POWERFUL TRUTH
Or
Don’t Let Your Heart be Hardened
There’s only one point today:
If you want to know the power of God’s Truth,
You have to soften your heart.
How do People respond to the truth?
John 12
37 Even after Jesus had performed so many signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him. 38 This was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet:
“Lord, who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?”[h]
39 For this reason they could not believe, because, as Isaiah says elsewhere:
40 “He has blinded their eyes
and hardened their hearts,
so they can neither see with their eyes,
nor understand with their hearts,
nor turn—and I would heal them.”[i]
The crowds had Truth standing before them, yet
42 Jesus said to them . . . 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46 Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? 47 Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”
Pilate had Truth standing in front of Him (John 14:7), Yet . . .
John 18:37 “You are a king, then!” said Pilate.
Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”
38 “What is truth?” retorted Pilate. John 18
But it’s not just the crowds & people like Pilate who resist Truth.
Mark 6: 51 Then he climbed into the boat with them, and the wind died down. They [the Disciples] were completely amazed, 52 for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened.
Mark 8:17 Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? 18 Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don’t you remember?
Yet the TRUTH is powerful, able to set us free from sin
John 8: 31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
Let’s unpac that verse just a bit. Three quick points before we move on:
First,
1. This promise is quoted quite a lot. But
it is made to people who are really (the word is TRULY) disciples of Jesus.
“If you hold to my teaching (literally, if you remain, or abide, in my word), you are truly my disciples. THEN . . .”
Think about Judas. He was sent with the other 11 to “heal the sick, raise the dead, & cast out demons”. Yet Judas was not truly a follower of Jesus. He hardened his heart to the point that Satan himself could enter it (John 13). The truth doesn’t make you free unless you respond to it properly.
2. THE WORDS There are two words most often translated in the NT as ‘truth” or “truly”.
One is Amen ?µ??, or ?????
It means reliable, or valid. It may be the most like what we think when we say the word “truth” in English
The other, which is used here, is aleitheia ????e?a it means Not Hidden
There are two words most often translated in the NT as “know”.
One is Oitos, which means knowing about something-Like I know the capitol of France is Paris, but I’ve never been there.
The word here, however is gnosko- ???ses?e
this is knowledge based on EXPERIENCE. The truth of God is not just something you hear or see or memorize from a book. It is the kind of truth you have to live. Strong’s Greek Concordance defines the word this way:
"experientially know") – functional ("working") knowledge gleaned from first-hand (personal) experience, connecting theory to application; "application-knowledge," gained in (by) a direct relationship.
The important thing Jesus wants of us and for us is relationship. It’s that relationship that is liberating. As Jesus said
21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ 23 Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’
(Matthew 7)
5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” 6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. . .” (John 14)
3. You see, Jesus is the Truth and His Word is truth. (John 17:17)
& we need to continue in His word...it's not deliverance or doing great acts like that...it's simply being clothed by Gods character by knowing His word. This is how we become people who make the world a better place, and we become instruments of transformation in the lives of others.
This is the TRUTH that is POWERFUL.
But our hearts can be hardened to the TRUTH
Hebrews 3:7 So, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you hear his voice,
8 do not harden your hearts
as you did in the rebellion,
during the time of testing in the wilderness, (quoting from Psalm 95)
& it’s not just the people of Israel
The same power that delivered them from slavery in Egypt drowned Phraoroh’s Army
Because Phaoroh hardened his heart.
John Alexander Dowie
Was a powerful servant of God. He prayed and saw multitudes healed. One time he was visiting California where there had been terrible drought, with no rain for months. He was challenged to pray, so he got on his knees & prayed. Before the service was finished, torrential rain was pouring.
Yet late in his life, against the advice of many of his dearest and best advisors, he made himself the head of a village community, trying to make himself the king of his own little realm. Before the end of his life his credibility, witness, and ministry were all destroyed. He allowed his heart to be hardened.
Hosea 10:12
Sow righteousness for yourselves,
reap the fruit of unfailing love,
and break up your unplowed ground;
for it is time to seek the LORD,
until he comes
and showers his righteousness on you.
13 But you have planted wickedness,
you have reaped evil,
you have eaten the fruit of deception.
Because you have depended on your own strength
and on your many warriors
Finally,
Truth and Love go hand in hand.
Joe LaGuardia
graduated in 1996 from Douglas High School in Parkland Florida, where a mass shooting took place this Wednesday. He got news of the death of his old friend, Aaron Feis, who died near midnight of three gunshot wounds he received while shielding students. But the loss of his friend is hightened because he lost his dad to a similar shooting in 2013 in Pennsylvania.
Here are his words concerning the tragedy.
People often say lightning does not strike twice in the same place. But as news reports came in Wednesday from Parkland, Fla., about a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, from which I graduated in 1996, I feared it had struck again for me. . . .
It had been four years since the tragic death of my father, James Vinny LaGuardia, in a 2013 mass shooting at a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania . . .
Aaron Feis, an old high school buddy who worked security and as a junior varsity football coach there, was on my mind. I checked his social media page after our Ash Wednesday service at First Baptist in Vero Beach, where I am pastor.
Conflicting news came in about Aaron's condition, until it was confirmed around midnight that he died from gunshot wounds, shielding students from bullets fired from a high-capacity weapon.
As one of at least 17 dead, the loss of Aaron from this shooting stabs my heart with horror yet again. . .
It is to the cross we must go, however — reminding us all that we follow a Lord who insisted those who live by the sword will die by the sword. We follow a Lord who died on the cross innocently, with forgiveness in his heart, rather than with words of vengeance, because he knew that retribution only perpetuates a vicious cycle.
He bore it himself to show us that a different way was, and is, possible.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/nation-now/2018/02/15/my-dad-died-mass-shooting-and-now-my-friend-killed-florida-shooting-joe-laguardia-column/341392002/
Sow righteousness for yourselves,
reap the fruit of unfailing love,
and break up your unplowed ground;
for it is time to seek the LORD,
until he comes
and showers his righteousness on you. Hosea 10:12
His Truth will, indeed, set us free. We must prepare our hearts to receive it.
If I could give only one message to you, and especially to you who will graduate in a few weeks,
It would be
Soften your heart
Daily
Humble yourself before the Lord every day & every moment, to embrace His truth, no matter how difficult that is.
