Don’t Scroll Past Jesus

You know, Jesus always had the best coffee. You know why? Because he brews it. All right. And so, let's go to Hebrews chapter 2. Hebrews chapter 2.

Uh, we're going to be looking at verses 1-4. And, uh, you're going to need to listen quickly today. All right? Because we have a lot we want to cover. I want to walk through and unpack Hebrews 2 1-4 for us. But then I'm also going to jump over to another passage to illustrate the warning that Hebrews is giving us today.

All right. So, we've got two passages that we're going to cover, which means it'll probably preach long, but you need to also listen quickly. Okay? Um, and uh we'll see we'll see how far we get with this. But before we get there, I want to ask a question. I want to ask a question.

And this is a very simple question, but I believe it has significant application in your life. Will you follow Jesus with your whole life? That's the question. Will you follow Jesus with your whole life? And it's a simple question with really a simple answer, but again, significant application to your life. The way you answer it is yes or no.

Yes or no. And I don't want you to answer it yet. I want you to answer it when we get to the end of the message. But Hebrews 2 1-4, let's read it. Therefore, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. Man, what a verse, right?

Sometimes it's a verse even just when you read it in the moment you think is that me? For since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? Man, another one that kind of stops you for a moment. Lord, I hope that's not me. It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will. And so I titled this the danger of scrolling Jesus.

And if you don't have social media, you don't understand the title. But on social media, what it's really easy for us to do is just scroll. We see a story and we pass it on and we keep going. We just scroll and we see a story and we read it and we pass on and we keep going. And for the most part, you're unaffected by social media. At least you think you are.

You'll read a story and you move on. You'll read a headline, you'll move on. And there's even some moments where it actually does stop you in your tracks and you think about it and you consider it and you're like, "Oh my goodness, what in the world?" Last night I was scrolling on Instagram and literally in Florence, Italy, where we were three weeks ago, they are now boarding up all of the buildings because of a demonstration that is about to take place there. And in a moment, I stopped. Kelsey, look at this.

We just walked this street. Can you believe that? And then three minutes later I was on to the next thing just scrolling and it really made me wonder man every sermon we hear every verse we read every Bible study we partake of there are moments where it stops us in our tracks wow and then we scroll on some some ways we're neglecting what we've heard, neglecting what we've heard. For the first couple of months, what we've been looking at in Hebrews chapter 1 is putting Jesus on display, stopping us in our tracks. It's all about Jesus. Jesus is better than everything.

Don't miss Jesus. That's the point of chapter one. Jesus is better than the prophets because he doesn't merely bring a message from God. He is God's final and full revelation. Jesus is better than the angels because he's not a created servant like they are. He's the eternal son.

Jesus is better because he's the radiance of God's glory. He's the exact imprint of his nature. He's the one who upholds the universe by the word of his power. He's the prophet who speaks as God, the priest who purifies us from our sins, and the king who sits at the right hand of the majesty on high. And yet we can read that and move on. And after telling us all these incredible things about Jesus, the author of Hebrews does something very interesting.

He stops teaching us about who Jesus is and he starts warning us about what we do with him. What we do with him. Again, look at that verse one. Therefore, we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard less we drift away from it. Again, when you see therefore, you need to ask yourself the question, what is it there for? What is it there for?

And in this case, the author is pointing us back to everything he just told us about Jesus in chapter 1. Because of that, because of him, pay very close attention to your life. Pay close attention to Jesus. Pay close attention to what you've heard about him, what's been spoken about him, what he came and declared. Every single one of us in this room, this command is for us. Pay close attention to your life.

And it's not just for members of the church and regular attenders of the church. It's even for those who are pastors and elders or elders in candidacy. Is there a bold elder in candidacy right now who is willing to get up and just recite Acts 20 verse 28? Do it. Amen. So even for those that are going to be called to lead the church, it declares of them pay careful attention.

Pay careful attention. So if it's important even for the leaders of the church, it's important for every member of the church. Pay careful attention to yourselves and to the flock. Why? Unless we drift away. First thing I want you to see from this is that drifting doesn't require a decision.

Drifting doesn't require a decision. It happens naturally. Let me explain it this way that even our kids that are not in big kids class today can understand. Imagine you're at the beach and and we've lived this because we've taken our kids to the beach. Imagine you're at the beach and you walk out into the ocean with your boogie board and you're playing and you're having a great time. And if you're not paying attention, what happens?

You drift. And all of a sudden, you wake up and you're like looking at what you think is where you entered and you're like, "It's way down there. How did I get here?" This is what happens to us naturally is we can drift. There was this one time uh when Kelsey and I were dating uh I I lived about an hour away and so I I was spending time with her um down in Franklin, Tennessee and I was driving back up to White House, Tennessee and it was late at night and um as I was driving I'm a great driver when I'm awake and so as I'm driving uh Tennessee has this ridge. All right.

