Sermon Tone Analysis

We Can Have Abundant Life

To know Jesus is to have joy.

His first coming as a baby brought joy to to family, shepherds, wise men, and holy men and women waiting for the consolation of Israel.....what a wonder it must have been to see God’s hand on his life as he grew.

in favor with God and man.

It’s in the teaching of Jesus we see so much with the hallmark of Joy....

Jesus taught these great truths to His disciples, which John stated are too numerous to mention,............. on one occasion, He made a distinction between His activity and the activity of the enemy.

Consider the words of the world and what it offers, and contrast it with what we have in Jesus.

Listen to His words in

Notice the detail Jesus gives here.

This is Jesus’s personal testimony about joy and abundant life for His people!

I’m not like the world....he says.... I’m not like the enemy of your soul......I have life to offer.

I have courage instead of fear, I have peace instead of anxiety .

I have joy and delight..... HIs commandments aren’t burdensome.

Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice.

You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.

21 When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.

22 So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

He says it in Revelation....

Behold I stand at the door and knock.....

He doesn’t promise a trouble free life, but He does promise life and THAT more abundantly.....The enemy is aggressive, the enemy is deadly, but Jesus has come to bring life!!!

There is a word used in the New Testament for the activity of Jesus.

Each time the word is used, it is translated, “take courage”, or “look up” It shows up 6 times, but in each instance it is in relation to the “joy” the people have experienced when Jesus did something for them.....

Remember the paralytic that the men let down through the roof!.........

Just then some men brought to him a paralytic lying on a stretcher.

Seeing their faith, Jesus told the paralytic, “Have courage, son, your sins are forgiven.”

The woman with the issue of blood had been sick for 12 years and only gotten worse, she saw Jesus passing by and said if I could just touch the hem of His garment.....you know she got hold of it and immediately felt a healing change.....

   Jesus turned and saw her.

“Have courage, daughter,” he said.

“Your faith has saved you.”

And the woman was made well from that moment.

on the Stormy sea of Galilee.........the disciples were afraid........

   Immediately Jesus spoke to them.

“Have courage!

It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

because they all saw him and were terrified.

Immediately he spoke with them and said, “Have courage!

It is I. Don’t be afraid.”

Bartimaeus was blind and called out “Son of David Have Mercy on Me!”

   Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.”

So they called the blind man and said to him, “Have courage!

Get up; he’s calling for you.”

I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace.

You will have suffering in this world.

Be courageous!

I have conquered the world.”

When Paul was in Prison and being moved from city to city, uncertain of the future....Luke tells us......

The following night, the Lord stood by him and said, “Have courage!

For as you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so it is necessary for you to testify in Rome.”

“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.

In the world you will have tribulation.

But take heart; I have overcome the world.””

( ESVi)

Then there is John,and his stated purpose, toward the end of His book.

Matthew starts with a genealogy showing the fulfillment of prophecies in the coming of Jesus.....Luke told Theophilus that he carefully investigated everything from the beginning…so that he would know the certainty of the things he was taught..

Mark talked about the power and miracles of Jesus...

..John however waits until the end of the book to tell you his purpose.

Throughout his narrative of Jesus’s John record how the “believed upon him”, then many others “believed” on him.....but it’s at the end of his book we find his purpose....and his purpose is so close to why Jesus came.....

When Jesus taught about the Spirit in , he summarized by saying:

These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

Because He Came, We can Have abundant life,......but also..........

Because He Came, We can Have the Joy of the Spirit

In that great chaper 5 of Romans, the apostle Paul was rejoicing in the wonder of salvation when he said:

More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

later in the book he would say.....

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory:

Remember that before Jesus left earth, He commissioned His disciples to go into all the world and make disciples.....In fact He gave them a 2 step formula: 1. Teaching them all that I’ve Commanded you, and 2. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit....in Addition to this Great Commission he gave some additional promises....Luke tells us that Jesus said to NOT LEAVE JERUSALEM, but wait for the Gift my father promised.

He promised them power.......

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

Later when John was writing His gospel we see the full wonder and joy of Jesus’s gift to us.

John 7:37-39

John wrote his book after the day of Pentecost!

He was there with Peter when they first had the outpouring of the Spirit!

It’s so fascinating and wonderful to see this commentary by John about the Spirit!

This said He. Crucial to this idea of the value of the Spirit’s outpouring is the result of His wonderful work!

For example, the writer of Hebrews said: keeping our eyes on Jesus,a the source and perfecter of our faith.

For the joy that lay before him,c he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

On the day of Pentecost, during Peter’s sermon about what was going on he said:

   “God has raised this Jesus; we are all witnesses of this.

33 Therefore, since he has been exalted to the right hand of God and has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit, he has poured out what you both see and hear.

3

What’s happening here?

The disciples clearly understood that the source of our joy was the triumph of Christ and the cross and His subsequent pouring out of the Spirit!!!!!!

This said about the Spirit!

Those who believed in Jesus were later to receive the Spirit! for the Spirit HAD NOT BEEN GIVEN…because Jesus was not yet Glorified....well

He has now!!!!

The writer of Hebrews tells us: 3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature, sustaining all things by his powerful word.d

After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.4

So he became superior to the angels, just as the name he inherited is more excellent than theirs.

Because He Came, We can Have abundant life

Because He Came, We can Have the Joy of the Spirit, And.................

Because He Came We Enjoy the Promise of His Certain Return!

Jesus taught specifically about the promise of his return and the tension between hope and realization

Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice.

You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy.

21 When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world.

22 So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.

After the day of Pentecost, the disciples, full of the Spirit went first to Jerusalem, then to Judea....then to the rest of the known world.

It was in Antioch that they were first called Christians.....Jew and Gentile.

They spread the gospel around the world.

But along with that good news of salvation was the joyful promise of His return!