1 00:00:00,320 --> 00:00:02,440 We'll pray for Paul and then we'll crack on. 2 00:00:04,040 --> 00:00:06,600 Lord, we thank you. I'm just super aware that Paul 3 00:00:06,600 --> 00:00:12,120 and Grace have poured out a lot and served us in many ways. 4 00:00:12,120 --> 00:00:15,320 And we just honour, honour that. And we're so grateful for their 5 00:00:15,320 --> 00:00:21,000 presence within the community. And we, we've just been thinking 6 00:00:21,000 --> 00:00:25,200 about freedom and how so much of our lack of freedom is because 7 00:00:25,200 --> 00:00:27,840 we don't really know the love God has for us. 8 00:00:28,280 --> 00:00:32,400 And so I just blessed us this morning, the good news to really 9 00:00:32,759 --> 00:00:37,520 receive fresh revelation of how deeply you love us through what 10 00:00:37,520 --> 00:00:40,160 Paul brings today. Amen. 11 00:00:42,520 --> 00:00:43,480 Thanks. Yeah, I think I will. 12 00:00:43,480 --> 00:00:51,080 I was going to say, everyone come come forward, but I'll come 13 00:00:54,600 --> 00:00:57,840 Grand. Thanks Lizzie for my third cup 14 00:00:57,840 --> 00:01:05,360 of coffee wherever she's gone during lockdown. 15 00:01:05,400 --> 00:01:07,560 We did. We did like one of these Airbnb 16 00:01:07,640 --> 00:01:10,600 remote tours. Did anyone do those things? 17 00:01:11,040 --> 00:01:14,400 No, because people couldn't. You couldn't do tourism stuff, 18 00:01:14,400 --> 00:01:15,720 right? So that's everyone was doing 19 00:01:15,720 --> 00:01:18,640 this kind of remote experiences. Then some of them were really 20 00:01:18,640 --> 00:01:19,480 good. So we did a few. 21 00:01:19,720 --> 00:01:23,480 One of them was with a Colombian coffee grower in her small 22 00:01:23,480 --> 00:01:27,880 holding in Colombia. And she had this goat that a 23 00:01:27,880 --> 00:01:31,440 little baby goat kept jumping up and eating the coffee cherries. 24 00:01:31,760 --> 00:01:34,720 And the goat was getting more and more wired during the 25 00:01:34,720 --> 00:01:37,000 session, you know, and she was talking about the coffee, but 26 00:01:37,000 --> 00:01:41,280 she told us that the legendary story of the origin of coffee. 27 00:01:41,280 --> 00:01:43,560 Have you you heard this one? You've heard it. 28 00:01:43,680 --> 00:01:46,400 Yeah. The story is that there's an 29 00:01:46,640 --> 00:01:52,400 Ethiopian goat herder and his goats are eating like coffee 30 00:01:52,400 --> 00:01:54,920 cherries and are getting really wired and they're jumping around 31 00:01:54,920 --> 00:01:56,720 and he thinks, wow, this might be interesting. 32 00:01:57,560 --> 00:01:59,920 You know, I guess being a goat herder out in the Ethiopian 33 00:01:59,920 --> 00:02:02,440 hills, you don't have a, you don't have a lot to think about, 34 00:02:02,440 --> 00:02:04,840 you know, other than seeing what the goats are doing. 35 00:02:04,840 --> 00:02:06,800 So if you see goats eating cherries, you know, you're going 36 00:02:06,800 --> 00:02:08,880 to try some. So he did and then got the 37 00:02:08,880 --> 00:02:10,880 caffeine hit and thought, wow, this is really good. 38 00:02:11,560 --> 00:02:14,880 But you know, being a good Christian Ethiopian goat herder, 39 00:02:14,880 --> 00:02:18,160 he took some of the coffee cherries to the local monastery 40 00:02:19,000 --> 00:02:22,120 and showed them to the Abbot who tried a bit and said, oh, no, 41 00:02:22,120 --> 00:02:25,800 this is this is of the devil, this is satanic and sent him 42 00:02:25,800 --> 00:02:28,840 away and threw the coffee cherries into the fire. 43 00:02:30,040 --> 00:02:32,240 And then, you know, went away. But of course, the coffee 44 00:02:32,240 --> 00:02:34,360 cherries in the fire then began to roast. 45 00:02:34,360 --> 00:02:36,880 The beans began to roast. And the monks came down for 46 00:02:36,880 --> 00:02:40,840 their nighttime prayers and they could smell this lovely aroma 47 00:02:40,840 --> 00:02:43,320 coming from the fire. So they collected, they 48 00:02:43,320 --> 00:02:46,520 collected the, the, the roasted beans out of the fire, ground 49 00:02:46,520 --> 00:02:50,240 them up, made them into a drink and then found that they were, 50 00:02:50,600 --> 00:02:52,920 they were able to stay up all night and pray because they're 51 00:02:52,920 --> 00:02:54,440 supposed to stay up all night and pray, right. 52 00:02:54,440 --> 00:02:57,480 And the Abbott wanted his monks to, you know, keep the kind of 53 00:02:57,480 --> 00:02:59,840 nightly pray vigil. And when the, when the Abbott 54 00:02:59,840 --> 00:03:02,520 woke up in the morning and came and found all of his monks had 55 00:03:02,520 --> 00:03:04,960 managed to stay awake and pray, none of them had fallen asleep. 56 00:03:05,200 --> 00:03:06,560 And it was because they had drunk coffee. 57 00:03:06,560 --> 00:03:08,720 He changed his mind and he said, oh, no, I got it wrong. 58 00:03:09,200 --> 00:03:12,120 This was not of the devil. This has actually come from 59 00:03:12,120 --> 00:03:13,360 Christ. And so he blessed it. 60 00:03:13,360 --> 00:03:17,200 And therefore coffee is a consecrated drink officially in 61 00:03:17,200 --> 00:03:22,600 the church due to this story. So there we go. 62 00:03:22,600 --> 00:03:24,720 If it was in the Anglican Church, it would be a flagon of 63 00:03:24,720 --> 00:03:28,080 beer or something, you know. But anyway, in here in Hope in 64 00:03:28,080 --> 00:03:32,000 Hope Chapel, we drink coffee while we preach to honour the 65 00:03:32,000 --> 00:03:38,960 Holy tradition of the church, Glory, John's Gospel. 66 00:03:39,600 --> 00:03:47,760 So if you've got books, Bible books, I, you know, I'm not a, 67 00:03:48,040 --> 00:03:51,360 I'm not a big PowerPoint person. Bill always has these very well 68 00:03:51,360 --> 00:03:52,560 put together PowerPoints and things. 69 00:03:52,560 --> 00:03:55,120 I don't have any of that, but I, but I do have references you can 70 00:03:55,120 --> 00:04:01,720 look at in the Bible. And last time when I, we started 71 00:04:01,720 --> 00:04:06,120 the, the John's Gospel series, one of the things I wanted to 72 00:04:06,120 --> 00:04:10,800 avoid, partly because there's just no time is, is just kind of 73 00:04:10,800 --> 00:04:12,680 being in a situation where we're going chapter by chapter. 74 00:04:12,680 --> 00:04:16,839 We'll never finish it. So I'm jumping around and trying 75 00:04:16,839 --> 00:04:21,200 to look at the overall themes in John's Gospel rather than trying 76 00:04:21,200 --> 00:04:25,920 to work like ABC through it. So there's lots of lots of 77 00:04:26,520 --> 00:04:28,200 angles, lots of places we can go. 78 00:04:28,600 --> 00:04:32,600 But we looked at the prologue and if you haven't listened to 79 00:04:32,600 --> 00:04:34,840 that one, I can't remember a couple of months ago, you can 80 00:04:34,840 --> 00:04:39,200 get it on the podcast where we were going into what is John's 81 00:04:39,200 --> 00:04:42,360 Gospel, the 1st chapter. How is it setting us up for the 82 00:04:42,360 --> 00:04:45,400 whole gospel? So today I want to jump around 83 00:04:45,440 --> 00:04:51,960 with a couple of points, but in particular I want to think about 84 00:04:52,320 --> 00:04:56,960 as a starting thought to frame the message this morning when it 85 00:04:56,960 --> 00:04:59,880 says in John one verse, one in the beginning was the word and 86 00:05:00,800 --> 00:05:02,560 the word was with God. The word was God. 87 00:05:02,920 --> 00:05:07,760 So the word word in the Greek is Logos. 88 00:05:08,880 --> 00:05:14,160 And I want to start with a putting a question out there. 89 00:05:14,160 --> 00:05:18,200 Why the logos? Why does it talk about the logos 90 00:05:18,960 --> 00:05:21,280 being made flesh and dwelling among us? 91 00:05:21,280 --> 00:05:23,400 Why? Why is this the focus in the 92 00:05:23,400 --> 00:05:28,080 first verse of John? And what is it that the gospel 93 00:05:28,080 --> 00:05:31,120 is doing when it's revealing to us who God actually is? 94 00:05:31,120 --> 00:05:33,760 This is this is a big question for me all the time. 95 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:37,760 How does the Scripture reveal who God is to me? 96 00:05:38,920 --> 00:05:42,880 Not just about how to live life or what we should do or how we 97 00:05:42,880 --> 00:05:44,680 approach different questions or different issues. 98 00:05:44,920 --> 00:05:47,320 All of that's fine. But the heart of the matter is 99 00:05:47,520 --> 00:05:49,320 who is God? What is he like? 100 00:05:49,520 --> 00:05:51,800 How do we know, and why does that matter? 101 00:05:53,120 --> 00:05:57,440 So I think I maybe mentioned this before, but I don't 102 00:05:57,440 --> 00:05:59,920 remember, and maybe you weren't here and maybe you don't 103 00:05:59,920 --> 00:06:04,200 remember, but John's Gospel historically has been understood 104 00:06:04,200 --> 00:06:06,800 as the the last gospel to be written, maybe even the last 105 00:06:06,800 --> 00:06:08,360 book of the New Testament to be written. 