Honoring Your Saviour
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HONORING YOUR SAVIOR
Introduction: What does it mean to honor someone? Why do we do it? Mart De Haan, a writer for the devotional book “Our Daily Bread,” provides a good example of someone who deserves honor and why in his devotion dated 12 July 1995. He writes:
“In the jungles of eastern Sri Lanka, 15 soldiers of a government commando unit were saved by two dogs adopted as mascots. According to a news report, the soldiers were completing a 10-mile hike when their dogs sensed danger. Running ahead toward a water hole where the unit planned to rest, the dogs suddenly began barking and circling the area. The troops searched carefully and found 12 buried grenades attached to a taut wire trigger.
It's intriguing to think about those two jungle mascots whose senses were tuned to the smell of danger. The soldiers escaped serious injury and even death because they listened to those barking dogs.”[1]
As you can see in the text, the dogs served their masters in an honorable way, sniffing out the grenades to preserve the lives of the soldiers. How did the soldiers honor the dogs? They did so by simply honoring or listening to and obeying the distress signals of the dogs. Unfortunately, the opposite extreme happens in the lives of people too often. They refuse to give honor to others, refusing to listen to or obey the counsel they hear. Such was the case for the Jews we see confronting Jesus in the fifth chapter of John’s gospel. They were upset because Jesus had broken one of the Ten Commandments by healing on the Sabbath. They certainly were not believing that Jesus was the Messiah sent by God and refused to give Him due honor.
Background thought: As we saw in last week’s message, Jesus was becoming more controversial in the eyes of the Jews by healing a man on the Sabbath. If the Jews had been paying attention to Jesus’ activities, they would have seen that, in reality, Jesus was doing the same thing as His Father in Heaven. As we look at our text for today, we will see that Jesus sets aside any misunderstanding about who He was claiming Himself to be, God in the flesh. Look with me at the seventeenth verse of chapter five.
Reading of the text: John 5:17 - 23
Prayer
GOD AND JESUS HAVE THE SAME NATURE (VV 18 - 19)
Explanation:
Verse 18 – Seeing that the Jews were in great disgust over Jesus healing the lame man on the Sabbath, Jesus identifies a significant factor about Himself. He identifies that Just as God has been and continues to work since He created the Earth, so Jesus is working. Some misunderstand God’s role in life itself. If God is intimately involved in everyday life, how can He rest on the Sabbath? Does the sun refuse to shine? Does creation cease to function? Obviously, God did not design the Sabbath for Himself, but for man. Thus, Jesus claim, if He is doing the same work as His Father, does one of two things. If He is just a man, He has broken the Sabbath and should be punished accordingly. If Jesus possesses the same nature as God, His Father, He is not violating the Sabbath.
Verse 19 - If we look at verse 19, we can see that Jesus statement made the Jews even angrier, angry enough to desire the death of Jesus. Not only had Jesus broken the fifth Commandment, but He had also broken the first one, suggesting that there was more than one God. Let’s remember, the concept of the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) was not being taught during the time of Jesus. Pragmatically speaking, Jesus was in the wrong in the eyes of the Jews. But was He wrong?
Illustration:
We can see such behavior in our world today. We often hear of a young man following in his father’s footsteps. We assert that the young man is behaving like his father. However, Jesus stands above such comparison, because unlike the young man who may, after a period of time, choose to do things differently, in honoring His Father, Jesus chose to be in complete union with His father’s will.
Application:
Many today refuse to believe that Jesus was of the same nature as God or that He is the Son of God. The result of such belief is the rejection of the precious gospel we offer. Our applicational point is for us to choose to believe that Jesus and God are of the same nature. This leads us to our next point. Not only is Jesus one in nature with His Father, but His actions are in unity with God’s.
GOD AND JESUS FUNCTION IN UNITY (VV 19 - 20)
Explanation:
Verse 19 – Jesus makes a strong assertion of the truth He is about to speak. He states “I tell you the truth.” The New King James says “Truly, Truly,…” Jesus is telling the Jews that He and His Father are inseparable, meaning that He cannot do anything other than what the father is doing. Jesus goes on to explain why such a relationship exists.
Verse 20 – Jesus identifies that His Father loves Him, and therefore, reveals His plans to Jesus. Jesus indicates that because of such great love for His Son, God the Father will also enable His Son to do greater things than what had been witnessed by the Jews up to this point of Jesus’ ministry. John McArthur indicates that the verb for “love” in verse 20 is one of deep feelings, the only time in the New Testament where the Father expresses such love for His Son. It is a love that does not hinder Jesus’ knowledge of His Father’s will, and, therefore, can be in perfect obedience to it.
Illustration:
We, in a small way, try to emulate such a relationship. You and I don’t tell just anyone the hidden secrets of our hearts. We will only tell such things to those whom we love very much, trusting that they will keep the things told secret. Unfortunately, sometimes those secrets slip out and people get their feelings hurt.
