism out there. Evangelism needs to be happening here. As I was wrestling through this witnessing, I remembered it's actually a video clip. Penn and Teller, they're two comedians, and Penn is actually a very outspoken atheist. And he challenged many Christians, unintentionally, but he gave a criticism. I want to read this quote to you. This is from an atheist. I've always said, you know, that I don't respect people who don't proselytize. I've always said that I don't respect people who don't proselytize. I don't respect that at all. If you believe that there's a heaven and a hell, and that people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think it's not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward, how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that? I mean, if I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that a truck was bearing down on you, there's a certain point where I tackle you. And this is more important than that. This is a powerful point by an atheist. He's calling us out if we really believe in a heaven and a hell and a God who judges sin and a God who sent his son to be judged for our sin, and we're not telling people about that. He accuses of hating them. Now, I think I would turn that around a little bit in my own heart. I wouldn't say I hate them. What I would say is that I'm loving my convenience more than I love them and I love God. I'm loving the fact that there's not socially awkwardness. I'm loving my convenience, my comfort more than I'm loving them and more than I'm loving the gospel of Jesus Christ. We must repent of longing for a comfort and a convenience. In response to the gospel that calls us to go bear witness to those who we know. Let's look what Andrew testifies. We have found the Messiah. We have found Messiah John gives us a little parenthetical, this means the Christ, the anointed one. Jesus has been anointed to do God's work for God's people. Jesus has been anointed to do God's work for God's people. Throughout the Old Testament, we saw many people anointed by the power of the Spirit to do a specific act for God. We saw prophets anointed to give the good message. We saw priests anointed to do sacrifices. We saw kings anointed to lead God's people. Here we see Jesus is the Messiah who is the great prophet, the real king, and the final priest, because he fulfills all that the Old Testament was pointing to. He is the anointed one, the prophet, priest, and king, who is able to save all who believe him. Andrew brings his brother Peter, Simon, to Jesus. Jesus changes his name. And we see here a clear confession of faith in these two men, because we see Peter get an identity change. When you come to Christ, there's an identity change. Now, this specific identity change has been somewhat confusing. Peter has a very strong and specific role in the church, but it's not who the Roman Catholics say he is. Yes, Peter was the first preacher. Peter was a great leader, but he never replaces. He never stands in the place of Jesus Christ as the head of the church or the foundation of the church. There is no man who can take the place of Christ. As we continue, let's look to the third main section here. Jesus calls Philip to follow him. Now, this section really stands out. Because the first one was John the Baptist bearing witness that Jesus the Lamb of God. We saw a man bearing witness to another man and then a title. Then we saw Andrew bearing witness to Simon, Jesus Messiah. We saw another man bearing witness to another to a man and a title. Here we did see a very direct conversation, a very clear imperative and command. Follow me. And then it's followed by two more witnesses of Christ. The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, follow me. Philip was from Poseidon, the city of Andrew and Peter. Now we see this and these words stand out. Follow me. We see Jesus worthy of being followed because he's seeking sinners. He is the Savior seeking sinners to die for them and give them life. He calls us to follow him. When we come to Christ, it's not a band-aid over our sin. It's us seeing a new way of living. It's us seeing that the old way we lived was wrong. It's us seeing Christ as Messiah, the true God who gives us true life and calls us to life. If we say we follow somebody today, we have to make sure we're thinking of that correctly. Because there's a way to say, I follow you, which means that I follow someone's random thoughts in 140 characters or less. And we follow people on Twitter. It's the way you communicate in 140 characters. And to follow someone means you sign up to get their random thoughts on the day. That's not what it means to follow Christ. It's not just getting some random thought from Christ every day. It's not just getting your daily little Bible reading, and that's all you get for the day. When you follow Christ, it changes everything about your life. It means he's sovereign and has the right to rule every part of life every day, every minute of every day. To follow Christ, first and foremost, means we deny ourselves. We deny the old master, our sinful heart. We deny ourselves. We submit to Christ and we say what he says is right is right. We seek to be confronted by God's word and let it judge us and tell us what we should believe. We don't pretend to be wiser or smarter or more clever than God's word. We must think we must seek to think God's thoughts after him. Because