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Well, good morning church. I hope after all of the news and all of the Instagram posts and all of the stuff, we made it all right. We made it here and we're good. I hope the last couple of days you have gotten to really catch up on whichever one of those Netflix documentaries you have been watching over these last months. But hey, we're here. If you're with us online, thank you for being here. We know that some of you are still blizzard it in in your driveways, right? Uh, across West Cobb and Pauling. Well, listen, last week was a great week. We started a new series 'cause it was the first of the new year, right? We started a new series last week that scares me to death, all right? That we're gonna be walking from now till about the middle of May through this book or this gospel that we call John. Walking through John.

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And it was a great day last week, right, of just introduction, of learning who John is and learning that he is the disciple John, and really and truly learning that his purpose is really God's purpose. And that is for us just to know who God is. Now, John, last week did something profound. All right? We looked at it, but I wanna mention it again. John last week, went to the very beginning of time and began to tie this scarlet thread all the way through scripture of who Jesus is, of that he is the word. And I love how John does this because this is one of the things I love about scripture, and I actually love about teaching scripture because I love that the more we fall in love with the word of God, the more we read the word of God, the more God shows us how he weaves throughout all time and all places through all of the events of scripture.

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This idea that he is pointing towards Jesus, he's pointing towards our redemption, and he's showing us the bigness, right? The beauty and who Jesus really is. And really, that's one of God's desires for us, right? It's for us to not only know who Jesus is, but us to fall deeply in love with him. Well, last week as I was walking out of here, which by the way, thanks for all the prayers last week. God got me through the beginning of the 9:30 was a little bit rough, uh, but he got us there this week. It's been a great week of bronchitis for a lot of us. Amen. Uh, but we made it through. I was walking outta church last week and somebody asked me a question that I had never think that I've, I've never really taught this. So I wanted to mention something before we get to the book of John today because it points to the book of John, if that's okay.

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All right. Last week I was walking out of here and, and, and I was really just trying to get to the truck. Amen. I was really, I was done. I'd asked God to just get me to 12:15 and, and get me home. And they stop me and they're like, Matt, I got a quick question. And you know, as a pastor, it's never a quick question, right? You know that, but it's what you're called to do. And I was like, all right, what do you got? They're like, Matt, why is there four gospels and not just one? And I was like, Ugh. All right. I, I mean honestly, I was like, oh man. I was like, well, I was like, honestly, I was like, look, there's no way that in one book God could really just show us who Jesus is. And I was like, Hey, drop the mic.

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That was the fastest thing I could come up with. And I walked out the door. Look, look, if that was you, I'm not gonna say who you are 'cause you actually might be in here if that was you. I'm sorry. Alright. A little bit of cough medicine. I was a little bit short with you. And, and I feel like I need to give a little better answer to that question. Um, and, and point in a little better direction. 'cause I got to thinking about it. And it's really important, you know, obviously, yes, there's no just one way to describe the bigness of who Jesus is. But there's also this idea that if you take all four gospels, there's this corroborating evidence that points towards Jesus and that's good. But really even four wouldn't do it justice, right? But really on top of that, there's this amazing thing that God does with the gospels that ties in to John going to the beginning of time that I wanna point out real quickly to you this morning. In the Old Testament, when you looked at who God was, we talked about this last week.

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When you looked at God, who God was, there was always, it seemed to be these four emblems or these four banners or these four symbols that represented not only who God was, but who the Messiah would be. One day, and I remembered this on Tuesday morning, like eight o'clock in that morning, I remembered this idea, particularly in the Old Testament when it wanted to represent who Jesus was. It gives us these images of who God was. Now last week we talked about the temple, right? We talked about in the Old Testament that God resided in the temple. He was in the temple. I got some images for you, visual people that are gonna help us walk through this. Now, in the Old Testament, God didn't rest inside of man. He lived in what we call the Holy of Holies. He lived in the Holy of Holies.

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It was the inner sanctuary of where his presence was. Now in Exodus, if you remember right, they, they traveled around the cloud by day and fire by night. And they moved all the time. And they had to have an orderly way to reset up this temple or reset up this tabernacle if you would. Now I want you to look at the screens, 'cause I wanna describe something to you that's gonna show you how incredibly cool God is. Inside the temple it had these two places. On the outside was kind of what you would just kind of call the holy place inside of that was the Holy of Holies. And then on all four sides of this, outside of the temple walls or curtains, if you would, then you had all of the Levites that lived there. Those were the guys that took care of the temple, took care of the affairs of the temple.

