 Amen, amen. Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets. But in these last days, he's spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God, the exact imprint of his nature and he upholds the universe by the words of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high. Hebrews chapter one, verses one through three. You see, the author of Hebrews knew something about Jesus. Everyone say Jesus. The author of Hebrews knew something about Jesus that many people miss back then. And sadly, if we're not careful, we too can miss today. The author wants us to know that our God speaks to us. Think about that. That our God, the supreme being actually speaks to us through the prophets we see that God speaks consistently at many times and God speaks creatively in many ways. God's consistency speaks to him wanting communication or relationship with him to be open and often. And God's creativity speaks to God knowing how to speak to us. Have you thought of this? How gracious is our God to understand that different people in different situations requires different means of communication? Think about this. God spoke to Moses through a burning bush. God spoke to Elijah through a whisper. God spoke to Balaam by opening up the mouth of his donkey straight up like a scene from Shrek, right? God knows how to get to us and God knows how to speak to us, amen. Then the author writes something bold about Jesus that again, many of us could miss. The author claims that when Jesus is speaking, God is speaking. That when Jesus is speaking, God is speaking. Well, how can we be sure? With the verses I recited, shout the surpassing greatness of Jesus by telling us that Jesus is the maker of all things, air of all things and sustainer of all things. That Jesus is the radiance of the glory of God, the exact imprint of his nature. Simply put, if you want to know who God is and what God is like, look to who? Look to Jesus. Look to Jesus. So what happens when the creator and sustainer of the world becomes man, puts on flesh, walks the earth and begins to speak to people? What happens when the very word of God begins to utter words? How do people respond to him? How should we respond to him? Well, if you have your Bibles and I hope that you do, open up to the gospel of John. John chapter five. John chapter five as we continue the series on this gospel. And as you do, I want to say hello to the family at Portage and downtown as well. We love you. We love you. John chapter five. Beginning at verse two. This is God's word. Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate, a pool in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roof colonnades. And these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame and paralyzed. One man who was there who had been an invalid for 38 years, verse six. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, do you want to be healed? The sick man answered him, sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up. And while I'm going, another steps down before me. Jesus said to him, get up, take up your bed and walk, verse nine. And at once, everyone say at once, the man was healed and he took up his bed and walked. The title of this morning's message is this. Don't miss it. Don't miss it. Let me pray. Father, we love you. Jesus, we adore you. Holy Spirit, we desperately need you. God, will we know not teach us, will we have not please give us and will we are not please make us for your glory and our good in Jesus' name. And everyone said, amen, amen. Title of the message is don't miss it. Don't miss it. So for 38 years, this man in his community was known by what their weaknesses and disabilities. They believe that getting into a certain pool under the right conditions will actually heal their bodies. But this paralyzed man had no one to put him in the pool. And when he tried to get there himself, other people would step in front of him. Now he knew in his bones, though they may be broken, that healing and hope was found where? In that water, in that pool. Now we don't know exactly all that took place there. I don't know if they actually seen someone get healed, but that's what he was thinking in the community that he was around until one day a person shows up and starts having a conversation with him and ask him a question. Jesus asked him, do you want to be healed? Now sometimes I read the Bible, I just go duh, right? Do you want to be healed? But he's actually dignifying him. The man responds by telling Jesus why he hasn't been healed. But then Jesus responds by saying a command, get up, take up your bed, and walk. What happens when the creator and sustainer of the world begins to speak to people? Well, we'll see it again, look again at verse nine. And at once the man was healed and he took up his bed and walked. Think about this, what has been keeping this man paralyzed for almost four decades instantly disappears, amen? At a moment disappears. How about this, one sentence from the mouth of Jesus changed this man's life sentence. Some of you need to shout amen right there. One sentence, one phrase, eight words from the mouth of Jesus changed this man's life sentence. Well, why is that? Because