Come, See, Stay: What Followers Do
Watermark Community Church
Series: The Visible Image (The Book of John, Message 5)
http://www.watermarkradio.com/index.php?id=153&channel=-1&series=210&message=2
Come, See, Stay: What Followers Do
Open John with me. We are in John, chapter 1. Let me set up where we have been because these last couple of weeks we've been out of this book, but in John, chapter 1, really what you have in verses 1 through 18 is John the disciple who is telling you, "I have seen Him. You no longer need to wonder what the highest truth is. I have met Truth. You no longer need to know where life is. I have met the Author and Giver of life. You no longer need to wonder how be reconciled to God. I have met God, and He has reconciled us to Himself through grace."
John said, "We have seen the Word. We have seen the One who is God, and we have beheld His glory, and He is filled with grace and truth." That's John the disciple's testimony in verses 1 through 18. Then in John, chapter 1, verse 19, you have this guy named John the Baptist, and this is way verse 19 goes. It says, "'This is the testimony of John' the Baptist." This is what this guy thinks.
So in verses 19 down through verse 34, you have John saying, "I am not the Messiah. I am not Elijah. I am not the prophet who is the Messiah. I am not the Word. I am a voice. I am not the Light. I just came to bear testimony to the Light. I baptize with water. I baptize with water. I baptize with water," he says three times in those fifteen verses.
"But there's another One coming after me who won't just have some ritual, some symbolic washing and identification, but somebody who will actually baptize you in the Spirit," which was an eschatological promise, a fulfillment of Ezekiel and Jeremiah. There would be a day that God would reconcile people to Himself, and they would be indwelt with His Spirit, and He will baptize you into relationship with Him.
What John the Baptist did is he was calling folks to leave the corruption of the Pharisaical system that was in Jerusalem, to come out of that religion, that effort to be reconciled to God apart from the provision of Christ and the Messiah and the corruption that was there. He called them away from Jerusalem out to the desert to study the Word of God and to look at what the Scriptures said about righteousness.
He had many disciples, and he was calling Jews to come out, and he was baptizing Jews which you never did. Gentiles got baptized when they left the corruption of their godless ways to identify with Judaism. They were the ones who were physically baptized. They didn't just go through spiritual washings like the Jews did. They were identified in submerging themselves in a need for complete and total cleansing, not just a little washing.
John said, "You religious people who are not trusting in God's provision but in yourself, you need to identify yourself with God's provision. You need to repent and prepare yourself for the coming King. I am not that King, but I want to prepare the way for Him. Repent," John declared.
Then John said these great words, "Behold! There He is! That's the Lamb of God." Now when you hear that little phrase, if you were an individual who studied the Scripture, if you were a righteous Jew, then you would have known, Oh my goodness! You're saying, "That's the One who is the fulfillment of the long anticipated provision of God?"
If you knew your patriarchs (as I mentioned), you'd know that the chosen son, the son of promise, was delivered from death, and the need to be sacrificed before God because of, if you will, the offense against God, that you knew God put a ram in the thicket, that God provided so that that chosen one could live. You'd know that the Passover lamb was the one the nation hid behind so that the angel of death when he came and brought judgment to the land of Egypt that he would pass over you if you sheltered yourself underneath the blood of the lamb.
Jesus says later in John, chapter 5, verse 24, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life." So, you'll know He is the Passover Lamb. He's that One whom you can shelter yourself underneath and judgment will pass over you.
You'll know Isaiah 52 and 53. This is the Lamb of God who offered Himself up, who went to slaughter without uttering a word for you that you might be reconciled to God. So when John said, "This is the Guy," there were a number of folks who were ready to follow Him, and they weren't going to try and earn their own salvation. They were going to trust in the provision of God. That's John 1:1 through 34.
When you get to 34, John the Baptist summarizes his effort to communicate to you with this line where he says in verse 34, "And I have seen and have borne witness that this is the Son of God." You see that? John the disciple said, "We have beheld His glory. I have seen Him." This is not just some metaphysical idea. We have seen God. He is come into this world. John the Baptist: "We have seen and told you He is here."
See the reason so many folks recommend you read the gospel of John is because of what it demands from you, which is a response. You can reject the witness of all the folks who now are going to be paraded before you, but the question becomes at the end of the day…What are you going to do with this Jesus?
In the gospel of John there's an effort for you to see you have to do something with this Jesus. You have to decide who He is. Is He very God of very God? Is He the One who is the Creator of all things, the One who was before John the Baptist said, "…me"? Even though John was born on this earth, he said, "This One existed before me." Why? "Because He is God." Who do you say that Jesus is?
Now what I love about this passage we're about to look at…This is one of those passages you might be reading devotionally one day, and you kind of go, Alright, I read that. So what? What difference is that going to make in my life?
 Let me just read to you John, chapter 1:35 down through 42, and then let's study it together. Now when you read this, it's interesting because John, the author of this gospel, it's like you're just ripping pages out of his journal. What he's doing is he's saying John the Baptist on one day he answered questions from the Pharisees and he identified Jesus as the Lamb of God. He goes, "Then the next day, and then the next day."
Then you'll find in John, chapter 2, verse 1, "Then 'the third day'" It's like he's just giving you a blow by blow, day by day account. Now everything we read today is on one day, but here you have in verse 35, "Again the next day John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as He walked, and said, 'Behold, the Lamb of God!'
 The two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus. And Jesus turned and saw them following, and said to them, 'What do you seek?' They said to Him, 'Rabbi (which translated means Teacher), where are You staying?' He said to them, 'Come, and you will see.' So they came and saw where He was staying; and they stayed with Him that day, for it was about the tenth hour.