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And then outside of that, you had the four sides or the four areas that the 12 tribes of Israel would camp. They did the same thing every time they picked up and moved, every time the fire would go or the cloud would go in front of them, they would go and they would settle into these same four sides. This is where the thousands of million of people would live outside in these four different groups. You say, well, Matt, there's 12 tribes. You're right. There was three tribes on every single side. And they all rested in behind what you would just call a lead tribe. To the east was the tribe of Judah. Alright? It was the tribe of Judah. All right? To the west was the tribe of Ephraim. To the south was the tribe of Reen. And to the north was the tribe of Dan.

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Alright? Each one of these though, they had this banner that they would carry in front of them that had an emblem on it. Alright? It had an emblem, alright? Judah obviously was the lion we're seeing on there. Rum was the ox, Reuben was the man. And then you see the eagle was who Dan is. Now, this is incredible. Why? You say, well Matt, this is going too far. Alright, stay with me 'cause this is awesome. Stay with me. Now, each one of these represented a piece of who God is, who Jesus would be one day. These are the same images that Ezekiel received in his vision of who God is in Ezekiel chapter one, in Ezekiel chapter 10. They're the same images that John the Apostle received in Revelation, right, of who God is. He received these same images. And here's the incredible connection. It's the same imagery that we find when we watch every single gospel of the New Testament.

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Every one of 'em. You see, Matt, what are you talking about? Stay with me. Watch this. Matthew in his gospel is speaking to the Jews and he's speaking so much about the fulfillment of Jesus being the what? The king of the Jews, right? The lion of the tribe of Judah if you would. Mark, in his kind of fast-paced gospel, he talks about Jesus being the servant over and over and over again. What is this picture of a servant? It's an ox. It was the best servant that they had, the best animal that they had. Luke, you guessed it. He talks of Jesus as the Son of God. See the emblem on Ruben, the son of God. And then John, when we get all the way around to John, John speaks of Jesus as being the exalted one high and lifted up above all things, which was the emblem of the eagle.

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So when you take all four of these symbols that pointed into the presence of God and who God was and who they marched under, and you put them together, you begin to see an incredible betrayal of not only who God is, but who Jesus has always been and who he wants to be. So we get to the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke of what he said and what he did and what he felt. But like we said last week, we get to John and we begin to see who is Jesus. And we see this completeness of a picture of not just pointing into a temple but pointing into our souls. That's the connection. And if you just begin church, if you begin, just allow God to press into your mind. If any serious minded person will take scripture and walk through it and pray through it, you will begin to see Jesus make himself known to you in every single one of these ways.

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Now, last week we started the book of John. We started in chapter one. We started in verse one and went all the way to verse 14. We said last week that it was kind of Jesus' resume, right? That he is eternal and he is God and he's creator. He's the giver of life and light, and that he doesn't wanna just dwell in the temple. There it is again, right? But he wants to dwell in you. This week we're gonna kind of pick up where we left off last week, but we're gonna skip down to John chapter one, verse 35. And John today is not just gonna show us who Jesus is, although he is gonna show us who he is. He's gonna show us what we do when we realize who he is. He's gonna show us how to respond or how to follow Jesus.

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So here's what I wanna do today. I just wanna walk through the text, point out some incredibly insightful questions, show you some key people, and allow us to see Jesus as the Lamb of God. All right? So here we go. Gonna start in verse 35 with all of that as the intro. Here it is. Watch this. It says this. It says the next day, John. Now stop there. Leave that on the screen. 'cause this is John the Baptist, right? John the Baptist in the above verses he's gotten some hot water already with the religious leaders. He's already told them, I'm not the Messiah, I'm not Elijah. I'm just the one that is saying that that guy is coming. He is coming. I am the forerunner of him. John at this point has a great following behind him. He's baptizing people into repentance. He's pointing and he's teaching about the Messiah.

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And watch what happens. Says this verse 35, the next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, look, might wanna underline this start, draw a little picture. Look the lamb of God. The lamb of God. Now, if you look right above this, in verse 29, this is the second time he has used this phrase, lamb of God. The first time he says, here's the lamb of God who does what? Who takes away the sin of the world. And he says, whose spirit of God has ascended on him at the baptism and who and I know he is the one. But this time he just looks at him and he pauses with all these people following him and says, that's the lamb. The lamb. Man what a testimony. What an incredible image to burn in our mind on top of these four images that we've already seen.

