Jesus Unfiltered - Week 2 - The CORE - Pastor Mike Novotny
Jesus Unfiltered
Week 2 - The CORE
Pastor Mike Novotny
In early 2022. Over who is following the real Jesus?
On the one side was former NFL coach and Super Bowl champion. Now NFL commentator, Tony Dungy, maybe you've heard of him and the other side was sports writer..and USA Today columnist, Nancy Armor. The online dispute started. when Tony Dungy, apparently tweeted something that he later found out not to be true. If we was in the, the camp of some comment about gender transgenderism, he found out that it shares, something that wasn't factual. And he said as a Christian, that was not okay, it wasn't okay, to spread false news to give false testimony against everyone. He needed to own the sin that he had committed. And so he publicly apologized for it. But Ms. Armor didn't accept the apology. Instead, she wrote an article trying to show that Tony Dungy's problem, was much bigger than a mistake in tweets. The problem was that he wasn't representing the real Jesus. She said, this, if you're a Christian, you're supposed to follow the teachings of Christ. Christ, preached love, and acceptance, he embraced lepers and prostitutes and hated Tax Collectors. Christ had no use for those who Proclaim their piety while using it to demean and mistreat others. Tony and Nancy held and still hold two very different positions and a very important moral issue of our day. But if you ask them, why do you hold this? Or why do you hold that? Both of them would say. Jesus.
Have you noticed this at all? And some of the biggest moral and cultural debates of Our Generation, it's really, really rare to find someone who says that they disagree with Jesus that they hate the teaching of Jesus that they believe that they know better than Jesus instead. What so often happens is people on the side A and side B, both claim that they're representing Jesus For example, if you have someone, you know why go to church, why be part of an organized religion and just instead of having some personal relationship with God, simple answer for many church, people would be Jesus, Jesus. He attended the synagogue, he was part of organized religion. He appointed Apostles and structure. Their first century church has, he always wanted us to be part. Jesus himself, organized his religion. Therefore, you should be part of an organized religion.
But other people would say, oh, it wasn't Jesus like the hugest critic of organized religion. Did he fight? Most notably wasnt unbelieving people, but those who claimed to lead, the church, weren't his fiercest enemies, the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and their hypocrisy and greed.
Or think of something like, traditional family and sexual, and gender values. If you ask someone why they hold to maybe the same beliefs that their grandparents did instead of was very common in our culture, they might respond Jesus Jesus was the one who defined marriage as a man and a woman. He was the one in Matthew, 19. And Matthew 5 who quoted back to the early days of Genesis, to talk about these Traditional Values. I'm sorry if you don't like it. But this is what Jesus taught. I'm not changing my beliefs because Jesus doesn't change. But then other people would say but didn't Jesus almost always take the side of those who are on the margins. Those who are judged by religious leaders. Isn't it true that he did reach out to tax collectors and prostitutes and lepers and people who didn't have their place in the organized church and he loved them and sided with him?
If you have some people, you know why in social media are you speaking about other people's Lifestyles? Why are you critical and judgmental? They would say because of Jesus. If they stand up for themselves, what is true? You have to stand up for justice. People can't just claim to follow God and do whatever they want. He doesn't change. That's why I'm doing this.
And other people would say, well why isn't Jesus the one who said do not judge, period? Love one another, period. God is love and the world will know that you're following God. By the way, you love one another. You see I'm saying that no one says I'm anti Jesus. Almost everyone on this side and the other side says that Jesus is on my side.
It's kind of confusing, isn't it? Like, if you care about Jesus, like I do if you want to follow him faithfully like I do, if you want to be true to him, in fact, worship him, like I do, how do you know what the real Jesus is like?
Well, there's a simple answer to that question. You got to throw yourself into the unfiltered, Jesus. The truth is you can make any claim and believe anything. If you just pick and choose a word, a sentence, a paragraph. The thing that's actually a lot of work for you and me is to dig into this Jesus enough that we understand what he said in the context of why he said it. What came before? It's what comes after it. What did Matthew say? And then Mark and then Luke. And then John, we have to get huge chunks of Jesus so he can interpret himself. Instead of people like me or people like you imposing an interpretation that we prefer, And that's why I'm glad you're here today. That's why I'm happy you're watching online because in the sermon series we're trying to get back to the unfiltered Jesus by turning to the Gospel of John. John, if you don't know, was one of Jesus closest friends and he recorded some of Jesus longest teachings. We're trying to cover as many of them as we can. I can't cover every verse. It is probably important for you to read the whole Gospel of John. You could do it in less time than it takes to watch an NFL football game. #nomoreexcuses, it's not too much, but I Love The Gospel of John because what Jesus says, Time and Time and Time and Time and Time and Time Again, is I am Blank. Jesus once no, you want to know what I'm like. I'm this. I'm that I'm like this. I'm not like that. Jesus himself from his own lips, doesn't just say it. Then spends a lot of time, some pretty long chapters, explaining what he means and today, he's going to do it again. Today, Jesus is going to say something very simple. But when you think about it, it's very profound that helps us understand who he is, what he's like and what he likes. Memory to an epic verse from John 8:12. Where Jesus tells us what he's like when Jesus spoke again to the people. He said, quote, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. Unquote. Jesus said he is the light. And you can learn a lot about what Jesus is like. If you think kind of deeply about what light is and what light does So, I did some research for you.
