Four Warnings of Christ

Well, there are some warnings that we received that we kind of smile at, maybe even laugh at, kind of like this stop sign right here in Princeton, West Virginia, at the intersection of center street and north walker. You will find this sign. You haven't encountered it yet. I can remember in days past when there was nothing here, but the stop sign, this intersection. And then years ago, they added this traffic signal. And rather than take the stop sign down, they just put a few extra words on the stop sign. Stop unless light is green. Maybe it's just me. I thought that's what the traffic signal was for. Whenever I see that and I go through that intersection quite often, I just smile. That is one of those amazing signs. So there are some warnings that we ought to take lightly and we laugh at, but there are other warnings that we need to be dead serious about. Like the four warnings we hear from Christ today. Those are warnings that we need to take to heart and we need to be very serious about. Would you open your Bible, please, to John chapter 7 this morning. John chapter 7 where Jesus gives us four warnings. John chapter 7 through 10 comprise a three month time period in our Lord's life and ministry. It's toward the end of his life. It's only six months before he will die on the cross. But these four chapters describe a three month time period in our Lord's life where he's ministering not in Galilee, not in the North anymore far away from the religious center of Jerusalem, but he's ministering right in Jerusalem and in Judea, the religious center of the nation, where the religious leaders are out to killing and they hate him. So he's right in their home court. He's ministering in their area. And these three months are marked by increasing intensity of conflict with the Pharisees and opposition from them. It's also marked by increasing instruction for his disciples as he prepares them for his death and his departure back to heaven. John chapter 7 through 10 describe this three month period of our Lord's ministry, Luke 10 through 13 also describe this time period in our Lord's life as well. We saw last time as we began chapter 7 that Jesus is purposely avoiding Jerusalem because he knows the religious leaders are out to killing. And even though there is a major feast, the feast of Tabernacles at which all Jewish men are to attend, he stays away because he knows that there is serious opposition there. We also saw that his brothers were goading him to go on up the Jerusalem proclaim himself to be king. Show your miracles where the action really is so that people can accept you as their king. They didn't say that because they believed in him. John tells us very clearly they did not believe in him. Quite possibly they wanted a piece of the action if he is accepted as king. They're the king's brothers or half brothers. So maybe they get a little piece of the action or maybe they just did it because they wanted to get rid of him. And they knew that that would probably lead to his arrest. Whatever the case may be, they did not believe in him and they did not accept him as the Messiah and as the son of God who came to be the savior of the nation. We found that Jesus waited while the crowds go to Jerusalem. Jesus waits until midway through the feast and then he shows up and he starts teaching in the temple. Now we don't know what he taught but we do know that what he taught caused a tremendous uproar and the uproar among the people at the feast brings out these four serious warnings of Christ. They're the four warnings we're going to look at today from verses 14 through 36. Jesus as he's teaching in the temple and this uproar surrounds what he's saying. He issues four direct, strong, serious warnings. Two of them would be considered warnings to believers. To those of us who know Jesus are really warnings to anybody. And then two of them are specifically directed to those who do not know Christ. To those who we would call unsaved or lost. Let's look at them this morning. Warning number one is a warning of a superficial knowledge of the scriptures. What I'm talking about here is just an academic interest and a head knowledge, an intellectual knowledge of the scriptures which never really reaches to your heart. Your emotions, your will. It never affects your behavior. It just puffs up your mind. That is a superficial knowledge of scripture and Jesus warns against that. Notice if you will how this starts. It starts with the question of Christ's knowledge. Let's begin in verse 14. Not until halfway through the festival that Jesus go up to the temple courts and begin to teach. The Jews there were amazed and asked him how did this man get such learning without having been taught. Now they were not saying that Jesus was uneducated. Jesus had been through the synagogue school just like any young Jewish boy would to a certain age level. Every young Jewish boy would go through synagogue school, learn the law of Moses, learn how Israel was to operate. But what they were talking about is he had not received any advanced training under a rabbi to be qualified to be a religious teacher, to be a rabbi in Israel. He hadn't gone to their schools. He hadn't been trained under the leading rabbis of the day, rabbi, hileil or shemai or gameleil. He hadn't been under one