Isaiah 48: 6 NIV
"From now on I will tell you of new things, of
hidden things unknown to you.”
What Do You Know About Jesus?
The other day I stood at the door while
eighth graders filed past me as they entered the classroom where I was to be
their substitute teacher. I heard one
say, “Oh, we have a sub!” I don’t know
if that was good or bad. Was she happy
there was a substitute teacher or disappointed?
I wasn’t greeted. Eye contact was
not made with me. The girl just walked
past me and made the declaration, “We have a sub!” She did not know me and I did not know her
and it seems unlikely we would ever come across each other again in this life
unless of course I was a substitute teacher in another class of hers. What struck me was that I was a category, not
a person. The only characteristic I
possessed that this young teen cared about was that I was a sub. She was not wondering about me at all. It did not matter if I was young or old,
married or single, a father, a Raiders or a Patriots fan, a Christian or a
Muslim or a Hindu, an intellectual or a high school dropout, a nice guy or mean
and disinterested in what I did. The
girl did not even worry herself over whether I was a human being or some
creature from another galaxy. I was a
sub and that was all that mattered. This
girl did not have any interest in knowing anything else about me.
When someone like the famous atheist
Carl Sagan makes clear that he has no interest in finding out anything about
God, no one is surprised. It seems
normal for him to not even have a bit of curiosity about the Creator. When someone who is Hindu or Buddhist makes
no effort to learn about Christ, we aren’t shocked. But if a person who claimed to have an
interest in Christianity did not care about finding out what God was like or
how Christ thought about things, we might wonder about that. It would maybe be odd if you did not show
interest in knowing more about God; if you were in fact satisfied that you knew
all you cared about knowing when it came to Christ. Now we come against a rather stunning
discovery. Many Christians without
saying it have decided they know all they need to know about Christ; that they
have come far enough in their understanding of Him to be satisfied. What about you? Have you gone as far as you care to go in
your familiarity of God and what He is like?
What is your true interest level in God and how He is personally?
When we think of heaven and eternal life
and the rewards of God, we don’t generally think along the right lines of all
this. Jesus defined the chief
characteristic of eternal life when He was praying in front of the disciples
just before being arrested and crucified.
He declared, “Now this is eternal life: that they may know
you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” (John
17:3 NIV) Eternal life is knowing God;
knowing Jesus Christ. That is all there
is to it. Nothing about streets of gold
or great food or new bodies! The most
crucial aspect of eternal life is knowing God.
The verb translated “know”, has two qualities to it. It is intimate knowledge, not hearsay, not
proclaimed and overheard but personal knowledge that is experienced. Second, it is a knowledge that keeps
developing, keeps happening. It is not
the knowledge of a moment but the knowledge of everlasting, of
never-ending. Eternal life is God and
more God and more God. It is like
falling in love and never wanting to back away or take a break but being so
head over heels in love that you cannot get enough of the one you love. There is always something more wonderful and
beautiful to discover, always something more fascinating and electrifying to
learn. That is eternal life. Getting to know God more and more and never
being bored of it, never getting weary of it because it is too good to quench.
Here is the problem we face. We have the heritage of Adam and Eve as our
own. Before Adam sinned, he walked with
God and enjoyed Him continuously but as soon as he sinned, Adam hid from God
and did not want to be seen by Him, did not want to talk with Him or be with
Him. That is the heritage of the human
race. Sin has made God irrelevant in us;
unattractive to us and uninteresting. We
certainly want Him to give us something but the interest is more in what He
gives than who He is. It is like Jacob,
who when he found out his father Isaac was going to bestow a blessing on
Jacob’s older brother Esau, he dressed up as Esau to fool his blind father into
giving him the blessing rather than who his father wanted to have it,
Esau. Jacob did not care how it hurt his
father to be fooled. He did not love his
father enough to let him do what made him happy. He did not want to know why his father felt
strongly about giving the blessing to Esau. Jacob just wanted the
blessing…but…and we are not being too judgmental to see it…Jacob was not very
interested in the father behind the blessing.
That is the curse of sin in us.
It makes God less inviting and less desirable than whatever He might
give us.