So, Nashville is basically the bottom of a bowl and everything around it is up on a ridge. And so, White House is up on the northern part of the ridge of Tennessee. And so, as I'm coming up to the place where you start to get up a ridge, and the only way in which you can get a road through a ridge is you have to blow out parts of the mountain side or there's valleys. And so, you work your way through it in order to get up to the top. So, as I'm driving, it's late at night. I start dozing.

I start drifting off. And there was even literally a moment right before I got to the ridge and started going up that I drifted all the way across the road, hit gravel on the other side of the road, which jarred me awake. I come back onto the road, and I start going up the ridge, and I literally, eyes wide open, think, "Whoa, that was a close one. Not a hundred more yards, I'm back asleep to the point to where I then come around a curve and I just keep going. And there's two options. I either run into the part where they blew out the mountain or I drive off of the valley.

And by God's grace, I ran into the mountain and pingponged the car around a few times, got it lodged into a couple of boulders, and ended up having to kick out the back window to get out because all the doors were jammed in on themselves. And yet, this can happen to us spiritually even when we're awake. And that's why I think so many times as you read throughout the New Testament, it says, "Wake up. Wake up. No, don't neglect what you've heard. It's the most important thing for your life.

Don't neglect Jesus. Don't just think that you're going to get there by chance." You don't wake up one morning and just announce, "I've decided to walk away from Jesus." Rather, sometimes you simply just stop paying attention. You stop paying attention. You stop listening to his word.

You stop taking your sin seriously. You stop gathering with his people. You stop praying. You stop thinking about eternity. And slowly, almost without noticing, your heart becomes increasingly indifferent toward Jesus. The warning here isn't simply against outright rejection.

It's just against careless neglect. Careless neglect. You didn't just wake up one day and be out of shape physically. There was a day months ago, years ago, where you stopped taking care of your health. And church, it's a frightening thought because you can drift without ever intending to depart. And so Hebrews is warning us, stay on guard.

Pay attention. Pay careful attention to what you've heard about Jesus, what you've been taught, and what's been preached. Pay careful attention to his word. And the second thing I want you to see in this text is going to sound like a Spider-Man quote, but greatest or greater revelation brings greater responsibility. Greater revelation brings greater responsibility. The more you know about Jesus, the more accountable you are to whether or not you receive it or reject it.

Look at Hebrews 2 2-3 again. For since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable, and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? Here's what the author is saying. In the Old Testament, God gave his people his law through Moses. And what we also covered in the last couple of weeks is that scripture also tells us that the angels were involved in delivering the law. And when God gave his law, he expected his people to obey it.

He expected his people to obey it, follow it. Disobedience to it has consequences. Now, think about the argument the author is making. If God's people were held accountable for disobeying a message that was delivered to them by angels and Moses and the prophets, how much more accountable are we for neglecting a message that's delivered by God's own son? Remember what we've learned in Hebrews chapter 1. Jesus is greater than all of the prophets and the angels.

They spoke in puzzle pieces. He came and delivered the full picture. And if we neglect the full picture, how do we expect to escape judgment? The author is reasoning here from lesser importance to that which is of greatest importance. Do not neglect this message. Do not neglect what you've heard.

Do you have a verse for that? Yes, I do. 1 Corinthians 15 3-11. Listen to this. For I delivered to you as of first importance. So is your physical health important?

Yeah, it is. Don't neglect it. But is what you've heard from Jesus important? Yeah. Of infinite and greatest importance. Nothing greater in all of your life than you paying careful close attention to what Jesus has come and proclaimed.

What did he come and proclaimed? It's exactly what Paul says here. That he received that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. That he was buried. That he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. If you ever want a a passage and verse where you can run to and show someone exactly how the gospel is defined, this is it.

This is it. This is for them almost a creed that Paul is establishing for the church. And then not only is that what was proclaimed, but verse five says that he then appeared to Cphus and then to the 12. Then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time. most of whom are still alive. So he's saying if you want to know, go ask them, go interview them, go talk to them, though some have fallen asleep.

It just means they've died and they're in their temporary place. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he also appeared to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to even be called an apostle. I love the humility there. because I persecuted the church of God.

But by the grace of God, going back to that Psalm 67, right? By the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that was within me. So again, the grace of God brings you to God, and the grace of God keeps you with God. You need to know that, and you need to believe that, and you need to hold on to that.

Pay careful attention to the grace that God is providing. Whether then it was I or they. And this is why it's so important this gospel is proclaimed. So we preach and so you believed. Believed. We don't give people church in hopes that it helps them reach heaven.