106 00:06:08,680 --> 00:06:11,280 It's certainly the book with, we would say it has the most 107 00:06:11,280 --> 00:06:14,960 developed theology in it in the New Testament in the sense that 108 00:06:14,960 --> 00:06:17,800 it's it's the most arguably, I think it's true. 109 00:06:17,800 --> 00:06:21,400 This is the most theologically dense book in the New Testament. 110 00:06:21,400 --> 00:06:24,360 Another reason why trying to go through line by line is going to 111 00:06:24,480 --> 00:06:29,680 take us forever. But one of the data points we 112 00:06:29,680 --> 00:06:33,320 have about the Gospel comes from Clement of Alexandria, who was 113 00:06:33,320 --> 00:06:37,640 kind of third generation after John the Apostle and early 114 00:06:37,640 --> 00:06:42,040 church father. And he said we basically have 115 00:06:42,040 --> 00:06:46,680 got the major facts about Jesus life that is set down in 116 00:06:46,680 --> 00:06:50,200 Matthew, Mark and Luke. They tell us the key points, you 117 00:06:50,200 --> 00:06:53,440 know, the summary of of Jesus life and ministry on earth. 118 00:06:54,000 --> 00:06:57,520 All of that's there. And what he says is that John 119 00:06:57,520 --> 00:07:02,000 towards the end of his life was urged by his own disciples to 120 00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:05,080 write a gospel. So you can kind of imagine John 121 00:07:05,080 --> 00:07:08,920 at this point is in Ephesus. He's kind of the, the kind of 122 00:07:08,920 --> 00:07:12,000 grand spiritual grandfather figure at the, of the church in 123 00:07:12,280 --> 00:07:15,960 Ephesus and has been ministering there for many decades. 124 00:07:17,440 --> 00:07:21,160 Mary, the mother of Jesus had been there with him as well. 125 00:07:21,160 --> 00:07:23,880 So they, they ended up there and you can go and see the, the 126 00:07:23,880 --> 00:07:28,240 memorials and graves, traditional sites, you know, in, 127 00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:30,040 in and around the ethicist area as well. 128 00:07:30,200 --> 00:07:33,640 If you, if you ever go and pay a visit, it's, it's cool, it's 129 00:07:33,640 --> 00:07:36,880 good fun. But John had all of these 130 00:07:36,880 --> 00:07:39,120 disciples, you know, in the church there and they said to 131 00:07:39,120 --> 00:07:42,320 him, John, you really need to write some stuff down or at 132 00:07:42,320 --> 00:07:44,160 least tell us so that we can write it down. 133 00:07:44,560 --> 00:07:49,720 We need your teaching to be put out because we we're not seeing 134 00:07:50,160 --> 00:07:53,400 all of the insights that you have in the gospel writings that 135 00:07:53,400 --> 00:07:57,560 we have available. So they urged him and so he he 136 00:07:57,560 --> 00:08:01,160 he did last time I talked a bit about how I like the idea that 137 00:08:01,160 --> 00:08:05,040 the the Book of Revelation, when it talks about the small scroll, 138 00:08:05,240 --> 00:08:09,320 it says the Angel says to John, you, you must write again that 139 00:08:09,320 --> 00:08:12,480 the small scroll he has to write again is the Gospel of John. 140 00:08:12,480 --> 00:08:16,600 So what he's getting in the revelation on Pat Moss in sort 141 00:08:16,600 --> 00:08:21,600 of psychedelic apocalyptic form, he then is trying to put into a 142 00:08:21,600 --> 00:08:23,320 narrative form in the Gospel of John. 143 00:08:23,320 --> 00:08:25,000 But actually the message is the same. 144 00:08:25,880 --> 00:08:28,760 But the the revelatory stuff happens on Patmos and then he's 145 00:08:28,760 --> 00:08:33,159 kind of trying to get it into intelligible words, you know, in 146 00:08:34,120 --> 00:08:38,480 in the Gospel. So, but Clement says that John 147 00:08:38,840 --> 00:08:41,080 recognised that the facts had been put down in the other 148 00:08:41,080 --> 00:08:44,920 gospels and that he sought to compose what Clement, Clement 149 00:08:44,920 --> 00:08:49,600 called a spiritual gospel in in the Greek Pinephomaticus 150 00:08:49,600 --> 00:08:56,040 Evangelion, a spiritual gospel. So he said the facts, we see 151 00:08:56,040 --> 00:08:58,720 them in the others, but the the spiritual essence. 152 00:08:58,720 --> 00:09:01,800 And I think that the point of what Clement's trying to say is 153 00:09:01,800 --> 00:09:03,920 that the Gospel of John is highly symbolic. 154 00:09:04,600 --> 00:09:06,720 Sometimes John will move things around. 155 00:09:06,720 --> 00:09:09,960 So you've got Jesus cleansing the temple at the beginning of 156 00:09:09,960 --> 00:09:12,320 his ministry in John's Gospel. In the other three gospels, the 157 00:09:12,320 --> 00:09:14,040 cleansing of the temple happens at the end. 158 00:09:14,840 --> 00:09:21,640 And so Clement's angle is, well, John moves, he'll he'll pull one 159 00:09:21,640 --> 00:09:23,840 thing out, change the chronological order because he's 160 00:09:23,840 --> 00:09:26,640 making a point. There's a symbolic point that 161 00:09:27,360 --> 00:09:31,680 that is very carefully curated in the Gospel Origin of 162 00:09:31,680 --> 00:09:35,600 Alexandria, another key church. Father also commented on the 163 00:09:35,600 --> 00:09:38,320 differences between John's Gospel and the other Gospels. 164 00:09:38,640 --> 00:09:42,080 And if you ever get into the apologetics space, lots of 165 00:09:42,080 --> 00:09:43,520 people argue about this. You know, why? 166 00:09:43,560 --> 00:09:45,480 Why do the gospels have things in a different order? 167 00:09:45,480 --> 00:09:48,800 Why are the stories being told in a seeming contradictory, 168 00:09:48,800 --> 00:09:52,280 contradictory fashion sometimes? And Origin says, well, because 169 00:09:52,280 --> 00:09:55,440 they contradict, they're not saying they're not kind of 170 00:09:55,440 --> 00:09:57,760 taking liberties. John especially is taking 171 00:09:57,760 --> 00:10:00,760 liberties with the order of things because he expects you to 172 00:10:00,760 --> 00:10:04,520 have an idea of the the narrative from the other 173 00:10:04,520 --> 00:10:06,280 gospels. But he's now trying to make a 174 00:10:06,280 --> 00:10:09,440 point by reorganising some of this stuff to give us a 175 00:10:09,440 --> 00:10:13,760 spiritual revelation about who Jesus is and, and what John is 176 00:10:13,760 --> 00:10:16,800 carrying as an evangelist and as an apostle. 177 00:10:17,520 --> 00:10:20,960 So Origin says in all these people trying to harmonise and 178 00:10:20,960 --> 00:10:23,640 make everything fit together, this is a waste of time because 179 00:10:23,640 --> 00:10:26,160 it doesn't fit together. I think that's, it's interesting 180 00:10:26,160 --> 00:10:30,280 to see someone, I think Origin was the 3rd century, someone so 181 00:10:30,280 --> 00:10:34,040 early on making very astute observations around these 182 00:10:34,040 --> 00:10:36,200 things. We think about these apologetics 183 00:10:36,200 --> 00:10:39,800 arguments about the agreement of the Bible, how it all matches up 184 00:10:39,800 --> 00:10:42,040 as being a very modern thing. But they already dealt with this 185 00:10:42,040 --> 00:10:44,560 like 1800 years ago. And he was like, stop trying to 186 00:10:44,560 --> 00:10:46,600 do that. It's not how it works. 187 00:10:46,600 --> 00:10:47,920 It's not how the Scripture works. 188 00:10:48,320 --> 00:10:51,400 There are spiritual truths that are being communicated in in the 189 00:10:51,400 --> 00:10:52,840 scripture. This is the important stuff. 190 00:10:52,840 --> 00:10:57,560 Actually the the historical facts, you know that is it 1 191 00:10:57,560 --> 00:11:00,000 Angel or two at the tomb, you know, all these kind of things. 192 00:11:00,280 --> 00:11:03,640 Origin was like really, can we, can we grow up? 193 00:11:04,000 --> 00:11:05,680 These are not the important questions. 194 00:11:06,800 --> 00:11:11,040 And I think that there's lots of people, again, as an aside, who 195 00:11:12,080 --> 00:11:14,120 read the Bible and struggle with will hang on. 196 00:11:14,120 --> 00:11:16,800 If this is really a book from God, why is it it seems to say 197 00:11:16,800 --> 00:11:19,440 one thing in one place and another thing in another? 198 00:11:20,320 --> 00:11:24,040 And this really wasn't a big deal for much of the early 199 00:11:24,040 --> 00:11:26,880 church. And it is a big deal for us and 200 00:11:26,880 --> 00:11:30,360 I think partly because we are approaching it in the wrong way. 201 00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:33,400 That's why I say this book is about revealing the nature and 202 00:11:33,400 --> 00:11:36,120 character of God to us. It's not really about trying to 203 00:11:36,120 --> 00:11:39,160 give you a blow by blow historical account of absolutely 204 00:11:39,160 --> 00:11:41,200 everything that happens in a certain order, which isn't to 205 00:11:41,200 --> 00:11:44,440 say that this isn't stuff that happened, but the point, the 206 00:11:44,440 --> 00:11:47,080 point of it is not to educate us about history. 207 00:11:47,080 --> 00:11:50,240 The point of it is to reveal Christ in US and to us. 208 00:11:50,240 --> 00:11:53,320 Now, John himself says that at the end of this book. 209 00:11:53,320 --> 00:11:56,240 He says, I've written these things so that you may believe 210 00:11:56,240 --> 00:11:58,880 and continue to believe and in believing that you may have 211 00:11:58,880 --> 00:12:02,080 life. That's that's why it's written. 