WHO’S YOUR DADDY?
John 8:31-47
Introduction: According to Wikipedia, “Who's your daddy? is a slang expression that, in one use, takes the form of a rhetorical question. It is commonly used as a boastful claim of dominance over the intended listener.” We see it often in the sports arena when someone or a team beats their opponent. It’s equivalent to another slang term used in the same way, “I own you”. The slang term is fitting to use in a spiritual sense because to answer the question, who’s your Daddy, means to answer the question, who owns you, who’s control are you under. Let’s look at the text so we can answer this question too.
1) How do we know that God is our Father?
• We hold to Jesus’ teaching (vs. 31-32). These Jews claimed to believe in Jesus. However, Jesus knew their heart and he needed to test their sincerity. Many people claim to be Christians. However, a test of our sincerity (and authenticity for that matter) is whether or not we have concluded that Jesus’ words and commands are absolute truth. We can say we believe, we can say we are Christians but here Jesus is saying unless you have concluded that my teachings are truth you are not truly my follower. Unless you’ve made a commitment to hold to my teachings and continue in them then you are not a true Christian. A disciple means student; one who follows another’s teachings. A true believer is a disciple, a student, one who has committed to follow the teachings of Jesus. If we’ve done that then we will know what truth is and the truth will set us free.
• We are free (34-36). What are we set free from?
o We are set free from confusion.We are free from having to figure out what truth is. Pilate asked Jesus, “What is truth”. There are some who think they’ve found it and they haven’t. And there are some who aren’t open to having their incorrect view of the truth exposed. Like the Jews Jesus was speaking to, they thought they knew the truth but were not open to having Jesus expose their incorrect understanding of truth. Some are confused by the idea that there is no absolute truth. ‘According to a survey done by Barna Research back in 2001 about 3/4 of all adults in America rejected the notion that there are absolute moral truths. Most Americans believe that all truth is relative to the situation and the individuals involved. Similarly, at least 80% of our teens embrace the same position regarding moral truths. 4 out of 5 claimed that nobody can know for certain whether or not they actually know what truth is.’ John 8:12. If we follow Jesus we are not blind anymore, we are no longer groping around in the darkness. We see the truth and we also see the contrast between light and darkness. We are not confused about what’s true and what’s false but rather we see clearly what’s going on around us. We have declared that Jesus and his word are truth and we measure everything else by this standard.
o We are set free from the penalty and the power of sin. Here Jesus is not only implicating them as slaves to sin but also the one they trusted in for their freedom-Abraham. For if everyone who sins (and this pertains to everyone but Jesus) is a slave to sin, then that includes Abraham as well. Abraham was declared righteous but by whom? Not himself but God. So, since everyone is a sinner except the Son then everyone needs to be set free by the Son because he is the only one who has a permanent place in the family. Jesus is the only begotten son of God. All others become part of the family through adoption. But these Jews believed they were not illegitimate children (children through adoption) but legitimate through Abraham. Jesus needed to highlight that their liberation could only come about through Jesus setting them free. We are free from the fear of the penalty of sin which is death. As a child of God we no longer have to fear death. We are free from the penalty of sin and we are free from the power of sin. We are no longer its slave. However, just because we are free from the power and penalty of sin it doesn’t mean we can sin as much as we want and get away with it. That’s not the mentality of one who’s truly free. Paul said in Gal. 5:13, “You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature, rather, serve one another in love.” Anyone who thinks Jesus paying the price for my sins gives me a clean slate to sin as much as I want is still in bondage. Paul was set free but he didn’t allow his freedom in Christ to cause him to allow sin to be his master again. This didn’t mean he never sinned again. In vs. 34 Jesus was talking about how everyone has sinned and is therefore a slave to that nature and is bound by it until he sets him free. Then he has the ability to choose to serve righteousness instead’. We still sin on occasion once we’ve been set free, but that doesn’t mean because we commit a sin we are once again its slave. Instead, we use our freedom to be more like Jesus. 2nd Cor. 3:16-18, “But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” Before knowing Christ we didn’t have the freedom to be like him but now that we are children of God we have the Spirit of God living in us enabling us to be like our Father and reflect his glory.
• We show love (vs. 39-42). We might say we love Jesus, but how do we show it? Obedience. John 14:15, “If you love me, you will obey what I command. Because he loved us, we love him back by doing his will. Vs. 39- Jesus is telling them that if Abraham was truly your father, you would be like him. What was Abraham like? He believed God. In Gen. 15 when God told him that he would father a child even though he and his wife Sarah were very old Abraham believed in the miraculous power of God. He obeyed God. He showed that he loved God more than anything else when he was willing to sacrifice his son Isaac in obedience to God’s command. James 2:21-24. If God is truly our father we will love him more than anyone/anything else and we will show that by our obedience. We also show that we love Jesus by loving one another. 1st John 3:10-12, 16-18. We know we belong to God when we show love to our brother or sister in Christ. And we show that love in tangible ways like helping them when they are in need.
2) How do we know that the devil is our father?
