Sermon Tone Analysis

How many of you remember a television game show that ran for years, called, “To Tell the Truth”?

The premise, or basic concept behind the show, was that there were three challengers who were introduced, all of which who were claiming to be the central character.

The announcer would ask the challengers , who were standing side by side, “What is your name please?”

Each challenger would then state, “My name is [central character’s name].”

There was a panel of four celebrities on each show, who would read along as the game show host read aloud a signed affidavit about the central character of that show.

Then, the panelists would each be given a time period to challenge and ask the three challengers questions, that were inherent to and only about the real CENTRAL CHARACTER for that show, of which no one knew which of the three, was the real CENTRAL CHARACTER.

Finally, after the questioning was complete, each panel member would vote on which of the challengers they believed to be the real central character for that show.

Once the voting was done, the game show host would ask, “Will the real [central character’s name] please stand up?”

Then, the real person of the three would stand up and the panel and the audience would then see who the real person of the three was.

The interesting thing about this show, is that you are talking about people who don’t know the real person and yet they are trying to use clues to determine the truth of which person is who they claim to be, so that the question can finally be asked, “Will the real [central character’s name], please stand up” and they can see if they got it right!

Today, I would very much like, to ask you a question similar in nature to this game show and see if you can answer it.

Not for me, or for anyone else here, but for you and your own life.

And if you are with us, watching via the live feed, then I am asking you the same question.

And like the game show that I just described to you, “To Tell the Truth”, in order for you to be able to answer this question and get it right, having the right information and knowledge base about the person I am going to ask you of is crucial!

Allow me to play a clip right now, from a song performed by Johnny Cash, who I believe, also wrote this song.

The name of this song as we shall see in the lyrics, is also the very question that I am asking you today, so pay close attention and see if you can pick out the question that I am bringing to you this morning.

PLAY SONG, “WOULD YOU RECOGNIZE JESUS”.

If you've never fed the hungry, or given clothes to the poor

If you've never helped the stranger who came knocking on your door

If you forgot to send some flowers to a sick and shut-in friend

Well if you ain't helping none of these, then you ain't helping Him

If you've ever seen some children, playing ball behind a school

If you've ever watched an old man, plowing ground behind mule

If you've ever stopped and listened, when you could not hear a sound

Then brother you have met Him, because Jesus gets around

Would you recognise Jesus if you met Him face to face?

Or would you wonder if He's just another one you could not place?

You may not find Him coming in a chariot of the Lord, Jesus could be riding in a "49 Ford.

Did any of you catch, within the lyrics, the question that is on my mind this morning?

Right, “WOULD YOU RECOGNIZE JESUS?”

This morning, I would like to walk you through various accounts found in the New Testament and show you some different people who truly recognized who Jesus was.

As we look at these various accounts, you will see that there were some who recognized Jesus, not because they had a personal prior knowledge of Him or walked with Him for years during His life or during the time of His ministry, but they knew and recognized Him through divine revelation and because of their faith!

I want you to begin to think in your minds this morning as we look at these accounts, about your own relationship with Jesus and of how intimately you know Him and whether or not you would recognize Jesus when He presents Himself to you.

Notice I didn’t say, “If” He presents Himself, but rather, “When” He presents Himself to you!

The reason that I say it like this to you, is because our perception of Jesus and our personal relationship with Him, cannot be likened to or treated as something as common as our other earthly relationships!

Our relationship with Jesus and how we see Him and our ability to recognize Him, is based not upon the flesh, but upon the very thing that He Himself said of our relationship with His Father, when He said, “But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.

God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

We will come back to this, as this deals with the very description of Jesus that we are to look for!

Turn with me in your Bibles this morning, or on your tablets and smartphones, to the gospel of .

Here we find a man who loved and served Yahweh with all of his being.

I say this because of the way that gospel records the account of this man named Simeon.

It calls him a righteous and devout man and these two words would only be used of someone and their position with God, if they were serving God with love and devotion and not wavering between the world and God.

And the passage lets us know that Simeon, because of his love for the Lord, had favor in the eyes of God and that God’s Holy Spirit was on him and had also given Simeon a promise!

A promise that he would not die until he had personally seen the Messiah!

The Bible doesn’t say when Simeon recieved this promise, but only that it had been given to him.

NOTE: When God makes a promise, the fulfillment of that promise is not on our time table, but His!

We must stop turning away from God and His precious and great promises in and for our lives, because our faith is weak and we get tired of waiting.

All of the promises that are from God are guaranteed through Jesus, just as tells us, “For all the promises of God are “Yes” in Christ.

And so through Him, our“Amen” is spoken to the glory of God.”