of the schooled rabbis of the day. And so they don't understand how is he able to teach like this? How does he know all this stuff? How is he able to teach with such authority? And notice what Jesus says in verse 16. Jesus answered, my teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me. This is an amazing stroke of Jesus really at the heart of what they're asking. You see in that day it was important that rabbis be able to quote other rabbis. That's how they taught. To show their wide breadth of knowledge they would quote each other and then they would be known as the follower of a certain rabbi. So it was not well thought of that your teaching was from yourself, that it was coming from you. It had to come from someone else. And Jesus says, oh, don't be alarmed. My teaching is not my own. I'm not teaching just what I've dreamed up. I tell you who my teaching rabbi was, it was God. I get my doctrine, I get my teaching. It's not my own. It comes from the one who sent me and identifies him in verse 17 as God. Now there's a question here about Jesus' knowledge. And Jesus says, I got my knowledge and I got my teaching and my doctrine from God Himself. Now let me pause for a moment to say there's nothing wrong with intellectual academic knowledge of the Scriptures. There's nothing wrong with good training. We believe in that here, it's reason we're involved in Piedmont's E412 program. We believe there's a place for good training in the Word of God for academically oriented, helping people understand better the Word of God. Nothing wrong with that, that's good. And I realize that we're talking here about Christ, the Son of God, who knew the mind of the Father and did not need any formal training. I understand that, and that's different from us, but still there is a danger in thinking that schooling or academic knowledge or increasing your understanding of what the text of Scripture actually says. There's a danger in thinking that's enough. It isn't enough. God has made us people who have a personality that has composed several functions, three of which are our intellect or our mind, our emotion and our will. And if Scripture never gets beyond your intellect, it does no good except puff up your mind and make you proud of your knowledge. That's exactly what Paul said in 1 Corinthians chapter 8. Knowledge puffs up. Edification builds up. Love builds up. Other people. If all you got is intellectual knowledge, it'll just puff your mind up and make you think you're really something. You know more than other people. The Bible knowledge you get never affects your heart and your will, then it is just a superficial academic intellectual understanding of Scripture which does you no good in the long run. And that's exactly what Jesus is warning against. Now this question of Jesus' knowledge spurs him to tell us the marks of true Bible knowledge. What does it mean to have a true Bible knowledge? Three marks Jesus points out about true Bible knowledge in verses 16 to 18. Verse 16, the first one is this, it has to be the study of the word. Verse 16, Jesus answered, my teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me. In other words, this is God's teaching. This is God's word. This is not, I'm not quoting other rabbis. This is God's word. This is straight from God. So any genuine true Bible knowledge begins here. It is a study of the word of God. It is an understanding of what God says, not what other people say, but what God says, not what other people say about what God says, but what God says. Now there's a room for good commentaries and what others have said. We don't want to ignore 20, 21 centuries of good teaching on the word of God. Certainly, but sometimes all we do is what the Pharisees did. We quote other authors. We refer to what people have said about the Bible rather than understanding what the Bible itself says. Genuine Bible knowledge begins with a study of the word, not just books about the word, preachers who have said things about the word, authors who have written about the word, but what did God say? What does God say? Study of the word. Second key mark of genuine Bible knowledge is a submissive attitude to the word of God. Verse 17, anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. When he talks about choosing to do the will of God, he's talking about a deep determination to do what the Bible says. The will of God is found in the word of God. I don't want to go too far into this, but there are only two ways the Bible uses that term will of God. The one is the sovereign will of God, his plan and purpose for all of creation, most of which we don't know except in hindsight as we see it worked out. But the other way the Bible uses that term is of his revealed will in his word, his moral will. What he expects of us, what he wants us to know and how he wants us to live, that's found right here. And you cannot have accurate genuine Bible knowledge unless you have a determination to be submissive to the word of God. To do what the word of God says, your Bible knowledge is seriously lacking, seriously incomplete if you don't live it out. You don't have a commitment in your heart to do what you're learning from the Bible. If all you do is store it up here in your memory banks, it will do you no good except to inflate your ego. James tells us that in