Jesus, the Misunderstood Teacher

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Transcript:

We’re going to be in John chapter 8 and John chapter 14. if you want to mark both spots in your Bible, John chapter 8 and John chapter 14. You know, many years ago, there was a young lawyer who sat and plotted about how he could take power in his home country.

Eventually, he went to Mexico. He found his way there. He found his way to Mexico, And he began attracting a following as he began to talk to people about overthrowing the very brutal dictator of their country.

He talked about freedom. He promised freedom. And he attracted a following.

People decided they were going to follow him. They were going to cast their lot with him. They would stand beside him and even give their lives, if necessary, for the ideas that he taught, for the things that they thought he stood for, that he stood for freedom.

And he even was supported to an extent by the Americans because they thought, hey, great, he’s going to bring freedom to his country. And so this young lawyer set out with his small band of heavily armed followers on a yacht from Mexico and landed in the southern part of Cuba and began their war to take over his home country. And the man’s name was Fidel Castro.

Many of you know the name Fidel Castro. We know how well that turned out. We know that after he came to power in 1959, he revealed himself at that point to be a Marxist, a communist. And only the people in his inner circle really understood what he was about, although looking back at it, the signs were kind of there.

But a lot of his followers and the Americans and a lot of other people were confused about what he was really about because they heard part of the message, they heard part of his message, and assumed he was all about freedom, and so when he said, follow me, lots of people did, and then they ended up getting something that they never bargained on, bargained for. The moral of that story is when somebody comes along with radical new ideas, or seemingly radical new ideas and says, follow me. You better be sure what it is they’re really about.

You better be sure what they’re really teaching, what they’re really saying, what they’re really leading you toward. Otherwise, you’re following them blindly and you may make a mistake. Now, I am not in the habit of comparing brutal, wicked men like Fidel Castro to Jesus Christ. I’m not in the habit of doing that, but this thing they have in common, that people listen to them, and if they weren’t paying close enough attention, they misunderstood the message they were being encouraged to follow and understood it to be the complete opposite.

You get that? They understood Fidel Castro’s message to be the complete opposite of what he was really about. He was really promoting communism, and they thought he was promoting freedom.

Jesus was promoting the idea that there are not enough good works that can get us to God. That was central to his message. He told them, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you won’t make it into the kingdom.

The scribes and Pharisees, by human standards, were incredibly righteous men. Now, by God’s standards, not so much. But by human standards, they were incredibly righteous men.

They were people that were so scrupulous about keeping the little bits and pieces of their law. And the regular people looked at them and said, there’s no way I can be as good as that Pharisee. There’s no way I can be as holy as that scribe.

And Jesus said, unless your righteousness exceeds even that, you won’t make it into heaven. And so his message was, there is no amount of good works that you could possibly ever do that will earn you God’s acceptance. And what has happened is that people, only paying half attention to what he said, come away from the things that he taught and the life that he lived and the example that he gave, and they say, oh, Jesus is all about being good and doing the right thing, and maybe God will love you and accept you.

If we’re not careful, we can get the opposite impression of our leader from what he’s really telling us. And that’s where the similarities between him and Castro begin and end. We can get the total opposite impression of what we’re supposed to if we’re not careful.

We can think he’s about one thing when he’s really about not just something different. He’s about something completely different, completely opposite. I’m continuing on this morning with the series that I started last week about who he really is.

And as I told you last week, we’re presented with a choice. He asked his disciples, who do you say that I am? He started first by saying, who do other people say that I am?

And of course, they were very quick with the answers on that one. Oh, some people say you’re this guy. Some people say you’re Elijah.

Some people say you’re John the Baptist. They were very quick with all the answers. And then Jesus said, okay, then who do you say I am? And suddenly when it gets personal, and we have to put our own ideas on the line, suddenly it becomes a little harder to answer.

And finally it was Peter who spoke up and said, you’re the Christ, you’re the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And he says, very good. Very good.

Blessed are you, Simon, Peter. Because flesh and blood has not revealed that to you. No man taught you that.

That came from God. You learned that from God. Jesus claimed to be God.

I gave you a list of some of his claims last week. If you didn’t get a copy of that, there are some bookmarks out there on the table. that I’ve put together that have a list of some of the claims that he made and some of the scriptures that show where he claimed to be God.