We give people the gospel. and by believing the grace of God comes to them. If disobeying the lesser revelation brought judgment, how could we possibly escape judgment for neglecting the greater revelation? That's what he's talking about. He doesn't say, "How shall we escape if we reject such a great salvation?" He says, "How shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?"

That word matters because neglect isn't always open hostility. Sometimes neglect is simply teaching something of infinite value as though it isn't important and it's infinitely important. You see, you can neglect your marriage without ever filing for divorce. You can neglect your children without abandoning your family. though for the last month my kids probably think I've abandoned them because I've been home for four days in the month of October. You can neglect your health without deliberately trying to destroy your body.

The author is warning us that we can neglect the greatest gift God has ever offered humanity. We can neglect it. Honestly, it's actually probably natural because of our sin that we neglect it. And that's why the warning is pay close attention. Pay close attention. You don't have to openly reject Jesus to be guilty of neglecting him.

It's basically death by a thousand cuts over time. Now, we need to be careful here. The author is not teaching that salvation is earned by our attentiveness. It's not what he's saying. nor that a genuine Christian loses salvation every time he forgets to read his Bible. That's also not what we're saying here.

Okay? He's warning the visible community of believers that hearing the gospel is one thing and responding to it with persevering faith is another thing. So remember, he's talking not only to Jewish Christians, but to primarily Jews who have also heard of Christianity or who have heard of the gospel and are neglecting to trust it, to believe it, to follow Jesus, to follow him. If you hear it and neglect it, which would which leads to rejecting it, how can you possibly expect to escape judgment? Think about it this way. The warning is one of the means God uses to wake his people up and point them towards a legitimate response of trusting Jesus.

So he's telling this audience who they're all hearing the gospel and some are Christians and some are not. And he's telling them if there's anyone in the room right now who thinks they're in but are neglecting what they've heard, you need a warning. You need a warning. And the third thing I want you to see here is that God has has made his salvation unmistakably clear. He's made his salvation unmistakably clear. It was declared at first by the Lord.

All right. If you want someone proclaiming a message, who better to pick than the Lord? So, thank you, Jesus, for coming to the earth and declaring, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." He came and declared, and not only that, but he put witnesses around it. It was attested to us by those who heard it. And then not only that, but he also provided some extra things around it just to continue building your faith that you can trust this while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.

The author explains why we have absolutely no excuse for neglecting this salvation. First, Jesus himself announced it. This isn't a message somebody invented. This salvation was proclaimed by Jesus himself. The second thing is that eyewitnesses confirmed it. Those who heard Jesus walked with Jesus.

They saw his miracles. They witnessed his death. They encountered him after his resurrection. And they testified to what they had seen and heard and they passed it down. And so we have eyewitnesses. There were just in the life of Jesus.

Like it it it's actually still astonishing to me that there are people who believe that Jesus never actually existed when not only do we have written we have the Bible that testifies to it, but there is both Roman and Jewish historians that attest to the fact that Jesus Christ existed. Thousands upon thousands of people experienced the ministry of Jesus throughout Galilee, Judea, Jerusalem, and the surrounding regions. So, he was there and he spoke and he declared the gospel. Not only did he declare the go the gospel that he would come and that he would suffer and that he would die and that on the third day he would be raised from the grave. He declared that. But more than 500 people, according to the Apostle Paul in and what we just read in 1 Corinthians 15, more than 500 people at one time witnessed Jesus in his resurrected body.

That's hard to convince that many people to lie when it in no way benefits their physical, social, or economic lives. Think about that. He didn't pay them off. for them to declare it in their day is straight sentence to death because to declare that would be to say Jesus is Lord and not Caesar. So that's really important. Just contrast that for just a moment with Mormonism.

I love to just pick on other religions whenever you get a chance. You know, nobody was with Joseph Smith when the supposed angel Moroni tipped him off to the location of these golden plates with God's hidden scriptures. Nobody was with him. Nobody was with Joseph Smith when he discovered the golden plates in Western New York. Nobody was there. And nobody can examine them either because Smith says that they were returned to the angel Moroni.

And therefore, you got to take his word for it. And just so you know, Angel Moroni wasn't even an angel. He was originally a Native American who lived in America and supposedly buried the golden plates in the fifth century, then came back as an angel to tip Smith off. Jesus walked around and thousands of people saw him. Thousands of people experienced him. Thousands of people witnessed the miracles.

More than 500 people saw his resurrected body. Christianity that we trust is not a sci-fi story that was that went viral 2,000 years ago. It's not what it was. It's an examined religion. It's an examined belief. No other religion has been under the microscope of examination more than Christianity has.

Third thing I want you to see here is that God himself bore witness to it. Signs, wonders, miracles, the gifts of the Holy Spirit. God confirms the truth of the gospel proclaimed by his own witness. Why? Because he just knows we're dumb and hard of hearing. So, he's like, "Let me get as much around this thing to help you guys out."

