Three Questions About Jesus You Have to Get Right
- Do I understand the MAN ? (Mk 8:27-30)
- Do I understand the PLAN ? (Mk 8:31-33)
- Have I made him PERSONAL ? (Mk 8:29)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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Open up your Bibles to the Gospel of Mark, and chapter 8.
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The Gospel of Mark, chapter 8.
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As a pastor every week, preparing to come and share the Word with you, I go through this every week.
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Every week I go through this.
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Like this passage is so important.
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Right?
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And we've seen that so many times throughout the Gospel of Mark.
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You know, the baptism of Jesus, this is so important.
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And we talked about the feeding of the 5,000.
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This miracle is so important.
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And the message this week, this passage that we're going to be looking at this week, is the pinnacle of the Gospel of Mark.
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The passage that we're looking at this week is really the turning point in the whole Gospel.
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Because everything that we have studied so far in Mark is leading up to this point in the life and the ministry of Jesus Christ.
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And everything that we say after this is going to stem from this.
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This is really the high point in the teaching ministry of Jesus Christ.
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Everything leads to this and everything flows from this.
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And we're going to be talking today about the identity of Jesus Christ.
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His identity.
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And I'm sure, like me, you have been in some situations in your life where you've been the victim of mistaken identity.
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Has that ever happened to you?
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I was thinking about that this week.
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And interestingly, that's happened to me a lot more than I thought at first.
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Mistaken identity.
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There were times that it just got irritating.
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There were times mistaken identity just got irritating.
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Like for the longest time I was getting calls from the student loan people that I was default on my student loans.
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The problem was my student loans were paid off.
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But they kept calling and calling.
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And finally I said, "You know what?
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You folks keep calling me, but my student loans are paid off.
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They've been paid off for a long time." And they said, "Well, our records show, Jeffrey S. Miller, that you are in default on your student loans." And I said, "Well, I'm not." And then they said something really weird.
02:40-03:03
They said, "Well, do you know there are 168 Jeffrey S. Millers in the state of Pennsylvania?" And I said, "Well, then do you think there's a chance that you're talking to the wrong one?" And they were like, "Oh, that is a possibility." And they stopped calling me.
03:05-03:06
So that got irritating.
03:08-03:19
And I can tell you at times it just got humorous, mistaken identity, years back doing a kids outreach camp at my previous church.
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We did this week of free camp for kids in the community, totally free.
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The church, generous people, it was the Lord that provided obviously, but the Lord provided through generous people in the church so that these kids could go to camp for free.
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So it was free to all the city kids.
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And what was funny is we'd promote this, I'd leave flyers on doors and I'd call people.
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And I'd talk to a lot of parents on the phone who never met me.
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So then they would bring their kid for the first day of camp.
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And I'd be wearing my cargo shorts and my t-shirt, you know, camp clothes, right?
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Tennis shoes.
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And these parents would come up and they'd say, "Excuse me, can you tell me where the pastor is?" Actually I am the pastor.
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They'd look me dead in the eye.
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He said, "No, no, no, I talked to this pastor on the phone." I'm like, "Yeah, that was me that spoke with you on the phone." They're looking over my shoulder as they're talking to me.
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Like, "Yeah, if you can just show me where the pastor is, that would be great.
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I need to ask him some questions." It just got kind of humorous.
04:18-04:22
And then there were times mistaken identity got scary.
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I'll tell you the scariest I've ever been over mistaken identity.
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It was one time at the Butler County Prison.
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This was the old prison, Mark. Remember the old prison?
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It's like the dungeon.
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But I went in for Bible study, and I'm sitting in that-- remember the little lobby there where they get you through the two big doors, and you sit in this lobby before you go in to have the Bible study?
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So I'm just sitting in the lobby waiting for them to get the inmates ready for me to go in and do Bible study with them.
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And I'm just kind of sitting there.
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Well, this police officer comes into the jail.
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And he's talking to the person that's working the front desk.
