The New Adam
The Gospel of John • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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WELCOME:
Wednesday night crew: THANK YOU! We have some workers in this church and ya’ll got to work Wed and got everything cleaned up and looking great!
This Wednesday we will be back in Romans and are going to eat chili dogs. So come and join us for some some great fellowship and spiritual nourishment.
Members meeting June 28th! Please make plans to attend.
SCRIPTURE READING:
Psalm 146:1–7 (NASB95)
Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! I will praise the Lord while I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being. Do not trust in princes, In mortal man, in whom there is no salvation. His spirit departs, he returns to the earth; In that very day his thoughts perish. How blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, Whose hope is in the Lord his God, Who made heaven and earth, The sea and all that is in them; Who keeps faith forever; Who executes justice for the oppressed; Who gives food to the hungry.
LET US STAND AND WORSHIP!
“The Goodness of God”
Words and Music by Hillsong’
PRAYER OF PRAISE FOR WHO GOD IS
Lord, thank you for your constancy. For never turning Your back on us, for never getting frustrated with us, for forgiving our sins, for allowing us to be part of Your plan. We ask that You would look down upon this gathering of people and fill our hearts with great joy today as we focus on You. Amen!
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
“What a beautiful Name”
Words and Music by Hillsong
PRAYER OF ILLUMINATION TO OPEN OUR HEARTS
Lord, give us ears to hear Your voice and eyes to see Your glory. Would you this morning illuminate Your Word and make it known to us? Help us no to make application to others peoples’ lives, but to apply every Word to our own lives. Amen
SERMON
INTRODUCTION:
John 18 begins a new section in the Gospel of John. We move from the private setting of Jesus with His disciples in the Upper Room into the garden of Gethsemane where Judas betrays Jesus.
Most of us are probably familiar with the garden of Gethsemane. This is where Jesus prayed asked the disciples to keep watch and they failed. And while Jesus prayed he sweat drops of blood. And He submitted to God’s will knowing what was coming. Judas then shows up and betrays Jesus with a kiss and He is arrested.
But John doesn’t record any of this. That doesn’t mean it did not happen. Each of the gospel writers wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit but from a different perspective.
And what John writes under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit has a different perspective in mind because one of the themes in John’s book is this new creation of people that will come THROUGH the person and work of Jesus Christ
Just as the book of Genesis is our creation book, so the Gospel of John is about the new creation book.
How does John begin: John 1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
Does that not sound a little familiar to Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”
Yes, all throughout the gospel of John there are hints and parallels pointing us back into the book of Genesis showing us that Jesus came to make all things new.
So what I want you to do today is turn to the Gospel of John, place a marker in there and then turn to the book of Genesis chapter 2 and put a marker in there. And we are going to jump back and forth a little today which I think will help us see the message in these verses.
So let’s begin in Genesis chapter 2 to give us a little background for this chapter
1) World History begins in a garden
(Gen 2:16-17) “The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” (Gen 2:16-17)
Now we all know how the story goes. Eve was tempted by the serpent to disobey the ONE command God told them not to do. She listened to the serpent and ate the forbidden fruit. And after she ate, she gave it to her husband and he ate it too, and the world was changed forever:
Romans 5:12 “just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—”
When Adam and Eve disobeyed God in that garden, sin entered the world and every person born from them were born with a sin nature and were natural born sinners! Humanity has never been the way we were created to be because of the disobedience of Adam and Eve.
Gen ch 3: ADAM AND EVE are banished from the garden forever, they have two sons: Cain and Abel and we see the effects from sin now dominating the human race.
Gen chapter 7 says humanity was so wicked that God floods the entire world and all but 8 people die in the flood waters except Noah (who was righteous) and his family.
Ch 9, the waters subside, Noah plants a vineyard, and the first thing Noah does is get drunk.
Sin has enslaved humanity. And Romans says the wages of sin is death: physical and spiritual death.
We are all born sinners. We transgress the commands of God. We do not start off in this life seeking God. We are rebels, disobedient to God and running to sin, lovers of self, and no matter how hard we try we cannot set ourselves free.
And from that news alone we are all doomed.
But then we come to John chapter 18. And the first verse of John 18 says:
When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His disciples over the ravine of the Kidron, where there was a garden, in which He entered with His disciples.
It’s not a coincidence that in a garden was where man first sinned and brought condemnation to the entire human race and that Jesus goes back into a garden, is betrayed and arrested so that He can die for the sins of the world and bring justification to all who believe in Him.
But I want you to notice who else is in this garden
Now Judas also, who was betraying Him, knew the place, for Jesus had often met there with His disciples. Judas then, having received the Roman cohort and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons.
We have a roman cohort which is a large group of roman soldiers.
We have officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees.
And then we have Judas.
