Pastor Dan Eddy
John 8:31-36
Living
the Truth: Set free to Serve
10-16-11
THE GOSPEL READING……………………………John 8:31-36 ESV
P: The Holy Gospel according the Apostle,
C: Glory to You, O
Lord.
31So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him,
"If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32and you
will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." 33They
answered him, "We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to
anyone. How is it that you say, 'You will become free'?"
34Jesus
answered them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a
slave to sin. 35 The
slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. 36So
if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.
P: This is the Gospel of
the Lord.
C: Praise to You, O
Christ.
I.
Introduction
– Do you really want to hear the Truth?
Have
you seen recent television commercials for Geico Insurance? They go something
like this: “Could switching to Geico really save you 15% or more on car
insurance? Was Abe Lincoln honest?”
Then
the commercial switches to a scene where Mary Todd, the wife of President
Lincoln, asks her husband whether this huge dress she is wearing makes her back
side look big.
A
long pause ensues as “honest Abe” looks over the big dress and contemplates how
to answer this question. He hems and haws and eventually raises his fingers just
a little and begins to say softly “Perhaps a…” and immediately Mary
storms off in a huff.
She
really didn’t want the truth from her husband she just wanted him to say “No,
it doesn’t. You look great.”
Sometimes
we just don’t want to face the Truth.
Now
just to be clear…guys the object of this morning’s sermon is not when your wife asks you what she looks like
a dress to be like a like “honest Abe.” I don’t want to get phone call tonight
where a husband is on the other end is saying “Pastor Dan can I sleep at your house tonight…because I told my wife
what I thought of her dress.” My advice ahead of time is to follow Luther’s
prescription to always put the best construction on everything.
II.
Exposing our lies, deceptions, and slavery
Rather, the reason why I
opened this morning’s sermon with the Abe Lincoln commercial is like Mary Todd there
are many times in life we don’t want to face the Truth. We want to hear what we
want to hear. Mrs. Lincoln just wanted feel better about herself. She really
didn’t want an honest perspective.
Many times we don’t want
to face the Truth of Christ, because if we do it will show a lot of lies in our
lives.
Take the Gospel lesson I
just read from John 8:31-36. Jesus at first is speaking to a group of
unbelieving Jews, who do not think that He is the promised Messiah prophesized
about throughout the Old Testament. But as Jesus preaches the Word to them…more
and more of them start believing.
Yet there’s more that
God’s Word needs to do. Jesus exposes the lies about their lives by implying
they are not free. They are slaves. And then in one of the greatest examples of
denial in Scripture the Jews respond emphatically in verse 33: "We are offspring of Abraham and have
never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, 'You will become
free'?"
Really? You want to go
down that road? You want to deny your people were enslaved by Egyptians for 400
years? Or that your people were in Babylonians captivity for 70 years? And
don’t forget all the times your people enslaved yourself to false gods lusting
after them, instead of trusting in the one Lord God.
And in Jesus’ earthly
ministry many of the Jews had enslaved themselves to their good works with one
of the greatest lies ever told…“that if
I am just good enough, pious enough, follow the Law well enough…God will love
me forever.”
See the Jews saw
themselves as that rip pumpkin that many of you will purchase in the next few
weeks in time for Halloween. It looks so beautiful, healthy, and shiny on the
outside until you cut it open and inside is all that yuck.
Christ was exposing them
to the Truth by basically saying in verse 34: “Truly, truly I am telling you that everyone is who is doing sin is a
slave to sin.”
Where are the denials in your
life? Where are you enslaving yourself?
Where are we ignoring the
Truth? (Point to the Cross)
The answer is when we deny
that we still sin and sin often. If we were to look at the 10 Commandments each
day and contemplated them, how many do we break?
We enslaves ourselves to
our passions with the lust for more money, beyond just paying the bills; the
desire for more and more recognition for our service as a mom, dad, husband,
wife, student, employer-employee, or a volunteer. In an unhealthy way we want
our ego stroked and that becomes our main motivation for serving. And if we
don’t get it we get mad or become sad.
Meanwhile we ignore the
Truth of Christ (point to the Cross) when we believe things like right and
wrong are relative to your situation in life and there really is no set Truth. That
most people are basically good…but Jesus was not perfect…He made mistakes. Or
the lie that there is more than one path that leads to God. There is no Devil
or Hell. There may not even be a Heaven…just something to appease people who
are dying. Or there is no life after death. Jesus is not God. He was a nice
person with some good teachings. Or I can’t believe God would forgive a sinner
like that.
Continuously trusting in
these lies enslaves us, like the text said, with the potential of removing us
from the House of God.
Pretty soon our denials,
the lies enslave us in a grim, negative view of life where happiness is shallow
in pleasure seeking activities, and real freedom and joy is sapped from our
daily lives. The shiny exterior is just a mask for the yuck we have inside. We
get burned out. And we don’t know where to turn.
III.
Believing Jesus is the Truth who sets us free
If you are feeling that
way this morning, I have Good News for you. Jesus own words of verses 31-32: "If you abide in my word, you are
truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you
free."