 One of the two who heard John speak and followed Him, was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. He found first his own brother Simon and said to him, 'We have found the Messiah' (which translated means Christ). He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, 'You are Simon the son of John; you shall be called Cephas' (which is translated Peter)."
Now what I love about that is you read that and you go, Okay, that's what I came for? That? That's why I opened my Bible today? What difference is that going to make in my life? What am I called to respond to in that text? What I want to do is I'm going to unpack this. I'm going to give you six observations from this little section of Scripture. I will tell you, if you'll just sit with the Bible and look at it and pray and study and reflect and read in it and around it, you will go, My goodness, the truth that is there!
 You want to look at what Christ said; you want to look at how folks responded to Him. What you have here is the beginning of the church, or if you will, the very first two followers of Jesus. You're going to see what a follower is, and you're going to see what Jesus thinks of His followers and what He desires for His followers, and you're going to see tremendous application for you. So let's dive in.
Here we go. Verse 35: John was standing there with two of his disciples, guys whom he had been telling about the coming Messiah, whom he'd been studying Scriptures with, whom he'd been remembering about the provision of the ram and the thicket with Abraham, whom they had remembered the provision of the blood in Egypt when God passed over them and delivered them by grace through faith through the provision of another. They'd been studying Isaiah, they'd been looking for the long-expected One, the Consolation of Israel.
John knew that One was coming. He even knew Jesus at some level, but he did not know Jesus was the One, he told us, until the Spirit of God revealed it to him. "That One. That's the One. He's the Messiah." When John identified Him, he took his disciples, and he said, "There He is. That's the Guy."
Now I love what happens. There are two men who have been following John who are disciples of John the Baptist. We know that one of them you'll see definitively is Andrew, the brother of Peter. The other one most folks believe (and I happen to agree) was John, the author of the gospel, that he was seeking just clarity on where righteousness came from. Not through the traditions of men, not through the broken perverted system of Judaism that had begun to trust in its own traditions itself and had lost its contrite and broken spirit and was more concerned with form than function.
So young John you're going to find was there. He beheld these things. He knew these things. He's an eyewitness to these deals. So what happens is that John says, "There He is. You go after Him." I love the fact that John is eager to let them go. Those guys had been taught well, and if you are taught well, you will always have your teacher have you grow in your affection for Christ and not just your teacher.
Let me say that again. One of the things that's a problem so much today and especially around Dallas with a lot of gifted teachers and now with the advent of the Internet and podcasts and things like that is everybody has their pet guy whom they love. It's Piper. It's Chandler. It's Nelson. It's Stanley. It's Wagner. Who cares who it is! But I want to tell you, all of those men are doing you a great disservice, we are doing you a great disservice, I am doing you a great disservice if I don't increase your affections for Christ, and we must decrease and Christ must increase.
Now we should all appreciate the gifts we have for one another and the way we use those gifts to serve and to build up one another, but at the end of the day, if you have a teacher whom you are falling more in love with than your Messiah then that is a bad teacher. I love what John says. "I have to get out of the way. This is the Guy. I am not the Guy. That's the Guy. Follow Him." We are not the thing…Watermark…I am not the guy, not that any of you thought for a second I might be, but my goal is for your affections to grow for Christ, not for me.
Now honestly, if you're somebody who causes my affections to grow for Christ, I'm going to love you and be grateful to you for it, but you're going to keep trying to get out of the way. Now rightly should you be able to say, "Hey, imitate me as I imitate Christ, but I am not the Word. I am a voice. I am not the Light. I bear witness to the Light. I'm a lamp stand." That's what the church is.
Now I love Watermark. I invite people to come to Watermark all the time. Why? Because Watermark is a lamp stand, meaning we hold up the Light, and we want men to come to the Light, but we're not trying to get you committed to Watermark. Watermark is the body. We're trying to get you to fall in love with the Head, and that's why the body has to be obedient to the Head.
So John says, "This is the guy." Two guys heard him speak and they followed Jesus. First observation. You ready? When you really believe who Jesus is, you will follow Him. When you really believe who Jesus, this is what you do: you begin to follow Him. You go, Are you kidding me? That's the observation? Yes. Now let me explain this to you.
When you are an individual who comes to great clarity about Christ, the Word, very God of very God, the One who can redeem and who cares for you and who desires good for you, who in His presence is fullness of joy and in His right hands are pleasures forever, who no good thing does He withhold from those who love Him, who is a Shepherd to you little lost sheep, who is a Head to you little body who needs direction, you will then begin to say, "Not just have I made some profession of faith in Him, not only have I accepted Him as a sacrifice for me, but He is my Father, my Lord, my God. I will follow Him."
I'm right now teaching a Bible study with a bunch of dads and fifth-grade boys in one of the things I do during the week with some of the guys I live in town with who go to school with my son. This week I was teaching a lesson. We're using the metaphor of a training camp to help these kids understand what it means to follow Christ.
I was just talking to them about the role of a coach. Tom Landry once said, "The role of a coach is to get people to do what they don't want to do so they can be who they want to be." So I was just telling them, "Guys, what is the purpose of a coach installing an offense?" They're fifth graders. "I don't know." So I told them. "The purpose of an offense is to give you a way to move the ball down the field that you might accomplish your goal, that you might score, that others would watch you move in the direction you intend and should go, and they go, 'That right there, they have it going on! They are moving the ball down the field.'
As a man, you are becoming more of what a man should be. Others should watch the offense you're running in the way you live and see you execute in a way that is penetrating that which is trying to resist you being a person of glory. This is who God is," I said. "He wants you to live in such a way that the glory that is lost because of sin is restored because of truth and righteousness and clarity of thinking."
So I said to these guys, "Here is God's offense. Number one, trust in the Lord. Number two, lean not on your own understanding. Number three, in all your ways acknowledge Him, and when you do that, He will make your paths straight and folks will look at you and marvel." When you have an effective offense that scores at will, that accomplishes that which it intends, people throw you parades. People marvel at your greatness.
