Do you Really believe in God?
Please turn in your Bibles to John chapter 20 as we look at why John wrote this Gospel, which is vital for us to know, to understand and apply to our lives. As you are turning their listen to what C. S. Lewis has said:
You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death. It is easy to say you believe a rope to be strong as long as you are merely using it to cord a box. But suppose you had to hang by that rope over a precipice. Wouldn’t you then first discover how much you really trusted it?
- C. S. Lewis, A Grief Observed
I am not sure where some of you are at, what you believe and how that belief is played out in your life, but it is important not only to know the truth, believe the truth, but we must also apply it to our lives. We need to let His love not only flow into our lives but through us to touch the lives of others. So with that said let’s begin reading in John chapter 20, starting in verse 30 and see what the Lord has for us.
JOHN 20:30-31
John focused his Gospel message on seven miracles that Jesus did and seven “I AM” statements that Jesus made to show people that Jesus is God and that if you would surrender your life to Him as Lord and Savior; it will bring you into that abundant and eternal life.
For some, they just laugh at the idea of someone dying for their sins, they think it is foolish and they think the Word of God, the Bible is inaccurate, that it contains all kinds of errors, that it was written by man to get man to act a certain way but the reality is, there is no God, at least in their mind! I totally disagree and tragically, people have come to this conclusion without searching this out for themselves.
First of all, for those who believe you must turn your brain off to become a Christian, I think it is the opposite; you must turn your brain off so you don’t have to see the evidence that is before you, and you must suppress the truth not to believe. Christianity is an intelligent faith for Jesus said in Matthew 22:37, “. . . ‘You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’” Notice, with our mind, we are to think these things out not turn off our brain! Also, Paul tells us “Test all things; hold fast what is good.” I Thessalonians 5:21. To put something to the test to see if it is good, to see if it is right means you must use the brain that God has given you! Don’t just believe with blind faith, test them, and see if they are true!
Historian E. M. Blaiklock said this:
I claim to be a historian. My approach to classics is historical. And I tell you that the evidence for the life, death, and the resurrection of Christ is better authenticated than most of the facts of ancient history, which I taught for forty-two years as a university teacher with some confidence. I said that Christ was quite different from anyone I had ever seen. And as a figure of history, Christ is precisely that. Four small books of simple Greek, called the gospels, picture a person who was not the product of His times, but remote from human conception or expectation – so remote that His own men never fully understood Him, until an astounding event transformed them, enlightened them, and so launched them on the world that the dozen of them infiltrated the Roman Empire in a generation. Their successors beat the Empire to its knees in three centuries.
Here are the alternatives. Either four men, only one of them with any education in the liberal sense of the word, invented the Character who altered the whole course of history, or they wrote of One they knew or had heard about from those who knew Him, a person so extraordinary that He could claim deity, sinlessness, all authority, and rouse no revulsion among those who long knew Him intimately. . . The religious leaders, collaborators with the occupying power so feared Him that they betrayed and murdered Him, and in so doing . . . loosed forces which swept the world.
- E. M. Blaiklock, Why I am Still a Christian, p. 16
Peter tells us in II Peter 1:16-18, “For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’ And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain.” You see, our faith is an intelligent faith, not a blind faith. Even today, in the twenty-first century we can investigate the claims of the Bible and see that they are true! The question is “Do you believe?”
Now some would argue that over the years things have been added or taken away from the Bible, which has caused many errors and deviations from the truth so what we have today is far from what was originally written! Again, I totally disagree! The Bible has survived for over 4,000 years for some parts and close to 2,000 years for the New Testament very well!
I am not going to expound a lot on this, but let me say this; any variations in the Bible do not change the text, the doctrine, the meaning that is being spoken. We have some 25,000 manuscripts of the New Testament in Greek today and from that there are some 200,000 variations, which seem like a lot, but when you think about it, it is not! Remember, the meaning of the text does not change. Let me give you an example of what I mean. In Matthew 17:10 some manuscripts read “the disciples” while others read “His disciples.” Thus, every time this difference occurs it is a variation. If a word is misspelled in 1,000 manuscripts, that is 1,000 variations! I think you get the idea.
