Second Sunday after Easter

May 5, 2019

Old Testament Reading: Isaiah 61: 1-7

Epistle: Acts 3:1-13

Psalm: 66/67, Alleluia verse: 7 &8

Gospel: John 3: 16-24

Sermon

In our Old Testament reading this morning we hear words that are most likely familiar to everyone, here are some of those words again: The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me; because of which He anointed me, He sent me to proclaim good news to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, to preach liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to declare the acceptable year of the Lord, the day of recompense, and to comfort all who mourn.

Do these words sound familiar? Our lord read these words in the synagogue in Nazareth from the prophet Isaiah; we see this in Luke 4: 16-21, and then Jesus said; today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing. Jesus made the proclamation that He is the LORD God that Isaiah was speaking about. Jesus, the God/man is speaking as the Son of Man when He said that the Spirit was upon Him because as the Son of Man he was anointed and sent out to humanity to preach the gospel. This prophecy was indeed fulfilled in Jesus the Christ.

This healing and preaching continues through His apostles doesn’t it? They are in turn sent out by our Lord to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, and to preach the gospel, also to baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. So many look for the healing of the body as a sign that one is sent from God but isn’t this about more than just a physical healing? When Jesus healed didn’t He say to go and sin no more? Healing must take place in the soul, in the spirit of a person even more so than in the body. What good is physical healing if the soul continues to be separated from God? To be truly healed, man must be re-united to God, Almighty God created us, He gave us life, we are from Him, even those who deny His existence are from Him, and there is no life for anyone or anything except from the Creator. We are also sent are we not? To proclaim the gospel, the good news to humanity and this good news isn’t about the healing of the physical body but the healing of the soul, the spirit, this must come first.

Many physical healings took place in the beginning mainly so that the people could see that sin and death had been overcome by the resurrection of the Lord Jesus and that Jesus was and is the Messiah, the Christ, the Savior of all mankind, He is the way, the only way back to the Father. These things were the proof of the message. Not everyone will be healed physically regardless of the amount of prayer or of the one praying. Of course this doesn’t mean that there is no physical healing today because there is but this is not the point of the gospel is it?

We have forgotten one very important part of all things: we have forgotten God’s will. If God wills, one will be healed. It is God’s will that is to be done. Our Lord Jesus Himself in His great prayer also prayed: Father, if there be any other way, however, not My will but Thine be done. So what is God’s will? Isn’t it that all may be saved? What does Paul tell us in I Timothy 2:3-5, for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is One God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time

In 2 Peter 3:8 and 9 we read; but, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is long suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

From the prophet Ezekiel in chapter 18 verse 23 we read; do I ever will the death of a lawless man, says the Lord, since My will is for him to turn from the evil way and live.

Leaving the scripture for a moment I ask; whose will shall be done on earth and in heaven? Is it not God’s will that shall be done? Is God’s will that all should turn from the evil way and live? We know that it is. God’s will, shall be done. So let us look at our gospel for today in light of other scripture. Practically all of Christianity knows the opening verse of our gospel, John 3:16, for God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Praise God, right? I say it again; praise God. Why? Because God loves us. He loves you, he loves me, he does not wish that anyone should perish, that means He loves everyone. God gave us all, life. We are from Him, whether we like it or not, we are from Him, He gave us life, everlasting life. We are His, period. But then He gave us freewill, why would Almighty God do such a thing? Why create us out of love, give us love, but then allow us to do whatever we choose by either rejecting Him, recreating Him in our own minds to be whatever we desire Him to be, or to come to Him fully according to His will and desire. Because of love, God is love, he is all love, without freewill there can be no love. If we are not allowed to make a decision for love than how can it be known that the love is real? Love is real when it is given freely. This is the only way.

Let’s look at today’s gospel of love in the light of the other scripture and see what just may be the actual truth of it all. I say that today you may hear things in a way that you may have never heard them before. You discern for yourself the truth of it, pray about it, and go to the lord about it. Meditate on it; I tell you, this will change you into a different Christian than you may be now at this moment if you regard the words and understand and believe them. We see in verse 16 of most all bible translations today, the words; that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. That word; believe, can be rendered in a different way. The Greek may also be translated and also has been in the past ; so that everyone trusting in Him should not perish. Does trusting in Him have a somewhat different understanding than to believe in Him? It does, to trust in Him is to place your whole being, everything that there is about you is handed over to Him, believing does not have the same understanding, if you are listening to this or reading this then I believe in you. I believe that you exist, that you are real but it does not mean that I trust you with my life. To trust in Him means that He owns every aspect of our being, nothing is left out. All good things as well as all bad things that come our way serve a purpose; we bring many bad things on ourselves don’t we? We also bring many good things to ourselves. God allows these things to come and go whether we bring them unto ourselves or not. This is a testing of our faith and love as well as a purging of the things that we need to get rid of.