God didn't whisper the message of salvation and just hope somebody heard it. All right? He sent his son. His son proclaimed salvation. His son built a team and welcomed masses of people to pay attention to him. Eyewitnesses confirmed his life and message and resurrection.

And God bes witness to it by providing all these supernatural things around it. That's incredible. That should build confidence that this is something we can pay careful attention to. All of which God made absolutely visible and public. So the problem isn't that God hasn't spoken clearly. The problem is that we don't always pay attention to what we have heard and seen, what he's revealed already.

And that brings us to another question I want us to wrestle with this morning. What does it actually look like to neglect Jesus? What does it actually look like to neglect Jesus? Because right now, you might be like, "I'm a little nervous. I'm a little nervous whether or not you're talking about me." I think most of us imagine neglecting salvation as somebody who openly hates God, mocks Christianity, or declares that Jesus isn't real.

And sure, that's an extreme version of neglect. But what if neglect is much more subtle than that? What if someone can grow up around Jesus, know the stories about Jesus, admire Jesus, and even be impressed by Jesus, and still never truly believe on Jesus for forgiveness of sins. That's exactly what we discover in another passage that I want to take you to to help you kind of illustrate some of this. So, turn over with me to John chapter 7. John chapter 7.

I'm going to kind of break this passage up a little bit just to give you a few different examples. I heard this message a few weeks ago from a friend of mine, Pastor Corbin Hobbs at the Heights Church in Denver, and he provided four responses to Jesus. There's actually more. There's like seven or eight responses, but we're just going to cover four of them in this. And as I listened, I was just struck by how well this passage illustrates the warning the author of Hebrews is making. And honestly, hopefully for us, I'm not trying to scare you out of what you think you are as a Christian, but hopefully just providing clarity and confidence and conviction that you've made a profession of faith and you're good.

Or if you're one of these categories, then just own it. Now, pay careful attention to it and believe on Jesus for faith or by faith. So John 7 gives us just this picture of people who are standing face to face with Jesus, who are hearing his words, who are witnessing his works and responding to him in very different ways. Very different ways. And so it's a question, how am I responding to what I've heard? How am I responding to Jesus?

Am I following him or neglecting him? Look at verse one, John 7. After this, don't worry about the after this yet, but Jesus went about in Galilee. He would not go about in Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill him. Now the Jews feast of booths was at hand. So his brothers said to him, "Leave here and go to Judea that your disciples also may see the works that you are doing.

For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself then to the world. Now, this is a great passage because this actually introduces us to Jesus's own brothers. This isn't brothers like what we call each other. Hey, brother. What's up?

These are actual brothers of Jesus. Actual brothers of Jesus. If you didn't know Jesus had brothers, he did. He had four brothers. These are men who grew up in the same household of Jesus. They ate meals with him.

They worked alongside of him. They probably picked on him because he was always perfect. They watched him grow up. If anyone should have recognized who Jesus was, should it not have been his brothers? They knew Jesus personally, but they did not yet believe in him as the Messiah. And in verses 3 through 4, they challenged Jesus to go to Judea and make himself publicly known.

How many of you have a sibling in the room? All right. The best way to read this is with sibling sarcasm. That's what's going on here. This is sibling sarcasm. If you don't understand what they're doing here, they're essentially egging him on.

Oh yeah, you think you're something, then go prove it. Go public with it. Stop telling us you're better than us. Their words reveal that they don't understand his identity, his mission, or his timing yet. How many of you have a brother? My brother was blessed with a brother.

I'll see my brother probably around Christmas time um this year and if I were to go to my brother and say, "Hey, I just want you to know I'm the son of God, therefore worship me." Like, I can tell you what he's going to do, but he's going to punch me. He's going to probably give me a wedgie and then sit on me. I mean, that's just like that's how we roll. So, it's kind of hard to get your brother to worship you, right? And so, could you imagine being the brother of Jesus, growing up with Jesus?

You never blame anything on him because he's never done anything wrong. He's the rabbi's pet. It's a teacher's pet joke for those you didn't get. It's fine. Terrible dad joke. But we know that his brothers did not have good intentions toward him because look at verse five.

For not even his brothers believed in him. For not even his brothers believed in him. This brings us to the first response I want to talk about for a moment. The close unbeliever. The close unbeliever. They know about Jesus but don't believe in him.

These are people who are around Jesus. maybe grew up in the church knowing about Jesus, singing the songs, learning the vocabulary, and in many ways being included by association, but not justification and sanctification. And I think these are some of the most miserable people that you can ever meet because they're in the church and they're doing the things, but they have no joy in Christ. They have no joy in Christ and they think they're in by association but not actual justification and sanctification. You can be familiar with Jesus without having faith in Jesus. You can be familiar with him without having faith in him.

