Praise No.6 Jesus in the Temple

I hear that Ben and Winston Webster will be with you next week. I'm sorry to miss them because we had some very good fellowship when they were with us in Chad. I wonder if you believe in a God of miracles, that God can do the same sort of miracles that he did when he was on earth today.

Well, I certainly do. And I want to tell you something that happened a few years ago in Chad. It was during the war and Marguerite and I were working at the orphanage.

We had 40 children and when the war started, we were completely cut off from home, from the capital, from any means of supply. And when our money ran out, we decided that we'd start to sell the things that were in the store. We started off with the tools.

There were no men around, so we thought, well, we'll get rid of those things first. And then when the stores became empty, we started to sell the roofs and the windows and the doors and some of the furniture. But we were able to eat every day for ourselves and for the 40 children that we had.

And it was coming up to Christmas time and we'd had a staple diet of macaroni and tomato or tomato macaroni. I didn't mind that at all, but I arrived one day for lunch and all we had was pancakes with spinach and I really felt that we'd reached the bottom. And I said to Marguerite, I'm sorry, I said, it's almost Christmas.

I'm certainly not eating a meal like this for Christmas. I'm going to pray and I'm going to ask God to give us a real Christmas dinner. I also want a present because it's Christmas and I'd like some cheese.

And I would like the pantry filled. Well, Marguerite being very polite, she didn't laugh, but she thought, dear me, what a thing to ask for. And we prayed and, you know, half an hour later, these vehicles turned up and there were soldiers.

By that time, we were occupied by the Libyans, but God is no respecter of persons. If he wants to work through somebody, he will. And these men had heard about us and their own rations, they'd clubbed together and they brought them to the orphanage and they bought us macaroni and rice and tea and sugar and soap.

Yes, and they bought the cheese, 200 pieces of it. And we also had our Christmas dinner because we had some potatoes. I don't know where they came from.

And one of the fathers bought us a chicken from a village and there was a little boy waving this tin around. He'd never seen it before. He didn't know what it was.

Well, I grabbed it. I certainly knew what it was. It was a tin of peas and it went very well with our chicken and potatoes.

And one of our elder boys drew us a calendar and it really looked like the genuine article. And all the visitors that came used to say, where did you get that from? But when they looked close, they could see it was drawn by hand. And with our pantry that was full, the southern Christians that had been released from prison wanted their Christmas dinner too.

And so we said, well, let's give them some rice and some tea and sugar and they too can have a Christmas dinner. So you see, miracles are still for today. They still are very, very relevant.

And we're still looking to God because he is still doing miracles for us in Chad, Eden, today. Can we now turn to the reading? It's in Luke's Gospel. Luke chapter 11 and verses 1 to 13.

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples. He said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come.

Give us each day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation.

Then he said to them, suppose one of you has a friend and he goes to him at midnight and says, friend, lend me three loaves of bread because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me and I have nothing to set before him. Then the one inside answers, don't bother me, the door is already locked and my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give you anything.

I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man's persistence, he will get up and give him as much as he needs. So I say to you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find.

Knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds.

And to him who knocks, the door will be opened. Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will he give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him? May God bless that reading to us. Just before you go back, Erica, how long have you been in Chad? Fifteen years.

I don't think they heard that. Will you tell them again? Fifteen years. And you're on furlough for a few months? Yes, I go back in July.

And which is your home church? It's Kingshurst Evangelical. It's just on the outskirts of Birmingham. And fifteen years, have you spent them all in that particular country? Yes.

And what's, give us a little bit more of a backdrop on the nature of your work there. Well, in recent years I've been working at the orphanage. It isn't a WECC work.

I was loaned there, but now God's going to do something really wonderful for WECC. We're having forty new workers within a year, so I'll be going back to join the WECC team. Would it be true to say that Chad is one of the poorest countries in Africa? Very, very poor, but we can boast of miles and miles of beaches.

You have to go three thousand kilometers to the sea, but we can boast of lots of sand. You haven't seen anything until you've been to Worthing Beach. Let's just commit Erica to the Lord.

