Delighted

John 3:19 “And this is the condemnation, that glight is come into the world, and men loved hdarkness irather than light, iibecause their deeds were evil. 20 For jevery one that kdoeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be ||lreproved. 21 But he that kdoeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.[1]

I.   Condemnation

     A. Insurrection

     B. Immoral

II. Condescension

     A. Illumination

     B. Indication

III. Commendation

     A. Included

     B. Inarguable

Introduction:   Today is the fourth Sunday of Lent.  Through these messages leading up to Easter we are considering a period in Jesus’ ministry when the religious leaders were growing more and more angry with Him.

People were coming to Him to have their problems resolved but most had no idea of the real problem that Jesus has resolved for us all.  They had physical problems that would be temporarily resolved but it was the spiritual condition that is eternal which Jesus came to heal.  Physical things we pray for people are really only the gravy that won’t last.  From the standpoint or perspective of living here now, we imagine that this life is what really matters.

Of course Jesus does care that we suffer physically.  He understood physical suffering, emotional and even for a small period of time, Jesus understood spiritual suffering.  He absolutely does want to hear us when we intercede for the physical needs of others but that is not what He died for.  That is a very small part of what He came for but when He left, the physical fixes are going on even though He is back in His rightful place in heaven.

What is the one thing that we absolutely cannot do for ourselves?  You know!  We cannot repair the broken relationship that we decided to break with our Heavenly Father.  Only the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus did that.

This is a thing that unless God enables us to understand, we cannot.  Everybody, Christian or not, can recite John 3:16 which is the text just three verses above our focal text today.  Most people don’t know who Jesus was talking to when He said those words.  When you think about the Pharisees, thoughts usually remind that they troubled Jesus.  Yet this Pharisee Nicodemus was the one which Jesus explained what it meant to be a born again Christian.  He was the first person to hear John 3:16 as Jesus was using those words to explain a person must be born again.

Jesus explained to Nicodemus what saves a person.  Now Jesus continues to explain to Nicodemus what it is in a person that discards a person.

Scripture:  Today’s focal scripture is John 3:19-21 but we will read beginning at verse 18.  When you have found it please rise to your feet for the reading of God’s written word.

Prayer: Please be seated

Message:  The title of today’s message is Delighted.  It might have been called God’s recycling plan.  Jesus came into this world to renew a relationship that we individually decided to discard.

I watch a TV show sometimes that has folks riding around in a big van going to piles of junk.  They call themselves “pickers.”  I can only speak for me but I am a picker too.  If you don’t believe it come to my basement workshop.  I use Rachael’s freezer to lay out things that I am working on because my workbench is covered.  When I need a bolt or a nut and somehow find one amongst the junk, I am delighted.  Here is something that would have been thrown out and now it is serving a need again.  Can you see why this message is call delighted? 

Jesus is delighted when He finds that one that wants to be used by Him.  Jesus was delighted when He resurrected you!

How do people get themselves in the position of being rejected?  It is a terrible thing to be in the hands of an angry God that you have told to throw you in the refuse pile.  There are so many!

In verse eighteen there is “whosoever” again.  In sixteen whosoever believes should not perish but have everlasting life.  Therefore he or she who believes in Jesus is not condemned.  That person has been taken off of the refuse pile.  Redeemed!  There is that caveat after the semicolon; he or she who refuses to believe and is therefore unable to believe is condemned and nobody will pick them off the scrap pile.

So who puts us on the scrap pile to begin with?  We wound up on the scrap pile when we decided to live by our own decisions that are against God’s plan for us.  Each and every one who has the capacity for reason has made that choice.  Someone came to the scrap pile and He is looking for the ones that His Father has pointed out as worthy; that person who can and will see the light.  There was a total eclipse of The SON so that we could not see Him but He came and the brilliance overtook the darkness so that anyone who will open their eyes can and will see Jesus.

We were living is a discarded place of our own making and were very comfortable there, thank you very much.  There is that word insurrection being floated around today.  People who are not comfortable with the way that they are decide to force others to join their discomfort rather that to conform to a more comfortable place.  The immorality that is described in so many places in the Bible has always been the point of contention because we are evil without God.  This is why people are condemned.  It is not God’s will but it happens when a person decides not to accept God’s will.  They say that they love the place that they have made for themselves because they enjoy the so-called freedom of doing evil things.

Condescension is an odd word.  Here is one definition: “an attitude of patronizing superiority; disdain.”  A person who thinks that they are smarted than you is to the point that they can make decisions for you because you are too stupid in their opinion is holding you in condescension.  You are in their little box where they categorize people as less than they are.  Pretty much condescending people hold everybody and everything in their little condescension box.  They put God in there too.  When they say that they are praying for you it really means that they believe that God really doesn’t know what is right so they are reminding Him of the right thing to do.  As long as they stay in the driver’s seat, they can look down and they think that nobody can look up to their lofty perch to find the things that are lacking in them.  As long as they can keep others in the dark about what they are doing they feel they are getting by.  When the light hits their deeds so that everybody finally sees the indication of their real purpose, they fall apart.  They fall apart because their lives are not set on the light and they cannot stand the light.

A picture made with film must be developed in darkness until the image appears.  Once the image appears the picture can come out into the light.  There are crowds of people whose image is still in darkness.  They like it there.  Exposure is coming though, even to them.  When enlightenment happens everybody will see them for who and what they are.

So that brings us to the last verse.  But!  You see we really are all condemned.  The difference from the rest of the world and the “believes” is we are not afraid of the light.  But he or she who does the truth…  “What is truth”, Pilate asked?  Jesus said a few chapters later, “I am hthe way, ithe truth, and kthe life: no man cometh unto the Father, lbut by me.” [2]  He that does or doeth the truth is the one who has taken the name of Christ.  Christian, little Christ!  As long as we keep our thoughts on His thoughts then we will one day receive that commendation, “dWell done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.” [3] He that doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest.  We will be included.  We are included.  That they are wrought in God.  You can take that to the bank.  You can count on that.  The fact is inarguable.

People take away your rights to assemble because they think you are too stupid to know when to be joined and when to disband.  They will tell you that your parents parents taught wrongly you about right and wrong.  Those ideas are upside down because they have progressed civilization beyond God’s way of thinking.  They are living in darkness and they want to draw you into the abyss.  Never fear, God is always here.  Are you delighted?

Prayer:  Let us pray

Invitation: As we near the time when we celebrate Easter my prayer is that in whatever we do God’s will is accomplished.  That might not be what we assume in our hearts.  Who would have ever thought that the events that have happened since last year and even before last Easter would be allowed to happen?  Yet God did let them happen.

The question that comes to mind is this, now that we are here, what is God’s will for where we are now.  We already know.  It’s in here and it’s delightful.  Ponder that and come to Him as we sing…

g ch. 1:4, 9. & 12:46.
h ch. 1:5.
i ch. 12:43. 2 Tim. 3:4. Comp. ch. 5:35.
ii ch. 7:7.
j So Job 24:13, 16, 17. Rom. 13:12. Eph. 5:13.
k See ch. 5:29.
|| Or, discovered. Comp. ver. 21.
l ch. 8:9, 46 (Gk.). & 16:8 (text). Eph. 5:11, 13.
k See ch. 5:29.
[1] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Jn 3:19–21). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
h Heb. 9:8. & 10:20. So ch. 10:9. See Eph. 2:18.
i See ch. 1:17.
k See ch. 11:25.
l So ch. 10:9.
[2] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Jn 14:6). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.
d ver. 21.
[3] The Holy Bible: King James Version. (2009). (Electronic Edition of the 1900 Authorized Version., Mt 25:23). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.