Lon Solomon Ministries
People Jesus Met Part 28
You know, without a doubt, one of the best-known Bible stories in all the world is the story of Noah and the ark. Every American child just about has heard of Noah and the ark. Every American toy store just about somewhere on its shelves has an ark with a little Noah and a little family and a bunch of little animals. But really what made Noah a great man was not that people know about him or people have toys that look like him, but what really made him a great man is the fact that the Bible honors him as one of the greatest men of God ever to live. I mean, Isaiah talks about him, Peter talks about him, Ezekiel talks about him, the Lord Jesus himself talked about him when we turn to Hebrews chapter 11, the Bible is a spiritual hall of fame, the Cooper's town of the Bible, there is all Noah, big as life. And what was it that the Bible applauds Noah for above everything else? Well folks, it was for his full obedience to God. You see the Bible tells us Noah had never even seen rain, Noah had no empirical proof that there was a flood coming, in fact at the time of Noah everything seemed safe and serene and yet in spite of all of that, Hebrews chapter 11 says Noah built an ark despite all of the evidence to the contrary, Noah fully obeyed God. Now that's what we want to talk about today because remember we're in a series entitled People Jesus Met and today Jesus is going to meet some folks at a wedding where the issue of obedience is central to the events of this meeting and we want to go back and we want to look at what happened 2,000 years ago and then we want to roll all of that forward and we want to talk about, well, so why should that make any difference to me? So that's the plan, we're doing John chapter 2 today and we begin at verse 1. There was a wedding in Cana of Galilee the Bible says and the mother of Jesus was already there. Cana is a tiny little town about five miles north of the town of Nazareth and even to this day there is a beautiful little church there that sits on the very spot where the rest of this story takes place, verse 2. And Jesus was invited to the wedding feast also along with his disciples and when the wine ran out, Jesus' mother came and said to him, they have no more wine. Now many commentators suggest that the reason Mary was at the wedding before Jesus is because she was good friends with the parents and the families of the people getting married and that she had taken on some responsibility for this wedding feast and that would explain perfectly why it was important to her that the party not run out of wine. Well I don't know if that's right or not but regardless of whatever the reason, Mary comes to Jesus and she makes a not so subtle request that he do something to fix this problem and remember Mary was not suggesting that Jesus go to 7-Eleven and buy some more wine. She was suggesting that he perform a miracle and that he makes some wine right there on the spot. Verse 4, "And Jesus said to her, 'Dear woman, why do you involve me? My time has not yet come.'" You say what does that mean? Well remember here in John chapter 2, Jesus' public ministry has not actually begun yet. Here in John chapter 2, Jesus has not actually begun to proclaim himself as the Messiah of Israel and God in the flesh yet. But Jesus knew if he started doing miracles like the one Mary was asking him to do, friend the cat would be out of the bag. I mean his public ministry would have started regardless whether he wanted it to start or not and for all we know perhaps Mary had even been pushing him a little bit to step out and actually start making those claims. In a nice way therefore what's happening here is Jesus says to her, "Hey Mom, please, it's all about God's timing, Mother, and I'm going to unroll everything, but I'm going to do it in God's timing, not in your timing." This was a rebuke to his mother. It was a sweet rebuke, but it was. So Mary walks away and yet as she walks away she does so with a clear sense that Jesus was going to do what she asked him. You say, "Well, how do you know that?" "Well, I know it by what she said and did next." Look at verse 5, "Then his mother said to the servants that were standing there, whatever he tells you to do, do it." She obviously was expecting Jesus to do something and to tell the servants to do something, now she got this sense that he was going to do it, I don't know, but she definitely had it. Verse 6, "Now there were six stone water jars sitting nearby, the kind used by Jewish people for their ceremonial washing, and each one held between 20 and 30 gallons. And Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water, so they filled the water jars to the brim. Then Jesus said to them, 'Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.' And so they did so. So the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. And then the master called the bridegroom aside and said to him, "Everyone serves the choice wine first. And then the cheaper wine after the guests have all had too much to drink. But you have saved the best wine until now." He said, "All right, log. Stop. Enough. Wait a minute. My question is, do you really believe that Jesus did this? I mean, do you really believe that he changed water into wine?" I mean, weren't you a chemistry major in college, Lon? Yes, I was. And you say, "Well, didn't you deal with atoms?" I did. And didn't you deal with molecules? I