Jesus offers a conditional
promise with a certain expectancy. He implies He is the ultimate in Truth which
He clearly says a few chapters later in John 14:6 emphatically saying “I, alone, am The Way, The Truth and the
Life.”
That means as the Truth
He’s the embodiment of reality; the firmness of legitimacy; the pillar of
integrity. The Hebrew and Greek origins of the word “truth” imply faith, trust,
and honesty. Something, someone you can rely on, instead of relying on
ourselves. Jesus is saying here “For
your own benefit, if you can trust me then I will liberate you from all your
lies, all your deceptions, all your denials, all your sins, all the yuck inside
you.”
Knowing the Truth that
sets you free is more than intellectual understanding, its faith in Christ to
give you certainty. Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection are the Truth in
action to prove the honesty of God’s Word. That’s the same Truth that came to
you through the waters of baptism, when you were initially freed from sin,
death and the power of the Devil. The same Truth you can dine on this morning
tasting, feeling, knowing, and trusting that Jesus is really inside of you, really
loves you, and is freeing you from the lies and deceptions for your life and
this world to be freed again.
IV.
Living the Truth in the Freedom of Christ: Cheryl Foote’s Testimony
Don’t let anyone ever tell you…you are not freed.
Trust the Word of God, the Son of God, the Word made flesh who assures you for
your own benefit in verse 36 when He said: “So
if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
And if you really believe
that last Truthful statement of Jesus, it will show in the way you live your
lives in service to God, because the better we trust the Truth the more freeing
our lives will be to serve others…not to please them, to not please ourselves,
but to glorify the Lord more with our time and talents God has given you.
And to illustrate that I
would like Cheryl Foote to come up here this morning to share her testimony:
Pastor asked me to speak today because of a
devotion that I did at the council meeting this past week. The devotion was based on John chapter 10
verses 38-42. Most of you are familiar
with these verses – when Jesus goes to the home of Martha and her sister
Mary. While Martha works and works, Mary
sits and listens to the Word of God spoken by Jesus. Martha is upset and asks Jesus to tell Mary
to help her, but Jesus says the Martha is worried about so many things but Mary
has chosen the one thing that really matters – hearing the Word of God.
I have in the past, and still do, a lot. I am involved in the Sunday School, the Confo
program, the church council, I help with Rotary events, I work, and I take care of my family and my home. I don’t do all of these things because I feel
like a super person. I do them because I
believe that God has given me many talents including accounting, organizing,
and mothering. I believe that because of
Jesus’ sacrifice for us, I receive God’s grace and mercy and will experience
everlasting life. EVERLASTING life –
never ending life with other people that believe in Jesus as their Savior while
they are here in this life - I can’t even begin to imagine how wonderful that
will be - except that I am looking forward to it.
I want other people to know and understand how
incredible a gift it is that we are given through Jesus Christ. So in all the things I do, I do them because
in some way I believe that I am using the talents that God gave me to show His
glory – that is what He designed me to do.
I have a book that I read to the kids in Sunday School – it is called
‘Designed by God – so I must be special”.
I am not more special than anybody else – we are all special. God made us so we can know Him and make Him
known by serving others using the talents that He gave us.
Most of the time, when I do what I do, I feel happy
and fulfilled because I know that whether it is teaching Sunday School or the
confo students, raising my own kids, or working at the job that God gave me, I
am showing His love and teaching His Word and His will by the way I act and the
things I do or don’t do. When I do that
I am being like Mary in the Bible verses.
Sometimes I work hard and there is only fatigue,
anger and frustration. When those times
happen I know that my motives were wrong – it was about me – what I did, what I
expected – and it didn’t turn out the way I expected. Showing God’s love wasn’t why I did what I
did. When these times happen I have to
stop….. then thank God for all He has given to me and to ask Him to forgive me
for working hard without including Him as the reason – I get caught up in the
details and forget the goal. After that
things go more smoothly and I get back to having more joy in what I do. When I go to long without remembering God
that is when the frustrations turn into feeling overwhelmed, depressed that I
can’t do it – I just can’t do it – its not fair!, and I border on
‘burnout’.
My service to God strengthens me and helps me to
continue to do more – or in other words – God strengthens me when I work to
glorify Him.
God did make you all and make you all special. He gave you abilities – or talents – that He
wants you to use - not just for yourself
but to help others. I would like you all
to think about what talents God has given you and how you can use your time with
your talents to show God’s glory to the people you work with, live with, or
encounter in other ways. If you think
you have nothing to share please talk to me or to Pastor Dan because we know
that God gave everyone something to share.
V. Conclusion: Bow in freedom to Christ
The story has been told
that after the slaves had been freed following the Civil War Lincoln got off a
train and one of the former slaves came over to him and bowed before him. It
was told that the President demanded that the black man stand up. The President
said to him that he was no long anyone’s slave, he had been freed.
May the Lord bless you to
trust the Truth in not bowing to the slavery of sin, but instead live the Truth
in faith being set free to joyfully serve others. Amen.