Let's take our Bibles now and
turn to John chapter 7. After these things, Jesus walked
in Galilee, for He would not walk in jewelry, because the
Jews sought to kill Him. Now the Jews' feast of tabernacles
was at hand. His brethren, therefore, said
unto Him, Depart hence, and go unto Him. Go into Judea, that
thy disciples also may see the works that thou doest. For there
is no man that doeth anything in secret, and he himself seeketh
to be known openly. So if thou do these things, show
thyself to the world. For neither did his brethren
believe in him. Then Jesus said unto them, My
time is not yet come, but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you, but
me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof
are evil. Go ye up to this feast. I go not up yet unto the feast,
for my time is not yet full come. Now, back in John chapter 6,
one of the outstanding chapters of this Gospel of John, I particularly
like chapter 6 and chapter 10 because of its content. But back
in chapter 6, I labored as much as in me is to show you that
Jesus Christ Himself, this is what He's establishing back there
in John chapter 6, that He Himself is the Gospel. It's not the ceremonies, it's
not the all these various things that take place in time. It's
not the feast and the holy days and your observance of them.
It's not a moral code of conduct. But this gospel is a person. Jesus Christ Himself. And all
these other things testify of Him. That all these other things
were given because of Him. All of these other things bear
witness of Him. Eternal life, he said, is to
know Him, and in knowing Him, to know the Father that sent
Him. And it's not in these ceremonial
customs of religion. The Jews kept the feasts. There
was nothing wrong with their obedience. They did keep the
feasts. They maintained a priesthood. They observed holy days. They
read their Bibles. He said, you search the Scriptures
for in them you think you have eternal life. They weren't lax
in reading the Scriptures. They read the Scriptures. They
knew the Scriptures. They weren't ignorant of them.
They read their Bibles. They taught a strict code of
morality and they exercised discipline on those who didn't keep it.
The Jews kept their traditions and they passed them down from
generation to generation to generation, all down through time. They were
careful to circumcise their male children on the eighth day as
a sign of God's covenant promise to Abraham. And they worshiped
in the temple that God gave to them to go into. And seeing the
high priest and his assistants in full priestly dress, speaking
the words they were given to speak and doing the duties they
were given to do. They saw all the vessels, all
the furniture, all the things that God ordained and put inside
of it. And they were convinced by their
observance of these things and those things which God had given
them and their history and traditions passed down to them by their
father that they knew God. But he said, you don't believe
on me and neither did your father. What you have and what constitutes
your hope is not true faith. The gospel, the good news of
God, the salvation of God is in a person. And this person
is standing before you, and like your fathers, he said, you've
seen me, yet do not believe. That's what he told them. Do not believe. They neither
knew Christ nor his Father. They did not see Him in creation. They did not see Him in the garden. They didn't see Him in Abel's
offering and Noah's ark or Moses' tabernacle. They did not see
Him. They did not see Him in the bread.
This was just one of the things that they pulled out as evidence
of their salvation. evidence of their relationship
with God. God, Moses, He gave us this bread
from heaven. He said, no, He didn't give it
to you. My Father gave it to you. This life so called, their life,
their faith so called was in the customs and ceremonies of
religion and in their self-righteous obedience to the law. Without
that one mediator, without that one revelation of God, they were
left to themselves to draw their own ideas and conclusions and
concepts about the living God. Over and over, he tells them
in the Proverbs and in the Psalms, he said, you thought I was altogether
such a one as yourself. That's what you thought. That's
what your concept was. That's what your reasoning was.
You reasoned that God Himself was just like you, that He thought
like you, had your preferences, had your standards, had your
goals. But He said, I will reprove you.
Life is in the Son. Salvation is in a person. God's
character is revealed in Him. God's will is revealed in Him.
Why He came, what He did, where He's at. And those that do not
see Him, this is being taught all the way through John chapter
6. Those who do not see Him find this gospel of Christ to be a
hard saying. It doesn't make sense. It's a
stumbling block. It's just like throwing up a
roadblock out here in the middle of the road. You're just going
along fine and all of a sudden, boom! Can't go no further. Got
a problem. And the majority of the multitude
left Him and went their way. And He turned to His disciples
and He said, will you go too? And they said, to whom shall
we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. They knew. They
knew that this was the Son of God. Believed on Him. Rested in Him. Looked to Him. They said, to whom shall we go?
