Living Victoriously (John 17:1-11)

http://goo.gl/wpU82B (link to live sermon)

            This particular passage of scripture is called the High Priestly Prayer, and also the Farewell Discourse. The Gospel according John Chapter is divided into 2 books, the book of signs, and the book of glory, it is also has 7 discourses;

Sign No. 1wedding at Cana-John Chapter 2

Sign No. 2            Healing of the nobleman's son-John Chapter 4

Sign No. 3            Healing of the lame man in Jerusalem-John Chapter 5

Sign No. 4            The feeding of the 5,000-John Chapter 6

Sign No. 5            Jesus walks on water-John Chapter 6

Sign No. 6            Healing of the man born blind-John Chapter 9

Sign No. 7            Raising Lazarus from the dead-John Chapter 11

Discourse No. 1            Early Judean ministry: Nicodemus-John Chapter 3

Discourse No. 2            The Samaritan woman: woman at the well/living water-John Chapter 4

Discourse No. 3            The discourse on the father and the son-John Chapter 5

Discourse No. 4            The bread of life discourse-John Chapter 6

Discourse No. 5            Feast of tabernacles: the spirit-John Chapter 7

Discourse No. 6            Jesus as light of the world-John Chapter 8

Discourse No. 7            Jesus as the good shepherd-John Chapter 10

But John chapters 14-17 are known as the Farewell Discourse, it is given by Jesus to 11 of his disciples after the Passover meal, that we Christians refer to as the Last Supper. This is a passing of the baton of sorts, Jesus knows what he has to do, so he is preparing himself and the Disciples not only for what is to come, but what they have to do afterwards.

As I was studying the passage, I thought this was going to be a real complicated piece to preach, I thought I was going to have to prune and take it piece by piece not trying to overcomplicate the message with some sort of profound revelation, but the more I studied the more I realized the purpose of this prayer was real simple. Eternal life is to know God and know Jesus. All right there in verse 3, know God and Jesus, you will know eternal life. That is what we are all here for right? Once we get past tradition, and maybe our parents making us come, that is why we are all here, we want there to be something more than the 70-100 if we are real strong, years on this planet. Here Jesus provides a prayer and gives us the answer, because he gives us the answer, he is operating like he already has the victory.  Notice also this prayer is not alone, clutching a rock, like so many artist have painted when he is in the garden; this prayer is right within earshot of all the other disciples.

Jesus prays for his own glorification in the first 8 verses, and he prays that the people know God, that word that Jesus uses for know in the Greek, is comparable to the Hebrew word used for know in the Old Testament, it means to intimately know God, develop a relationship with Him. The next part of the passage, Jesus intercedes for the disciples praying for them because he is going to the Father, they still have work to do on Earth. Jesus is not praying with defeat, he is praying from a position of victory.

I am a fan of video games; I am a fan of all kinds of games but mostly video games and particularly those from the 80s and early 90s, for the home console systems. Something that I understand about those games is that they are expensive to make. Teams of computer programmers, hardware and software specialist come together to make a video game along with testers, graphic designers, musicians, etc. They work together for a year or some years to develop a game, which is why they cost so much. These days, they try to make the video game long to play  (60 hours on some) so that the customer doesn’t feel like they wasted $60, but back in the 80s and 90s there was not much room on the disks and cartridges so to make the customer feel good about their purchase, they made the game hard. I would spend entire weekends, and when school was out, the whole summer trying to figure out how to win some of these games, some I got really good at, others, not so much.

Just recently I came across a group of professional gamers who “speed run” they have made a career out of playing a video game better than everybody else, and some specialize in beating the game in the fastest way possible. So games that would take me all weekend to get halfway through, they can beat from start to finish in 10-15 minutes. Some of these speed runners put on an annual charity marathon where they speed run these games live and raise money for charity. For example somebody will call in to the marathon and say they will donate $1000 to autism research if someone can beat a certain game in 13 minutes, and the speed runner will do it.

Now after getting over the pain of watching them make my childhood video game skills seem trivial I started to watch how they played and noticed they didn’t play the same way I used to play or play now, they have a whole different approach, and I found a sermon in it. The speed runners play the game victoriously.

First off, they prepare, they know the game sometimes better than the people who programmed it. We should all study our craft no matter what it is.

2 Timothy 2:15

King James Version (KJV)

¹⁵ Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.

That word study has other translations, be diligent, do your best, The Message Bible even says concentrate. The fact is if you want to be victorious, you have to prepare. One of my favorite music producers Leon Lewis, says all the time, “I am not the best musician, not the smartest, not the most creative, but you will NEVER out prepare me.” We ought to spend time studying what ever it is we want to do, but especially study God’s word.

Something else I noticed about the speed runners, they don’t stop when the enemy comes, nor do they fight every enemy. I watched the speed runners walk right past enemies, straight up ignore them and what they were doing, didn’t fuss, didn’t stress, didn’t stop, just kept moving. That is hard to do for some of us, we won’t allow ourselves to be disrespected. We argue every motion, fight every battle, resist every bit of change, because we want to do it our way and our way is best. We might think so, but I noticed in the game when you stop to fight every enemy, you might win, but you lose energy.

Psalm 23:4-5

King James Version (KJV)

4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

5 Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

Thirdly when they enemy does lay a hand on the runner, they allow the damage caused or the way that they enemy hit them, push them forward. Everything is used to push the runner forward and not backwards, instead of sitting around complaining about getting hit they let the hit push them further toward the end. Too many times we let our setbacks be our stopping points, we want to spend the rest of our lives talking about something that happened years ago instead of learning from it and moving on.

