One summer evening, during a violent thunderstorm, a mother was tucking her little boy into bed. She was about to turn off the light when he asked with a tremor in his voice, “Mommy, will you sleep with me tonight?”
The mother smiled and gave him a reassuring hug. “I can't, Dear,” she said, “I have to sleep with your daddy.”
A long silence was broken at last by his shaky little voice: “The big sissy.” (Source Unknown; www.PreachingToday.com)
Ever since childhood, we have all longed for somebody close, especially in the storms. We want to be connected. We want to know we belong. The problem is a lot of people go looking for it in all the wrong places.
Monty Roberts’ work with horses inspired the movie called The Horse Whisperer. And during a 60 Minutes episode, Monty Roberts taught the world the secret of his horse whispering. It involves his getting into the corral with the untamed mustangs and staying as far away from the animal as possible, without leaving the enclosure. He also refuses to allow any eye contact between him and the horse. By moving slowly, but surely, away from the horse, and by keeping his eyes averted from the animal’s gaze, Monty slowly draws the horse to himself. Even though the beast is pounding the earth with his foot, and snorting and circling with great speed, Monty keeps steadily moving away from the horse. He won’t look at it. He won’t approach it. As astounding as it sounds, Monty can have a wild mustang saddled and carrying a rider quite happily. When asked about his secret, he says, “The animals need to be with others so much, they would rather befriend the enemy than be left alone.” (Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, The Shaping of Things to Come, Hendrickson, 2003, p. 98; www.PreachingToday.com)
People will befriend even the enemy of their souls rather than be left alone. They will do things in the search for intimacy that are only self-destructive in the end. They will look for it in the bars. They will look for it in internet pornography. They will look for it in bad relationships.
But there is a better way to find intimacy. There is a better way to find the companionship we’re all looking for. There is a better way to find the fellowship and joy we all so desperately need. If you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to 1 John 1, 1 John 1, where the Bible shows us that way.
1 John 1:1-4 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete. (ESV)
Find fellowship and joy through the Word of Life. Find the delight of intimacy in a relationship with Christ. Find the pleasure of companionship in Him.
That’s where John, the one who penned these words, says he and his friends found it. They were rugged fisherman, used to the hard life of the sea. They worked hard to earn a living, putting up with the unpredictable storms that often arose on the Sea of Galilee. Life was not easy for them.
In fact, John and his brother, James, were actually nicknamed “Sons of Thunder,” not because they were nice, easy-going fellows. No. They were the ones that wanted to call fire down from heaven on a town that rejected Jesus. They were not sissies in any sense of the word, and yet these rugged fishermen found joy in their companionship with Jesus. I get the sense that they had a lot of fun together.
They experienced God himself in the flesh. They heard Him with their own ears. They saw Him with their own eyes, and they touched Him with their own hands. They weren’t making this stuff up!
In his book, Faith Is Like Skydiving, Rick Mattson illustrates the reliability of the gospel accounts of Jesus’ life and resurrection by drawing a horizontal spectrum on an easel pad. He labels one pole 0% and the other pole 100%. Then he asks people to imagine that four friends named Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John attend a sporting event together and afterword write down what they saw. If 0% of the four reports harmonized with each other, we’d think the guys got their wires crossed and attended separate events. Matthew reported on a baseball game. Mark reported on a football game. Luke and John reported on completely separate sports events. By contrast, if the accounts were 100% verbatim, or pretty close to it, we would also be skeptical. We would think Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John huddled in a room somewhere to fabricate a single harmonized account.
But what if the reports were in the 70% range, roughly speaking? What if the broad contours of the stories were very similar, though some of the details different? Say Mark’s account of the baseball game was the shortest and most selective. Matthew’s account was longer and more organized. Luke highlighted some of the underrated players and a distressed female fan who got beaned by a foul ball. John’s was the most philosophical about baseball.
Despite these disparate angles, the reports had much in common: the [Kansas City Royals] beat the [Baltimore Orioles] 8 to 4, the game was played in Kansas City, such and such players [did poorly], and one player in particular stood out as the clear hero of the game—knocking in all of his team’s runs and hitting a grand slam on the final out to seal an unbelievable come-from-behind victory.
It seems to me we could feel pretty confident that this game actually took place and that its elements were truthful as reported by the four witnesses. Well, that’s just what we have in the four Gospels. (Rick Mattson, Faith Is Like Skydiving, IVP Books, 2014, pages 65-66; www.PreachingToday.com)
They were four eyewitnesses, with basically the same fantastic story, but from four different points of view.
They experienced Jesus as a real flesh and blood human being. You see, Jesus was such a fantastic person that a rumor began to circulate in the 1st and 2nd centuries, which said He didn’t really exist in the flesh. Some thought that he was just a spirit being that only appeared to have a body. But John says, “No. We heard Him, we saw Him, and we touched Him ourselves.” He was as real as you and me – God in the flesh.