Father, we thank you for your servant. For fifteen years, spent out in Chad. And some of the political upheavals we've known of here, in our own country, during those days.

And you've kept to, we commend it to you, and to your grace. We thank you, you're the God who gives cheese. You're the God who responds to the needs of your children.

They ask for a fish, you don't send them a scorpion. If they ask for bread, you don't give them a stone. You delight to give good gifts.

Grant to your daughter here, the fullness of blessing. And may her life continue to be owned by your spirit. Bringing many precious souls to you, in the country of Chad.

We commend her, and hers to you. In the name of our Savior, Amen. My heart is overflowing.

My love just keeps on growing. Here in thy praise so proud I stand. And I will praise you, Lord.

I will praise you, Lord. And I will sing of all that you have done. Our likeness in thy spirit.

Here in thy praise so proud I stand. I'd like you to turn in your Bible to John and chapter 7. I've decided, just as it is Pentecost Sunday, to break from my little series on praise, just this morning. And I'll come back to that next week.

And yet, what we're going to be sharing together is not exactly unattached to, unrelated to, the whole concept of praise, and the manner in which our Lord sometimes astonishingly conducted himself when he was at, inverted commas, church, in his day. Sometimes he could disturb. Sometimes he could create such a stir, which, had there been the addition of the Jerusalem Post available, then he'd have stolen the headlines.

Let's read the 28th verse of John 7. In the temple, we discover our Lord Jesus. Then, then Jesus, still teaching in the temple courts, cried out, Yes, you know me, and you know where I am from. I am not here on my own, but he who sent me is true.

You do not know him, but I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me. At this, they tried to seize him, but no one laid a hand on him, because his time had not yet come. Still many in the crowd put their faith in him.

They said, when the Christ comes, will he do more miraculous signs than this man? Verse 37. On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.

By this he meant the spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time, the spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified. The Feast of the Tabernacles is actually the context of this particular reading.

It was a time in the history of Israel that was recalled when thousands, tens of thousands, bordering on over a million people, moved on one of the greatest migrations in the ancient world from the land of Egypt to that of Israel. A vast number of people in transit, without therefore regular housing. How did they live? In tents, in impermanent dwellings.

The day came when they arrived at their homeland, the land God promised to their forefather Abraham. And so there was set up one of the several annual feasts of the Jewish calendar, the Feast of Tabernacles. On that occasion, in the streets of Jerusalem, people would leave their own residences.

They would have cut out or cut down willow branches from the trees, and they would have built what were known as booths, the branches not too tightly intertwined, so that as they were asleep at night, they could look through the cracks and see the sky, the night light. And recall those days, centuries ago, when God significantly and signally blessed their forefathers in bringing them from tyranny to freedom. It was a great feast.

The Jews knew how to worship. Worship and feasting, revelry, they were all part and parcel of the same thing. It's only us who have made a distinction between enjoying yourself and worshipping God.

Seven days it lasted. And each day the tradition had grown up that the priest or several of the priests would go down from the temple in Jerusalem to the Pool of Siloam, and he would draw large quantities of water, and in procession and singing some of the Hallel Psalms, those are just four or five psalms in the middle of the book, the people would dance before the Lord and sing his praises as they recognized that in the wilderness, not only did God protect them at night from the extremes of climate, but he granted to them the food they required, bread and also water, water which once gushed miraculously out of a rock. God brings water as well as cheese to his people when they pray.

And so, let me just qualify that for those who will get this tape and wonder why the reference was made to cheese. We just had a missionary telling us of the way that God blessed her in responding to her request for provision at Christmas in the African country of Chad. God blesses, God responds to the needs of his people.

Now, on the eighth day, the priest didn't go down to the Siloam Pool. According to tradition, which conflicts a little, it appears that this only occurred on the first seven days. But on the eighth, our Lord Jesus seizes the opportunity and he stands on some high point in the temple precincts and he addresses the thronging multitudes of Jews from the diaspora.