Don’t ever let the so-called modern experts convince you, oh, Jesus never claimed to be God. Right there in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, he did. And we’ve got enough manuscript evidence to show that those books have not changed in 2,000 years.

We can go back to within a generation of the time of Christ, not enough time for an entire shift in the way of viewing Christ to have happened. We’ve got enough evidence to show that that has not been changed over time. The people in Jesus’ day believed he claimed to be God, and the reason they believed that is because he did claim to be God.

And so we are left with the question, do we agree with Jesus’ assessment of himself or do we not? See, we can’t look at Jesus and say, well, I reject all that claiming to be God stuff, but he was a good moral teacher. C.

S. Lewis had it right, partially right, and then, as I said last week, Lee Strobel and some others have added some other thoughts in there. If he was not God, then he wasn’t a good teacher or a good man.

Because a good teacher with some good ideas is not going to say, well, I’m God, unless he’s crazy, because he thinks he’s God, but he’s not. Or he’s lying to you because he knows he’s not God and he’s saying it anyway. Or he never made the claim to be God, which the manuscript evidence says otherwise.

He’s got to be one of those three things. He’s got to be a liar or a lunatic or a legend if he’s not Lord. You can’t take half of what Jesus said and say, I accept this.

We wouldn’t do that with anybody else. We wouldn’t say, well, some of his ideas were just completely crazy, but he’s good right here. I mean I don’t hear anybody saying yeah the killing the Jews stuff that was not good but Hitler sure was smart about the Audubon or the Volkswagen we don’t hear people praising and say oh he was a good leader other than killing the Jews no we don’t hear that he was crazy he was either evil or crazy maybe both Jesus claimed to be God And if that claim is not true, then there’s something wrong.

There’s something wrong with him, and it’s hard to take his teaching seriously. So he claimed to be God, and the question for us today is, do we believe it or not? Do we believe it or not?

That’s the most important question you can ask yourself. That’s the most important question that you can answer for yourself today, is do I believe Jesus Christ when he claimed to be God, or do I not? He’s either right or he’s wrong.

There’s no middle ground. And one of the most popular views of Jesus today, I told you we were going to go through this over the next few weeks and talk about some of the popular views of Jesus in our world today, and then what does Jesus say about those things? One of the most popular views of Jesus today that you’ll hear is that he’s a misunderstood teacher.

He’s a good man. He’s a good teacher. He’s a misunderstood teacher.

They just didn’t understand what he was really teaching. They didn’t understand what he was really about. And I submit to you, somebody doesn’t understand what Jesus is really about.

And I think it’s the people who claim he’s misunderstood. See, he was a good teacher. He came and taught this wonderful ethical system about how we could just, you know, follow righteousness, do right, and be accepted by God.

Basically, he taught us to be nice to each other. Well, folks, he did teach us to be nice to each other. He did teach us to do the right thing.

He did teach us to try to obey God. But nowhere does Jesus teach that that’s the way to accept to God’s acceptance. Nowhere does Jesus teach that if we’re just good enough and follow his ethical system, that we’ll go to heaven.

He doesn’t teach that. As a matter of fact, he teaches the complete opposite. That’s where that comes in from the very beginning this morning.

When somebody says, follow me and do as I say, you got to be very sure that you understand what they’re teaching, or you might come out understanding the opposite of what they’re trying to get across. Jesus taught the complete opposite of this modern view. He never taught, be good, follow these teachings, and you’ll go to heaven.

He came and taught, you can’t be good enough. You can’t follow these teachings enough. There is no way for you to earn heaven.

Turn with me, if you haven’t already, to John chapter 8. We’re going to look at a few verses there, and we’re going to look at a few verses in John chapter 14. John chapter 8, starting in verse 21, he’s in conflict with the Pharisees.

One of many times that he’s in conflict with the Pharisees. And it says in verse 21, Then Jesus said again unto them, I go my way, and ye shall seek me, and ye shall die in your sins. Whither I go, you cannot come.

He tells them, I’m about to die. I’m about to go away, and you’ll look for me, and you won’t be able to find me. You won’t be able to come where I’m going.

He said, you’re going to die in your sins. okay he was talking to the the best most religious segment of his society and telling them you’re going to die in your sins because you can’t go where I got that’s a pretty tall claim especially that’s a pretty tall claim for somebody that they say oh he never claimed to be God he just said do these good things and you’ll go to heaven he’s telling the best people he’s telling the people who did all the right things they thought you’re going to die in your sins and that would be his message to us today. You know what?