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So what's happening, John is walking with two of his disciples, right? The first one is Andrew, he's named in the text. The second one is none other than the writer of the book, the Apostle John. I told you last week that John doesn't point out a whole lot that he's the guy, but he is. We know that from the other gospel writers and we know that because of the details. So Andrew and John are following John the Baptist. They're followers of him. They have submitted to his teaching. They've been following him from some time. They've been hearing the messages that the Messiah is coming. They've been hearing the messages of the Old Testament. They had been hearing that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah. They were nowhere near their house at this point. They were in the North. They lived a little bit farther down to the south, which means that they were following learners.

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That's what a disciple is. And at this moment in time, John the Baptist is somewhat of a celebrity religious figure. And he sees Jesus and he stops in his tracks in the text and he says, look the lamb of God. Now to us, non-Jewish people we're like, okay, well that, that's good. I got that right. For those of us that have been reading scripture, we're kind of on board with this already, right? But for them, the lamb as being Jewish, right, the lamb was the central figure of forgiveness. In Jewish worship. It was the central figure, right? Going all the way back to Exodus and, and the children of Israel being delivered at the last plague. They took the lamb and spread its blood around the door, going all the way back to a family, bringing a lamb to the temple to be sacrificed for their sin.

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Going all the way back to the day of atonement. John the Baptist looks at Jesus. Man, catch this. Don't just skim over it. Looks at Jesus right here and says this person, don't miss it. Don't ever let nobody tell you that it's not. This person is the one. This person is the man. This person is the lamb for all time. Now this is an incredible claim. It's an incredible claim. But the problem was, the problem was is the Jews were or still are, right? They were not looking for a lamb, right? They were looking for a king. They were looking for a huge Messiah. Conquering like, like government king, right? But John stops and he says, Hey look, it's always been about him. It's always been about him. It will always be about him. It will forever always be about him. John says, everything written, everything spoken by the prophets, everything points to the lamb.

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Now catch this. The lamb and the Messiah are one. They're one. It's what John is teaching us right here. They're one and the same. And this blew their minds. John looks at them at this very moment and says, Hey, behold, maybe yours says, look, maybe yours says, get on board. This blew their minds. He says, behold, pay attention. You need to recognize who Jesus is. And church, lemme just say this, that plea is still the same plea that God is asking of us today. It's still the same plea that is just as relevant today as it's ever been. Why? Because we have a sin debt that cannot be paid. It cannot be covered by anyone else. But the lamb. The lamb, only Jesus, the lamb can pay it in full. And only, what did we talk about last week? Only when we believe. Only when we receive Christ as the Messiah and as the king can we know the lamb.

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So my question today is this. Have you come to that place that you have believed, not just in here, but have you trusted, have you committed and have you acted on the lamb? Now, keep reading because these guys do watch what happens. In verse 37 says this, when two of the disciples heard him say this, oh man, here it is. Here's the example. They followed Jesus. Man, do you see that? So simple. They followed Jesus, turning around Jesus saw them following and asked, what do you want? Now I, that's probably not how he said it. I get it right. It's probably not, but it's what it says, right? I want you to write this down 'cause here's the first question that just kind of popped up in my mind that helps me process through this text. Write this down. Number one, this is what Jesus asked, right?

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What is it that you truly want? What is it that you truly want? In fact, the NIV says, what do you want? ESV says, what are you seeking? Or what are you looking for? Or hey, if you're just still KJV, what seeketh you? Right? Whichever one, it's all the same, right? But, but think about it just for a minute. The first words outta Jesus' mouth in the Book of John are profound. And in fact, it's really the same thing that Jesus asks every time he has an encounter with a person for the rest of the gospels. And that is, what are you really looking for in life the most? What is it really that you think I can do in you? What is it that really matters the most? What are you really searching for? Or what is it that really brings you life?