I checked into a Bible search engine, the words, light and dark, and darkness, and related terms. And I find out there were three hundred and ninety eight separate Bible passages from cover to cover that use that imagery at a chance. Just last week to read every one of them. And what I found out was pretty cool. That when the Bible speaks about light and darkness the five principal meanings of that metaphor fit into the acronym. In fact, if you're here live in church, I want you to grab a pen, because we're going to do for the rest of this message is to unpack. That Jesus said, he is the light the L I G H T. If you're watching at home, make sure you grab a piece of paper and write this down, but I am going to met up front before you take notes. This isn't it's not my best acronym. Um there's going to be one time, maybe two times where you put the pen down, you're like, come on. That's like if there's an award for the best acronym of the year, the Akron, Emmys or something, I probably wouldn't have to prepare a speech. I won't be winning any awards, so I get it. But here's my goal that when you get in the car after church, or when this program is done, that you could turn to the person next to you and ask them, What's the lightnat0r enough? Have to stretch a little bit. I'm hoping that you remember these five things about Jesus and what he meant, when he claimed to be the light of the world. I grab a pen. Let's jump in and write the first one. Down the L in L I G H T stands for Life.
Lights both in the Bible and in nature are connected to life. If you're in the lights, you have life. If you're in the darkness, that's connected to death. If you remember your fifth grade science, class, and photosynthesis, that should make sense, right? How many of you have plants in your home? Just curious. And last night, how many of you store those plants in the darkest room of your house? You kill all the plants. Well, you're gonna learn a lot today. Well, why? Well, because the way that plants work through photosynthesis is that life happens, they grow. They survive by receiving the sunlight, Jesus is saying the same thing spiritually.
He's actually saying something. Very big did you know what's his words? He didn't just say, I'm, I'm light. But I am the lights, the definitive. Not just light of my family or light of my community, or light of my ethnicity. I am the light of The world. It's a huge controversial pretty exclusive claim. Jesus says, if you want to have life with God, if you want to have eternal life in heaven, there's only one way to get it. And it's through me. If you thought, you know, just trying your best to be a decent person gives you life with God. No.
If you think like many people that just believing something or having faith in some higher power will give you life with God. He says, We'll just be religious and devout. Whatever your religion is unfiltered. Jesus as no. No, I'm not one path up the mountain to the light of Heaven. I am the lights of the whole world. Whoever follows me, he says, will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. Some people think that Jesus was accepting of everyone's beliefs and this passage is proof that he was not.
He made huge claims that he was the only way to the father because he is the light of the world.
But before you kind of get offended by Jesus and walk away, notice what he said. I am the light of the world and whoever follows me.
Have the light of life.
I love that phrase, whoever
Did you know that most world religions that billions of people follow today, would not be able to say that?
Most religions say, whoever is fairly good will have the light of life. Whoever has shown noticeable improvement from their past will have the light of Life whoever keeps these Ten Commandments, or these five pillars, or these eight principles. Whoever's fix their karma, balanced out the right or the wrong. The world religions say you better be doing good and you better be doing a lot of it. You better avoid the bad or else all of you are in trouble but Jesus does not say that. He's the only religious founder who says, whoever You got some stuff in your past, okay? Whoever follows me will have the light of life. You got a rap sheet, does the local judge or cop know your name. Have you been through a divorce? Is their Addiction in your past? Are you struggling with some moral issues, some sin that you keep going back to that? Maybe you went back to just in the last week. Well, thank God Jesus does not say whoever is good, whoever's better or whoever has grown in the last year. He just says, and I quote, whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. As Jesus is exclusive, but he is also amazing. He's offering you, despite your past, despite your presence struggles, he's offering, you free of charge, no strings attached, the light of his love which leads you into life with God, you could run from him. But he's offering you, despite all of your flaws, light and life.