did. And so, Lon, you're telling me that you believe that Jesus actually changed the molecular structure of water and turned it into wine? I do. And let me tell you why. I believe that. It's because of Colossians chapter 1, verse 16, which says, "For by Him," that is the Lord Jesus Christ, "all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. All things were created by Him and for Him." But wait, there's more. Next verse. Friends, do you know that to this very day, scientists have no idea why the atom sticks together. No idea what holds it together. I mean, with all those positively charged protons all crammed together in the nucleus, why atoms should be erupting apart all around us. But they don't. And why don't they? Well, the Bible tells us why. The Bible says that the living, risen Almighty Christ of the universe, Colossians 1,17, holds every atom together by the exercise of His divine sovereign power. Now, if Almighty God, if the Lord Jesus Christ has that kind of power over every single atom in the universe and He does, then it doesn't present any problem for me to believe that He could change any atom He wants into some different atom whenever He feels like it and at His soul discretion, I have no problem with that at all. And friend, you shouldn't have any problem with that if you know Christ either. Verse 11, this was the first miracle that Jesus performed and He did it at Cana in Galilee. In this way, He began to reveal His glory, in other words, His public ministry starts now. And His disciples put their faith in Him. Well, I guess so after seeing this happen. Now, that's as far as we're going to go today in our passage, because it's time now for us to ask our most important questions. So everybody, are we prepared for this? All right, all you on the internet, here we go, nice and loud, 1, 2, 3. Oh, that was good. That was. You say long. So what? It's a wonderful story, and I know about the miracle. But Lon, I mean, I don't even drink wine. What difference does any of this make to me? Well, let's talk about that, shall we? You know, next to the miracle of Jesus walking on the water, the miracle Jesus did here in John chapter 2 of turning water into wine is probably the second most famous miracle that Jesus ever did. I mean, you hear people at work talk about this. What do they say? Well, what do you expect me to do? Turn water into wine. You hear this all the time, right? And it really is true that this reveals God's glory. The Lord Jesus is glory, just like the Bible says. And it really should, as the Bible says, cause you and me to put our faith in Him. All that's true. But today, I don't want to focus, rest of our time, on the miracle Jesus did here as magnificent as it is. What I want us to focus on is the comment that Mary made to the servants at this wedding. And remember what she said, John 2 verse 5, she said, "Whatever He tells you to do, do it." And with this, we come full circle all the way back to our friend Noah. Remember what we said at the beginning of our message, that what made Noah the spiritual giant, that he was, what would cause the Bible to applaud him and put him into the hall of fame, was his full obedience to God. What God told him to do, Noah did, he did it fully and he did it completely and he did it without compromise. You know, I was thinking this week about what impresses God up in heaven. You know, I was thinking, what causes God to sit up and really take notice of something happening on the earth? What causes God to jab O Gabriel in the ribs and say, "Hey, hey, hey, do you see that? Do you see what's going on right down there? Look, look." And I'm convinced that one of the things, it may not be the only thing, but one of the things is when somebody here on earth gives God full and total obedience, like Noah did, like the servants at the wedding did. God loves full and total obedience. And you know, Jesus actually told a little story about this in Matthew chapter 21, this very idea. And before we dig into it, let me just tell you that there's three people in this story. The first one is the Father who represents God. And then there are two sons who represent two different ways that a person can respond to God on this issue of obedience. So here we go, Matthew 21, verse 28. But what do you think, Jesus said, "A man had two sons, and he came to the first son and said, 'Son, go and work today in the vineyard.' And the first son said, 'I'll go, sir, but then he didn't.' Then the Father went to his second son and said the same thing. But the son answered, 'I will not go, yet afterwards the son regretted it, and he went.' Verse 31, "Then Jesus asked the rabbis standing there, 'Which of the two sons do you think obeyed the wishes of their father? Well, friends, any nincompoop can get this one right.' I mean, even those rabbis could get this one right. Verse 31, and they replied and said, 'It was the second son.' And of course, they were right. It was the son who, you know, he didn't talk a great talk, but when the chips were down, he went and did what his father told him to do. Now the question is, which of these two sons do you think the father in the story preferred? And since the father stands for God, then let's ask the question, which of you do these two sons do you think God prefers? Well Jesus makes it crystal clear that it's the second son, the one who actually went and obeyed, not the one who talked about it. You know, the Bible reiterates