Why We Miss God When He's Near

Transcript

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[0:00] Our scripture reading today comes from John chapter 1. I didn't put my bookmark in there, sorry. And it's verse 1 through 18. In the beginning, the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him. The Word gave life to everything that was created, and his life brought light to everyone.

[0:43] The light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it. God sent a man, John the Baptist, to tell about the light so that everyone might believe. Because of his testimony, the Word was created. John himself was not the light. He was simply a witness to tell about the light. The one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He came into the very world he created, but the world didn't recognize him. He came to his own people, and even they rejected him. But to all who believed in him and accepted him, he gave the right to be a man of God. He gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn, not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God. So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father's one and only Son.

[1:51] John testified about him when he shouted to the crowds, This is the one I was talking about when I said, Someone is coming after me, who is far greater than I am, for he existed long before me. From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses, but God's unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.

[2:18] No one has ever seen God, but the unique one, who is himself God, is near to the Father's heart. He has revealed God to us. Let's pray. Our gracious, loving God, we thank you that you sent your Son into this world that we may have life. God, we pray that you would bless this service. We pray that you would bless your words to us. And we pray that this service would exalt you. God, speak to us. Speak to each and every one of us and help us to be more and more aware of your Spirit among us. These things we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

[3:04] Just a warning to Eric. At some point, I'm going to have people shout out answers. And you can give them the mic or they can just shout it out, whatever is easier for you. So before we begin, I'm going to ask you some questions. And these are not microphone questions. These are just think-to-yourself questions. You don't even have to get into groups yet.

[3:30] We're going to take a moment for you to just think through them. In fact, I'm going to time out two minutes. And so for some of you who don't like the uncomfortable silence, it's only going to last two minutes.

[3:42] But I want you to think through, maybe write it down on your bulletin or just think in your head, when was a time that you were rejected? And this might be a time that you felt you should be better received. This might be a time where you didn't expect it. This might be a time you were rejected by people you didn't expect to reject you. Or it might be a time you were rejected by people you did expect to reject you.

[4:14] Importantly, I want you to think about what were the feelings you had surrounding that situation. And who was it? Who were the people that you most expect to be rejected by? And who are the people in your life that you most expect to be accepted by and received by? So it's a lot of questions. Should I repeat them?

[4:38] Yes? Okay. Think of a time you were rejected. Think of the circumstances surrounding it and the feelings surrounding it. And who are the people you most expected to reject? And who are the people you most expect to be rejected by? And who are the people you most expect to be received or accepted by? And I will do two minutes on the timer starting now.

[5:34] Right? Right? Right? Right? Right? Right? Right? Thank you. All right, time's up. So there are times when I do think about the fall. There are times when I think about the fall and I think about the chaos that it caused. There are times when I see the world and I understand that the fall was not just about sin but about the brokenness around us. But really, I think I don't spend enough time thinking about the effects of the fall of humanity that were on the world.

[7:41] It's possibly because I've always lived in the world after the fall, and I never knew, I never knew the perfection that we're now missing. So it's easy for me to think, oh, the fall of humanity was just sin entering the world, just sin itself entering the world. And that is a terrible enough concept. And I think maybe it's hard for me to wrap my mind around just that concept that before the world was, there was no sin, and then there was sin. But the impact of that fall is so insidious and evil, and so far beyond just sin, that we don't always recognize everything that has happened. All of our relationships are distorted now. And that didn't used to be the case. So it wasn't just that now we do bad things and we used to not do bad things. It's our relationships, these relationships that we just are not in, understand as normal, didn't have to be this broken. And they weren't originally. So with creation, our relationship is now broken. Can you imagine walking in perfect harmony with creation? Because I honestly can't. Or I can imagine, but my imagination doesn't reach the fullness of that.

[9:10] Our relationships with each other are now broken. And I think that's a really important point. With our children, with our children, with our parents, with our friends. You know, the people we love the most, and they're broken. And that doesn't even include the people we don't know, the people who are strangers, the people who have wronged us, the people we will never meet in person. Those relationships are broken.