So that's the L. I grab your pen for number two because the L I G HT. The I stands for I see.
Alright, this is a little bit of a stretch, right? That's unimpressive. Don't you have time to work? This pastor. I was gonna put illumination, but that felt like a big word, but this is really a simple concept, right? If the lights are on, I see. If it's really dark, I don't.
It's a lights are off. I filled out, I have to guess I'm unsure, but if the lights are on, it's actually pretty simple. How many people writing on the shirts, service, or sitting in the front row?
Yep, that was easy. Because of light. If we killed all the lights and you ask me how many people are sitting in the fourth row, I'd have to guess by saying that he is the light. Jesus is saying that there's some really big questions, everyone's asking about life and you don't have to guess because of his light, you see? If you don't Jesus though, you're kind of in the dark, it's easy to be deceived and the best you can do is guess
Actually makes me think of the time that my wife and I almost got eaten by a predator in Northern Thailand. Everything about this. Kim and I were on the other side of the world I got to speak to some Christian missionaries there and they put us up in this big complex. It was amazingly huge and they had a zoo right in the middle of it and all these walking paths and like beautiful trees and stuff. Can I like to run? So one morning we get up and it's early and it's really dark and by dark I mean like not American dark with sidewalks and Street lamps its pitch black It's so dark we can't even run, really can't see that far ahead of us. So we're kind of jogging, shuffling really slowly barely seeing like the sidewalk a foot in front of us, the paths all twisted and turned we got totally lost and we were like in the middle of the zoo. And we turn this corner and what is in front of us, but 2 Giant animals. I see their silhouette in the really dim light and I see their eyes, not this close together. But this far apart on their massive heads, we gasp we'd stopped dead in our tracks. Obviously, I take him and put her in front of me, we try to run we're trying to crash into each other. We're taking off into the darkness. Within a few hours later, the sun came up. And we went back to see what animal almost devoured us.
I'll show you a picture of what it was.
I ran for my life from two giant Shrubbery bunnies. Yes, there's a fancy hotel, they turn their bushes and two giant these. We thought we thought we were about to get eaten We thought. It was our best guess in the darkness. You ever noticed how we think a lot of things that aren't always true.
Jesus says, I am the light of the world because he means he wants you to see what's true. There's some really smart people in our world who have fancy degrees and titles. But if they don't know Jesus they don't they don't see the simple answers to Life's biggest questions. It feels very scientific and philosophical to say, well, where did we come from as human beings?
I know. In the beginning, God created.
In it us together. In our mothers wombs, we are not accidents of evolution. We are intentionally created by a loving father moments like a mother and father, the Overflow, their love leads to a child, the Overflow of God's love read to you. You're not an accident without purpose, you part of the family of humans that God made of a what happens? After death that great mystery, no one knows.
I know, I know a guy who died and then he came back to tell us about it. He said that, whoever believes in him will live, even though they die are back pain and our anxiety, our relational struggles, death and mourning is over. We immediately go to paradise to see the face of God. I know. Are you getting right with God? How do you know you're on the good side of the Divine?
In the back you again. Yes. Well, Jesus. He is actually very simple. Whoever believes in him, will not perish, but have eternal life. What's the purpose of life? What does God want me to do such a mystery? No, it's not. God doesn't care if you work here or there. You just care that you love people Wherever You Are. Stay here, sell your house. Apply for this job. Apply for that one. Guy doesn't care. He just cares that you love him and love people wherever you are. These things that keep us up at night that philosophers debate. Jesus says, if you follow me you will never walk in darkness, you will see the truth of Life Death, your past, your present, and your future, what a beautiful confident thing, not to stumble around and Shuffle in the dark but to know who you are to know where you're going to not fear life. Four deaths because God's word is a lamp for our feet and a light to our path.
So, we covered the L. And the I just went to the G. G stands for growth.
But I know that if you've ever had plants before, Actually true of our mental health to write. It can be tough to get out of bed, but there's something about lights that helps us to grow. It grows our joy and our peace. I forgot this about photosynthesis, but I believe light is soaked into a plant cell, it grows to the point where it divides, which stretches out the stem, and the leaves and produces fruits. It's the same here on the light, he's saying that if you want to grow spiritually, If you want more love in your life or peace with God or patience when things are, just not going according to your plan. Well, the simple answer is the life of Jesus.