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And the police officer turns around and looks at me.
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He says, "Those laces are going to have to come out of your shoes." And I'm like, "Why?" And he's like, "Look man, you know how it is.
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I can't transport you with the laces in your shoes.
05:14-05:22
Get them out." And I'm like, "What just happened?" Well, then the police officer turns to the person working at the desk.
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He says, "Is this the inmate I'm transporting or what?" The person at the front desk was like, "No, no, no, that's not him." Meanwhile, some of the people that were with us were trying to talk to the police officer that that was me.
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Like, "Yeah, officer, that's him.
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This is the guy you're transporting." They almost took me to another prison over a case of mistaken identity.
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I could tell you a whole bunch of stories like that.
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And those ones are kind of funny, but the issue is this.
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When it comes to Jesus Christ, the issue over His identity - who is He?
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That issue isn't humorous.
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And getting it wrong isn't even a little scary.
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This is an issue that your eternity is based upon.
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Understand that.
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Your eternity - whether you come from death into life; where you spend life when you leave this earth ; Whether you go to heaven, or whether you go to hell, that all hinges on what you do with Jesus Christ.
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So let's look at this passage very simply on your outline.
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Three questions about Jesus you have to get right.
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Okay?
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These are three questions about Jesus you have to get right.
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You can't miss any of these.
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The first question is this.
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Do I understand the man?
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Meaning, do I understand the person?
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Do I understand who Jesus Christ is as a person?
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Do I understand the man?
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Look at Matthew 8.
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It says, "And Jesus went on with His disciples." Remember, we've been studying Jesus took His disciples on a private tour through Gentile territory to give them some personal instruction.
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And you see, remember we saw as soon as He came back, the Pharisees were ready to fight.
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And there was this whole issue.
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They refused to believe in Him.
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They were committed to unbelief.
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We saw even the disciples were a little thick-headed.
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So this issue about who is Jesus more and more was coming to the forefront.
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So Jesus went on with His disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi.
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Where is that? That is about 25 miles north of Bethsaida.
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This is mostly Gentile territory, and it's a place that was known for idolatry.
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So this was a pagan, idolatrous place, and Jesus is taking His disciples through this, and on the way, He asked His disciples, "Who do people say that I am?" Do you have that scene in your head?
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Traveling through all this idolatry, pagan land, and Jesus just turns to His disciples and He says, "Who do people say that I am?" You know, here's all these statues of all these gods, and who is God, and how many deities are there, and spirituality and religion, and who do people say that I am?
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Well, look at their response.
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"And they told him, 'John the Baptist.' And others say, 'Elijah.' And others, 'One of the prophets.'" There's the question, who do people say that I am?
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Jesus was saying, "What's word on the street about me?" And look at their answers.
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First of all, they said, "Well, some people think you're John the Baptist." Like, where did that come from?
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Keep in mind at this point, where was John the Baptist?
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He was dead.
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He was beheaded.
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And because Jesus was this miracle worker, and He was driving out demons, and He was healing people of blindness and deafness and speech impediments and leprosy, there is sort of this almost spooky urban legend thing about Jesus.
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Do you know who that guy is?
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"Oh, do you remember when Herod cut John the Baptist's head off?" "Well, like John the Baptist put it back on, and now he's walking around and healing people." That's who Jesus is.
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Like John the Baptist back.
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That's what some people thought.
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And they said, "Well, some people think you're Elijah." Like, where did that come from?
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That comes straight out of Malachi chapters 3 and 4.
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In the Old Testament, the Lord said that Elijah would be a forerunner of the Messiah.
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That before the Messiah comes, Elijah was going to come, and Jesus said that John the Baptist during his earthly ministry when he was alive, was the forerunner in the spirit of Elijah, Jesus said.
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But the disciples said, "Well, some people think that you're Elijah.
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Like the prophet has come back, and you are preparing the way for the Messiah to come." And then they said, Some people say you're one of the prophets.
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Okay, that's like nothing to sneeze at.