But here in chapter 7, you'll notice that His disciples were
not the only ones who stayed. He had some kinsmen. He had some
kinsmen. See there in verse 3 of chapter
7? His brethren therefore said unto him. Now he's not talking
about his James and Joseph, his literal brothers, but he's talking
here, brethren is something they used a lot to describe their
cousins and nephews and nieces and their kinsmen. They use this
word brethren. Sometimes they even use the word
brethren for Jews, whoever they were. Is it in Romans chapter
9 or chapter 10 where Paul said his prayer to God was for his
kinsmen according to the flesh, his brethren. He talked about
his brethren there. And kinsmen, he's talking about
his nephews, his nieces, his uncles, on both sides of the
family, both with Mary and with Joseph. And kinsmen, I began
to study this chapter, kinsmen have a unique place in this ministry
of the gospel because of their association to you. They're caught
in the middle. When you profess Christ, regardless
of what your wife does, she's in the middle. She's in the middle
because of her relationship to you. She's in a hard place. And
that's the way it was with these folks. They were in a hard spot
because of their association. The Lord's cousins or uncles
or nephews or whatever they were, were catching a lot of flack
from these Pharisees and doctors of the law, these rabbis and
priests. And there being kinsmen kind
of put them in the middle. Now on the one hand, they had
the testimony of very credible witnesses. They had Mary and
Joseph. They had Elizabeth. They had
John the Baptist. They had Simeon. You couldn't
discount the word of these men. These men were established. These
men were above reproach in this family I'm talking about. They
were above reproach. And they couldn't discount the
word. And then they had undeniable miracles that He did in their
presence. Did right before their eyes.
They couldn't discount that either. They had in him, personally,
a flawless life. Now, I grew up with brothers
and sisters and nieces and nephews. None of them had flawless lives.
I didn't either, and you don't either. And I knew it. But if
there was one in there who did, I would have known it, wouldn't
you? We had some in our family that were, I'd say, head and
shoulders as far as outward morality above the rest of it that we
all looked up to. But imagine how you'd look up
to a man with a perfect nature and perfect obedience, perfect
kindness, perfect commitment. They had in him personally, and
they grew up with him. They couldn't deny these things.
They grew up right around him. And they had in him personally
a flawless life as a testimony, giving away every possession.
tending to the sick and the needy, teaching the ignorant, feeding
the hungry. And he had an unquestionable
wisdom of the Scriptures. At 12 years old, he had the doctors
of the law stammering and stuttering and couldn't answer his questions.
But on the other hand, they had these multitudes of traditional
family and friends, men of recognition and honor, the priests, the rabbis,
the Pharisees, scribes, doctors of the law, They had the long-standing
ceremonies of these things passed down from generation to generation
by their fathers. They had their mothers and fathers
pulling at their strings without ceasing, thinking that they were
going astray, talking to them about the danger of associating
with this man. So you see how they're being
pulled? They're being pulled one way or the other. They could
not discount this man. And yet, they could not force
themselves to separate from the influence of these. And they're
caught right dead in the middle. And they don't want to cause
hard feelings, but I've got sisters and brothers. They don't want
to separate with me. They try everything in the world
to build that bond, and I want that bond, but we've got no common
ground. when it comes to salvation and
worship of God. There's no common ground there.
We can't be friends that way. I have to look at them as family
and leave it there. Leave it there. So here's what's
going on. These people are having the pressure
put on and they want to believe on it. for him to be accepted. And so
they turned to him and they said, well, if this is your intention,
no man who wants to make himself known goes over here in the corner
somewhere. He said, what you need to do
is go down to Jerusalem and just tell them, here I am. Do something
phenomenal right before their eyes that they can't deny. Call
a dead man out of the tomb. Do something. Do something right
before their eyes. And then it'll be established.
What they wanted was either for him to put the crown on his head
or for the bubble to be busted. Now that's what they wanted.
And that's what your relatives want too. That's what they want. They either want to understand
what it is you're saying or prove you'd be a liar. One or the other.
In the meantime, they're just like this, getting squeezed.