That's why we're so infatuated here at our church with this book. So I love seeing your faces here in church every Sunday because even though it doesn't glow, there's light and growth in this Word. And every time you go home and start your day or end your day, or interrupt your day, you know, this answer your phone does glow. If you have a Bible answer, I was like oh here's how spiritual growth happens. Right. So if you're Just praying “God give me peace. Give me patience.” are great prayers. His answer is going to be to grow you through the photosynthesis of the soul that comes from this book. And so I'm not trying to beat you over the head with a Bible, but I am going to keep beating this message. The Bible, the Bible, the Bible. You're not going to grow 50 feet in a day like an oak tree. It's going to be bit by bit, but exposure to the light of this word is going to grow you to be more like Jesus. Makes me think this young man who just started coming to our church? I was really excited to sit down and chat with him for the very first time because I quickly found out from his family that they simply could not understand how his life had changed for Jesus. Remember talking to a sister. I was standing right there just last Sunday and she shook her head with joy and said, I cannot believe this is my brother. His beliefs, changed his behavior, changes, a totally different human being. And so I sat down with him and he's telling me about all these changes and these changes he wants to make for God and I was curious. So I asked him the question. Like, do you read the Bible at all? Anyone guess what he said? Yep. Yep, he just got into this habit, which he called his holy hour, So every morning you get up, he grabbed his Bible. Maybe turn on a sermon on YouTube. He get out his notebook, you learn better if you take notes he said to me. Yep. And he told me that for 60 minutes every day, he just soaks in the light of God's truth and I'm I'm listen to this guy like dang,I should do that. Who'da thought like. Explosive growth is connected to a really faithful, really solid habits of God's Word. So let that be an encouragement from Jesus today, if you just want more spiritual fruits, if you're struggling with Joy or peace in the midst of all these uncertain things in your life, What If, instead of sitting, waiting, worrying, you spent the first 60 Minutes, or 30 minutes, or 15 minutes, or Five minutes. Letting the lights of His truth, grow your heart and grow your faith. It brings us to the h.
The H is the hard part, because the H in This Acronym stands for Harsh,
You know, this about light. If you've been in the darkness for a while, light is Harsh.
When I was in Middle School, I'm not sure if this is true for you, I could sleep past lunch. Anyone else have that? Spiritual gift. So eventually my mom you're like, lunch is getting cold. You have to bust open the door and whip open the curtains. And if you've been in the dark light, despite all of its warmth and beauty its painful you know? You want to hide from it.
Everyone. Friends around a fire and a really dark night. Someone turns on their head lamp and looks at you.
If you ever been inside a movie theater during a matinee show, you step out into the light. It's eventually, it's beautiful. But the first moment if you've been the darkness is painful,
I remember, in fact, when I was in high school, I thought it would be cool if I would wear clothes from Abercrombie and Fitch. And I remember like the dressing rooms at Abercrombie and fish. The the lights were really, really dim. And I was trying their clothes and think dang. Hello, good. I'm gonna get home with the same clothes and I'd like to turn on the bathroom I like, oh, wow, what happened, what happened, right? Light exposes things, light show something as it really is, with all of its flaws, and Jesus is the light. Which means when his truth and his word shines brightly on you, you can't hide it. Exposes it, judges. And that's why some people hate Jesus. Actually the Gospel of John chapter 3. Look at what it says just versus after the God. So loved the world Passage John adds, this is the verdict. Light has come into the world. But people loved Darkness, instead of light because their deeds were evil everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.
And Jesus light is crazy bright.
And if you love your Darkness, You will hate this Jesus.
Jesus isn't. Accepting excuses. He's not turning down the lumens on his truth. If you come to Jesus, if you read his word, if you do life with people who love the word of Jesus, if you come to a church that loves the word of Jesus, it will expose you. It won't just accept you as you are, it will show you what's wrong, judge it and ask you to change it. It's really important.
I'll be candid with you. This is the very, very hard part about Christianity. Jesus is God. And you're not. That means if we find something in that book, that doesn't line up with your life. We're not changing the book. We're asking you to change.
There's no updates on the New Testaments. There's no modernizing, Jesus, morals. He's God, he's Timeless. And he's always right.
Right? And that will expose you, you will feel judged in sermons and services and conversations because that's what light does. If there's some part of your lifestyle that you're keeping in the dark for yourself, Jesus Will Shine his truth on it and it will be painful. You'll want to run back inside. Hide under the covers. Get away from this harsh. Judgmental light.
For example, if You're a dad who acts very religious and brings the kids to church. But the kids see behind the scenes that you were very unlike our heavenly father. That you threatened and you control and you use anger and you're verbally, abusive like Jesus.
He hates that. Greatest misuse of God's name is not someone drop in Jesus name, like a swear word. It's someone who claims to follow Jesus, but behind the scenes, they're nothing like Jesus. If you think that we're going to accept your lifestyle because it's natural for you, it's just in your heart and you didn't choose it. What, what?