Isaiah 40:7-8 tells us, “The grass withers, the flower fades, Because the breath of the LORD blows upon it; Surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, But the word of our God stands forever.” How true that is as skeptics have come and gone but the Bible still remains. H. L. Hastings put it this way:
Infidels for eighteen hundred years have been refuting and overthrowing this book, and yet it stands today as solid as a rock. Its circulation increases, and it is more loved and cherished and read today than ever before. Infidels with all their assaults, make about as much impression on this book as a man with a tack hammer would on the Pyramids of Egypt. When the French monarch proposed the persecution of the Christians in his dominion, and old statesmen and warrior said to him, “Sire, the Church of God is an anvil that has worn out many hammers.” So the hammers of infidels have been pecking away at this book for ages, but the hammers are worn out, and the anvil still endures. If this book had not been the book of God, men would have destroyed it long ago. Emperors and popes, kings and priests, princes and rulers have all tried their hand at it; they die and the book still lives.
- H. L. Hastings, The Greatest Book in the World, pp. 17-18
Thus, what we have in our hands, the Bible, the Word of God is not only accurate but it has survived all the assaults that have been made against it and the men who have made them have long since departed! Understand that no other religious book has been held under such scrutiny and has stayed the test of time other than the Bible! The question is, “Do you believe?”
Now the central theme of the Bible is Jesus, of course. In Psalm 40:7 we read, “Then I said, ‘Behold, I come; In the scroll of the book it is written of me.’” And in John 5:39-40 Jesus said to the religious leaders, “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me. But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.” Thus, from Genesis through Revelation we see the story of fallen man, which only takes a page or two in Genesis to occur and the rest of the Scriptures deal with God’s redemption of man, God becoming flesh, dwelling among us, and paying in full the penalty for our sins on the cross of Calvary and rising from the dead the third day.
It is His resurrection that separates Jesus from all other religious leaders; past, present and future ones and because He conquered death, so too will we if we surrender our life to Him. Paul, in I Corinthians 15:20-22 said, “But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.” This is a glorious promise to each of us!
Let me give you a couple of verses to show you what I mean, that it is all about Jesus and His finished work, not ours. First, in John 8:24 Jesus said, “Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am [He], you will die in your sins.” Notice, if you don’t believe that He is God, that GREAT I AM, then you will die in your sins. It was not that Jesus was a great teacher, a good person, a righteous man, but He is God incarnate!
Secondly, in John 14:6 Jesus said “. . . ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’” You see, there is no other way, it is only through Jesus that we can enter into that abundant life. It is His message, His life that can transform ours into a new creation and no other book can lead you to the power to live the kind of life that God wants you to live except the Bible as it reveals to us Jesus and gives us the power through the Holy Spirit!
I like the way that Carnegie Simpson speaks of the uniqueness of Jesus. He said:
Instinctively we do not class Him with others. When one reads His name in a list beginning with Confucius and ending with Goethe we feel it is an offense less against orthodoxy than against decency. Jesus is not one of the group of the world’s great. Talk about Alexander the Great and Charles the Great and Napoleon the Great if you will . . . Jesus is apart. He is not the Great; He is the Only. He is simply Jesus. Nothing could add to that . . . He is beyond our analyses. He confounds our canons of human nature. He . . . awes our spirits.
- Quoted by John Stott, Basic Christianity, p. 36
When Jesus said in John 3:16-21, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.” do you believe that?
All you have to do is come to Him, repent of your sins, ask Him to forgive you and to be Lord and Savior of your life and He will! That is why John wrote this Gospel, that you would believe, but let me say this, it does not end there. You see, if we truly believe these things, then why don’t we apply them to our lives? Are you living what you believe? If Jesus is real to you, if He has impacted your life, then that should be seen in not only what you say, but how you live your life. If your life ended tomorrow, what would people remember of you? Be honest! Would you be remembered for how many hours you put in at work, for your job, your honesty, your ability to play sports or how you lived your life? You see, I believe even after we are gone we leave a legacy behind and that can be either good or bad!