James chapter one, he says, you're not blessed if you read the Bible or know the Bible, you're blessed if you do it. And he says, who does the word of God? So genuine Bible knowledge, the second mark of it is a submissive attitude, a settled purpose and determination to do the father's will, to do what God tells us in his word. The key mark of true Bible knowledge is a desire for God's glory and not our own. Verse 18, whoever speaks on their own does not or does so to gain personal glory, but he who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is a man of truth. There is nothing false about him. Jesus is speaking about himself. He's just said, my teaching comes from God's not my own. And so he is speaking primarily about himself. If you're speaking on your own, you're just building yourself up, you're glorifying yourself. But the one who speaks, he says, the one who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is a man of truth. Nothing false about him. And so it must be our earnest hearts desire as we gain knowledge and do what we learn from the word of God that we do it with a desire for God's glory, not promoting ourselves. If we are promoting ourselves, if we are teaching, preaching, learning, gaining knowledge so that we gain a following, so that we gain recognition, then we are no better than the Pharisees. That is a superficial knowledge of the Bible. Right in this amazing, Jesus' hearers raised the issue of the competence of the teacher. Who were you to be teaching? If you didn't go to our schools, and Jesus turns it around and raises the issue of the competence of the hearers, you really don't know the Bible. You really don't know the Word. You don't have a genuine knowledge of the Scriptures because that begins not with quoting different rabbis, it begins with understanding what God said in His Word, and then a reverent, submissive spirit to live it out to do what God says for His glory and not our own. That's the person who has genuine Bible knowledge. Anything else is a sham. Anything else is just for your benefit and your glory. Anything else is superficial. And Jesus ends this section by warning, by really driving home that warning about a superficial knowledge of the Scriptures in verse 19. He says, has not Moses given you the law yet not one of you keeps the law. Boy, wonder how they loved hearing that. These are the teachers of the law. These are the religious leaders of Israel. Moses gave you the law and yet not one of you is keeping it. And he proves his point with the last statement. Why are you trying to kill me? You see, Jesus is basically using them as an example of the very kind of superficial knowledge he's just talked about. These people he's talking to, these religious leaders, these scribes and Pharisees, these teachers of the law know their Old Testament well. They've got it all packed up here. They can quote you verse. They can tell you exactly what it says. And at the very same time, they are trying to violate one of the Ten Commandments. One of the very core commandments of the law, the sixth commandment thou shalt not kill. They want to kill Jesus. And so it's obvious that their knowledge of the Word of God has not yet affected their heart, their behavior, their will. So they are not at all in tune with the Word of God. Any knowledge of the Bible, which does not change your life and move you to love God better and love others better and serve you. And so it's obvious that the Word of God is just a superficial knowledge, intellectual academic knowledge of the Bible. Anybody can get that even unsaved people can get that. Jesus is talking to unsaved people who have that. And yet demonstrating their hearts there, not at all committed to the Bible because they want to violate one of the primary commands in the Word of God. And so it's a real danger of a superficial knowledge. I want to challenge all of us this morning. Knowledge of the Bible is not just mind. It is not just intellect. It is not just an academic accumulation of knowledge. If what you learn does not move you in your heart to have a passionate longing for God, a vision of him that desires to be moral like him. It does not move you on that level. It is of no good. And if what you know about the Bible does not compel you to be obedient to the Scriptures and to serve him to see that others hear the Word of God and come to know him. If you are not moved to service from what you know, then it is just empty head knowledge. Any Bible study, any Bible learning that does not result in a passionate heart to know God better and to become more like him and to serve him is just empty head knowledge. That's all it is. And that's what Jesus is warning about. A superficial knowledge of the Scriptures. Gain all the knowledge you can get. We should do that. I believe in that. But if it stops there and does not move our hearts and move our wills, then it is of no good. It just puffs up. It just gives you pride about what you know. Jesus is warning about that. He is talking to people who know their Bible inside and out but are not living it. And want to violate one of the key commands in Moses' law. Superficial knowledge of the Scriptures. Second warning, Jesus gives us is a warning about judgment based on appearance. Making judgments based on appearances. Notice in verses 20 