when Jesus speaks, reality bends to his will. When Jesus speaks, creation obeys its creator. When Jesus speaks, what's impossible with man is made possible with God. When Jesus speaks, we see that God wasn't being exaggerated, he wasn't exaggerating or being poetic when he said in Isaiah, for as the rain and the snow come down from the heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty but shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. Don't miss the church because when Jesus is speaking, God is speaking. So when Jesus says something, when Jesus commands something, it is so, it is so. Growing up, my mom used to say it is what it is. It is what it is because when Jesus is speaking, God is speaking. Now as powerful as this miracle is, it's actually not the point to this story. John will later make a larger point but he's using this miracle or this sign to help us get there. Because that's what signs do, right? Signs point to something greater than themself. Let me make this really simple. If you, my family and I, I think a year or two ago, got to for the first time go to Disney World, life changing. I woke up with Lilo and Stitch, Cotton Candy in the bed, it was great. It was awesome. Imagine if all of our travel, we get to Florida and we finally get to the sign and we stop at the sign and go, yes, we made it. No, we didn't, all right? The sign is telling you, hey, beyond this, pointing to something greater than itself. The experience, what you worked for, what you traveled for is just a little bit of ways ahead. Well, that's what signs in the Gospel of John do. They point to something greater than themselves. And so the question becomes, what is this sign? What is this miracle pointing to? Now, if you're thinking Jesus, you are right. Give yourself a hand. But what exactly about Jesus? What is it that John wants us to see and know and feel about him? Well, we'll pick up this story right again at the end of verse nine. Let's keep reading. This is what John says. Now, that day was the Sabbath. Stop right there. This is him giving us a little context, giving us some background. He wants us to know specifically that this miracle took place on a specific day, this Sabbath day. Now, why is that? Let's keep reading verse 10. So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, it is the Sabbath. And it's not lawful for you to take up your bed, but he answered him, the man who healed me, that man said to me, take up your bed and walk. What do the Jews do? They confront this man, because they're saying, hey, you are breaking our Sabbath laws. You're breaking the traditions. It is not lawful for you to be picking up your bed. And I love how the once paralyzed man, the now healed man responds. You know what he does? He blames Jesus. I love that. Don't you love blaming Jesus for good things? Right? He goes, wait, wait, wait, wait. I know you're coming at me, but the guy who healed me, that dude told me to pick up my bed and walk. So I did. Right? So I did. See, I love how simple, but how powerful his statement is. To him, obedience to Jesus made sense after he encountered Jesus. If you keep reading at this time, he didn't even know Jesus' name. He was just like, this guy healed me. He told me to do something. So I did it. How would our lives look like if our obedience matched our encounter? That's for another sermon. Here we go. Here we go. Let's keep going. How do they respond to his answer? Like, how did you say? Verse 12, they asked him, who is the man who said to you, take up your bed and walk? Who is he? See, they want to find out who is telling people. Who's behind telling people they can break the Sabbath laws? But you know what they didn't do? They don't ask this man what he has been healed of or how long he's been sick or weak, do they? They completely miss the moment of celebrating with this man because they're fixated on capturing the man who told him he can pick up his bed. They're so fixated on the law that they miss the very work of God. How about this? They completely miss the work of God while trying to defend God. Oh, they completely miss what God is doing while trying to uphold the law, while trying to defend God. Let me give you an example of this in my life. So I got saved when I was a teenager through this outreach ministry and I was like 15, 16 years old. And my pastor at the time, he believed that the only Bible, any Christian chari of all time is the King James Bible, period. If you had any other Bible, it was not the Bible. Okay, it just wasn't, right? And so much so that he taught us how to defend the King James Bible over any other Bible. So if you had an NIV, you did not wanna get close to me, all right? And I would come up to people, I was trained literally, King James only had my Bible, right? King James only walked up to people, especially had an NIV, and I'll have them turned to certain places in their Bible. And I'll go, all right, there's verse 21, and then it jumps to verse 23. Where's verse 22? Mm, right? And I'm like, oh, well, let me open up my Bible and show you what verse is missing. And then I was showing them this crazy verse that talks about how God came to save and to