I Am: The Door of the Sheep

And that last bass drop is a thing. Good morning family. How are you? Thank you for being here. We have so much to talk about before we get to what we're going to talk about. First of all, I want to talk about offering and I wanted, I want to help you see some, some things that your faithfulness has been able to allow us to do. We talked a few weeks ago about how we're being able to support some of the local area churches that have been struggling, and we've been able to step in and fill that gap because of your faithfulness, which is awesome. Let me tell you something else that's happening. Two major things, actually three major things that are really significant because of your faithfulness. And I say this because I want to take the opportunity to say thank you. First of all, when we got here next week, next week will be one year. Yeah! Who would've thunk like, man, it's been a year. Whew. Uh, flown by one level. And then at another level it feels like, gosh, I don't remember my life before Southeast. The evening of June the 30th last year, we rolled into Parker for good. And so we've been here and when we got here, one of the things that we found out was that our staff had not had a raise of any kind in five years. I want you to imagine trying to survive in the world that we're living in without having a raise of any kind for five years. And so that was something that we needed to fix. But here's another issue that was concerning is that for the same position, there was a discrepancy between men and women on how much they were making; men were making about 30% more than women for the same job. Not only is that wrong, I call that sin. And so we committed to our staff to do the best that we could do to close that gap. Because of your faithfulness, as of July 1, what I will tell you is that both of those issues have been remedied for all of our staff. I mean, there's, I mean, you know this, so you can compare organizations around the world. So we can compare churches with similar size and budget and location, you know, is it urban as it were all those things, all of our employees are within the band, the high and the low they're within that band of where they should be. And there is no salary discrepancy anymore. And so I'm really excited about that. And I'm honored to be a part of a team that would work so hard to get there. Here's the other thing that I would say about your offering and your faithfulness and what it's allowed us to do as the church was in decline over the last few years, except for this last year, the mission's budget kept getting trimmed and kept getting trimmed and kept getting trimmed. As our budget went down, the missions giving went down as well. Global impact is one of our four pillars as a church, right? It's one of the four keys to success for us. We want to impact the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so what we've done, what we've been able to do because of your faithfulness is our fiscal year is September to September. Don't ask me why it was that way when I got here. So starting September 1, we have officially, for our new budget, doubled our missions giving, And that's your faithfulness. And all that stuff is because you guys have chosen to step up and believe in what God's doing through Southeast. So I just want to say thank you so much for participating in that. I would invite you to continue to participate in that so that more cool things like that can continue to happen in our community and around the world. There's black boxes at the exits at every exit around here. And the other thing is if you're online or if you want to give online, you're more than welcome to do that. There's lots of different ways. The easiest way would be to go to Southeastcc.org/give. And so that will take care of that next item on the agenda. Monday, last Monday, so six days ago, or whenever that was, we officially opened for registration, the trip to Israel for May, 2021. So if you want to go to Israel in May, that trip is officially open for registration. I announced it to our staff Wednesday and I put it on Facebook Friday. I say that because this morning, that trip is over half full already. So if you want to go on that trip, you need to trust that the Holy Spirit's nudging your heart right now. Like you don't need to take a month to pray about it because it won't be there. And I do that by design. I'm never going to lead in Israel -- I shouldn't say never -- I don't want to lead an Israel tour where we have two or three buses, because what that becomes is just a whole bunch of people getting off and looking at a site and getting back on the bus and moving on, it becomes a sightseeing tour. Which there's a place for that, but that's not the kind of tour that my heart beats for. I want to have an experiential tour that helps the Bible come alive. And what happens in a sightseeing tour is after about four or five days, you're like, I can't look at one more pile of  rocks cause they all start to run together and it's cool, it's cool. It just, there are ways to open sites up if we're willing and able to hike and to get out and experience kind of some, some physical activity. So, we do, and I'd love for you to be a part of that. If you're interested in getting signed up for that, you can either chase me down on email or you can chase me down on Facebook. You can message me and I'll get you the information for that. Next thing that I want to talk about before we get into what we're going to talk about. Uh, last week we did the coolest thing in the at risk services. We had a good old fashioned congregational vote. It was awesome. And we were wrestling with kind of, as, as we get into this process and we move through and we figure out how to best serve the needs of our people and all the different things that go on. What we were finding is that there may be some better ways for us to continue to do this. Now, you know that before, before, COVID you remember, then back when we walked around and we rode in covered wagons-- remember then, before COVID, that's what it feels like. If a gosh, I don't remember life before COVID, um, we were talking about adding the third service in here and just by sheer numbers of people we were talking about, and we're going to move that direction in the fall. What we're going to do is in kind of the next phase of adjusting what's going on in our church is that we're going to move starting next week. Next week, we're going to move our services to 8:30, 10 and 11:30. And they're all going to be in this room. This is going to be really exciting for us on a number of levels, 830, 10, and 11:30. But let me explain to you how this is going to work at the 8:30 service and the 11:30 service. We are going to have designated space for at-risk people to sit so that they can participate in the big room. And they've been so gracious and wonderful over in the gym. It's just not the same as worshiping with more people in this room. Right? And so what happens is a lot of those people that are over there start trickling in here and I'm like, what are you doing? And they're like, Oh, the worst. Like, I just want to be a part of this experience. So let me show you some pictures of how this is going to work. Do I have some pictures up here? Yeah. So this is where it's going to happen. So up in the top, middle that's the building. And then the at risk parking lot is going to be over on the South parking lot. So that's going to be their own parking lot, which means you guys that are in here, can't park there. I don't want you to park there. There's plenty of other spaces to park -- don't park in that South lot because what you do, here's the thing, my number one priority is that we keep our people as safe as possible. That's more important to me than anything else. And what I can tell you is this is our fourth weekend now doing this. And we haven't had any, any infections, anybody get sick here because we're working really hard to keep that safe. That's been awesome. So I don’t want you guys to park in the South, that's their lot. Now what's going to happen is-- next picture --is they're going to come in the South entrance and come down the hallway, which is basically this hallway that's over here. That goes from that door to the bathrooms. And then they're going to come down the hallway that runs along this side of the auditorium. Okay. They're going to have their own entrance and exit, which is going to be that far double doors down there. They're going to have their own entrance and exit. Here's what that means for you guys. It's going to be really important that you guys honor them by not using those entrances and exits on that side because I don't want any cross-contamination. I don't, I don't want to do that. I want to keep everybody safe. 

