The Insider and the Outcast Encounter Jesus - Tim Keller - This is Jesus

hello and welcome to this is Jesus this is Jesus it's a week it's just an opportunity for every student in Oxford to explore who versus Jesus since I'm your host this evening my name is Madeline foot and I'm one of the many Christians who have already encountered Jesus character we're delighted tonight to have to Taylor speaking she will be speaking all her things this week he's based out of New York in my hometown but speaks a little world oops like this I'm gonna pass the street over to Tim will talk for 25 to 30 minutes am I on there thanks for coming back some of you I can see have come back thanks for coming the first time some of you can see how cumbersome I do see that you I could see what you are each night this week we're looking at another place in the New Testament Gospel of John which is you're sitting on right now I've shown the worst like get out but you're about to look at it tonight we're looking at Jesus Christ encountering certain individuals why we're doing it because we're looking over the series of five nights at answers to the big questions that everybody needs to have working and to score who are we human beings what's wrong with us good there's something wrong with the world what if anything will improve it there's no way to live life without a working theory of what the answers those questions argue what we're doing is explore each night the Christian answer to one of those questions no tonight the question is what's wrong with us or what what's wrong with the human race why is the world the way it is and we can't believe I'm talking about what we can do about those we look at what is wrong with in essence we're exploring the Christian answer to that question tonight that's going to get us into the subject of sin I know the word greats and it's warranted for people to cringe when they do a Christian use the word sin because it is a way to Marge applies and objectify your opponent to say oh you're not just someone who disagrees with me you're a sinner and I'm not a senator and you are sooner instead of us having a debate or discussion suddenly marginalize you know it the word has to use that way nevertheless what I like to show you tonight is that the actual biblical understanding of sin it's much more nuanced than that can't be views that way actually and it's also much more profound so what we're going to do it I'm going to look at two encounters that Jesus Christ has that in the book of John actually come back to back in Chapter three he meets a Civic and religious moral male leader and in Chapter four he meets a social and moral outsider an outcast a woman in John 3 and 4 both of these texts are pretty famous and it's partly because each chapter is long the characters are developed in great detail they're full of interest and almost always if you ever study them or if you ever hear anybody speak about them it's always one or the other never both together the reasons I'm going to do this tonight is because I actually think that the writer of this book wants us to consider them together they are so different on the surface and I believe he's trying to Johnson to say is different as they are what have they got in common because if they had something in common at all so what I want to do is do what I want to do to you what I want to be with you what I wanted to do with you is look at each of these incidents each of these encounters a little more briefly than I would like to and yet the only way to see the big picture I think is to look at each one but something the outsider before we look at the insider the moral spiritual cultural outsider and the moral spiritual cultural insider the outsider is on page 11 and on page 11 in the little subscript numbers between the sentences are worse they guessed those the numbers of the verses so you can talk about chapter four verse we're going to start the chapter four verse nine it's in the middle of page and go over to the next page is the story of Jesus encounter with the woman at the well you should know that Jesus is traveling with his disciples through Samaria when he gets to Samaria which is outside of Judah his disciples go to get something to eat go into the town Jesus is very very very thirsty and in the middle of the day the sixth hour which is noon in the heat of the day he goes to a well he has no way of getting water out of the well but at that hour a lonely solitary woman comes to draw water from the well and he says would you give me something to drink starting verse nine the Samaritan woman said to him you are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman how can you ask me for a drink for Jews not associated with Samaritans jesus answered her if you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink you would have asked him and he would have given you and the well is deep where he would get this living water are you greater than our Father Jacob who gave us this well and drank from it himself as did also his sons in his livestock jesus answered every one who drinks this water will be thirsty but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst indeed the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life so the woman said to him Sir give me this water so that I won't get thirsty enough to keep coming here to draw water he told her go call your husband and come back I have no husband she replied she said her you are right when you say that you have no husband the fact is you've had five husbands and the man who heard that you now have is not your husband what you have said is quite true sir her the woman said I can see that you were a prophet what's that was a comic let me show you why it's comic let me show you what whether remarkable conversation is there's two features of it the first feature is how gentle he is and what a strong radical outreach Jesus is doing and very