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You know, in Israel, to say you are a prophet, that was a very highly regarded office.
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Some people were like, "Well, I'm not sure exactly who he is, but obviously he's somebody to contend with. He's a prophet." But notice something that didn't come up.
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Nobody said Messiah.
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Nobody said the promised one of Israel.
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Why wasn't that the general understanding of the public?
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Because the understanding would be that the Messiah would come as a conqueror.
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I'm going to talk more about that in just a minute.
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But I want you to notice, the word on the street did not include the concept of Messiah.
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Verse 29, "And He asked them, 'But who do you say that I am?'" That certainly turns it, doesn't it?
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Who do people say that I am?
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Well, John the Baptist, Elijah, the prophet.
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I've heard all kinds of things, Jesus.
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Who do you say that I am?
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Peter answered Him, "You are the Christ." That word "Christ," that's actually the second time the word shows up in the Gospel of Mark.
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The first time is in chapter 1 and verse 1.
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Understand that Christ was not Jesus' last name.
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Okay?
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There are some people that think like, you know, Jeff Miller, Ken Frederick, and like Jesus Christ.
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Like Christ was His last name.
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Christ is not a name.
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That word Christ is actually a title.
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And it literally means "the anointed one." All through the Old Testament, God promised that He was going to send this anointed one.
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that He was going to be a prophet, and a priest, and a king.
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This is the one that all of history has been waiting for.
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And all of Israel has been longing for, especially being under the occupation of the Romans.
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So as a people, the Israelites were waiting and waiting.
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Someday God's going to send the Messiah.
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Someday, I promised all through the Old Testament.
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And Peter at this point in Jesus' ministry, in response to this question by looking at Jesus and saying, "I'll tell you who I think you are.
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I think you're Him.
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I think you are the one that God promised throughout the law and the prophets.
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I think that's who you are." And then verse 30, "He strictly charged them to tell no one about Him." We've seen this several times through the Gospel of Mark, I've come up again, so I feel I need to remind you.
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Why did Jesus say, "Don't tell anyone"?
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I kind of laughed, I was telling my wife this morning.
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You know, through the week I was reading different things about this passage, and I came across this one article that this preacher wrote on this passage.
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He says, "So Jesus says to Peter, 'Who do you say that I am?'" And Peter's like, "You are the Christ." And Jesus is like, "Don't say anything about that." The preacher had this whole thing about Jesus was saying, "Peter, you're wrong, and keep your mouth shut." I'm like, "Wow, that preacher is wrong, and I think he kind of needs to keep his mouth shut." Because when you cross-reference this passage with the Gospel of Matthew, you see that Jesus actually commended Peter for what he said.
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He said, "Blessed are you, Simon, son of John, for flesh and blood did not reveal this to you." So why did Jesus say don't tell anyone?
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Well once again, I'd like to remind you, Jesus wanted to wait until His ministry was done before people went out and started preaching about Him.
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Right?
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Why is that?
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Well at this point in Jesus' ministry, what was yet ahead was the cross, the empty tomb, the ascension.
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At this point, if people went out talking about Jesus, this was the sum total of the gospel message.
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And here's this guy that's this great miracle worker, and he feeds people and drives demons out.
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And that's the message of Jesus.
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Jesus didn't want that to be the message of Jesus, because it would have turned into some sensationalism.
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Jesus is a magic act.
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Jesus is like David Copperfield.
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He was like a first century Criss Angel mind freak kind of thing.
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He's this showman, and he does all these amazing things.
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And Jesus is like, "That's not who I am.
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I came for the cross and for the tomb." And Jesus wanted to wait until after those events transpired before the message got out because what do we see in the Great Commission?
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After Jesus' earthly ministry was complete, Jesus said, "Now tell everyone.
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Tell everyone." Because the story was complete.
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So Jesus was very careful about people becoming preachers before the story was over.
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The question for you is, do I understand the man?
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Who is Jesus?