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That's what Jesus is asking right here. It's one of the biggest questions we can ever ask ourselves to, which I just wanna pause and do this, man, would you do me a favor this week? And at some point this week, would you just carve out 30 minutes of your time to sit before the Lord and just ask him, God, what matters the most to me? What is it that I really, really want? Ask God. Ask him. I mean, just straight up ask him to reveal it to you. And then lemme make this deal with you. If he doesn't show you in that 30 minutes, somehow, if he doesn't show you, here's what I want you to do next. If he doesn't show you, then I want you to go look at your bank account and your transaction history. 'cause that'll show you. Go look at your calendar.

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'cause that'll show you. Go look at your browsing history. 'cause that'll show you go look at your screen time that you just popped onto your iPhone this morning, right? That'll show you go look at the secret parts of your life, right? That you're hiding from everybody else. And that'll show you. Or just really look at what is it that makes me the most mad, the most glad, or the most joyous? Or what is it that I really want? Man? Would you just ask Jesus that this week? 'cause he'll begin to point it into you and he'll begin to show you where it might not be him. And I love that question from Jesus. What do you want? So direct. But man, doesn't it hit? Now look at their answer. I love it. Verse 37, it says this. It says, when the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around

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Jesus saw them following and he asked, what do you want? They said, Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? Now you gotta laugh at that, right? But you gotta give it to the guys. At least they call Jesus Rabbi, right? At least they do that. Which is a term of respect. It's a term of honor. It shows they're beginning to transfer their followship from John the Baptist over to Jesus, right? This is not their official calling right here to throw down their nets. This is just an initial calling to come discover who he is. They look at Jesus outta the first things that they could say outta the first things they could say to the lamb of God and go, Hey, where you staying? Right? Where you staying? Now we laugh at that, right? We laugh at it, but man, doesn't this happen all the time with Jesus?

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I mean, haven't you ever been there with Jesus where you know there's something he's pressing into your soul, but you're like side winding it over here just a little bit and trying to come up with something else. It seems like right here that Jesus is talking on this level that is way up here. But people always seem to be talking on this surface level down here, right? I mean, we're gonna see it all through the book of John, John chapter six, right? Where Jesus looks at all of his disciples, he is like, I'm the bread of life. And they're like, well, we like bread, right? I mean, you saw it in that. You see it again in John chapter three, right? Where Jesus says to Nicodemus, unless you were born again, you will never receive my kingdom. Right? And and and Nicodemus is like, I can't crawl back in the womb, right?

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We see it again. We're gonna teach it later in John chapter four, when the woman at the well looks at Jesus or Jesus says, Hey, I have living water. And she's like, well, where's your bucket? Right? And we see it all the time when Jesus, but Jesus is asking the spiritual question of life and identity and purpose. And the disciples answer worldly in the moment. But I love it. But thank goodness Jesus doesn't get frustrated with him. 'cause he knows that this is just a way for them to kinda maybe break the ice or get into the scene, look at the response of Jesus. Oh, if we could just grab onto this response, watch what he says in verse 39. Verse 39 says, Come. Oh, that's good. Come He replied. And you will see. So they went and they saw where he was staying and they spent the day with him.

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And it was about four in the afternoon. Now, if the first question is, what do you really want? I want you to look at this statement from Jesus because there's really a question in here. 'cause there was actually a, a chance for them to make a choice. Write this second question down. First one's, what do you want? The second question is this, will you come and see who Jesus really is? Isn't that the question of all questions? In other words, will you humble yourself to the point that you come to a point in your life and you just decide, yes, that's the lamb? Yes, that's the lamb. And I don't know all the answers and I don't know all the stuff and I don't know all the theology. But what I do know about you, Jesus, is that you are the lamb that takes away the sins of the world.

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And I'll follow you Jesus. And I want you just to show me you, all of you church. That's still the greatest invitation of all time for us to surrender and know Jesus. That's the good news. That's the gospel throughout this book is that we see Jesus receive people, right? They don't have it all figured out. They have the dumbest questions. They have the craziest motives at first. They have all kinds of baggage. They have all kinds of wrong ideas. They have all kinds of troubles. But Jesus takes them. And Jesus can take us from wherever we are in humble submission and transform all of us. That's what he does. Look, it's even possible today that you're asking a dumb question of God. And I don't mean that in a bad way, but just a secondary question of God. Maybe it's like, God, fix this, or God fix that.