good anyone even begins to talk with her it's not surprising to us to see this conversation but it should be and if you understood the context you would be surprised here's why there is one low reference there it says the Jews and Samaritans don't get along that's a bit of an understatement and she is shocked that he's even talking to her as I mentioned you're a Jew and I'm a Samaritan not a woman how in the world are you having this conversation the context is the Jews and the Samaritans were bitter enemies centuries before when the Jews were taken most of the Jews were taken in exile to babylon by their Conqueror some of the Jews that stayed behind intermarried with other Canaanites and formed and essentially a new race the Samaritans who then also took parts of the Jewish religion in parts of the Canaanite religion and created a synchronistic religion the Jews considered the Samaritans racial inferiors and heretics that's the first reason why she surprising thing is speaking to her the second reason is he was a Jewish man and his speak to a strange woman in public was a shock to I'm a woman and you're talking to me why would we even talk to me but the third thing is she came to draw water and if over the years pointed out is that's not when women became through our water you came early today when it wasn't hot yet so you didn't have water for your housekeeping chores for the entire day why was she there why was she in the middle of the day and the answer is we're going to stay in and then it Ben who actually heard and read about it but she was immoral outcast even within her own Society she was a farm outcast and Jesus Christ reaches across every single barrier that the world puts up between people there was a racial barrier there was a cultural barrier it was a gender barrier and it was a moral barrier and according to every social convention and everything the world at that time said he shouldn't have anything to do with her and care he sent a radical is he reached right across any when we connected her she was his age than they should be that's quite me when I say to the markable I would like to take that literally or like even market the second remarkable thing is in spite of the fact that he clearly is over there he is very warm to her he's a Spanish community desires in a relationship with her and yet he confronts her but he confronts her in a way I would consider gentle certainly it's brilliant he says if you knew who I was you asked me for water and if you drink that water you'll never thirst again and what's he talking about I think Paul's in it talks about it because the eternal life Jesus is talking metaphorically and he's referring to something as living water now the metaphor is a little bit lost Oz if you live in ancient times and if you lived in a buried aquinas you would know something about the agony of thirst England of course is one of the least arid climates in the world it's one of the reasons why you agreed and what's the plan when the Sun comes out it's incredibly pretty pleasant so you know much about thirst however they did and because your body is made of water largely of water to be in real thirst as to be an egg and then a taste water when you are thirsty really thirsty is the about the most satisfying experience possible so what is he said he speaking metaphorically and inside I've had something to you that is basic and necessarily spiritually as water is to you physically without which we're lost and let's draw a little further how does the metaphor work well water would be satisfied deeply satisfying and secondly did you notice what he says at the bottom here of the page when he says my water if you get it it will become in you a spring of water welling up to eternal life comes from inside and here's what he's saying he's talking about deep soul satisfaction he's talking about incredible satisfaction and contentment apart from what's happening outside of you what will make you happy do you think what will really give you a satisfying life almost certainly it's going to be something in your mind that has to hang on the side of you some of you have your heart set on the love some of you have your heart set on career some of you have your heart set on peer recognition to make a contribution in your field maybe it's politics maybe it's a social cause maybe it's just money but whatever it is that you say if I had that if I get dinner then I'll know I'm important that I know I have significance then I know I'll have security it's outside of you Jesus says there is nothing outside of here that it will actually satisfy the thirst that is really into you I have something for you that will give you unbelievable deep absolute satisfaction in the core of your being regardless of what happens outside regardless of circumstance that's what I got now the reason it's hard for me to talk to a young crowd largely uncrowded about this is I know what I just said does it sound plausible Clearwater there's something strange about this very thing that Jesus is talking about you don't really believe you're that thirsty in the way to speak as long as you think there's a pretty good prospect of you achieving your dreams as long as you say I've got a good possible I'm in Oxford I've got a really good possibility of achieving a lot of my dreams as long as you think there's that possibility you're almost completely to how deep the thirst is inside of course you're not perfect that's okay because eventually out there I know I'm going to be okay and that's the reason why only a few people and then it's the very few people in life that actually do research dreams inevitably they talk about this unbelievable emptiness that they are so shocked to find and they get to the top of the leaf i'ma get to the top of the mountain I mean in fact it's almost a cliche like for example years ago the great tennis player Boris Becker he was actually embarrassed to