Okay. So we're going to do that for them. And then the last picture, I'm gonna show you the last picture. These four sections right here are going to be for our, at risk people at the 8:30 service and the 11:30 service, if you're like, but that's my seat. If that's you over here, come to the 10 o'clock service there's okay. Is nothing wrong with that. There'll be there for you at the 10 o'clock service, but these four sections will be here for the at risk folks on Sunday mornings. And that's really important again, because the most important thing isn't that they get the best view, it's that they're safe. And so we want to make sure that everybody is as safe as possible. So that's going to start happening next Sunday. So don't forget that when you get on to reserve your spots this week, you're going to be like, but not where's 9:30. Oh, we're going to have service at 8:30, 10 and 11:30. And we'll all be able to be in here. And that'll be like, our volunteers have been so incredible in this process. They've been like, whatever, just want to step up. And so we've, we've basically doubled our volunteer load and doubled it again. Like we doubled it because of what it takes for us to keep everything clean and all that stuff. And then we doubled it cause we're doing services in two spots. And so this will just be more helpful for us as we move forward and it'll give everybody a great worship experience. So is that okay? Yeah. Good. So that'll start next week. And we're excited about that.

Now we're ready to get into our sermon. And today we're going to wrestle with this statement that Jesus makes -- I'm the door -- and you guys need to pray for me because one of the tensions that I wrestle with is exactly how much of the history, I'm a history nerd. And so I could go for 45 minutes just on the history and never really talk about the passage. And I live in this tension and we're all, so consequently, we're all kind of living in it is how much history is enough and how much is too much. And there's a lot of things there, but we've been looking through a couple of lenses. One of them is the cultural lens of like, how does what John is writing, how does it hit the culture that he's living in? And then the other lens that we've been looking at is for those Jewish Jesus followers that were kind of rooted in the, in the Hebrew Bible and the old Testament, how are they hearing it? And what are they learning and seeing and how is it affecting them? And so we're wrestling with these two lenses and it's hard to know for me, how much to give you and how much to not give you. I can't find a good way. And I've been, I've been preaching for 27 years like this-- long time. And I can't find a good way to adequately convey to you how important the Pantheon, the gods and the goddesses were in the Roman world. We have our gods too, and they're equally as important. They're just not the same. And I don't know how to convey how central the gods were to all of this stuff. So please pray for me in that. I really hope that, and I'll try to tighten it up this week. I will. And you’ll be, like he said, he was going to tighten it up. We'll see. So we're getting ready to run at an incredible rate of speed. Are you guys ready to go to work? Okay. 

