Is Your Jesus Too Small?

Intro

Hey everyone, we are so glad you are here with us today! My name is Austin for those who don’t know me and I work at Heartland Alliance Church and it is a true honour to be here with all of you today! Before we get started I am going to need your help with something! When you think of the word and name Jesus what comes to your mind first? All of these are great words, they really describe Jesus well! but what if i told you, that is only scratching the surface on who Jesus, The Son Of God really is. There is so much more to Jesus than we realize. So I ask you, is your Jesus too small? and while I am asking you all this, i am also asking myself. I have caught myself thinking too little of Jesus, almost as a second thought when it comes to God. I also find myself just thinking of Jesus in the context of the New Testament. As christians we do have a tendency to stick to the New Testament and that is where our theology of Jesus comes from. But in fact we can see snapshots of Jesus all over history and throughout the bible, we just have to intentional on looking for those instances. So today I will go with you and we can see these different instances and then we will bring it back to the stories we know best about Jesus. First of all, who likes stories, or hearing stories? Okay, because that is how I’m going to share them with you, I remember being in your shoes and sometimes just sitting there reading can be hard, so I am going to share them like a story.

Angel of the Lord

So the first story we will look at a story we can find in . Who has heard of a guy named Abraham in the Old Testament? I hope you all have at some point. But there was this time in history where this dude named Abram (later to be called Abraham) was probably just chilling and the Lord comes to him and says the all peoples on earth would be blessed through him. That is some high expectations to live up too, but also the Lord said that his offspring would be as many as the stars in the sky, but there was one thing that did not make sense to him was the fact of him having kids because his wife couldn’t have any. So what he went and did was he slept with one of Sarai’s slaves from Egypt, Hagar, and where she would late have Abraham’s first child. But after hearing that she was pregnant, Sarai mistreated Hagar so she ran away. But when she ran away the Angel of the Lord came to her and spoke but the thing is that this Angel all of a sudden starts speaking like he is God where he said that “he [the angel] would increase her descendants” and then she responds by saying that He is the God who sees her, so she just called this Angel God, which doesn’t make sense because whenever someone saw God they died. This is the first instance where we see this Angel of the Lord showing up, which makes things interesting because now this opens the door to more times like this.

The next place we see this Angel of the Lord show up is during the lifetime of Moses. This instance is in the very popular story of Moses and the burning bush, but i know for me i read it and I just think that it is a cool story and end it there without reading into it. But as I was studying to prepare this talk, it made me realize how much I was truly missing. So this story takes place in a barren desert where Moses is taking care of his sheep and then they come to a mountain that was said to be the Mountain of God. As he came up to it, he realized that there was a bush on fire without burning up, and in this flame came the Angel of the Lord once again. And then continues to say that once the Lord saw that Moses had stopped to look, God called out to him from within the bush. Once again we see that there were three different descriptions of who was speaking from the burning bush. We first see the Angel of the Lord, then the Lord and then God. And this Angel of the Lord is the Glory of God showing up a a human form.

As we look through these different stories, some of you may think, “how does any of this have to do with Jesus?” It will all come together at the end.

Suffering Servant

Suffering Servant

Another instance that we can see Jesus in the Old Testament is in the book of Isaiah. Isaiah was a prophet of God during the years of 739-686 B.C. Throughout the years, he has been considered one of the greatest prophets the world has ever seen. In his book, the overarching theme is the topic of Judgment and Hope. There is one part of this book that we see the Judgment really come to pass. In the 53rd chapter of this book we see that there is going to be suffering and then glory for the Servant. This servant is one who is to fulfill God’s mission which Israel had failed to do. This servant is to restore God’s people and bring them back to him while also being a light to all the nations. Alongside all of that this individual is empowered by God’s Spirit to proclaim the news to all the nations. But the way we think that he would restore his people, is not the way most would have thought. This servant would be rejected and killed by his own people, without them realizing that this servant is doing it on behalf of Israel. We see that through this suffering that the servant would not even be able to look at him because of how ugly he would look. He would be beat to a point where he would be ultimately beyond human likeness. Isaiah also explains that “He” the servant would grow up like a root of dry ground. And if anyone knows anything about plants, a strong and nourished plant cannot come out of the ground where there is no water around. And if this does happen the plant will look rather rough and unappealing such as a cactus in the desert. So this is seen that this Servant that is being written about will not come from a place of wealth or beauty but will grow up rough, with little beauty so this will put most off because they won’t expect much from such person.

We then see that it was the Lords will to crush him and cause him to suffer, like this had been planned out for a while. It is said that this righteous servant would justify many by the pain he would have to endure. But then through all of this we see that God would glorify this servant. God’s plan was to exalt and prosper his righteous Servant because he was willing to bear the sins of many. And not only would God exalt the servant for what He did, the servant would crush the head of the serpent and would stand between humanity and evil.

New Testament

Now as we look back at the new testament, i ask you, now that you have seen a few instances in the Old Testament where Jesus or the messiah shows up, has your perspective changed at all on what he did? says this,

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

The New International Version. (2011). (). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

Jesus has always been, there was never a moment in time where Jesus did not exist. Though he was named Jesus in the old testament, we can still see he was at work. The Gospel or the life of Christ was pointed to through the history of the bible. Everything was used and shown in a way where it would point directly to the coming messiah in Jesus. There has been never anyone like Christ and there never will be again till he shows up again to take us home. He was without blemish or sin. Let me ask you, what is the longest amount of time you have gone without eating? This guy fasted for 40 days and then satan came and tempted him with food but he stayed true to he was and who God called him to be. That is nuts to me that someone could be so in tune with God that nothing could faze him not matter how weak he was. The power and the magnitude of Jesus can’t be overstated, he is far greater than any of us could ever understand. Our Jesus shouldn’t be too small, our Gospel shouldn’t be too small because he laid it all down regretting nothing for us. He took the death of a criminal and hung on a cross so that we could spend eternity with him. He built a bridge to God that was severed when man first sinned.

Ending

So as I wrap up here I would like to spend some time just in prayer. I have asked Cole to come up and just play some music on the keys so you could spend some time between you and God. I ask you that you don’t distract those around you, please be respectful for those who actually want to take part in this. I ask you guys to pray something super simple, just ask God what he wants to reveal to you about Jesus and how he lived his life and how we can apply it to our own lives. But we also do have to remember to listen as well, we can’t be speaking the whole time because then we can drown out God’s voice. So when you think it’s appropriate, just sit and wait on God. But if you don’t hear anything don’t be discouraged, God has a timing that is more perfect than any of us could ever understand. So before you start i’m just going to pray for you.