The New Master
Notes
Transcript
My kids say Im the cheapest man in the world… Im not buying it
Why would a pig dressed in all black never get bullied? Because Batman promised to protect Goth ham.
This next section of scripture we are going to start looking at Jesus talking about himself as the new master, and this is a hard statement for us, we don’t like the thought of someone being our master and being in control of us and our ideas and life. We run from that, we want to be in control of our own destiny and our own life. We want to just do you boo but Jesus is going to go against that idea wholly here.
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22 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing.
23 John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized
24 (for John had not yet been put in prison).
25 Now a discussion arose between some of John’s disciples and a Jew over purification.
26 And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.”
I want to give you a picture of what is happening at the beginning of this passage
Jesus disciples baptizing (Not Jesus John 4:2) and So is John
John’s disciples want to do something about it… its making them look not as good.
John you’re not looking so bright now, what do you want us to do about it?
And this is something I think we can all relate to… at some point in our lives, we will be eclipsed by someone else… job… ministry.. knowledge… performance… whatever… it will be people that do it better than us… It’s the nature of life… people just keep getting better at stuff… we learn at a younger age.... it happens… the real question is how do we respond when this happens and I think we can learn a little bit from John’s response...
We live in a competitive society… we are always trying to one up the next guy.. we always want to do so much better than the guy behind us… or in front of us. that is the nature of the human life. We want something better for ourselves, but look at how we should really be responding.
27 John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven.
28 You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’
He is standing before his followers and telling them, look, if someone is doing better than me, and showing better gifts and success than me, it is only because God has given that to him. God has given him the success that he has had, its not me… and that is tough.... you know what we tend to do?
If we see the success in other people we tend to think the only reason they were successful is because they had a leg up… They just knew the right people or slept with the right people to get the job. Their dads or their family did it… They just got off because they have money… we try to reason it away, those people aren’t responsible for their success… its someone else....
But what abotu when we get something… oh its becasue we had to work so hard and had to walk to school five miles up hill in the snow both ways… right… and if we don don’t get that success we are expecting we look back atthe same thing we described in the successful people but the opposite way… its not my fault… I wasn’t born with the silver spoon… etc…
What we fail to realize is its all on God…
Look at how Paul describes it in 1 Corinthians 4:7
7 For who sees anything different in you? What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?
Don;t you see… its not your fault… its not you.. its JESUS
And can I tell you something else that I think Jesus has been showing me? I think all of this relates back to how we define success… the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors; the accomplishment of one's goals. dictionary.com
And we tend to define it by what the world calls successful… lots of money.,.. lots of prestige… so our happiness and our definition are all releated to the same thing and we think there is this huge thing to attain…
Never forget reading a post by John Cooper about the deconstruction of a prominent christian artist and how we shouldn’t be looking to these artists as ou guides and their platcforns,,, we should instead be looking at Jesus, nad it just struck me.... success is using the platform God gave you for what he wanted you to do with it… Let that sink in....
What if God hasn’t called me to shepherd a church of 5000, what if he has called me to shepherd a church of 200.... does that make me any less successful than the guy that is pastoring that huge church. OF. COURSE.NOT; I am being faithful in what I was given...
Look at the parable of the talents, I am going to read it to you
14 “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property.
15 To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.
16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more.
17 So also he who had the two talents made two talents more.
18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money.
19 Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them.
20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’
21 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’
22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’
23 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’
24 He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed,
25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’
26 But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed?
27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest.
28 So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents.
29 For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
30 And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
Understand… we are all given talents from God and what makes us successful is how we use them. God may not want you to be the president of your company, and what he has given you is a place where you can be a team lead and you can make a difference with teh people that you work with every day and that sit under you, does that make you any less succesfful? OF COURSE NOT… you are doing exactly what he has called you to do, that is success! AND here is the cool thing
IF we can get a hold that what we need to do is exactly what he has given us to do, and that everything we are given is his in the first place. then we will start to have happiness… hear me out… if you are not always striving toward somethign that you are not given and do not have, then you will be much more content in waht you do have and the work and life that God has given you
29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete.
And this is interesting and might not be somethign that you and I pick up on right away, becasue we aren;’t first century Jews. “THe friend of the bridegroom” comes from teh word shoshben and this person had a unique place in the wedding party . They were the liason between the bride and bridgroom… he would have taken out the invitations and prided over the wedding feast. He had one special duty, it was his job to stand guard ad the bridal chamber and not let anyone in but the bridegroom… he would only open the door to the bridal chamber when he heard the bridegrooms voicee… and when he heard it and recognized it he would open the door to let him in and he would leve and rejoice that his task had been done. ANd there was true joy in that...
Do you feel a piece of that Joy? In bringing people to the bridegroom? In doing the work of the father?
We cna find true joy in that place… when we are doing exactly what it is God has called us to. in bringing people to Christ.... and we may see John the Baptist as teh greatest example of this friend of the bridegroom, the shoshben. He is the one excited to bring people to Jesus and that Jesus is doing his thing…
We tend to think about Jesus as, man if i serve Jesus I am so happy because I will get to be with him in Heaven… and that is true… but the greatest thing about serving Jesus is the joy we should get in doing it.
And what we see in this passage is John is basically saying, look I am not even trying to attempt to compete with Jesus.... and look at what he says
30 He must increase, but I must decrease.”
Scholar Leon Morris said these are “some of the greatest words ever to fall from the lips of mortal man.” If we really want to make a difference in the world, we would take these words and make them the words of our lives… taht Christ would be more and I would be less. That Jesus would be more and I would be less… that he would be on display so much more than myself.
It is true humility.
And if he is the Bridegroom and we are his bride, waht can we learn from the picture we are seeing?
The bride would spend her wedding day making herself as beautiful as possible making sure she weas prepared… we should do the same make sure wa are prepared… devoting ourselves to spiritual growth… not stagnation… and thats not that we ever “make it” but we constantly are trying to better ourselves.... the bride wouldnt just wake up in the morning and grab whatever she can find and slap herself together on the wedding day… no there are careful preparatiosn that are made....
How are you preparing… how are you making sure that he increases and you decrease? This is why spiritual disciplines are so important. I love the writer who said in the last days Facebook will be used to show that prayerlessness was not from a lack of time… or bible reading… or fellowship....
I want to encourage you to start taking some time to get into your word daily… this used to be something that was hard for me, I would spend so much time in the word preparing sermons i neglected personal study time.... here is a tool that helped me…,
31 He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all.
32 He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony.
33 Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true.
34 For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure.
35 The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand.
36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.
This term from above is with the idea that it is the perfect spirtual world.. they would have understood what was going on and what he meant… Jesus left the perfect to come to the imperfect.
again we find these same words about eternal life we have hit on over the last few weeks....