212 00:12:02,320 --> 00:12:04,520 It's not written so that you may be educated. 213 00:12:04,920 --> 00:12:08,600 It's written so that you may believe, have life, giving 214 00:12:08,600 --> 00:12:11,040 faith, experiential. You're supposed to feel 215 00:12:11,040 --> 00:12:14,000 something and experience something when you read this. 216 00:12:14,400 --> 00:12:18,080 And the symbols and the references that are there in the 217 00:12:18,080 --> 00:12:22,440 gospel are difficult to engage if you don't know the back story 218 00:12:22,440 --> 00:12:24,120 because there's lots of references. 219 00:12:25,240 --> 00:12:27,240 And so when you read that it might kind of be confusing. 220 00:12:27,240 --> 00:12:28,880 What, why is it putting it that way? 221 00:12:28,880 --> 00:12:33,480 Why is it putting it this way? But I would say just don't worry 222 00:12:33,480 --> 00:12:36,120 about those bits. Read it in a way that is 223 00:12:36,360 --> 00:12:38,720 engaging your heart and is read it. 224 00:12:38,720 --> 00:12:41,760 Read it prayerfully in a way that you're saying, Jesus, how 225 00:12:41,760 --> 00:12:44,240 are you revealing yourself to me in this gospel? 226 00:12:44,440 --> 00:12:47,680 That's how it was written, perhaps more so than any of the 227 00:12:47,680 --> 00:12:49,880 other books of the New Testament, although I think it's 228 00:12:49,880 --> 00:12:51,680 a good way to read the whole of the Bible. 229 00:12:52,240 --> 00:12:55,520 John's Gospel, the tradition of the church historically has been 230 00:12:55,520 --> 00:12:58,080 this is how you read this book. It is a spiritual book. 231 00:12:58,320 --> 00:13:00,840 It's supposed to reveal who Jesus, those are supposed to 232 00:13:00,840 --> 00:13:02,800 reveal who you are in revealing him. 233 00:13:02,960 --> 00:13:06,400 It's supposed to be experienced. It's supposed to be felt. 234 00:13:06,600 --> 00:13:08,720 It's supposed to be something that you have a sense of. 235 00:13:08,840 --> 00:13:11,520 Something more is going on within me than I can grasp with 236 00:13:11,520 --> 00:13:13,760 my natural mind. Something is happening in my 237 00:13:13,760 --> 00:13:17,840 heart, something's happening in my spirit and I need to kind of 238 00:13:17,840 --> 00:13:20,600 just not resist that. I need to relax into that and 239 00:13:20,600 --> 00:13:25,560 allow the Holy Spirit to do the Holy Spirit's work in teaching 240 00:13:25,560 --> 00:13:35,320 me, in forming me right. So just as a longer intro, how 241 00:13:35,320 --> 00:13:38,040 do we look at the book now? There's a couple of things if 242 00:13:38,040 --> 00:13:42,960 you, if you're new to studying John systematically, a couple of 243 00:13:42,960 --> 00:13:45,120 things to look out for that I didn't mention before. 244 00:13:45,480 --> 00:13:48,640 There's lots of numerology in John, symbolic numbers. 245 00:13:49,560 --> 00:13:53,320 We have 7 signs in the book of John. 246 00:13:53,400 --> 00:13:55,760 The signs are called mighty works or signs. 247 00:13:56,200 --> 00:13:58,800 When you read the other gospels you see Jesus doing miracles all 248 00:13:58,800 --> 00:14:01,600 the time. In John's gospel there are 7 249 00:14:02,560 --> 00:14:07,600 curated miracles that are chosen and there are also seven 250 00:14:08,360 --> 00:14:11,720 so-called I am sayings of Jesus. There are actually more I am 251 00:14:11,720 --> 00:14:14,840 sayings, but there are 7 special ones where Jesus says things 252 00:14:14,840 --> 00:14:19,040 like I am the bread of life, I am the true vine, I am the Good 253 00:14:19,040 --> 00:14:21,040 Shepherd. Like over and over again he says 254 00:14:21,040 --> 00:14:23,720 these phrases. And as I say, there are a couple 255 00:14:23,720 --> 00:14:26,680 of others which are not in the list of seven, but they are 256 00:14:26,680 --> 00:14:28,440 other I am sayings. I'm going to say a little bit 257 00:14:28,440 --> 00:14:32,720 more about those in a moment, but you have this, the I am 258 00:14:32,720 --> 00:14:35,800 sayings and the signs also happen in a certain order and 259 00:14:35,800 --> 00:14:40,960 that's there's a purpose to it. So we see for example, in in 260 00:14:40,960 --> 00:14:45,600 John 2, you get Jesus changing the water into wine. 261 00:14:46,240 --> 00:14:49,920 So this is on page 1064 in the Bibles, if you're looking at it, 262 00:14:50,920 --> 00:14:56,360 it says we've got the story on the third day, a wedding took 263 00:14:56,360 --> 00:14:59,160 place in Cana in Galilee. Jesus's mother was there and his 264 00:14:59,160 --> 00:15:01,480 disciples and then they had no more wine. 265 00:15:01,920 --> 00:15:06,200 And his mother said to the servants, do whatever he tells 266 00:15:06,200 --> 00:15:07,840 you. And then he says nearby there 267 00:15:07,840 --> 00:15:11,520 were 6 stone water jars used by the Jews for ceremonial washing. 268 00:15:13,040 --> 00:15:15,560 Jesus said fill them with water and then draw it out and then 269 00:15:15,560 --> 00:15:17,320 they turn into wine. You know the story, right? 270 00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:21,960 And then in verse 11, it said what Jesus did here in Cana of 271 00:15:21,960 --> 00:15:25,040 Galilee was the first of his signs through which he revealed 272 00:15:25,040 --> 00:15:26,960 his glory. So John makes a point of saying 273 00:15:26,960 --> 00:15:30,680 this is the first of the signs, the transforming of the water 274 00:15:30,680 --> 00:15:32,640 into into wine. Now that's not the case in the 275 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:34,400 other gospels. You get a different order. 276 00:15:34,640 --> 00:15:37,320 John is doing this deliberately. He's saying this is the first 277 00:15:37,320 --> 00:15:39,280 one. And and what does it mean? 278 00:15:39,280 --> 00:15:41,840 Well, it's really, it's really full of symbolism. 279 00:15:42,080 --> 00:15:45,880 You, you notice that it says 6 jars and the jars are for 280 00:15:45,880 --> 00:15:50,120 ceremonial washing, which means it is representative of the 281 00:15:50,120 --> 00:15:52,560 whole Jewish law and the system of the law, the system of 282 00:15:52,560 --> 00:15:57,360 purification that requires water for ceremonial washing. 283 00:15:57,360 --> 00:16:00,160 A little bit like we're, we're more familiar with perhaps with 284 00:16:00,160 --> 00:16:02,840 a Muslim prayer practises, people have to wash before they 285 00:16:02,840 --> 00:16:06,760 pray in a ceremonial way. That's what these jars were used 286 00:16:06,760 --> 00:16:08,480 for. And there are six of them. 287 00:16:08,480 --> 00:16:11,360 And numerologically 6 is a number of incompletion. 288 00:16:12,160 --> 00:16:15,600 So what you have is 6 jars and there's no wine. 289 00:16:15,840 --> 00:16:19,720 So you've got ceremonial water, but there's no wine, which means 290 00:16:19,720 --> 00:16:23,360 there's no life because wine is symbolic of life, the life of 291 00:16:23,360 --> 00:16:25,120 God. And particularly it's symbolic 292 00:16:25,120 --> 00:16:27,840 of the life of God because it brings joy when you drink it, 293 00:16:28,080 --> 00:16:31,320 you, you have a good time. That's the idea, right? 294 00:16:31,680 --> 00:16:37,120 So you have, they're there at this wedding, but the, the 295 00:16:37,120 --> 00:16:40,280 central point of the wedding can't be reached. 296 00:16:40,280 --> 00:16:42,920 They've got all this other stuff, all this party, 297 00:16:42,920 --> 00:16:45,400 everything has been set out. But suddenly it's like, but 298 00:16:45,400 --> 00:16:48,160 we've got no wine. We've got all of the form, but 299 00:16:48,160 --> 00:16:50,840 no substance. In other words, and this is a 300 00:16:50,840 --> 00:16:52,600 critique of the whole religious system. 301 00:16:52,880 --> 00:16:56,040 It's saying this whole a tradition that you've inherited 302 00:16:56,040 --> 00:16:58,080 gives you the form, but it gives you no substance. 303 00:16:58,080 --> 00:17:00,800 It leaves you wanting. It's like the rich young ruler 304 00:17:00,800 --> 00:17:03,120 who comes to Jesus and saying what must I do to receive 305 00:17:03,120 --> 00:17:05,240 eternal life? And Jesus says keep all the law 306 00:17:05,240 --> 00:17:08,040 and the prophets and he said I've done that, but I still know 307 00:17:08,040 --> 00:17:10,839 I don't have it. Something in my heart I know 308 00:17:11,079 --> 00:17:13,079 I've done all the things I'm supposed to do, but it hasn't 309 00:17:13,079 --> 00:17:17,560 solved my problem. And that's the the symbol here 310 00:17:17,560 --> 00:17:21,920 in this story. 6 ceremonial jars full of the holy water. 311 00:17:22,680 --> 00:17:26,720 They can't do it but 6 + 1 = 7. So here's Jesus. 312 00:17:26,720 --> 00:17:32,280 He's the 7th one, right? And when it's 6 + 1, suddenly 313 00:17:32,280 --> 00:17:38,400 the water is transmuted into the wine of the Spirit that they say 314 00:17:38,400 --> 00:17:41,400 is the best wine, which is completely counter intuitive. 