Christ is Life Podcast

So have you ever felt like God was leading you to do something, but you didn't do it because you were worried about what other people might think about you if you did it, or what they would say about you if you did it? I remember when I was in high school, I remember there was kind of this, this loner kid. He was just, he was just different. I mean, he was just different. He had a different personality. He dressed differently. And a lot of people just thought he was weird, and stayed away, and he stayed to himself. And I clearly remember seeing him in the lunchroom every day, either standing by himself, or if he did sit down, he was the only one sitting at the lunch table. And I remember hearing the voice of God, not necessarily in an audible way, but in my spirit, saying, Jason, you need to befriend him in some way. At least, go introduce yourself to Him, or sit down with him and at least, at the very least, say hi and acknowledge His presence. And I never did do it. I didn't do it because I was worried about what other people would think about me if I did it, what they might say about me if they saw me hanging around him. I remember another time as an adult where God clearly was asking me, felt like he was leading me to share my faith, to share the good news about Jesus with my neighbor, who didn't go to church, and I know, didn't have a relationship with him, and I had a lot of opportunities to do so he was outside quite a bit. I was outside quite a bit, and we entered into a number of conversations together. And yet I never did share Jesus with him, because I was too worried. I was too worried about what it is that he might think if he didn't respond well, how our relationship would change if he didn't receive Jesus and didn't want anything to have to do it. Then I thought it might just be weird, and I just avoided it because I didn't know what to think. I remember this other time when Natalie and I were just going through a really difficult season in our lives. We were grieving, we were hurting, we were just experiencing life in a difficult season. And I remember being in worship one Sunday, and we were singing the song, it is well with my soul. And I remember just feeling and experiencing the presence of God like, like it is okay, it is well with your soul, even though your situations and your circumstances aren't great. And I I wanted to kneel, and I wanted to raise my hands and just declare in front of everyone who was there that morning that it is well with my soul, despite what is going on in our lives. And yet I never did, even though I was feeling all of that in that moment, the next thought I had was, What would people think about me if I did that in that moment? What would they say if that's how I responded and expressed myself in worship, and so I didn't What about you? Are there times when you really felt like the Lord was leading you to step into something, to do something, and you didn't do it because you were scared about what other people might think about you, or what they might say about you if you did, my guess is that you have, maybe you've even experienced one of those this morning as we worship today, we all have those moments. The question is, what do we do in those moments? What do we do from now, if we have those moments in the future, how can we overcome them and move past what other people are thinking about us or what they might say about us? If we step into those things that God is leading us to do, we continue our message series road to the resurrection, these questions are going to get answered in one way, shape or form. And so let's just jump right in. John. Chapter 12 is where I asked you to turn just a minute ago. And here's what John tells us in verse one, he says, six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. This is what we talked a little bit about last week. We didn't look at the whole story of Lazarus, but we talked about how Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead. He'd been dead for four days. Raised Him from the dead, got all kinds of people's attention. The Sanhedrin used that to go he's getting too much attention. If we keep letting him go on like this, everybody's going to believe in Him. And so they entered into this plot to kill Jesus. It was this pivotal point on Jesus' road to the resurrection. Well, as a result of that, we are told at the end of John 11 that he no longer ministered publicly. He went out into the wilderness to prepare for his death on the cross and His. Resurrection, but now John is telling us that that's changed, that there's another pivotal point on the road to the resurrection where he removed himself from the public, but now he's entering back into that space. And we don't know how long of a time it really was, but we're told that the event that caused him to come out of the hiding now was the Passover. The Passover, of course, was a major event in the lives of the Jewish people because they were celebrating God's deliverance from slavery. In Egypt, it was tied, of course, to the final plague and the killing of the First Born that God was going to use to free his people, and they were told to take a lamb and slaughter the lamb and use the blood over their doorposts to mark it, and that God would pass over them, the Angel of Death would pass over them, and they would be they would be saved. And we know on the other side of this that this was a foreshadowing to Jesus. We know that John, the Baptist in His earthly ministry, pointed at Jesus one time and said, look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Jesus was coming out of the wilderness in preparation of heading to Jerusalem to give himself up as the sacrificial lamb who would take away the sins of the world. How he would rescue his people, save His people, the same way he rescued them from slavery in Egypt now, but for heading into Jerusalem, though John tells us about this stop in Bethany, where Lazarus lived, and so let's see what happens. Verse two, he says, here in Bethany, a dinner was given in Jesus' honor while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. Now, one of the things that you might assume from what we've read so far is they're at Lazarus house. I mean, it says came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, and