Application:
Such is not the case with God, the Father, and His relationship with His Son. Jesus knows God’s will, because His Father chose to reveal it to Him completely. With our acknowledgment of this truth, we must choose to recognize that God the Father and Jesus the Son are united as one in function, and give Jesus honor as we do God accordingly. Verse 21 reveals the next aspect of the unity between God and Jesus, the power over life and death.
GOD AND JESUS GOVERN LIFE AND DEATH (VS 21)
Explanation:
Jesus now reveals one of those greater things that God the Father had given Him, the power to govern the living and the dead. This power was not just on a case-by-case basis, as was with the prophets and the apostles, but the same power possessed by His Father. Jesus had the power to give life to whom He chose. Remember the paralytic man at the pool of Bethesda? Jesus chose him out of the crowd, went to him, and asked the man if he wanted to be made whole.
Illustration:
Matthew 9:23-25 verifies this power that Jesus possessed. Jesus, in the face of a funeral entourage raised a girl from the dead.
Application:
Once again, we see the power of God resting upon Jesus, giving more evidence of Jesus being the Messiah. Our applicational point here is to recognize that Jesus has the power to give eternal life to those who call upon His name. If you have placed your trust in Him as Savior, accept the fact that you have life eternal and allow no one to change your mind set. This leads us to another one of the greater things the Father would show to His Son, the power to judge.
GOD AND JESUS ARE UNITED IN JUDGMENT (VS 22)
Explanation:
Jesus plainly states that God is not judging, but has given the responsibility to His Son, which gives all the more reason to have a reverential fear of God the Son. Such a statement gives more strength to the words of Jesus. Can you imagine what His listening audience must have been thinking? If what He said was true, and they continued to resist His words, they would one day face Jesus in judgment, a moment where He would tell them to depart from His presence, due to Him not knowing them. In other words, they would be would not have life, because they chose to reject the giver of life.
Illustration:
1 Peter 4:4-6 give us an indication of the judgment Jesus possesses. The apostle Peter states:
“4They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you. 5But they will have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. 6For this is the reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead, so that they might be judged according to men in regard to the body, but live according to God in regard to the spirit.”
Application:
The applicational point is that you and I choose to acknowledge Jesus not just as our loving Savior, but as our Loving future judge. May we choose to live that He may judge us worthy and faithful servants of His kingdom. This point of the sermon serves as the reason for our next point, God and Jesus are both to be honored.
GOD AND JESUS ARE TO BE HONORED (VS 23)
Explanation
Note the first word in verse 23, “That.” This word points to the reason judgment was entrusted to Jesus, that He would be honored just as the Father is. This emphasizes the exclusivity of Christ above any other religion. This would prove to be a shocking change for the Jewish population. Jesus was and is asserting that He merits the same honor given to the Father. What if the Jews chose not to honor Christ as their Father in heaven? Jesus answered the question in the second part of the verse. Dishonoring Christ would mean dishonoring God, which, from the understanding of the Jews, would mean blasphemy.
Illustration:
Psalm 2 identifies what will happen to those who choose not to honor the Son. The son would, as the NIV version of the Bible puts it, “lest he be angry and you be destroyed in your way,…” (vs. 12).
Application:
From all that we have covered today, it is obvious that God requires that you and I honor His Son, Jesus. Our point of application is that you and I choose to honor Christ with our lives, knowing and understanding that we will have to answer to Him one day for how we chose to give Him honor.
Conclusion:
What about you? Are you honoring Christ with your life today? You don’t have the ability to do so until you have established a personal relationship with God through Christ. Put your trust in Christ, and, in doing so, you will begin to show Him honor. Honoring Christ means that you and I recognize what He did for us at Calvary, and desire to honor Him through obeying His commands. As I mentioned earlier, honoring Christ as we honor God, our Father, makes Christianity exclusive from all other religions, for no other religion will honor Christ in the same way as He requires.
If you don’t know Christ as your Savior, you can know Him today. Salvation does not involve you physically doing anything. It involves making some choices from your heart. You must admit and confess that you, as I once was, are separated from God because of your sin (Romans 3:23), acknowledge what God has done about your sin (John 3:16, Romans 5:8), realize the opportunity you have to have a personal relationship with God (Romans 6:23), make the decision from the heart to believe what Christ has done for you, asking for God’s forgiveness, and confess Him as Lord (Romans 10:9-10, 13)
If you are a believer in Christ, confess your sins to God right now (1 John 1:9)! Ask Him for the gift of repentance, remembering that it is Christ who is working within you through His grace to live the Christian life. Ask Him to empower you to live for Him from this day forward, enabling you to depart from any doubt in believing His promises for you, both now and in the future!
[1] http://www.rbc.org/devotionals/our-daily-bread/1995/07/12/devotion.aspx
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