that's the only way we're going to think properly. Secondly, we deny our desires. This is the heart of our sin. This is the desires that come from our heart. This is the center of sin. That's where it begins. We must stop desiring sin and seek to desire God. It's a slow process. If we have trained ourselves to desire in such a way that's against God over so long, it's going to take time to train your desires to be changed. You can change them slowly by changing your behavior, no longer feeding those desires. But it's a slow process and it is commanded by our Lord. Finally, we deny ourselves by seeking Christ and seeking to glorify him. So I want to mention here to follow Christ is never a solo act. When we follow Christ, we're called to follow him as part of a body and in a body with other believers, there's no such thing as a lone ranger Christian in Scripture. Even Paul, who was called out to to do not be a member of a church, but to constantly be going out and building churches and churches, he always had friends around him. He knew he needed that fellowship and the building up and the care of others. You cannot survive as a Lone Ranger Christian. It's not a solo act. We're called to invest in one another, to build one another up. This is why we encourage discipleship groups at Jefferson Park. We don't think you coming and hearing a sermon is enough. We don't think that you coming once a week to hear a message is enough. We believe you need other believers in your life constantly seeking to care for you, seeking to discuss sin and righteousness and God's word and the gospel. If you're a Christian, I encourage you to find a church where you are fed and cared for and built up. Our next section, Philip witnesses to Nathaniel that Jesus is the promised one, verses 45 to 46. Philip found Nathaniel and said to him, We have found him of whom Moses and the law and the prophets wrote Jesus of Nazareth, son of Joseph. Nathaniel said to him, Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Philip said to him, Come and see. Here we see another disciple going and gathering, bearing witness. Jesus only called one man in this section. Now we see Philip going to find Nathaniel. And this is a great declaration. We have found him, of which all the Old Testament prophets wrote. We have found the one that has been anticipated. He is here. Now the title he gives Jesus is really somewhat startling. He does say he's a promised one. But then he tells of Jesus of Nazareth and the son of Joseph. Now, Nazareth is a nowhere town, as we'll see. Andrew, he says, well, what good could possibly come out of Nazareth? You see, the promised one, he's supposed to be born in the royal city of Bethlehem. What is this guy from Nazareth? And maybe Andrew's from the neighboring rival town. You know, like Blacksburg to Charlottesville. What good could come out of Blacksburg? What good can we... It's possible that that's there, but I think there may be something more biblically founded here, because the promise, when he's supposed to come from Bethlehem, here he's asking, what good can come from Nazareth? And I also, I do think there's some prejudice here. Nazareth is a nowhere town where no one comes from. We see that there is a prejudice against this, this people of Andrew and the beauty of it is that Christ, while he is the son of God from Bethlehem, born of Bethlehem, he takes on this humility. He's also the son of Joseph. He became flesh. He had a human father. He had a real mother. He came and lived in Nazareth, a nowhere city. He came humbly. And we have to realize that those who follow him, we are called to be humble. to be lowly. Regarding our witness, Jesus is worthy to be worshipped because he came so humbly to save us. Regarding our witness, there's a warning here against our prejudice. There's a warning here against our prejudice. Was there somebody that came through the doors this morning that you said, I'm not going to go greet them? Was there somebody who would come across your path and you would say, they're not worthy of hearing the gospel? Look at them. There's no way God could love that person. Friends, that's prejudice. The gospel is for every kind of sinner. We must repent of thinking that someone is unworthy of the gospel. God says you go tell everyone I'll be selective. We're putting ourselves in the place of God when we're being selective as to who gets to hear it. Fifthly, Nathaniel bears witness that Jesus is the son of God. Verses 47, 49, Jesus saw Nathaniel coming toward him and said to him, Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit. Nathaniel said to him, How do you know me? Jesus answered him before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree. I saw you. Nathaniel answered him, Rabbi, you are the son of God. You are the king of Israel. Jesus sees Nathaniel coming. An Israelite, indeed, a true Israelite with no deceit. Now, every man is a liar. Nathaniel is not removed from this accusation. What I believe he's saying here is that Nathaniel is a single-hearted guy. He's not like Jacob, the original Israelite, who was duplicitous. He had two desires. He had many motives. I believe he's saying that, anyway, you're a genuine man. You say what you intend and you intend what you say. We already see that in Andrew. What good could come out of Nazareth? He says what's on his mind. Andre says, How do you know me? Jesus says, I saw you under that fig