• We are prideful (33). “We are Abraham’s descendents”. They were hinging their ‘salvation’ on their ancestry; on their being a Jew. These Jews were priding themselves on their being a descendent of Abraham without following in the heart of Abraham (39). They missed the point. Equivalent to saying today, “I was baptized as a baby”. We cannot hinge our salvation on what someone did for us just like the Jews couldn’t hinge theirs on someone else, namely Abraham. And people might attach their salvation to a profession of faith they made years ago but hadn’t living according to the faith since. A singular act does not constitute salvation any more that being a descendent of Abraham did for these Jews. However, someone has to be humble enough to allow the stronghold to be demolished. We point to something as the basis for our acceptance with the Father and if it’s the wrong thing or if we haven’t walked in the pattern of truth (like these Jews who attached themselves to Abraham yet they didn’t do as Abraham did) we need to be willing to have that belief system challenged. “We have never been slaves of anyone”. The irony here is that the Jews had been in slavery to the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians. But even if they wanted to erase their history from their minds they were forgetting the fact that in that very moment they were under Roman rule. They weren’t free but their pride kept them from admitting that. But Jesus wasn’t even talking about that kind of slavery. He was talking about slavery to sin; which everyone was under. But, again, their pride would keep them from recognizing that too. As is does for people today. “I don’t need to be saved. I’m a good person.” Jesus would say, “You think you’re free but you’re not. You have no place in the family. You are a slave to sin and you need to be set free.” We think, ‘I’m no slave to anyone or anything. I do what I want, when I want. I’m my own man’. The reality is that Satan has lied to you and deceived you into thinking that. And he has also put a spirit of pride in you to where you resist anyone suggesting that you are bound in the chains of sin. Satan is subtle; he doesn’t want anyone to think they are a puppet on his strings. And since we are people who aren’t sinning all the time and we occasionally do good things that it would be absurd to think we are a servant of sin. In fact, just the opposite: “I’m a good person”. Warren Wiersbe said, “Unfortunately, the word Christian has lost a great deal of significance over the centuries and no longer means ‘one who has turned from sin, trusted Jesus Christ, and received salvation by grace.’ Many people who have never been born again consider themselves ‘Christians’ simply because they say they are not ‘pagans.’ After all, they belong to a church, attend services somewhat regularly, and even occasionally give to the work of the church! But it takes repentance from sin and faith in Jesus Christ, who died for our sins on the cross and rose again to give us eternal life.” Prov. 14:12, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.” We think we know what God’s conditions are for acceptance. We think we can have a relationship with God on our terms. We can think our way is the right way but that belief system is steeped in ignorance, denial and pride; and it’s deadly.
• We have no room for Jesus’ word (vs. 37). Why don’t I have room for his word? Pride and selfishness come into play. Pride says I don’t need to make room for it and selfishness says because I enjoy what I’m doing don’t want to listen to Jesus word that tells me what I’m doing is wrong and I need to stop. 2nd Thess. 2:9-12. I don’t want to be told that I’m not okay. I don’t want to be told that I’m a sinner. I don’t want to be told I have to change. I want to be told I’m fine just as I am. I don’t have room for Jesus’ word when I want to stay inside my dark thinking. Another reason I don’t have room for his word is because there are other theories and philosophies that I’ve come to accept as truth and I’m not willing to have those views or beliefs challenged. I have no room in my heart for Jesus’ word because there are other ‘words’ there instead and I’m not willing to make room.
• We want to ‘kill’ the truth (40-47). How do we kill the truth?
o We live in sin (41, 44). Through our choice to continually live in sin and be disobedient to Jesus’ commands we kill the truth and in turn we deceive ourselves. D.L. Moody said, “The best way to show if a stick is crooked is not to argue about it or to spend time denouncing it, but to lay a straight stick alongside it.” We won’t think we’re very crooked when we compare ourselves to other crooked people. The best way for us to determine if we’re crooked is to compare ourselves to the straightness of Jesus. Yes, we will always come up short in some way but we will be able to see just how crooked we really are compared to how crooked we think we are. We can say, ‘I’m a Christian’ all I want but if we don’t start to walk a different path then I’m lying to myself. Vs. 44-what a slap in the face for these Jews who declared that God was their father (41). We need to face the harsh reality of what we are if we are going to be free from sin.
o We choose not to listen (43-47). We kill the influence of Jesus through our resistance to his voice. We don’t understand because we don’t want to. We are unable to hear Jesus because of our pride and the loose hold we have on his teachings. Vs. 46-Jesus cannot be proven false by any account yet this validity doesn’t sway them. In our pride we can have the truth slap us in the face and choose not to subscribe to it. In His book “The Case for Faith” Lee Strobel interviews a top molecular biologist from Texas A&M, a recognized expert in the field. He goes through many different reasons why it is impossible for evolution to be possible, and when Lee Strobel asks him why so many scientists fail to see that, his answer was shocking. He said, “They refuse to believe it because the only alternative would be a Divine Creator, and to an atheist this is unacceptable.” They are the kind of people Paul talked about in 2nd Tim. 3:7, “always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth.” People have heard the truth, and they could understand it if they choose to humbly accept it. Being a child of the devil means we choose to listen to the world instead of Jesus. We choose to adopt a view of things from a worldly perspective rather than a godly one. 1st John 4:5-6. Those whose father is the devil chooses to side with worldly perspectives and viewpoints and is unwilling to listen to God.
CONCLUSION: When you look at my son, Shaun it’s fairly easy to tell who his father is. Why? Because of the resemblance. It’s the same spiritually. Who do you resemble? Who do we look like; who are we similar too? Is our life patterned after doing the things the heavenly father does or is our lifestyle patterned after the devil? Who’s your daddy?