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Because the identity of Jesus is a non-negotiable issue.
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You can't settle for, "I think Jesus was just a good moral teacher." There's no room for that.
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This issue of who is Jesus Christ is the issue that divides really all of the religions in the world.
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You look at every cult, the thing that you need to get to the bottom of is what does this cult teach about Jesus Christ?
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There are people that say, "Well, you look at the Mormons and you look at the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Christian scientists, I mean, those people use the Bible.
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So aren't they just like brothers that we'll see in heaven?" And the answer is no.
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They're like, "Well, how can you say that?" Because they have the issue wrong about who is Jesus Christ.
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That's why.
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Like the Christian scientists believe that Jesus was just a man.
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But this concept of Christ was this healing principle that we all have - Christian science teaches.
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They teach we all have this Christ principle in us.
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That we can be healed.
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It just so happens that Jesus of Nazareth had a lot of it.
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that name was kind of attached to him.
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That's wrong.
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Christ isn't a healing principle.
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Christ is the title of God in the flesh.
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You know, the Mormons teach that Jesus is actually the brother of Satan.
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Not God.
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And that is wrong.
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The Bible teaches that Jesus was an angel that became a man for a while, and then became an angel again.
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That is wrong!
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The identity of Jesus Christ is vitally important to get right because your eternity hinges on that.
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Like, where did you come up with that?
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Well, jot this down.
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John 8:24.
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You need to write this down and you need to highlight this in your Bible.
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Jesus said, "I told you that you would die in your sins, For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins." Jesus made it very plain.
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Unless you embrace a right understanding of who I am, you're going to die in your sins.
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The only way that you can have eternal life is by a proper understanding of the person of Jesus Christ.
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Do I understand the man?
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Secondly, three questions about Jesus you have to get right.
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Do I understand the plan?
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Well, do I understand the man?
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Well, do I understand the plan?
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Well, the disciples obviously finally are getting it, But their problem, we're going to see, isn't with the person of Jesus Christ.
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They had a big objection to His plan.
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It says, "And He began to teach them," verse 31, "He began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, and the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days, rise again." It says, "He began to teach." Meaning, this became the theme of His teaching.
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From this point, much of Jesus' emphasis was on one thing, "I'm going to die, and I'm going to raise from the dead." When you think about things from the disciples' perspective, on one hand, you can understand the excitement, "The Messiah is here, the Messiah is here." Peter says you're the Christ, and you acknowledge that, and this is something we've been waiting for as a people for the entire duration of our history, and you're here, and...
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What? You're getting killed?
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You're going to be killed?
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That doesn't make sense.
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Obviously, at this point, the disciples weren't thinking of the 16th Psalm, which talks about the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
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They weren't thinking about Isaiah 53, which talks about how the Messiah would suffer.
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Look at verse 32.
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It says, "And He said this plainly." That's important. "He said this plainly." Jesus a lot of times spoke in parables.
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And the kingdom of heaven is like this, and he makes a comparison, and there are so many times that people are like, "Yeah, what was he talking about there?" This wasn't one of those moments.
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What this means is Jesus was like, "I'm going to be killed," as in literally killed.
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And then literally, after three days, "I'm literally going to rise from the dead." This isn't a metaphor, this isn't a poem.
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This is clear.
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And even though they couldn't accept it, they understood what he was saying.
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Look at what happens next.
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Your Bible says, "And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him." You know, Peter who just made the confession.
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This is Peter. Peter just got a gold star.
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He just earned an A+ for the day just like five seconds ago.
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Like, "Who do you think I am?" Peter's like, "You are the Christ!" And Peter's like, "He's feeling good now, right?" Don't you think Peter's just like, "I am so spiritual." And Peter often times was the spokesman for the group.
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And you know he was feeling it at this moment.
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"I am so spiritual." Peter's like, "You know what, it's hard to be humble, but I'm not surprised I'm so good at it." And I got this. I so got this. Like everybody else got it wrong, like Elijah, thinking he's Elijah. Please, dearly Christ.