through 24, Jesus has just said to the religious leaders why are you trying to kill me? Now notice how the crowd responds. You are demon possessed. Verse 20. You are demon possessed. The crowd answered, who's trying to kill you? Now the word crowd refers to all the people that have gathered in Jerusalem from all over Israel and even from other parts of the world to observe this feast of tabernacles. A lot of them are clueless about the religious leaders plot to kill Jesus. And that's why they think you're crazy. You're demon possessed. Who's trying to kill you anyway? They don't understand what's happening in Jerusalem. And so Jesus answers them this way. Jesus said to them, I did one miracle and you were all amazed or you're all astonished. But what miracles are they talking about? From what he will say in a moment it's clear that he's referring back to the last time he was in Jerusalem in chapter 5 when he healed the man at the pool of Bethesda. Remember he did that on the Sabbath day and the religious leaders got so upset with him about healing a man on the Sabbath day and then the fact that he claimed to be equal with God. John 5, 18 says they tried all the more to kill him. They wanted to kill him then. And so Jesus is referring back to that miracle. I did one miracle and you were all astonished. In other words, you were all bent out of shape that I would do that, particularly on the Sabbath day. Now he's going to drive home his point verse 22. Yet because Moses gave you circumcision, although actually it did not come from Moses but from the patriarchs and it goes all the way back to Abraham way before Moses, you circumcise a boy on the Sabbath. Now if a boy can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing a whole man's whole body on the Sabbath? This is ingenious. This is what you would expect of the Son of God. Jesus points out their inconsistency in their handling of the law, handling of the Bible and how they make judgments based on appearances only without taking all the information into account. Basically what he's saying is this, you're ready to kill me because I healed a man on the Sabbath. I made a whole man's whole body healed in conformity with what God wanted it to be. And yet you will perform the Jewish right of circumcision which marks out a young Jewish boy as one of the Jewish people under the covenant made with Abraham. You will do that on the Sabbath day. What he's referring to is that the Vitticus chapter 12 and verse 3 says that a young Jewish male is to be circumcised on the eighth day. And if that eighth day just happens to fall on the Sabbath they go ahead and do the circumcision. That's working on the Sabbath and they're accusing him wanting to kill him because although they will keep Moses law by performing a surgical procedure on the Sabbath, if he makes a man's whole body well somehow he's to be killed. You see the inconsistency and Jesus is pointing out to them basically you've got an agenda and you've got an agenda based on your appearance, the appearance what you see of things you're not taking all the information even all the biblical information into account. And so he nails home the warning in verse 24. This is a summary of it. Stop judging by mere appearances but instead judge correctly in other words take the whole of scripture into account. You're judging only by appearances and Jesus is warning of the danger of judging by appearances. We do that. I have heard all kinds of things condemned based on taking a verse of scripture out of context and making it to mean what you want it to mean rather than what God intended to mean. I mean I've heard other translations other than the King James condemned from verses and Psalms. I've heard women wearing slacks condemned from a verse in Leviticus. I've heard of contemporary Christian music condemned from First Thessalonians 5 which says avoid all appearance of evil, the Greek word for appearance really is the word for form, every form of evil, everything that the Bible clearly says is sin. It's not everything that appears to be evil or looks like what the world may do. That's not the point of that verse but I've heard verses like that pulled way out of context without taking the rest of scripture into account and people are condemned just like Jesus was based on appearance rather than taking all of scripture into account. It's very easy to judge others on the basis of appearance, on the basis of the way things look. When I may not have all the information, when I may not even be using scripture correctly, or when I may not have all the information about what that person has done or why they did it. It's very dangerous to judge on the basis of appearance only. I read a story about a lady who was between flights. She was in an airport waiting for her next flight. She went by a little gift shop and bought a little bag of cookies to munch on while she was waiting for her flight. She sat down and she got her newspaper out and started reading and all of a sudden she heard this little rustling sound and she looked down from reading her newspaper. The guy sitting a seat across from her has his hand in the bag of cookies that's between them getting a cookie out and she is incensed by that but she doesn't want to say anything so she just reached over and got a cookie too. She