[9:37] Our relationship with ourselves are broken. And that one I think we rarely pay attention to. And that's why I think we need to be more careful about the way we think about ourselves. But how would it look like for you to live in harmony with yourself? When I asked you, when you felt rejected, how many of you said that one person who rejected you was yourself? Because that's true.

[9:59] But most especially, and this is the one we're going to focus on today, most especially, our relationship with God was broken. Our relationship with God was so damaged, damaged by the fall, that we don't recognize God when we see him in creation. We don't recognize God when we see him in other people. We don't recognize God when we see him in ourselves.

[10:30] We didn't even recognize God when he came to dwell among us personally. So John's words in this passage are really a little sickening. They're really, really quite heart-wrenching when you let them sink in. It's Isaiah who tells us that the people were walking in darkness and they would see a great light. But then John tells us that when that great true light came, the light that gives light to everyone, it wasn't recognized. He wasn't recognized.

[11:10] Later in John, Jesus will tell his people that the sheep recognize their shepherd's voice. They are so intimately acquainted with their shepherd that when his voice calls among all the other voices, the sheep turn toward that voice and follow it. That's because the sheep have come to know that their shepherd will care for them. But the one who cares for us in all of our needs, the one who is with us from the dawn of the day, the one who cares for us in all of our needs, the one who is with us from the dawn of the day, the one who is with us from the dawn of the day, the one who is of creation, we did not recognize him when he came to speak to us. When Jesus entered the world, the voice they heard came to him through the filter of the fall. Now think of that time that you were rejected and imagine if it was by something that you created with your own hands and poured all of your very heart into. Some of us have been rejected by our own children and even that doesn't compare to someone whose heart you shaped personally.

[12:21] God came into the world that he created. He came to the people whom he had intimately and intentionally created, pouring himself into each one, but they didn't recognize him. And so they turned their backs on him. And we see this all throughout the Gospels. Christ healed, Christ taught, and he led by perfect example. But then time and time again, people just followed their sinful nature instead, because they thought that was what was right. They were so confused by the fall that they thought, I need to do what is right for me. I'm the one who has to take care of me. We no longer relied on our Creator to take care of us. We relied on this false God. We no longer relied on the falseness that we see through the filter of the fall to take care of us. And so we think, I need to take care of me. And so we push away and even cast hate on Christ. And we see this in the Gospels. And then not just the Gospels, but the entirety of the Bible. People simply reject God repeatedly. They reject him in the desert. They reject him in Egypt before they leave for the desert. They, they reject him over and over in the time of the judges. They do what is right in their own eyes. They reject his prophets. They reject the law. They refuse to recognize him when he's working in

[13:53] the world around them. The fall caused us to be so alienated from God that we couldn't even recognize him when he came directly into this world, which is shocking because maybe it's hard to recognize God when he's in some realm and we can't see him face to face. Maybe it's hard when he feels so far away and distant, but he came into this world directly in the flesh and stood right among us. And John tells us we didn't recognize him. He was in the world, but his own people did not receive him. Now we're, we're somehow pre-programmed to think better of ourselves. Um, and so when we read the Bible, it's really easy for us to say, oh, they did something wrong. And to say it was them, they did that thing. And we know better. Uh, we want to say that if we had lived 2000 years ago, we would have noticed.

[14:55] We want to not just say that to other people, but we genuinely want to think it to ourselves that if we lived 2000 years ago and we saw Jesus walking around, we would have known there's something about us. Maybe we have a deeper relationship than they had 2000 years ago. We would have noticed something different. We would have understood on some deeper level that this is God and we wouldn't have rejected him. We would have received him and cared for him and followed him out of the darkness. I, uh, at Easter time, and this has been the last few years, there's this little meme slash cartoon that goes around about an alien race. Uh, and they're talking to humans and they're just really excited about Jesus coming again. And the human is like, oh, we've been waiting 2000 years for Jesus to return. And the aliens say, really? He visits us every year. We give him donuts every time he comes. And the human, and then they say to the humans, what did you do to him? And the humans are just silent. Um, we always ask ourselves or we always assume we would be like the aliens. We would give him donuts and receive him. But then how did we treat him when he came? And it's not just because those people 2000 years ago were savage. It's not just because those people 2000 years ago couldn't see

[16:36] something that we would obviously see. And of course, hindsight is 2020. We know now that we rejected God in the flesh. We today get to see the whole story played out for us and we can read it for ourselves. We can read it before, during, and after Christ's time as a human and what happened.