Let’s take a moment and hear a different rendering of the Greek writing into English; the Gospel of John, chapter 3, verses 16 to 24. For thus God loved the world that He gave His Only Born Son so that everyone trusting in Him should not perish but should have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world but that the world should be delivered by Him. The one trusting in Him is not judged; but the one not trusting is already judged, for he trusts not in the name of the Only Born Son of God. And this is the judgment - that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness more than the light for their works were evil. For everyone who acts heedlessly detests the light and does not come to the light so that his works should not be reproved. But the one observing the truth comes to the light, so that in God his works should be made manifest.

Trusting in Christ Jesus, giving one’s life entirely over to Him, allowing God’s will to work in us and not our will , is the re-uniting of ourselves to our Creator, our Father in heaven. This is salvation, this is the desire of our Creator, those who do this are not judged but those who do not are already judged. What is this judgment? Here is one example; Matthew 25:31-46

The Sheep and the Goats

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

“

They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

“He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

“Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

In verse 33 we see that Jesus is separating sheep and goats, sheep on the right and goats on the left but I see a problem here; sheep and goats are adult animals, children of these animals are lambs and kids respectively. From the Greek I see a different understanding; the words say sheep on the right and the kids on the left. The word that is translated into goat is actually a word for kid, so you may say, what does it matter, it is still a goat, I say yes, technically this is correct but why use the words meaning a fully grown sheep instead of a baby sheep called a lamb but use the word for a baby goat called a kid rather than an adult goat as done with the sheep? The English of course rendered this as an adult goat because it fits into the philosophy of the elect who are saved and the others who are condemned for all of eternity. Why would the translators not translate the word as kid when this is what the Greek says?

Well, a kid is a child, one who is unlearned, an uneducated one who has not understood. Why would a loving God who gave life to all that lives, choose to send a kid into the eternal flame, the fire meant for the devil and those who fell with him, and leave this kid this uneducated one there to burn for all of eternity if the desire of God is that all shall be saved? Yet the kids are sent into the eternal fire, but this we know, God is an eternal fire; in the letter to the Hebrews chapter 12 verses 28 and 29 we read; Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire.

We also know that God, the consuming fire is everlasting.

We are also told that God, the consuming fire is everywhere throughout the universe, that we can go nowhere that He is not. Psalm 138/139 verses 7 -12; where could I go from Your Spirit, or flee from Your face? If I should ascend into heaven, You would be there; if I should descend into Hades, You would be there; if I should take up my wings at dawn and pitch camp at the furthest part of the sea, even Your hand would lead me, and Your right hand would hold me. And I said, perhaps darkness shall cover me, but the night shall be light to my delight, for darkness shall not be dark because of you, and the night shall be bright as day; as it’s darkness, so also shall be its light.

So, when one is banished into the eternal fire, one is still standing before the Almighty God who is the consuming fire, we shall always be before Almighty God, there is nowhere we can go, even sent into the eternal fire is to still be before or in the presence of Almighty God. Those heading to eternal life as well as those heading to eternal fire are all standing before the unbegotten, eternal, Almighty God. The consuming fire will purge us of all sin that we have left in us; our works shall be tested, 1 Corinthians 3:12-15. "Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any man’s work abide which he has built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as through fire”.

Matthew 5: 25, 26 agree with your adversary quickly, while you are on the way with him, lest your adversary deliver you to the judge, the judge hand you over to the officer, and you be thrown into prison. Assuredly I say to you, you will by no means get out of there until you have paid the last penny. God is a loving God. He created so that we could share in this world with Him. He will forgive but we must be willing to allow Him to operate in us, we must do this willingly, God will not force us, force is not true love. For those who deny the Christ will enter into the fire of God and shall be purged, God is patient as we saw in the beginning, one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years is as a day. He will wait for us. Going to God completely will be our decision. I pray that you make yours now while you have life in you here, pay now rather than later, you will feel the pain of it here but I fear that the pain of it there will be far worse.

Those who go through Jesus will be in the same eternal fire with this exception; through Christ the fire will be light, eternal light which is life for those who have chosen it. One is in the fire and one is in the light. Some will have a heavy purging and some will have a lighter purging. 1 Corinthians 15:27-28 For he has put everything under his feet. Now when it says that everything has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all.

I say that these things have been revealed to me, but this is not a revelation as in a prophecy regarding some future event that no one has heard yet. These are revelations in the sense that through the years of reading Holy Scripture this idea has slowly taken shape, I have not spoken publicly regarding this until now because it goes against all of mainstream Christian teaching. The teaching is regarding the suffering in hell for all eternity for those who did not believe while they were alive. It began to come into my mind that who in the world would do this? Who would not cry out to God during this burning? It began to seem to me that all who claim to not believe would become sudden believers at death and the separation of the soul from the body and suddenly find themselves standing in the fire.