What's wrong with that nephew of yours? He lost his marbles? Why in the world would he go
over there and join that cult? Why would he go over there and
listen to them? Why would he want to go see this and hear
that? Why would he want to do that? See? And what they really
like for you to do is just come over there and blend in. Now
I want you to notice something. His relatives didn't go to the
Jews and try to get them to be reconciled to Christ. But they
took the one who had manifested every evidence of God undeniable
before their eyes in a lifetime, and they wanted him to be reconciled
to the Jews. Now, ain't that what your folks
want? They don't want your church to be reconciled to this one.
They want this church to be reconciled to theirs. You see where I'm
coming from? So they urged the Lord to get
out of this Galilean obscurity and go up to the mainstream of
their society, openly declare himself to be the Messiah. And
later on, that's what they just flat out tell him. If thou be
the Christ, tell us plainly. He said, I told you. I told you. But you don't believe me. And
you don't hear me because you're not my sheep. Not my sheep. They wanted their doubts and
fears relieved. They wanted him to either put
a crown on his head or for the bubble to burst. They wanted
the persecution to stop and for the shame to go away. You're folks ashamed of you.
I know. I know. Feel sorry for me. Come over and hug me and tears
in your eyes and feel sorry for me. Try to say something to me,
you know, to help like I'm in pain or something, and go back
doing what they do. That's what these folks wanted.
They wanted the shame to go away. If He was indeed the Messiah
though, they wanted to share in the glory. They wanted both sides. Christ
had become the stumbling block. And the one thing that kept his
brethren from believing on him, this is what I want you to see
here, was the wholesale rejection of him by mainstream religion. The wholesale rejection. Israel wasn't going to have it.
We're not going to have it. And because they wouldn't have
it, the people wouldn't have it. The people wouldn't have
it. They could not bring themselves
to believe that so many could be wrong and so few could be
right. They could not convince themselves that something so
long maintained in their history could be so empty of reason and
cause. In Stephen's message to the Jews,
The Lord poured out His Spirit on Stephen, and he spoke to them,
and they hated his guts. They had taken him as a prisoner,
put him up here, and God poured His Spirit out on Stephen, and
his face, in spite of their hatred for him, his face, it said, was
as of the face of an angel. And he stood there in the grace
and power of God and went back in their history all the way
back to Abraham. And he brought it all the way
down through time, all the way up to them. And he said, you
stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, you do always
resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.
And they gritted their teeth and ran on him with one accord
and gnashed on him. They didn't want to hear one
more word about what he said. They refused to believe on him
because of what mainstream religion had taught them. They wouldn't
have it. They wouldn't have it. Now, what's
the problem today? We invite folks in here and they
come in here and they hear what we preach about Christ. I'm not
trying to build a big church. I'm not trying to build a name
for myself. I'm not trying to sell you anything. You're not
charged admission for coming. We don't pass an offering plate.
You're not intimidated for anything. I don't ask you to do anything.
I don't have an altar call. I don't beckon you to come down.
I don't do any of those things. So what's the problem? What I
say don't line up with what mainstream religion says, so I can't possibly
be telling you the truth. Ain't that the problem? That's
exactly what was going on here in John chapter 7. Exactly what
was going on. And I can stand here and I can
just pile up evidence to you of my calling of God and of His
calling me to preach and of all the things concerning it, and
I can take you into Scripture and show you in the Scriptures
where these things are told beforehand concerning pastors and preachers.
But because I don't have a diploma up here from somebody's denominational
school, I'm discredited for what I say. Am I telling you the truth? I'm telling you the truth. I
stand up here and I pile up evidence of scripture. I don't know how
many scriptures we turn to, usually in a message about eight or ten,
but every time I tell you something, I give you two or three scriptures
to nail it down, pile up the evidence of these things, but
because it don't jive up with religion, I'm preaching a lie.
Now that's what was going on, and his relatives was pushing
him, pushing him to do this, pushing him to do this. The multitudes
had walked away from him. The only ones who was with him
was his disciples. All the rest of them was against
him. They was against him. Let me tell you something. There
had never been a time when the majority of men held a right
view of the Gospel of Christ. Not from the garden. Not one
time. Read your Bible. A man ought
to read this Bible if he believes God. He ought to study it. He ought to know its contents.
