The Heart Searcher

Intro:I was reading in the book of John this week and read something that bothered me, so I wanted deep understanding of what this verse meant and what we could learn from it..

Please stand for the reading of God’s word!

John 2:23–25 “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did. But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.”

PRAY!!

This story reminded me of another time when Jesus “didn't commit Himself to them.”

Mark 4:10–12 “But when He was alone, those around Him with the twelve asked Him about the parable. And He said to them, “To you it has been given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God; but to those who are outside, all things come in parables, so that ‘Seeing they may see and not perceive, And hearing they may hear and not understand; Lest they should turn, And their sins be forgiven them.’ ””

We need to know some things about the way things were during that time for the Jews

The average Jew was poverty-stricken. They suffered at the hands of the Roman overlords, at the hands of the tax-collectors, and under the heavy yoke of the religious bigots in Jerusalem. The Jewish nation had a proud heritage. It had enjoyed pre-eminence under David and Solomon, but during the hundreds of years since Solomon, this nation had suffered oppression and slavery at the hands of her conquerors. Israel had become the byword and the laughing stock of the heathen and the barbarian. It had been some four hundred years since God’s last direct communication with His chosen nation.

And so this multitude of Judeans who were beholding His signs were anticipating these signs as omens that He was about to declare Himself the long awaited King, the One who would forever relieve their poverty, their political oppression and their religious burdens.

And this is what Jesus saw when He looked on their hearts, and this is why He would not entrust them with His cause

Temporary excitement or saving faith?

Jesus knew that a temporary excitement or a faith based on signs was not sufficient. Many of the early followers later turned back when He did not take up the role of a political king

Until His death and resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit, the foundation for faith was not fully laid

They believed in His name, that is, they trusted in Him. This was not the saving faith as the next verse implies. They believed He was a great Healer and teacher, but not necessarily a great Savior from sin.

There is a great difference between mere intellectual belief, and the saving faith.

Many who saw the miracles He did believed that He was a messenger from God. They saw that His miracles were not the clever tricks of an impostor, and they were prepared to listen to His teaching and enroll themselves as members of the kingdom He came to found. Yet our Lord did not encourage them. He saw that they misunderstood Him. He recognised their worldliness of heart and of aim, and Jesus did not admit them to the intimacy He had established with the five simple-minded Galileans. The Jerusalem Jews were glad to fall in with one who seemed likely to do honour to their nation

It appears that those who believed on him here were interpreting His signs as harbingers of an impending militant Messiah who would spark a revolution and throw off all their oppressions.

The Top 10 Lessons From The Searcher Of Hearts:

10. God knows your heart

John 2:24 “But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men”

“because He knew all men”....He knew they had “heard” and “seen” but He also knew they weren't commited

OMNISCIENCE = omnis, all, and scientia, knowledge.] The quality of knowing all things at once; universal knowledge; knowledge unbounded or infinite. Omniscience is an attribute peculiar to God.An American Dictionary of the English Language

Daniel 2:22 “He reveals deep and secret things; He knows what is in the darkness, And light dwells with Him.”

Psalm 139:1–4 “O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off. You comprehend my path and my lying down, And are acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word on my tongue, But behold, O Lord, You know it altogether.”

In the end, they just couldn’t get on board with Jesus because He didn’t match up to King David’esk version they had of what The Messiah should be like.

And in the end it tore Jesus’s heart to pieces when He He stood on the hill overlooking Jerusalem and sobbed saying:

Matthew 23:37 ““O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!”

9. Examine the condition of your heart

Jeremiah 17:9–10 ““The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind.”

It takes courage to ask this:

Psalm 139:23–24 “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; And see if there is any wicked way in me, And lead me in the way everlasting.”

There is a difference between God searching me and my searching myself. I may search my heart, and pronounce it all right, but when God searches me as with a lighted candle, a good many things will come to light that perhaps I knew nothing about.

Dwight Lyman Moody (Evangelist)

( God's examination is for our ultimate good, instilling in us a desire for purity and alignment with His will.)

8. Don’t be shallow

John 2:23 “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did.”

Believed in His name vs. believed in Him.”

Reminds of the parable of the sower..

Matthew 13:5 “Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth.”

Colossians 2:6–7 “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.”

John 15:5 ““I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.”

The deeper the roots go, the more fruit it bears

7. Have fruitful soil

Matthew 13:8–9 “But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!”

So how do we cultivate the soil of our hearts to make sure we have it right?

By living authentically

By seeking repentance

By seeking Him

And by Praying to Him for all things

6. Ask, Seek, Knock

Matthew 7:7–8 ““Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”

James 1:5 “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.”

James 4:2–3 “You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.”

For Pete’s sake ask! ASK!

5. More of The Holy Spirit

Luke 11:13 “If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”

Where there’s more of The Holy Spirit, there’s more abundance of fruit

4. Transformation is a must

For the folks who Jesus didn’t commit to, it was because their belief made them spectators only, not a commited soul on fire for Christ.

Seek God’s help in transforming our inner selves, highlighting our need for Christ's redemptive work in purifying our hearts.

Romans 12:2 “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

3. Grow In Christ

2 Peter 3:18 “but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

Hebrews 6:1 “Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,”

1 Timothy 4:15 “Meditate on these things; give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all.”

James 4:8 “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.”

He promises that He will draw near and dear to us, if we’ll just make an effort to know Him

Listen, were moving in 1 of 2 directions.. up or down

If your’e not climbing up, your sliding down

2. Don’t Quit

Galatians 6:9 “And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.”

Jesus will not leave you but you may abandon Him

John 14:18 “I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.”

Acts 20:24 “But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.”

The number 1 question to ask of yourself this morning that must be answered is..

Can Jesus trust Himself to you?

Jesus isn’t looking for a reason brush you aside, He’s looking for genuine faith and love

What God wants is really quite simple: He wants us. All our service for God must flow from those two commands to love

Mark 12:30–31 “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

CALL UP WORSHIP TEAM!

IN CLOSING:

Wherever there is a searching heart, God responds.

Warren W. Wiersbe

Some times in football you'll see a quarterback and a wide receiver look at each other during a play and you’ll see the quarterback make this motion. What the QB is telling him is “Go deep!” And sometimes I think God makes the same motion to us.. “Go Deep!”

PRAY!!!!