You're a sinner. Why would we trust your heart?
Well, I follow mine. It's not Perfection within us or a fallen human race. We don't can't trust our Instinct, I feel it. Therefore it's good. That is such unbiblical logic and the light of Jesus is teaching will shine brightly on you. It will call you to repent, change suffer, whatever you have to to Faithfully follow the teachings of Jesus. You think that just because you're religious and go to church? You can be a jerk to other people. You can jump online and post whatever you want because you're right.
And the Bible says, you can know every last scripture in the whole book, but if you don't have love, it's nothing to God. It's not impressive to him. It's just care about Bible Jeopardy. He cares about people who behave, like Jesus.
So there will be times when you absolutely will be judged by Jesus. And ninety-nine percent of the time, the way that you will be judged is through, Jesus is faithful people. Foolish people who love darkness and hate the lights run from Jesus people who are holding an open book that beams lights.
And, I'll put it out there, will you run from it? Because it's painful.
Eventually my experience is that your eyes adjust, you come to trust God and even if it's hard you enjoy the warmth and the light and the growth and the ability to see but some people don't ever get that far, they run from it because they think God's job is just to say yes to everything they want. That's not true. It's not true. There's one lord. It's not the person you saw when you were brushing your teeth today. Jesus. He's right. Sometimes we are wrong. He's the lights. And sometimes the light is bright.
But I hope you don't leave Jesus because there's one last thing. He wants to offer you.
The T in L I G HT stands for safety.
I know. All right. I know you can laugh. You can blow dries but that's true, isn't it? The dark is really dangerous. When the lights are on, there's much greater safety. So imagine for a second, if we killed, all the lights in this space and you had to leave, you stub, your toe, you'd run into someone. I might fall off the edge of the stage, but if the lights are on, it's actually very safe. You see where you're going, you know, where the danger is. And that's what Jesus is saying to you that if you follow him, what's called, I am the light of the world, whoever follows me will never walk in darkness. It's his way of saying you will never be in danger. You could lose your job, you could lose your relationship, you could lose your ability to walk or talk, but you will never be in spiritual or Eternal danger because I am the light. In fact, it's pretty cool in the original Greek language that the New Testament is recorded in. It's probably a touch better translation to say this. That Jesus said, whoever follows me will never ever, ever, ever walk in darkness, it's an emphatic, grammatical term. Jesus is saying categorically. If you have me, if I am your light, you will never ever ever be in danger of the darkness of hell. And never ever have to wonder if God's going to accept you or condemn you on the last day you'll never ever ever have to feel like you're alone because God will be with you and you will never ever ever have to think that you're unloved because you're not You'll never ever ever have to question your place in God's family you'll never ever, ever have to wonder if you have God's ear or his heart, if Jesus is your life, he saves you from all of that Danger. When we say that Jesus saves, it's our way of saying that Jesus keeps you safe. You're never in the danger of missing God in life, in death, or in the life to come. He's offering you all of that absolutely for free because he says, whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but have the light of life. So put it all together. And what do you get? Jesus is the source of Life. He's the way you see the truth. He's the way you grow spiritually. He can be harsh but he offers you safety with God now and forever.
Gonna guess I'll people reacted to that.
I'll show you in the context. John chapter 8 says the Pharisees challenged him. Many believed in him.
Once again, the unfiltered Jesus didn't take everyone side. He spoke the truth. Some ran from it. He followed it.
Salvaged, you.
I will not promise you that Christianity will be the easiest path or Jesus will be the easiest God to follow, but I can promise you this. If you do by the grace of God, you will have lights and gross and safety forever and ever. That's want to leave you with one last picture. My favorite artist picked up on an old Greek. Parable, some of you might know Plato's allegory of the cave We're all these people are trapped in darkness their whole lives. They just stare blindly at the wall of a cave where their Master is Project Shadows. They never see what something really is. This artist is saying, all of us are like that by Nature until To the holy spirit opens our eyes. Until that blazing dove. That's a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Turns our head, not to shadows and symbols, but to the light of Jesus and he beams with Brilliance and glory with truth and Holiness. I wonder if it was tempting to turn back into the Shadows, but there's something about Jesus that you see in this picture that makes him worthy. No matter how hard or harsh is teaching can be. Do you see it? Stars in his hands. The blood that he shed. The proof of his love. When you were far from him, he died for you. When you had nothing to offer him, he bled for you. He is This brilliant life and he is worth staring at for the rest of your life. Turn to Jesus. You want to see the truth? You'll see the light.
That's right.
