Getting to Know Him
What a friend we have in Jesus • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Today we start a little series called What a friend we have in Jesus. We will see how spiritually important it is for us to recognize that Jesus is the truest friend.
So today we start with getting to know Jesus
I see so many people looking for fulfillment and hope from what the world has to offer.
I spent most of my twenties looking for fulfillment from what the world has to offer only to be let down, time and time again.
It was when I came back to God who had been waiting for me, let the Spirit be my guide, and deepened my understanding of who Jesus is and what he did for me that I found fulfillment and joy.
Let’s read together chair Bible pg. 435 Proverbs 18:24
24 A person of too many friends comes to ruin, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Are you ready for the message God has for us today?
Cool let’s dig in!
Being a friend implies a relationship, and relationship implies knowing someone
So, how well do you know Jesus?
The Surpassing Value of Knowing
The Surpassing Value of Knowing
Let us read together Chair Bible pg. 787 Philippians 3:7-11
7 But whatever things were gain to me, these things I have counted as loss because of Christ.
8 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them mere rubbish, so that I may gain Christ,
9 and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith,
10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death;
11 if somehow I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Look at verse 8 again
N.T. Wright translated it this way - “I calculate everything as a loss, because knowing King Jesus as my lord is worth far more than everything else put together!”
How deep was the desire of Paul in wanting to know Jesus. Everything else paled in comparison to the value of knowing Jesus!
In verse 8 the Greek word translated “knowing” means knowledge, the psychological result of perception and learning and reasoning.
Paul’s expression to know Christ is intimate and glows with the warmth of direct relationship, it is equivalent to fellowship with Christ.
This knowing Jesus is not intellectual knowledge. This is intimate knowledge that deepens a relationship.
It’s knowing Jesus in the sense of Galatians 2:20
20 I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
Galatians also sets out why we would want to know Jesus in this way.
There is nothing in the world that can be considered even remotely as significant or valuable compared to the surpassing value of knowing Jesus.
We are talking about Philippians 3:11
11 if somehow I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Knowing Jesus as Friend and Brother
Knowing Jesus as Friend and Brother
In getting to know Jesus we we begin to know him as a friend.
Do we really know Jesus as a friend?
Some are afraid to consider that, which is understandable if we use the worlds understanding.
In wanting to be friend Jesus is not sending you a facebook friend request!
13 Greater love has no one than this, that a person will lay down his life for his friends.
14 You are My friends if you do what I command you.
15 No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, because all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.
The Greek word for “friends” - A person you know well and regard with affection and trust.
That word trust, do we trust Jesus? Do we have a close affection with Him?
So we simply cannot know the kind of friend Jesus is without knowing Him.
One thing that crossed my mind is how many friends have come and gone in my life.
Some friends have passed away, others moved away, other I lost when I moved away.
That is not the kind of friendship we have with Jesus, as the proverb says he sticks closer than a brother.
See Jesus isn’t just a friend but also is a brother!
Consider what Jesus said in Mark 3:34-35
34 And looking around at those who were sitting around Him, He said, “Here are My mother and My brothers!
35 For whoever does the will of God, this is My brother, and sister, and mother.”
The words “brothers and sisters” means siblings believers understood as one’s own siblings in God’s family.
These are brothers and sisters who have the same parents.
This we share with Jesus - Romans 8:16-17
16 The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God,
17 and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him.
Through Jesus we have adopted as sons and daughters now sharing the same Father as Jesus, who considers us siblings in His family!
What a blessing to know Jesus in this way.
As in a family there is also a promise of being heirs. We are not just heirs but co-heirs with Jesus!
Paul said “fellow heirs” - this is a person who is an heir in the same inheritance as another.
When we put this all together the more we know Jesus the deeper our friendship and stronger the familial connection to Him.
Are we beginning to see how worthless everything else is in comparison to knowing Jesus?
This kind of relationship is what God has always desired and is why we were created!
Thus, the importance of reconciliation - 2 Corinthians 5:17-19
17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, this person is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
18 Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation,
19 namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their wrongdoings against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
God has been waiting for us to come home - Luke 15:20
20 “So he set out and came to his father. But when he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion for him, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.
Reconciliation - the act of establishing friendly relations after disagreement. To make things right with one another.
Being reconciled with God means adoption into God’s family, Jesus becoming our friend and brother!
Knowing What Jesus Did
Knowing What Jesus Did
As we get to know Jesus we begin to understand more fully what the cross means and why Jesus died willingly in our place.
6 For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
7 For one will hardly die for a righteous person; though perhaps for the good person someone would even dare to die.
8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
This passages ties back to John 15:13-14
13 Greater love has no one than this, that a person will lay down his life for his friends.
14 You are My friends if you do what I command you.
That is how much of a friend Jesus is!
That is one reason knowing Him surpasses the value of anything this world can offer!
In reconciliation there was a necessity of payment for our sins.
As a friend and brother Jesus did what we could not do ourselves.
God through the prophet Isaiah tells us the best we could ever do - Isaiah 64:6
6 For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; And all of us wither like a leaf, And our wrongdoings, like the wind, take us away.
By “filthy garment” the Hebrew is actually “bloody garment”
Our best is bloody clothes! Considered unclean under the Old Law!
Thus, Jesus without spot or blemish, sinless, and while we were still sinners gave His life as a sacrificial payment for the eternal cost of our sins!
Why? He wanted friend and family! He loved us!
Thus He secured reconciliation - John 1:12-13
12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name,
13 who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of a man, but of God.
That is what Jesus did!
Conclusion:
We need to study more and get know Jesus more intimately!
Friend if you have not come Jesus yet, do you see what he did for you?
He is with His father waiting for you to come home!
He secured reconciliation for you!
He wants to be your friend and brother, and so much more
24 A person of too many friends comes to ruin, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.
Will you come to the altar today and accept Jesus, give him your life, be reconciled to God today, the altars are open.
Let us pray!