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Then Jesus says I'm going to be killed. And Peter's like, oh, hold on a second. And your Bible says, Peter actually pulls Jesus aside, not to ask Not to be like, "Hey, what did you mean by that?
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Were you serious?
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Why would you be killed?" He didn't ask him.
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Your Bible says that he rebuked him.
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He rebuked him.
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Peter pulled Jesus aside and said, "What are you talking about, man?
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What are you talking about?
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Getting killed?" You're wrong.
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Please understand how I mean this.
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I think there is a sense in which Peter thought his heart was pointed in the right direction.
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Okay?
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And here's the sense in which I mean that.
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I think from Peter's perspective, he was probably thinking, we're not going to let that happen.
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You're too popular.
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And yeah, there's some people that hate you, but look at all these people that flock to you.
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I can't imagine that anybody let you get killed. I think Peter probably thought he was being the hero in this story.
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Like Jesus, it says he rebuked him. He was harsh with Jesus. Could you imagine? Like Jesus, don't talk like that. You've got to stop this death nonsense. Okay? I don't want I don't want to hear that anymore.
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Stop talking like that." Wow.
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Well, then look at verse 33.
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It says, "But turning and seeing His disciples, He rebuked Peter and said, 'Get behind Me, Satan!
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For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.'" Peter sure went down a couple of notches in a hurry, didn't he?
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And you can just imagine this scene, can't you?
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Peter pulls Jesus aside and he rebukes Him, and the Bible says Jesus turned and looked at the disciples.
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I don't know how far away they were, I imagine they were close.
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It says He turned and looked at them, and I imagine they were all looking at Him like, I wonder how this is going to turn out.
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Peter just chewed out the Lord.
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Well, Jesus turned and looked and saw the disciples looking.
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The Bible says He rebuked Peter.
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This was an important moment.
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They're acknowledging that He is the Christ, but then Peter is denying what the Christ was going to do.
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This is so important.
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How fired up was Jesus right here on a scale of 1 to 10?
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It was like a 12 here, right?
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I think, you know, when you call your number one follower Satan, Jesus was pretty fired up.
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"Get behind me Satan." Literally, that is "get out of my sight." That's what that means.
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"I don't want to look at you.
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Get out of my sight." He says, "You're not thinking about the things of God.
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You're not setting your mind on the things of God." He says, "But on the things of man." You're just thinking from a totally earthly perspective here, Peter.
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Because glory without suffering is not part of the plan.
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And church, we live under the illusion that suffering is never a part of God's plan.
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That is a lie from hell.
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We live under this illusion that as long as I do the right thing, and as long as I go to church, and as long as I...
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then there's never going to be any suffering in my life.
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The Bible says sometimes it is God's will that you suffer.
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Not because He's punishing you, but God allows these things to come into our lives to refine to make us more like His Son.
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That's why the Apostle Paul said in Philippians, he goes, "I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection." We're all like, "Sign me up for that, power of resurrection, yeah, yeah, yeah." But what's the next line?
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"And the fellowship of His sufferings." And we're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a second.
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Suffering?
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Suffering can't be part of God's plan.
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Like, you know, God has big plans for me, None of them include enduring any type of hardship.
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When you think like that, you're setting your mind on the things of man.
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Here's what it boils down to.
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Here's what Peter was saying in church.
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We still do the same thing today.
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We say this, "Jesus should fit into my agenda.
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Jesus should fit into my agenda." Not, "What's Jesus' agenda?
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Let me jump on Jesus' agenda.
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Let me get on board with Jesus." We think the universe revolves around us and we think, "Jesus, you should jump on my agenda." Like he's a vending machine.
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"Give me this, and give me this, and give me this, and give me this.
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Get on board with me, this is what I need." And when you think that way, you are setting your mind on the things of man, not on the things of God.
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"Jesus should fit into my agenda." It was inconceivable - I mentioned this earlier, I want to talk about this for just a second - but it was inconceivable for Israel that the Messiah would suffer.