I said, "This is who God is! Okay? I want you to know He is the provision for your sin, but the reason He's provision for your sin is because He is glorious and perfect, and He is glorious and perfect not just in His sacrifice but in His person, and His person calls you to live for Him and live with Him. To not lean on your own understanding; you must follow Him."
People ask me sometimes, "Well are you a Christian?" I just go, "Well define that because depending on how you define that I may or may not answer it." The word Christian has become so watered down and ineffective that I almost don't even use it. When folks ask me to tell me about themselves, I mention to them, "I am a follower of Christ." That's who I am. I follow Him. In other words, I don't lean on my own understanding. In all my ways I want to acknowledge Him. I trust in the Lord.
Now I don't always do that, but sometimes part of learning my offense is when I run a play I don't listen to the coach, and I audible and run a Wagner, and I'm sacked or get intercepted or do something wrong, I then begin to run His offense again. I seek forgiveness. I acknowledge what I did was self-willed, and I do what I can to make restitution, and I run His offense again. When I do that, people go, "That's not normal." Folks don't usually execute that way when they fail. We move the ball down the field.
So look, let me just tell you something. What you want to be is not just somebody who owns a Bible and not a Qur'an, somebody who wears a cross and not a Star of David. You don't want to call yourself a Christian and not an agnostic or an atheist. Listen, you don't even want to be somebody who just says, "I believe I'm a sinner and Christ died for me."
When you really believe who Christ is…and by the way, do all those things. Own a Bible and not a Qur'an. Acknowledge you're a sinner and Christ died for you, but when you really believe who Christ is, you will follow Him.
So one of the things I had those dads and sons do is "You come," I said last Wednesday, "and you tell me one thing you did because you are a follower of Christ." Now the reality is we always think it has to be something dramatic like, "Oh, I drilled a well in Africa this week," or "I decided to sponsor a kid."
Let me just tell you something. If all you do is have a picture of a kid on your refrigerator, good for you. That doesn't make you a Christ-follower. A Christ-follower is somebody who says, "Rabbi, teach me. I want to learn how to interact with others, I want to learn to walk through this life, I want to learn how to do everything I do the way You, Rabbi, You Teacher (that's what rabbi means) tell me to do." Why? "Because You're not just a normal Teacher. You are very God of very God, and You love me, and You have an offense that if I execute, it will restore me to glory."
It won't make me perfect. That's why I need a Savior, but it will make me be an individual who now begins to execute. When you really believe who Christ is…let me just say this to you one more time…you don't have a Bible by your bed. You trust Him.
So I told the kids, "What did you do? What did you do this week because you're a Christian, which is to say, a Christ-follower?" If you can't tell me that, then you might have made a profession of faith somewhere along the way, but you are not accomplishing that which God intends for you if you are not parapateo, walking with Him. That's what Christ says. "Abide in Me," meaning, "You hang with Me. You walk with Me. You follow Me."
Jesus never says, "Come, make a profession of your need for a Savior, acknowledge you're a sinner, acknowledge that if I don't die for you you're going to hell, and carry on." But don't we act like that? You know what Christ says? I'm going to show you what He says actually in a minute, but I want to tell what you are to do…Follow Me, meaning Christ.
Are you a Christ-follower, or are you somebody who has checked the box that I believe this thing happened, and I guess I'm okay because I say I'm a sinner? No, do you know what it means to be a sinner, that you are broken, that every aspect of your reasoning and your morality and your desire has been tainted by sin, and if you appeal to yourself in any form or fashion, you will not be executing His offense?
So you deny yourself, and you say, "I'm not going to go to how I feel. I'm not going to go toward what I want. I'm going to trust in the Lord. I'm going to acknowledge Him. I'm going to not lean on my own understanding."
So I said to these kids, "Alright, here's one. What did you do this morning when mom said (and I picked on my own son because I was there), 'Go brush your teeth before you go out'? You rolled your eyes, and you go, 'Mom! No! We'll just eat a doughnut at Bible study anyway.'" I go, "Whose offense was that that you were running right there? How did that work out for you by the way? What would have been Christ's offense?"
Because you're a Christ-follower, you go, "You know what? I don't want to run back upstairs and brush my teeth again, but I'm going to do it because God has given me this provision of a mother who wants me to have teeth when I smile a little bit later in life, so I'm going to go upstairs," and while I'm on my way upstairs, I see my brother's shoes that he didn't take up last night when his parents told him to. I'm going to pick up his shoes without wanting to be patted on the back, and when I go upstairs anyway, I'm going to carry them up there, I'm going to lay them by his bed, I'm going to notice my bed is not made, I'm going to make it, I'm going to turn my light off, see the lights are on in my sister's room, and shut them off. I'm going to come down, and I'm going to tell my mom, "Mom, I love you. Thank you," and head out to the car.
Why? Because I want to? Does that feel good? Is that what 11-year-old boys do? No. They roll their eyes and they moan about everything. They run their own offense. Alright? Do you know what 50-year-olds do? Very similar stuff because they run their own offense, and it is not well. I'm not moving the ball down the field. I don't have children throwing me a parade because of the grace and love that flows from me when I execute my offense. When you really believe in Christ…have I made this point yet? …you follow Him. How are you doing at following Him and leaning not on your own understanding?
Secondly, right there, okay? I love this. Verse 38: Now Jesus turned and He saw. "I have two, baby!" I mean, He's on the map! You can't be a leader unless someone is following you, right? The old saying is, "If you're out there leading and others aren't following you, then you're not a leader. You're just taking a walk."