now Martha, his sister, is serving. But it doesn't specifically say that. It just says that he came to Bethany. Bethany was the place where Lazarus lived, and so this may not be his house. As a matter of fact, both Mark and Matthew tell about this same event here. There's some question whether they're talking about the exact same event, but most commentators believe that they are and in Matthew and Mark, they tell us that he's actually at the home of Simon the leper. We don't know much about Simon the leper, but of course, he probably had leprosy, and it's the name Simon the leper had healed him from that leprosy, because they probably wouldn't be having dinner with him right now. So you've got Simon, who's been cured of leprosy. Remember, if you have leprosy, you're moved outside the community, you're isolated, and you're living with this terrible disease away from people. But now you've got him in community around people having a dinner, along with Lazarus, who was in a tomb for four days. Can you imagine the stories they could tell,
man, what a dinner party. That would have been amazing to be a part of that. So again, you've got to imagine that they're there, and family and friends are there, and they've all been impacted by Jesus in this way. They wouldn't even all be here together if it wasn't for Jesus. And so the emotions are probably running high. There's a lot of thoughts that they have, a lot of gratitude that they're experiencing and well, we kind of see that because of what happens next. Look at what John says, beginning in verse three. He says, Then Mary took out a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume, and she poured it on Jesus' feet and wiped His feet with her hair, and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. Now let's not allow the significance of what is really happening right here in this moment pass us by, because there is so much to what is happening here. I mean, first and foremost, as he John says, this is an expensive perfume. Nard was extracted from the root and spike of the Nard plant. It was found in India, grown in India, and this was a really expensive perfume. And later, a little bit later on, we're going to find out it was a year salary for an average day worker and so, I mean, for the average person, it was an entire year's salary to have this right here, this was no small gift that Martha, or excuse me, Mary, was preventing or presenting to Jesus in this way, right? I mean, it wasn't the least of what she had was the most. Can you imagine the conversation around that? I wonder if she thought, I wonder what people are going to think if I take the most valuable possession that I have and present it to Jesus as a gift, what were they going to say about me that she's an issue? It for getting rid of all of her savings and all of that stuff. You know, I could imagine she might have been a little bit worried about that kind of thing and presenting Jesus this gift. And yet she entered into it and was extravagant with this gift that she presented Jesus in this way. The second thing that we see here is what she did with it. She poured it on his feet. For most Jewish people, that was a degrading thing to do is well beneath her. That was only reserved for slaves and people of the lowliest manner. And so if, if this is what she would do with this truly expensive gift, then what Mary's taking here is the lowest possible position, the lowest possible posture she could take. It was an act of humility on her part. It was an act of worship. Of course, the last thing that we see here is what she did with her hair. Because women in this particular culture, Jewish women, never really let their hair down in public in this way, it was considered indecent. It was even considered possibly immoral in this culture. And so I wonder if Mary thought about any of this. I mean, what are they going to think if I'm touching his feet, the degrading thing for a Jewish woman to do? What are they going to think about me if I let my hair down in this way? I wonder if she considered not even doing it because of what other people might think or say about her. We don't really know. I mean, Dex doesn't tell us if she ever had any of thought those thoughts, maybe she didn't. But if she's like any of us, she probably had at least a passing thought in that way. But what happened is, is that Mary was so overcome in this moment that Jesus her Lord and Savior, the one who had raised her brother from the dead, the one that was sitting at the table now, as a result of him. And all the other times that she had spent with, by the way, the other time we see Mary, where was she also sitting at during that time, at his feet, right, both times in this way. And so she had been, you know, experiencing Jesus in a very life giving way. And with her focus solely on what he was providing for her, she was able to remove those other thoughts potentially about what other people might think or say, and just enter into what the Spirit was leading her to do in that moment. This is one of the most pure and I mean, uninhibited acts of worship that we see in Scripture to be presented with such an extravagant gift, to do it in the manner in which she did with the feet and the letting down of her hair,
she focused on Jesus instead
of what everybody else
was thinking around her. I
can't help but think if that's what the Spirit did in Mary's life, then that's what he would do in our lives as well. I mean, if the Spirit lays things on our hearts that he's leading us to do in situations and circumstances where we might tend to think about what other people are going to think or say about us, if we do them and we quit focusing on them and just put our focus on Jesus and who he is and what it is that he's done for us, and that he never leads us astray in any way, shape or form, that we wouldn't experience the empowerment of the spirit to enter into that and just move those things to the side. I was reading a little bit earlier this week, being reminded as I was preparing for this about Rachel Scott. Many of you may remember Rachel Scott, or at least the name may sound familiar to you. Rachel was one of the victims from the Columbine High School shooting in 1999 she was a teenager. She was a student there.
