See Jesus! Series

“There are lots of stories in the Bible, but all the stories are telling one Big Story. The Story of how God loves his children and comes to rescue them. It takes the whole Bible to tell this Story. And at the center of the Story there is a baby. Every story in the Bible whispers his name. He is like the missing piece in a puzzle—the piece that makes all the other pieces fit together; and suddenly, you can see a beautiful picture.” (Sally Lloyd-Jones, The Jesus Storybook Bible, Zondervankids, 2007, page 17; www.PreachingToday.com)

Do you want to see that beautiful picture of Jesus in your life? It’s simple. Just open your Bible. Then...

OPEN YOUR HEART to Him, as well.

Invite Jesus into your life. Welcome Him to stay and live with you. That’s what the two men on the road to Emmaus did.

Luke 24:28-29 So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.” So he went in to stay with them. (ESV)

Jesus would have left them, but they urged Him to stay. You see, Jesus doesn’t force Himself on anyone. Rather, you must invite Him to stay.

Luke 24:30-31 When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. (ESV)

Had they not invited Jesus in, they would never have seen Him.

Luke 24:32 They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us [literally, did not our hearts LIGHT within us] while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?”

Because Jesus opened the Word to them, and because they opened their hearts to Him, Jesus enlightened their hearts to see Him! If you want to see Jesus through the fog of your pain, then do the same. Open your Bible, to be sure, but also open your heart to Him.

A. W. Tozer put it this way: There is today an evangelical rationalism which says that the truth is in the Word and if you want to know truth, go learn the Word... [Such rationalists] have the text and the code and the creed, and to them that is the truth. So they pass it on to others. The result is we are dying spiritually. To know the Truth, we must “know” the Son. (A. W. Tozer in Power for Living; www.PreachingToday.com)

You see, it’s not enough just to know the Bible. you must know the One that the Bible is all about. Invite Jesus into your heart and life, so you can know Him personally.

Pastor Kevin Miller talks about the time when he was working in publishing, they had their annual staff Christmas Party. There were about 150 people in the room seated around tables that held six or eight people. The CEO came in right before the program was about to start, so there weren’t many seats left.

He spied an empty seat at one of the tables and came over. Very politely he said to the woman sitting by the empty seat, “May I sit here?”

She was waiting for someone from her department to come, so she kind of scowled at him and said, “No, that’s taken.”