started eating a cookie and she thought well that'll tell and that'll show him these are mine. Another moment passed and she hears the rustling again and he's got his hand in the bag of cookies again getting another cookie and this went on like four or five times and finally they're down to the last cookie. And to add insult to injury he takes the last cookie breaks it into moves half of it across the chair toward her sticks the other half and his mouth and takes off and she is levied by this point. Who is this guy who's been eating my cookies? But they're calling for her flight and so she reaches down in her bag to get her boarding pass and to her shame and embarrassment she sees an unopened bag of cookies. And she says, I'm going to have to say something to you. It's dangerous to judge by appearances. You may be wrong. You may not see things the way they were intended or you may not have all the information. You may completely be seeing it the way it's not at all. You know that's even true about the work of God. It's dangerous to judge by appearances. Sometimes we think the only way God works is through the spectacular, through the big, through what we can see. Elijah had to learn that lesson didn't he? Elijah just got done with a huge miraculous display of God's power on Mount Carmel where God sent fire from heaven to consume his sacrifice and 450 profits of bail or slaughtered. And it looks like there's going to be a national revival, but it doesn't happen. In fact, the Queen Jezebel says, I'm out to get you Elijah for getting my profits. I'm going to kill you and so Elijah runs. Please the country sits down under a juniper tree depressed. And one of the things he says to God is, I'm the only one left standing for you. There's nobody else. I look around. I don't see anybody else. And God said, okay, Elijah, I'm going to teach you a lesson. Hide over here in the cleft of the rock. And God calls the strong wind to come by. Powerful wind. The Bible says, but God was not in the wind. And then he calls the earthquake and shake, but God was not in the earthquake. And then he calls the fire to sweep through. Man, those things are spectacular. They are surely acts of God. But God was not in the fire. And then there was what scriptures call a gentle whisper. God was in the gentle whisper. And then he reminded Elijah, Elijah, there's 7,000 people that have not bowed the need of bail. Elijah didn't know about those 7,000. He didn't know anything about them. But God was at work in ways that Elijah couldn't see. And I've wondered, as I've read that story through the years, I wonder how many of those people were encouraged and challenged and maybe even built up in their faith. Maybe even one to the Lord by the public ministry of Elijah, but he never knew it. He never saw it. And God showed him that God's not always at work in the spectacular, big things that we see. God is sometimes at work behind the scenes in the gentle whisper that we never see the results of. So don't judge by appearances. We can judge falsely when we do that. That's the reason why Paul said to the Corinthians, I don't care if I'm judged by you or anybody else. In fact, he says in 1 Corinthians 4, I'm not even going to judge myself because you know, the implication is my own heart is deceptive. And I don't really, I'm not even in a good position to judge my own motives. So he says in 1 Corinthians 4, 5, wait until the day when the Lord reveals all the secrets of men's hearts. Because when God judges, all that was unknown will be known. All that was done that we never saw will be revealed. And it's not always in the spectacular, public demonstrations that God is at work. Sometimes it's in the quieter ways. I'll tell you what, if I hadn't, if I hadn't begun to understand that and begun to learn that years ago, I would have quit the ministry because there are long stretches of time where you see nothing visible. Where you see no response. Sometimes response doesn't always mean God's working. Sometimes lack of response doesn't mean God is not working. God's not always in the earthquake and the fire and the wind. Sometimes he's in the gentle voice, the gentle whisper. So be careful not to judge by appearances. Jesus is saying to these people, stop judging by mere appearances. You don't understand what's happening. You've not taken all of Scripture into account. Judge correctly. Judge with all of the Scriptures in mind. There's a good warning for all of us. But there's a third warning Jesus gives. And it's a lack of true knowledge about Christ. Jesus is now going to turn to those who do not trust him. And he's going to warn them about a lack of true knowledge of Christ. In fact, he's going to talk about three different kinds of knowledge in these next few verses. Look at verses 26 to 28 where Jesus talks about, verses 25 or rather to the 27, where Jesus talks about false knowledge, verse 25. At that point, some of the people who drew some began to ask, isn't this the man they're trying to kill? Here he is speaking publicly. They're not saying a word to him. Have the authorities really concluded that he is the Messiah? Those who are listening to Jesus realize at least some of these people, the people of Jerusalem. This is different from the crowd now, from all over the Roman Empire. These are the people in