I want to begin this morning with a quote about a God by the name of Janus. Now, if you're like, I've never heard of Janus. I know. Here’s the interesting thing. Janus is a fascinating God in the Roman world, there is no Greek equivalent. Janus is distinctly Roman. There was no, no Greek God that got renamed, which is what a lot of the Roman culture was. A lot of the Roman culture was like Greek culture, renamed and expanded. That's kind of what it was. And so this is a unique opportunity for us to look at something that isn't that. And I'm going to begin with a quote that just, if I read it, it'll go faster. This is taken from the great theologian Wikipedia, but it's a good kind of overview and description of Janus. And if you're like, well, you need to check your sources. Well go to Wikipedia. You can look it up and not plagiarizing. It's just a really good quote. It's written well and says what I want it to say. So I'm going to move through it really quickly. And then we'll get into John chapter 10. Okay. And the ancient Roman religion and myth, Janus is the God of beginnings Gates, transitions, time, duality, doorways, passages, and endings. He is usually depicted as having two faces since he looks to the future and to the past. It is conventionally thought that the month of January is named for Janus. But according to ancient Roman farmer's Almanac, Juno was the tutelary deity of the month. I don't read good. Janus presided over the beginning and the ending of conflict and hence war and peace. The Gates of a building in Rome named after him (not a temple ,as it is often called, but an open enclosure with Gates at each end) were opened in time of war, and closed to mark the arrival of peace (which did not happen very often). As a god of transitions, he had functions pertaining to birth and to journeys and to exchange, and in his association with Portunus, a similar harboring gateway god, he was concerned with traveling, trading and shipping. Janus was involved in a lot. He's like the cranberry of the gods. He was in all the other juices. That’s the way cranberries work they taste nasty by themselves, but you mix it with Apple. It's cran-apple -- it's delicious, right? Mix it with cherry it's crancherry. It's delicious. It's -- Janus is a cranberry of the gods. You guys will never remember another thing that I say, Janus, the cranberry of the gods. Janus had no flamen or  specialized priest assigned to him, but the King of the sacred rights. Now this is so important because the King of the Sacred Rights is like the one in the entire Roman empire that is like over all of the pagan religions. Like he stands right next to the emperor, the King of the Sacred Rights, or the rex sacrorum, himself carried out his ceremonies. Janus had a ubiquitous presence in religious ceremonies throughout the year. As such, Janus was ritually invoked at the beginning of each ceremony, regardless of the main deity honored on any particular occasion. Here's what that means. If we went to a festival of Apollo, which we talked about last week, before we could celebrate Apollo, we have to bring up Janus and celebrate him. And that was true for all the gods. If it was Aphrodite or Demeter, which we talked about, could we say like, it doesn't really matter whatever god or goddess it was. We go to a celebration for them before we can celebrate them. We've got to celebrate Janus. The Greeks had no equivalent for Janus, the Romans claimed as distinctively their own. So this guy is a really big deal. And I want to show you a couple of pictures of Janus here's picture. Number one, Janus had said in the quote is depicted with two faces. Here's why, because Janus is the God of transitions. And therefore Janus sees into the past and Janus sees into the future. And so he sees both directions. Some statues of Janus had four faces representing the four points of the compass -- that he could see in all directions. But this is Janus. Here's another picture. Sometimes Janus was depicted as an older man with a beard, looking into the past and a younger man without a beard, looking into the future. And so Janus is this god of transition. So, when you come to worship Janus, you come to him with this question of what does the future hold, especially in any time that you're about to do something new. I can tell you this. Over the last three months in the Roman world, they would have been worshiping Janus a lot because we've been through a lot of transitions, right? A lot of unexpected transitions. And so what they do is they would come and they would offer an animal, some kind of sacrifice, whatever, or money or something else. They would offer this to Janus the god, and they would hope that that sacrifice was enough. See, here's how the Pantheon works. It's all about manipulation and control because they're operating fundamentally on the premise that I have to appease the gods in order to get them to do what I want. And so I come to them, offering a sacrifice of some kind, hoping that I can persuade Janus to give me a good future in this transition, whatever it is, whatever the transition is. I hope that I can have a new, a good successful journey. Whether that transition is a job like I'm moving from being a plumber to be in a general contractor, or I'm going to be a school teacher, and then I'm going to be a principal or, or it's a war we're at peace and we're going to go to war. And we want Janus to be the God of favor for that so that he can help us succeed. Whatever we do. But the problem is, if I don't give Janus what he needs, he won't bless my endeavor. And so I constantly come to him with this posture of like this, like here's a …I hope you like it… don't drag me down. That's how we approach the gods. And so transitions are constantly fraught with fear, because this is how it works. So hopefully we can get, hopefully it's enough, but we never really know for sure. Right? And so we, we go into it with this fear and trepidation, like the whole relationship is built on fear, which by the way is not a good motivator, but it is a powerful one. I know.