Like perseverance right here. I'm a Cowboys fan and thank you. Appreciate it. I'm a Cowboys fan and I know a lot about Dak Prescott, but I don't know him and he does not know me. Some of us know Jesus like that. We know a lot about him, but we don't know him and he doesn't know me.

Being in church does not get you into heaven. for the disciples or for the brothers of Jesus being in his family didn't get them in. They had not believed on him. They know a lot about him. They do not believe on him. One of the scariest teachings of Jesus in my opinion is Matthew 7:21-23.

You don't have to go there. It'll be on the screens. Jesus says, "Hey guys, listen to this. I want you to be aware. Not everyone who says to me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one, this is what you want to hang on to, the one who does the will of my father who is in heaven. He goes on to say, "On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many mighty works in your name?"

Guys, that that sounds greater than things I've done in ministry. According to my knowledge, I've not casted out any demons. I tried one time. There was a situation. I did a mission trip in Haiti. We tried some things.

Do we not prophesy in your name? Cast out demons in your name? And Jesus turns and looks at them and says, I never knew you. Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness. What a wakeup call that is. If you're riding in the church vehicle and don't know Jesus, you're asleep at the will and this is a wakeup call.

It's a wakeup call. Well, how do I know if I know Jesus and Jesus knows me? Right? You're like, "Please get to that question. Answer it. I'm nervous."

The biggest indicator is that you have a secret life with God. What is your response outside of church? What is your affections and desires towards Jesus? What's the fruit that's coming out of your life? If you're only into public Christianity, which means I just come to church and that's when I open my Bible or I come to church and that's the only time I pray is publicly so others can hear and see. The Bible calls those types of people whitewash tombs.

Whitewash tombs. There was nobody in Jesus's day who knew the word of God more than the Pharisees. And he refers to them as whitewashed tombs. You look alive on the outside, you're dead on the inside. You're dead on the inside. There are people who know.

There are people you know about and people you know. And the difference between the two is relationship. I don't have a relationship with Dak Prescott. But I do know Kelsey and she knows me because there's relationship there. We didn't just get married and then I moved on to somewhere else and said, "I'm married." We abide.

We live together. We communicate with one another. We were fruitful and made babies. I don't need to go further than that. There was relationship there. That's why verse 21, the one who does the will of my father.

Real talk, in the past couple of weeks or even month, let me give you that. Is there something you've learned in the word of God and then you've gone and actually changed what you did that day because of what Jesus said to you? Man, that's a good evidence that you're following Jesus. You spend time praying and then you don't want to get up because you don't want to stop talking to him. That's good evidence that you're paying close attention and that he knows you and you know him. That's not legalism.

It's transformation. It's Romans 12:1 and2. Let me offer my body as a living sacrifice. Why? Because he's renewing my mind. He's renewing my mind.

If you are a close unbeliever, the greatest thing to happen to you this morning is for you to believe on Jesus for forgiveness from being around him, but not believing in him. It's the greatest thing you could do this morning. There's no guilt and shame in that. Pay careful attention to your life, what you've heard. So examine yourself. Examine your dayto-day.

If you have no affections for Jesus, but you know a lot about Jesus right now, repent from that and believe on him for faith. The truth shall set you free. I'll come back to that in a moment. Second response here is respectful observer. Basically verses 6 through9, Jesus sends his brothers up to the festival. And then we'll pick it up in verse 10.

This is what he says. But after his brothers had gone up to the feast, then he also went up not publicly but in private. The Jews were looking for him at the feast and saying, "Where is he?" So they're asking all these questions, "Where is he?" And there was much muttering or other translations say murmuring about him among the people while some said, "He's a good man." We'll stop there for a moment.

Here's where we get all the opinions about Jesus. where some think he's a good man, some don't think he's deceiving, and they're refusing to to follow him. You can think um in this moment, you can think Jesus was a good teacher. He's a good man. You can admire him. You can admire his compassion.

You can admire his social justice. Look at what he did for those who were broken and marginalized and on the fringes of society. You can agree with his moral teachings. You can believe that Christianity is generally good for society and still not believe in Jesus. Take people like Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro. They can believe Jesus was a good man and generally good for society.

but will not publicly profess that Jesus is the son of God. Jesus never called people merely to admire him. He called people to follow him, to follow him. And so I'm asking you, are you a respectful observer? Do you show up because you think Jesus is a good example to follow and therefore you want to simply be a better version of yourself? So you come to receive some golden nuggets from Jesus on how to improve your life, but you actually don't believe in him for the forgiveness of your sins.