Rachel had had a
merry moment, if you will, as a believer in Christ as a teenager. That wasn't just a one time thing. It continued into a merry lifestyle of worship and focus on Jesus. Rachel was known as the one who would carry her Bible to school. She was the one who would read it during free periods throughout the day. She would go on prayer walks around the perimeter of her school, praying for people to come to know Jesus. She would offer to pray for people who seem troubled and just in real need. She anonymously was known for paying for students lunches who couldn't afford to eat, and she would write them notes saying, God loves you and He desires a relationship with you. She shared her faith with other people who would. Listen and talked about how much Jesus had changed her life and how he could change their lives too and and as a result of that, there were times she was ridiculed, time she was called a Jesus freak and called a number of other names. But we know that just like Mary, stayed focused on Jesus and the Spirit empowered her to carry those things out. Rachel stayed focused on Jesus and blocked those things out and just kept going where he was leading and empowering her
to do so.
One of her classmates at her funeral said Rachel didn't worship to be seen. She worshiped because she couldn't help but express her love for God, either socially. She may not have realized how much impact she had on other people before she died, there were many people who came out after she had passed away, to express how they either came to know Jesus because of Rachel, or they were able to take a step deeper into their faith and trusting Jesus, seeing the way that she trusted Jesus with her life and the actions and the things that led to in there and again, I can't help but think that the Spirit will do the same thing for you and for me, whether you're a student or an adult. As we make ourselves available to him, he'll lead us to push those things aside and carry those things out in our own personal context, roles, areas of life that He leads us each into. Now not everybody's going to understand that. Some people are going to have questions. Some people are going to get pushed back against those things, as we saw happen in Rachel's case and well, we actually see that in Mary's case. Now too, look at verse four, but one of his disciples, one of Jesus's disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, why was it this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year's wages. John tells us that he did not say this because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief as keeper of the money bag he used to help himself to what was put into it. Sometimes people are not going to understand what Jesus or the Holy Spirit is leading us to do. They have questions about that. Sometimes they're going to push back and say, we could be living our ways according to their wisdom and the way it would happen. Now, oftentimes, that may not be because of a real, genuine concern for me or for you, but because of themselves. Right? It's a it's a self justification technique, if I can put you down and talk about what you should be doing as it compared to what you are doing, and if it especially relates to how I'm living my life, then it helps me justify myself over you and what it is that you are doing. And so Satan is at work in these kinds of things to steal, kill and destroy and take our focus off of God and what it is that he's leading us to do in those moments, and he wants to empower us to be able to do and to keep other people from experiencing that grace in their lives. Because if God's leading us into those areas in the same way that he led Mary into those, he's not most likely just doing it for her. He's at work in bigger ways than you and I don't understand, and that's certainly the case that we see here as well as we go on, look at verse seven, leave her alone. Jesus replied, It was intended, intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me. And so we see that while the spirit was leading Mary to worship in this way, this this uninhibited act of humility and devotion and worship, that it was even bigger than that. It was part of His kingdom work. It was to prepare Jesus' body for burial. It was what he was going on this road to the resurrection. This was a step, a place on the road that God was up to in using her to prompt her to an act of devotion and humility and worship that she didn't even know was a part of His kingdom work to prepare him for burial in his finished work on the cross that would impact people for all of eternity. She had no idea that what it is that she was doing would be talked about for all of eternity. We're not told that here, but in Mark and Matthew's Gospel. One of the two. I can't remember which one he says truly, I tell you that wherever the gospel is preached, whatever she's done, referring to what Mary did in this moment, will be talked about, will be preached. Wow, when the Spirit leads us into those things, sometimes it's about what he wants to do in our lives and through our lives. But a lot of times, it's even bigger than that, and how he wants to impact other people around us that we don't know anything about. Sometimes, as I mentioned a second ago, we saw how this particular idea played itself out in the life of Rachel Scott. And I believe that, as Paul tells us in Romans 12 to present our bodies as a living and holy sacrifice, that that's our spiritual act of worship, that there's a way that what we're talking about with this merry moment here leads into a merry lifestyle. Right as we submit ourselves to Him, this will flesh itself out in ways that he leads us to not worry about what other people are going to say or think about us in our schools, in our places of work, in our neighborhoods, if it's the kind of thing that we begin to fear, may cause other people to think certain things about us or say certain things about us. So I want to encourage you today to consider what that looks like for you. How is the Spirit leading you to worship Him through your lifestyle, speech and actions towards others in your context of life, what is Jesus leading you to do that you've been holding back on and not doing because you've been too worried about what other people will think about you or say about you
if you enter into it with him, I
want to encourage you to enter into it this week, to Keep your eyes fixed on Jesus, focus on Him,
if any of that comes,
allow him to be your peace and your life.