So, with that in mind, we're going to enter into John chapter 10. Now remember last week when we talked about John chapter eight, what's so stunning about John chapter eight? Seven and Nine, yeah, this is no exception. We got to read it in context. And what happens for a lot of us is that when we read the Bible, like we'll just kind of pull it out and read it. We don't really know what's going on or the bigger picture or anything like that. And so we read it and we just wait for it to say something pithy to us. There's nothing wrong with that. Like God speaks to us in that way. But what I would invite us to is this possibility that there's this depth and richness in the scriptures. If we'll pour in, if we'll dive in and look at the context a little bit, that's actually really profound. And so we need to understand the bigger picture. Like never, never proof text, never pull a verse out of its context and just read it and go see I was right. Like husbands do this all the time with their wives. Right. You wives are like, I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah. Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord. Right? Listen, some of us husbands have tried that once -- you only do it one time, right. Woke up with her hand on our head and a big knot underneath of it. Um, the wives, here's what you do say, Hey, put that back in his context because the next verse is husbands love your wives the way Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. And then just say, honey, when was the last time you became less so that I could become more? The queen has spoken, right. Do it.  Always want to put it back in its context. That was pure bonus material. That was all pure bonus material.

Okay. Let's jump into John chapter 10 here and let's see what we can see now. Remember in John chapter 9, what's happening is there's a man born blind and the disciples ask who sinned that he was born blind, him or his parents. And Jesus says neither -- he was born blind so that the glory of the Lord could be revealed in him. Right? And so then Jesus puts mud on his eyes. Now here's the crazy thing. What it says is Jesus spit on the ground and made mud and put it on his eyes. To which we go, Oh, there there's mud on his eyes. That is not the best question for this passage. The better question is how much spit does it take to make enough mud? Like, that's amazing. That's amazing. And you're like, the only reason he let him put that mud on his eyes is cause he couldn't see, he didn't know what was going on. And then he goes to the pool of Siloam and he washes the mud off and he can see (come with me to Israel, we'll stand in the pool of Salome). And so he washes the mud off and then the Pharisees put him on trial, kinda. And they have this big conversation in which we'll look at a little bit more in a minute. But then at the end, Jesus kind of finds him and has another conversation with him. And then Jesus says this to his disciples. He says, truly, truly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in another way, that man is a thief and a robber, but he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him, the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. By the way, in the ancient world, still to this day, when Bedouin shepherds come together, they'll put all their sheep, all these different shepherds with their sheep. They'll put them all in one pen or they'll put them in a circle and the shepherds will sleep in a circle around them to protect them. Okay? And you're like, how in the world are they ever going to separate those out in the morning? Here's how they do it. Okay. Every Shepard has a unique noise that they make. For some of them, it's a whistle for some of them, it's a word that they say -- something that they do that calls out their sheep. And what happens is their sheep, that shepherd will get up and make his call, as we hopefully we'll see it in Israel. It's really stunning, but they'll make their noise, and they just start walking and their sheep follow them. It's incredible. It's incredible to watch. His sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name and he leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him for, they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of the strangers.” This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. 