say this is a quote from him he says I had won Wimbledon twice once as the youngest player ever I was rich I had all the material possessions I needed money cars women everything and I know that this is a Gosha what I'm about to say it's the old song of the movie and pop stars who commit suicide they have everything and yet they are so unhappy but I had no inner peace sure I'd rather have these problems in my car yeah let's keep talking this is this is very famous a very famous Sophia Loren interview some years ago when she was talking about I had everything I had the awards I've had marriage Carlos utter and then she says in my life there's an emptiness as is impossible to fulfill in my life there is still an emptiness which is impossible Philip my favorite example of this by the way though was a clipping I read when I first moved to New York by Cynthia - she had written four years for the Village Voice a kind of downtown arts paper and she knew in the 1980s an awful lot of pretty big movie stars I won't even mention their names they're very good movie stars but partly because what she's about to say it's a little bit unflattering but she knew a number of them when they were working behind the cosmetics counter at Macy's department store and when they were you know just they were just doing anything they could waiting on tables trying to make it and then they made it and they became $20,000,000 of movie stars and this is what she's said about them she says every single one of the people that she knew before they were successful and after successful she says that giant thing that they were striving for that same thing that was going to make everything okay that was going to make their lives bearable that was going to fill them with happiness had happened and the next day they woke up and found they were still there the disillusionment turned them howling and insufferable and what she said was almost everybody she knows it's really become successful with more hangry more manic more unhappy more unstable than they were before now let me give you the most tragic and most astounding example of this everybody has got to live or something whatever you think it is outside of you it's going to Jesus is saying if it's not me if it's not me I can give you that satisfaction and when I give it to you will be something inside you that has nothing to do with the circumstances but if it's not me then you're going to be looking at something outside of you and whatever that cleavage is going to be the thing that you're gonna have your whole life rotating around orbiting around and whatever that is is going to enslave you and it's going to hurt you because if it's listen anything that you feel like if I okay I'm at God in my life I don't have to turn it down a little bit village this is a thing that's really going to make me happy this is the thing that will really help me know that I've really become a better person I've made it different whatever that thing is you've got to have you've got to happen or there's no tomorrow and that means is anything practicing you will become an ordinarily scared and fearful if anyone blocks it you will become importantly angry and bitter and if you fail to get to it you will never be forgiven if you base your life on your careers I'm gonna be good and you don't do only put your career will never forgive you and you'll never be able to forgive yourself nobody put this better than David Foster Wallace David Foster Wallace was the person who did get in the top he was a postmodern novelist I mean in America what you know one of the great American novels he did commit suicide a few years ago and just before he committed suicide he gave this commencement speech to Kenyon College and this is what he said he said everybody worships the only choice we get is what to worship by the way this isn't not a religious man if you know anything about this to call us you know that listen everybody worships the only thing the only choice we get is what to worship and the compelling reasons of maybe choosing some sort of God or spiritual type thing to worship is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive if you worship money in things if they are where you attack real meaning in life then you will never have enough never feel you have enough worship your body and beauty and sexual lore and you will always feel ugly and when time and age starts showing you will die a thousand million deaths before they finally grieve you worship power and you will end up feeling weak and afraid and you'll never and you will need ever more power over others than know you - your own fear worship your intellect being seen as smart and you will end up feeling stupid a fraud always on the verge of being found out but the insidious thing about these forms of worship is their unconscious they are default settings it's astounding because he was one of the great intellectual systemic Rangers say worship this and it'll be afraid worship this and you'll be Greek worship you're gonna like being seen as being smart and you won't end up feeling stupid a fraud always on the verge of being found out not too long after that he killed he killed himself and I don't know exactly what the relationship between this speech is what was going on in his life but something ate him alive and what's frightening is his parting words to us a non-religious man very nice man to the world is something we need Eva life - because worship is something you actually think he would never call worship thank you all Jesus says unless it's me unless I'm the center of your life unless you're trying to get your spiritual church points for me and not for long as everything there's something from inside rather than something outside it's going to eat you alive she starts to say what is this thing would you give it to me he says after Sabinas they're messed with no you're right you had five husbands in the