Jerusalem who know the lay of the land, who know what the religious authorities hold against Jesus. And they want him dead. And so these people who drew some were saying, isn't this the guy they're trying to kill? These guys are talking publicly in the temple. They're not raising a finger to try to get him. What's wrong? You think maybe they've become convinced he's a Messiah? And the way the question is asked, it anticipates a negative answer. They really don't think he's the Messiah, do they? Come on. They couldn't believe that. And notice what they say next in verse 27, but we know where this man is from, when the Messiah comes, no one will know where he is from. Now they're operating on wrong information. They were basically going by a popular legend of the day that said when the Messiah comes, he'll kind of drop out of thin air. It was based on a misinterpretation of Malachi 3.1 and another verse in the Old Testament talks about the Messiah coming suddenly. And they thought he'll just appear, we won't know where he came from. And that was a popular legend of the day. Not everybody believed that when the wise men came to find out about the birth of Christ, the Old Testament scholars knew that Micah 5.2 told us exactly where he would come from, Bethlehem. So not everybody believed that popular legend, but these people were going by that popular legend. They had wrong information. They had false information about Jesus. And a lot of people have false knowledge of Jesus because they got the wrong information. They believe that Jesus is a good teacher. He may be a prophet. There are a lot of world religions that claim Jesus as a prophet. That's wrong information. I mean it's right up to a point. But if you stop there, that's the wrong information. That's false knowledge of Jesus. If all you know about him is he is a good man, a good example, a good teacher, a prophet. That's wrong information. That's false knowledge of Jesus. That's not enough to get you to heaven. So Jesus swings it all the way to the opposite and gives us true knowledge of Christ, true knowledge of who he really is. Look at Jesus' answer verse 28. Then Jesus is still teaching in the temple courts, cried out, yes, you know me. And you know where I'm from. I think that was said sarcastically. It was an ironic twist on their words. Oh yeah, you know me. You know where I at least you think you do. That's the sense in which Jesus is saying that because what he's going to say next basically is saying you really don't know me and you really don't know where I'm from. Here it is. Yes, you know me and you know where I'm from. I am not here on my own authority. But he who sent me is true. You do not know him. But I know him because, okay, here it is. Here's where I'm from. I am from him. And he sent me. Well, we know him. We know where he's from. And Jesus basically said, oh, you do really you know me and you know where I'm from. No, you don't. You've got false knowledge. The true knowledge is I am from him. I am sent from heaven. Now we know what's what all's packed in that. We know why the father sent the son. He sent the son. Jesus doesn't fully describe it here, but we know from other scriptures. Jesus was sent from the father from heaven to be our savior. He's not just a good moral teacher. He's not just a good moral example. He's not just a prophet. He is the sent one. He's sent from the father to this world to be our savior. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life. So he is the sent one sent to be our savior. If you've never come to that level of knowledge about Christ, you have a false knowledge about Christ. He's not just a good man, a good teacher, a good example of prophet. He is the savior sent from heaven to be the savior of your sins. That's who he is. That's true knowledge of Christ. But you know, it's even possible to have an incomplete knowledge of Christ. And that's what happens next in verses 30 and 31. Verse 30, if this they tried to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him because his hour had not yet come. Still many in the crowd believed in him. They said when the Messiah comes, will he perform more signs than this man? So there are certain people that are listening to him that believe in him because they're thinking, Messiah, is there's been back on do more signs and he's done more miracles than he's done. Now that's a start, but that is incomplete knowledge. That's the same kind of knowledge about Jesus. We saw back in chapter two where people saw the miracles in Jerusalem early on. And they believed in him, but the Bible says Jesus did not believe in them. In fact, he did not believe in their faith. He did not entrust himself to them. They did not really trust him completely. They just were impressed by the miracles and believed he's a mighty miracle worker. It's the same kind of belief that we saw in chapter six where Jesus feeds the 5,000 and the people are ready to believe in him as the king. A great miracle worker who could do great things for the nation. That's the level of belief. Now the miracles are important in the New Testament. They are designed to be the credentials that Jesus offers to the nation to prove that he is the Messiah. But that's only the front door. That's only the entrance into true faith which is to recognize. Yes, he is