heal. And I'm like, your Bible doesn't have that verse. Mm, right? And I'm just defending it. And God said, mention, I live by a better world, but by every word that preceded out of the mouth of God and your Bible are missing words, right? I would just, boom, just kinda go at them, go at them, go at them. And people just look at me and just like, what is up with this dude? No, it's interesting. I was so fixated on defending my right Bible translation, translation that if I just took the time to actually read the NIV, the reason why that verse was missing, because all the earlier manuscripts didn't have that verse in it. Actually, my Bible added some things to it. I completely missed it. That's a funny way, but there are also ways that we try to defend the faith. Question, but how do we do that? Does it reflect the faith that we're trying to defend? They try to defend God while completely missing what God was doing. Look at verse 13, this story continues. Now, the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn. There was a crowd in the place. Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, see, you are well, sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you. The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. Verse 16, and this is why the Jews were persecuting Jesus. Because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. On the Sabbath. Again, you see why John actually mentions this sign, this miracle in the text. It's to point us to this conversation. John writes about the miracle and we see how beautiful and powerful it is, but he also wrote this miracle and this sign to point us to the persecution of Jesus. Why was Jesus being persecuted? Why was Jesus actually executed on a Roman cross? Well, it's partly because of teachings like these and what he's gonna say next. Jesus just takes it up a little notch. Verse 17, but Jesus answered them, my father is working unto now and I am working. You see, it was unlawful for man to work on the Sabbath, but Jesus isn't just a man, is he? He's God. Jesus is God. Jesus isn't under their authority. Jesus isn't under their written laws. Why? Because Jesus is the author and Jesus is the word of God. You see, they knew that God rested on a seventh day if you go back and study kind of what the Jews believed in at that time, but they also knew that God never stopped working. It's not like God took his hands off the universe. So when Jesus says, my father is working and so I'm I am working, you know what he's saying? Well, if God keeps working, that's why I'm working, which means I am God. And they didn't know what to do with that. They didn't know what to do with that. Jesus isn't being a rebel. He's actually revealing the heart of God in the life that's actually behind the law, right? Jesus didn't come to abolish the law. He actually said, I came to fulfill it. He's trying to show him the heart and the life and the love that's actually behind the law. Later in John chapter seven, when speaking of this miracle, listen to what Jesus says. He says this to them. He says, has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why do you seek to kill me? The crowd answered, you have a demon. Who is seeking to kill you? Jesus answered them, I did one work and you all marveled at it. Moses gave you circumcision, not that it was for Moses, but from the fathers and you circumcised a man on the Sabbath day. If on the Sabbath, a man see, listen, don't miss it. If on the Sabbath, a man received circumcision so that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me? Because on the Sabbath, I made a man's whole body well. You see when speaking of this miracle later in John chapter seven, Jesus actually reveals their faulty thinking and the evil that resides in their hearts. To put it simply, this is what Jesus says. Wait a second, you saying you keep the law? You don't even keep the law. There came a time when you circumcised a man on the Sabbath day so that you wouldn't break the law. You removed a piece of a man so that you can be righteous. But now you're angry at me because on the Sabbath day, I've healed and fixed this man's entire body? That's why you wanna kill me? Here's the crazy thing we have to remember. Jesus didn't touch this man to heal him, did he? He simply spoke. What happens when a creator and sustainer of the world, Jesus becomes man, walks to earth and begins to speak to people. What happens when the word of God begins to, other words, how do people respond? John chapter five, verse 18, this is why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him. Because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own father. Don't miss it. Making himself equal with God. When Jesus came to the earth, many people wanted to argue and eventually kill the one whose words bring life, bring life. The point of this miracle, the point of this sign is to point us to Jesus, mainly to see, we gotta get this today, church, mainly to see that Jesus knew that he and the father are one. There's some ideas going around right now that Jesus was just a teacher, that Jesus was a healer, that God used him. There's people who believe that Jesus is the son of God. It's a whole