Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Today we continue our We Believe series on the Apostles’ Creed as we talk about the forgiveness of sin.

Repeat this after me: We believe in the forgiveness of sin.

This is one of the foundational truths of the Gospel, that Christ came to attain forgiveness for all those who belong to Him.

There are three things that I want us to leave with today as we look at what the Scriptures say about forgiveness: 1) Clarity on how to receive forgiveness (2) Confidence in the completeness of our forgiveness in Christ.

(3) Conviction to live in light of our forgiveness in Christ.

The main point today is that Forgiveness is available and complete in Christ Jesus, and those who have received it must live like it.

We are going to be in several different passages of Scripture today, but the main texts we will be looking at is , , and .

We have a lot of ground to cover in a short amount of time, so lets dive in and look first at .

(NKJV)

Christ Witnesses to Nicodemus

3 There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these signs that You do unless God is with him.”

3 Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

4 Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old?

Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

5 Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

7 Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’

8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes.

So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

9 Nicodemus answered and said to Him, “How can these things be?”

10 Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things?

11 Most assuredly, I say to you, We speak what We know and testify what We have seen, and you do not receive Our witness.

12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?

13 No one has ascended to heaven but He who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of Man who is in heaven.

14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.

18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.

21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”

Clarity

There is so much that we could unpack in this passage, but for the purpose of today’s message we will be focusing on verse 14.

But I want to set the stage by summarizing the verses leading up to it.

So Nicodemus comes to Jesus because he believed Jesus had the answers he was looking for, and he was right.

Jesus didn’t even let the man ask his question, He just answered it.

Jesus knew exactly why Nicodemus had come to Him.

Nicodemus wanted to know how he could be a part of the kingdom of God, how he could inherit eternal life.

Jesus answered Him and said He must be born again.

This baffled Nicodemus so he asked a follow up question: How can this happen?

Can a man enter a second time into His mother’s womb?

Then Jesus said listen you have to be born of the water and Spirit, what is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.

In saying this Jesus is alluding to where the Lord says that He will sprinkle clean water on His people and put His Spirit in them.

Jesus is summing up scripture to him which is why He is a little frustrated that Nicodemus did not know these things.

Jesus has told Him earthly things, simple things and Nicodemus still did not receive it, did not understand.

So in verse 13 Jesus tries to make it clearer for Nicodemus.

He says, listen no one has ascended to heaven but the Son of Man, Jesus Himself.

Jesus is telling Nicodemus that no one has climbed their way to heaven, no one has scaled that mountain.

Why?

Because no one can!

Humanity has a problem so deep that they must be born again, the problem with humanity is sin and sin has killed our soul, we are spiritually dead so the only way to inherit eternal life is to be born again, to be made alive in Christ.

So Jesus is pointing Nicodemus to the fact that the only person who could ascend to heaven based on His merit alone is God Himself in the flesh, Jesus.

Then in verse 14 and 15 He moves on to the remedy for the problem.

Jesus said look the only one who has ascended to heaven is the Son of Man, who has descended from heaven, who has come to the earth for this purpose: to be lifted up.

Look at what He says: “14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

To get the full picture of what this means we are going to have to go back and look at the this story from the Old Testament.

But before we do lets make sure we are clear on what Jesus is saying here.

He is telling Nicodemus, and us, that in order to receive eternal life we must be born again because we cannot ascend to heaven based on our own merit, we are dead in our sins, tainted and unworthy.

We have to be made new, with a new life.

And the only way for this to occur, is for the Son of Man, Jesus, to be lifted up as the serpent was lifted up and for us to believe in Him.

So the question is how was the serpent lifted up?

To answer this we must go back to the story Jesus is talking about.

That passage is found in .

Nicodemus

(NKJV)

The Bronze Serpent

4 Then they journeyed from Mount Hor by the Way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the soul of the people became very discouraged on the way.

5 And the people spoke against God and against Moses: “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?

For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.”

6 So the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and many of the people of Israel died.

7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us.”

So Moses prayed for the people.

8 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.” 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent, and put it on a pole; and so it was, if a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

So, in this passage, we see that the Israelites are traveling along in the desert.

They have been delivered from Egypt, they had received the ten commandments, God had been sustaining them with water from rocks and from manna from heaven, and God had just given them a victory in battle.

But the Israelites became discouraged and then angry.

They spoke out against God and Moses, His servant.

“5“Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?

For there is no food and no water, and our soul loathes this worthless bread.”

They spoke out against the very Lord who had delivered them, who had saved them from slavery, who was continuously providing for them in the wilderness, they said that their soul loathed the bread the Lord had given them.

In their anger they sinned against the Lord.

They turned on their God.

So, as an expression of His anger and wrath, God sent fiery serpents into their camp.

The serpents bit them and many died.

Israelites were suffering and dying from the venom of the snakes so they came to Moses, God’s chosen mediator to the people and said“We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord that He take away the serpents from us.”

So Moses prayed for the people.”

They came to the mediator between God and man admitted their sin and asked that He pray to God on their behalf.

So God told Moses to fashion a fiery serpent out of bronze and lift it up on a pole so, vs 8“everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.”

So Moses did as God said and all who looked on the bronze serpent lived.

The Israelites were in dire trouble, they had sinned and they were desperate.

They knew that they were wrong, that they deserved what they were getting, and that the only way to get out of their dire situation was for God to intervene.

Brothers and sisters that is the state of every human ever to live!

We are sinners who are enemies of God under His wrath and the only way for us to escape our just punishment is for the Lord to intervene.

Do we understand how serious sin is?

It is killing us!

There is no way out for us unless God does something.

We are in a desperate situation.

We are all the woman caught in adultery.

We are sinners who deserve the stoning, the stones are in the air about to fall and the only way out is if God does something.

Brothers and sisters the good news of the Gospel is that God has done something!

Christ has come!

But instead of a pole, He was lifted on a cross.