So Jesus, 50 to 60 years before John writes this down, makes this statement. I am the door. And they're like, what, what does that even mean? That's the goofiest thing. And then all these years later, John is walking down the street in Ephesus and goes, Hey, that's a weird statue with two faces. Who's that? And his buddy goes, that's Janus. He's the god of transitions. We call him the door. And John goes, what? That's incredible. I just picture him like you do in the first century, pulling out his iPhone and texting Peter and be like, you will not believe the connection. This is so incredible. You will not even believe it. So Jesus, Jesus makes this statement, but they don't understand what he's saying to them. So Jesus, again said to them truly, truly I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I came that you might have life and have it abundantly. Is this our definition of abundance? I hope he likes it. I mean, this is how we approach the gods and Jesus is like, no, no, no, no, no. I want you to have the fullest life, like crazy awesome, amazing life. That's what I want for you. Think about a coach in the locker room. Pregame. All right, guys. It's time for us to go out and play the game. You guys ready? Let's go guys. Is that team ever gonna win? No. The coach is like guys, we're good to go. You can do it. Even when the coach believes they can't. I've been a coach. I know that to be true. Yeah. Come on. You got this. You can do it. We're going to take them on. That is what a coach does. That's whew. That's abundance. Not this. I'm so scared. I'm so concerned. Not that. And yet that's how Janus would invite us. That's how the door in the Roman world would invite us to approach it. Well, Jesus is like, no, we're going to open the way. Right? Remember that? Remember that --  going to open the way. Cause here's why. In the Roman world and the Gentile world, they would have said, Oh, he's inviting us to be more confident in our transitions. Yeah. And in the Jewish lens, they would have been like, Whoa, you don't understand what he just did. And we're all like, I know Micah chapter two, right? You all went there. And we all did right. Micah chapter two, which is a super foundational passage for the Jewish people. And especially at the time of Jesus, this is a conversation that is going on a lot in the Jewish world. Micah chapter two, there's this really interesting passage that starts like this. I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob. I will gather the remnant of Israel. I will set them together like sheep in a fold, like flock in its pasture. So you see the parallel so far so that he's the door of the sheep pen. The sheep are up in a fold. Now I want you to imagine that we're all sheep and we're all standing in the sheep pen and we're all on top of each other. This is not social distancing. Right? Like they're not doing that right now. And so they're all shut up in a pen. I don't know if any of you have ever worked with cows growing up, but like cows, when you hold them in for the winter, that day in the spring where you finally throw open the gate to let them out, It says, I will shut them up like sheep in a fold, like a flock in it's pasture, a noisy multitude of men. When you transition cows from the barn to the field, these are 2000 pound animals. And they're in the shoot, like moo, right? Like I don't speak cow. But um, if I could translate moo to English, they're like gloomy me out. I'm so ready. It's and what they do is they run out into the field and they jump and they kick and they talk to each other and they butt heads and they play and play and play and run. Why? Because they've been shut up for so long and they're ready. Let's continue in our passage. It says he who opens the breach, goes up before them. And I love how English vanillaizes, the Hebrew. The word that's translated” opens” in the Hebrew is the word “protz”. Let me hear you say protz. If you were to go to Israel today and ask them for protz Hey, can I have some protz? They would hand you a stick of dynamite. 
Protz is the Hebrew, modern Hebrew, word for dynamite. And it gives you a much, much better idea of what's going on here. This isn't. He opens the breach. Let me get this one. Let me get this one. It's not like that. He who opens the breach is like, boom, let's go. That's what's going on here. Just like a great coach getting his team ready to take the field. He who opens the breach, who blows open the way, goes up before them. They break through and pass the gate, going out by it. Their king passes on before them, the Lord at their head. Now, let me ask you this question? Who is their King, the Lord at their head? This is like the most Sunday school answer opportunity. That would be Jesus. Right? It'd be Jesus. You know how, when you were growing up in Sunday school, that was the answer to every Sunday school question is Jesus. I hope he's happy. So Jesus is passing before them, the Lord at their head. So Jesus is leading them out. Who's the one that blows open the way? John, the Baptist. John prepares the way, right? And go back and read Matthew 11 here's bonus material. Go back and read Matthew 11, where Jesus is having a conversation with the people about who John the Baptist is and how important he is, what he meant. He makes this weird, unJesusy statement where he says, the kingdom of heaven, up until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing and forceful men take hold of it, which doesn't sound like Jesus at all. Unless we understand that the word that's translated, “forceful” King James translates it ”violent”, which is even less Jesusy it's the word Briadzo -- guess what the Greek word Briadzo -- guess what Hebrew word it translates to? Pratz!” What Jesus is saying is look, if you want to be a part of the kingdom of God, you gotta be a part of this explosion into something new. You can't fear, transitions. You have to embrace them. Why? Because Jesus is the door. Because we know in whom we have believed, and we are persuaded that he is able to keep that, which we've committed unto him until that day. We don't have to be afraid when we're stepping into something new. We could turn it loose because I'm not, I don't know what the next thing looks like, but I know who does. And he's saying come on. That is not -- our relationship with God can never be this -- I don't know. I don't know. I hope he likes me. I hope he likes me. I hope I'm okay with him. Jesus is like, Oh my word, hope you're okay with me. I love you so much I died. Like hope I'm okay with you? There's nothing that I wouldn't do to give you every chance to succeed. Come on. It's time to take the field. And you're like, but I got stuff, mistakes. And Jesus is like, this is better! How do they say it in toy story? Move, move move!!! Right? Jesus is the door and because he's the door, we never have to fear when weird circumstances cause transitions in our life. And by the way, maybe there's a couple of hundred applications to our world right now. But I would go even a step further than that because where we came from, we, there was two major universities. And so we got to see people in transitions a lot. And it was great. Here's an interesting thing. Like one of the things that I observed is like 80% of the major life decisions that you make you'll make before the age of 23, like who you marry, what kind of career you're going to take? Like, there's, there's all these things. And I'm like, are you kidding me? They can't even hardly tie their shoes. And we're making all these decisions. It's hard. And it's scary. It's scary. Like when they kind of that first major one is when they kind of come to the end of high school and people start asking them like, Hey, what, you know, what are you gonna do after high school? And they were like, go to college. Why are you going to college? Cause that's what I'm supposed to do. Right. That's what everybody does. They go to college and then like, what do you want to study? I don't know. Like that feels like a big commitment. Feels like a lot. I don't, I don't want to commit. I want options. What if I don't like it? What if, what if I hope he's okay with me? And Jesus is like, follow me, come on. Move, move, move! And they're like, I don't know. But Jesus says, I came that you might have life and have it to its fullest. This is not abundance -- squeaking by. And then they get to the end of college and they're like, oh my word. Now I actually have to do something with this. I didn't think I would get this far. To which everybody says, you know, congratulations for surviving the easiest part of your life. Don't email me about that. Um, and then, uh, they got to like all these transitions in our life. We get so nervous. We forget who our God is. Jesus is the door. 

