Pray and Go Together - What's Your Story?
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Series
5 Weeks
Part of the over all emphasis in January of Praying for unreached people and some of the least-reached places across North Carolina.
There is a prayer guide, encourage you to be using it.
The prayer guide and all of the resources for this month are going to be found on our website: fairmontfirstbaptist.org/pray-and-go-2021
Prayer guides also available in person
Ask that you only take one per family and if you are comfortable using the web to get the PDF from the website that you do that (only have a limited number)
So, over the 5 sundays in Januray, we are going to be looking a key passages in the Gospel of John that dovetail with this idea of Praying and Go for and to the unreached and underreached people of our world and state.
And so, we start today in John 1 and with the interaction between John the Baptist and the Jews from Jerusalem.
This was John’s testimony when the Jews from Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him, “Who are you?”
He didn’t deny it but confessed, “I am not the Messiah.”
“What then?” they asked him. “Are you Elijah?” “I am not,” he said. “Are you the Prophet?” “No,” he answered.
“Who are you, then?” they asked. “We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What can you tell us about yourself?”
He said, “I am a voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord—just as Isaiah the prophet said.”
Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.
So they asked him, “Why then do you baptize if you aren’t the Messiah, or Elijah, or the Prophet?”
“I baptize with water,” John answered them. “Someone stands among you, but you don’t know him.
He is the one coming after me, whose sandal strap I’m not worthy to untie.”
All this happened in Bethany across the Jordan, where John was baptizing.
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
This is the one I told you about: ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me.’
I didn’t know him, but I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel.”
And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and he rested on him.
I didn’t know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The one you see the Spirit descending and resting on—he is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’
I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”
The Jews Question and John Denies (1:19-22)
The Jews Question and John Denies (1:19-22)
Not the mesiah (v.20)
john 1:20
He didn’t deny it but confessed, “I am not the Messiah.”
First thing that they ask John is who are you?
Why does John jump to Messiah?
Because he knows that that is what they have been saying about him.
He answered them properly and carefully (notice it says “confessed”, twice in the ESV): “I am not the Messiah.”
For John, it was unthinkable that attention would focus on him, because he unequivocally not the Messiah, he knew that and he wanted to be clear that they knew that.
His job was to point to the Messiah, but we will get to that in a moment.
Not Elijah
John 1:21
“What then?” they asked him. “Are you Elijah?” “I am not,” he said. “Are you the Prophet?” “No,” he answered.
Fair question:
Looks like Elijah
Comes in spirit and power of Elijah
Jews expecting the return of Elijah prior to the advent of the Messiah
Final words of the OT are about Elijah coming again
Malachi 4:5-6
Look, I am going to send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.
And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise, I will come and strike the land with a curse.”
But John is not Elijah
Not the Prophet (v.21)
They were thinking about the one God promised through Moses in Deuteronomy 18:15 and again in Deut 18:18.
“The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own brothers. You must listen to him.
I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him.
But John, again and again, says NO!
He is very clear in each denial
So they are left with the question in v.22:
Who are you then? We need an answer!
A voice, Preparing for another (1:23-28)
A voice, Preparing for another (1:23-28)
John’s answer is as radical as it is straight foward:
I am a VOICE, who is simply preparing the way for the one who is to follow me.
John 1:23
He said, “I am a voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord—just as Isaiah the prophet said.”
Not “I am the Word”
I am just a Voice
a communicator
John is taking the language and imagery of Isaiah 40:3-15 here.
A voice of one crying out: Prepare the way of the Lord in the wilderness; make a straight highway for our God in the desert.
Every valley will be lifted up, and every mountain and hill will be leveled; the uneven ground will become smooth and the rough places, a plain.
And the glory of the Lord will appear, and all humanity together will see it, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.
A voice was saying, “Cry out!” Another said, “What should I cry out?” “All humanity is grass, and all its goodness is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flowers fade when the breath of the Lord blows on them; indeed, the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God remains forever.”
Zion, herald of good news, go up on a high mountain. Jerusalem, herald of good news, raise your voice loudly. Raise it, do not be afraid! Say to the cities of Judah, “Here is your God!”
See, the Lord God comes with strength, and his power establishes his rule. His wages are with him, and his reward accompanies him.
He protects his flock like a shepherd; he gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them in the fold of his garment. He gently leads those that are nursing.
Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand or marked off the heavens with the span of his hand? Who has gathered the dust of the earth in a measure or weighed the mountains on a balance and the hills on the scales?
Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or who gave him counsel?