315 00:17:41,400 --> 00:17:44,640 So with again within the story, you see the reversal of the 316 00:17:44,640 --> 00:17:47,240 natural mind. The natural mind expects the 317 00:17:47,240 --> 00:17:49,720 best thing to come first and then it's kind of depreciate 318 00:17:49,720 --> 00:17:51,960 over time. But the mind of the spirit says 319 00:17:52,040 --> 00:17:55,440 you go from one measure of glory to another, that it's ever 320 00:17:55,440 --> 00:17:58,680 increasing glory. It's the same with the story of 321 00:17:58,680 --> 00:18:00,800 Moses face, which I'll also come to in a moment. 322 00:18:01,480 --> 00:18:05,600 Moses covers his face after he's encountered God because the 323 00:18:05,600 --> 00:18:09,200 glory was fading away. The Bible says Moses didn't want 324 00:18:09,200 --> 00:18:11,800 the Israelites to see that the glory was draining away from 325 00:18:11,800 --> 00:18:14,000 him. So under the Mosaic covenant, 326 00:18:14,000 --> 00:18:16,920 you have this divine infusion at the beginning which just drains 327 00:18:16,920 --> 00:18:19,960 away and leaks out and it gets diminished over time. 328 00:18:21,000 --> 00:18:22,640 But that's not the way things work with Jesus. 329 00:18:22,640 --> 00:18:26,400 With with Jesus, it goes from one measure of glory to another. 330 00:18:26,400 --> 00:18:30,720 Exponential growth, exponential increase, ever increasing glory. 331 00:18:31,960 --> 00:18:35,240 So you see, this is the first sign, right? 332 00:18:35,240 --> 00:18:37,960 And it's the first sign because John is trying to tell us, pay 333 00:18:37,960 --> 00:18:42,680 attention to this first. This is a key entry point to 334 00:18:42,680 --> 00:18:45,000 understanding the ministry of Jesus throughout the whole of 335 00:18:45,000 --> 00:18:47,480 the Gospel of John. It's telling us to refer back to 336 00:18:47,480 --> 00:18:50,000 it when we see what he's doing. When he's arguing with the 337 00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:51,760 Pharisees or they're arguing with him, he doesn't really 338 00:18:51,760 --> 00:18:53,680 argue with them, He just kind of grenades them. 339 00:18:54,400 --> 00:18:57,160 But when he's engaging with them, all these other things 340 00:18:57,160 --> 00:19:01,880 he's doing, it's kind of a an ongoing expression of this first 341 00:19:01,880 --> 00:19:05,600 sign, water into wine. Every time he turns up into a 342 00:19:05,600 --> 00:19:09,640 situation, he transmutes it from an ordinary watery situation 343 00:19:09,680 --> 00:19:12,600 into a very divine alcoholic situation. 344 00:19:13,200 --> 00:19:17,680 It's constantly elevating people into this, this kind of altered 345 00:19:17,680 --> 00:19:20,760 state of consciousness, which is actually to become conscious of 346 00:19:20,760 --> 00:19:23,520 true reality. That's the image here. 347 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:27,560 But he goes straight from changing water into wine, into 348 00:19:27,840 --> 00:19:29,920 cleansing the temple. And as I said in the other 349 00:19:29,920 --> 00:19:32,800 gospels, he cleanses the temple at the end of his ministry and 350 00:19:32,800 --> 00:19:34,880 it's part of what gets him killed, right? 351 00:19:35,240 --> 00:19:39,200 So he he goes and right at the end he cleanses the temple, has 352 00:19:39,200 --> 00:19:42,120 this direct confrontation with the Sadducees, and then within a 353 00:19:42,120 --> 00:19:45,240 week he's crucified. But John has the cleansing of 354 00:19:45,240 --> 00:19:46,640 the temple right at the beginning. 355 00:19:47,440 --> 00:19:50,320 And that's once again for a purpose. 356 00:19:50,520 --> 00:19:54,400 He's trying to say to us this act that Jesus performs is very, 357 00:19:54,400 --> 00:19:57,400 very important to understand what the whole message in the 358 00:19:57,400 --> 00:19:59,600 trajectory of this gospel is going to be. 359 00:19:59,800 --> 00:20:01,920 So keep it in mind. That's why he's put it right at 360 00:20:01,920 --> 00:20:03,720 the beginning. Just like with the prologue, 361 00:20:03,720 --> 00:20:05,880 keep it in mind because he's put it at the beginning. 362 00:20:06,080 --> 00:20:11,920 This is the logic. So you have this interesting in 363 00:20:11,920 --> 00:20:16,400 the second-half of Chapter 2, again, you know the story he 364 00:20:16,600 --> 00:20:18,560 you've got people selling animals in the temple. 365 00:20:18,960 --> 00:20:21,600 And he says, get out of here, stop turning my father's house 366 00:20:21,600 --> 00:20:24,120 into a market. His disciples remembered what it 367 00:20:24,120 --> 00:20:26,120 was written. Zeal for your house will consume 368 00:20:26,120 --> 00:20:28,840 me. Then the Jew said, what sign can 369 00:20:28,840 --> 00:20:31,240 you show us to prove your authority to do all this? 370 00:20:31,560 --> 00:20:34,320 Does this question all throughout John, what authority 371 00:20:34,320 --> 00:20:37,320 does Jesus have to do and say the things that he does all the 372 00:20:37,320 --> 00:20:39,560 way through? You'll notice it comes up again 373 00:20:39,560 --> 00:20:42,240 and again. By whose authority do you do 374 00:20:42,240 --> 00:20:44,000 this? What gives you the right to make 375 00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:46,240 the kind of claims that you do? Jesus. 376 00:20:48,320 --> 00:20:51,120 And his answer is remarkable. And I don't know if you've ever 377 00:20:51,120 --> 00:20:52,600 stopped and really thought about this. 378 00:20:53,280 --> 00:20:56,080 He says, destroy this temple and I will raise it again in three 379 00:20:56,080 --> 00:20:58,640 days. That's a remarkable answer. 380 00:20:59,040 --> 00:21:05,440 So John has Jesus driving people out, cleansing the temple, gets 381 00:21:06,480 --> 00:21:07,560 accused. Why are you doing this? 382 00:21:07,560 --> 00:21:08,600 Why do you have the right to do it? 383 00:21:08,600 --> 00:21:12,480 What sign can you give to prove you have the right to, you know, 384 00:21:12,480 --> 00:21:15,880 tell us what to do? And he says destroy the temple 385 00:21:15,880 --> 00:21:18,400 and I will raise it again in three days. 386 00:21:19,720 --> 00:21:21,680 And we know from the other gospels that everybody was 387 00:21:21,680 --> 00:21:24,200 extremely confused by this statement because it comes up at 388 00:21:24,200 --> 00:21:27,760 Jesus trial. He gets accused of, of being a 389 00:21:27,760 --> 00:21:29,720 revolutionary. Who's going to who that he is 390 00:21:29,720 --> 00:21:31,920 going to come and destroy the the Jews temple. 391 00:21:31,920 --> 00:21:34,160 I think, look, he's you see, he's a, you know, he's a 392 00:21:34,160 --> 00:21:35,760 radical. He's going to blow the temple up 393 00:21:35,760 --> 00:21:41,840 or whatever they, you know, they would do in those days, destroy 394 00:21:41,840 --> 00:21:43,240 this temple and I will raise it up. 395 00:21:43,240 --> 00:21:45,480 So notice that he's telling them you destroy it. 396 00:21:46,600 --> 00:21:48,160 He's not saying I'm going to destroy the temple. 397 00:21:48,160 --> 00:21:49,640 He's saying you're going to destroy the temple. 398 00:21:49,920 --> 00:21:53,120 You destroy it and I will raise it again in three days. 399 00:21:54,200 --> 00:21:56,640 And then John sort of tries to help us. 400 00:21:58,040 --> 00:22:00,840 It says the temple he had spoken of was his body. 401 00:22:00,880 --> 00:22:03,080 And after he was raised from the dead, his disciples. 402 00:22:03,080 --> 00:22:06,800 And John's saying me like I, I recalled what he had said. 403 00:22:07,040 --> 00:22:12,400 And then they believed. So Jesus is making reference to 404 00:22:12,400 --> 00:22:14,520 the temple. He's making reference to his 405 00:22:14,520 --> 00:22:17,320 body. And he's saying to him, this is 406 00:22:17,320 --> 00:22:21,520 the sign that is going to show you by whose authority I say and 407 00:22:21,520 --> 00:22:24,520 do the things that I do. The sign is going to be this, 408 00:22:24,520 --> 00:22:27,880 you destroy the temple and I'll raise it again in three days. 409 00:22:29,040 --> 00:22:31,880 Super confusing. No wonder they they had no idea 410 00:22:31,880 --> 00:22:36,600 what was going on. I've said many times, often 411 00:22:36,600 --> 00:22:39,600 people will say the reason Jesus talked in parables was to relate 412 00:22:39,600 --> 00:22:42,600 spiritual truths to ordinary people so that they can 413 00:22:42,600 --> 00:22:44,120 understand them. But that's not what the Bible 414 00:22:44,120 --> 00:22:46,000 says. The Bible says he spoke in 415 00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:48,560 parables so that people couldn't understand them. 416 00:22:49,920 --> 00:22:53,320 He did it to veil truth so that the natural mind would be 417 00:22:53,320 --> 00:22:57,840 confused. Remarkable, you'd think a 418 00:22:57,840 --> 00:22:59,840 teacher like today. I'm trying to make things 419 00:22:59,840 --> 00:23:01,640 intelligible, right? I'm trying to put it out in a 420 00:23:01,640 --> 00:23:04,200 way that is that you can follow and grasp. 