manual it look right now it's not your husband you were right what is he doing no if you if he disdained her he would never have open that the channels what he did what does he do maybe why did he change to something he didn't change the subject she says I want this water of life she says go get her husband he's not changing to something that's the point he said that's how you've been trying to get this water of life you've been trying to get it from the men and guess what it's not a religion sir the men are eating you alive anything of me will she says and she says we worship at this temple here are the Jews worship at the temple in Jerusalem where shall we finish McDonald Jesus says the congressman economist that there will be no need for a temple and she says Messiah comes he will explain all these strange things to us and nice to see let's look at the second command the second case because I wanted to show you the difference I'm not obviously that's bad I'm on the second case but there's a very very important man a Pharisee a logistic civic leader chapter three that's on page eight and I'm only going to read you seven verses starting on page eight chapter 3 where you see the victory now there was a Pharisee a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council he came to Jesus at night and said rabbi we know that you are a teacher who has come from God for no one could perform the signs you were doing if God would have repented jesus replied very truly I tell you no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again how could some would be born when they are old that if he was fast surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother's womb to be born jesus answered very truly I tell you no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water in the spirit flesh gives birth to flesh but the Spirit gives birth to spirit you should be surprised am I saying you must be born again do you notice that this is almost the opposite of how Jesus treats the woman the woman go well he starts off very gently surprising her with its openness and then slowly confronts her with their spiritual need with Nicodemus think David says rabbi I've heard many wonderful things about you people say that you really have a lot of wisdom and gods with you you must be born again Jesus does not work off with a template he confronts Nicodemus great firm and he says he must be born again and by the way I think this is probably he was as offended that you would be if somebody said that people because when you hear that turn born again what does that mean to you when you hear the term born again I think most people today say oh okay it's a kind of Christian who are born again Christians well born again people at people some people are more emotional or maybe it won't broken into drug addicts have been imprisoned and they need a cathartic experience so that it maybe being more than two different people who are emotional and coordinating the public occurring or being born again some people they just eat a lot of harden in their lives maybe structure and so they they they join these kind of regimented authoritarian structure religious movements be 40 minutes for a kind of person the problem with that it is a Nicodemus is a male Jew he is a civic leader he was a member of the Sanhedrin he was at the top he made a lot of money very prosperous he is not emotional type he is not a broken pipe he is by no means anything like that and secondly he was embarrassing you couldn't anymore we would disrupt her than that and not only that he wasn't a bad Pharisees or the word Pharisees today it has almost nothing with negative connotations but he goes to a man Jesus who was only a carpenter had no training and he calls him rabbi which shows open-mindedness this is the most admirable person possible pull together successful disappointment tomorrow religious and yet open-minded still and once you say you must be born again now that's other medical and of course it's like a metaphor for life in Jesus is talking about spiritual life again and he's now using a different metaphor not living water but big morning in the new board means you come into life but this is it of course getting something across the other metaphor didn't about the life that Jesus offers and that is this you can't earn or contribute anything to be born why don't you have to do wasn't it hard luck to get forth you remember it was really murder no we do decide to be born actually no what is Jesus Christ saying to this man who is as morally and religiously accomplishes anything he's saying the pics of the prostitutes outside on the street and you are in the same place you can contribute anything to your salvation you need spiritual life and it's not happy free gift you're gonna just have to ask for it comes in free here you are and the question is the wood panels the roaring fire the leather chair you know all of the letters that you name the degrees and here's somebody out on the street is homeless maybe a mafia another way as far as guys concerned your equal you both have this part through scratch me how can you say that here's how I said it Jesus is working on a deeper understanding his sin okay let me bring your word back now even look at the woman at the well and they say okay that's a traditional understanding of sin right she broke the rules maybe she printed adulteration you know she's had a number of questions she obviously some more laughs cast okay I understand the Christian are saying you said it's breaking a law well why is he talking to this man like that and there's the answer there's a deeper view sin sin that Jesus is working on sin is putting yourself in the place of God putting yourself in a place of being your own Savior not many guys with your savior your own Lord and Master now there is a second way to do that and that is to say with my critical faculties with my hard work I'm going to