Who did he consult? Who gave him understanding and taught him the paths of justice? Who taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding?
Look, the nations are like a drop in a bucket; they are considered as a speck of dust on the scales; he lifts up the islands like fine dust.
I am only a workman, making a road, a path, a way for the Messiah
He is moving the emphasis off himself.
Does the same thing in v. 27
I’m not worthy to untie his sandles
Turning the converstioan off himself to bring attention to Jesus.
OK, but the sandal thing?
Among Rabbis and their disciples, there was a teacher-student relationship that had the potential for abuse. It was entirely possible that a Rabbi might expect unreasonable service from their disciples. One of the things which was considered "too low" for a Rabbi to expect from his disciples was the untying of the Rabbi's sandal strap. John says he is unworthy to do even this.
John is a great witness
You don’t photobomb the picture of the one whom you are witnessing.
Puts the emphasis on you, right?
JOhn wants to make sure all of the emphasis is on the one that is coming after him!
This is the attittude that we should strive for
Going to say something that in our current culture isn’t a popular thing to say:
I am nothing,
you are nothing
Here is the thing: Jesus is everything.
We are taught and conditioned over and over again in our culture to look out for “number one,” right? To place ourselves first and foremost.
“I’m going to work on me, this year”
But, again, we are nothing, at least apart from Jesus
Jesus is everything.
Believers need to cultivate the idea that we are second to Jesus
This is one of the biggest barriers to belief in our currrent world.
John is saying the samething:
I am nothing, the one that follows is everything
So, What’s your story?
“Now that we got all of that out of the way, i’m glad you asked!”
The Lamb of God, Who Takes Away the Sin of the World (1:29-33)
The Lamb of God, Who Takes Away the Sin of the World (1:29-33)
In one sentence John 1:29 we have the heart of the Christian message.
Jesus is greeted with words that remind Him of his destiny.
Clear that Jesus would be a sacrifice for sin.
Shadow of the cross cast over the entire ministry of Jesus.
God had provided the Lamb for humanity’s deepest need!
This must be our message too, the sacrificial death of Christ.
This reality must be primary in our witness and in our thinking!
Christ came to give abundant life - true.
Christ worked miracles - true, and he can still work miracles in our lives today.
But these are benefits of the Gospel, not the Gospel itself.
The Gospel centers upon Christ who took on our sin - the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”
We must not just know this; we must believe it.
It must make its way from our heads to our hearts so that it might impact our entire lives.
The Lamb of God slain for you, and me, so that we might be reconciled to the Father and; then reconciled to one another. There is no other way
He is the one I told you about, who is preesxistant and preeminent.
John 1:30-31
This is the one I told you about: ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me.’
I didn’t know him, but I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel.”
We know that John was born before Jesus
So when John says “he existed before me” he is indicating the eternal pre-existance of Jesus.
John knew, and is telling us here, that Jesus was God.
Col 1:15-23
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
For everything was created by him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities— all things have been created through him and for him.
He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.
He is also the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything.
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him,
and through him to reconcile everything to himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
Once you were alienated and hostile in your minds as expressed in your evil actions.
But now he has reconciled you by his physical body through his death, to present you holy, faultless, and blameless before him—
if indeed you remain grounded and steadfast in the faith and are not shifted away from the hope of the gospel that you heard. This gospel has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and I, Paul, have become a servant of it.
v.31
John’s water baptist were baptisms of repentance.
this is how he prepared the way.
People had to turn from sin so that they might recieve the messiah and the benefits of his salvation.
Our lives and our witness must be immeresed into Christ, look to the Lamb (v. 32-33)
John’s preaching motivated the human will to change: BUT Jesus’s message brought the power to change!
The power to change our lives—to leave our life of sin and enjoy the fullness of eternal life—comes only from a soaking or immersion in the Holy Spirit!
The word, baptize ‘baptizō’ in the Greek means to immerse, to cause to be engulfed or plunged into something.
That something is Jesus Christ.
We are to be immersed into Christ, engulfed with Jesus Christ, plunged into HIS rich and eternal GRACE.
Our lives should be centered in and around God, through Jesus, by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Conclusion
Conclusion
So what is out story?
It is like that of John in v. 34: “I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”
We must witness of Jesus, who perfectly declares the nature and character of God the Father!
John 1:18
No one has ever seen God. The one and only Son, who is himself God and is at the Father’s side—he has revealed him.
When someone shows up and asks us: what is your story? This is how we need to answer:
“Behold the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!”
“Here is the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!”
“Look, the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world!”