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My God, my family's in need. And look, yes, Jesus can handle those questions and he wants to. He doesn't get mad at him. But what if today Jesus is thinking bigger? What if today what Jesus wants you to do is to walk away from your sin and walk into his presence and follow him and know him and fall in love with Him? I love, I love, I love what John does here. John gives us these details of what happens. Look back at verse 39 again. Lemme read it to you again. Watch what it says. Come Jesus replied, and you will see, man, somebody needs to hear that this morning. That's the invitation. So they went and saw where Jesus was staying and they spent that day with him and it was about four in the afternoon. I love how John gives us these details. Just to remind us, this is not a fairy tale.

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This is not a mystery. This is not a parable. No. You gotta know, John is saying this really happened. I mean, shouldn't of Jesus just been like, who cares where I'm staying? Right? But he doesn't. Why? 'cause at this point is where Jesus begins to pour his soul into their souls. Now, every theologian I read this week, every single one of 'em agrees with this statement because of the fact that John put the timestamp on here means this. It means in Jewish tradition, if anyone was at your home at particularly this time of year after 4:00 PM you would've needed to offer them a place to stay that evening. So think about this in your mind just for a minute, whether it's true or not, these guys went in with Jesus to see where he was staying. They sat around the table with him. They sat around dinner with him.

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They heard the stories, not just from John the Baptist now, but now they saw the light, they saw the love, they saw the lamb, they saw who Jesus is. It kind of mimics, doesn't it? Luke chapter 24, that Road to Emmaus experience where Jesus begins all the way back in the Old Testament, he says, there I am, and there I am. And there I am. And here's the gospel and here's salvation, and here's who I am to you. And guess what, Church? These guys meet Jesus. They surrender their lives to Jesus. How do we know? We'll, keep reading. Watch what happens next. Verse 40 says this, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother was one of the two that heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus. The first thing, circle that word first thing, you're gonna need it in a minute. The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, we have found the Messiah.

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How do you know they met Jesus? Because now they're out there talking about Jesus, right? They're out there spreading the word of Jesus. We have found the Messiah that is the Christ. And he brought Simon, right? They brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, you are Simon, son of John, and you will be called Cephas, which when translated is Peter. And two things came to my mind when I read this text this week. Write this question down. Here's the third question number three. Not only do you want, what do you want? Not only will you come, but number three is, are you introducing others to Jesus? Are you introduc introducing others to Jesus? Verse 41, and what we're about to see in verse 45 are incredible reminders to us. Listen, I told you to circle it earlier, that no matter where you are on your faith journey, no matter if it's the day after our roll is to invite others to come and see Jesus.

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What? There's no other role that is more primary to this. So are you making that imitation? Are you meeting people? Are you like here reaching out to those that are closest to you going, Hey, I don't have all the answers. I don't know all the stuff. All I do know is that is the Christ and you need to follow him. That's what happens. Man so what about you? It's the theme of Andrew's life. We see that later on. But then the second question that popped in my mind right here, and it goes right here with it, is this, what do people call you? What do people call you? Say, Matt, what difference does that make? Oh, it makes a lot of difference. In other words, when people see you, what's the first thing they think about you? What's the first thing that pops into their mind?

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I love Jesus' interaction here that we just read with Peter, right? Why? Because Jesus here gives Peter his nickname, right? He gives him his nickname and he does it in an incredible way because he does it even before he earns it. Now look, some of you got some great nicknames, right? My particular favorites are the largest human beings on the planet that are named tiny. Those are my favorite ones, right? But a nickname normally comes because of something. You are something that stands out about you or something you've done right? Some of you're still holding onto him for middle school, right? And you hate 'em. You hate 'em, but they stuck, right? But what does Jesus do here? Jesus gives Peter a nickname that hasn't even happened yet. It's really a prophecy of who he will become. In fact, let me walk you back through it.

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I didn't put it back up here, but what did Jesus say? Jesus looked at him and says, Hey, you are Simon, right? That's that's his current name, right? That's who he is right now. But then he looked at him and says, you are the son of John. What is? What is that? That's his family name. Like a last name. But really what does that represent? It represents his past. He says, you're Simon, that's your present. You are the son of John. That is your past, if you would. And then he looks at him and says, but now you're Cephas. What is that? That's a picture of who Peter would be. Man, there's an incredible lesson here. Listen, believer, there's a huge encouragement here. And that is this. When you believe and when you follow Jesus, you cease to be defined by your past. You cease to be defined by where you were.