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Do you know, even today, Orthodox Jews, when they're reading their Scriptures, you know what we call the Old Testament, when Orthodox Jews read the Scriptures and they're reading through the book of Isaiah, they read Isaiah 50, Isaiah 51, Isaiah 52, Isaiah 54, what did I miss there? 53. Do you know they skipped that? They completely skipped that chapter.
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Unapologetically. They pretend that that chapter does not exist in their scriptures. Why? Because And even today, there are Jews, there are Orthodox Jews that say, "I'm not going to have anything to do with the thought that the Messiah would suffer.
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He has to fit my agenda.
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I'm not going to jump on His." The mindset then and the mindset now is this, someday yes, the Messiah is going to come, but He's going to conquer and He's going to reign.
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Now listen, the Old Testament teaches that.
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The Old Testament teaches that ultimately the Messiah is going to reign over all the earth.
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The Revelation teaches that for a thousand years, Christ is going to come back and He's going to reign on this earth for a thousand years.
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But so many of the Israelites wanted to skip this whole cross thing.
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Let Him come, let Him reign.
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That's suffering in the middle of it?
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That's just, that's inconceivable.
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But look what Jesus said about that in verse 31, He said, "The Son of Man must." Must!
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Isn't that an interesting word choice?
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Jesus didn't say, "The Son of Man is probably going to suffer." or the Son of Man, more than likely is going to go through some hard things.
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Jesus said His suffering, His rejection, and His death, He said they must happen.
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Jesus said it wasn't an option for anything else to happen except this.
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These things have to happen.
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Because His agenda was more than defeating Rome.
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His agenda was for defeating sin.
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And church, that is good news.
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That word "must" I have it circled in my Bible, you should circle it in yours.
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That is good news.
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Because it is the very death of Jesus Christ that paid the penalty for my sin.
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And it is His resurrection as He speaks up here.
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It's His resurrection that gives us eternal life.
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Because He rose from the dead, we can have life.
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I spoke a couple of times about Isaiah 53, one of the key verses.
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I encourage you to go home and read that, but one of the key verses in that passage is Isaiah 53.6.
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And it says, "We all like sheep have gone astray, each to his own way." You know what that means?
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First of all, we're like sheep.
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What are sheep like? Anyone?
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Go ahead and say it. What are sheep like?
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Dumb.
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Sheep are stupid.
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They are. Sheep are stupid animals.
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You don't believe me?
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Name me one other animal that requires hiring somebody full-time to babysit them.
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Like sheep have a shepherd, right?
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What do you call the guy that takes care of the pigs?
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"Oh yeah, there isn't a guy that just does that." "What do you call the guy that just takes care of the cows?" "Oh yeah, there isn't really a guy." Do you know how dumb sheep are?
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Sheep are so dumb that people use dogs to help them take care of sheep.
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People take another dumb animal to take care of these dumb animals, because by comparison, dogs are like geniuses compared to sheep.
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Sheep are stupid animals.
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Do you know what the Bible says about Jeff Miller?
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"I'm a sheep. I'm just a dumb animal." And so are you.
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We all, like sheep, have gone astray.
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That's why sheep need a shepherd. Do you know why?
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They're so stupid, they don't even pay attention to what they're doing.
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It's just like, "Oh, look, a butterfly. Oh, look, a tuft of grass here.
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Oh, look, there's a little puddle here." And before you know it, they just kind of wander off, and they're like, "How in the world did I get here?" They just do their own thing, self-absorbed, and walk right into danger.
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And the Bible says that's you.
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We are sheep that get so consumed with ourselves, so wrapped up in our sinful nature, we're not paying attention, we just kind of do our own thing, and we, like sheep, go astray.
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And then the Bible says, "Each to his own way." That's very important, church.
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What that means is, your sin tendency is going to be different than mine.
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And I've been so guilty of this.