Before you think this view is not held within the church, there are a lot of people who believe this in churches. There's a ministry called Ligonier Ministries that every few years they do a survey and the survey goes out to churches. So, this isn't surveys on the corner in in downtown urban centers. This is a survey that goes out to the churches. And I'm specifically pulling this one from 2020, a survey that they did called the state of theology. The state of theology.

And so, if you if you like to nerd out on these things like me, you can search it up there. I think there's even a more recent one just in the last couple of years that have come out. But this one's from 2020, which means it's probably worse now than what this one is. But one of the questions they ask two churches is this. Agree or disagree? Jesus was a great teacher, but he was not God.

30% of the people who regularly attend church agreed with that statement. Guys, I counted earlier. There's 40 people in this room. That means about 15 of you would agree with this statement. Again, Jesus never claimed to just be merely a good teacher, but he did claim to be the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. He did claim to be the savior who saves you from Satan's sin, hell, and death.

He did claim to be the Lord who can satisfy every deepest desire of our heart. He never claimed to be merely a good man with some good teachings. Therefore, Jesus is not a concept to consider. He's a king to trust. He's a king to trust. So, I want to ask you a question.

Are you a are you a respectful observer? And if so, then I want to beg of you. Don't settle for that. Wake up because you are one of the ones neglecting such a great salvation. There's so much more available to you than just seeing Jesus as a good man. The third response is the intellectual doubter.

Look at the second part of verse 12. There was much mur muttering, murmuring about him among the people. While some said he's a good man, others said no, he is leading the people astray. Other translations say he's deceiving the people. Let me ask an honest question. Have you ever wondered, is Christianity just some giant deception?

Have you ever asked that question? Is Christianity just some giant deception? Now, some of you, if like me, you might not have been raised in the church, might have thought Christianity, I mean, was just this crazy cult at one point, but at least maybe it was intriguing to you. Like for me it was intriguing. Even though I wasn't raised in it and I thought it sounded crazy, I was intrigued by it and I at least wanted to know whether or not it's actually a cult or whether it's actually true. And if that's ever been you, and even if that's you right now, uh you're welcome here because questions are good.

Christianity is not a blind faith. It is an examined faith. But if we can be honest with ourselves, there are times where a part of us is like the person here who says maybe it's just all one big deception. And there's a word we have for this. And that word's called doubt. Doubt.

Like have you ever doubted the legitimacy of Jesus? Have you ever doubted that? If you say yes, me too. Me too. I don't remember specifically when it was, but there was a time when I was driving on a motorcycle heading to a meeting to talk with someone about the assurance of salvation because they were doubting their faith. And I remember on the way to the meeting thinking, is it all really true?

Is it actually true? Am I a part of the deception? Have I believed a lie? Am I now not on the team of the Autobots, but the Decepticons? Because I know many of you in this room, you've staked your life on, you're all in. But I'm like really deep, like super deep into this.

My livelihood is based on what we believe. So, I want to talk about doubt for a moment before we get to the final one which is belief. One of my favorite passages to run to when I'm doubting is Matthew 14:31 when Peter's walking on the water and towards Jesus and he takes his eyes off of Jesus and he begins to sink and he says this and it says Jesus immediately, this is Matthew 14:31, it says Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him saying to him, "Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt? Why did you doubt?" So if when you doubt no more than anything, no more than anything, Jesus wants to reach out his hand and take hold of you. Jesus wants to reach out his hand and take hold of you.

That's what you need to know about Jesus when you are doubting. And so a question I have for us is doubt allowed in our practice of paying careful attention to Jesus or is doubt a part of the neglecting? If I'm doubting, does that mean I'm neglecting? And here's what I'll say. Yes and no. Is doubt allowed?

I'll say yes and no. And I'll explain why both. I believe doubt is an invitation for investigation. Anytime you doubt, is this real? Taken as an invitation to investigate. As I already mentioned, Christianity is an examined faith.

It's real people, real places, real events, real history. So, examine it, investigate it. Apostle Paul was a historical man. He actually lived. I visited his tomb three weeks ago. I stood six feet away from where Paul's buried.

real people, real places. We stood in the room where Peter and Paul were imprisoned and shackled and bound before their executions. Where Paul wrote second Timothy, he says, "I fought the good fight. I finished the race. I kept the faith." where he says, "I'm being poured out as a drink offering."

So, you can examine this, all of it. But there's one disciple I want to focus in on who we all know because he's popularized this was a doubter. What's his name? Thomas. See, everyone knows. The scriptures don't even call him doubting Thomas.

This is what we've ascribed to him. his famous moment of doubts recorded in John 20:24-29. Thomas wasn't present when Jesus first appeared to the gathered disciples after his resurrection. And so when the other apostles told him that they'd seen the risen Lord, Thomas responded this way in verse 25. Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails and place my finger into the mark of the nails and place my hand into his side, I will never believe. This is one of the 12.