It doesn’t matter what religious rituals you go through. It doesn’t matter how good you try to be. I’m going to go where I’m going, and you can’t get there.

You’re going to die in your sins. Verse 22, Then said the Jews, Will he kill himself? Because he saith, Whither I go, ye cannot come.

They’re confused again. Wait, is he going to kill himself? He’s talking about going, and we can’t follow.

He’s going to end it all here. Verse 23 says, And he said unto them, Ye are from beneath. I am from above.

Ye are of this world. I am not of this world. I said therefore unto you that ye shall die in your sins.

For if you believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins. He says, I’m completely different from you. Those don’t sound like the words of a moral teacher who’s just saying, do what I tell you to do and you’ll be all right with God.

Those sound like the words of somebody who’s saying, I came because you cannot be good enough for God. He says, you’re from beneath. You’re from down here.

I’m from up here. You’re part of this world. I’m not, he says.

And he says, the reason you’re going to die in your sins is because you’ve not believed in me. So for Jesus, it’s not about do this, don’t do that, be good, love each other, be kind to animals. He says, you’re going to die in your sins because you have not believed in me.

Now, some people like to object to God and object to the idea of God’s goodness or object to Christianity as a whole because they say, well, how awful is that that God says, well, if you don’t believe in me, I’m just going to torture you for the rest of eternity. God did not choose for us to go astray. God created us with free will, no doubt, but we abused that free will that he gave us.

And we are the ones who made the choice to sin. We are the ones who choose to reject him on a daily basis. And God is just and has to punish sin.

And so Jesus says you’re going to die in your sins because you will not believe. Because you will not just take hold of the offer of mercy that God is offering here. We turn into John 14, and he goes from talking to the Pharisees to talking to his disciples.

And in chapter 14, starting in verse 1, he says, Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. Again, there we see a parallel where he’s saying, you know what?

Just the same way you believe in God the Father, you should believe in me the same way. I would not tell you that. No human teacher should tell you that.

Here is another. They are all woven throughout Scripture. Once you start looking for them, they are all throughout the Gospels.

Places where Jesus is putting himself right up there with God the Father. And yet these ridiculous claims, Jesus never claimed to be God. He said, you believe in God, you believe in the Father, believe also in me.

Believe in me the same way, he says. In my Father’s house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you.

I go to prepare a place for you. He said, I’m going to the Father. I am going to prepare a place for you.

I will be there preparing your place. Again, more than just some human teacher. But also, he says, in my Father’s house there are many mansions.

If it were not so, I would have told you. Because he’s saying, I’ve been there and I would know. It just screams off the page at me that he, there’s no way he claimed to just be some good human moral teacher.

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, there you may be also. And he doesn’t say, and we’re all going to die and go and be with the Father. He says, I’m going to come get you and bring you to me, that you may be there with me.

Identifying himself as the one who’s going to be our host when we get to heaven. And whither I go, verse 4, and whither I go, and the way you know. And Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way?

I like Thomas a lot. Thomas gets a bad deal from the way we view him in Scripture. Yes, he doubted.

When they came to him and told him about the resurrection, he said, I will not believe it unless I see the nail prints. And we look on that and we say shame on doubting Thomas. But you know what?

I think Thomas asks a lot of the same questions that I would and a lot of the same questions that many of us would. That if we were, I mean, we have the benefit of looking 2,000 years back and seeing how the story ended. If we were living in that day, I think Thomas, I think I probably would have been Thomas in the story.

Are we sure? Did he really? This is incredible.

I’ve got to see this for myself. He says, but Lord, how can we know the way where you’re going? Jesus is talking about preparing a place for them.

And on Thomas’s mind is, yeah, but how do we get there? How do we get there? And Jesus said to him, verse 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life.

Let me read that with a little different emphasis. I am the way, the truth, and the life. And he says, no man, no man cometh unto the Father but by me.

So how do we get to heaven? Some people will say verse 6 is taken out of context. Oh, he wasn’t claiming to be God there either.

Okay, just tear all the pages out of your Bible because apparently you think he’s not claiming to be God anywhere. Not y’all. You don’t tear the pages out of your Bible.

