Spiritual X-Rays - Jesus knows what’s in us
John 2:12-25
The Point:
Spiritual X-Ray - Jesus
knows what is in a persons heart – where we are at –
Do you? What will you do about it?
Does anyone really know what is in your heart? What you deal with, what makes you happy,
what stress you. Does anyone really know
what you fear or what motivates you?
In this passage, we are going to consider the reality
that Jesus knows you like no one else knows you
John 2:12-25
Two pieces of
theological trivia…
1.
Jesus earthly family…
V 12 – is a reference to the
siblings of Jesus, in the mention of his brothers = Catholic religion would have us believe that
Jesus’ mother, Mary, was “perpetual virgin” and had no other children. Here it clearly identifies brothers of Jesus
2.
Jesus earthly ministry…Another feature
of this passage that has been important to the understanding of Jesus and his
ministry is in v 13
13 “When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to
Jerusalem.”
John is unique to the other
gospels in it identifies 3 Passover
events = it is from this that it is recognized that Jesus earthly ministry spanned
3 years.
Two stories / one
message
The connection
between Cana and Jerusalem
In the story of Jesus cleansing the temple John
purposefully sets it in a theological context with the miracle of turning water
into wine – that we looked at last week.
Connection to the
story in Cana
John juxtaposes these stories quite purposefully – he is
making a point from the very beginning of Jesus ministry – that knowing Jesus for who he is,
as both man and God, and being in a relationship with him as the one who brings
you to God.
In Cana, John shows us that the purification jars of
water at the wedding feast become the vessel of the new wine that Jesus
provides. Previously, Jews would rely on their Jewish religion and culture to
bring them to God, but Jesus dramatically alters that picture when he turns the
water into wine.
He himself becomes the
purification for us to be clean and before God himself
Jesus is the sign of God
present and at work in our world
Those who see the glorious
signs of Jesus, place their faith in
him
The disciples put their
faith in him, not because he performed a miracle but because of the sign of who
he was. Their faith was more than
‘believing in him’ but they “put their faith in him” and that was life altering. They recognized him as God and were willing
to live their lives trusting in that reality of Him.
Now John shifts the scene from Cana to Jerusalem and this
story has 3 distinct scenes …
The trip from Capernaum to Jerusalem – about 90 mi
In the story in Jerusalem – there are three important
scenes that occur
1.
The temple (V 13-17)
Scholars debate over whether there were 1 or 2 temple
scenes. All four gospel accounts speak
of only one scene of Jesus cleansing the temple. In the synoptic gospels, they each refer to a
scene that occurs only days before Jesus crucifixion, but John talks of a scene
at the beginning of Jesus ministry. None
of the accounts recall 2 accounts.
The Temple = the place people would come to make
sacrifices in the effort to be pure before God.
The temple was the most important feature of the Jewish
religion and culture. It was at the
heart of all Jews. It connected their
history to their lives. It gave them
identity as a people and their faith was the centerpiece of their culture –
what it meant to be a Jew. The temple
brought them strength and unity, it gave them hope for their future. It was what they taught their children.
Jesus comes and upsets all that. Imagine if someone were to come along and
challenge the role of hockey in Canada.
Jesus comes to upset the way we think about our
lives.
Jesus is not a feature we neatly fit into our lives, but
he is to become the centerpiece of our lives
The disciples remembered Psalms 69:9 “for zeal for your house
consumes me,
and the insults of
those who insult you fall on me.”
In that Psalm, David is acknowledging his desparate need
for God in his life and the high price he personally is willing to pay for that
kind of relationship.
What consumes you?
What is important to you, your spiritual life & expression
1c = temple
Today = independence, Image of what others might think of
you? Your privacy, freedom
Men want signs but Jesus will
provide a sacrifice. The only sacrifice
acceptable to God, and it becomes the foundation of our faith
2.
Question
of Authority (v18-22)
The Jewish leaders were demanding some proof that he had
a right to cleanse the temple and make this kind of proclamation. They
saw it as a prophetic action – not the action of a crazy or angry man, but the
actions of a prophet, so show us the signs of a prophet, act like a prophet…
Ciaphas, the high priest is thought to have brought the
marketplace into the temple area, some suggest he may have even had his hand in
the business. So you see, Jesus was not
only challenging the culture of the day, but the leadership of the day.