He ought to go back there in time and read these things. And
then you'll understand when a man stands up what he's saying, if
he's saying the truth or if he's speaking a lie. There's never
been a time when the majority... There was three million of them
who said, we're not going into the Promised Land. There was
only two of them who said, we're going to go. Who was right? The
two? There was a crowd of them stood
up and said, Moses, you're taking too much on yourself. We talked
about this and voted on this and the majority of us believe
that you need to share in this power and glory. He said, everybody's
on the Lord's side, line up over here. Everybody's on your side,
line up over there. God opened up the earth and swallowed
them and took them to hell with their shoes on. Never been a
time when here's the majority of Israel and they're all going
this way and Christ is going this way with this little band.
Who's right and who's wrong? Then why do today when we stand
up and see the great cathedrals and men and places on every corner,
why do we give them so much credibility because of what we see? They're
not preaching anything. They're not saying anything.
They're not glorifying God in what they preach. Why do we give
them so much credibility? That's what the Lord's pointing
out to these relatives. His relatives, according to verse
5, here's why they said these things. He tells the truth on
them down here in verse 5. They did not believe. Ain't that
what he's saying? For neither did his brethren
believe in him." Now here's the problem. There's the problem. They could not dismiss what they'd
seen and heard, but neither could they defend him before the Jews. So they tried for their sake
to get him to reveal himself plainly to the world. Now watch
this. His brethren therefore said unto
him, Depart hence, and go into Judea, that thy disciples also
may see the works that thou doest. For there is no man that doeth
anything in secret, and he himself seeketh to be known openly. In
other words, if it is your intention to be heard, and make thyself
known, and show thyself to the world, let him see you. For neither
did his brethren believe in him. If you really believe that you
are the Messiah, the promised seed of Abraham, the Christ,
the Redeemer of Israel, leave this backwoods. Let's go to town. Let's go to downtown. Let's build
a big cathedral. And let's do something amazing
and prove to the world what's going on. We really want this
gospel to be made known. Why don't we all just organize
into a big denomination, into one big group, buy some primetime
spots on TV and take this thing like Billy Graham to the world.
Why don't we do that? Because it ain't in the purpose
of God. That's what the Lord told them.
It's not my time. This is not your work. This is
not their work. This is God's work. Didn't you
hear me? He said, I come not to do my
own will. I come to do the will of Him
that sent me. And this is the will of Him that
sent me, that of all which He has given me, I should lose nothing
but raise it up again in the last day. This is the will. I'm here to do the will of the
Father. Your will don't enter into it.
That's what he's telling. It don't enter into it. It's not the will of God. Brethren,
I don't care how big your cathedral is, if you're not accomplishing
the will of God, you haven't accomplished anything. What have
you accomplished? He could have went to Jerusalem.
He could have turned Jerusalem inside out, but he didn't. Why? It wasn't the will of God. You
won't ever find that kind of working in the Scriptures. Never!
The Lord said in 1 Corinthians 1, He said, For you see your
calling, brethren, not many mighty among you is there, not many
noble. Huh? How come? Because this thing
ain't about you, it's about God. And no flesh is going to glory
in His presence. He's going to take the things
that are nothing. He's going to take the things that base
things and things of not, and he's going to bring to not things
that are. His brethren reasoned among themselves,
gave counsel out of ignorance and unbelief. Not yet time for him to establish
himself like they wanted him to. There'd be a time He had
a time. He rode into Jerusalem on a wild-ass's
colt, according to Scripture. And they threw down the palm
branches before him, according to the Scriptures. And he went
up there and was judged according to the Scriptures, and suffered
the indignity of man right before him, slapping him on the face,
telling him to prophesy. You know the story. There was
a time when he'd go to Jerusalem, reveal himself for who he was.
And God has a time for all things. Their goings and comings had
no consequences, the Lord said. But there's a consequence for
me. There's a consequence. Boy, that's hard to enter into.
The sovereign God in the person of a man telling his brethren
that if he goes to Jerusalem, he'll be killed. I can't explain it, but that's
what he's telling them. Not my time to go up there yet.
I'll go up in my time, but it ain't my time. They were more concerned about
what the people thought than they were about what God said.