I know that God loves all because He has shown this to me over the years by calling me to rise up from sleep and to pray for someone and then to discover later that this person was in fact passing from this life at the time, these souls that I am referring to were not ones that had accepted Jesus Christ during their lifetime, some had actually rejected him completely when given the chance many times during his lifetime. I also know that God loves all that He has given life to because He has shown this love to me in spite of my previous lifestyle. I am indeed a prodigal son, the events that I have somewhat just spoken of caused me to begin to read the writings of the very early church along with what is called the Bible, through these writings I began to see that I was not in fact beginning to believe something that was not a reality because from the earliest beliefs of the church this idea of a loving God that would allow all to eventually be saved was taught.

Hell is real, it is a place of chastisement, it is a punishment, a correction, one can be rehabilitated there. Whether it is a moment, a thousand moments or a thousand years I cannot say. It is a time period, and I believe that each time period or age is different for each one of us. Now do not confuse this with universalism, universalism I believe also contains the idea that all paths lead to God. This is not what I am saying, there is only one path and that path is Jesus the Christ. So what is the difference if everyone will eventually be given life, and why is Jesus the only way? The only way out is to finally believe that Jesus is Lord. It is not a matter of how many good things that we did or did not do. We will give ourselves to Jesus or we will not get out. Why? Let’s complete the circle and go back to the beginning of the sermon.

For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son, that whosoever believes or trusts in Him, will not perish but have everlasting life. If we go to the beginning of the Gospel of John and start in chapter one we see; In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God, He was in the beginning with God, all things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men….He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name. Who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

So we see that Jesus is the very Word of God, born in the flesh. What does this mean? The Word of God is God, the word of God, or God, was born in the flesh, or became flesh through birth as a child, suddenly as all of heaven and all of the angelic host stood and watched in awe, God and humanity were re-joined in the God/man Jesus the Christ. This is salvation, the joining of humanity and God. It is only through Jesus that we may be re-united to our Creator, our Father who gave us life. Jesus unites us. When we realize this, when we participate in this, we then learn of salvation. God Himself sacrificed for His creation, this is love, to sacrifice oneself for others. How is it that we can make any other claim when we have a God who made this incredible sacrifice of Himself not in just coming down from the throne of heaven and becoming flesh, then to sacrifice His flesh willingly in such a horrific way as the cross, not even in a swift painless death, how can we say anything other than that Jesus is the way. There is nothing else that we can do other than to unite ourselves to our Lord and savior Jesus the Christ. There is no other way, whether that happens in this lifetime in the flesh or in the ages to come, we will not escape until we are united to Christ and then have been purged of the sins in which we died with.

May you not simply just blow this off, may you begin to search your heart for it is there that you will find the light that was given to you at birth. There you will begin to find the truth. Amen.

We must live our faith in spite of those who make the statement that they do not need God in their life to do good. We who believe still need our Savior because we sin everyday whether in thought, word or deed. There is no amount of good that we can do that will erase our sin once we have committed it. There is only our faith in Christ Jesus, our recognition of our sin, our confession, and repentance. This is our faith.

God can do all things; there is no situation that we get ourselves into that God cannot help us out of. Don’t think though that if there is some earthly penalty that we must pay, that we will escape this because we suddenly come to God for help. We simply must have the faith and believe that all things are known by God and that He in truth loves all of His creation. Keep in mind however; God's plan is far above ours. We suffer and we have plenty coming based on what God Himself has in store for us whether it is for purging, for testing, or for reward or necessity for our life. God is in control.

We do not know when this will end and the new beginning will be, in spite of the many modern prophets who make a living selling Jesus and the destruction of the world; we have no clue when it will be. In the meantime, it rains on us all, haters and lovers of Jesus. The sun shines on us all, haters and lovers of Jesus. We remain together in this world until that day. So take a lesson from the readings. Continue to praise and worship the Lord God, the Father and Creator of all that is seen and unseen, in the name of Jesus the Christ and through the Holy Spirit. Never cease to pray and live according to the gospel. Allow the Holy Spirit to guide you. Love God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, and with all of your strength; love your neighbor as yourself. You may never know whose life you will change because of this love of God in you.

The light has entered the world and the times; they are changing.

If one does not have love for the soul of mankind and the desire that all come to the truth than one does not have Christ in them fully.

Little children, love one another; because this is our Lord’s command and if you fulfill this, nothing else is needed. Through love and because of love we will follow all of the commandments that we have been given. They are written on our hearts by the hand of Almighty God. We simply need to see them within us and follow.

Remember; if we confess our sins and repent, he is faithful and just, to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity.

May the peace of our Lord Jesus the Christ be with you throughout this day and the rest of your life. May the Holy Spirit fill us all to overflowing so that everyone in whose path we cross may receive a blessing from our Lord Jesus the Christ.

In Christ.