nother thing, which is true, but it's a whole nother thing to believe that Jesus is God the son. Do y'all see that? See how he plays out? You can even watch award shows and when people get their awards they go, hey, man, I'd like to thank Jesus and God. You know what I mean? Like, in their brain, they really can't put him on the same level. And sadly, if we're not careful, we don't. We think like, oh yeah, Jesus was just, you know, Jesus was God in the flesh. Well, Tim, where are you getting this from? Well, we're in the Gospel of John. That's how John chapter one starts. That's how the whole gospel starts. You may be sitting here and going, all right, Tim, that's a cool little Bible lesson. What does this have to do with our life today? Why shouldn't any of this matter? How could it shape my thinking and my life today? Well, let me ask us a few questions. When we consider the words and commands of Jesus in our lives, how much does his words weigh? Think about that. When we consider the words and commands of Jesus in our lives, how much do they weigh? Another question. How many more God encounters do we need to obey what Jesus has already told us? Think about that. How many more God encounters do we need to listen and to obey what Jesus has already told us? Another question. Well, proposition, could our self-righteousness, the rules that you and I make up to either prove ourselves to God, to others or ourselves, be the reason why we're blind from seeing Jesus who is the righteous one? Another question. What do we defend with more passion? Are political and cultural positions or are spiritual identity and mandates? All right, let me make this simple because y'all look like y'all sleep. Here we go. One of the things I love to do as a pastor is just to visit the congregation. I love being a shepherd and being around our spiritual family. And many of you have opened up your homes and have fed me. That's why I'm overweight. Thank you. And we have a great time. But you know what I've noticed sometimes? I come in and I'm the pastor and we talk about Jesus and it's nice and Jesus, yeah, he saves. You know, it's just good. But the moment we get to something political, the heat just rises. And it's like, and I'm like, wait a second. We just been talking about the Lamb of God, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the king of kings and the Lord of lords. But the moment my pinky toes steps into something political or cultural, it's like, I mean, it just, we get riled up. Is the sermon on the mount our worldview or the news outlets we give our attention to? Hello. I'm asking us, us, including myself, these questions. Why? I don't know if y'all know but there's an election coming up. And let me say this in Jesus' name as one of the shepherds. What happens to that election should not divide the family of God. Well, Tim, why do you say that? Because I know people who still aren't speaking to their kids because of how they voted almost four years ago. Church, what Jesus says, how much does His words weigh? I'm asking us, including me, these questions because when I read the gospels, I love to put myself in the story, right? I want to see myself as the man who needed healing because you know what? There came a time in my life where I actually didn't need healing. My disease was sin, the price was hell, the cure was the blood of Jesus. My healing was salvation. And one day I will see Him face to face, amen. I want to see myself as Jesus when I'm reading the Bible. I want God to use me to bring healing to bodies, to hearts, to minds and families. I want God, and I believe God, to say greater works will you do. I'm like, Jesus, I want to be that way. I want to be able to walk into hospitals and go be healed and people like just straight up, just walk out. I want to be able to do those types of things. I want to be able where there's tension in families, where there's tension in marriage, to speak a word and change people's lives. I want to be able for those who've been struggling with bitterness and anger and heartache and sadness to be able to pray with them and they literally feel the very presence of God bring life to their bodies. I put myself as Jesus in the story. I want to be able to teach God's word with power. I want to have conversations with people and they walk away forever changed, not because of my presence, but because of God's presence. I want when people bump into me, they felt like they bump into God because I'm a part of His body. But rarely do I put myself in a position when reading the gospels of those who oppose Jesus. Yet at times I find my motives and actions are doing just that. I believe we all, as followers of Jesus, must look to Him, see Jesus for who He really is, weigh His words and listen to Him. Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is God the Son. And if we want our lives and the way we live and work and play to look like Him, we must look to Him. We must depend on Him. We must believe Him. We must trust Him. Not just must, how about this? Isn't it a privilege? We get to look at Jesus. We get to believe Him. We get to trust Him. Listen church, God is doing something in the earth and He actually wants you to be a part of that plan. How beautiful is that? You're a part of the greatest work that has ever taken place and I don't want us to miss our role in redemptive history. God has created you on purpose with the purpose. Don't miss it. And the way that you and I can miss it is by missing Him. Well Tim, we're the ways that we miss Him. We miss Him when we believe that Jesus came to make our life better instead of giving us new life. I wasn't someone who was doing okay and just needed Jesus to make me better. I was dead in my trespasses and sins and I needed Jesus to make me alive. We miss Jesus instead of Him being a Lord and Savior of our life when He becomes an accessory to our life. What do I mean by that? Instead of giving Jesus our everything as we sung we just add Him to our everything in our life. What that looks like is we just add Him. We just say Jesus, this is what I'm doing and we treat Him like the date we really don't want. Like, you can come along but you look all right. Holler if it hits, you know what I mean? Like, you know what I mean? We go about our day. This is me. I'm not talking at you. I'm talking about us. So I'm talking about all of us, right? We could go throughout our whole day and not even spend time with Him because in our bones we believe we don't need Him. You know what God does lovingly? He will bring you to a situation when you know you need Him. He will bring you to a situation where you will get on your knees and say, God, I need you and not to harm you but to show you you can't do life without me because I am life. And here's the beautiful thing. God doesn't wanna do life without us way more than we wanna do life with Him. So we could just go to Him and just say, God, I'm sorry for living a life and treating your words like everybody else's words. How much does His words weigh? At times I find myself weighing the words of my mother or father or my culture or other people higher than Jesus. And I don't want Jesus to say of my life what He said of theirs. In the Gospel of Matthew, you know what He said? He actually said this. He said, because of your traditions, how you hold your traditions, your laws, your views, your perspectives, your paradigm, you actually make void the word of God. I don't want that to be spoken of my life. I don't want that to be spoken of our lives. We behold Christ so that we can look like Christ. Author N.T. Wright said this beautifully. Let me read this to you. He says this, if you want to know who God is, look at Jesus. If you want to know what it means to be human, look at Jesus. If you want to know what love is, look at Jesus. If you want to know what grief is, look at Jesus. And go on looking until you're not just a spectator, but you're actually a part of the drama which has Him as the central character. Look to Jesus. Church, it's so easy at times to come to church on Sunday, worship God through song and giving, and get to the word and almost kinda just check the box. Just go, that was a cool sermon. Some of you, you're even kind enough to come up to the preacher and say, good job. Some of you, you're diligently taking notes. But if we're not careful, it can almost just become like a routine thing. Rather than thinking about it this way, God, I believe that when the word of God is preached, that by your spirit, you are speaking to me, and approaching the word of God with such a holy reverence that you actually believe that your life and calendar can look drastically different because you stepped into church today. It can be so easy just to go to church and not realize that we are the church, that the Holy Spirit lives within us, and every time we gather something supernatural, something sacred takes place, and if Jesus is actually the leader of our life, the trajectory of our life can change as you're under the presence of God and the word of God being preached. Question, how did you prepare yourself to walk in and hear this today? No shame if you didn't, because there's grace, even where sin abounds, his grace more abounds. But hear this, practically what this looks like. We have seniors that are graduating, right? All these graduation parties going. To my seniors, to the families, I'm sure you have some plans. Some of you want to do higher education, some of you want to go right into the workforce, and those things are beautiful. But families, have you paused? God on your knees, God on your face, and said, God, my life is not mine. Holy Spirit, tell me what you want of me, and give me the power to do it. Like, try that. Like, actually try that, right? Like, it's one thing to pray like, Jesus, thank you for waking me up, which is a good thing. God, thank you for starting me on my way, blah, blah, blah. It's a whole nother thing to say, God, my life is not my own. To you, I belong. How much does His words weigh? How should we respond to the words of Jesus? Will this man respond it immediately by taking up his bed and walking, and he didn't even know his name, but we know his name, and we know his name is greater than any other name. And my hope, and my call to you, is that when you hear God speak to you, whether it's through the preached word, or