You know, I wondered as I read this, I wondered as I go through
these holidays and family gatherings and I talk to my own family on
the phone and these things and visit, if I'm not pulled into
situations just like this. Why don't you come visit? I'd like for you to get to know
our pastor. I know you don't know what he preaches. He's different
than everybody else. No, he ain't. No, he ain't. He's just like the rest of them. In the light of who He was, the
overwhelming evidence of God concerning Him, you'd think they would have wanted
them Jews to come and be reconciled to Him, but they didn't. They
wanted Him to compromise. You compromise. You know, it's one of the hardest
things that a man is faced with in this walk of faith. It is
to see those he loves and those he's known all his life, those
he grew up with, shared memories with, sorrow together over the
death of loved ones and catastrophes, his blood kinsmen, And know in
your heart and mind that they're enemies of God. Now, that's one
of the hardest things you'll ever have to do. I have to look at my sister and
my brothers, my cousins and aunts and nephews and uncles, and I
have to look them in the face and know that they're enemies
of God in spite of what I know about them and in spite of their
relationship to me. Blood kinsmen. You're pulled
and pushed by their influence all the time. They won't push
you as to where and how and when you worship God and walk this
walk of faith. And the Lord was about His ministry.
He was telling some strong words to the scribes and Pharisees
and had His disciples gathered over here, teaching them something
of the living of their doctrine. telling them that there was a
day coming when, like Sodom and Gomorrah, they were going to
be under the judgment of God, that it was going to be too late,
the fire was going to fall. He was telling them these things,
telling them to his disciples. And somebody came, just like
I'm standing up here talking to you this morning, somebody
came up and went pulling on his coat. Hey, hey, hey. And he turned
to see what they wanted. They said, your mother and your
brethren are outside and they want to talk to you. He said, who's my mother and
who's my brothers? Who you talking about? He took his hand and he pointed
over to his disciples and he said, here's my brothers, my
mother, and my sisters. Are you there yet? Are you there yet? These are
my brothers. This is my sister. This is my
mother. This is my father, right here. And this no here just have to
wait. This no here going to have to wait. Does that mean I don't
love her? No, it don't mean that. But it
means I don't love her. My love for her doesn't exceed
my love for these. My love for her don't exceed
my love for him. That's what it means. Who my
brother? Who are my brother? If you're
a true believer, You come to Christ and embrace Him in faith
as He set forth in the Scriptures. Receive the testimony of God
concerning His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Your life is going
to be filled with this trial right here. You are going to
face it every day of your life. Every day of your life. There's
always going to be a choice of priority. There's always going
to be a test of brotherhood, natural or spiritual, heavenly
or earthly. Every day you wake up, every
waking moment, you're going to face this trial. The Lord faced
it time and again, time and again. My mother, father, sister, brother
can come between me and the Lord or between me and you. I don't
know the Lord. He said, now listen to me and
I'm going to wind this up. As many as received Him, this
is what He tells them over there in John chapter 1. Here's the
basis of everything He's been building on here in the book
of John. As many as received Him, to them gave He power to
become the sons of God. Sons. Sons. Not a man with a diploma telling
him that he's a Calvinist. He's a son. And this one's a
son. And if you love him that begat,
you're going to love him that's begotten of him. Has to be. Just like you love your earthly
brothers. That's just a picture of this
relationship. Just like your wife is a picture
of your relationship with Christ, this is just a picture. Your
earthly brother is just a picture. Here's the brotherhood, I hear.
I hear. That's what he tells them. As
many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons
of God, even to them that believe on His name which were born,
not of blood. We're born the first time of
blood. not of the will of the flesh, not of the will of man,
but of God. This resurrected, regenerated
life of the believer is one of adoption. We're sons of God.
And because we're sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His
Son into our hearts, he said, crying, Abba, Father." This is
your family right here. Have I still got an earthly family?
I sure do. But my love for them beside my
love for him, and his appears like hatred." Now that's what
he said in the Scripture. He that hateth not mother, father,
sister, brother. He's not talking about that you
hate your natural kin. He's talking about that your
love for them will appear as hatred to this world. Because
you love those that gather here in His name. Because you're begotten
of Him, and so are they. That's what's going on here in
John chapter 6.