this over and over and over again, my friends, the same truth. Over and over the Bible tells us that God is not interested in rituals or creeds or doctrinal statements or prayer books. God is not interested in him singing or taking communion or church membership or religious activity of any kind above all else first and foremost God wants obedience from his children. This is Malachi chapter 1, verse 6, "God says a son honors his father and a slave honors his master, so if I am your father, God says where is the respect do me and if I am your master," he said, "where is the obedience," there's our word, "do me," says the Lord Almighty. The Lord Jesus said the same thing. He said Luke chapter 6, verse 46, "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, but you do not do what I say?" That's a pretty good question. James chapter 1, verse 22, "But prove yourselves," James says, "to be doers of the word and not hearers only," which is why Psalm 111 says, "a good understanding, have all those who, what's the next word, say it, do God's commandment." You can talk about anything you want, but when the chips are down, it's what you do with what God says. Now this very truth is put clearly on display in one of my favorite stories from the Old Testament, 1 Samuel chapter 15. Let me just review the story for you a little bit. God tells King Saul of Israel that he wants him to go and destroy this Amelekite town. Now God had his reasons and I don't have time to go into them, but they were legitimate reasons. And God said, "I want you to destroy the town and not only that, I want you to burn it to the ground and I want you to kill all their livestock." So Saul attacks the Amelekites just like God ordered and he defeats their army just like God ordered and he burns their town to the ground just like God ordered, so far so good. But watch, verse 9, "But Saul spared," the Bible says, "the best of the sheep and the oxen, all that was good. He was unwilling to destroy everything like God had told him, but he destroyed only the animals that were worthless and weak." Verse 10, "Then God said to the great prophet Samuel, 'I am grieved.'" Stop there for a moment. Would you notice, please, that disobedience on the part of God's people grieves the heart of God? "I am grieved," God said, "that I have made Saul king because he has not carried out my order." So early the next morning, Samuel got up and went to meet Saul and when they met, Saul said to the great prophet Samuel, he said, "The Lord bless you, Samuel, I have carried out the Lord's instructions." Really? So Samuel said, "Really?" He said, "Well then, what then is this bleeding of sheep in my ears and this lowering of oxen that I hear?" This is hysterical. You get the sarcasm here? I mean, the point is that if Saul had fully obeyed God, there would be no oxen to low and there would be no sheep to bleat. I'll forget it. Forget it. All right. It really is funny. And look at Saul's excuse. He says, verse 15, he said, "All that," he said, "All that." He said, "We spared the best of the livestock, watch now, to sacrifice to the Lord our God." This is like saying, "God, I am bezzled $50,000, but I gave ten percent to the church." So what's the problem here? Verse 22, then Samuel said, "All right, Saul." He says, "Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as he does in obeying the voice of the Lord? The whole," Samuel says, "to obey is better than to sacrifice, to obey is better than to sing hymns or put money in the offering plate or be a church member or get baptized, you name it, to obey is better." You see, Saul had given God partial obedience, but friends in God's mind, partial obedience is no obedience. And as a result, you know what God did, God immediately stripped Saul of the kingship and gave it to somebody else, he gave it to David. Now as followers of Christ here in the 21st century, all of this has huge implications for our lives. You know, our modern brand of Christianity today in the 21st century emphasizes God's love, God's mercy, God's forgiveness, God's understanding, God's patience. And that's good because God is all those things, but so often we emphasize these things to such an extreme that I'm afraid we forget something. We forget that our God is a holy God. We forget that our God is a righteous God, and we forget that above everything else God demands obedience from His children and He has every right to. I love what A. W. Tozer says about this, and I quote, "He said, 'Have you noticed how much praying for revival has been going on of late and how little revival has resulted? Considering the volume of prayer that is ascending these days," Tozer says, "rivers of revival should be flowing, that no such results are in evidence should not discourage us," He goes on to say, "rather it should stir us to find out why our prayers are not answered." He concludes with this profound insight. He says, "I believe that our problem is that we have been trying to substitute praying for obeying, and it simply will not work." May I please point out to you that there was the possibility in Jesus' little story of the Father and the two sons of a third son? Remember, we had son number one who said, "I'll do it," but then He didn't. We had son number two who said, "I won't do it," but then He did. Friends, there's the possibility of a third son in there, a son who says, "I'll do it," and then He goes, and He really does it. A son who