So up until this time, Jesus had just been taking a walk, and all of a sudden He turns around, and He goes, I think someone is following Me. I think this is going to work out. I might be the Messiah. Of course, He's not thinking that. We would be, but He's not. There are two! So what are you going to do if you have your first two? Go, "Alright, man, I'm so glad you're here! We can get this thing started. It's going to be fun. You're going to like it. Just hang with me here. I mean, you two first. I mean, good"?
No. You know what Jesus does? Look what He says. "'What do you seek?' What do you want? Why are you following Me?" I love this. This is huge. This is what Christ is going to say to you tonight: "Why are you here? What do you want from Me? Who do you say that I am? 'What do you seek?'"
See because there are some folks out there who have bought this lie that if you come into a relationship with God that it's all going to be well with you. You're going to lose…well, your wife will lose 10 pounds, you'll get a raise, and your kids will obey you. Or if you're a woman, your husband will lose 25 pounds, he'll get a raise, and he will obey you! Okay, that'd be even better. But that's not what happens.
God says, "Look, okay, what do you seek? What do you want? Who do you think I am? Do you think it's going to be easy for you? Is that why you're going to follow Me because now I'm going to be here?" Because why?
Let me just say this. The Jews rejected who Christ was for this reason. You see, when Christ walked in three years later from this moment into the city of Jerusalem, word was out that this Dude raises the dead, walks on water, calms storms, and feeds multitudes, that lepers are healed, the lame walk, and blind see. This is the Guy! Word was out.
There were more than a few folks following Him at that moment, and they thought, Okay, here comes the consolation of Israel. Here comes the Guy who's going to take us all the way. Let's get the palm branches out, let's lay our cloak down, let's prepare the way for the King so there's nothing in the way of Him and His donkey. Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest! God save us! Here's the Messiah!
 Then what happened? A few days later, "Crucify Him! Crucify Him!" What in the world happened? I'll tell you what happened. They were seeking a Messiah on their own terms. They wanted God to do what they wanted Him to do. They thought God was going to be again a great political leader, a military genius who would usher them into a time of great economic prosperity. Just what you and I want.
If I told this country there was going to be a great deliverer who was going to come, and I said, "He's either going to deliver from the morass of your own moral failure, your own blindness, your own unrighteousness, and your own chaos of sin, or I could tell you there would be one who would get rid of the gridlock in Washington, deal with this foe we have out there who is making all of us show every nook and cranny of our body as we go through the airport, and eliminate our worldwide enemies militarily so that we can live in peace again, and restore confidence in the dollar and get us out of this cycle of debt which is going to lead to certain coming destruction," which one of those two Messiahs do you want?
I have to tell you a thousand to one, this country will take that second one. What they don't understand is that it's the first problem that leads to the second group of issues. What Jesus was going to do to these folks is He's going to say, "Let Me just tell you something. Your problem isn't Caesar; your problem is sin. You just want Me to run Rome out of Israel, and I need to run unrighteousness out of you. Once we deal with that and you begin to follow Me, we'll take care of Rome, but we have to get Egypt out of you before we worry about getting you out of Egypt. That's the problem."
So Christ is saying, "'What do you seek?' Are you wanting Me to be a King? I'm not going to be that kind of King just yet. I'm going to be a Lamb first and then the Lion. You make no mistake, there will be a glorious day and I deal with all unrighteousness, but just so that I'm not alone, I must create righteous so when I come to get rid of all unrighteousness those unrighteous ones will not be totally consumed. There will be a few righteous who have identified with the Lamb of God and walk in faith with Me and have been reconciled to Me. Then we will deal with sin one day."
Do you get this? What do you seek? Do you seek a wife? Is that why you're here? You seek a husband? Do you seek a guaranteed series of positive reports from your doctor when you go get your mammogram this year that there will be no cancer in your breasts? Is that what you seek? He doesn't promise that.
See, I want to just tell you there are folks who are out there in churches all around this community and around the world who look a lot like ours who are selling this nonsense that if you come into relationship with Christ, it will be well with you in a physical, material way, that there is health, wealth, and prosperity for those who follow Jesus. That is completely inconsistent with Scripture. It comes from a perverted view of equating Israel and the church together and taking the contractual agreement God had with the nation of Israel in the Old Testament as He promised them as a revelation of who He was that if they walked in obedience and humility before Him that He would give them peace with their enemies.
There was only a few times in the nation of Israel's history, in the reign of David and slowly into the reign of Solomon, these periods of great blessing that there was some shadow of that, but by and large Israel never really received it. What were contractual and conditional statements to Israel in the Old Testament, people have made unconditional promises to Christ in the New, and it comes from a perverted understanding of Scripture, and it sets people up for a great deal of despair.
What do you do when a guy's six-year-old gets cancer? Are you going to tell him it's because he didn't have enough faith? What do you do when a guy who is faithful loses his job? Are you going to say it's because he doesn't love God? Â I've watched men have to do this to defend their theology. I've watched them say, "The reason your husband died is because you didn't give enough. You weren't faithful enough because God always blesses people who follow Him." Really? That is not consistent with the New Testament.
In your New Testament which you have, is that the sign (if anything) of being a fully devoted follower of Christ is not prosperity; it is persecution. Second Timothy 3:12: "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." Paul said, "Three times I have asked God to deliver me from this sickness or from this oppression, and God has said, 'No, but "My grace is sufficient for you" in your weakness.'" "Most gladly therefore," he says, "I boast in my weakness." He goes on to say, "I am going to be 'content…with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties…'" Why? "Because I'm not following Him to make it easy now. This is when I carry my cross."
What do you seek? Are you going to be after Him as long as it goes well with you? Then you are not ready to be His disciple. I love this. Matthew, chapter 8: This is a consistent message throughout Christ's life. When there are a few more folks who are following Him a little bit later in Matthew, chapter 8, verses 18 through 24, watch what happens.