421 00:23:04,280 --> 00:23:07,240 But that's not how Jesus taught. He didn't teach in a in a 422 00:23:07,240 --> 00:23:10,120 systematic, intelligible way. He taught in a way that when you 423 00:23:10,160 --> 00:23:13,720 listen to him, you were extraordinarily confused, spun 424 00:23:13,720 --> 00:23:16,920 around, dizzy, but yet in your heart you felt like this is 425 00:23:16,920 --> 00:23:18,080 life. I just can't. 426 00:23:18,080 --> 00:23:20,640 I can't explain it. I can't put it into any scheme 427 00:23:20,640 --> 00:23:23,240 that makes sense to me. My heart is burning within me, 428 00:23:23,360 --> 00:23:25,600 but I can't rationally make sense of any of this stuff. 429 00:23:26,200 --> 00:23:27,920 That's how he taught over and over again. 430 00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:31,080 And I think there's, I don't know who said this. 431 00:23:32,120 --> 00:23:36,800 It was someone, some famous church person said, for, you 432 00:23:36,800 --> 00:23:39,520 know, Jesus began his ministry by turning water into wine. 433 00:23:39,520 --> 00:23:41,720 And the, the church has spent the last 2000 years trying to 434 00:23:41,720 --> 00:23:47,000 turn it back into water again. So hopefully we're not going to 435 00:23:47,000 --> 00:23:49,600 do that today. But this issue of destroying the 436 00:23:49,600 --> 00:23:53,800 temple, what is the temple? Well, we've, we've got 2 temples 437 00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:56,160 referred to here. 1 is the physical temple that they're in. 438 00:23:56,160 --> 00:23:58,480 And then the second one, the more important one, he's talking 439 00:23:58,480 --> 00:24:01,600 about his body, right? John tells us that his body. 440 00:24:03,040 --> 00:24:06,080 In the Jewish scheme, the temple is the place where God is 441 00:24:06,080 --> 00:24:09,040 supposed to live. The temple is the place where 442 00:24:09,040 --> 00:24:13,280 you come and approach the divine presence, but you can't go fully 443 00:24:13,280 --> 00:24:20,960 into the divine presence. The temple is there to teach us, 444 00:24:20,960 --> 00:24:24,160 to form within us a sense of the sacred. 445 00:24:24,920 --> 00:24:29,360 We recognise sacred presence because we've got a place that 446 00:24:29,360 --> 00:24:33,040 we can look at physically and identify it as this is a sacred 447 00:24:33,040 --> 00:24:35,080 presence. There are sacred protocols that 448 00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:36,680 we adopt when we go to the temple. 449 00:24:36,960 --> 00:24:40,480 All of that is supposed to enculturate us with the idea 450 00:24:40,480 --> 00:24:44,840 that OK, there is. God is not just ordinary, right? 451 00:24:45,960 --> 00:24:48,160 It's supposed to create an awareness of the sacred. 452 00:24:48,320 --> 00:24:51,320 It's supposed to do something in society, in the community, that 453 00:24:51,320 --> 00:24:53,800 gives us a sense of there are things we need to treat as 454 00:24:53,800 --> 00:24:57,760 sacred that we we take seriously, not things that we 455 00:24:57,760 --> 00:25:01,560 just take lightly. We have an intuition towards the 456 00:25:01,560 --> 00:25:03,880 sacred, and the temple is supposed to do that. 457 00:25:04,200 --> 00:25:06,640 The whole of the religious practise is supposed to do that. 458 00:25:07,160 --> 00:25:10,360 But here's the the kicker. The purpose of building the 459 00:25:10,360 --> 00:25:19,040 temple is to destroy the temple. So the Temple is part of the Old 460 00:25:19,040 --> 00:25:22,280 Testament story. It's divine in origin, divine in 461 00:25:22,280 --> 00:25:25,440 design, but its whole purpose is to be destroyed. 462 00:25:26,080 --> 00:25:28,640 It exists so that it will be torn down. 463 00:25:29,480 --> 00:25:31,520 It does not exist so that it will remain forever. 464 00:25:34,520 --> 00:25:37,960 It's like the law. The Jewish law exists so that it 465 00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:42,600 can be torn down, not so that it remains forever in in that form. 466 00:25:43,280 --> 00:25:45,240 That's what the Apostle Paul says through the law. 467 00:25:45,240 --> 00:25:47,360 I died to the law so that I could live to Christ. 468 00:25:47,880 --> 00:25:51,320 The Christ in his flesh abolished the law with its 469 00:25:51,320 --> 00:25:55,320 commandments and ordinances. So when we're looking at the 470 00:25:55,320 --> 00:25:58,000 temple, when we're looking at the the Jewish law, when we're 471 00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:01,280 looking at that religious system, which is the water in 472 00:26:01,280 --> 00:26:04,840 those ceremonial jars, it promises a lot, but it delivers 473 00:26:05,000 --> 00:26:07,720 little to nothing and it's diminishing returns. 474 00:26:09,800 --> 00:26:12,960 The whole purpose of that is to be set up so that we'd get 475 00:26:13,120 --> 00:26:17,120 knocked down. You build the temple to destroy 476 00:26:17,120 --> 00:26:21,160 the temple. Like through our lives, we have 477 00:26:21,160 --> 00:26:24,320 all sorts of practises and experiences that acclimatise us 478 00:26:24,560 --> 00:26:27,480 to what is sacred, what is important to. 479 00:26:27,520 --> 00:26:31,080 We recognise, you know, we differentiate between things 480 00:26:31,080 --> 00:26:32,920 that are good, things that are not, things that are clean, 481 00:26:32,920 --> 00:26:36,640 things that aren't. But the whole purpose of that in 482 00:26:37,800 --> 00:26:41,600 developing our intuition towards the sacred is so that ultimately 483 00:26:41,600 --> 00:26:46,640 it can get torn down completely. And in the tearing down, we 484 00:26:46,640 --> 00:26:49,880 discover that the whole earth is a burning Bush alive with the 485 00:26:49,880 --> 00:26:54,360 presence of God, that the whole world is the temple of the of 486 00:26:54,360 --> 00:26:58,600 the Spirit of Christ. Because in John one verse one, 487 00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:00,480 it is the logos who is made flesh. 488 00:27:01,640 --> 00:27:06,840 What is the logos? The Logos is is the divine mind. 489 00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:09,600 It is the sometimes called the wisdom of God. 490 00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:14,320 The idea of Lagos is that the whole of the world emerges out 491 00:27:14,320 --> 00:27:18,160 of an invisible matrix that is the mind of the God who created 492 00:27:18,160 --> 00:27:20,200 it. And while we can't know the mind 493 00:27:20,200 --> 00:27:24,000 of God directly, we can we can see the hallmark of the 494 00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:28,040 fingerprints of the mind of God in what God has created. 495 00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:33,000 So you can see something of the nature of the artist in that 496 00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:35,200 artwork. You learn something of the 497 00:27:35,200 --> 00:27:38,840 Craftsman in their craft. You learn something of the the 498 00:27:38,840 --> 00:27:41,280 person who's designed an organisation in the way that 499 00:27:41,280 --> 00:27:43,480 they organise it. We talk about having values. 500 00:27:44,080 --> 00:27:45,600 We have a mission, you know, here at Hope. 501 00:27:45,600 --> 00:27:48,360 We have things that we value. Ideally you would be able to 502 00:27:48,360 --> 00:27:51,320 know something about the identity of this church by the 503 00:27:51,320 --> 00:27:54,280 way people act and behave. But the, but the values that we 504 00:27:54,280 --> 00:27:58,320 have are helping us get into alignment within those 505 00:27:58,400 --> 00:28:01,280 particular things that we prioritise as a community. 506 00:28:01,600 --> 00:28:04,000 So the logos is what does God prioritise? 507 00:28:04,000 --> 00:28:08,040 How does God think what's going on in the mind of God that would 508 00:28:08,040 --> 00:28:09,880 even mean that he would create anything. 509 00:28:10,360 --> 00:28:12,840 That's John. One in the beginning was the 510 00:28:12,840 --> 00:28:16,200 word, the logos. This is this divine matrix out 511 00:28:16,200 --> 00:28:19,280 of which everything else is. It's the substructure, if you 512 00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:24,440 like, of the whole of creation, if you like quantum mechanical 513 00:28:24,520 --> 00:28:28,200 analogies, maybe you would think about it like the Higgs field, 514 00:28:28,200 --> 00:28:31,560 what that, that even people call the, the, you know, the Higgs 515 00:28:31,560 --> 00:28:36,680 boson, the God particle, because scientists are thinking about it 516 00:28:36,680 --> 00:28:40,040 as the substrate from which all reality emerges. 517 00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:41,240 You know, why do we have substance? 518 00:28:41,240 --> 00:28:43,680 Why do we have matter? And they're thinking about it in 519 00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:47,680 mechanical terms. But for us, we think about it as 520 00:28:47,680 --> 00:28:50,520 this is the Logos, this is the divine mind which has given rise 521 00:28:50,520 --> 00:28:54,560 to the creation of everything. It matters that it is the Logos 522 00:28:54,600 --> 00:28:58,720 that has been made flesh, the divine mind, the way that God 523 00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:02,720 thinks, the way that God processes and views everything, 524 00:29:03,280 --> 00:29:06,960 that has been fully embodied in the person of Jesus Christ. 