says yes, and then a son who does yes. Folks, that son, number three, is the kind of son, the kind of daughter that the Lord Jesus Christ wants every follower of His to be pure and simple. You know, back on September 1st of this year, and I began my 30th year as your senior pastor here at McLean Bible Church, and you said, "Gosh, long man, you must have started when you were 18. Oh, God, bless you, and God bless you." Pretty close. Yeah. Well, actually, let me tell you how it all happened because it's germane to what we're talking about here. I was out jogging. My wife, Brendan, and I were living in Maryland. We weren't even attending McLean Bible Church in the late '70s, and I was out jogging one day and praying because I knew the Lord had called me away from the ministry where I was and to become a pastor, but I didn't know where, and so I was out praying and running. And I'm telling you, as clear as a bell, I heard the Lord Jesus say to me, "You're going to McLean Bible Church. I want you at McLean Bible Church." And so I came home, and I said to Brendan, when I came in, I said, "Brenda, the Lord has really made it clear to me. I'm going to be the pastor of McLean Bible Church." And she said, "That's wonderful." She said, "What's the pastor who's there now think of that?" I said, "Well, I don't know. I don't know what he thinks about it, and I don't know how this is going to work, but I'm just telling you, go to Giant and get some boxes. We're moving to McLean, Virginia to do this. That's how sure I was." Well, it wasn't long after that that the pastor here got fired in a very ugly situation. I had nothing to do with it. There were deep... I didn't. There were deep... I wasn't even attending the church. Come on, give me a break. The deep feelings of bitterness and the congregation and acrimony were here. The board of elders was split right down the middle with just horrible dynamics going on there, and the whole church, for all practical purposes, was in a state of anarchy. And here I am, a 31-year-old young man who'd never pastor to church in his whole life planning to come here and become the pastor. You know the old song "Fools Rush In" where angels fear to tread, you know that song? Well, hello, hello, that's me. And right towards the end of the "candidating" process, they called me up. They said, "Are you interested?" I said, "I certainly am." We were almost to the end. They were almost ready to offer me the job. I got a phone call from another pastor here in Northern Virginia, a friend of mine that I had worked under years before. And he's still my friend today, and he called me up and he said, "Lawn." He said, "I heard that you were thinking about going to McLean Bible Church as the pastor, and I said, 'That's true,' and he said, 'Lawn.'" He said, "I'm calling you up to tell you as a friend, that that church has more problems than you can shake a stick at. Could I tell you? He didn't know the half of it." No, no, he didn't even have an idea how bad it was. And he said, "Lawn, you've never pastored a church in your life. You know you've never had this responsibility." He said, "I've been a pastor for 20 years," he said, word for word, and he said, "I wouldn't touch McLean Bible Church with a 10-foot pole." He said, "You have no business going there." I said, "Well, you know, I appreciate your calling, and I'm sure you're probably right. On the human level, I'm sure everything you've said is exactly right." I said, "But the one problem is that God has commanded me to go to McLean Bible Church." And I know that, as sure as I know my name, if they offer me the job and I don't go to McLean Bible Church, I said to him, it will be direct disobedience to God in my life. I said, "So even though I'm sure you're right, and even though I have no idea what I'm getting into, whatever I'm getting into, you know what? If they invite me, I'm going, and we'll just trust the Lord with whatever happens. And I am so glad I came to McLean Bible Church. You bet." And let me tell you what this story illustrates about obeying God. Number one, it reminds us that full obedience to God always presses us out of our comfort zone. Number two, it reminds us that full obedience to God always involves risk. Number three, it tells us that full obedience to God is always the hardest alternative available to us. I don't care what situation you're in. If you have three alternatives, I can promise you the one that involves full obedience to God is always the hardest and the one you least want to do in the flesh. Why? Because our flesh always wants to take the easy way out. I'll tell you one-fourth and final thing, full obedience to God always makes us glad we did it always. Thirty years later, I am one grateful man. I swear I am. The God told me to come to McLean Bible Church. And if you obey God fully, I promise you, there will always come a day where you will look back and say, "I am so glad I fully obeyed God." So let me close today with a question. My question is, where has God been asking you in your life to fully obey Him? Maybe He's been asking you to go and ask forgiveness from somebody that you wronged or you heard and to humble yourself before them and confess that you were wrong and ask them to forgive you. Or maybe God's been asking you to forgive somebody else who hurt you. Maybe God's been asking you to make restitution for something you did that's wrong. Maybe to go back and tell a teacher that