create a satisfying life we'll help you face debt in other words there's a secular way I'm going to say look there's an irreligious way deliberately irreligious I'm going about break off of rules I'm going to break all the traditional morals and show that I'm a free spirit and there's a religious way to be your own Savior in order to say if I live a good life I'm an incredible moral God with half the blessing we people have to answer my prayers why are you good over this person for God's sake no really for your sake why are you doing it to get control over God God will have to bless me he will have to save me you'll have to take me to heaven you're being your own Savior Lord so there's two ways to be your own Savior Lord according to the Bible one is by being incredibly bad breaking all the rules there's been incredibly good and say now God is in my cat self-centeredness there is an immoral self-righteous and incredibly moral kind of person who is so self-centered so bigoted looks down on everybody that creates a lot of misery in the world another kind of self-centeredness I'm gonna kill I'm going to steal I'm going to rape I'm gonna do whatever I want that means creates a very visible world to see it but it's all sin and the only way for us to be saved is to admit whether we're good or bad we need to be born again so what have these guys in common you said first of all everybody's guilty I guilt it I haven't mentioned but I think I would just say something about at this moment everybody was guilty a lot of people say to them in the years look I'm a good person I'm not religious and I think there is a God I guess but you know I'm a good person and that's what matters is it matters imagine a woman poor old widow who has a son and as she's growing racing she says to him son I want to know always tell the truth I would always work for her and I want you to take care of the poor and now he grows up he goes off to the grave University she she she Said's was pretty amount you can from her from her job and she puts him through college and university he gets out and he gets into his life and from then on he never speaks to her oh the Christmas party but he doesn't answer her phone calls he never speaks to her ah but he always tells the truth he always works hard anyway spiritually poor so he doesn't even have anything to do with his mother but he's a good person is that okay is that not class no he says it's condemnable because he owes her second thing if there is a God you will everything if there is a God he should be the center of your life and just because you're a good person especially if you're being a good person a wicked innocent pretty much everybody is you're actually you have a self-centeredness there you're not going down and secondly if they're all and slowly because you know if if you just build your like on men be really like on money or you feel like over rapidly I'm okay God's gonna love me every but everybody should respect because I'm a really really good person if you fail your career if you break up with your boyfriend or your girlfriend or if you fail you'll never forgive yourself every other master but Jesus Christ if you get we can get it in one satisfying and if you fail it won't forgive you Jesus is the only Lord if in getting will satisfy her and if you failed in him he'll forgive you your career can't divert your sentence why was it that she the woman there found the living water she did bother later if you keep reading the chapter she goes on and she tells her friends about the living water she found you might have been brought here tonight by a friend trying to do the same thing have a heart for him or her just trying to tell you about the living water so she finds hoping wonder why because Jesus was thirsty if he had him in her stinky wouldn t go on to the well she wouldn't have done her living warmer why was he thirst if he could have become a human being he was great he was God will see this tomorrow night but he let himself become so weak that he become tired and thirsty she found a living water because Jesus Christ said I thirst Jesus was experiencing the loss of a relationship that was father he was taking the punishment we deserve for our sin and that is to become about to lose the source of the water isn't that paradoxical but astonishing because Jesus Christ experienced Talisman thirst on the cross you and I can have our spiritual thirst is swirl aged that's the gospel now we're going to take some questions about tinder respond did you sell text the number on the suite and while you're doing that while you're teaching your questions I'm going to invite a fella from st. John's who well every evening were sharing and rolling people shared story how they energize us and how they affected their lives right here doctor and Helen I will tell you how she has encountered hi everyone I got Nick agnostic and welcome you a little about Christianity from school I didn't think any of it is more than nice idea I was happy to accept that some people did Christianity but my I felt ok as it was adopted grace I have plans my future and that's a nice person to me Christianity felt like a completely unnecessary lifestyle then five years ago I was invited to a christian III I wanted to find out why they can be like I strange ideas and I liked the way the art of my questions of openness so I started going over activity and they'll turn you about Christianity but my deception shifted to be conversations I'd see Christianity as feeling quite boring and full of rules but cookies I heard about seem to throw people but what was alive and set them free of ice constraints I began to see how amazing it could be to be in a relationship with him but I was still scared but I believe existed I found out when people trained about but after one I decided to try out the home try anything I felt pretty stupid and I was far from convinced I wasn't just talking