525 00:29:07,640 --> 00:29:11,240 So when we see him talk about his body as the temple, well, 526 00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:14,520 that actually starts to make perfect sense, because within 527 00:29:14,520 --> 00:29:18,600 him, within his physical body is the fullness of the Godhead, 528 00:29:18,600 --> 00:29:20,200 right? Is the fullness of God. 529 00:29:20,480 --> 00:29:24,400 Everything, every thought that exists in the divine mind is 530 00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:27,400 within Jesus. He is the thought of God. 531 00:29:27,440 --> 00:29:32,760 He is the word of God. Hebrew says this is the word by 532 00:29:32,760 --> 00:29:35,320 which God upholds the existence of all things. 533 00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:41,280 He's the very fabric of reality. But we don't see the fabric of 534 00:29:41,280 --> 00:29:42,480 reality. We can't. 535 00:29:43,360 --> 00:29:45,600 We can't grasp it, we can't conceive of it. 536 00:29:45,760 --> 00:29:49,640 And so we create all these religious structures to try and 537 00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:52,400 acclimatise us to it, to try and reach for it. 538 00:29:52,400 --> 00:29:55,800 These are the six jars. We're trying to hold it somehow, 539 00:29:55,800 --> 00:29:57,840 but we can't hold it. We can't contain it. 540 00:29:58,600 --> 00:30:03,240 Here comes Jesus containing it in its fullness and every place 541 00:30:03,240 --> 00:30:06,560 he goes into he he's constantly like digging up the ground, he's 542 00:30:06,560 --> 00:30:09,760 ploughing the ground, unearthing what's really going on under the 543 00:30:09,760 --> 00:30:13,200 surface. When he says destroy this temple 544 00:30:13,280 --> 00:30:18,240 and actually he's talking about his body, he's saying in at that 545 00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,120 at that point you're going to see the authority that I have. 546 00:30:23,160 --> 00:30:26,760 I mentioned that I am sayings. I am the bread of life. 547 00:30:26,760 --> 00:30:31,120 I am the Good Shepherd. I am is an important phrase here 548 00:30:31,120 --> 00:30:34,080 because this is the name of God in the Old Testament, God who 549 00:30:34,080 --> 00:30:37,560 reveals himself to Moses. Moses says, who are you? 550 00:30:37,560 --> 00:30:41,360 And God says, I am Yahweh, right, Jehovah. 551 00:30:42,640 --> 00:30:45,640 I am. When Jesus says I am, I am. 552 00:30:45,640 --> 00:30:50,000 I am over and over again he is identifying himself as Yahweh. 553 00:30:51,240 --> 00:30:54,640 Sometimes people who don't understand this will say, well 554 00:30:54,680 --> 00:30:56,840 Jesus never claimed to be God in the New Testament. 555 00:30:57,320 --> 00:31:01,040 Oh he absolutely did. Every time he says I am, he is 556 00:31:01,040 --> 00:31:04,240 directly invoking the divine name and applying it to himself. 557 00:31:05,600 --> 00:31:09,560 7 specific times in John's gospel and then at least two 558 00:31:09,560 --> 00:31:12,000 other times. Once when asked about Abraham 559 00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:16,920 and he says before Abraham was I am and another time when in the 560 00:31:16,920 --> 00:31:20,880 Garden of Gethsemane they say where is Jesus of Nazareth? 561 00:31:20,880 --> 00:31:23,160 He says I am and they fall to the ground. 562 00:31:23,160 --> 00:31:25,960 If you remember that part. So there's a two additional ones 563 00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:31,120 at least, but there are the 77 symbolic ones and each one of 564 00:31:31,120 --> 00:31:33,600 these is Jesus referring back to himself. 565 00:31:33,600 --> 00:31:35,200 By what authority do you do this? 566 00:31:35,480 --> 00:31:43,840 I do it because I am. I am who I am as Jehovah said to 567 00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:49,600 Moses. So let me tie this together. 568 00:31:51,480 --> 00:31:53,800 Jesus who is I am. What does that mean? 569 00:31:54,680 --> 00:31:58,640 I am is a reference to the fact that he is the ground of all 570 00:31:58,640 --> 00:32:03,240 being. All the reality emerges from the 571 00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:05,360 I am. That is the log offs of God. 572 00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:11,000 Everything emerges from that. In him we live and move and have 573 00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:14,600 our being. The Apostle Paul says everyone 574 00:32:14,600 --> 00:32:18,160 and everything has a pre established relationship with 575 00:32:18,200 --> 00:32:22,000 Jesus because he is the very ground of their being moment by 576 00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:25,880 moment sustaining their life and existence. 577 00:32:26,120 --> 00:32:30,040 He is the ground of reality. But just to say that he's the 578 00:32:30,040 --> 00:32:32,680 ground of reality doesn't tell us what reality is like. 579 00:32:32,920 --> 00:32:35,080 Because if you you look around you can see all kinds of 580 00:32:35,080 --> 00:32:38,320 terrible things and good things. And we might infer that God is 581 00:32:38,320 --> 00:32:41,080 both good and bad if we were just to look at the natural 582 00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:44,120 world. But Jesus comes to show us the 583 00:32:44,120 --> 00:32:48,640 fullness of the character of God that we can't see apart from his 584 00:32:49,000 --> 00:32:55,080 physical human life. So the ground of being what? 585 00:32:55,360 --> 00:32:58,640 What this is telling us is how should we view the entire 586 00:32:58,640 --> 00:33:02,160 universe, not just how should we view our Christian activity or a 587 00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:04,680 Christian experience. It's setting us up for a 588 00:33:04,720 --> 00:33:07,520 Christian cosmology. What is the nature of the 589 00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:08,440 universe? What? 590 00:33:08,760 --> 00:33:11,760 What is the universe's origin and what is its destination? 591 00:33:12,200 --> 00:33:15,280 Well, the answer is Christ as the divine Logos. 592 00:33:16,520 --> 00:33:19,400 Everything we see in Jesus, everything we see revealed in 593 00:33:19,480 --> 00:33:24,000 Jesus, is informing us that this is actually how the universe 594 00:33:24,000 --> 00:33:30,240 works and operates. As Richard Raw puts it, if God. 595 00:33:30,880 --> 00:33:36,360 So if Jesus is the face of the Father and if God is a Trinity, 596 00:33:36,360 --> 00:33:41,520 therefore we are living in a benevolent universe, which is a 597 00:33:41,520 --> 00:33:43,320 remarkable statement. Now if you look around, the 598 00:33:43,320 --> 00:33:45,120 universe does not appear benevolent. 599 00:33:45,760 --> 00:33:47,960 Nature's does not appear benevolent. 600 00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:51,280 Supernova millions of light years away do not appear 601 00:33:51,280 --> 00:33:53,320 benevolent. There are many things that do 602 00:33:53,320 --> 00:33:56,400 not appear benevolent in the material world as we look 603 00:33:56,400 --> 00:33:58,160 around. As long as we're just looking at 604 00:33:58,160 --> 00:34:00,840 those things, we will be deceived and confused as to who 605 00:34:00,840 --> 00:34:04,840 God is. We can't infer who God is just 606 00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:07,800 by looking at the natural world. Fact as part of the Christian 607 00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:10,000 witnesses that there is something disordered about the 608 00:34:10,000 --> 00:34:12,800 natural world and it's a bit of a mystery how that happened. 609 00:34:13,080 --> 00:34:17,760 But when Christ comes in, he shows us in himself the pattern 610 00:34:17,760 --> 00:34:21,760 of how things were designed to be and actually the pattern that 611 00:34:21,760 --> 00:34:27,360 they're still held in the logos. It's other focused self giving 612 00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:31,880 love. It's water into wine, it's joy, 613 00:34:31,880 --> 00:34:35,159 it's life, it's light. My yoke is easy, my burden. 614 00:34:35,159 --> 00:34:37,600 It's like all of these things that life does not feel like a 615 00:34:37,600 --> 00:34:40,360 lot of the time. So whenever life doesn't feel 616 00:34:40,360 --> 00:34:43,800 like that, the invitation is to go back to the temple, the 617 00:34:43,800 --> 00:34:45,960 temple that is the broken body of Christ. 