It says, "Now when Jesus saw a crowd around Him…" not just two, but this group of two had grown, "…He gave orders to depart to the other side of the sea. Then a scribe came and said to Him, 'Teacher, I will follow You wherever You go.' Jesus said to him, 'The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.'" "You still want to follow Me?"
See a lot of times students would want to be in certain rabbinical schools because the dorms were nice. The food was good. There was prestige in being one of that guy's disciples. Jesus says, "You want afflictions? You want persecutions? You want distresses? You want to give your life away? You want to drink of the cup I drink? Follow Me. What do you seek? Why are you here? What do you want? Prosperity, health, wealth? I'm not going to promise it."
Jesus says, "'My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled…' I'm going to give you a different peace, not conditional peace, but faith in the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen, and I'm going to have you take up your cross and follow Me right now. There'll be a day, a glorious day, that I will return, but right now, let's go to war. What do you seek? A political king? A military genius? An economic Savior? Somebody who will hook you up and give you a love, or somebody who is the love you're looking for?" I love that. It's right here all in John.
So it goes on, and these guys… When Jesus says that by the way that the foxes didn't have a hole and the birds of the air don't have a nest, what's the next thing that happens? If you jump right down there to verse 23, it says Jesus got into the boat and those who stuck with Him after that little discourse, after He told somebody else, "Let the dead bury their dead." It says they got into a boat and they began to cross the sea.
What happened to the sea? They sailed right into a storm. During that storm Jesus was asleep, and they go, "Well don't You care about us?" They tried to wake Him, and they eventually did wake Him. "'Save us, Lord; we are perishing!' He said to them, 'Why are you afraid, you men of little faith?' If you're with Me there will be perfect peace." "He…rebuked the winds and the sea…"
Just to clarify, let me just tell you who's in control in this boat. Not Mother Nature, but Creator God, and He's in the boat with you. Don't you be concerned about cancer because Christ is in that boat with you. Don't you be concerned about the trial because the faithful One is in that marriage with you. Don't you be concerned about the economy because you're not living for wealth on this earth if you're His follower. So Christ is saying very clearly here, "What do you seek? I'm not going to tell you calm waters; I'm going to tell you relationship with Me. If you want to be restored to God, come on."
I love what the disciples say next. In John, chapter 1, now look right there in verse 38 still. "They said to Him, 'Rabbi (which translated means Teacher), where are You staying?'" The word there is the same word that shows up again and again throughout the book of John. It's the word meno. It means abide. It does mean to rest or to associate with. "'If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you…' If you stay here."
 You could easily say, "Where is Your abode? Where can I go and be with You? We want to go and stay where You stay." Christ was going to tell them in just a minute. In effect, "Well look, I'm not telling you we're going to go to a nice fancy house. This is not Harvard with coiffed lawns and really nice dorm rooms, but there is veritas. There is truth here, and there is life here, and this is the way. Follow Me, but not for the dorm rooms, not for the nice frat houses. Follow Me because I am the Teacher, and I alone have the authority to reprove, rebuke, to correct, and train in righteousness so that you might be adequate, prepared for every good work."
"We just want to be with You. You are the Lamb. You are the long-anticipated Messiah. You are eternal Father. You are Prince of Peace. You are Wonderful Counselor. You are mighty God. We just want to be where You are." To which Christ says, "Come on then. I'll give you some of that. Come."
Now I love what happens next. When you follow Jesus…let me just say this to you. Here's an observation I just made. When you follow Jesus, it won't be because of where He stays geographically or materially what He offers you. It's going to be because of where He stays theologically and morally.
So what do you really get? Let's talk about what you get when you're a Christian. Here's what you get. You get forgiveness. Alright? You become regenerate. In other words, you no longer think with a fallen, corrupt mind. You have understood that man has left good, that man knows right and wrong, but he doesn't choose right because rightness does not dwell in him.
So you become regenerate. You begin to be spiritually appraised. You know there is a God who is good who wants to reconcile you to Himself. So you begin to follow Him. You are no longer a slave to your flesh. You are redeemed by the blood of the Lamb in order that you might begin now to walk freely. Freedom doesn't mean you can do whatever you want to do. We're already free in that sense. Freedom biblically is having the freedom to not do what the body that leads to death and destruction wants to do.
I now have the freedom to go, "I understand now why I craved those things. I understand now why the current of the world carries me that way. I understand now why the enemy makes it so appealing to disobey God, but I am free to rebuke that lie. I am free to resist that broken flesh, and I am free to follow truth."That's what you get when you become a follower of Christ. You see clearly things which eye hasn't seen, ear hasn't heard, things which have never entered into the hearts of man. All these things God has freely given to those who love Him.
But you're not going to go hang out with God. Again, this is that error again. Do you remember this? This week, Steve Johnson, last Sunday, do you remember Steve Johnson? He's the leading wide receiver for the Buffalo Bills. Steve Johnson…do you remember…dropped a pass last week playing the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Bills had lost seven games in a row. Then they won two, and they were about to win their third against Pittsburgh. Steve Johnson in overtime got wide open on a corner route, about a 45-yard pass was spot on, hit that brother in the hands, and he dropped it. This photo was taken as he sat there and cost his team the victory.
A little bit later on the bench, he's just sitting there looking dejected, and his problem wasn't that he looked dejected in the end zone, he looked dejected on the bench, Pittsburgh ended up getting the ball back, going down, and kicking a game-winning field goal and beating his team. His problem was when he went back home and picked up his iPad, and he got his little Twitter account out, and he threw this up there.
He said, "I praise You 24/7!!! And this how You do me!!! You expect me to learn from this??? How??? I'll never forget this!! Ever!! Thx Tho." I kind of like that at the end. So Steve Johnson to his credit a little bit later came back, and this is by the way why 23-year-olds should not have Twitter accounts.
