Sermon Extras

SERMON NOTES

ADVENT 2022- Part 3- John 1:19-34

REVIEW> We continue in our journey through Advent! Advent is the season before Christmas that prepares us for the arrival of Jesus! 

• Advent reminds us to never confuse God’s silence for God’s absence. 
• John The Baptist teaches us that the only way to receive King Jesus and his kingdom, is to repent. 

ILLUS> There is something that happens this time of year that I think we often times glaze over and forget and don’t realize the significance of and it happens with the giving and receiving of gifts. Imagine this scene, it’s Christmas and you are there with your loved ones and a family member or a friends hands you a gift and you say thank you and you open it up and …. it’s a book… and the book says, “How to get into shape this year!” I mean… you’d be a bit confused and possibly offended, right? Or if it was new clothes with a pamphlet on “how to dress better” 

APP> You can’t accept a gift without at the same time admitting your need for that gift. 

APP> Now… when it comes to this time of year, and all the music and all the signs and decorations that talk about God, giving us the greatest gift.. being Jesus Christ. ““For God so loved the world,that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”… do you see it there? Perish and Eternal Life? Or how about this famous Christmas verse… “She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Matthew 1:21…… Do you see it?

Big Idea> Receiving the Gift of Christ requires humility. 

CONTEXT> When it comes to humility, we are studying this Advent, the best charter study we could do would be on John The Baptist. This is the man that Jesus said was the GOAT but john said of himself, “John answered them, “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know, even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.”

APP> John makes 3 key statements for us to understand what true humility looks like…

1. Humility knows who it’s not. 

• “And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.” John 1:19-20 John says, “I am not” 3x to the religious elite. Notice how they keep trying to peg him into a corner. When John says “I am not the Christ” He is saying “I am not the Χριστός (christos)” He is saying… “I am not the Messiah..” or to say it another way… “ I am not the Savior”

APP> Do you understand how freeing of a statement that it? Here is another way to say it, “I do not have the power to save anyone..” This is something that many of us struggle with… 

Marks of a Messiah-Complex: 

• You really believe that you can change people. 
• You really believe you’re right. 
• You really struggle to say “no”. 
• You’re arguing with this list. 

*ILL> Last summer I read Alex Trebek’s Memorir entitled, “The answer is…” He writes it after he announced that he had pancreatic cancer and stayed as the host for a while on Jeopardy. In the introduction of the book he writes, “ I’ve never really seen myself as anything special. That’s why if you listen to Johnny Gilbert’s announcement at the opening of Jeopardy! I’m introduced as “the host” and not “the star.” I insisted on that when I took the job back in 1984.” pg 1

APP> Are you the star or the host of your life? 

2) Humility knows who it is. 

• “ 22 So they said to him, “Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.” don’t you just love it… he answers so freely and easily and notice… “as the prophet Isaiah said…” that’s a biblical view of self! 

APP> When you know who you are you are free from the comparing competitive life. 

*ILL> Remember Toy Story, the first one? Wooody is insecure, until he looks on the bottom of his foot and see’s andys sig. 

APP> You know who you are when you know whose you are. 

3) Humility knows who Jesus is.

• “The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Can you see the moment, John see’s Jesus and blurt out “He’s here!” The reference to the lamb is no doubt in reference to Exodus 12 and the passover lamb who died. 

APP> Think about this, to take away the sins of the world! Christmas means that we can’t save ourselves. “Christ… did not come to earth to be a conqueror, or a philosopher, or a mere teacher of morality. He came to save sinners. He came to do that which man could never do for himself…to do that which money and learning can never obtain- to do that which is essential to man’s happiness: He came to “take away sin.” JC Ryle 

Big Idea> Receiving the Gift of Christ requires humility. 

ILL> Few are more moving than the burial ceremony of the Hapsburg emperors, who were laid to rest in the vaults of the Capuchin monastery in Vienna. When Emperor Franz Josef died, the grand cortege arrived at the closed doors of the monastery and a herald knocked at the gate. From within the voice of the Abbott could be heard asking: “Who are you, who knocks?” “I am Franz Josef, Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary,” the herald replied. “I don’t know you. Tell me again who you are?” “I am Franz Josef, Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, Bohemia, Galicia, Lodomeria, and Dalmatia, Grand Duke of Transylvania, Margrave of Moravia, Duke of Styria and Corinthia…” “We still don’t know you. Who are you?” the sepulchral voice reiterated. Whereupon the herald knelt down and said: “I am Franz Josef, a poor sinner humbly begging for God’s mercy.” “Thou mayest enter then,” the Abbott said and the gates were flung open.

• Do you know who you are?
• Do you know who your not?
• Do you know who Jesus is?