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I've heard of people committing a certain type of sin, and I'm just like, "How in the world can somebody do that?" That's the way that they go astray.
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They can look at my sin and say the same thing.
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You know, like for example, stealing.
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That's something I've never understood.
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Back in my days, I'm working at Walmart, I used to help bust the people that would shoplift.
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And I remember sitting there, the police would come, and we'd have to write all these reports.
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And I just remember sitting there going, "I don't understand this.
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This guy has $80 in his pocket, and he stole a $15 pocket knife." Like, why would somebody do that?
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But the truth is, he could look at my sin and say, I can't believe anybody would be tempted to do that.
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And that's the point in Isaiah 53.6, "We all like sheep have gone astray, each to his own way." The second half of that verse says, "But the Lord has laid on Him," on the Messiah, "The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all." That is such a beautiful verse.
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Do you know what that means?
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That when God sees me by nature, what He sees, "Well, let this represent my sin." Let's just imagine you could write...
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Well, actually, that's not going to work.
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Let's let this book represent all of the sins I've ever committed.
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And you're going to have to use your imagination, because it would be a much thicker book for me.
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every time that I've sinned in thought or word or action.
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Imagine that those were all written down and put on a book, and let this hand represent me.
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When God sees me, what He sees is my sin.
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Like, Jeff, here's all the things that you've done wrong.
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You are a sinner.
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Here's the beauty of Isaiah 53:6.
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It says, "The Lord has laid the iniquity of us all upon Him." Let this hand represent Jesus Christ.
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Here's what Jesus has done.
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When Jesus said, "I must suffer, I must be killed." When Jesus was on the cross, He took my sin upon Himself.
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The Lord has laid my iniquity on Him.
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The Lord has laid our iniquity on Him.
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So now, when Jesus was on the cross, Jesus was getting punished for my sin.
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But when God sees me now, What does he see?
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He sees no sin.
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You see?
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He took our sin on Himself.
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That's why someday for the believer in Jesus Christ, when you stand before God, so many people think, "Well, I've got a lot I've got to answer for." When the truth is, Jesus took our sin on Himself and took it away.
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And when God sees me, He sees me as being perfectly righteous.
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It says you're perfect.
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I know I'm not perfect, in and of myself.
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The perfection that I have has been given to me because Jesus took my sin on Himself.
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So do you understand the man?
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Jesus is God, okay?
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He is the Messiah, God in the flesh, the Anointed One, the Promised One of Israel.
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Do you understand the man?
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Do I understand the plan?
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Lastly, this is where it all has to be tied together folks.
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Lastly, have I made Him personal?
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I want to go back to verse 29.
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Jesus wasn't paranoid, trying to find out what people think.
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Jesus wasn't a game show host just asking trivia questions to see if the disciples would right. This issue of wrestling with the identity and work of Jesus Christ, listen, this has to be personal.
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Because at this point in the message, everybody in this room I imagine is 100% on board. Yes, Jesus is the Messiah, obviously He fulfilled all the Old Testament Scriptures. You know, He was obviously more than just a man. I'm on board with that. Yes, I see He died and yes, He rose from the dead.
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You're probably all on board with that, but it has to move from an objective truth to a subjective truth.
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That's why Jesus said, "But who do you say that I am?" That's what's going to matter.
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"Who do you say that I am?" Meaning you have to do something with this.
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Agreeing is not the same as receiving.
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Not opposed to Jesus is not the same as receiving.
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Agreeing is not the same as receiving.
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Over and over and over, the Scripture teaches that there is a personal transaction that has to take place between you and Jesus.
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coming out of here thinking, "You know, I agree with the facts that Jesus was probably God and Jesus died and rose from the dead.
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Those things are probably true." That's not going to save you.
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Like, what do you mean by that?
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Over and over and over and over in his ministry, Jesus talked about the fact that you have to receive Him.
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Let me give you some examples.
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In Matthew 13, we went through this a couple of years ago.
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Matthew 13, Jesus tells all these parables.