618 00:34:46,760 --> 00:34:49,639 That reveals to us again who He is, what He's like. 619 00:34:49,840 --> 00:34:53,920 Because if we can catch a glimpse of that, we will also 620 00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:57,920 know that is what we are like. Because we are formed from Him 621 00:34:57,920 --> 00:35:00,680 and out of Him and our life is held in him. 622 00:35:01,240 --> 00:35:04,400 It's who we're designed to be. All the ways in which we are not 623 00:35:04,400 --> 00:35:08,640 like that as individuals or a society or anything else is is 624 00:35:08,640 --> 00:35:12,120 indicative of a lie that we have believed about who we are and 625 00:35:12,120 --> 00:35:14,600 how the world is. We've been deceived and 626 00:35:14,600 --> 00:35:22,760 disordered into being selfish, prideful, violent, greedy, often 627 00:35:22,760 --> 00:35:25,240 hearted, feeling like we have to fight our own corners, be 628 00:35:25,240 --> 00:35:28,000 controlling, fearful. All of these things are based on 629 00:35:28,000 --> 00:35:32,840 a lie that we are something that we are not or that we are not 630 00:35:32,840 --> 00:35:37,120 something that we actually are. Which is the same lie that is 631 00:35:37,120 --> 00:35:41,880 there in the garden when the snake says to Eve, you know, oh, 632 00:35:41,880 --> 00:35:44,880 you will be like God if you eat this fruit, even though it was 633 00:35:44,880 --> 00:35:47,040 already established she was already like God. 634 00:35:49,240 --> 00:35:55,440 So Jesus then last thought, we go to John 14. 635 00:35:57,120 --> 00:35:59,920 It's page 1082 and 1083 if you want to take a look at it after 636 00:35:59,920 --> 00:36:01,680 it's for time. I'm not going to read it, but I 637 00:36:01,680 --> 00:36:06,200 just want to mention it. In the Old Testament, you have 638 00:36:07,080 --> 00:36:09,960 this phrase that God actually says. 639 00:36:10,400 --> 00:36:14,280 No one may see my face and live. He says that when he's talking 640 00:36:14,280 --> 00:36:19,920 to Moses in Is it Mount Sinai? No one may see my face and live. 641 00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:23,800 Moses asks to see God's face, and he says you can't see my 642 00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:26,840 face, you can only see my back because no one can see my face 643 00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:29,880 and live. So there emerges this idea that, 644 00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:33,320 well, God is we can get close to God, but we can't get face to 645 00:36:33,320 --> 00:36:35,760 face with God because if you get face to face with God, you're 646 00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:39,680 going to spontaneously combust. That's Moses's testimony, right? 647 00:36:40,120 --> 00:36:44,080 So the glory that Moses gets, he gets from the back of God, not 648 00:36:44,080 --> 00:36:46,560 from the front of God. Then when he goes down the 649 00:36:46,560 --> 00:36:48,120 mountain, that glory drains away. 650 00:36:49,600 --> 00:36:52,960 Philip says to Jesus, show us the Father and that will be 651 00:36:52,960 --> 00:36:56,240 enough for us. And Jesus says you've been with 652 00:36:56,240 --> 00:36:58,760 me so long and you've not yet realised if you have seen me, 653 00:36:58,760 --> 00:37:02,960 you have seen the Father. So Philip, face to face with 654 00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:05,600 Jesus at the moment, at that very moment, has still not 655 00:37:05,600 --> 00:37:08,200 figured out I am actually looking into the face of the 656 00:37:08,200 --> 00:37:10,000 Father when I'm looking into the face of Christ. 657 00:37:10,360 --> 00:37:12,400 And yet I did not spontaneously combust. 658 00:37:14,160 --> 00:37:17,360 I did not dissolve away into nothing, going to some divine 659 00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:22,120 holy conflagration. Actually, in being face to face 660 00:37:22,120 --> 00:37:27,120 with him, I, my true nature has been rehabilitated and has been 661 00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:30,440 brought forth. The apostle Peter, the first 662 00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:32,240 time he meets Jesus, go away from me, Lord. 663 00:37:32,240 --> 00:37:35,120 I'm a sinful man. He says not six months later, 664 00:37:35,120 --> 00:37:37,800 he's arguing with the other disciples about whether or not 665 00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:41,400 he would be #2 in heaven. The greatest in heaven is 666 00:37:41,400 --> 00:37:44,080 extraordinary. You go from I'm too sinful to 667 00:37:44,080 --> 00:37:47,240 even look at the holy preacher to six months later I might have 668 00:37:47,240 --> 00:37:50,360 a shot at being the number 2 head honcho in the Kingdom of 669 00:37:50,360 --> 00:37:52,480 heaven. What's happened to Peter in 670 00:37:52,480 --> 00:37:54,480 those six months? He's just been hanging around 671 00:37:54,480 --> 00:37:57,840 with Jesus. So what does hanging around with 672 00:37:57,840 --> 00:38:00,760 Jesus do to us? How transformative is that? 673 00:38:01,240 --> 00:38:05,840 The face to faceness that Peter experienced with Jesus was 674 00:38:06,640 --> 00:38:12,360 liberating his true nature. So to be, to be true, there is a 675 00:38:12,360 --> 00:38:15,640 fire when you look into the face of Christ, there absolutely is a 676 00:38:15,640 --> 00:38:17,440 fire, but it's not a fire of destruction. 677 00:38:17,440 --> 00:38:21,240 It's a fire of liberation. It's not a fire of retribution. 678 00:38:21,240 --> 00:38:23,560 It's a fire of purification, of refinement. 679 00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:29,440 It's a fire that that lifts us up into who we are, not a fire 680 00:38:29,640 --> 00:38:33,080 that burns us up into nothing and gets rid of us. 681 00:38:33,280 --> 00:38:36,880 This is the consuming fire that is in the face of Christ. 682 00:38:38,080 --> 00:38:42,760 So he says to, he says to Philip and the others in that day, this 683 00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:44,800 is what I'm going to finish with because I live. 684 00:38:44,800 --> 00:38:48,520 You also will live on that day. You will realise that I am in my 685 00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:50,320 father and you are in me and I am in you. 686 00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:54,480 So he's telling them just before he goes to the cross. 687 00:38:54,480 --> 00:38:58,640 You don't understand this now, but in that day and that day. 688 00:38:59,720 --> 00:39:03,560 Next time I'll talk about chronological time and divine 689 00:39:03,560 --> 00:39:05,120 time, but I'm not going to do that now. 690 00:39:05,440 --> 00:39:07,920 But just think in that day he goes to the cross and then he 691 00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:10,320 rises from the dead and he calls that a day. 692 00:39:10,720 --> 00:39:15,240 Right in that day you will realise not I will be in you and 693 00:39:15,240 --> 00:39:17,280 you will be in me. He says In that day you will 694 00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:20,120 realise I am. Remember the divine name. 695 00:39:20,440 --> 00:39:23,760 I am in You, I am in the Father and you are in me. 696 00:39:24,720 --> 00:39:27,360 You're going to see it then, and this goes back to when you 697 00:39:27,520 --> 00:39:29,920 destroy the temple and I raise it up again in three days. 698 00:39:29,920 --> 00:39:32,240 Then you will know by whose authority I speak. 699 00:39:32,560 --> 00:39:36,320 Here's his answer there in John 14 you're going to see the 700 00:39:36,400 --> 00:39:41,160 authority is I speak by is my own authority as the very Logos 701 00:39:41,160 --> 00:39:45,280 out of which all of creation has come into being in that day. 702 00:39:45,280 --> 00:39:49,680 You will know you are in me. They were already in Him. 703 00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:54,320 They couldn't recognise that yet because they're still seeing Him 704 00:39:54,440 --> 00:39:57,320 in the flesh. How can I be in you, Jesus? 705 00:39:57,320 --> 00:40:01,160 You're standing right there because He's the Divine Logos 706 00:40:01,280 --> 00:40:04,880 who upholds your very existence and in whom you were created and 707 00:40:04,880 --> 00:40:07,080 designed for a good purpose right from the very word go. 708 00:40:07,720 --> 00:40:10,240 You're going to see that when you go to the cross because his 709 00:40:10,240 --> 00:40:14,480 body is broken symbolically, His body being broken and his 710 00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:17,520 insides being exposed, as gruesome as it is, is also 711 00:40:17,520 --> 00:40:21,240 trying to tell us something that the very core of Jesus is being 712 00:40:21,240 --> 00:40:25,160 is being revealed to us now. It's shining out of that broken 713 00:40:25,160 --> 00:40:27,120 body. And just as the veil is torn in 714 00:40:27,120 --> 00:40:29,720 the temple and ultimately the temple is done away with, the 715 00:40:29,720 --> 00:40:33,840 physical temple, now what we see is the light of and life of 716 00:40:33,840 --> 00:40:37,600 Christ shining out in and to and through all things, 717 00:40:37,800 --> 00:40:41,000 regenerating, rehabilitating, bringing them back into their 718 00:40:41,000 --> 00:40:46,480 proper designed divine order. And as we see many things that 719 00:40:46,480 --> 00:40:48,920 are disordered in the world, as we recognise this and 720 00:40:48,920 --> 00:40:52,280 participate with it, we also join in with reordering the 721 00:40:52,280 --> 00:40:54,960 world, bringing things back into right alignment, right 722 00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:58,880 relationship, sorting out the environment, whatever it is, 723 00:40:59,320 --> 00:41:02,160 we're participating with Jesus in seeing those things happen. 