There is a fascinating case study in the
Bible of just what it is like to begin the journey of eternal life and it is a
mirror of our own experience. When Jesus
invited Peter to follow Jesus, he knew enough about Christ to do so. What information he had, we cannot say
exactly but it was enough for Peter. As
Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called
Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they
were fishermen. "Come, follow
me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." At once they left their nets and followed
him. (Matthew 4:18-20 NIV) Sometime later, after having seen some of
Jesus’ miraculous deeds and listened to Him teach, Peter made a most surprising
decision. When a great storm arose on
the Sea of Galilee and Peter was with the other disciples, off in the distance
came someone walking toward them on the water and everyone in the boat thought
it was a ghost. It was of course Jesus
and when the Lord reassured them that it was Him, Peter asked if he could climb
out of the boat and walk on the water too and Jesus told him to come on out and
join him. But after just a few steps,
Peter looked at the waves and his faith in Christ sank. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked
on the water and came toward Jesus. But
when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out,
"Lord, save me!" Immediately
Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. "You of little faith," he
said, "why did you doubt?" (Matthew 14:29-31 NIV) Now Peter
knew by experience, personal experience, something about Jesus he did not know
before. He could trust Jesus to take
care of him in even the worst of circumstances.
That is eternal life; knowing more of Christ.
Later, Peter was on a hill with James
and John and Jesus when something wild happened.
About eight days after Jesus said this, he took Peter, John and James
with him and went up onto a mountain to pray.
As he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes
became as bright as a flash of lightning.
Two men, Moses and Elijah, appeared in glorious splendor, talking with
Jesus. They spoke about his departure, which he was about to bring to
fulfillment at Jerusalem. Peter and his
companions were very sleepy, but when they became fully awake, they saw his
glory and the two men standing with him.
As the men were leaving Jesus, Peter said to him, "Master, it is
good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters — one for you, one for
Moses and one for Elijah." (He did not know what he was saying.) While he was speaking, a cloud appeared and
enveloped them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. A voice came from the cloud, saying,
"This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him." (Luke
9:28-36 NIV) What an amazing
experience. Peter got to meet the
legends Moses and Elijah. What he did
not know until then was that Jesus was not on a par with Moses and Elijah. He was not their equal, not their peer. He was the Son, He was their God. He did not know this before. He thought he knew who Jesus was but He was
much more than Peter realized. He was
the Son. This was eternal life. He knew more about Christ than he did before.
A fourth experience of Peter gives us an
even better idea of what eternal life is.
Boldly, before Jesus died, Peter announced to everyone including Jesus
that he was far more brave and loyal to Jesus than any of the others. Jesus was not very encouraging. He told Peter that Peter would in fact deny
that he was one of Jesus’ followers three times in the next few hours and that
of course is what happened. Peter was
heartbroken later when it came to pass and he felt like an absolute
failure. But after Jesus returned to
life and began meeting with the disciples and others, Christ pulled Peter aside
and three times asked Peter if Peter loved Him, the exact same number of times,
Peter cowardly denied knowing Jesus. In
the end the Lord gave Peter a special mission one that required great courage
and dedication. Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.
I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where
you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone
else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." Jesus said this to indicate the kind of
death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, "Follow
me!" (John 21:17-19 NIV)
Here, on the shores of the Sea of Galilee, Peter found out how merciful
Jesus is. Christ did not hold Peter’s
cowardice against him. He did not lose
confidence in Peter. He gave Peter a
mission, to take care of the new community of Christians who would soon join
them and He did so without any sort of warnings against failing. Jesus, Peter learned does not hold our sins
and failures against us but builds up our lives and gives us honorable work to
do. Peter learned something new about
Jesus and that is eternal life. He
discovered how kind and generous Jesus is.
One more moment we can consider about
Peter’s life. After Jesus went back to
heaven and physically left the disciples, now known as Apostles, they all were
gathered together praying when the Holy Spirit came upon them and they began to
speak in all sorts of foreign languages that were supernaturally given to
them. A crowd was nearby made up of
people from various parts of the world.
As the Apostles preached to the mass of people, each one understood
perfectly in his or her own language what the Apostles were saying. This was a miracle and one that was
stupendous but that was not the greatest miracle that day. What the Apostles discovered and Peter in
particular was that God took them all in, regardless of race or national
origin; gave each of them salvation. Peter
saw, and more fully than he had ever seen before, that Jesus is Savior no
matter who you might be or what you have done or where you have been. Christ takes the sin out of you and makes you
perfect in every way. All the heartache,
all the anger and bitterness, all the hard feelings and held grudges, all
corrupt lusts and selfishness and wrecked parts, Christ saves you from them. There is not a part of you that Jesus will
not make perfect and completely good and lovely. He will do this for every person who comes to
Him for salvation. He is Savior.
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