JOHN 1:40-51 | I WANT THAT

JOHN 1:40-51 | I WANT THAT

ILLUSTRATION: When we go to the store with my kids there is a common statement the comes from the lips of my kids: I want that.

They see the toys or the treats or the gum and they want it.

And the truth is, very little changes as we get older.

In your teen years it’s “I want a car” or “I want a cell phone” or “I want freedom”

And then you become an adult and all the other adults are getting cool stuff and I want cool stuff too.

I want that car

I want that house

I want that tv

I want that life!

EXPLANATION: As John, the author, concludes this first chapter, he does so by bringing our attention to two people who were brought to Jesus.

Peter, who would become a pillar in the early church, and Nathaniel who would be one of Jesus’ followers.

And the interactions that we find, gives insight into just one reason that real Christianity is so appealing.

Not some rule led dictatorship

Not some live your life how you want and just feel good about yourself.

Not some set of religious rituals that if you do will make you feel religious.

We are talking about real, Bible Christianity, and it’s something that will leave you saying, “I want that.”

APPLICATION: With everyone here today, I don’t know what your experience of Christianity has been.

Maybe it was an incredible experience that you have nothing but positive things to say about.

But it could be that some are here and you feel you’ve been burned by religion.

You’ve been burned by places that called themselves churches, but in the end they were just a religious group trying to make people “copy and pastes” of each other.

Friend, I want to tell you this morning, that isn’t Jesus’s Christianity.

It isn’t Bible Christianity.

No, the Christian life that Jesus offers, is one that will make you say, “I want that”.

For a few moments, let’s look into these interactions and learn what makes a true relationship with Christ so much better!

V.42, 47-48, JESUS SEES YOU AS YOU ARE

John 1:42 KJV 1900

And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon the son of Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, A stone.

John 1:47–48 KJV 1900

Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile! Nathanael saith unto him, Whence knowest thou me? Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee.

EXPLANATION: In both interaction, the first communication with Jesus was Jesus telling them something he already knew about them.

For Simon, Jesus knew his name and He know what family he came from.

For Nathanael, Jesus knew his lineage and that he was honestly searching… that’s what He meant when He said Nathanael had “no guile”

Jesus would go on to tell him that He had seen him when he was under a fig tree.

The implication was that nobody else knew he was there.

Both of these men discovered that Jesus saw them just as they were.

ILLUSTRATION: We were standing in line at McDonalds in Ellettsville, IN getting ready to order.

I was just a kid, and I couldn’t wait to eat my food so I could head into the play place.

My dad was standing in line, and there was a guy standing next to us who just kept awkwardly looking over at my dad.

I mean I was a kid and I noticed it, so it was pretty obvious.

The guy finally said, “Excuse me sir.”

My dad turned to him.

The guy continued, “I’m sure you get this all the time, but you look just like Bill Clinton.”

Now, to my dad that wasn’t a compliment.

I later would like up a picture of Bill Clinton, because even though he was the president at the time, I had no idea who it was.

My dad responded to him, “It must be this jacket I’m wearing, I need to get rid of it.”

There are people that dress up to impersonate other people, my dad was not one of them.

They will do there best to act like someone that they are not.

But at the end of the day, they cannot change who they truly are.

APPLICATION: Friend, God sees you as you are.

He sees the single mom

He sees the wayward teenager

He sees the husband and wife just struggling to keep going

He sees the drug addict looking for their next fix

He sees the person who dressed up for Sunday but the rest of the week their life is a mess

There is no hiding the real you from God… He sees you just as you are!

Proverbs 15:3 KJV 1900

The eyes of the Lord are in every place, Beholding the evil and the good.

Job 34:21 KJV 1900

For his eyes are upon the ways of man, And he seeth all his goings.

Proverbs 5:21 KJV 1900

For the ways of man are before the eyes of the Lord, And he pondereth all his goings.

God sees you and He knows who you really are.