Philippians 3:13-14

King James Version (KJV)

¹³ Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,

¹⁴ I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

Last point I noticed about the runners, they played with victory in mind, they knew in the end, they were going to win, just like Jesus knew in the prayer Glory was his. Even though it was the last supper he knew he had to be whipped all night long. Crown of thorns on his head, nails in his hands, piercing in his side, fed vinegar for water, hang his head and die. Be put in a borrowed tomb, but early on the third day rise again!

Dry Bones, Breath, and Life

Dry Bones, Breath, and Life

Ezekiel 37:1-14

Ezekiel 37:1-14, the passage on the valley of the dry bones is one of the most famous Old Testament passages, definitely the most popular of the Book of Ezekiel. Ezekiel is more structured than other OT prophet books, and it is one of the few times in the OT that life after death is discussed. About 600 years before Christ, Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon defeated the Hebrew people, the Kingdom of Judah, some of the people we held captive, while others were exiled. The people of God were in disarray and Theologians refer to this period as the exilic period, a byproduct of the period was some of the rich OT literature, and the finalization of the literature that was already out.

This also influenced literature and art for the later years. James Weldon Johnson, author of Lift Every Voice and Sing also penned a song in dialect, you may have heard of…

Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones.

Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones.

Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones.

Now hear the word of the Lord.

Influenced by Ezekiel 37

This passage is pretty popular.

Ezekiel is taken to a valley of dry bones, you can tell a lot about an organism based on its bones. I remember taking a health class in High School and the teacher showing us a skeleton. The teacher asked us to tell if the skeleton was male or female. No one knew how to determine this and after many guesses, the teacher showed us the hipbones, they pointed out, he said that was for child bearing so the skeleton was a woman. You can tell a lot by the bones, that is why we have archeologists digging up fossils and when we have something wrong with us medically we get x-rays.

The bones in the valley were dry, we can relate to dry situations. Trying to look for colleges, find money for colleges, looking for a spouse for the first or second time, struggling to have children, struggling to raise children, health issues, finances, looking for a job, loosing family members, friends, or dealing with our own mortality, we all have dry periods in our lives.

God asks “can these bone live? I wonder what was going through Ezekiel’s mind when God asked him that? The very idea seems preposterous, bones do not get up they stay down. I know we can see the end already but I am wondering what someone like Ezekiel would have thought in this situation. Bones stay down, dry bones are dead and gone, and how do you reconcile that in your mind?  The prophet is told to speak a word that will give life and power, but be have learned not to trust words anymore because we are flooded with them.

We are bombarded constantly with commercials, radio, television, magazines, billboards, news presentations with words all over the screen social media, now companies compete for the “second screen, meaning they know you are watching TV, but looking on your phone or tablet at the same time. I know better than to get on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram on Thursday nights after 9pm CST unless I want Scandal spoiled before I get to watch it.

We have learned not to trust words over time; speed limit signs are merely a suggestion. We know politicians are lying either by omission, commission, or the fact that they really don’t understand how hard it is to pass a bill or really changes laws when it is not their time. Make campaign promises, get to Washington and learn they cant even be on the committee that makes the laws they promised to change because they are a Freshman Senator. We make vows and break them; sign contracts and renege, gossip columns and blogs are more popular than ever. I heard one news reporter say the problem with news now is companies would rather be first to break the story and wrong than fifth to report on it and right. We have stopped placing value on the word.

But the word of God is different than the word of man. When God speaks things happen, the word is still important.

Genesis 1:3

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

³ Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.

Isaiah 55:10-11

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

¹⁰ For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
    and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
    giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
¹¹ so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
    it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
    and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

John 1:1

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:14

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son,^[a] full of grace and truth.

Psalm 119:25

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

²⁵ My soul clings to the dust;
    revive me according to your word.

You see the idea would seem silly or preposterous to some because they have tried to control their god. God is only as big as they want him to be, they decide what kind of God they have and keep him in a box.

Shubert Ogden said “God is the all inclusive whole of all reality”

Anything less is not God. Even though Man may have failed us, we can rely on God. God has the knowledge that we do not.

God gives a word, and then he gives breath.

Breath is important, we use the word for so many terms, Breathe child breathe, when somebody is shocked or surprised. You can take the air out of the room, when somebody talks a lot with no action we say they are full of hot air. When you try to tell someone something but it is not received well, you are wasting your breath, a burst of energy is called a second wind. When you don’t think something is going to happen you tell people not to hold their breath on it. Breath is important, in the Hebrew the word used for breath in this passage is also used for wind and spirit, ruah or ruach.

God’s word was promising them life, also note how the text says they were promised breath/life but they got put together first. The promise came in verse 5, but the breath did not actually come until verse 10. Dealing with a verse 6-9 moment can be hard but

Isaiah 40:31

King James Version (KJV)

³¹ But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

It is hard waiting but once we are finished waiting we will appreciate the hard times and be glad we went through them. A period of financial hardship will help us appreciate the next time we get money. A period of sickness will force us to take better care of our health. We should be grateful for the waiting period because after the waiting period comes the breath of life.

James Weldon Johnson saw resurrection of a dry dead situation in his life, he was the son of a waiter, went to college, graduated and became an attorney in the late 1800s. Once of his examiners walked out in protest because they did not want to see a Black men become a lawyer. Johnson went from the son of a waiter, to a college graduate, to an attorney. Johnson went on to work on Theodore Roosevelt’s Presidential campaign and was appointed Consul to Venezuela. He had seen a dry situation resurrected and come to life!

The breath of life that can resurrect our dry situation, the breath of life that resurrected Lazarus, the breath that was with Jesus when he gave himself up for us so that we might be saved, so that death does not have the final say over us.