Besides the very great promises that we find for us all in the Bible, if God has given you a personal promise for your life, HOLD ONTO IT as a great treasure, because HE is faithful and will bring to pass all that He has said that He would!

So Simeon is led to the temple that day, by Holy Spirit and upon entering it, he sees a couple bringing their newborn son before the Lord in dedication and offerings.

This was nothing unusual and it went on, probably almost daily, if not weekly.

As soon as Simeon sees the baby Jesus, he knows that this is MESSIAH, this is the CHRIST of God!

And he takes the child into his arms and blesses God and announces that he has seen salvation, both for the Jews as well as for the gentiles.

Jesus had not even crawled or walked yet, let alone went to the cross for our sins and yet here is a man that states that he has witnessed salvation!

How could he see salvation when the cross had not even taken place yet?

The answer is simply this.

Jesus is SALVATION, period!

The cross of Calvary is where He paid the price with His own blood for the forgiveness of our sins to give us access to salvation, but He is our salvation.

In fact His name in Hebrew, Yeshua, literally means, SALVATION!

, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

So, when Simeon recognized Jesus, even as a newborn child and declared that he had seen salvation, this was a literal declaration of who and what he was seeing; OUR SALVATION!

Let me ask you, “WOULD YOU RECOGNIZE JESUS?”

Now stay right there in that same chapter of Luke, and just drop down to verses 36-38 and read with me.

“And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher.

She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four.

She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.

And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.”

Here, in this same instance with Simeon, we see another faithful servant of Yahweh, who had spent the majority of her life worshipping and serving God, daily in the temple, through prayer and fasting.

Let me say this, I know that many of us are not accustomed to fasting (and probably many of us are not accustomed to much prayer), but in the passage, there is a relevant point that we see.

We have talked about recently, that our worship of God is, in the truest definition, our obedience and service to God, right?

Well, in this passage, we are told that this ESHET CHAYIL, (this woman of valor), worshipped God night and day in the temple.

And how did she worship God?

With PRAYER and FASTING!

Praying and fasting are not just neat things that we should try, but they are part of our obedience and service to God; i.e.

OUR WORSHIP of God!

The Bible tells us that Anna was 84 years old, when she walked into the temple that day and saw the baby Jesus and instantly, she RECOGNIZED the redeemer, the messiah, Jesus the Christ and began to speak of who she had just witnessed to all whom she could!

She was declaring that REDEMPTION had arrived, simply by seeing the and recognizing the baby Jesus!

WOULD YOU RECOGNIZE JESUS?

Since we are talking about the baby Jesus and the recognition of who and what He was, let me back up just a little bit, before He was even born, and show you another instance.

In we read this,

Elizabeth, the mother of John the baptist and a relative of Mary, the mother of Jesus, recognized who Jesus was, while He is still in the womb!

As soon as Mary walked into the house and upon Elizabeth hearing her voice, Elizabeth was granted the recognition of who the baby inside of Mary’s womb was (for the Bible tells us that Elizabeth became filled with the Holy Spirit), as she cried out and called the unborn baby Jesus, LORD!

It says that the baby John, leaped for joy in the womb and so g

Not only that, but the unborn baby, John the baptist, leaped for joy inside of the womb!

This unborn baby heard Mary’s voice and knew instantly who else was in the house!

Two things here, in this account of the recognition of Jesus: whenever you see that a person has the Holy Spirit of God come upon them, or fill them, things change and something great and mighty happens!

Can you say the same thing in your life about His presence within you?

And the other thing we see in this account with Elizabeth and her unborn child, upon the recognizing of Jesus, there was the instant filling of joy!

Great rejoicing should come from all who recognize Jesus in their lives!

In talking about John the baptist and his recognition of Jesus, let me make a couple of more remarks here.

It was John the baptist years later, while baptizing and teaching of repentance at the river Jordan, who recognized Jesus coming towards him and called out, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!

This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks before me, because he was before me.”

John recognized Jesus as the redeemer of God and also recognized Jesus’ equality and preeminence with God, by saying that Jesus was before Him.

In other words John was saying that, Jesus was already existing, before they were born.

Just as Jesus said Himself, to the religious zealots, “Before Abraham was, I AM”, showing His equality with God the Father!

The other main thing about John the baptist and his recognition of Jesus, that we need to pay attention to is this.

John had the amazing “in the womb” recognition of the Christ and he had the recognition of Jesus being the redeeming lamb of God by the river, which came with him witnessing the Spirit of God descending upon Jesus like a dove.

Two amazing accounts of where John recognized who and what Jesus was.

And yet, it was John, after being imprisoned by Herod, who had some of his followers go and ask Jesus if Jesus was truly the one that they were waiting for, or should they look for another?!