04-15-2018 – The Truth Will Set you Free!

Sermon Notes:

In John 8:24, Jesus says to the crowd, “unless you believe that I am, you will
indeed die in your sins.”
The Hebrew theonym [name for God] is written with four letters
[tetragrammaton], expressed in Latin as YHWH which is transliterated [spoken] as
Yahweh. But most orthodox Jews would never pronounce this name, instead, they
would substitute one of several Hebrew terms that are expressed in English as The
Holy One, Blessed Be He, The Lord, The Name.
Everyone who rejects God’s Son will go to hell when they physically die;
everyone who believes in and receives Christ as Lord, will go to heaven when they
physically die (2Corinthians 5:8), “We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be
away from the body and at home with the Lord.”
Read John 8:25-30… These Jews had received more than enough proof that Jesus
came from God the Father to do His will; in fact, Jesus repeatedly made it clear that
He was the Messiah (See Luke 4:16-21).
These religious leaders (John 8:27) “don’t understand that [Jesus] is telling
them about His Father,” even though Jesus already told them that the Father is the
One who sent Him (see John 8:16-18).
Scripture is clear, the Father’s plan was to send His Son to release us from sin’s
penalty/condemnation.
John 3:16, “For God [the Father] so loved the world that He gave His one and only
Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
John 3:18, “Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not
believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of
God's one and only Son.”
Jesus made full payment, for our sins, so that we would not have to be punished
in hell for eternity; but instead, we would be granted life eternal through His death
and resurrection (Romans 3:23; 6:23, 5:8).
2Corinthians 5:21, “God made Him [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us, so
that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
Again (John 8:28), “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will
know that I am,” i.e., you will know that I am [who I have been claiming to be],
the One who came from the Father, to die for the sins of all people (Hebrews
9:26), “Christ has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin
by the sacrifice of Himself.” (see Hebrews 10:1-10).
All those who repent, believing and following Christ, are granted eternal life, and
even though they will most likely die physically, they can never die spiritually, in
other words, Christians don’t remain dead.
John 11:25-26, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me will live,
even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in Me will never die.”
God provides temporary physical life [Gr. bios] to everyone on earth; but He
provides eternal spiritual life [zoe] to all who believe in His Son, for we are (John
1:13), “born of God,” (John 3:8), “born of the Spirit.”
The Son of God [The Word of God, John 1:1-2] is One with [equal to] the
Father, yet He was submissive to the Father while in human flesh (John 8:29),
Jesus says, “I always do what pleases Him [The Father].”
John 8:30 says, “Even as He [Jesus] spoke, many [of those in the crowd] put
their faith [belief] in Him.”
We are all going to die physically, some day; but if you die rejecting Jesus Christ
as Lord and Savior, you “die in your sins” to awaken condemned by God in Hell!
But, there is a way to reconcile our sinful nature with the Holy, Righteous and
Just God of Creation; for Jesus turns no one away, He forgives anyone and
everyone who repents of their sin and believes in Him for salvation.
Jesus loves you and has a marvelous plan for your life here on earth, and your
life in heaven.
Jeremiah 29:11-14, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the LORD,
‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.
Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You
will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart.”
Romans 10:9-10, “If you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in
your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your
heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess
and are saved.”
Read John 8:31-32… To believe in is to have faith in Him; belief and faith in
Jesus Christ sets us free; but not all belief is equal to saving faith.
These Jews (verse 31) who are said to have “believed in Him,” are later, in this
chapter (cf. 8:37-47) said to be children of the devil, not of God.
Believing certain facts does not equate to saving faith. James 2:17 says, “faith
by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.” In fact, in verse 18 James
writes, “But someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’ Show me your faith
without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.”
In the parable of the sower (Luke 8:13), the rocky soil is said to be those who
“receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no root. They believe
for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away.”
Genuine faith will produce a changed life; not like the Jews in John 8:31a,
whose “belief” was shallow and so they fell away, like those John speaks of in
1John 2:19, “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if
they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going
showed that none of them belonged to us.”
A born-again relationship with Jesus Christ sets us free from sin’s curse, while
removing any threat of eternal judgement because of sin (Romans 8:1),
“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,
because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of
sin and death.”
Grace and truth comes through Jesus Christ to everyone who repents of sin and
submits to the Lordship of Christ (honoring and obeying God’s Word).
Romans 6:18-22, “You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to
righteousness. I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural
selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to
ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading
to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of
righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now
ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free
from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness,
and the result is eternal life.”
To die in your sins (John 8:24) is to die apart from the free gift of forgiveness
and eternal life that has come through Jesus Christ, for He is (John 14:6) “the way
and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through [Him].”
Jesus is the Word of God, the living, revealed, and eternal Word of God. When
you believe in and confess Him as Lord and Savior, you (John 8:32) “will know the
truth, and the truth will set you free."

Pastor Mike
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