Today, people say the historical Jesus is not all that important. It’s not all that important whether He did all those miracles. It’s not all that important whether He really died and rose again. It’s not all that important whether He really existed. What’s important are the ideas He represents.
Hogwash! Nothing could be further from the truth. Jesus is more than just a nice idea. He is God in the flesh, a real person who makes a real difference in the lives of those who encounter Him.
John and his friends experienced Jesus as a real flesh and blood human being, and they also experienced Jesus as the “Word of Life” (vs.1). He was God Himself, o logos in the original, the Word. That’s the title the Greeks gave to what they called “the Controlling Reason of the Universe.” Jesus was the Word – God Himself.
But he was more than that. He was the Word of LIFE – the LIVING God Himself. Everywhere Jesus went, he brought life! Do you know Jesus broke up every funeral he ever attended? That’s right! He was always raising the corpses back to life. He raised the widow’s son in Luke 7. He raised his best friend, Lazarus, in John 11, and He even raised Himself from the dead at the end of all four Gospels.
To be around Jesus was really and truly to be around “THE LIFE!” And that’s how John describes Him in verse 2 – the Life was made manifest. Jesus Himself said, “I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).
On September 11, 2001, when the now infamous plane crashed into the Pentagon, Officer Isaac Hoopii was nearby but outside the building. Immediately, he began helping people straggle out of the building – in some cases, carrying them out.
But Hoopii wanted to do more. Wearing only his short-sleeved, blue, police uniform – no mask, no protective coat, not even a handkerchief – he ran into the inky blackness of the Pentagon. Someone yelled at him to stop. “We gotta get people,” he shouted back.
Suffocating on smoke, Hoopii heard the building cracking. He called out, “Is anybody in here? Anybody here?”
Wayne Sinclair and five coworkers were crawling through rubble and had lost all sense of direction when they heard Hoopii's voice. They cried out, and Hoopii responded. “Head toward my voice. Head toward my voice.” So following his voice, Sinclair and the others soon made their way out of the crumbling building. (Steve Gertz, Wheaton, Illinois, U.S. News & World Report, 12-10-01, pp. 24-32; www.PreachingToday.com)
Hoopii’s words were literally “words of life” to those people. In the same way, Jesus Himself IS the Word of Life for anyone who listens to Him. In fact, He is the only way to life. He is the only way to an eternal and abundant life, which begins the moment you trust Him with your life.
John and his friends experienced that life. They experienced the real flesh and blood Jesus as the “Word of Life.” And they want you to experience Jesus in the same way. That’s why John is writing these words here in 1 John.
1 John 1:3 That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. (ESV)
That word, “fellowship,” means to share things in common. John wants you to share in his experience with the Lord. He wants you to have that same experience he had with Jesus, that life-changing, personal encounter with the Living God of the Universe, who became a flesh and blood human being.
In the movie, Jurassic Park, there is a powerful moment when world-class paleontologist, Allen Grant, comes face-to-face with real, live prehistoric creatures. He has devoted his life to the study of dinosaurs, but when he comes face to face with one, he suddenly falls to the ground, dumbstruck.
You see, it is one thing to study books about dinosaurs. It is one thing to pick through fossils and bones of dinosaurs. It is one thing to picture dinosaurs in your head, but to encounter an actual dinosaur—well, there is nothing like it. (William D. Hendricks, Exit Interviews, Chicago: Moody, 1993; www.PreachingToday.com)
Sad to say, for many people, their Christianity amounts to picking through the artifacts of faith that have survived from long ago and far away. They read about Jesus. They wear crosses, and they try to imagine what it must have been like to live in His day, but that’s as far as it goes.
Please, don’t do that to yourself. If you want real fellowship and joy, if you want the delight of intimacy in a relationship with Christ, if you want the pleasure of companionship in Him, then you must…
EXPERIENCE CHRIST PERSONALLY.
By faith, hear and see and touch the God who is real. Don’t just know ABOUT Him. Get to KNOW him intimately and personally.
Invite Him into your life, and then spend time in His Word. Talk to Him. Let Him become your closest friend, and let Him change your life from the inside out. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you, James 4:8 says. Please, don’t confuse religious activity with a real relationship with the real Lord, Jesus Christ.
Todd Wilson, pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, Illinois, talks about the times when his kids slip up or, for fun, call him by his first name. “Todd,” they'll say. They do it in just, meaning no disrespect, but Todd says, “I'm always eager to correct them just the same.”
“Why is it such a big deal to call you by your first name?” they ask him.