It's normal to go through these kind of cycles, but what he did is very publically he just said, "God, I followed You. I praise You 24/7, and I drop…" He dropped about five passes that game, that one most famously. I want to say, "Steve, is that why you're following Him? The promise wasn't if you follow Him that you'll catch everything thrown your way. You're not going to become Flypaper Williams if you know Jesus Christ. Sometimes, Sam the sinner hits the three and Bill the believer will shoot an air ball because God is not ultimately consumed about that little sport outing. He is concerned about your heart, and He doesn't frankly care much about the Bills and Steelers."
What He cares about is you, and you follow Him not because of what house He's going to give you or what material you're going to gain. You follow Him because theologically He can reconcile you to truth, and morally you run His offense. The way you handled that drop pass, man just look at you. Let me just tell you something. The world is filled with rich men. It is not filled with men who are rich in good works, and when the world watches you be rich in good works whether you're rich or poor, they're going to say, "May there be more men like you. We don't need more rich men in this earth. We need more men who are rich in good works whether they're rich or poor." That's God's offense.
My buddy Matt Chandler who a year ago almost to the day about a month ago was diagnosed with cancer. He had a tumor in his head and went through some rather major surgery. Matt never in any way felt like God owed him healing. I can remember right before he went into surgery, he said, "Todd, I'll either wake up tomorrow to glorious revelation, or I will wake again to a foggy awareness of the goodness of God." In other words, "If I'm still here, I'll have some sense God is good, but I won't know as fully as I might know if I don't come back out of this thing."
Well as it turns out, God has chosen it looks like for Matt to have more than a bit of a miraculous recovery. Not in any small part through I'm sure the hand of skilled doctors whom God has given great ability to, but at the end of the day, the Lord is the One who said, "Matt, your days aren't over at least for now, at least not for this purpose today."
So he blogged something this week I want to read to you. This is what you get by the way. He had a number of things in his blog, and one of the things he wrote down, he said, "This is the only thing that matters in my life is that I am His." Now watch what he says. This is what you get when you become a follower of Christ.
"If you ask people about me, depending on who they are, they will tell you I am a husband, father, preacher, leader, son, brother, friend, etc. When we were prepping for surgery, they went over this long list of things that were 'possibilities.' I could lose the ability to speak, walk and lose short-term or long-term memories. The list was much longer, but I think you get the point. I am primarily known as a pastor and preacher, but here's the truth that slammed into me when I was wrestling with God over this surgery. One day I am not going to preach or pastor; one day I am not going to be Lauren's husband or my kids' father. All the things that define me here will be gone, and I will simply be His. I'm still meditating on that. That's all I really am…His. Now, while He gives me breath there are sermons to preach and people to shepherd, children to impart the glory of God to and an extremely beautiful wife to love. All these things are shadows of a greater reality."
What I know is that I am His, and so when I can't preach anymore, when I can't run fast anymore, when I drop balls (and you're going to drop them), is it enough just to be His? One day you're not going to be a president of a bank. One day you're not going to be a college athlete. One of these days, you're not going to be married, you're not going to be dad, you're not going to be healthy. Are you His? If you're His, then what else matters? So when you follow Him, you follow Him. You want to stay with Him not because of where He is geographically, but because where He is theologically. He is very God of very God.
I like this. "…and they stayed with Him…" They went to see where He was staying. It says a little bit later. Oh excuse me, I jumped. "He said to them, 'Come, and you will see.'" This is so great. Christ doesn't say, "See, and then you'll come." In other words, "I'm not here to do a bunch of tricks for you and make you happy so that you'll stay and come on back."
By the way, this is what a lot of churches are getting into these days, right? I want to come and tickle your ears. I'm going to give you a show you'll like." Listen, we rightly put excellence into everything we do up here. I try to be fairly creative in the way I communicate, but at the end of the day, I'm not trying to have you see so you'll keep coming here. What I want to do is invite you to come and follow Christ will me, and you will see that He is who I'm claiming He will be.
Romans 12:2: "And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…" In other words, you follow the Word of God, and then it says, "…so that you may prove…" It will flesh out in your life. You will personally experience "…what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect."
So here's the deal: Don't ask me why you're not experiencing the abundant life. I'm going to say, "Follow Christ. Walk with Him. Don't do what you want to do. Run His offense, and you will see." What? That your wife will lose weight, that you'll get a raise? No! But it is a better way to live. You will then have proved out in your life…that's what that means…what the will of God is. It is a good will. It is an acceptable will. It is a perfect will for you. He has your best interest in mind. Christ said, "Come and see." Not, "I'll deal up what you want so that you'll keep coming. Come and see. You have to follow Me."
I was talking to a guy today who at first made a profession to want to follow Christ, and then we told him what he had to do, and he goes, "I'm not doing that." I go, "Well we're still going to be friends, but let's just be very clear right here. I can't give you what you want until you come and get it." "Well, I'm not convinced anymore He is the Christ."
I mean, this literally happened after the second service. I told him, "This is your next step." He goes, "I don't want to do that." I go, "Well just so you're clear here, this is not my opinion. This is the Christ you said you wanted to follow because somebody told me they prayed with this guy out here that he would receive Christ and trust in Him."
It was my message, and he wanted a Savior. But he came in and said, "Okay now that I'm a part of your team, are you guys going to give me what I want?" I go, "No, no, no, no, no. Come and see. You need to do A, B, and C." "Well I thought when this happened, you guys would give me a room, you'd give me cash, you'd give me money, and I could keep hanging out with you guys and all this stuff I've done would go away." "No, this is the next step."