the Messiah. If he's the Messiah, he is the Son of God who came to be our Savior. That's what he claimed all through his ministry and they've not yet reached that level of faith. So it's incomplete knowledge of Christ. It's a good start. They understand these are miracle worker, but they've got to come to the point where they realize he's a Savior. You know, there are folks today who have incomplete faith. They see Jesus as a problem solver or a miracle worker or a healer, but they haven't come to see him yet as a Savior. It's possible to have what's good as a first step. It's a good front door entrance, but it's not true faith to just come to Jesus because you want him to straighten out your life and solve all of your problems. And heal this or heal that or be your deliverer. That's a start. But if you never get to the point where you realize you're a sinner and you need a Savior. You don't have true faith. You have incomplete faith. So Jesus is contrasting these different kinds of faith. False knowledge of him against the true knowledge of understanding these sent from God to be our Savior. And then an incomplete knowledge just sees him as a miracle worker. He is much more than that. He's much more than a problem solver and a miracle worker. He is the Savior of your sin. He came to deliver you from sin. And until you come to the point where you realize you are a sinner and need of a Savior, you do not have true knowledge of Christ. That's the point Jesus is driving at here. So he warns about the lack of true knowledge of Christ. But that leads to his most serious warning of all. And that is the danger of rejecting Christ in verses 32 to 36. He ends with this warning. And it is a strong one, a pointed one, a very serious one. The danger of not trusting Christ, the danger of rejecting Christ. Notice if you will how this begins, it begins in verse 32 with a description of the hearts rebellion, verse 32. The Pharisees heard the crowd whispering such things about him. What are they here? Whispering. Well, back in verse 26. Do they really think he's the Messiah? They're not arresting him. They must think he's the Messiah or verse 31. Man, he's a miracle worker. They're hearing this. They realize they're beginning to lose their grip on the people that some of the people are beginning to kind of shift toward him. And so here's what they decide to do in the verse 32. Then the chief priest in the Pharisees sent temple guards to arrest him. Now we'll find out how that goes next week and didn't go like they planned. But you can see the hardness of their heart. They've heard Jesus teach. They've heard him speak and preach in the temple. And how do they respond? Their hearts are hardened. There is a more bitter, intense hatred and desire to kill him. And when you hear the word of God, when you hear Jesus speak to your heart, you can respond in one of two ways. Your heart will either become more tender and soft toward the things of God. And you'll begin to sense, I really need Christ. I am a sinner. I can't get the heaven on my own. And your heart will become more tender toward Jesus and you'll be drawn toward him. Or you will pull back. And your heart will become hardened. Your heart will become intense against Jesus. And you'll crawl back into your shell of rejection. Not wanting to receive him. Not wanting to give up either a life of sin or the facade, the pride of what people think of you. And for whatever reason you draw back into that shell and you pull back and your heart gets a little harder than it has been before. My friend, I want to warn you of the danger of that because that's exactly what Jesus does. Look at Jesus response to them. Verse 33, Jesus said, I am with you for only a short time. And then I am going to the one who sent me, you will look for me, but you will not find me. And where I am, you cannot come. Jesus says there's a limited opportunity. I'm only here for a short time. Then I'm leaving. I'm going to a place where you can't find me. And you can't come. And they completely misunderstood what he was saying. Verse 35, the Jews said to one another, where does this man intend to go that we cannot find him? Will he go where are people? If scattered among the Greeks and teach the Greeks? What did he mean when he said, you will look for me, but you will not find me. And where I am, you cannot come. And we know because of what Jesus will continue to say. We know what Jesus meant. These people misunderstood it. They thought, is he talking about going to Greece or to Rome and speak to the Greeks over there? We're surely not going to follow him there. No, we don't want to go there. So what he's talking about, of course not. It's clear from what we know Jesus says earlier, he uses the same terminology in the upper room for the disciples talking about his death, resurrection and ascension. Where is he going? He's going to the cross. He's going to the grave. He's going to be resurrected. He's going back to heaven. Where is he going that they cannot go to heaven back to be with his father? Why can't they meet him there? Why can't they find him? Why can't they find him there? Because they have rejected him. And that's what he's warning about. You've got a brief window of time. You've got a brief opportunity. Where I'm here, I'm not going to be here much longer. I'm