Those are Jews who have come from the various communities of Judaism, not just in Palestine, but in the then known world. And he addresses them in these terms, If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. He was Jesus, if you please, stealing the seed.

Imagine in the sacred precincts of Westminster Abbey, after there's been a civic service that's gone on for some while, we've had all the dignitaries, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Queen is there, her consort is there, members of Parliament are there. They've listened to an address, they've engaged in the act of worship, so to speak. And then somebody stands up and says, Now listen to me! If you really want to know what the whole thing is about, listen to me! Preposterous, blazing headlines across the Times, independent, nor the lesser papers would greet you on the following day, not so? Well, precisely the case in Jesus' time.

You see, your problem, my friend, when you read Scripture, you know it so well, the shocking aspects of what Jesus did doesn't startle us anymore. He stands up, and with all this imagery, this historical practice, as a back cloth, he addresses the assembled Jews from Palestine and the rest of the Jewish world. If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.

And he didn't whisper it. He shouted, a loud voice, so that Caiaphas and all that bunch would know what Jesus was saying. You see, this is in a context.

The whole chapter, we didn't read it, I thought we'd go to Luke 11. It seemed appropriate to link up another Scripture on the gift of the Spirit. But the whole of this chapter has the idea of connivance behind the scenes, people wanting to bring about the death of Jesus.

And he never was a timid person. And so he let them know, not only where he was, but who he was and what he was saying. And they were utterly disenchanted.

But what he says here is pure gold in terms of teaching. Now, there's an explanatory comment that the evangelist tucks in. Have you noticed how he does this so often in John's Gospel? For those who are not sort of in on the action, who need a little bit of theological education, he gives us insertions which help us to understand why it is that Jesus said what he did say.

He's referring to the Spirit, verse 39. By this he meant the Spirit. He's talking, you see, about that which water symbolizes, the life-giving, pulsating power of God.

By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time, the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not been glorified. Actually, a more accurate translation, because the NIV translators rightly, going along with the AV, sometimes put in words which are implied, but are not specifically there in the Greek.

It actually says, up to that time, the Spirit was not. Up to that time, the Spirit was not. What is meant? Well, not that the Spirit didn't exist.

The Spirit is one with the Father. Eternal existence of the same substance as the Son and the Father. But the Spirit was not in the sense of being incarnated in the experiences of ordinary people.

You say, what do you mean by that? Well, listen to me. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit's ministry was known, wasn't it? In a most remarkable way. He comes upon Samson.

He comes upon David. But it's intermittent. There is not that experience in the Old Testament of which Jesus predicts in the New, the fullness of the Spirit, a man being linked up with the Lord, the Heavenly Father, through the gift of the Holy Ghost.

There's not that in all its fullness in the Old Testament. The Spirit in the Old Testament is very much like, and I'm using this as an illustration, very much like Noah's dove. You remember? Noah sends the dove out of the ark, and the dove flitters to and fro.

Well, that's an illustration, as I say, of the ministry of the Spirit in the Old Testament. The flittering to and fro. The coming upon a person for a specific moment or for a specific period of time.

But Jesus predicates the day when the Spirit will come in all His fullness, in all His power. And it's this that is symbolized by the water that has been poured out in that feast seven days regularly, day by day. But on the eighth, there's no pouring of water.

So Jesus says, if you want to really know what that water stands for and why I came into the world, then if any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. Now, this is not information that Jesus is disclosing on the first occasion. This is the first time He's publicly made this sort of reference, but not the only time.

The first occasion, well, I'm almost tempted to test you, but I won't. At least I'll test you, but I'll give you the answer. The first occasion in John's Gospel, and there are other little intimations, was, you recall, when He was with a woman by a well.

And the woman, well, He asked her for a drink. And He started to speak about a greater water than she had ever known which He could supply. If thou hadst known, I quote the A.V. because that's the only version I can remember.

If thou hadst known the gift of God and He it is who speakest with thee, thou wouldst have asked of Him and He would have given to thee living water. You remember? Living water. A little private disclosure.