[17:00] But the first century people of Judea did not have that opportunity. They are exactly like us. It's just that we have the knowledge of what was happening then. And it really honestly hurts me when I, when I stop and think about this and allow myself to really dwell on it. It really hurts me to know that I would have acted the exact same way.

[17:26] That I would have acted, uh, just as the people that he walked among did. But the truth is, I do this. I do this every day. And I think you do too, not to call anyone out, but I think you do too. Because I reject God and I reject Christ over and over. Whether I mean to or whether I don't mean to, or whether it's something that just escapes my notice, there are times every day where I reject Christ.

[17:58] So I want to take another moment of silence. But there are times where admitting sin or admitting faults in front of the body of Christ can be healing. Um, and we don't do this often. So if you're comfortable, you can, um, speak out and Eric can come with a mic or you can just shout it out. Uh, where have you rejected Christ in your life recently? If you're uncomfortable speaking out, we'll just take two minutes of silence and you can think about it in your hearts.

[18:36] But if you're comfortable and you think it would be beneficial to you spiritually or beneficial to somebody else spiritually, then I encourage you to speak up out loud. Um, just stand up, uh, where you are, uh, and tell us where have you rejected Christ in your life spiritually? And I will start our two minute timer again.

[19:06] How many times in my use of time does one go after getting Christ? George, go ahead. When I was, when I was sick and our family stayed home from church and what she said, they, they chose not to watch this ceremony either while it was happening or after it when I rejected that. Thank you.

[19:30] Go ahead. Um, I would say maybe, uh, yeah, truthfully, uh, uh, uh, the gospel of Christ and the people that follow his truth and I chose to you know follow my simple nature and you know to go along with the way I was living and the way they were living and believe in that for my life and so I lied to myself and chose to not believe in the truth and now I chose to believe in the truth praise God I would agree with time and time management and the goodness of life and the goodness of life and I'm really excited to get back and I'm working on my book okay I'm very structured I'm very structured I just like to know that time is exact so that's today there are some things we spoke out loud and there are things I imagine that are more personal or harder to admit that we only spoke in our hearts but we've all rejected God and that's today that's knowing that he came to walk among us the people who walked with Christ in person 2,000 years ago had no handy written New Testament to understand what they were doing and from their perspective they had no reason to even consider that God would come to this earth and become human to take on the wretched condition of sinful humanity not only that but to start from infancy God could have done whatever he wanted

[21:57] he could have become a powerful king right from the start and demanded our allegiance but he started as an infant in a poor family in some unimportant little town in their world view they had no reason to think that the one through whom all things were made would come and make a living as a carpenter turned traveling rabbi from all they knew they had absolutely no reason to expect the Messiah to be the last man to come to the world and to be the light of the life walking in the dark alleyways of our sinful lives so they were absolutely clueless when they said things like who is this who commands even the winds and seas and they obey him they meant it they were clueless when they said who is this it wasn't a rhetorical question like it is to us now and they really had no idea when they asked who is this who speaks with such authority they were even mocking him when they said that and yet they had really no reason to understand or believe that it was God and especially when they considered him an illegitimate son of this sinful Mary they were being sincere when they asked why does this man speak like this who can forgive sins but God alone we take it now as a question that was made to make us think but they didn't know that he was God alone

[23:38] and so like John said he was in the world and yet the world did not recognize him he came to his own and his own people did not receive him but it's not as though God was caught off guard by all of this he knew precisely how humanity would respond are you kidding it's not how it's how humanity would respond to this he has been responding since the beginning of the fall and God knew the possibilities of the Garden of Eden before the fall and none of this is too surprising or too shocking to him even the things that you called out today even the things that were in your heart they are not too surprising for God they are not too shocking for God they are not too appalling for God God knew he understands he knew he understands he expected this it's not as if Jesus expected everyone to know who he was which is why he could say with compassion and concern on the cross Father forgive them for they know not what they do our Lord was not caught off guard by the lack of a welcome party at his arrival by the lack of a welcome party at his arrival in fact in fact Jesus came into the world precisely for the purpose of not being recognized or received at first in order that we would recognize and receive him now it is because he was rejected