“Well, it's not,” Todd says in response. “It's just that you don't want me to start treating you as though you only know me as Todd. You want me, you need me, to be dad or father, not Todd. [Others] call me Todd. But I wouldn't die for [them]. I'd die for you, so you call me dad or father.” (Todd Wilson, “The Gift of the Son: Everlasting Father,” sermon at www.Preaching Today.com)
That’s the kind of relationship God wants to have with you! Jesus said to His followers, “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my father, I have made known to you” (John 15:13-15).
Friends share secrets with each other. Servants just obey without question. Jesus wants to be your friend! Please, don’t ignore the friendship He offers.
Trust Him with your life, and ask Him to reveal Himself to you, personally and intimately. Ask God to fill you with His own Holy Spirit every day. Then bask in the light of His presence. Walk with Jesus as with a friend. Live your life with the conscious awareness of Him at your side. Pray your way through the day. Consult the Lord about every decision, and share every moment of every day with Him. You see a beautiful sunrise; thank Him for the sunrise. You face a problem; ask Him to help you through. Just enjoy His presence every step of the way.
Oh, if you want the joy of sharing in His life, then by faith reach out and touch Him today. Get to know Him personally and intimately. In a word, experience the Living God for yourself.
Then don’t keep Him to yourself. If you want to increase the joy, once you have experienced Him, then…
SHARE HIM WITH OTHERS.
Proclaim him so others can join in the fun. Let people know of your experience so they can share in the joy.
That’s what John is doing right here. Verse 2 – We proclaim to you the eternal life. Verse 3 – That which we have seen and heard we proclaim to you. Verse 4 – We are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.
John and his friends found great joy in knowing the Lord personally. They found great joy in hearing and seeing and touching Jesus. They found great joy in their experience with Christ, but they want to complete their joy; they want to make their joy full; they want to be filled with even more joy. How? By sharing it with others.
When the Kansas City Chiefs won their division against the Colts this last January, people around here were very happy. But do you know what made them even happier? It was the opportunity to re-live the game with their friends. It was the opportunity to share the good news with others.
There is joy in the victory. But there is even greater joy in the telling of the victory. So it is when we experience Jesus Christ. There is wonderful joy in the experience, but there is even greater joy in the telling of the experience.
Personally, I know of no greater joy than sharing Christ with people and watching them respond by putting their faith in Him. Over the years, when I’ve been discouraged, my spirits are always lifted when I recall those whose lives God has transformed through my witness and testimony. There is no greater thrill, and I pray that all of you could have that experience, not just once, but many times in your life.
Angie, a Christian college student, was on a flight from Chicago to Lincoln, Nebraska, several years ago, sitting next to a 19-year-old Saudi Arabian guy. His name was Ali, and he was on his way to the University of Nebraska. They struck up a conversation, and Angie learned that he had never been in the United States before.
That’s when she felt Jesus tugging at her heart. They talked about his feelings on being so far away from home, and Angie asked what he knew about American culture. That’s when Angie told him that she was a follower of Jesus and asked about his spiritual background. She told him that he'd probably meet a number of people in Nebraska who are Christians, and said it'd probably be helpful to understand a little of where they're coming from. Then she pulled out a 4 Spiritual Laws booklet and read through each point with him…
They talked a little bit more, and then she went to reading her book. He went back to the booklet and read it from cover to cover! Angie says, “I could hardly concentrate, I was so excited. I prayed for him as he was reading it, thankful to have been reminded this morning in the Word that God is the one who works, convicting people of their need for him.” After he finished reading, Angie asked him what he thought, and he said it was very interesting.
As they landed, she told him she’d pray for him… then was convicted that she should do it right there. Scary!!! What would this Muslim think? She asked if she could pray for him, and he immediately said yes. At the baggage claim, she went over and met his cousin and invited them both to an American culture event: Christmas Eve service at her church!
She writes: “This is why I love being a Christian—it's heart-pounding-scary at times and exhilarating when I see someone that I know Jesus wants to come to him, and I have the choice to step out in faith or stay in security. (personal e-mail from Marilyn Adamson 12-06; www. PreachingToday.com)
That’s the joy of knowing Christ. It’s heart-pounding scary at times but exhilarating when you step out in faith.
Do you want to really live? Then find fellowship and joy through the Word of Life. Find the delight of intimacy in a relationship with Christ. Find the pleasure of companionship in Him. First, by faith, experience Christ personally. Then, share Him with others.
I like the way Rich Hansen, a pastor in California put it. He says, “God's reality in our world is like gently falling rain. We each have a bowl in our hearts and minds in which we can easily catch God's reality—if we just hold it before us. But it makes all the difference in the world whether our bowl is turned upwards—or downwards.” (Rich Hansen, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Visalia, California; www.PreachingToday.com)
My dear friends, by faith, turn your bowl upwards this morning to receive all that God has for you.