And I want to point out something about Judas. The last time we saw Judas, he was in the Upper Room with the other disciples, and Jesus had just washed all of their feet (including Judas’), and when Jesus dipped the morsel of bread and handed it to Judas, the Bible says “Satan entered into him”.
After the morsel, Satan then entered into him. Therefore Jesus said to him, “What you do, do quickly.”
This is a physical embodiment of the devil himself into the person of Judas.
So this is is not just Judas in the garden, but this is Satan himself in the person of Judas in the garden as well.
And he is not just hanging out, he is leading the revolt against Jesus: He has the roman soldiers, He has the religious leaders, and he has embodied the man of Judas Iscariot.
Now lets jump back to Genesis and let me remind you who was in the the garden then as well:
Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?”
Satan was there as the serpent. This was not his first garden. Satan was in the garden of Eden, he is the one who tempted Eve to eat the fruit by questioning God’s motives and twisting God’s Word and tempting man to betray God.
Application: What is God saying to us?
POINT: God is saying in these close parallels that JESUS IS THE ONE WHO HAS ADN COULD GO BACK INTO THAT GARDEN TO UNDO WHAT ADAM DID.
Jesus is the ONLY one who can remove that disobedient heart from man that constantly betrays God and can give us a brand new heart and live like children of God.
God is saying that man’s greatest problem of sin and death and has been resolved by THIS MAN CHRIST JESUS!
God is saying to us the same thing Pilate said to the Jews: BEHOLD THE MAN!! (John 19:5).
HERE IS THE ANSWER! HERE IS THE ONE, THE ONLY ONE WHO IS ABLE TO WALK BACK INTO THAT GARDEN THAT ADAM DESECRATED IN HIS DISOBEDIENCE AND COMPLETELY OVERTHROW THE CURSE OF SIN AND DEATH AND MAKE PEOPLE RIGHT WITH GOD!
He is the One who puts things back right! Here is the hope of the world! Here is the One that can truly bring you new life.
Here is the hope of the church and if we are hoping of clinging to anything else in this life we will fall short and miss heaven altogether.
No person can save us! No works can save us! No good deeds, not other gods, nothing will ever be able to go back into that garden and set us free but Jesus.
And until Jesus’s work has been applied to our life, nothing else really matters!
On to verse 4:
So Jesus, knowing all the things that were coming upon Him, went forth and said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered Him, “Jesus the Nazarene.” He said to them, “I am He.” And Judas also, who was betraying Him, was standing with them. So when He said to them, “I am He,” they drew back and fell to the ground.
Again, don’t miss the details here!
They come to seize Jesus. And they see the disciples, yet they do not know which one is Jesus. So Jesus asks them, “whom do you seek?”
And they tell Him, Jesus the Nazarene…and Jesus says: “I am He”. And when he said this, (v 6) “they drew back and fell the ground”.
Isn’t that strange?
But here is an example of where the Greek matters. In the Greek all Jesus said was two words:“I am”. The English translators added in the third word “He” to make the English smooth. But its a little misleading and misses the point of these verses.
What was it about those two words “I AM” that caused this reaction?
If you know the Bible fairly well you will remember the first time we have heard these words and their significance.
They are found all the way back in Exodus chapter 3 in a conversation between God and Moses when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush.
When Moses asked what God’s name was to tell the children of Israel, God said you tell them, “I AM has sent me to you”
God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM”; and He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ ”
God said to tell them My name is: “I AM”.
It’s no coincidence that when they ask for Jesus the Nazarene, Jesus responded with the same name God told Moses I AM!
That name represents such great power that all the soldiers, all the religious leaders, and the devil himself was blown back on the ground
This is not a man whom like Adam will be defeated in the garden by the work of Satan but God Himself who came back into the garden to conquer sin and death forever!
Unlike Adam who failed, God will never fail and have victory over all the forces of this world
All the opposition of the world and the forces of evil are standing against Jesus and with JUST two words and great power Jesus defeats them all.
Now he allows them to arrest Him, but the point of this display of power is that the entire world here including the greatest forces of evil are overcome by Jesus.
Point 2: What is life like in Christ?
It is victorious! Those sins and temptations this world throws at us, they are overwhelming to us. We cannot break those old patterns and cycles on our own!
But when the power of God moves into your life, THINGS CHANGE FOREVER! That is because the same power we see in these verses are living inside of you and for the first time in your when confront ed with temptation that overcame you for years, you can finally say no to and stay faithful to Jesus!
There are no sins, no bad habits, no addictions , no bad attitudes, no unfaithful hearts that the power of God cannot eradicate and make new.
All those in the old Adam, who still live by the flesh, will continue to live like Adam…When Satan comes they will give in. When opportunity comes to be unfaithful they will take it. When they get to choose to be a lover of God or lover of self they will choose to love themselves.