And while, you may be thinking at first, “that isn’t making me want Christianity”, I want to direct you to the next point of the message:

V.42, JESUS SEES YOUR POTENTIAL

John 1:42 KJV 1900

And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon the son of Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, A stone.

EXPLANATION: When Jesus met Simon for the very first time, the interaction is kinda crazy

The very first thing that Jesus says when He meets Simon is, “I’m gonna give you a nickname.”

Now I don’t know about you, but nicknames in my life generally came from the friends I was closest to.

So, I can’t imagine what was going through Simon’s when the first thing Jesus does when He meets him is give him a nickname!

But the nickname that Jesus gave Simon is profound.

“Cephas” was Aramaic for “rock”, which is translates “Petros” or “Peter” in Greek.

You see, Jesus looked at Simon and He knew everything about Him.

He knew that Simon struggled with sticking with things.

He knew that Simon battled his emotions

He knew that Simon would oftentimes be up and down and struggle with fear.

But when Jesus looked at Simon, while He knew all of Simon’s shortcomings, He also saw Simon’s potential.

He was saying to him, “you may struggle with being consistent and controlling your emotions… but I see your potential… your potential to be solid and unshakable. Your potential to be a rock!”

And over the next 3 1/2 years of ministry together, when Jesus referred to him as Simon, he was reminding him that he was living like his old self before Christ.

But Simon had been given a new name in Jesus, a potential that Christ saw… Peter… the unshakable stone.

ILLUSTRATION: A family member on my dad’s side had an opportunity to purchase some land in Florida.

When he looked out, he saw the swamps and the snakes and the mud.

He walked away saying that nothing could ever be done with that nasty swamp land.

But shortly thereafter, another man came along and saw the same swamp land.

Any while he saw the same mud and snakes… he also saw the potential of what it could become.

And that man, Walt Disney, would go on to create Disney world on that piece of land.

APPLICATION: When God looks at your life, He doesn’t just see what you are today… He sees the potential of what you can become for Him!

Wherever you are in life, you can mark it down that Jesus sees the potential of what you can be for Him!

If you are here today and you don’t know Christ as your Savior, He can see how your life would be impacted if only you would put your trust in Him.

If you would do what Romans 10:9-10

Romans 10:9–10 KJV 1900

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

The greatest change you could ever experience, is the change to stop trusting in yourself to get to heaven, and to trust in Christ alone and the sacrifice He made for you to get to heaven.

Romans 6:23 KJV 1900

For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

If you are here today and maybe you can’t imagine what God could do with and through you life.

Can I tell you, God is a God that sees potential beyond what we can see!

ILLUSTRATION: In the book of Judges, a young man named Gideon is threshing wheat by a winepress, the Bible says to “hide from it from the Midianites.”

Gideon was fearful and was working what could have been seen as a pointless job.

And then something happens: Judges 6:12

Judges 6:12 KJV 1900

And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour.

Can you picture it… Gideon is hiding out trying to avoid the dangers around him, when an angel appears and tells him, “The LORD is with thee, thou mighty man of valour.”

Why would God say such a thing about Gideon… it was because He knew the potential of what Gideon could become!

ILLUSTRATION: Israel had their king Saul, but he had turned away from obeying God and now God was going to anoint the next king of Israel.

Samuel the prophet made his way to Jesse’s home and after God said “no” to the first 7 sons, finally David who was out taking care of the sheep was brought before Samuel.

And God said, anoint him… David would be the next king of Israel.

But no one would have dreamed it would be David.

God explains the difference 1 Samuel 16:7

1 Samuel 16:7 KJV 1900

But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.

God didn’t just see a young shepherd boy… God saw his potential.

APPLICATION: Friend, if you are here today and you can’t imagine God using you the way you are.

I’ve got great news… He sees your potential.

He wants to change you and mold you into a vessel that can bring Him glory

And maybe you can’t see it yourself.

Maybe you are afraid of what that life would look like.