724 00:41:02,920 --> 00:41:07,400 So John is trying to, he's trying to draw us into an 725 00:41:07,400 --> 00:41:12,400 encounter with this Jesus, the Jesus who is the divine Logos. 726 00:41:12,760 --> 00:41:14,880 Right back in the prologue, this is what he says. 727 00:41:15,080 --> 00:41:17,320 In him was light. That light was the life of men. 728 00:41:18,240 --> 00:41:21,760 And then all the way through we see the same thought is being 729 00:41:21,840 --> 00:41:25,080 preached from different angles, going, it's like going round in 730 00:41:25,080 --> 00:41:27,440 a spiral, looking at it from all sorts of different angles until 731 00:41:27,440 --> 00:41:30,720 you get this culmination in the cross and in the resurrection. 732 00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:35,000 So this is John. Is that too heavy for a Sunday 733 00:41:35,000 --> 00:41:39,240 morning? Let me finish and let me finish 734 00:41:39,240 --> 00:41:46,040 and pray because as I said at the start, this is not, this is 735 00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:48,040 actually supposed to scramble our brains. 736 00:41:49,640 --> 00:41:52,440 It's not supposed to sit, you know, logically and 737 00:41:52,440 --> 00:41:55,480 methodologically in a way that that feels very comfortable. 738 00:41:55,680 --> 00:42:00,320 It's supposed to scramble our natural thinking to reveal what 739 00:42:00,320 --> 00:42:02,720 is more true, which is underneath our natural thinking. 740 00:42:02,720 --> 00:42:05,800 And that is the reality of the Spirit inside us. 741 00:42:06,440 --> 00:42:07,960 Christ in you, the hope of glory. 742 00:42:08,400 --> 00:42:15,880 So Father God, my prayer for us all is that you would reorient 743 00:42:15,880 --> 00:42:20,760 the furniture of our natural mind, that you would unearth the 744 00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:24,440 reality that is Christ in US and that is our union in him. 745 00:42:24,960 --> 00:42:26,920 Thank you Jesus, you are in the Father. 746 00:42:26,920 --> 00:42:28,880 The Father is in you and we are in you. 747 00:42:29,280 --> 00:42:31,880 Therefore we are in the Father and the Father is in US. 748 00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:34,600 And there just as the fullness of the Godhead dwells in you in 749 00:42:34,600 --> 00:42:39,960 bodily form, so the fullness of the Godhead now dwells in US in 750 00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:43,160 bodily form. Thank you that the natural mind 751 00:42:43,160 --> 00:42:48,440 cannot apprehend that or get even define its dimensions. 752 00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:51,800 So we just lean back into you, we relax into you. 753 00:42:54,360 --> 00:42:57,360 Thank you, Holy Spirit, you give us permission to just say we 754 00:42:57,360 --> 00:43:03,360 don't know, but we are known. Whatever situation you're facing 755 00:43:03,360 --> 00:43:05,040 in your life today, I want to speak that over you. 756 00:43:06,240 --> 00:43:09,600 You do not know how it's going to work out, how to solve it, 757 00:43:09,880 --> 00:43:13,800 how to address it, but you are completely and fully known. 758 00:43:14,400 --> 00:43:17,440 And in being known, you are completely and fully loved. 759 00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:23,640 Holy Spirit, would you make that truth blaze so brightly in us as 760 00:43:23,640 --> 00:43:27,000 individuals and as a community that it will be impossible for 761 00:43:27,000 --> 00:43:30,160 us to miss it, and, if possible, for those of us around us to 762 00:43:30,160 --> 00:43:33,880 miss it as well. And then thank you. 763 00:43:39,280 --> 00:43:42,120 Thank you, everyone. Thanks, Paul. 764 00:43:44,760 --> 00:43:48,000 We've got to go and collect our children now. 765 00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:52,400 But I think one thing I think God's been putting on my heart, 766 00:43:52,800 --> 00:43:57,600 which is that, you know, Jesus sat at the feet of Mary and 767 00:43:57,800 --> 00:44:01,920 Martha was distracted by the diaconos, which was like, not 768 00:44:01,920 --> 00:44:04,480 just it. People think of Martha as doing 769 00:44:04,480 --> 00:44:06,960 the kitchen work. And it wasn't about being 770 00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:09,560 domestic. It was about being a sitting at 771 00:44:09,560 --> 00:44:12,000 the feet of Jesus as a rabbi, as a learner. 772 00:44:12,440 --> 00:44:14,760 But in that story, actually, she was in ministry. 773 00:44:14,760 --> 00:44:16,680 It was like leadership. It's a leadership role. 774 00:44:16,680 --> 00:44:21,640 She was busy doing the things of God and she was distracted 775 00:44:21,640 --> 00:44:24,800 because Mary had chosen the better part, which was to sit at 776 00:44:24,800 --> 00:44:27,960 the feet of Jesus, listening to his word, looking at him. 777 00:44:28,320 --> 00:44:33,440 And I think Paul talked a few times about this idea of being 778 00:44:33,440 --> 00:44:39,040 face to face with God, which is we see, you see that image in 779 00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:42,240 Genesis 1 and John 1. And So what I'd encourage us to 780 00:44:42,240 --> 00:44:49,040 do is to prioritise that sitting at the feet of Jesus like Mary 781 00:44:49,040 --> 00:44:55,280 and actually taking time to look at Jesus because we're very 782 00:44:55,960 --> 00:45:02,160 capable, prolific people and can often miss him because we're 783 00:45:02,160 --> 00:45:05,720 doing extraordinary and interesting things. 784 00:45:06,560 --> 00:45:09,400 And I think he's calling us to Mary. 785 00:45:09,400 --> 00:45:12,400 He actually said she really has chosen the better part, the good 786 00:45:12,400 --> 00:45:15,600 part, which is quite a strong statement. 787 00:45:16,360 --> 00:45:20,720 There's something about, I think what what Paul's bringing about 788 00:45:21,120 --> 00:45:26,120 this revelation of who Jesus actually is and gazing upon him 789 00:45:26,120 --> 00:45:29,720 until we really see him for who he is and therefore see 790 00:45:29,720 --> 00:45:35,080 ourselves for who we are, that requires us to take time to do 791 00:45:35,720 --> 00:45:37,000 so. I think I'm going to bless us 792 00:45:37,000 --> 00:45:40,600 with that as we go away. It could be we do that in 793 00:45:40,600 --> 00:45:44,440 community with other people. It could be on our own, but but 794 00:45:44,440 --> 00:45:46,640 actually almost like an intentional action. 795 00:45:46,640 --> 00:45:50,640 This isn't about a quiet time or solitude or any of those things. 796 00:45:50,640 --> 00:45:52,320 It's literally about who are you? 797 00:45:52,800 --> 00:45:56,360 Who are you, Jesus? I need to sit here and know who 798 00:45:56,360 --> 00:45:59,960 you are because in knowing who you are, I will know who I am 799 00:46:00,040 --> 00:46:01,680 and I will know who everyone else is. 800 00:46:03,760 --> 00:46:06,800 Lord, I thank you that you have. You give us that gift of that 801 00:46:06,800 --> 00:46:12,360 story of Mary and Martha, and You make us prolific and gifted 802 00:46:12,400 --> 00:46:16,560 and active leaders in so many areas. 803 00:46:17,120 --> 00:46:20,880 But actually, the better part is to sit and look at your face 804 00:46:21,880 --> 00:46:24,120 because that's reality looking at your face. 805 00:46:24,120 --> 00:46:27,520 And we desperately need you to help us to do that. 806 00:46:28,200 --> 00:46:31,160 We pray like Paul prays in the Bible that the eyes of our 807 00:46:31,160 --> 00:46:33,440 hearts are enlightened, that we may know you better. 808 00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:38,120 May you literally turn the lights on so we can see you for 809 00:46:38,120 --> 00:46:40,440 who you are. We can see ourselves and we can 810 00:46:40,440 --> 00:46:44,240 see everyone else the way you see the world, the way the world 811 00:46:44,240 --> 00:46:47,440 actually is. We just cry out to you in this 812 00:46:47,440 --> 00:46:51,080 community that your kindness will lead us to a repentance. 813 00:46:51,240 --> 00:46:54,560 Your kindness towards us will lead us too. 814 00:46:54,560 --> 00:46:58,040 I love how Paul puts it an upgrade in our thinking, a light 815 00:46:58,040 --> 00:47:00,960 bulb, just more clarity as to who you are. 816 00:47:00,960 --> 00:47:04,840 If this is true, that you hold the universe together, you hold 817 00:47:04,840 --> 00:47:08,160 us together, you hold everything together, which I believe is in 818 00:47:08,160 --> 00:47:12,480 Hebrews and Colossians. You say that then we need to 819 00:47:12,480 --> 00:47:15,880 have fresh revelation on who you are. 820 00:47:16,440 --> 00:47:19,800 So we, we, we just cry out to you to give us that gift of 821 00:47:19,800 --> 00:47:22,520 fresh revelation. Amen.