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Two of the stories, Jesus said, "The kingdom of heaven is like this guy who was like digging in a field and he found a treasure and it was so valuable, he covered it back over and he went and sold everything that he had so he had the money to buy the field." That story teaches a lot, but one of the main things that story teaches is that guy had to do something.
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He had to make a personal transaction.
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That treasure wasn't his until he was willing to receive it.
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Then Jesus told another story right behind it.
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He says the kingdom of heaven is like this.
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There's this pearl merchant.
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He goes around, he buys and sells pearls.
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And one day he sees the greatest pearl he's ever seen.
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He's like, "This pearl is so valuable, I'm selling everything that I have just to get that one pearl." It was a transaction.
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See the guy seeing that the pearl was valuable didn't mean anything to him.
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The question was, "How do I obtain that?" So there's a personal transaction that has to take place.
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It has to be personal.
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Jesus said it again, John 6, verse 53.
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Remember we went through this story actually in Mark, when Jesus fed the 5,000 men plus the women and the children.
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Do you remember at the end of John 6, all these people started walking away from Jesus.
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Why?
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Because of this statement.
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This statement made people go from following Jesus to walking away from Jesus.
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John 6.53, Jesus said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you." What did He mean by that?
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Obviously, Jesus didn't mean that we literally partake of His flesh.
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And this also isn't about communion.
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Okay?
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Communion wasn't even instituted yet.
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What he was saying was you personally have to receive Him.
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That Jesus isn't something you observe and admire.
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Jesus is someone that you have to consume.
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Like He has to become not just a part of my life, but my very life.
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And Jesus said, "Unless you are willing to take this step to fully receive Me, you have no life in you." So again, a transaction has to take place.
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How about one more?
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John 1.12 says, "Yet to those who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God." Who is a child of God?
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The people who receive Jesus and believe in His name.
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It has to become personal for you at some point.
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It has to be personal for you at some point.
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Kids, this faith has to be personal for you.
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You're not granted heaven just because your parents are fantastic Christians.
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That doesn't promise you heaven.
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It has to be personal for you.
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Parents, you might have adult kids that are phenomenal Christians, and you think that somehow you're going to get into heaven based on your children's merits.
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It doesn't work that way.
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You have to make Jesus personal.
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Have you, by faith, received Jesus Christ as your Lord and as your Savior?
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Have you by faith cried out to Him and said, "Jesus, I understand who You are and I understand what You've done and I understand that on my own I'm just a dead person.
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I am dead in my sin.
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"Jesus, I cry out to You for forgiveness for the eternal life that You give.
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Jesus, I am Yours.
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I want You to be mine.
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But it has to be personal." Recently, going through some health issues, my wife talked to Amanda Frederick, who is a dietician, who graciously went to work with some dietary intervention for my health issues.
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She explained some things.
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She actually gave us a handout.
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Eat these things.
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Don't eat these things.
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She spent the time and effort drawing on her experience, on her education, on her expertise, and said this is the plan.
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Do this.
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Now look, church, I know that I should eat healthy.
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I can study and research all of the facts about nutrition and fiber and riboflavin, whatever that is, and all these things.
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But unless I act upon what I know, knowing does me no good.
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Unless I act upon what I know, Amanda could drop off a stack of books about diet and nutrition at our house.
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But unless I do something with it, it does me no good knowing.
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At some point, it has to become personal.
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At some point, I have to go from I think people should eat healthy to I think Jeff Miller should eat healthy.
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There's a parallel there with your faith.
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It has to go from I think Jesus is God to Jesus is my God.
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Church, it doesn't matter what others say.
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It matters what you say.
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It doesn't matter what you want Jesus to be.
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What matters is who He is.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Mark 8:22-33
In Mk 8:29, Jesus made the issue about Him personal ("Who do you say that I am?"). How would you explain to someone what it means to make Jesus "personal"?
Why did Jesus not want His disciples telling people He is the Christ?
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.