I Am: The Door

A Picture with words

Intro: One of the hardest and most important decisions of a home builder is picking out the main entry door. It has to declare a message about the home owner. It needs to be bold and accent the house. It sends of message of stability and strength. A home builder will spend several thousand dollars on this element. How you enter the home matters.

What kind of entry door do you think you should have? Well, this text doesn’t pull any punches. Our entry door is to be Jesus.

Jesus uses the picture that the people would certainly understand. A sheep pen was kept either at the edge of the town or closer to the center in which sheep were brought in from the fields at night to keep them safe. They were corralled and then the gate was shut. They spent their day wandering from area to area without even so much as lifting their heads to see what is in front of them.

Sheep imagery was strong in their culture. Abraham, David the shepherd king, and Ezekiel 34 is a heavy shepherd picture.

If our minds and hearts are not filled with God’s Truth, something else will take His place: cynicism, occultism, false religions and philosophies, drugs—the list is endless.

The Exclusivity of God: Who do you think you are?

Exodus 20:3 NRSV

you shall have no other gods before me.

God is anticipatory. He knew our need before we could even begin in our limited minds conceptualize what needed to take place. Our of his knowledge he acted.

Philippians 2 “If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is…”

Christians accused of theological arrogance in that Jesus is the only way to God and salvation.

1 John 5:11–12 “And this is the testimony: God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.”

John 3:36 “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God’s wrath.”

Acts 4:12 “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.””

John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Jesus is THE door.

Why?

Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Exodus 12:23 “For the Lord will pass through to strike down the Egyptians; when he sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over that door and will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you down.”

there is no religious pluralism. We are not being rude just proclaiming truth. There is no other religious practice that has been proven more authentic and reliable both in accurately and historically. Our doctrine exists confirmed on over 15,000 manuscripts written well within the first generation church.

“If our minds and hearts are not filled with God’s Truth, something else will take His place: cynicism, occultism, false religions and philosophies, drugs—the list is endless.”— Billy Graham

Wrong way down a one-way street. Police enforce the law whether I feel it is right or not.

God is adjudicatory: He has taken in all of the necessary information and taken decisive action on our behalf. 2 Timothy 4:1 “In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I solemnly urge you:”

Jesus is both the gate and the gatekeeper

Prophet: speaks and his voice carries the words of God.

Priest becomes the sacrifice offered to atone for our sins.

King: Is the authority of God himself. The creatio demurge.

The privileged Opportunity

God is revelatory: God has given us His

Romans 8:9–12 “But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you. So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh—”

Jesus is the answer to Pilate’s query what is truth?

Spread the word

How we speak matters just as much as what we speak.

We do not apologize for the Gospel but joyfully share it.

We invite all to receive Christ and profess his name.

2 Peter 1:16 NRSV

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we had been eyewitnesses of his majesty.

We are a people rallied by the truth of Jesus Christ. We are not going to be timid or apologize for it.

2 Timothy 1:7 NRSV

for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.

2 Timothy 3:1–5 “You must understand this, that in the last days distressing times will come. For people will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, inhuman, implacable, slanderers, profligates, brutes, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to the outward form of godliness but denying its power. Avoid them!”

Jesus makes it clear that any religious leader who offers salvation other than the teachings of Christ is a “thief” and a “robber.

Speak. Share. Stand.