But this is what makes Christianity possible!! This is what happens to us when Jesus comes to live inside of us!
Romans 8:11 “But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”
The key to Christianity is that the great I AM dwells inside of you
And the evidence of that will be victory after victory.
Simon Peter then, having a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s slave, and cut off his right ear; and the slave’s name was Malchus. So Jesus said to Peter, “Put the sword into the sheath; the cup which the Father has given Me, shall I not drink it?”
Explanation:
Peter sees what’s going on here and in a very courageous act, steps into action, pulls out his sword and cuts off the ear of Malchus.
And Jesus stops Peter, tells him to put the sword away, because all of this is going exactly as it is planned. “The cup which the Father has given Me, shall not drink it?” Nothing is shocking to Jesus here…its just the way God ordained it..
Let me make a quick point of application:
This cohort of soldiers and religious leaders and betraying Judas are all doing exactly what the Father had planned for them to do.
“The cup which My Father had given ME”
This was God’s will for Jesus to go through this and Jesus knew it.
Do you know that nothing comes into your life that God does not allow?
God allows hardships, suffering, tragedy, triumphs, things we celebrate, things we love and things we hate....God is the One who controls them all.
Do you know what God would say to us today?
“Put the sword away and trust God’s plan for your life”. God could remove you from whatever situation is afflicting us with a single command…but often He doesn’t because that very thing we do not want has been put there by God to bring about something great in our life.
We don’t have to understand God’s plan to remain in it. There is much that God ordains for us that is not comfortable, that is not the way we would do it, that is not the course we would choose.
And some of us spend all our lives fighting to get out of things that God Himself has sent to us.
What God would rather see is us know that he is in complete control and every difficulty has its purpose..
Jesus said, “the cup which the Father has given Me”…What is the “cup” Jesus is speaking of?
In the OT, the cup represents the wrath of God.
Jeremiah 25:15 “For thus the Lord, the God of Israel, says to me, “Take this cup of the wine of wrath from My hand and cause all the nations to whom I send you to drink it.”
Isaiah 51:17 “Arise, O Jerusalem, You who have drunk from the Lord’s hand the cup of His anger”
When Jesus says there is a cup from the Father for Him, He is talking about the wrath of God that will be poured out for the sins of the world.
When Adam broke God’s commands, Adam received a just punishment. Not only would his time on earth be difficult, but he would eventually die. And the same for Eve.
And the same is true for us. When we sin, there will be a just punishment, the wages of sin is death!
But for those in Christ, God applied that just punishment for sin to His Son.
He took the wrath that our sin deserves, moved it from you and I, and poured it out upon Him, so we would not have to bear God’s wrath.
Thats why the lad became dark when Jesus hung on that cross.
That is why Jesus said, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?”
That is why Jesus was beaten, and scourged, and shamed and, crucified, because of the terrible wrath of God!
And knowing how much our sin cost Jesus, some who claim to be in Christ continue to sin as if it really doesn’t matter at all.
There may be some in here today, who take advantage of God’s grace, who minimalize God’s wrath, who pile the sins upon the back of Jesus with never considering the punishment he received
And so they continue to sin, willfully, trampling on the grace of God.
In fact, churches teaching people that repentance is not needed. Grace comes freely to all even those who continue to live in sinful lifestyles.
But that’s not what the Bible says:
For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.
Make no mistake church! No repentance will bring God’s wrath!
If there is no turning from sin in your life, then there is no sacrifice for sins. And that awful terrible wrath of God that was applied to Jesus, will be yours
If you are living in sin, turn from it today and turn to Jesus while you still can!
He will forgive you, and will give you His righteousness, if you will turn from your sin and trust Him with your life
Last verse, quickly
So the Roman cohort and the commander and the officers of the Jews, arrested Jesus and bound Him,
They, “arrested Jesus and bound Him”.
That’s an interesting choice of wording. All the other gospel writers say Jesus was seized or arrested. But John picks this specific term “bound”
When an animal was chosen to be a sacrifice for the Lord, it was not arrested, but bound or restrained. Tied up so that it could not escape and prepared to be sacrificed upon the alter.
In the OT, the Bible says Issac was “bound” (tied up) when Abraham took him up on Mt Moriah in obedience to God to sacrifice him to the Lord
Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.
The picture here is of a perfect human sacrifice that was sinless: neither born in sin nor ever commited any sin. Lived a perfect human life
Who walked back into that garden where Adam rebelled, and willingly gave His life so that we could live.
Adam brought sin and death into this world, Jesus brought life and righteousness into this world.
The garden that was once a place of disobedience has become the place of renewal.
You can really be a new person, changed from the inside out, freed from Adam’s curse, if you’ll come to Jesus today and give your life to Him.
~PRAYER~
