Tension - Week 2
Tension • Sermon • Submitted
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· 4 viewsChristians need the Holy Spirit to help Christians hold truth in tension with grace.
Notes
Transcript
PASTOR DOUG TEXT:
Hello Church: I’m joining you online again and wanted to tell you how much I love and miss you. Even though it’s been only 3 weeks - 3 days- and 3 hours since surgery, it seems like 3 months since I’ve been here . Recovery, treatment and therapy are going well and I can’t wait to see you soon. Your prayers are working and we both feel the love of our church family. As soon as I’m released to return, I’ll be back with a three hour sermon😂 Love you all.
I. Intro
A. Recap
B. To live in tension, we must allow the Holy Spirit to stretch us to hold truth and grace together.
C. Last week—spoke to “Protectors” in the truth camp.
D. Truth campers can be rigid, dogmatic, judgmental, legalistic.
E. Must hold Criticism Loosely and Compassion Firmly.
Grace Campers
A. This morning we’re shifting our focus to the Grace Campers.
B. “go with the flow,” soft, non-confrontational enablers.
C. Illustration:
Zipper down in public. Embarrassed and angry.
D. Grace campers @ bedside: “you look wonderful” but you look horrible. Possible to be loving person & present the truth.
E. Jesus: both personable and able to present truth attractively.
John 4 – Woman at the Well
A. Look @ Jesus & Samaritan woman.
B. At first, no biggie. But Jews and Samaritans were enemies.
C. Facts about Jews & Samaritans ON CARD
-Babylonians left behind what they considered “lower classed” of society.
-Intermarried with non-Jewish peoples
-Mixed religion of Mosaic law and superstitions
-Considered “half breeds” by the Jews
-Deemed impure because of the mixture
-The Jews found way to destroy the temple mount of Samaritans, on Mt. Gerizim.
-The Sams. then went into Jew temple in Jerusalem scattering human bones defiling it on the eve of Passover.
- Jews in the time of Jesus, for reasons related to Jewish purity laws, considered Samaritan women to be in a constant state of ceremonial uncleanness.
-Jewish men would literally have crossed the street to avoid physical contact with a Samaritan woman.
-LOTS of resentment between two people groups.
READ John 4:3-10 (NKJV)
3He left Judea and departed again to Galilee.
4But He needed to go through Samaria.
5So He came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.
6Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.
7A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”
8For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
9Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.
10Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”
Pray
II. Grace Precedes Truth.
A. We’re going to talk about why grace needs truth.
B. We’re going to see that Grace Precedes Truth.
C. Jesus demonstrates “Costly Grace.”
D. A lot happening culturally.
a. Jesus was a man, talking to a woman.
- men did not speak privately w/ a woman that wasn’t their wife.
b. Jesus talking to a Samaritan.
-V. 4: “But He needed to go through Samaria.” Jews planned trips to avoid Samaria.
c. Scholars debate time: Rom. calendar-6PM, Jew. calendar-12PM. 12 more likely.
d. Woman was alone. Many scholars comment on how unusual this was.
E. Then, He asks for a drink.
F. She couldn’t believe He was asking her.
G. “You shouldn’t be talking to me. Don’t you know the rules?”
H. “You want me to give you a drink—again, I’m a Samaritan.”
I. Jesus bypassed rules & went to main point: If you knew who I was, you’d be asking Me for help. You too would bypass the “rules.”
—>Application:
-Jesus cut prejudice & legalism to extend grace.
-There’s no way He could’ve gone in guns blazing.
-Had to start w/ grace. Grace set the stage for Jesus to then be able to lovingly speak truth.
III. Grace Precedes Truth, but it Doesn’t Supersede Truth.
A. The power of grace is that it sets the table for truth that brings freedom.
B. But doesn’t overshadow truth.
C. Last week we said, “Grace w/out Truth is meaningless.”
a. Dr. who prescribes meds w/o exam to determine truth is not a good dr.
b. The dr’s goal is not treating symptoms; it is discovering the root cause.
c. Takes place @well. Jesus: brilliant @ turning their disc. To object lesson.
d. He allows her to slowly unpack spiritual truth by seeing it in natural.
e. 11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? – How? You’re ill-equipped?”
f. Jesus talks about LW=never thirst again. She requests it, He reveals she is ill-equipped.
D. John 4:16–19 (NKJV)
16Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”
17The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’
18for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”
19The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.
E. Truth is arresting. Jesus very gently, but directly allows her to see her reflection.
F. Jesus didn’t really want to meet her husband. Wanted her to see her cycle.
a. B/c of sin, it was she who didn’t have a bucket to draw Living Water with.
b. She wasn’t thriving. Not Abundant Life. There’s more.
c. Jesus had to pass thru Samaria to reveal destructive concealed sin.
d. He wanted to satisfy thirst she was trying to satiate with wrong sources.
e. Sin only numbs.
f. Used to quench unmet needs or desires but end up quenching life.