And he's responding, I will never believe the resurrection unless I put my hand in the wounds myself. How many of us have made similar claims? Unless I see God do this, I will never believe. Eight days later, Jesus appeared again, this time with Thomas present. Jesus invited him to examine his wounds. And Thomas responded with one of the clearest declarations of Christ's deity in the New Testament.

Verse 28, he says, "My Lord and my God." So he doubted and it was an invitation to investigation and the Lord entertained it and said come investigate and his doubt led well his doubt which was an invitation for investigation led to conviction and proclamation. So is doubt okay? Yes, as long as you use it to investigate the claims and it leads to conviction and proclamation. Thomas no longer doubted but moved to devotion and declaration. And the reason why we know that is church history tells us around AD52, Thomas took the gospel to the southern coast of India where he planted seven churches over the next 20 years that then led to a church planting movement across India and also led to him being martyed and because God sometimes has a sense of humor even in our suffering.

You want to know how according to church tradition and history how um Thomas was martyed? Death by spears. Is it okay to doubt? Yes, as long as that doubt moves us to conviction. Here's why I say doubt's also not good. Or here's the the doubt that you're not allowed to do.

So just don't do this, okay? Don't do it. Perpetual doubt paralyzes disciplehip. Perpetual doubt, which means you never move on from it. You never investigate. You just constantly question.

You constantly doubt. I heard Matt Chandler once say, "It's okay to not be okay. It's just not okay to stay there." It's okay to not be okay. It's just not okay to stay there. It's okay to doubt as long as you don't stay there.

Investigate. Pay careful close attention to what you've heard. Look into what you've heard. If you have a question about Jesus, then investigate it and come to a conclusion. Don't neglect it. Perpetual doubt is just neglecting.

It's neglecting. The theme of doubt is prevalent throughout the New Testament, but it's not a sign of sickness. It's a sign of invitation to build your faith. So what does perpetual doubt look like for us? Listen to this way. If productive doubt looks like construction that leads to conviction, perpetual doubt looks like deconstruction that leads to rejection.

And that's what a lot of our people are doing. Those who have known about Jesus, who are observers, who are intellectual doubters, they are just maintaining perpetual doubt that leads to destructing everything, not investigating everything. And that's ultimately going to lead to them rejecting and walking away from Jesus, walking away from Christianity. It's doubting God by removing yourself from all of the opportunities to actually find the answers. It's neglecting what you've heard. It's drifting away from what is true and right and good and holy.

And so, how do we handle doubt? Um, I'm going to move through this real quick. Lee Strobble has a acronym called faith. And this is a way that you can handle doubt. Find the root of your doubt. So, is it intellectual?

Is it spiritual? Is it emotional? Is it pain? Is it experience? Did someone at church say something negative one time and you're like, "It's all it's all a sham. Church hurt.

I'm walking away." Find the root of your doubt and don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. In another way, don't don't put Jesus's Christianity on a disciple of Jesus who does it imperfectly. You understand that? Like for example, if I were to come over here and play one of Bach's, like how are you going to judge? You're going to judge Bach and say, "What a terrible composer he was."

No, you're going to look at me and say, "You ain't doing it right." So, there are Christians who don't do Christianity the right way, but that doesn't mean that we should reject Christ. Find the root of your doubt and then investigate. Ask God. Here's the A. Ask God and others for help.

So don't when you're doubting, don't isolate and pull back. Press in. Ask God and others for help. Don't pull back from the people of God and don't pull back from God. Pay careful attention to yourself and to the flock. Jump in and figure out, "Hey guys, here's where I'm doubting.

Ask others for help. Here's where I'm struggling. I can't figure this out. I'm I'm wor I'm I'm nervous about this or I'm I'm investigating this. Will you investigate this with me? And from there, here's the eye.

Initiate a course of treatment. Don't neglect the injury. Treat it. If you're unsure about Jesus, then read about Jesus. Start in the book of John. Just read the whole thing this afternoon.

Read the whole book of John. be a great assignment to do. The T is take care of your spiritual health. It's likely not intellectual, but just spiritual. God in or get in God's word, get in prayer, get in Bible study, gather on Sundays, like feed your faith. Don't neglect it.

Feed it. Take care of your spiritual health. Don't neglect it. And then H is hold your remaining questions intentions. Like, wait, what? Not all of your questions are going to be answered.

I still have questions. Actually, I feel like the longer I'm a Christian, the more questions I have. How does this work? How did you do this? What is this double predestination thing? Do we choose God?

Does God choose us? Work it out. But know that not all your questions are going to be answered. We we see dimly there. We will see clearly. Right?

So don't wait for all your questions to be answered before you take seriously what you've heard and believe on Jesus. And that's the fourth response. And here's where we'll close. The devoted disciple. Here's what John is doing in John 7. He's exposing many of the improper ways to respond to Jesus.

