Well today is our final message in this series we've been calling "UNDER PRESSURE." We've explored what it looks like to find peace, to experience joy, and to maintain hope under pressure. Everything we've learned about... Jesus shared with his disciples in the final hours of his life, before his arrest. So here we are. There is one final topic Jesus spoke to his disciples about... it's how they should maintain sense of purpose in the midst of pressure.
Actually in John 17, Jesus is praying. And the disciples are listening, their eavesdropping on his conversation w/the Father, they're like a fly on the wall. And honestly, there is a boatload of things we could talk about in Jesus' prayer. But he's praying that they would maintain a sense of perspective, a sense of purpose, in the midst of all that was about to happen. I believe that no matter how great the pressure we have four opportunities:
Pressure is an opportunity to... Know "Eternal Life" more deeply.
John 17:1-3. Jesus prays: "Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. 2 For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. 3 Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
What's intriguing, is for most of my life, I always thought of "eternal life" as something God gives me, as in, something he can give me apart from Himself. But actually, eternal life isn't a thing at all, and it's not something that can be given apart from God. Eternal life is knowing God Himself, it's knowing Jesus. In the Old Testament God told the Israelites, "I am your very great and precious reward!"
Have you ever stopped to think, when under pressure, that God most wants to give you is more of Himself? In your trouble, God wants to become more real to you than ever before. The pressure you face (no matter how great) is an opportunity for you to see God more clearly, more completely than you could ever imagine.
About a month ago, I was in so much pain, I couldn't sleep. I had this sharp, piercing pain in my knee, and despite going to the doctor, I couldn't find any relief. I couldn't bend my knee, put pressure on my knee, look cross-eyed at my knee. If my dogs came within five feet of me, I'd yell at them. Poor Lara, she didn't know what to do for me. There were several nights I laid in agony on our downstairs couch, literally, crying out to God for mercy. "Lord Jesus, please, help me... You're my only hope... I don't deserve your mercy, but please."
I know we preachers are prone to exaggerate for affect. But I've never experienced more persistent, sharp, unrelenting pain, than over these past few months. And there were times I just sat in silence, depressed, exhausted, demoralized. But you know one night I prayed, "Lord what do you want me to understand... what are you trying to teach me through this pain?"
The doctor told me I needed to try to exercise my knee despite the pain. So I hoped up on my exercise bike, and I couldn't even do a single peddle rotation... and I look down and notice the crankshaft of the peddle. And I thought, it sure looks an awful lot like a railroad spike... it sure looks an awful like the kind of spike the Roman's might have used to pierce Christ's hands and feet, when he died for my sins. And I began to think of the agony of the cross, and how wimpy I am, and what a Savior Christ was.
And I tell you there in my pain God met me, and He made himself as real to me as the pain shooting through my body. And so I pushed my foot forward in agony, and I prayed, "Come on Lord..." And I rocked my foot forward again and yelled, "Come on Lord, help me." And again and again... and you know what, I got those peddles turning. And I prayed, "Lord, I will remember your pain. And I will remember the pain of people around me. And this pain I'm enduring won't be wasted."
I want you to know that pressure is an opportunity to know Eternal Life... and by Eternal Life, I mean the Father, and the One he sent into world, Jesus Christ.
[Symbol]Pressure is an opportunity to... Abide well in Jesus' Words.
John 17:6-8. "I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. 7 Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. 8 For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me.
John 17:16-19. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.
When we're under pressure, our words, our thoughts, often run amuck. I think of the story of Job, his wife, and his friends. Job was a man who had everything. But then Satan decides to sift Job. One day raiders attack his fields, steal his oxen and donkeys, and put his servants to death. Then news comes that a fire fell from heaven, consuming his herds of sheep, and killing his shepherds. Then his camels are stolen, and bandits kill more of his servants. Then, a tornado strikes his home, killing all his children. And if that isn't enough, his body is afflicted with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head.
The book of Job is forty chapters of Job and his wife and friends debating WHY all this stuff was happening to Job. At one point, Job even becomes suicidal. He begins to think it be better if he'd never been born. How quickly we succumb to our thoughts, destroying ourselves, even destroying others. There is nothing we need more in times of trouble than the right words going into our ears and into our brains.
I had a situation a few years ago that was extremely distressing. I don't care to even describe it, nor characterize it. But I realized that I needed my thoughts and words recalibrated, and that I really need to think about my pressure the right way. So one evening I went to HyVee, and I spent the entire night reading the New Testament. I had a journal. And I wrote down every single verse I found that applied to my situation. And I didn't leave until I'd gone from Matthew to Revelation. I didn't realize you could read the whole New Testament in one sitting.
But you know God recalibrated my thinking. I had my Job 38 moment, where through his Word, God ministered to me by his Holy Spirit. What was I doing? I was letting God's word sanctify me, heal and strengthen my spirit, clarify God's will.
Jesus gave his disciples the Father's words, and they accepted them! You know, think what good we would do for ourselves if we would accept what God's word says about our pressure, and dismissed the "hallow drivel" so many biblically uniformed Christians spew who've never received counsel of God's word.
Pressure is an opportunity to know God, to abide more deeply in his words...
Pressure is an opportunity to... Remember where Jesus is going.
John 17:9-15. "I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me. . ."
13 "I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. 14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one."
Do you remember last week's message? The disciples are sad, and they're grieving because Jesus has told them he is going to suffer, and die, and be raised. But Jesus' criticism of his disciples is they had the wrong focus. In fact he says to them, "GUYS! You should be asking where I am going..." In other words, I'm not just going to trial, I'm not just going to a cross, I'm not just going to a grave, I'm like a seed that is cast in the ground, and later Springs to life. I am going back to the Father! And if I go, I'll come back to take you to be with me...
No matter what we experience, we should be reminded that God hasn't abandoned us. Not in our pressure, not in our trouble, not in our stress, not even in our grave. If HOPE isn't relevant to you now, because you feel safe, and your comfortable, and your healthy, and everything seems great... one day HOPE will be the only thing you have to grab hold of. The trouble is a moment to remember our hope... Where was Jesus going? Not to a grave, but to the Father's side. What is our destiny? Not a grave, but its to dwell in the Father's presence.
Pressure is an opportunity to... Let Jesus' mission, be your mission.
John 17:20-23. "My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me." 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one-- 23 I in them and you in me--so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me."
Pressure is an opportunity to make Jesus as real to others as he is to us. Our pressure is a pulpit, through which we invite others to know the Eternal Life we've found, which is Jesus Christ himself. It's a pulpit by which we invite people to be ONE with God, and His Son Jesus Christ, and all of us who've been included in Christ by faith. The pressure is occasion to love as we've been loved...
Living Life on Mission...