God Draws Us In

Recap Last Session

Ok who can give me a quick recap of what we learned last session?

What were some things you learned in the small group time?

Intro

That was kinda the bad news session. Now we’re going to focus on the good news. but it’s important to remember how bad the bad news actually is, so that we can appreciate the good news all the more. The reality is that if sin is not bitter to us, Christ isn’t sweet. So we must realize the bitterness of our sin so we can come to recognize the immense sweetness of Christ.

Let me ask you this:

What’s the kindest thing someone has done for you? Apart from Jesus.

For me, I can think of a lot really. But one, I can think of is that people are paying for my grad school. I’ve been going to school for free the past 4 years, and that is incredible!

All throughout Scripture, there are countless demonstrations of God’s love and God’s kindness to us. And they aren’t just passages telling us that God loves us, they’re passages of Scripture showing us his love. The most obvious demonstration of this is Jesus’s death on the cross for us, right? This was God making the first move towards us to repair the broken relationship. Even though we were the ones who messed it all up and deserved to be punished by God, he stooped down to our level, became a man, and died a gruesome death on the cross. In that moment, He took all of the wrath of God towards our sin. That way we don’t have to experience his wrath.

We’re going to explore this idea in this session. Turn in your Bibles to John 1:1

Teaching

Let’s go ahead and read this together, then we’ll pray as we jump in.

Read Scripture passage

Prayer

The first thing I want to point out is this:

1. The World is Dark Without The Light Of Christ

Sin affects everything. It has broken our relationships

with each other

with the created world around us

with God,

and even our relationship with ourselves.

We talked last time about the pull of sin and how it has damaged our desires so that even those aren’t pure. And we feel the consequences of sin all the time . Do you guys feel that heaviness? That darkness because of sin? Especially after last night?

This passage in John tells us that Jesus is the light that shines in the darkness of our broken sinful world. We have no hope, no light, no life without him. And his light is so much stronger than the darkness. It changes everything.

You guys know how the sun (S-U-N) provides light and heat. And without it, life wouldn’t exist on this earth. We would die without the sun. It’s even more true of Jesus as light.

John 1:4 says that in Jesus is life itself.

And it says that Jesus, the Word, became flesh and dwelt among us. He didn’t just look on our mess from afar, he came into it for our sake. And he lived with us in a very real, intimate way. So that he could give us grace upon grace. So that he could make us children of God.

Transition: So Jesus coming to earth is the solution to our massive sin problem.

Let me point you to John 3:16.

Who has it memorized?

2. God Loves the World

You guys see the motive for sending Jesus? It’s the pure love of God.

Have you ever been around a sick toddler? They’re often pretty gross because they’re not aware enough to not get their germs everywhere. They’re often crying a lot, or just whining. Pretty unpleasant to be around. But that often doesn’t matter to the parent right?

My son Owen has been sick a few times, and when he gets sick he usually gets stuffed up and can barely breath. And have y’all heard of a thing called a snot sucker? Babies can’t blow their noses, so the snot has gotta be sucked out of their nostrils. We have one that’s a long tube connected with a filter to a thicker tube that you put in their nostril, and you suck on the other end to pull the snot out. I HATE IT! It’s the grossest thing to me, and I literally almost throw up every time Reggie uses it. And I’m not the one who does it, because I get too disgusted. It’s a moment of weakness of mine, but it shows me how deep Reggie’s love for Owen is, because she’s willing to do something so gross just to help him breath easier.

We often forget that we are like a sick baby. We need someone to help us in our desperate state, and it’s a messy job. But God loves us so much that he’s willing to stoop down into our mess and draw close to us.

This is truly amazing.

But what’s even more amazing is that he died for us. That goes above and beyond just entering into our disgusting world full of darkness. It’s actually radical to think of God doing this for us. Not just becoming a human being, but being willing to suffer in our place. It’s unlike any other religion out there because it doesn’t make sense humanly speaking. Our human love does not go that deep.

Romans 5:7–8 “For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

We were enemies of God. Dirty, worthless sinners who rejected our Creator. We rejected the very one who is keeping our hearts beating, who’s filling our lungs with breath.

This meant there was a great divide between us. And God did not want that divide to continue. So he did the unthinkable and drew near to us by becoming a human being, then died in our place to draw us even closer to him by removing the barrier of sin.

Now, we can be sons and daughters of God, part of his family, when we put our faith and trust in Jesus. And that warrants a response from us.

3. Drawing Close to Jesus

Flip over to Romans 8, verses 14-17

Read passage

You see the family language here? When we trust Jesus, we’re adopted as sons and daughters. We can call him our Heavenly Father and we call each other spiritual brothers and sisters. This passage says that it’s the Holy Spirit who leads us and makes us children of God. This means that its by his grace that we come to know the truth, receive forgiveness of our sins, receive salvation, and receive eternal life. It’s all by his grace that we become children of God through adoption.

Being a part of any family has great benefits right? You have a close, unbreakable bond with a group of people, and you belong there. Think of your own family. You can enjoy meals together, go on vacation together, talk to each other. Your family provides a sense of protection because you know they have your back. There are a lot of benefits to being a part of a healthy family.

How much more do we receive benefits from being part of God’s family?

We have unlimited access to our Heavenly Father. We can go to Him whenever we need, whenever we want. And as part of his family, we experience forgiveness over and over and over again. We grow in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control — the fruit of the Spirit.

So why wouldn’t we take advantage of these great benefits as much as possible? This is one of the ways we respond to what God has done… by leaning in to him! The way we experience these great benefits is by drawing near to God our Father.

Practically speaking, we do that as we read our Bibles, meditate on Jesus, pray, worship with other believers, worship on our own, confess our sins to God and ask for forgiveness, and so many more things. The point is that we experience more of God’s gracious benefits when we draw near to him, like he drew near to us.

Closing

So before we go to our small groups, I want to take a few minutes for you to reflect on some questions. They’re in page 12 of your booklet.

What part of this — if any — do you have a difficult time understanding or believing?

Why is it a big deal that Jesus chose to draw near a sinful world to save his people? (in other words, no one forced him to do this)

Go ahead and write down your answers.

Prayer and dismiss.