the Holy Spirit speaking to you, that on the inside you would say yes and amen, no matter how hard it may be, no matter how big the price may be, because you know obedience to him is better than any other option. It's Jesus, there is no other option, there is no option B. Would you say yes to him? Some of you are like, Tim, I did say yes to him for salvation, yes, but I'm saying saying yes to him today. I'm saying Holy Spirit, fill me today. Why? Because we leak, amen. I'm saying, God, what do you want from me today? Even as I prayed and I prepped this message right now, I'm saying, God, what do you want to say to your body right now? And this is what God wants me to say. The Father took Jesus and said, behold, this is my son. Listen to him, listen to him. Growing up, my mom did the best she could, raising three crazy kids and I'm the middle child, so I was the craziest. And my mom, if it was something I knew that would get me, was my mom wanted to make sure that I paid attention to her. She was like, I know you heard me, Bar, are you listening? And if I wasn't my mom, she was one of those moms, I'm gonna judge my mom, okay? I'm glad she did this. My mom would find anything in her vicinity to throw at me to get my attention. Man, that flip flop, she had angles. She had like a curve, it was wild. By no means, I feel like I'm taking like a rod or a staff as a shepherd and beating us today. No, no, no, no, no, I just hope to get your attention. I hope that God grabs your attention. Why? Because he has healed you, because he has saved you, because he do love you, because many of you have wonderful testimonies that you have shared with me and others and I want us to continue to live our lives looking at Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith and trust him so that we can behold him and become more like him, amen? Let us stand, let us stand. I like to call the prayer team to get into place and position. Here's the invitation, pretty simple. Some of you know what God has called you to do. Some of you know the area of maybe disobedience in your life that you have to surrender to the Lord. And the beautiful thing about that is, he's here and he wants to give you grace. He wants to give you grace. He wants to give you everything you need for life and godliness. He wants to help you follow him. He wants to give you a new heart that beats for him so that you can love him with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And here's my invitation to you today. If you need help and you want someone to pray with you that you may say yes to Jesus. Some of you maybe for the very first time we wanna pray with you. Scripture tells us if we confess our sins that he is faithful and that he is just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. It's only the enemy that will keep us from receiving prayer in this area. Because he wants to keep you captive to the lie that God has either done with you or you're disqualified to be used by God. But to every man and woman, every child of God that's in this building today, you're not disqualified because you belong to Jesus. And you may have walked away from him, but he hasn't walked away from you. And he's still here and he wants to lead your life. And I promise what he has for you, though it may be hard, it's good, it's good. So would you close your eyes and bow your head? I wanna pray for us and after I pray, if anyone here just needs prayer, specifically to hear the voice of God and to obey the voice of God, I wanna have you come to the front and we wanna pray for you. Father, we come before your throne of grace knowing that we're gonna find help in our time of need. And God, we just say thank you for being a good father. God, thank you that your goodness towards us isn't based on our performance. God, thank you that you never change. God, thank you that when we're faithless, you remain faithful. God, we say that you're the vine and we're the branches. God, we need you for life. We need you for strength. And right now, Jesus, we look to you. We look to you. God, we depend on you. And God, we say we believe in you again. God, we say we wanna trust you again, afresh and anew. Jesus, we surrender our lives to you because you lay down your life first and we thank you for your sacrifice. Holy Spirit, I ask that you fulfill each and every one of us to love you and to know you and to listen to you and to obey you. God, you are worthy of our worship. God, you are worthy of our lives. God, you are worthy of our obedience. So this moment, God, we ask that you would take this moment and make it sacred. God, make it special. Mark us in such a way that our lives forever change. May the beauty of Jesus capture our hearts, our lives, our imagination, our attention and our affection again. As we sung earlier, God, we do believe that all of this is for your glory. May our lives glorify you. May our lives glorify you. May each breath we take praise you in Jesus' name. And everyone said, amen, amen. Hey, listen, if you need prayer, we would love, really, really love to pray with you. If not, thank you so much for coming, being a part of what God's doing here. We love you. See you next week.