[25:24] that we are now seen as acceptable before God Almighty before God Almighty he had to be rejected in order that we could be made as a in order that he could be made as a sacrifice for our sin it is because he was rejected by his own people that God the Father now receives his own people as his children Jesus came into the world specifically for the purpose of not being recognized or received specifically for the purpose of not being recognized or received at first so that we would now recognize and receive him so by grace and by the Spirit's enabling we do recognize him now and what do we recognize we recognize that Jesus Christ is the King of creation and we receive citizenship in the kingdom of God we recognize our own sins and we recognize our own sins and we receive forgiveness and mercy and we receive forgiveness and mercy so everything that was on your heart when you asked where have I not recognized him or where have I rejected him we can receive forgiveness and mercy for those things and we do receive forgiveness and mercy of those things because at first we rejected Christ we recognize that his death was in our place and we receive eternal life in his name and we receive eternal life in his name we recognize our need for a savior

[27:05] and we receive salvation in him we recognize our unrighteousness and we receive Christ's righteousness as our own we recognize he is the true light and we receive his calling to go and shine as his true light in the world because of that we recognize that he is the true light because that's what we are we are lights shining in the world now the world rejected its savior before but that doesn't stop him from continuing to act in the world today now Christ the true life takes action in the world through those who do receive him so John 1 5 says the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it and I want you to notice that that is present tense the light currently shines and it shines through you so these last two are group questions so I want you to turn to just the couple of people next to you sorry Jackie just the couple of people next to you you don't have to move if no one is next to you then scooch a little bit but you don't have to move if you don't want to just take a personal inventory of your life right now in what ways can you welcome Christ in the midst of your current circumstances that's question one and how can you intentionally help others in your life to recognize and welcome Jesus

[28:45] in the next few days and weeks so one is how can you welcome Christ two how can you help others welcome Christ and we'll take two minutes and if you want to just think about this on your own you can but I'm going to prod you and encourage you to move into groups and you can do that and you can do that and you can do that Thank you.

[31:08] All right, that's time. Okay. So there are ways that we make ready, like John did, the path for Christ to come. John made ready the path for Christ to come the first time around. And by welcoming him in our lives and by helping others welcome him, we make ready the path for him to come again.

[31:44] We make ready the way by raising children in the faith. Your children, someone else's children, adult children, young children. I mean, any of God's. Children we make ready by raising them in the faith. That is shining the light of Christ in the world. We make ready the way by living as honest and honorable students or honest and honorable employees or honest and honorable bosses, whatever your situation at work or school is. That is shining the light of Christ in the world.

[32:28] We make ready the path for Christ in the faith. We make ready the way by not gossiping or not speaking cruelly or even poorly about others, but rather putting the best light on circumstances and on people.

[32:43] That is shining the light of Christ in the world. We make ready the way for Christ by putting our lives of worship, whether that's coming to church or reading scripture at home or taking time out of our lives to pray for others. Whether that's coming to church or taking time out to sing songs of praise or getting out in nature and worshiping the Creator. We make ready the way for Christ by putting our lives of worship before all other parts of our life. That's hard to do. But that is shining the light of Christ in the world.

[33:20] Telling others about the One who entered into the darkness of the world all for you, that is shining the Christ of the world. And where we fail at all this, we make ready the way for Christ to come again by confessing our sins before God and before one another and accepting his forgiveness and accepting the forgiveness of others and extending the forgiveness to others also. That is shining the light of Christ in the world, all for the purpose of being the light of Christ in the world. that others too may recognize and receive Christ and that to God be the glory. We want others to see Jesus, the true light in us, to recognize him in all we say and do. And that is shining the light of Christ. Let's pray.

[34:21] God, we thank you that you came and that you're coming again. We pray that we can help make ready the way by shining your light in this world and that all we say and do would bring glory to your kingdom. These things we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.