I’m talking about the people who say, he never claimed to be, just tear those pages out because you don’t want to see it anyway. That’s not taken out of context. He is claiming to be God because Thomas just asked him, Lord, how do we get to heaven?

How do we get there? This kingdom in the next world that you’re talking about, how do we get there? And Jesus says, I am the way to get there.

I’m not one of many ways. I am the way. I am the truth.

Not one of many truths. It bothers me when, and we’ll talk about this a little bit more in the coming weeks, but it bothers me when people say, because they want to sound like they’re just tolerant and accepting because that’s the way to get people to like you in this society. They say, well, all religions are true.

how can they all be true when they say directly opposite things I mean they could all be wrong all the religions of the world could be wrong but they can’t all be right when they say opposite things if I say the door is closed and Charles says the door is not closed we can’t both be right he says I am the truth I am the way to heaven I am the truth that points you to God and I am the life he is the source he is the one and only source of life for us for those of us who are going to die in our sins he is the life that God offers to us and he says no man cometh unto the Father but by me and again the world wants to look at that and say that’s so harsh that’s so narrow minded what kind of God would say there’s only one way to me there’s only one way for you to be saved and you have to go this little narrow way otherwise you don’t get to be saved I look at it the other way at it opposite and say, what kind of God would look at us and let any of us be saved?

What a loving and merciful and gracious God that He would offer any way back to Him. People are going to spend so much time whining that there’s only one way and completely miss the beauty of the fact that there is a way. There is a way back to God and we don’t deserve it but he gave it anyway.

What an amazing God we serve that he would offer us a way to be forgiven at all. No man cometh unto the Father but by me. He says Thomas you want to know how to get to heaven right here.

The way, the truth, the life. No man gets to the Father any other way than me right here. He says in verse 7 if ye had known me If ye had known me, you should also have known my Father.

You should have known my Father also. And from henceforth ye know him and have seen him. I talked last week about Jesus being the image of the invisible God, as Colossians calls him.

Colossians 1. 15. That means that Jesus Christ is the one who displays all the attributes of God.

He’s the one who shows us what God is like and what God looks like. When we talk about images of God, most of the time in the Bible, It’s talking about idols that people have used to represent God. And one of the reasons God got so angry about idols is inevitably it led to a false, even if they were making statues intending to worship the true God, no statue could ever contain his glory.

No statue, no picture, no image could ever give us a full picture of who God is. And so inevitably we start worshiping something less than what he really is. And yet the Bible says that in Jesus, all the fullness of the Godhead dwelt bodily.

And Colossians 1. 15 says that he is the image of the invisible God. So when we’re looking at Jesus Christ, we are seeing who God the Father really is.

Now God the Father and God the Son are not the same. They’re both God, but they’re two different persons within the Godhead. I realize that’s confusing.

I don’t want you to leave here thinking that I’m teaching the Oneness Pentecostal doctrine, that Jesus is the Father, Jesus is the Son, Jesus is the Holy Spirit. No, that’s not true. Jesus is the Son.

But Jesus said himself, if you want to know what the Father is like, if you want to see what the Father is like, you’ve seen him right here. Jesus was the ultimate revelation of who God is. And he says, if you had known me, you would have known my Father also.

If you knew who I really was, if you completely understand me, you completely understand the Father. And he says from this point on, you have seen him and you have known him because you’ve known Jesus. And Philip saith unto him, verse 8, Lord, show us the Father and it sufficeth us.

Philip’s still asking, show us the Father. And again, we’re reading this 2,000 years later. We read that and think, Philip, he just, one of those facepalm moments.

Philip, he just told you that if you’ve seen him, you’ve seen the Father. Well, we’ve got to cut these guys some slack. We would be.

Anybody else in here ever do dumb things or is it just me? Okay, it’s just me. Well, I’d be in the same boat with these guys.

And Jesus looks at him, verse 9. Jesus said unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father, so how sayest thou then, show us the Father?

He said, I’ve been with you all this time, and you still don’t understand. Of course, I want to believe that Jesus probably said it a little more gently than I just read it. But he said, I just told you that if you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father.

If you know me, you know the Father. Because Jesus and his Father were one. So he says, how do you then stand there and say, show us the Father?

He says in verse 10, Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? And the words that I speak unto you, I speak not of myself. But the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.