"How do you know?" "Well let's turn to Matthew 5, let's turn to Matthew 7. Come and see, and eventually you will see God's way is good, and acceptable, and perfect, but if you're going to just CLEP out to this, and if you don't get this today, if you're going to go, then no mistake you aren't following Christ. You're trying to follow a plan that will get you what you want."
"Come and see," He says. "You have to walk with Me. You have to put this thing and execute this thing and put it to play."
Here's my next point…When you really follow Jesus, you're not going to be disappointed.
Anybody else you follow…do you know that? …anybody else you follow, you're going to be disappointed. I love what we're doing right now in our Foundation Groups. If you're a young married couple, and you're not in a Foundation Group, you're missing out. Get with other young couples that first year, two years of your marriage with a marriage mentor, going through some curriculum that we have seen consistently set you up and lay a foundation.
One of the books you're going to read in that little class is called When Sinners Say "I Do." The reason we're having you read that is because some of you guys are going into marriage, and you think you have just found your Shangri La, but you will be disappointed. It is not long. There is nowhere in life that you can…There's no club you can join that eventually you won't be disappointed. It's going to not be all you thought it would be. There is no man or woman you can be with that eventually you're not going to go, "This is not how I thought this would pan out."
Now let me just say this. My marriage has been a greater blessing to me than anything physically on this earth, but if that was my salvation, I got taken. My wife exponentially got taken. She married this young guy. He was in ministry. He was a nice guy, and everybody thought the world of him, but I knew she was marrying a broken guy who sometimes ran his own offense. So we got married that first year, and she was like, "Oh my goodness!" I was like, "What? Did you think you married the fourth person of the Trinity? He's not on eHarmony!" There wasn't even an eHarmony at the time.
But I want to just tell you, "Hey look, you married a sinner, sister, and I know that I did." My problem is not who I married or who you married. Our problem is that we're at times running our own offense, and I had to learn that I wasn't just a good guy who was a joy to be with all the time. For me to love my wife meant I had to die to myself in ways I was not familiar with. I could not say to my wife, "Hey, come and see, sister. You'll like it," because I at some level am going to disappoint her. Everybody will disappoint you at some level except the good One, the One who is true, God.
If you were a hippie in the Seventies…not a hippie. If you just liked good music, and there were a few of us who were alive then. You listened to The Beatles, you might have heard this song if you were deep into The Beatles and The White Album. This is a track. Not one of the more well-known Beatles' songs, but its Sexy Sadie. Listen.
"Sexy Sadie what have you done? You made a fool of everyone. You made a fool of everyone. Sexy Sadie oh what have you done?" He goes later on, "You broke all the rules. You laid it down for all to see. You told people you were righteous, but you broke the rules."
This is a little John Lennon song. Now what's interesting about this song is the original title of the song was Maharishi. When Lennon and The Beatles were at the height of their fame, they were longing and looking for something else and something that would center them and give them hope, and so the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said, "Come on over here to my little compound. I'll teach you the wonders of Eastern Mysticism," and they went over there and they hung out with the Maharishi for awhile.
While they were there, there was a lot of other stars and starlets who were there including one young Mia Farrow, and word got out to Lennon that at the meditation center one day that the Maharishi wanted to do more than mediate with Mia, and it disappointed Lennon. He said, "Let me just tell you something, man. That guy is just a cankerous old letch just like me. That guy is still seeking for meaning. He wants that starlet to give him some physical pleasure. He wants some validation. In fact, he's kind of getting all wound up because we're here. That guy is no different than us. What are we doing here? I am disappointed." Lennon said, "I'm leaving!"
Now George Harrison and McCartney weren't as quick to want to leave. In fact, they weren't really sure they bought the story about Mia, but Lennon just went to his room. He said, "You call a cab." When he went to his room, he wrote that song, and as he was leaving that little meditation center, "Harrison," he said, "I want you to listen to a song." So in that cab ride away from there, he played "Maharishi, oh what have you done?"
He just talks about the lines actually he wrote were filled with expletives, dropping the f-bomb and the c-bomb and other words in the song because he said, "This guy we've come all the way to India to be enlightened by, he's just like us. There ain't nothing here."
So Harrison said, "You can't do that to the Maharishi. I don't care who you think we are." Lennon about two years later was being interviewed by the Rolling Stone, and he said, "I caved. I sold out, people. I changed that lyric to "sexy Sadie," but let me just tell you who "sexy Sadie" is. This sexy gal out there who you think you can find fulfillment is the Maharishi. He's not who you think he is."
Now Jesus on the other hand says, "Not Me. Come and see." I love what it says in Romans 9:33, in Romans 10:11, in 1 Peter 2:6, it quotes Isaiah 28:16. "HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED." Can I just tell you guys…You've heard me say this a bunch, but I've been a follower of Christ for 30 years, and I have never once executed His offense, not one time in 30 years have I been disappointed.
I'm going to tell you another story about Lennon next week that's going to blow you away, but we'll leave him for now. Let me just tell you this about Christ today…If you know Christ, and you follow Him, you will not be disappointed.
 Let me give you one more little observation. It comes down after this. It says, "…they stayed with Him…" They didn't leave, right? I love that. "…for it was about the tenth hour." This is where I think it was probably Andrew and John. John said, "I know exactly when I began to follow Him. When you really start to follow Jesus, you know exactly when you began to follow Him, and it isn't long before others around you know. John said, "…for it was about the tenth hour," which means it was four in the afternoon.
"I was with John the Baptist. I was his disciple. We were studying the Scripture, we were looking for the coming Messiah, and he said, 'There He is,' and I started to follow Him, and I have stayed with Him. It was 4:00 on this day and my life changed. Now that doesn't mean that's when I walked forward. That means when I started to follow Him, and since that day, everything has been different."