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You cease to be defined by your family, by your mistakes, by your accomplishments, by your failures. And listen, you now begin to be defined by who Jesus has made you. That's why we come and see. That's what he does. Now, Jesus knows you is what it's saying. And he saves you. He remakes you and he's reshaping you. So the question is, what is it today that you need to surrender to him to remake, remold or rename? And Jesus will do it. If you'll turn to him, he'll make you new. He wants to call you by a new name. Why? Because now you're his beloved. You're his chosen. You're his redeemed, and you are his rock. Man, I love this text. Keep reading what's happening. Remember John the Baptist has introduced Andrew and John, Andrew and John. Spend time with Jesus. They go get Peter, right?

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Andrew goes and gets. Peter brings him. Peter gets a new nickname. Now keep reading. 'cause now Jesus now calls two more to himself, Philip and Nathaniel. Watch this. Verse 43 says, the next day, Jesus decided, I love that to leave for Galilee. In other words, he's leaving the north, coming back down toward the south, finding Philip. He said to him, follow me. Follow me. Man, I want you to circle that word follow me, because this is another one of the greatest invitations of all time that Jesus has put in front of us. And really, really, really, it answers the question of what does it really mean to be a Christian? What does it really mean to know Jesus? What does it really mean to follow Jesus? And it doesn't mean that we start perfect. It doesn't mean that we know all theology. No. To be a Christian is to believe and to follow.

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Now here in Jesus' day, it was really easy to see who's following Jesus, right? What did you do? You looked up on the road, you'd see Jesus walking the guys behind him. They were following him, right? They were showing up. But in our time it's a little bit different because we don't have the physical Jesus walking in front of us. So what does it look like for us to follow Jesus? Really it's the same thing. Lemme put it into two words for you that maybe can help you. I didn't put it in your notes, but you can just kind of put 'em in your mind for the rest of the week. The first one is to follow Jesus is to be a learner of Jesus. It's to be a learner. That means you've committed yourself to learn who Jesus is, what Jesus does, how Jesus interacts with people.

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You want to see what he saw, what he taught. Church. If you're gonna follow Jesus, you gotta know Jesus. There's no shortcuts. There's no ways around it. You need to have a life of reading, studying, being at church, being in messages, being in a small group, growing in knowledge. If you're gonna be a disciple, you've got to do that. Well, Matt, I'm just not an academic person. That's okay. But when you love somebody, you learn about 'em. That's the point. But secondly, it's not just learning, it's doing. If you wanna be a disciple, there's learning and there's doing. See some of us, we've had a lifestyle of learning. We are so spiritually knowledgeable, but this is the part we miss. See not, it's not just about knowing what Jesus did. It's about doing what Jesus did. So when Jesus invited Philip to come follow him, Jesus invited him and others into a life of learning and doing, knowing Jesus and emulating Jesus.

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And the same is true for us. The same is true for us. And that's why we don't apologize every time we stand up here and say to be a part of this church. We want you to be a learner. We want you to be a committed worshiper, a committed member of the family. We want you to be a a servant. We want you to be a life on mission person and we want you to be a steward. We don't apologize because that's what it looks like. Now watch what happens to Philip. Philip doesn't get a lot of press, but I love his example. 'cause he like Andrew, he can't keep this news to himself. Watch it. He moves. Verse 44, it says, Philip like Andrew and Peter was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathan, Nathaniel. And he told him, we have found the one that Moses wrote about in the law and about whom the prophets also wrote.

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Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. What another incredible example of what it looks like to lead others to Jesus. Hey, I met him. He's the one and you need to know him. Do I know all the answers? No, but he's the Messiah, the giver of hope, the giver of deliverance. Lemme just pause just for a second to ask you the question. Does this look like your life in Jesus? Does your life in Jesus look like a life that when Jesus has come, you begin to follow? Does your life look like a life in Jesus where Jesus says, Hey, introduce others to me that you are introducing. Can you even recall the name of the last person that you shared the name of Jesus to? And from the beginning of Jesus' ministry, to the end of it, that reach people, reach people, followers, invite new followers, believers, invite new believers.