Well that takes us to the final piece of the message:

V.49-51, JESUS PROMISES GREATER THINGS

John 1:49–51 KJV 1900

Nathanael answered and saith unto him, Rabbi, thou art the Son of God; thou art the King of Israel. Jesus answered and said unto him, Because I said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree, believest thou? thou shalt see greater things than these. And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.

EXPLANATION: Jesus told Nathanael… “Just wait, you are going to see greater things… miraculous things.”

God has a way of taking your life from where you are now, seeing the potential of how He could use you… and then doing even beyond what you could imagine!

Ephesians 3:20 KJV 1900

Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,

God would use Gideon and 300 men to defeat an army that the Bible says was innumerable.

God would use David to kill a giant that was 10 feet tall and deliver Israel from the Philistines.

God would use a shepherd named Moses who had a stutter, to deliver the children of Israel from Egypt, part the Red Seas, and do miracles in the wilderness.

God would use a prophet named Elijah to rain down fire from heaven and consume and altar to show there is only one God

God would use 12 unlikely men, to turn their world upside down for Christ.

And he would take a man named Simon, who struggled to stand, who battled doubt, and struggled to say the right things at times, and God would do more with his life than Simon could ever imagine.

And it started on that day when Jesus gave a nickname to Peter, because He saw where he was, and He saw the potential in Simon’s life, and He knew that He could do greater things in Simon’s life than he could ever imagine.

He turned Simon into Peter, and made him a solid rock for Christ in that first century church.

So much so, that under inspiration of God he penned two letters… and they weren’t 1 and 2 Simon

They are 1 and 2 Peter.

Because God can do greater things in a life that is willing to allow God to use them!

He can give a life that you can’t even imagine saying today, “I want that” because it’s so far beyond what you could dream.

CONCLUSION

ILLUSTRATION: When we were in college, Tressa and I had been dating for a little while and my birthday was coming up.

We had an opportunity to go out on a date night, and I was excited to celebrate my birthday at a restaurant.

There was a place there in Lancaster that I had seen before called Claim Jumper… I had even walked inside at one point.

It was an expensive restaurant by college student budget standards

The thing I was most excited about at Claim Jumpers was after the meal I was going to get a slice of their 6 layer chocolate cake: the chocolate motherlode

This thing was huge!

6 Layers of chocolate with Chocolate icing between each layer.

I actually went online to see if they still had it and they do!

You can get a single slice for $18

So the night arrived and me and my beautiful date made our way to Claim Jumpers and everything was going according to plan.

I don’t remember what I ate, but I’m sure it was overpriced and fantastic.

We had finished our meal and it was time for the moment I had been waiting for…

But then Tressa says, “I’ve got a surprise for you”

Now I asked her about it and neither one of us remember how she pulled it off, but somehow, she had made a cake for me and secretly got it into the restaurant

I’m not sure if I was just so distracted by her beauty or what.

As she pulled that cake out, just for me, it was a chocolate peanut butter cake with Reeces Pieces on top.

Now I don’t remember what I ate for dinner that night, but I do remember eating that cake she had made me.

It was without question, the most delicious cake I had ever eaten in my life.

It was so good, I completely forgot about the chocolate motherlode cake because there was no way it could have held a candle to what she made.

It was so good in fact, I have had it for other birthdays since then.

When we walked in that night, I saw a slice of the chocolate motherlode cake and said, “I want that”

But by the end of the night, I had something so much better… something I never even imagined.

APPLICATION: Friend, if you are here today and you’ve been burned by religion.

If you’ve been confronted by some kind of Pharisaical Christianity that left you saying you wanted nothing to do with it

Can I tell you, “I’m sorry”

Because what you experienced wasn’t from Christ.

But I can tell you, that real with real Christianity, Christ can see you where you are

He sees the potential of where you could be.

And friend, I can tell you He can take you to a place that is so much greater than you could ever imagine!

I hope this morning as you leave the church you’ll be able to say, “I want that”

And I hope today you will pursue Him with a renewed passion!