Isn't it wonderful that Jesus selected the insignificant Samaritan woman to tell her of the water of the Spirit. But it wasn't just to be a private piece of information. Here Jesus blazons it out in front of all those who will listen to Him.

If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me. Here is a condition which is supposed. If anyone is thirsty.

Jews from Media. Jews from Persia. Jews from Rome.

Jews from Cappadocia. Jews from Greece. Jews from the Fatherland.

If anyone. It's wide, you see, as Jesus addresses His own ethnic race. If anyone.

There's a universalism in the Gospel. There is the word whosoever written into Scripture. Jesus has a concern for the whosoever of the Jews and of the Gentiles.

If anyone is thirsty. And then the universalism is narrowed down. Because the blessings of God are not automatic in a mechanical sense.

You want power in your life. To a greater degree than you have ever known. You want spiritual energy in a capacity that you have not yet received from the Lord.

If anyone. Not the preacher. Not the elders.

Not the deacons. Not respectable evangelicals who go to church on a Sunday on the south coast of England. The African.

The person who doesn't feel comfortable in a church. The one who never went to Bible college. The one who doesn't seem to be spiritually a giant in the eyes of his contemporaries.

If anyone is thirsty. Let him come to me. But there is a condition supposed.

Thirst. That can be an agonizing thing, can it not? Thirst. Remember being thirsty once.

In the desert. You could have brought all the Coca-Cola in the world. I didn't want the stuff.

I wanted water. There was a pain in my thirst. There was a pain in my heart.

Thirst is alike. It's a dryness. It's the absence of a necessity.

You and I were made for God. Did you know that? We were born in the image of God. We have several hungers which are ours naturally.

A hunger for food. A desire for air. A need for companionship.

A requirement to be loved. These are all psychological and natural hungers. And they're honorable.

They should be satisfied in degree. But there's also another hunger. That many people try to sublimate, try to stifle.

It's the hunger that you have for the living God in whose image you have been created. And it's that sort of hunger that Jesus addresses. If any man thirst, let him come to me.

Very often when the gospel is preached, those who have thirst will give evidence of the condition in which they find themselves. Peter makes his debut as a preacher. And there's a thirst in the congregation.

The hearts of folk are pricked. The Philippian jailer in the company of Paul and his colleague shouts out, What must I do to be saved? You see, at every end of Christian experience there is, as a presupposition, a thirst. A thirst for salvation.

A thirst for spiritfulness. As though our Lord can do nothing for you unless you thirst. As indeed he cannot.

Though he be omnipotent. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness. Happy are people in that condition.

For they shall be filled. God does not place a hunger in your heart in order to mock you. He's not like that.

There is no hunger that you have that God will not legitimately satisfy. Because he is the father of the hunger. He places it there.

And what our Lord is asking on that great day of the feast when he steals the headlines is people to acknowledge the hunger that they legitimately should have. And if anyone is hungry, if anyone is thirsty for that liquid, spiritual liquid refreshment, then our Lord will give it without measure to him. A condition supposed.

A remedy proposed. If anyone is thirsty, let him come. Listen to two words which are important.

Let him come to me. Did you hear that? He didn't say go to a denomination. He didn't say go to a commentary or to a convention.

He didn't say go to a creed nor did he say go to a church. He says come to me. Our Lord is here speaking prophetically of all that he shall do for men and women after there has been the atoning sacrifice, his precious blood spilled on Calvary.

There he will deal with the sins of the world. And as a result of that, he will have the ability to pour forth from the father, having been received into his presence, the promise of the father, the precious gift of the Holy Spirit. But it will come to you.

It can come from no other source. You look to Jesus. I looked to Jesus and I saw in him my star, my sun.

S-U-N. I love hymns that are Jesus-centric, that bring us back to the heart of blessings because it's only through our Lord Jesus Christ and his ministry that we are enriched with salvation and spiritfulness. No other way.

Let him come to me. Not just in community but on his own because Jesus doesn't deal with us en masse. Generally he deals with us in a one-to-one relationship.

Let him come to me. Not just to say the creed. A dead creed, says Charles Spurgeon, is of no use.