to like that but I'd say something like God if you're real please show yourself to me it would be nice but it was a matter of months favor which do you credit of Jesus I remember that became real to me I began to see many good things in my life that didn't make sense otherwise my family was going through really tough times and the realities brought it up I can't pinpoint the precise moment I decided to become a Christian I think if my life to God but I know you know that Jesus could have led me to that moment I couldn't say everything has been perfect but my life has been completely turned upside down I need to spend a lot of time worrying about what people wanted me I was 15 ah it wasn't but that's changed remember that we really need the coordinates unconditionally I see God working in my life every single day and I could never have got through the first time if he needed help him God's everlasting love has given me a joy I never imagined it'd be possible to hear and when I think about my life before it's like the transition from gray to tell her from letting life happen to me the purpose for being asleep thank you straight to questions isn't psychology moving closer every day to explaining our actions through materialistic forces rather and as he says virtual forces of the soul I needed technology the idea that you can explain absolutely everything as the response of chemical reactions in your brain that are due to the way in which your genetic code has been programmed by evolution in the States my guess is a different sometimes it's called sociobiology evolutionary psychology basically saying there really if everything has a physical cause and therefore since everything has a physical cause it must have a chemical by a biological cause when my feeling of love my feeling of everything actually comes from my gradient that comes from the genetic code let me cut to the chase the problem with this idea that says my feelings are basically just the responses of my brain my brain chemistry would have to be applied to your reason as well Alvin Plantinga who's been teaching philosophy Notre Dame from years has put a couple of hooks on this I I actually think it's an irrefutable argument the plenty of people are trying to refute it but you need to at least know it so it's a form of argument what he tries to say is if you say that my moral intuitions and my emotional intuitions are nothing but the response of what I have been programmed by which my genetic code code the feel I feel I miss all I feel I have been addicted well that's because your ancestors who survived had those feelings and so you're programmed to feel that way his whole point then is the new cue if you can't trust your model intuitions and your spiritual intuitions then you shouldn't kill it trust your rational thought as well and I'm trying to give it to you in a in a nutshell it's not easy but it's an extremely well-worked out argument Alvin Plantinga it's called the evolutionary argument in international naturalism I'll say it's the evolutionary argument it's naturalism says the problem is if you try to explain your actions away by materialistic forces that would also explain away the belief and the thought that your actions are only a materialistic faces following so you know because he says that claim if you actually proves too much it actually undermines the plane itself if I can't trust these things I can't trust my reason as well I can't you're quite recently interested what you're asking me the logic behind what you're saying psychology's trying to get there I think in the end for us today they make a hundred years from now people are going to say we can't really explain human psychology strictly by biological forces that's just as a prediction it's a great question the reason why I'm not nailing it is because it's a great question that there really are good long Christian responses to it then I suggest trying to look at that thing he's written a book like things like - my sister is gay and she feels alienated and judgment returns what do I do okay I to me it looks like there's two I'll say three things obviously I say a lot more than that first of all it's possible that the Christians are judging her that is their baby condemning their big condescending they're being they're marginalizing her because she's gay it's pretty hard to me to swear that with everything I said so far these last two nights Jesus is not I'll tell you this that Jesus doesn't treat that woman in a moralistic Society and a paternalistic society in which a woman who behaved like the woman in the what at the well and John for that would she would have been utterly despised by everyone in society and Jesus did not judge her obviously he did not look down in there so if if you're a Christian and Jesus is your paradigm how to know how in the world you can treated a person and an abusive or harsh or condescending really disdainful way number one number two I do want to suggest this if if a Hindu man and I are debated God and the Hindu really disagrees with my view of God I don't feel like he's judging me you might you know having the same platitude but the fact that he disagrees with me I could never say well you're judging me because you're disappearing so if you are gay and a Christian says I have some problems or I disagree with you the way in which you're behaving of your beliefs just because this Christian friend disagrees with you about something doesn't automatically mean they're judging because if everyone you disagree with by definition was being judged and you are judging a Christian by disagree with America number three let me be first of all about this part yes the Bible says a number of times for him and vigorously that homosexuality is not God's designed way to use sexuality that it was according to the Bible is designed by God for uniting a man and woman in a marriage and it should be in any other