He says, don’t you believe that I’m in the Father, and the Father’s in me? Don’t you believe that the things I’ve spoken were given to me by the Father? Don’t you believe that the works I’ve done were compelled by the Father?

Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me, or else believe me for the very works sake. He says, you’ve been with me all this time. He says, believe me when I tell you that the Father and I are one.

He said, and if my word is not enough, look at the miracles that have been done and believe those. believe those verily verily I say unto you he that believeth on me the works that I do shall he do also and greater works than these shall he do because I go unto my father we’re not really going to get into verse 12 right now but all throughout this passage he’s explaining the father and I are like this we’re one he’s in me and I’m in him and he tells me and I speak and he tells me and I do And so if you’re looking at me, you’re seeing what the Father is like. Again, that’s not saying they’re the same person.

That’s like saying, though, with my kids. And I realize that we’re human, they’re God. It’s not a perfect analogy.

But looking at my kids, you can at times, now I won’t take credit for everything they do, but you can at times see their personalities. You can see my personality in theirs. You can see me, right, Charles?

you can see me in the things that they do. Sometimes Benjamin will argue with Charno. I think he’s to a point we’re trying to teach him it’s disrespectful. He still doesn’t understand that yet.

But he’s trying to logic with her in a way that, anyway, she says that is your child right there. I’ve told the story many times. It was a few years ago.

I got on to him. Well, actually, I didn’t have the heart to get on to him. He asked me if he could have another spoonful of ice cream.

And I said, no, you cannot have another spoonful of ice cream. And I walked to the living room, came back to the kitchen. Five minutes later, I found him digging in the ice cream with a fork.

That is my child. That is my child. And Madeline, bless her heart, does things as well.

None come to mind, but there was something she did this, I wish I could remember something she did this week that I just looked at Charlotte and I said, I’m sorry, that’s me right there. They both do it. They both are very different personalities, but they both got aspects of me in there.

That’s what he’s saying. Only my example pales in comparison to what he’s saying. See, he didn’t get aspects of the Father’s personality.

He didn’t take after him in a few ways. He took after the Father in every conceivable way. And so he’s telling them, if you’ve seen me, if you’ve walked with me, if you’ve listened to me, if you’ve heard what I’ve taught, then you know exactly what the Father’s like.

Without having seen him, You know exactly what the Father’s like. You know what He thinks. You know what He teaches.

You know the kinds of works that He does. He’s saying you know these things because you’ve seen them in me. He said my Father and I are one.

And His whole reason for coming was to be the way, the truth, and the life. And not to limit heaven. Not to say I’m the gatekeeper.

Nobody gets in but me. But to be the way that people get in. Again, I go back to this, but the world likes to look at it and say, well, that’s such a narrow view.

To believe that God would only allow one way into heaven, that’s horrible. No, what amazing mercy that God would allow a way in. And that he would allow it in through Jesus.

That he would allow us to come in through his son, that he would actually send his son to die for us, to pay for our sins, because otherwise we would be dead in our sins. That even the best among us would have no shot of getting into heaven. that even the best among us would have no shot of the Father’s acceptance.

We could live all of our lives and we could work so hard and we could try so hard to be the best we absolutely could be. Do everything right. Behave ourselves every moment and we would go to hell exhausted because it still wouldn’t be enough.

Like he told the Pharisees, you will die in your sins because you’ve not believed in me. But to those who believe it, he spoke and said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes unto the Father but by me.

I’ve got three points here this morning, but I’m not going to give them to you. You don’t need my three points this morning. You need this one point.

Or you need to look at the difference in these two points. these two views. The world likes to say Jesus was not God, he was just a good moral teacher who taught us how we could please God.

Jesus, on the other hand, said, no, I’m the Son of God. I’m God the Son, and I came because you can’t do enough to please God, and the only way you’re getting back to God the Father, the only way you’re getting to heaven, is through me. You’ve got to believe.

So we have the views of experts 2,000 years later, or we have it straight from Jesus’ mouth. And we’re presented with a choice this morning. That is my one point.

We are presented with a choice this morning. Is Jesus who he said he was, or is he not? Now I leave that to you to answer in your own mind.

If you’ve got questions about that, I’d love to talk with you about it and answer your specific questions. But that’s the question facing each of us. That’s the question facing everybody we run into.

That’s the question that faces everybody in the world whether they want to deal with it or not. Is Jesus who He said He was or is He not?