We must have our creed baptized with the Holy Ghost. The Holy Spirit does not flow through machinery or through methods but through men. He does not anoint plans but men and men of prayer, says E.M. Bownes in a quotation that's as good as that of Charles Haddon Spurgeon.

Let him come to me. A condition supposed, a remedy proposed. But how? How are we to come to him? What are the significant things that he tells us to do in this particular injunction? Well, there are three.

The first thing is to draw near. Let him come to me. No disciple will send you away.

Jesus has no security corps. No bodyguard. Not even a loyal secretary to deflect phone calls that might take the time of the pastor.

But she can answer herself. There's always a hotline through to the Lord Jesus. Isn't that so? Draw near to me.

He's always previous and I will draw near to you. You thought you got him first? No, he was waiting. A.W. Tozer says that God waits to be wanted for so many and for so long.

He constantly and more often than not is left waiting and wanting. Jesus says draw near. What's more? Speak out.

Let him come to me and drink. The implication is confess your thirst. Confess your need.

Thus our Lord Jesus in the quotation I gave you to the woman by the well of Sychar. If thou knewest the gift of God and him who was speaking to you, you would have asked of him. Do you continually ask for his spirit? For the overflow of his energy in your life? Draw near.

Speak out. Cling on. Whosoever believes, the word believe there has got the idea of the ivy clinging to the tree.

Utterly dependent on the tree for support. It's the barnacle and the boat. It's the hungry infant on the breast of his mother.

It's Jacob clinging to his assailant. All that is involved in what our Lord is here saying to the crowd as he promises them the fullness of the spirit. Draw near.

Speak out. Cling on. Do you mean business with the Lord? I don't just mean, although thank God that you've come along on a Sunday morning and Sunday evening.

But I don't just mean the perfunctory attending of church. Though I'm not suggesting that it necessarily is perfunctory, but it can be. Do you mean business with the Lord? Do you really want to know his fullness in your life? Jesus says, if, if anyone is thirsty.

I was quoting at Ted Davies induction service yesterday. The homiletics of a black preacher. And it seems to me that his approach to sermon preparation well illustrates the approach that we all need to have as far as spiritual fullness is concerned.

He says this, first, I read myself full. Then, I think myself clear. Next, I praise myself hot.

And then, I let myself go. If anyone is thirsty. I let myself go and I've prayed myself hot.

There's good theology that comes from some of the black preachers. In your praying before the Lord. For a greater awareness of his power.

Are you specific? Or as someone has put it, do you just spray the solar system with words? Do you ask the Lord particularly for what you require of him? And you ask him with passion and with fervency. Let him come to me. Says the Lord Jesus Christ.

A condition supposed. If anyone is thirsty. A remedy proposed.

Let him come to me. Finally, a picture composed. Whoever believes in me.

As the scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him. Do you envision that? When you get a glimpse, maybe in a photograph of Niagara Falls. Or some other spectacular miracle of nature.

Where water is involved. Do you think, Lord, that is nature. Your handiwork speaking to me of what spiritually I ought to be.

And pray yourself into that situation. Streams of living water will flow from within him. I smile at the modesty of the NIV translators.

The AV translators didn't blush so much. Out of his belly will flow. Do you remember when Paul is writing to one of the churches, the Philippian church.

He refers to those whose God is their belly. Philippians 3, 19. And the use of that rather inelegant word.

At least it is now because language changes. I wonder if you appreciate that. The English language changes quite a lot over a period of years.

But the use of that inelegant word actually illustrates that part of man which controls him. Where his cravings are. Sometimes his illegitimate cravings.

His cravings in the area of sex. His cravings in the area of food. When it has gone into the realm of greed.

All the things that are nasty and ugly. Where Satan reigns enthroned. In one of his manifestations.

In the heart of a man. That's what the Bible means by the belly. And Jesus speaking.

To those who have come to him. Is saying that that throne. Once occupied.

By a being that was causing you never to have satisfaction. Has now been taken over from me. And there's fullness and satisfaction.