G. As we see people bound by sin.
a. We’re not better; we were bound once, too.
b. Seeing bondage should energize us to see them liberated, not placated.
c. In hyper grace, perversion of grace wants to back off on confronting sin.
d. True Grace provides hope, but allows truth to reveal danger.
e. Grace campers need rev. that truth can be told in love to bring life.
f. Illustration: Truth may be painful before it comforts. Peroxide: Presence of pain means infection is dying. Healing is happening.
g. When we see sin as enemy between us & freedom, we embrace sting of truth as evidence of healing.
IV. Tradition Is Not Truth.
A. We want to tell the truth. But must distinguish tradition from truth.
B. Tradition is not truth.
C. Sometimes we mix this up. When confronted w/ truth, sometimes we don’t yet want it.
D. The Samaritan woman doesn’t immediately want to embrace truth.
E. She deflects, as we often do when faced with truth.
John 4:20–26 (NKJV)
20Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.”
21Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father.
22You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.
23But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.
24God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
25The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”
26Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”
F. In verse 19, she declares Him a prophet. “If you’re a prophet, tell me your thoughts about who’s in the right.”
h. The Samaritans who worship God on this mountain?
i. The Jews who worship in Jerusalem?
j. In essence, she’s saying, truth isn’t as easy to discern as Jesus says it is.
k. We follow example of our fathers. Jews say something else.
l. Isn’t this just a difference of opinion? If so, You can’t judge me.
m. Jesus doesn’t debate. Location doesn’t matter. Spirit & Truth matter.
à Both camps blur the lines between truth and tradition. The difference between them is…
G. Grace Campers don’t want any kind of structure.
a. We have sayings like “You do you,” or “his truth,” “her truth,” “my truth.”
b. See any kind of structure or organization as “law” and not “grace,” so they dismiss it.
c. Opt for relationship over religion, but erroneously reject truth.
H. Truth Campers
a. Truth Campers see tradition as truth.
b. Just because it’s “what we’ve always done” doesn’t mean it’s truth.
-I grew up with Hymns only. Contemporary worship is too distracting.
-King James Version only
I. We all have traditions that we love.
J. Need to allow the Holy Spirit to stretch us & reveal where we confuse truth & tradition.
Illustration: African church service in the village—poor sound equipment, no a/c, but abandoned worship and passionate prayer. The same Holy Spirit who meets us in this building is accepting invitations to underground Chinese church services, six-hour prayer services in Brazil, and hot African gatherings. Just because it’s your tradition doesn’t mean it’s truth. No coffee bar, no doughnuts…
—>Traditions are “comfort food” of the soul.
-We can’t imagine joy outside of traditions.
-Amazing when willing to discern bet. truth & tradition by allowing H.S. to stretch us.
V. Grace Leads Us to the Truth That Sets Us Free.
A. Vs. 26—w/o realizing it, she confessed tha truth was a hallmark of the Messiah.
B. Vs. 29--“Come see a Man who told me all things that I ever did…”
C. Here it is demonstrated how perfectly Jesus balances grace and truth.
John 4:39–42 (NKJV)
39And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days. 41And many more believed because of His own word. 42Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.”
D. Though it stung, grace led the woman to Truth that set her and her people free.
E. “Come see a Man who told me...”
F. She received grace, let truth in. She received truth, opened door to transformation.
G. Jesus could have called her a sinner and condemned her.
H. He could have dismissed her sin as “you do you,” and condemned her further.
I. But He chose to use grace as the highway to her heart, to present truth.
J. I love what Randy Alcorn says:
“Unfortunately, many nonbelievers know only two kinds of Christians: those who speak the truth without grace and those who are very nice but never share the truth. What they need to see is a third type of Christian—one who, in a spirit of grace, loves them enough to tell them the truth.” (Randy Alcorn, p. 76)1
Closing:
VI. Hold Comfort Loosely and Courage Tightly.
Illustration: Jon on the ladder
When he realized he had reached the top, he panicked, because he knew there was no way he could get down on his own that didn’t result in injury. But as his Father, I knew, and before danger occurred, I was already on my way with the answer.
Application: The truth is we get in over our heads. But revealing truth is revealing the way down when we get stuck.
A. We don’t want to tell truth, b/c don’t want to be like a dr. giving bad news.
B. Truth about truth: When giving world Jesus, we NEVER give diagnosis w/o Cure.
Let’s Pray.