And he's building towards the only right response of Jesus. He's showing us what can happen if you hear the word but neglect it and don't truly investigate it and ultimately jump allin on Jesus. You'll either find yourself as a close unbeliever or a respectful observer or an intellectual doubter. But what we are praying for is that by faith we believe and become a devoted disciple. Look at verses 28 through31. Jesus proclaimed as he taught in the temple, "You know me and you know where I come from, but I have not come of my own accord.

He who sent me is true and him you do not know. I know him for I come from him and he sent me." So they were seeking to arrest him because they're not liking what he says. They're basically saying, "We know where you come from. You're Jesus of Nazareth. We know your family.

We know the people associated with you. We know your brothers. We can actually talk over here at the feast, but you're saying you're coming from something else and so we don't like that. You're saying you're coming from God. We don't like that. That's blasphemy.

So, we're going to arrest you for that. That's essentially what's going on. So, they're seeking to arrest him, but no one laid a hand on him because Jesus jked him, right? Because his hour had not yet come yet. And what a big yet this is yet. Many of the people believed in him.

Believed in him. They said, and I just love this. This is kind of like a kind of like a Jesus juke moment, too. When the Christ appears, will he do more signs than what this man's done? So, that's almost summarizing Hebrews chapter 1. Everything we see in this guy, is there anything greater that could come?

Is there anything better that could come than him? And if there's nothing better that we're all in. We believe him. We believe him. In other words, the case rests. We don't need anymore.

We're all in on Jesus. We believe. We believe. Even though there were many from the crowd who had differing opinions, they were deceived, continued to doubt, progressed in indifference, there were also many from the crowd who saw, heard, and witnessed, and it was enough. And they believed in Jesus as their Lord. So pay much closer attention to what you've heard.

Is it enough? I'll tell you this. It is enough. It is enough to believe on Jesus for forgiveness of your sins and to follow Jesus as Lord and Savior of your life. And so the question is, which response best describes you? Are you a devoted disciple?

Praise God. Praise God. If you're any of those other categories, there's still an opportunity to pay cl care careful close attention to what you've heard and believe on him right now. Just take the step and believe on him. Let's bow our heads. Jesus, you said to us in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the father except through me."

Father, right now, there might be some people in this room who know a lot about Jesus, but don't actually believe on him as the way, the truth, and the life. And they might not even be in relationship with the father right now because they haven't gotten there through Christ. But this is an opportunity for everyone in this room to consider and examine their life and which best describes them. And if there's anyone in this room who feel like they were one of the first three categories, then I pray right now that by faith they believe in Jesus. No guilt and shame in that. Honestly, all celebration.

All celebration. Because that's what the angels in heaven are doing. When one sinner comes to faith in Christ, they celebrate and they throw a party. And so, if there's anyone in this room who's who's doubted and has just never truly been sure, have you considered honestly who Jesus is? And has it transformed your life now? to where you're like, I'm all in and I actually believe he is the son of God.

He lived the perfect life I could not live. He died my death as a substitution for me. And he rose from that grave three days later. And I believe he is who he says he is. And I believe he did what he said he did. And I believe right now as Hebrews 1 has taught us, he is sitting at the right hand of the throne of God.

and I submit and surrender my life to him. I want to love him with all my heart, all my soul, all my might, all my strength. I want to go all in on Jesus. I believe in him. Examine your life. Examine your heart right now.

If that's you, believe in him. And then please let us know. No guilt, no shame in that. all celebration. Let us know. Let us know.

We will praise God together. Don't neglect the salvation that you've heard. Don't neglect it. Believe it to be true. As we come to this time of communion, Lord, we just thank you again that the way that you made this possible was by coming to a cross and breaking your body and shedding your blood. Your death paid our punishment and it's paid in full.

That's why you declared on that cross, "It is finished." We praise you for the fact that it's finished. We don't have to break our bodies and shed our blood to pay for any of our sins. You paid for it in full. Thank you, Jesus. We honor you.

We lift you up. We magnify your name. We worship you. We pray as Psalm 67 declares, we pray that all the nations would hear that message and that they would come to receive grace from you and to be blessed by you and to have your face shine upon them. We pray those things for us today. It's in Jesus name that we pray.

Amen. Would you stand with me? If you believe Jesus, died on the cross for you for the forgiveness of your sins, I invite you to come down, grab the elements, bring them back to your seat. We'll partake together at the end of um the song. And if there is I'm I'm telling you if there's anyone who truly like this is the first time light bulb. I've grown up in church, been around church the whole time, but it was just never fully there.

But now I see clearly and I believe. Please come talk to me. Please let me know afterwards so that we can rejoice and be glad in the Lord together. Come on down, grab the elements, bring them back to your seats.