So I want to take this from one more angle and then we're gonna tie it down. John chapter nine, you remember great thing about John chapter 10, right after John chapter nine. John chapter nine -- so the guys he'll blind. And then, and then they, the Pharisees put him on trial and they kind of kick him out and they gotta confer. So they bring him back in and I want to pick up the story there. Here's what it says. It says for a second time, they called the man who'd been blind and said to him, give glory to God, we know that this man is a sinner, right? Cause here's the fundamental theological position of the Jewish leaders is that God is good to those who are good. And he's bad to those who are bad. So if a guy is able to do a miracle, God has to be with them. And if a guy is able to receive a miracle, he's, he's gotta be okay with God. But the problem is he's born blind. So we know there's some sin there, but he's okay with God, but there’s sin, but he's okay with God, but there's sin, but he's okay with – you see the tension for them. And they got to figure out how to wrestle this through. And he says, he answered whether he is a sinner I do not know. One thing I do know, though, is I was blind and now I see. Here's what I know. I don't know who the guy was. I didn't see him. Here's what I know. I was blind this morning when I woke up and now I can see you.  And they said to him, what did it, what did he do? How did he open your eyes? And the guy was like, he spit on the ground like nobody has ever spit . That's in the Aaron couch paraphrased version. And he answered them. I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples? That’s like a verbal backhand? That's, whew! And they reviled him saying, you are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from. And the man answered why this is an amazing thing. You do not know where it comes from, yet he opened my eyes. We know that God does not listen to sinners. But if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him. So we don't know where he came from. I'll tell you where he came from. He came from God, you know how I know I was blind. And now I see. Never since the world began, has it been, has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a man born blind? If this miracle is not from God, he could do nothing. And they answered him. You were born in utter sin. They can't let go of their stuff.  And you would teach us? And they cast him out. And Jesus heard that they cast him out and having found him, he said, do you believe the son of man? Do you believe the son of man? He answered who is he, sir? That I may believe in him. And Jesus said to him, you've seen him and it is he who is speaking to you. He said, Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. Why? Why does he worship him right there? Here's why, because an encounter with Jesus always inspires worship. And you can take that to the bank. One of the things, you know, in our life, we kind of wrestle. Sometimes, was that God, was it me? Was it, listen, are you inspired to worship? Then whatever the circumstances – an encounter with Jesus inspires worship. It always does. This whole time of separation for all of us. When the church was deployed, I longed to worship with all of us here? Like, which means to me that at one level quarantine was an encounter with Jesus because I was inspired to worship. Jesus said, for judgment, I came into the world that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind. Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things and said to him, are we also blind? Are you saying that we can't see, look at us. We're Pharisees we’re religious leaders. We got this stuff figured out. You're saying that we're blind? And Jesus said to them, if you were blind, you would have no guilt. But now that you say we see, your guilt remains.