Because that's the great thing about this new covenant, is that you and I live on the other side of the cross, and our identity is not tied to what other people say about us or whatever we think other people think about us. It's tied to who we are in Christ. And so we're now free from the bondage of having to try to get people to think certain things about us and say certain things about us, to make us who we are. And so we can really step into these kinds of things on the other side of the cross, with Jesus living in us and making us a new creation. But also as we consider that application, as those of us leave the church here in a little bit, or leave this building as the church that we've gathered in, I want us to think about what this looks like, this merry moment looks like, as we we gather together for corporate worship in here each and every Sunday, again, we are the church just gathered together in this particular building that we're in. But, but what would it look like if we allowed the Spirit to lead us in corporate worship the way that Mary worshiped Jesus in John chapter 12. Let me just share with you how that played out in the life of one individual. His name's Ron Kennelly. And Ron Kennelly, he grew up in a Baptist church. He started a career in secular music, but then the Lord impressed upon him that he wanted to lead him or use him in worship ministry, and so he began to serve as a worship minister at a church that had Baptist roots as well and and through his experience, he talks about this one particular worship service. It was a service, just like most services they had planned for they had planned for it. It was extremely structured. There is a design and a plan that they were going to follow all the way through it. And yet, Ron talks about how at one point during the worship, said that he began to feel this overwhelming sense of God's presence, and this, this gratitude for who Jesus was and what he had done with him, for him on the cross, and He He just felt like the spirit was was moving him in a different direction. Band didn't have any idea what was going on. He just sets his microphone down. He walks up to the front of the stage, and he kneels down, and he just begins to worship himself. Band had no idea what he was doing. They were all confused by it. Everybody else in the congregation was confused by it. They were a little bit worried about what was happening. Didn't really know what to do or say, but he wasn't worried about it at all. It was this merry moment where he pushed away what everyone else was thinking about what he was doing in that moment, and he. Just started to worship himself, focused on Jesus, him being at the feet of Jesus. Few minutes go by, and all of a sudden, one of the other band members puts their microphone down and joins and starts to worship in with him, right at the front of the stage. Another one puts his microphone down and joins him here. Until they're all doing that. And then little by little, as that began to happen, it began to spread throughout the rest of the congregation. All of a sudden, other people in the congregation began to kneel. Some began to sing with everything that they had. Others began to pray out loud or pray at their seat. But they all began to worship. However, the Lord wasn't leading them in that particular experience. But it wasn't just that they was doing something in them and threw them in that moment where they quit caring about whatever one else around them was going to think about them or say about them if they entered into worship in that particular way, it was something that God was up to, above and beyond that, to make them into the kind of church that he wanted them to be. Because it wasn't just that one particular experience, but it carried into the actual worship service on Sunday and the following Sunday after that, and the following Sunday after that, and they became a church that was known not only for their theological depth, but their expressive worship in their particular culture. Later on, Ron was asked about that experience, and here's what he said. He said, guys, I I realized in that moment that the best way to lead people into God's presence wasn't through perfect arrangements, but through modeling what it meant to be a worshiper myself now. Now, here's the last thing he said. Listen to this. He said, I had, I had to be willing to break the alabaster jar of my own professional pride
and expectations,
the Nard perfume that we talked about, that Mary carried earlier was most likely carried in an alabaster jar. Ron was talking about his Mary moment, where he had to quit carrying what everyone around him thought or were going to say and just fall at the feet of Jesus in worship. However, the spirit was leading him to do so in that particular moment, and it didn't just impact his life. It impacted the congregation's life and whoever would walk into those church doors from that day on it. So my question to you is, pull you back from worshiping Jesus in the same way this morning, hold you back from worshiping at the feet of Jesus in the same way that Mary fell at the feet of Jesus, poured oil on his feet, let down her hair. Knew that it would get everyone else talking around her, but entered into it anyway. My hope and prayer is that you be open to allowing Jesus to lead you to worship in the same way that he led Mary, whatever that looks like for you as he was doing this kingdom work in and through her on Jesus' road to the resurrection. Let's pray