When my spirit flows into you. And I give the spirit without measure. So that having been filled.

I continue to fill you. What happens when you fill a glass. And it's more than to the brim.

It overflows precisely. That's how Jesus envisions his church. Full to overflowing.

So that from within you. Shall flow out this divine energy. This newness of life.

Which will make an impact on the society. Where you find yourself. Now Jesus is not a theologian.

Who's purely academic. I've never really been interested in abstract philosophy. I was listening to a lecture on Freud last night.

Late at night. Turned it off actually. Halfway through.

Because very often it seems to me. That these philosophers. And the academic theologians.

They're not where the action is. But Jesus is an action man. He's action packed.

He's power filled. And when he envisions his church. He sees his church as an extension of himself.

He is making a stir in the temple. Not so they want to silence him. Now when the day of Pentecost is fully come.

The power of the Holy Spirit falls upon the disciples. With what consequence? Well the whole of Jerusalem hears. Not converted.

Though many priests turn to the Lord Jesus. As a result of the testimony. Of those early Christian warriors.

But the whole of Jerusalem. Knows that something has happened. Within the experience of an increasing number of people.

The Spirit's power. The impact. Is significantly felt.

In the holiest city. Historically speaking. At any rate.

On earth. Jerusalem. And that was the fulfillment of what our Lord was.

Was anticipating here you see. Out of your belly. Out of your innermost being.

Will flow rivers of living water. All that the priest illustrated. As he went down to the pool of Siloam.

All that the temple should have stood for. All that should have come about in Judaism. Through the keeping of the law.

And so on and so forth. All this really never was consummated. In the old legislation.

But in me. If you respond to me. And my gospel.

Then that will be worked out in your life experimentally. You understand? If. If any man thirsts.

There's a condition supposed. Let him come to me. There's a remedy.

A proposed. And out of his innermost being. Will flow.

Rivers. Of living water. A picture.

Composed. Charles Haddon Spurgeon. Preaching on this text.

Some 80. No it must be more. Some 95.

96 years ago. Said this. The problem in London.

Is that there are many people. Who are Christians. Who have come to this particular promise of our Lord.

And they have been satisfied with the sip that saves. But they've not gone on. To the baptism that empowers.

Whatever your theologizing is on Christian experience. And about that I have only secondary. Secondary.

Interest. This I do believe is absolutely necessary for the church of Jesus Christ. In this country.

In Chad. In East Africa. Throughout the world.

To enter into all that Jesus meant. When envisioning his church. He sees her as a fountain.

Of liquid energy. That bubbles up. And pours out.

And affects society. In a most remarkable way. And as a result.

Starts to win the world. Which belongs to his father. Back to him again.

It was the eighth day of the feast. When Jesus makes this declaration. Seven days are through.

He's really standing on resurrection time. The first day of the week. The first day of the week is here.

As Jesus makes this declaration. He is proclaiming the state of his church. Ideally.

In the centuries that are yet to be. That's why I say there's gold. In these verses of scripture.

Unhappy is this man. Who reads with beclouded vision. Our Lord Jesus.

Disturbs. A church. A congregation.

He speaks about all that he has come. Into this world. To release.

In terms of energizing power. And because he's the Lord Jesus. His words apply to you.

And to me. Right now. The sip that says.

What are you going on? Into waters in which you can paddle. Waters in which you can wade. Waters in which you can swim.

Waters where men and women. Have been energized to the extent. That made that they've made a mark.

Upon the civilizations. In which. They found themselves.

You're afraid. I often fear. In launching out into the purposes of God.

That's why I got Erica to read Luke 11. If you ask the Heavenly Father. The Heavenly Father.

The best dad in the world. Ask him for bread. He won't give you a stone.

Ask him for. Fish. He won't give you.

A scorpion. Your Heavenly Father. Has.

A unique talent. He's reserved. The best gifts.

For his family. How much more. Shall your Heavenly Father.

Give the Holy Spirit. To those. Who ask.

Him. For. The gift.

Let's stand in prayer for a moment. Oh. Father.