place that's the Christian understanding the only thing I can say of course that's extremely unpopular you do have to really have to be careful about being ethnocentric if I go to the Middle East and I say I'm a sex righteous and I'm a Christian homosexuality sin and you should forgive your enemy seventy five or seven in the Middle East they're going to say the first thing you said is wonderful the second thing you said is crazy but if I go to Oxford or demand Athena and I say horse I try this and you should forgive your enemy 70 97 they're going to say the first thing he said is crazy and the second thing he says is wonderful the fact is that everybody is going to have problems with Christianity somewhere why if it's true that Christianity is actually that's true if the Bible actually was inspired by God then it would actually to offend every culture someplace you see it has to if it's not the product of one culture and it comes down from God then it is going with them every country somewhere just the fact that it offends our culture our Western culture at this point that's it means you just write it off now you say ah but win it this isn't just a matter of things I'm gay and I'm looking Christianity and I don't see a place for myself all I can say is your sexuality should not determine how you study the facts which is to say sometimes I'll say to a gay person I say are you saying you could repay the Jesus equipment than raised from dead they say no I'm not talking about that at all I said well do you know what the Jesus was raised is that or not the person's a lot on them that's what you have to figure that out Christianity is based on that and and so if you've got a good read on Christianity and you say you know Jesus was enriching the dead alright well then who cares what the Bible says but if on the other hand you've studied in this I think there's really good evidence that Christian is raised from the dead then you say we'll go there first and if you believe that then we'll go to everything else second because becoming a Christian means believe in Christ first and then we're going to have to if Jesus was raised for dead then you won't have to look at and deal with everything else that Jesus said and that will take a process but you should know when I start a lot of church years ago the first 200 people that joined my church for my signature because I was a brand-new minister and people and I didn't ask them anything about their sexuality but 20 to 25 percent of all the people the joint said I'm attracted to the same sex however I also know what the Bible says is I'm going to live by that it's really stretching me it's turning me to somebody very rude wise is helping me understand myself in new ways and I just wanted you to know no pastor home by the way 20 to 25% they did not feel because okay I can't embrace Christianity they looked at the truth of Christianity they decided this is proven they said now I'm gonna have to deal with this and they and they might see what the Bible says about homosexuality I buy it and I'm going to figure out how that means that God is still going to bless me and that's what they did it's a pretty quick number lawyers and the others of what can come from constantly and so I'm glad to have a chance to give you a pretty long answer so let's try to is it harsh that God doesn't appreciate well you know what if I if I manage somebody and I want to pick up a stone and smash on the side of the head I'm a Christian now by the way but I still want to do that there's there's a couple things like to tell myself to stop myself one is I could say hey you're you're a Christian and you're loved by Jesus Christ you're completely accepted in him why is this person making you angry probably the person has made you feel humiliated or perhaps the person has has kept you from some goal but in Christ it doesn't matter whether I'm a million I'm I'm I'm accepted in him what people think of me shouldn't matter this and that shouldn't matter get your heart right you shouldn't be to say I could do that the other thing I could say is just don't do it because you'll go to jail because you'll hurt the person because after you'll hate yourself in the morning now it's likely that when I'm really angry right my motives are be bright and unless they are right in the long run and I'm not going to become a non endian person see unless I get my heart right I'm never going to eventually overcome I owe as my wife has I'm not all an angry person but as a short run I think I was appreciated if I go kill a person even if my motives are absolutely wrong I think God cares about the misery of this world we're told in Psalm 145 he loves all that he has made he feeds them he cares for them he doesn't want to see them on athletes and if you just simply if you love somebody rather than take them if you feed them rather than oppress them regardless of your motives regardless I think God does appreciate that because he wants to see people happy he made us he wants to see us cry but when it comes to your salvation in your relationship with God I would say yeah your good deeds are not appreciated by them when you're doing them basically to stay away from me I don't think that woman who gave her son everything and he has abandoned her and yet he still live a good life really appreciates all those good needs at least in some ways his long glad he's not in jail but she says no which is what was then is wrong so you've got me a little bit because it on one hand I am saying from one point of view even the good things are actually bad things and they're alienated from God but on another level of course God appreciates your doing the right thing these are the great questions that's the reason why my answers are so long I can't why is sex okay after marriage Justin before oh that's right I didn't say that it all depends on last night I mentioned that Alistair McIntyre who wrote