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Listen, sometimes it goes incredibly, incredibly bad, but that doesn't matter. The results are not up to you because sometimes the results are good and people meet Jesus. In fact, watch what happens in the story. Verse 46 when we speak the name of Jesus. Look at verse 46. Watch what Nathaniel says. It says Nazareth. Can anything good come from there? Nathaniel asked, come and see. Man can I just tell you that's one of the greatest evangelism strategies of all time. Man, come and see, said Philip. When Jesus saw Nathaniel approaching, he said of him, here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit. Now that's a whole message right there. But Jesus is basically looking at him and says, Hey, that guy knows God and whatever he's dealing with, whatever people are accusing him of, he didn't do. Come on with me. Watch this.

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How do you know me? Nathaniel asked. Jesus asked. Jesus answered, I saw you. Boy, that's encouraging. And he still sees you while you're still under the fig tree, before Philip called you. Now this is profound because this is not even the same city. It's not like they kind of went over there one day and kind of peeked in on 'em and hid, no, no, no. They were up here. They went down here, different place. And Jesus is looking at Nathaniel going, Hey, I see you. I see all of you. I know all of you before we even met because I'm not only the lamb, I am God. Now watch this. Then Nathaniel declared, rabbi, you are the son of God and you were the king of Israel. Jesus says, wait, wait, wait, wait. You believe because I saw you. 'cause I told you I saw you under the fig tree?

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You will see greater things than that. And then he added, very truly, you'll see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending on the son of man. Now that's a lot, but I want you to write down something. Then we're gonna close it up on the backside, looking at John and Andrew and Peter and Nathaniel and seeing them follow Jesus man. And here's, here's the last question I just wanna ask you. What will it take? Here's the, here's number five. What will it take for you to follow Jesus? What will it take? 'cause here's what we've seen in this scripture. So clearly we have seen that Jesus is the one that Jesus fulfills all of these prophecies about himself. That Jesus not only just fulfills these prophecies and puts himself up on a throne, Jesus invites us to follow him. And it shows that Jesus in inviting us to follow him, he knows our most innermost thoughts.

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He knows our innermost life and Jesus loves us and cares for us even through those things, even through the baggage of life. And now we see that Jesus even gives his life to us. Man, you know what? You begin to realize in following Jesus that two of the greatest needs that all mankind have is to be known and to be fully loved. And in this one text, Jesus offers both. He offers both. And Jesus right here offers up to us, to all of us, to John. And he shows us that he loves us. He shows us that he cares for us. He shows us He loves the secret parts and he wants to love us through 'em. He loves the public parts and he wants to mold us through 'em. There's so much of us that is so unlovable that we wanna hide, but Jesus has come and follow me and I will be yours because I am the lamb of God.

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Man, I love this. It's really what 51 means, verse 51. Lemme read it to you again. Then he added very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending on. On who? On who? The son of man. Now this phrase right here, heaven, open and angels ascending. Ascending. Maybe, maybe just maybe in your Bible reading this week, you got a Genesis chapter 28. Not sure, right? It's describing Jacob, alright? The younger son of Isaac who's done what? He's kind of cheated. He's kind of stole. He's now running for his life. He's lost. He's alone. He's a cheater. He has nothing. He's vulnerable. But what does God do? God gives him this dream, this great ramp to heaven, staircase, ladder, whatever the gospel song we used to sing is right. The angels were like manning up and down that will ultimately help him help Jacob reach God.

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Right? That was the story in chapter 28. But here Jesus looks at Nathaniel knowing that Nathaniel knows that story, knowing he's a guy who loves God. And Jesus says, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're telling me that one small thing is big. No, no, no. Jesus says, listen, pause for a minute because I am the one and I am the gate. And I'm not only the lamb, but I'm the gate. I'm not only the gate, I'm the stairs. I'm not only the stairs, I'm the escalator. I am the one that gives the way. And Jesus says this to them and us, and I'm offering you the way. I'm giving you the way, because I am the Messiah. Church, this is the lamb. John the Baptist says, it takes the way, the sins of the world. But the question is this, will we believe and receive? Will we believe and receive? Some of you, you still have a problem with that receive language and that's okay. That's what it takes. It takes a belief that walks out our feet and we begin to say, yes, Lord Jesus, will you come and see. Here's the invitation today. Oh, we're gonna get there quick. Right? Here's the invitation today, <laugh>. They're like, yep. Time's up. <laugh>. Um, the invitation, today's this.

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What is it that you feel like right now that Jesus is saying, Hey, if, if you will, if you will just give it to me, I'll take it and I'll rename you and I'll make you mine, and we will walk into the gates of earth and heaven together. He's the lamb of God.