Discipleship Will Cost You, Part 4 Series

John, Part 30

Series: Discipleship Will Cost You, Part 4 Passage: John 7:19-24

FOCUS: Continuing our focus on Discipleship and its personal cost

Discipleship is the process of becoming like Jesus; changing our wants to His

This means giving up what you desire to follow the One who is discipling you

SETUP: Jesus’ brothers chall. Him to go to festival: NOT my time/NOT a show

He was not going to go to perform; nor to be famous or be seen by people

Jesus does go - in secret - Purpose: teaching to correct bad doctrine; bad practices

ASK: Why do we come to church? To draw closer to the One who died for you?

TRUTH: Whenever we open God’s Word, we can have our proximity challenged

Do we come to hear from God; to be challenged to be like Jesus; or for ourselves?

“If you’re always searching for the next emotion/feeling, you’ll never truly find God!”

YES emotions can motivate; truth is MORE powerful if we allow it to change us!

Challenge of what we’ll unpack today is: “Discipleship requires a Response”

Read John 7:19-24 & Pray ? “Lord, teach me today.”

TR: Many are hearing this for the 1st time: Jesus is confronting their preferences

These are pilgrims; not residents of Jerusalem (visiting for festival); so this is NEW

His question v19 is jarring – so their reaction is … natural (they are curious)

Point 1 – The People Respond to Jesus

Need to remember what Jesus was opposing; it causes their feather ruffling v20

• Their “religion” was well settled & became their national identity

• Same religion founded by forefathers: their “godly men of the faith”

• MISSED: Jesus was opposing their religious institution & leadership

So, their natural conclusion about Jesus’s teaching is:

• Only a man who hated God would oppose their comfort zone!!

• If He would say these things He must be disturbed, crazy, possessed, etc.

RE: The religious leaders had no accountability; the worst thing for humanity!

PEOPLE THINK: Surely, our religious leaders would never:

• Act unrighteously – they’d never make immoral decisions/policies

• They’d never be undisciplined, corruptible, or even act irresponsibly

But … doesn’t false churches allow our “leaders” to act in the same way?

• Of course we do … this is EXACTLY how cults become so appealing!

• This is all that Jesus is speaking against … and yet, they get offended by it!

APP: This is how false teaching becomes accepted: Not enough biblical literacy!

OT Warning: Jeremiah 14:14 NT Confirmation: Matthew 24:24

KNOW: Jesus came to point out inconsistencies like this! v19

• He came to correct their behavior and draw people to God!

• It is true … He came to forgive their behavior and to offer grace

• BUT – He also came to pronounce judgment on those who refused God!

SEE: Religious believed they were above that; that they were “good” with God

REACTION: Thought, “Surely, our “god” would not judge us like this, right?”

CHALL: Do you see how the ego can quickly take over and lead someone astray?

REM: Our options are really simple: We’ll either submit to God or refuse Him!

This is exactly the point Jesus makes; which naturally sets the people against Him!

Point 2 – Jesus’s First Response to the People

Jesus’s responses are a plea to them – a plea to draw them TO God! v21

• He appeals to them: examine the work He has done

o RE: He healed a crippled man at the pool in Bethsaida

o A man bed-ridden for 38 years was suddenly restored to health!

• But (problem) it was the Sabbath and “work” was not “allowed”

• Pieces: He healed a man, on God’s “day”, and they are mad about it?

To the Jew this was a SERIOUS offense against “their beliefs” (i.e., their prefs)

• It was strictly forbidden to “work” on the “day of rest” (even God’s work?)

• They had determined that they were in charge of enforcing who worked

Yet despite their own hypocrisy (circumcise on Sabbath) – this is a problem? v22

• Kind of like what we do when we judge people who sin differently than us?

• RESULT: They needed correction, He gave it, they wanted Him dead for it

We need to insert ourselves, our preferences, here; this is where it gets painful!

CONSIDER: Do we hold others to a standard we prefer versus God’s words?

Jesus responds by inquiring of them why they are so mad that a man was healed?

RE: He is confronted with a “mob mentality”; v19, “you are demon-possessed”

SEE: He attempts to draw their attention to their own duplicity & correct it

• Circumcision was actually mandated under Abraham (Gen 17)

• It was further instructed as part of the Law given under Moses (Lev 12)