you cheated in school or to tell someone that you lied to them or to go return and pay back something you stole. Maybe God has been asking you to speak to somebody about their need for Christ. And you know, if you do it, you're going to pay a huge price for doing this, but God says, "I don't really care. I want you to do it anyway." Maybe God's been asking you to stop dating some person that you got no business dating. They're not walking with Christ. Or maybe God's been asking you to stop sleeping with your boyfriend or your girlfriend or your fiancé until you get married. Or maybe God has been asking you to quit that adulterous relationship that you're in and go back and fix your marriage. Maybe God's been asking you to get help with that secret pornography problem you've got. Or with your drinking problem or your drug problem or your nasty, ugly mouth problem. Maybe God's been asking you to spend some more time with your family and to trust your career success to him and get home and be the father or the mother to that family you need to be. Or maybe God's been asking you to take on some area of Christian service. Maybe as a volunteer here inside McLean Bible Church. Or maybe he's been asking you to quit your job and go full time into the service of Christ. I don't know what God's been asking you to obey him fully on. I've got enough issues with what God asked me to fully obey him on. But I'll tell you this. I don't care whether it's a big thing or whether it's a little thing. God is looking for people who will fully obey him when he asks them to. And if we will do that, the blessing that God has promised to pour onto people's lives who fully obey him is positively staggering. Listen to Deuteronomy 28. This is the promise God made to the Israelites if they would fully obey him. But you know what? It applies to you and me just as much. Listen to this Deuteronomy 28 verse 1, Moses said, "Now it shall be if you will fully obey the Lord that the Lord your God will set you high above the nations. Blessed shall you be in the city and blessed shall you be in the country. Blessed shall the offspring of your body be and blessed shall the produce of your ground be. Blessed shall you be when you come in and blessed shall you be when you go out. The Lord will cause your enemies to be defeated before you. They shall come out against you one way and they shall flee before you seven ways. The Lord shall open for you his good storehouse and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow from any the Lord shall make you the head and not the tail if only. You will fully obey the Lord's commands." What an amazing set of blessings. An astounding collection of promises and how do we activate all of this in our lives? Well what did it say in Deuteronomy 28? It said, "If we will fully obey the Lord our God." Now let me close by saying lots of us here. I believe that God's asking many, many of us to fully obey him in some areas of our life. And maybe you've been like the second son up to today, you've been saying, "I will not." Why not? Because I don't want to step out of my comfort zone and I don't want to take any risk, and it's too hard, it's much too hard, I don't want to do it. Well friend, may I say to you that I'm here on behalf of God to plead with you, to appeal to you, to really be like the second son and change your mind. I'm here to appeal to you to trust God with the comfort zone that you've got and trust God with the risks and trust God with the hardships, you trust God with that. And I'm here to appeal to you to step out and trusting God to do what He asks you to do, exactly the way He asks you to do it. And if you will, folks, I'm telling you God will bless your life beyond anything you could ever believe. And there will come a day you will look back and you will say, "Thank you, God, thank you, God, that I obey you. Thank you, God." I love the fact that the second son had the permission from his father to change his mind. And friends, you have that permission from God today as well. So if you're here and you've been saying no, this is your moment to say, "All right, God, I'm changing the answers now, yes, with your help, the answers now, yes. Let's pray together." Lord Jesus, you lived here on earth. You understand the struggles that we have with fully obeying God. And yet, Lord, today, I pray that you would work deeply in each one of our hearts to reassure us that fully obeying God is for our own benefit. Lord, when you tell us to do something, it's because you love us, because you know what's best for us, even though we don't know what's best for ourselves most of the time. Lord, work in our hearts today and give us a zeal for fully obeying God every day in everything. We won't always get it right, but Lord, may that be the goal every day. For some of us here who have said to you in these quiet moments, God, "Okay, I'm changing my mind. The answer is yes. I'll do it with your help." Lord, give them that grace, that strength, that courage, and bring them to the point where one day they will stand and say, "Lord, thank you, thank you, that you helped me fully obey you." Lord, make us like the third son, make us people who say yes, make us people who do yes for the glory of Christ. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. What do God's people say? Would you say? Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. the Lord. the Lord. the Lord. the Lord. the Lord.