Remember we've been talking about this whole idea of John mirroring Isaiah 40 to 53. And so I want to read a section out of Isaiah 43 and see if we can draw some parallels. The people who think they see are blind and the people who don't see can see, and then help us maybe tie down, like, what does this mean? That God is the God of transitions. Here's what Isaiah 43 says, bring out the people who are blind yet have eyes, who are deaf yet have ears and all the nations gathered together. All the peoples assemble who among them can declare this and show us the former things. Let them bring their witnesses to prove them right? And let them hear and say, it is true. You are my witnesses declares the Lord and my servant, whom I have chosen that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he.  before me. No, God was formed nor shall there be any after me, I am the Lord. And besides me, there is no savior. I declared and saved and proclaimed when there was no strange god among you and you are my witnesses declares the Lord. And I am God also hints. I am He, there is none who can deliver from my hand work and who can turn it back. I work and who can turn it back. When you encounter the Christ, there will be a transition.

This is our first implication. When you encounter Christ, there will be a transition. Will you choose to see? How, how do you, how do you approach transitions in new beginnings? How do you do that? See, here's the thing. If God is who he said he is, then we don't have to fear when life takes us in a direction we hadn't planned. So that's at one level. But the second thing that I would say is this. When you give your life to Christ, you will experience a transition. You don't have a choice because we have a plan and a trajectory for our life. Prior to Jesus, it is not God's plan and trajectory for our life, it's my own. When we give our life to God, what Paul says is, I died. It's not me. Who lives? It's Christ, who lives in me, right? My life isn't mine anymore. And so what I have to be willing to do is to say, I had a plan, God, but it's yours now do with as you see fit. That takes faith. And it will take you to some places you hadn't planned, but I guarantee you this, it will be better than anything that you could come up with on your own. It will be better than anything you can come up with on your own. How do you experience transitions --  fear and trepidation? I don't know if we're going to make it, Or do you believe that Jesus is the door? Come on, let's go! And you're like, I don't know where we're going. And he's like, I know. Cool. Right? So that'd be better than what we could come up with on our own implication. Number two, when you came to know Christ, what, what really changed? Like if we're going to experience a transition, when we follow the Lord, which we are, we're gonna experience lots of them. Some of them are these global transitions that we're experiencing right now. But when you came to know Christ, what really changed? Like did, did you, I don't know, like, did we really give our life to Jesus and say, God, take it where you want it to go and that's fine. Or did we go, Hey, I have a plan and I've worked really hard to kind of bubble wrap my life financially and emotionally and spiritually. I've been, I've been working really hard to kind of keep things safe for me. I'm walking around like Gumby cause I got bubble wrap all over me. I'm, I'm good. I just need to get out of hell. So Jesus, that's your job in my plan. And Jesus is like, and then he, this you're pleading. That's what Jesus does with your plan. When you came to know Christ, what really changed? I know there's so many people that are like, I gave my life to Jesus and it didn't go the way I had it planned. I'm out. Well, it wasn't your plan anymore. Jesus is the door. He's the God of transitions. He's the one who takes us where he sees fit.