You know it when you begin to really follow Christ. Not only do you know it, everybody around you knows it. You turn from being Simon to being the Rock. Not some guy who emotionally flies off the handle and who constantly fails in his flesh, but becomes one who built on the foundation of Christ becomes himself a foundation for the church because he walks filled with the Spirit, convinced by the resurrection, intimately informed by God's Word, a vessel for Him who no longer leans on his own understanding and his confidence in his own ability to follow, but follows by faith. The world goes, "You are no longer this flimsy guy. You are Cephas, the Rock."
Here's the last one I'll give you…When you really follow Jesus for the first time, you cannot help but to compel others to come and see what it is you have found, to see what it is you have seen. See Andrew and John went off with Him and stayed with Him. They got up the next day, and as a matter of course, Andrew said, "Excuse me, Rabbi. I must go get my brother, and I have to tell him to come and see because he has no idea You are here. I have found the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and I will compel him to come follow You with me."
You see, when you really know truth and life in Christ and forgiveness and redemption, and you are spiritually appraised, you can't keep your mouth shut. You say to your friends, "Come and see. Follow Him with me. Forgiveness, peace, hope, restoration, regeneration, reconciliation, renewal, life is here. Follow Him."
I love this. I want to close with this one story because He changes you completely, and you can't wait to testify about Him and tell others about Him. This is a guy who has come to find Christ, and I want to tell you he's come from no small background of dysfunction, like all of us. I mean, a felonious background.
He wrote me this email after a couple of weeks ago I was doing this Compelled to Converse series, and we did that little drama up on stage with the folks who were on a flight with that little girl who was mentally disabled. I don't know if you were here for that. Go back and check it out.
But this is what he said, "Todd, the skit about the disturbed young woman and her mother in the airplane really brought back a memory of just a few years ago. Like many others, I was standing in a long line at the post office to buy a one-cent stamp for the postal rate was increased that day, and it was announced just before Christmas, and so I needed some stamps, and the place was packed.
Well after approximately 30 minutes in line, a woman entered through the door from a line that extended outside the front door. With her, she had a child that looked to be 13 or 14 years old that had a leash around her waist and chest. The child was clearly distressed, wailing loudly, and making the most unusual noises. The woman and child were clearly a disruptive presence in the long line, and they were annoying many people. She was carrying two large packages, and the pulling and tugging of the screaming young girl were making it difficult for her.
For five minutes or so, the line slowly inched forward. I observed the revulsion on the faces of many in line. They kept looking back at her as if to say, 'Can't you shut up that thing? Won't you just give up and leave?' And at this moment I remembered you saying to look for opportunities to extend grace to others in need."
Not my words. They're the One-I-follow's words, and I had been teaching this follower we should live as He wants us to live.
"I'd been in this line for 30 minutes at that point, and she was now in line with that child way in the back, and I started saying to myself, How could I help them in a crowd of people who hated them so much as I saw the looks in their eyes? At this point I was third in line from the front, and so I told the woman behind me to save my place, and I walked past approximately 40 people and said to that woman, 'Come with me.'
I took her and the child to my place in line which now was number 2, and I started back to the end of the line, when someone in line yelled, 'Well at least take where she was in line if you're going to do that!' which I did. And then soon the mother and child came up to me and with tears welling up in their eyes said, 'Thank you so much. No one has ever done something like that for me. No one has ever been so kind to me, and I will never forget this.'
She then said, 'Why did you do that?' I said…" and if you know my friend, he hadn't been following long, and not especially boldly. He goes, "But I said, 'I learned it at church.' Someone in line said, 'Well where do you go to church?' And I said, 'I go to a church that is a community of believers called Watermark where I'm learning to serve rather than be served.' And then I did the boldest thing I had ever done in front of 60 people, and I still can't believe I did it. I said, 'Jesus would not have stood by and not helped this mother and child in distress, so who am I to do any less?'" He got back in line.
He said, "The story doesn't end there. I went home that night reflecting on what happened that day. I prayed and I asked Christ to forgive me." You have to know this guy. "I asked God to forgive me for taking five long minutes to respond to this mother and child. I asked Christ that He would have me be more Christlike, and the next time that I would not wait so long before I responded and that it would be immediate and I'd be bold.
Todd, this whole process didn't hurt like I thought it would. And I didn't even know what I was going to say, but just like the Bible says, the Holy Spirit gave me the words to say and created for me a teachable moment in front of 60 people that witnessed what had happened and that I got to tell them in the post office about my Christ. As a final point, I want to let you know that I got back to my first spot in line, number 3, the postal people shut the door and said, 'We are out of one-cent stamps.'"
Perfect because he wasn't there for one-cent stamps, and you're not here for one-cent stamps. You're not here to live in 75225 or 90210. You're not here to get a wife. You're not here to not get cancer. You are here to live in such a way so when people say, "Who is your Christ? Who do you follow?" you say, "Let me tell you who He is. He's the One who though He was rich, for my sake became poor, who though He was a King, He came to serve me and to ransom me from the depths of sin, and I follow Him. I am not the Light, but I give testimony to it."
Father, I pray for my friends that they would follow Him. I thank You, Lord, that You can say, "Come and see," and that You know we will not be disappointed because You know You are truth and no amount of scrutiny will affect who You are. Lord, I thank You for my friends that they would come and sit and listen, they would labor with me through this text, and that we would find again a reminder that when we stay with You there is life there, there is hope, and we are satisfied.
We don't want to come because of what we think You'll provide us physically or where we will be geographically. We want to come because You theologically restore us to the righteous One, and You teach us to live and to operate in a way that restores the glory our sin has lost. I pray, Father, You would free us from living for one-cent stamps, and that we would follow You for Your glory I pray, for our good I pray that we might be Your people, and if we are not that we would come tonight and see Your goodness. May we follow You, in Christ's name, amen.