leaving. I'm going back to heaven. And you cannot come there to find me unless, of course, you're willing to accept Jesus as your Savior. You cannot go to heaven unless you trust Jesus. And Jesus is warning about the danger of rejecting Christ. Warning about closing that opportunity. Warning about the fact that the opportunity will not always be there. And someday the door will be closed. There are lots of passages that tell us about this missed opportunity. Look at a few of them. Proverbs 29, 1 says, whoever remains stiff net. You're not going to tell me I need a Savior. You're not going to tell me I need to admit my sin. I'm not going to come to Jesus. I know Christians who do this. Who he remains stiff net after many rebukes will suddenly be destroyed without remedy. The prophet Isaiah made an appeal very similar. Isaiah 55 verse 6, seek the Lord while he may be found. Call on him while he is near. He is implying that there will be a time when he cannot be found. There will be a time when he is not near. Jesus pled with the nation of Israel along these very same lines in Luke chapter 13. He said make every effort to enter through the narrow door. In other words, get serious about this. To enter through the narrow door because many I tell you will try to enter and will not be able to. Why would that happen? He explains once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door. You will stand outside knocking and pleading. Sir, open the door for us. But he will answer, I don't know you or where you come from. What Jesus is saying is the door of opportunity will be closed someday. It will be shot. There is an end. There is a limit to the time in which God will continue to show His mercy and grace and provide opportunity for you to get saved. That door will be shot someday and once that door is shot, there is no further opportunity. There is no such thing as purgatory where you are cleansed after death of your sins and finally make it to heaven. There is no such thing in the Bible as second chances after death. Once that door is closed, it is closed forever. And you will never have a chance to receive Christ and enter heaven. There is coming a day like Jesus warned His generation. I'm not going to be here long and I'm going to leave and go to a place where you can't come and you can't find me. Why? Because you did not trust me. The same thing could happen to you, my friend. And for that reason, the writer of Hebrews poses this terrible question, how shall we escape if we neglect or ignore so great a salvation? Jesus is offering you His salvation today. He came to save you from your sin. He died for you on the cross. But the opportunity to respond to that is limited. One day the door is going to be closed and that door could shut today. Any of us could die today and go out to meet God. Jesus might come back today and begin that series of events which would usher this world into a great tribulation. You don't know whether you would live another day through that. What I'm saying is the door will not always be open. It will be closed someday. And so the only opportunity you have is right now. That's what Jesus was saying to these people. I am with you for only a short time. Then I'm going to go to a place where you can't come. You can't find me. You will knock at the door and you will not be allowed entrance because you wasted your opportunity. I don't want that to ever be said of anyone here. As I look into your faces, I wonder if there will be some of you knocking on that door after it's too late. My friend don't wait until that time. Come now to Christ. He says, I'm only with you for a short time. Come now before the opportunity is gone. These are serious warnings. This is nothing to smile at. This is nothing to laugh about. This is serious business. We are on the break of eternity. We stand as Jonathan Edwards said suspended by a thread over hell and could drop into hell into eternity at any moment. My friend, the door of opportunity will not always be open to you. So you need to put aside whatever may be keeping you away from Christ. Whatever may be keeping you from His mercy and grace. And you need to trust Him today, today while you still have that open door of opportunity. Let's pray together. Father, we do sense that we are standing on the brink of eternity. We're hanging by thread and that thread could snap at any moment. Now we could be ushered into eternity where the door for gospel opportunity is shot. Our eternal destiny is sealed. Lord, for those of us who've trusted Jesus as Savior, we know that means the blessed entrance into your presence and we thank you for your grace in making that possible through Christ. But Lord, for those who have never trusted Jesus as Savior, it means an eternity of crying out like the rich man in hell. Please, please, somebody do something for me. It means an eternity of regret means an eternity of wishing they'd taken that opportunity. So I pray today that anyone who has lost would seize the opportunity you're giving them today to trust Christ and be saved. We ask that in the precious name of our Savior and your Son, Jesus. Amen. Let's stand together and sing this closing song. I will never be the same and I promise you my friend if you come to Christ, you will never be the same. You'll be a child of God, forgiven.