Authority Assumes a common starting point – culture / law
– when prophets speak they speak from the Lord and connect the dots
For Jesus this was not an issue of authority – but a
different starting point all together; a
heart issue regarding our relationship with God through Jesus himself – and he
points directly to himself.
V19 "Destroy this temple, and I will raise
it again in three days."
He touches the
authority of what we believe in, why and how…
20 The Jews replied, "It has taken forty-six years
to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?"
The temple was built by Herod the Great who was an
amazing builder of massive construction projects and the temple and Masada were some of his signature projects. The temple project began in 20BC and was to
rival or better yet surpass Solomon’s temple.
The temple represented
a lifetime achievement; building the temple consumed a generation. It was their effort, their taxes that
accomplished it. The temple brought
their faith and their own accomplishments together and Jesus says “give it up”,
you are going to have to trust me and not your abilities.
It is much easier to put my faith in my own
accomplishments or the things I have participated in, I can believe in those
things.
21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body. 22 After
he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they
believed the Scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.
3. Belief
(v23-25)
23 …many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and
believed
in his name.
The people in Jersualem Believed in him (Jesus ) as a
person ; his authority & character; they believed because he did miraculous
things
Between the two stories in John 2, in Cana at the wedding
feast and then in Jerusalem with the temple story, John shows us 2 different
sides of this important issue of BELIEF
Entrust is the same word in v 11, 23 & 24 – epísteuen
pisteu/w pisteuo (pist-yoo'-o); from NT:4102;
to have faith (in, upon, or with respect to, a person or thing), i.e. credit;
by implication, to entrust (especially one's spiritual well-being to Christ):
KJV - believe (-r), commit (to trust), put in trust with.
Three kinds of
belief –
Intellectual –
I know something – facts / figures / dates / events and I believe it
I know the world is 93 million miles from the sun – I
have no reason to measure it nor dispute it.
This is where we come to reasoned conclusions and base our future
choices on those outcomes. Science here
provides security because it reduces the unknowns and we have less risk in our
beliefs
Emotional – I
feel something – I have an emotional response to this – this is how many people
feel about the environment and feel that something should be done to care for
it. This is how we believe the Canucks
can win the Stanley Cup. We want it to
be true, we hope it is true, we feel strongly about it so we believe it.
Spiritual –
Where we know certain things about God, we have encountered him in ways and our
soul responds to him like two magnets.
It is where we know we are known, the good and the bad.
The challenge for us today is many of us have lost touch
with our souls – we justify our sin, explain it away, medicate the problems and
we loose touch with our souls – But God deals with our souls, Jesus comes to
save and redeem them and we don’t even know what it is.
The Point:
Spiritual X-Ray - Jesus
knows what is in a persons heart – where we are at –
Do you? What will you do about it?
. 24 But Jesus
would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all men. 25 He did not
need man's testimony about man, for he
knew what was in a man.
He knows what consumes us, what motivates us and He wants
to be that place in our lives
Jesus knew what was going on in the hearts of people in
Jersualem and That was not what Jesus was looking for = he we not going to be
their celebrity but he would become their savior – and so…
In Cana, the disciples put their faith in Jesus, they
believed Jesus, because they saw him for who he truly was, the one who offered
himself for them to know God and bring them life and invited them into a
completely new way of living life. so
the disciples followed him, from Cana, to Capernum to Jerusalem, they rearraged
their life to follow Jesus
In Jerusalem… they wanted their theology to be more
sophisticated, they wanted proof, evidence of His authority, they wanted to
connect the intellectual dots that neatly fit their reasoned understanding
24 But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he
knew all men. 25 He did not need man's testimony about man, for he knew what
was in a man.
Jesus knew the people were looking to him for who they
wanted him to be. They were willing to
believe in him for what he could perform for them, what he could do for them
and Jesus would have none of it.
Jesus knows you, everything about you and he wants to
offer you the opportunity to know him and His father. He knows our lives are consumed, and mostly
by things other than him. He wants to be
the driving force in our lives, but we let other things become our temples
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