the great book after Richard says it's the only way you can judge the morality the rightness or wrongness of someone or something is if you first determine its perks and the reason why christians and other people does disagree about Meryl sexual ethics is because Christians have a view of the purpose of sex that most other people don't share if you're asking me for the inner logic I can having to tell you God sees according to the Bible God sees sex as a unitive act that is sexist is something is a way for you to say to another human being I belong completely and exclusively to you it's a way that indication if you're not if you're not marrying the person then that's a lot what you're doing is saying I want your body and I want you to give me your body and I want to give you my body but I don't want to give you all the rest of my life I don't want to give you myself legally psychologically permanently other words I want let's give each other our bodies but let's keep our lives for ourselves so stay independent that's not what we say luli sex is for sex is a covenant renewal ceremony sex is away after two people had said I'm giving you my whole life of sex equator renew that commitment and deepen it it's a kind of glue it's a it's a way of creating deep unity between two people who are saying all the rest of my life belongs to you and now physically I gave myself to you and that unites Sullivan so since we understand the purpose of sex for unit stated somebody else I belong completely exclusively to you I'm not my own I don't want anybody else then sex did a lie unless you do it inside the context of a marriage now if you don't agree that that's the purpose of sex if you see it's just a way of personal fulfillment or just simply a biological process that brings pleasure of course what have we feel that that engine is well what if you feel emptiness because existence has no fundamental purpose or intent what if religion including virginity is just another one of man's efforts to fill the void there was a man who used to teach years CS Lewis can I try was awfully planning on the Blackwell to notice Lewis and Tolkien where hundreds were in the today section you know they're from Oxford of course so they're ours they're ours we don't expect they belong to us CS Lewis says the very fact that we want something that this world can't satisfy it it's a a clue that we were made for something beyond the world now you're right whoever you said this is it come back here to say maybe the emptiness emptiness is just simply because life is meaningless and you're trying to fill the void but - meaningless and we're supposed to feel that it to us but Lewis is trying to say quite an animal's feel that way why aren't they afraid of death why why do we feel our finitude so strongly if we were really I think the way Louis God says if why would a fish that's in water even argue basically he says a fish out of water would know it's it needs to be in water if you're in the water you would feel that you're out of your element human beings is feel meaningless that they don't like the finitude that they're unhappy about the fact they're gonna die does that indicate why would they do that why would you feel that way why would we have involved with that way and that's just so good it's not proof by anything but missus I think it's actually a pretty good argument in probably I suppose makes it way better than I make but you want to take a look it's called if you could go online and you if you would go online and say google CS Lewis's argument from design it's argued for desire he's pretty eloquent in saying the very fact you feel meaningless is a clue that there's something about you that didn't just evolve let me just suggest one thought that would for those Star Wars who weren't here last night and tonight would you notice something that is that is common to Jesus was encountered to all three people in the Fanueil the woman at the well and Nicodemus Nicodemus is confronted early but I could make a case if you get all the way to enter the book of John you'll see him buried in Jesus when it was very dangerous to do so with Joseph of Arimathea Nicodemus was confronted and inventing his love the woman that was loved then she was confronted Nathaniel if you remember from mr. Vega was about the firm and confronted to be loved but not known it's nice to be known and not loved is our greatest nightmare that's what we cover up and make sure people don't see all the stuff that says but to be known to the bottom and love the sky by the only person whose opinion in the whole universe really counts is a solid foundation on which like because circumstances cannot touch that another way to do that is to say father God the Father would you accept me and adopt me and forgive me not because of anything I have done that everybody will be able to do but because of Jesus price is done in insulating them across nobody's father except me because of Jesus for Jesus sake because of what he did amen that's true step through the door and if you can say that it's not a bad idea to mark that second box with this commitment and what people say I know I need to talk to somebody about it we'll talk with a friend of pain so I'm going to close with prayer and then I will dismiss you our Father we thank you that it is possible for us to say this here Lord because of what Jesus Christ has done receive me into your family Lord because of what Jesus Christ has done giving you a living water give me your life show me what it's like to live for thirst so father that we pray at tonight many people tonight and soon words thank you for showing us the way can only pray all these

Channel: OICCU

Views: 23,117

Rating: 4.9036145 out of 5

Keywords: OICCU, Jesus, This is Jesus, Oxford University, Gospel of John, Tim Keller

Id: Xk8z1OMUg-c

Length: 60min 31sec (3631 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 09 2012