tree. Because he said, I saw you, he had seen where he was not, because he is omnipresent. Andrew says, Rabbi, again, Master, You are the Son of God. Now, I believe this is actually the climax of our story. For remember, the whole point of John is that you will believe that Jesus is the Son of God. We've walked through all these different titles. He's a Lamb of God. He's called Rabbi. He's the Promised One. He's the Messiah. Follow me. Now we get to the real confession. He's the Son of God. This is what John wants us to believe, that Jesus is the Son of God. We see Andrew making this profession a faith. He is the true Son of God. He is the one who is able to save. Now, he connects the Son of God with the King of Israel. That's because of 2 Samuel 7. Where God promised David, you will have a son who will sit on your throne forever. His reign will be eternal and righteous. And so he's connected the son of God to the king of Israel. But I don't think he actually knows what he's saying quite yet. And it's false. We see that we were to follow the one who is fully God, the one who is the true son of God, the king. Finally, let's look at verses 50 and 51, Jesus promises there is more to come. In answer to Nathaniel, Jesus answered him, Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You will see greater things than these. Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and ascending on the Son of Man. It didn't take much for him to believe. Jesus had a very small miracle. He happened to see him under a fig tree where his eyes could not see him. And he believed and he confessed that he was the Son of God. And Jesus says, if you believe because of this, you ain't seen nothing yet. This is the beginning of the Gospels. He hasn't even begun his signs yet. We see greater things are going to happen. The wedding at Cana is what John the Evangelist will declare. This is the first sign. There'll be numerous signs, numerous miracles that happen to point to Jesus. He is the true Messiah. He's saying you haven't seen anything yet. He's really preparing us now. What happens? Jesus has made the transition from the old to the new, from John the Baptist to himself. He's the Messiah, the one we're supposed to be looking to. And then he begins his signs, the things that are greater to come. Notice verse 51, Jesus, for the first time, he's going to use truly, truly, this is a true and trustworthy saying, I say to you, you will see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and ascending on the Son of Man. This is referring back to Jacob and his ladder. When God right before God called Jacob to be Israel, his people, his nation's name, and there you saw a new authority taking place, the heavens opened up and God was speaking and acting in a new way. Jesus is saying with everything I teach, with everything I say, with everything I do, you're going to see the heavens opened up. The rest of the gospel is going to be progressively showing us how the heavens are opened up and a son of man is seen as the one who has authority to save sinners so that we see that he is a son of God whom we should believe. The final sign, of course, is his dying for sinners and being raised from the grave. If you look through this text, Jesus is worthy. He's worthy of our worship because he's God. He's worthy of our worship because he's our substitute. He's worthy of our worship because the anointed one, the king, the prophet and the priest. He's worthy of our worship because he's the one that all the Old Testament was looking forward to. He's worthy of our worship because he is the son of God, the king of Israel. He's worthy to be followed. This means we Stop seeking our own kingdom, our own comfort, our own pleasure, and we seek to glorify him. We stop determining what is right and good for us and we submit to him and we ask him, God, what is right and good for you? As we think of thoughts, we have to realize Scripture is very clear on a very precise thing. Scripture is clear on who God is, what he has done for us and what he expects from us. This is what we look to God's word. This is we're looking to the gospel of John for who is God. What has he done for us? What does he expect from us? That is how we follow him. And finally, he's worthy of our witness. It's good news, friends, that's what the gospel is. It's declaring a new order is here, a new king is here. He's worthy of our witness. What are we loving more that keeps us from witnessing to our neighbors, our friends and our family members? We have the good news. Why aren't we sharing? Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, we look to you, the one who is worthy of all praise and honor and glory. The one who is true love, and we see that love in your Son, Jesus Christ. Help us, Spirit, to worship the one God, the Father, the Son, and yourself. Help us, Lord, to worship you. Point out our sins. Illuminate in our hearts, in our minds, in our eyes, where we are hanging on and clinging to our old master's sin. Help us, Lord, to repent of that sin and help us, Lord, to see the glory of Jesus Christ more as we see that he forgives us and reconciles us to the Father. Help us, Lord, to be witnesses. Help us, Lord, to know that it is the power of the gospel that saves sinners. Help us, Lord, to be faithful and to trust in the spirit that changes lives when they hear the gospel. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.