Which leads us to our third implication: Jesus is the door. He shows us how to do life and who God is. And I want you to think about this for a second. Why does Jesus have dinner with sinners? Why does he touch the untouchables? Why does he minister to the sick, the broken, the tax collectors, the prostitutes, the dregs of their society. Why does he care so much about them? Here's why, because that's what God's like. And if we don't somehow allow that to penetrate our souls, we're missing out on a major piece of where God wants to take us. Reconciliation between people who shouldn't be reconciled, that is God's business because his desire is the reconciliation of all things. And that word in the Greek, that's translated all things. You know what it means? all things. It’s a really good translation, but there's a profound implication. We don't get to escape because we're like, yeah, I'll try. I'll I'll reconcile most things. But some things I just don't really care about that. No, you have to care because if you're going to let Jesus be the door and allow him to take you where he takes you, you got to go where he went. Why? Because that's what God's like. Jesus is the door. And he shows us how to do life and who God is. You just have to be willing to go there. 

Here's implication number four. This isn’t something new. That at some level, the church has been just trying really hard to avoid it. We've tried to feel like that we can appease our spiritual duty by doing things other than -- they're good things --there's nothing wrong with the things that we're doing. It's just not where God would want to take us. And in the world that we're in right now, like I think the church ought to lead the charge on racial reconciliation. And I'll say this, I'll say this. There are some people who are like, I’m not prejudiced. I believe you. I believe you. That doesn't mean that racial reconciliation isn't a part of the world that we live in and the church should be initiating. So if you're not prejudiced, prove it. Like, we can't just sit back and go, well, if somebody came to me, I would be nice. That's not racial reconciliation. Racial reconciliation is Jesus as the door going, Hey, or here, move, move, move. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Boom. The way it's open. And we are initiating the relationship. Church has got to lead the charge in these places, in our culture, the church has gotta lead the charge. Like we don't get to sit back and go, well, if it happens, if it comes to me, we'll deal with it. 
That's not Jesus being the door of our life. I don't believe there's a person in here that would say that they're prejudiced. I don't believe any of us are. I think we just need to initiate what it would look like to actually be reconciled to one another. And we can because our God is a God of reconciliation.

And so I, I just want to invite us as we think about communion time. I want to invite us to this question to wrestle with for just a little bit, do we really let Jesus be the door? Do we allow him to move us into these uncomfortable transitions? Do we allow himm to take us into these places we haven't been? Or do we run from them and kind of try to protect ourselves and say, yeah, but I believe in God and I'm doing okay. You know, not murdering anybody, um, those kinds of things like, or, or are we like, no, no, no, no. We're going to go. We're going to be right in God's hip pocket. As he storms the Gates of hell, because there are people's lives that are depending on it. Let's take a minute and sit with that. As we move forward.

On the night, Jesus was betrayed. He took bread and he broke it. He said, this is my body, which has given for you. So whenever you eat this bread, do it in remembrance of me. After the dinner, he took a cup and he said, this is the new covenant and my blood, which is shed for you. So whenever you drink this cup, do it in remembrance of me.

Let’s pray. God, thank you that all these transitions and all the insecurity that comes with them and the risk and the danger and all those things, that you're the God of all of it. And that you're not inviting us to timidly come in, hoping that things will work out, but that you're inviting us to storm those opportunities to blow open the door, to run with passion into these new horizons that you're taking us, knowing that no matter what it costs, that you're the God of all of it. And that in you we will be okay. God, I pray that you would give us the courage to live in that truth in your name. Amen.

Let's stand and sing one more time.