Must if not all of you have heard of the space shuttle Columbia’s disaster on February 1, 2003 at about 8 AM CST, only some 16 minutes from their touchdown in Florida. It was a horrific site to see as Columbia exploded upon re-entry and what a sad ending to the lives of those seven astronauts.
As tragic as this is, at least two of those seven astronauts were devoted Christians who spoke openly about their faith. Rick Husband who was the mission commander for Columbia and Michael Anderson who was the payload commander for Columbia both attended the same church, Grace Community Church in suburban Houston, Texas.
President George Bush, just hours after these tragic events took place, said this to the grieving families, this grieving nation and this grieving world:
My fellow Americans, this day has brought terrible news and great sadness to our country. At 9:00 AM this morning, Mission Control in Houston lost contact with our Space Shuttle Columbia. A short time later, debris was seen falling from the skies above Texas. The Columbia is lost; there are no survivors.
On board was a crew of seven: Colonel Rick Husband; Lt. Colonel Michael Anderson; Commander Laurel Clark; Captain David Brown; Commander William McCool; Dr. Kalpana Chawla; and IIan Ramon, a Colonel in the Israeli Air Force. These men and women assumed great risk in the service to all humanity.
In an age when space flight has come to seem almost routine, it is easy to overlook the dangers of travel by rocket, and the difficulties of navigating the fierce outer atmosphere of the Earth. These astronauts knew the dangers, and they faced them willingly, knowing they had a high and noble purpose in life. Because of their courage and daring and idealism, we will miss them all the more.
All Americans today are thinking, as well, of the families of these men and women who have been given this sudden shock and grief. You’re not alone. Our entire nation grieves with you. And those you loved will always have the respect and gratitude of this country.
The cause in which they died will continue. Mankind is led into the darkness beyond our world by the inspiration of discovery and the longing to understand. Our journey into space will go on.
In the skies today we saw destruction and tragedy. Yet farther than we can see there is comfort and hope. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, “Lift your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created all these? He who brings out the starry hosts one by one and calls them each by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.” [Isaiah 40:26].
The same Creator who names the stars also knows the names of the seven souls we mourn today. The crew of the shuttle Columbia did not return safely to Earth; yet we can pray that all are safely home.
May God bless the grieving families, and may God continue to bless America.
- President George Bush, February 1, 2003
What we have here are words of comfort and hope from our President from the Scriptures. Now prior to the launch, just prior to their quarantine for this mission, their church prayed for these men and their mission and Michael Anderson said this: “I’m asking you to pray for us that, above and beyond the purpose of the mission, God will use our faith, our belief, our testimony for Him in ways that we don’t know.” Guess what? God is doing that now!
Rick Husband, the commander of the shuttle Columbia, said this at his church before the start of this mission:
“And I got to thinking about it and I thought, well, if I ended up at the end of my life having been an astronaut but having sacrificed my family along the way, or living my life in a way that didn’t glorify God, then I would look back on it with great regret, and having become an astronaut would not really have mattered all that much. And I finally came to realize that what really meant the most to me was to try and live my life the way God wanted me to, and to try and be a good husband to Evelyn and to be a good father to my children, and to do everything that I possibly could to make sure that they knew who Jesus was, and that they had every opportunity to make a choice themselves for Jesus.”
“And it was like a light came on all of a sudden, where I finally realized that this thing about being an astronaut was not as important as, as I though it was. And finally came to the point where I said, ‘OK, Lord. I don’t care what I go do, or where You send me; I just want to try and do those things, I just want to be somebody who lives a life that glorifies You. I want to be a good husband, I want to be a good father, and come what may – as far as the rest of it goes.’”
He surrendered his life to God and what a great thing to do. What was most important to these men? Jesus was the most important thing in their life and as their pastor, the Reverend Steve Riggle said: “And I believe that in their death, Rick and Mike – their story, their testimony, their faith will probably do more for the kingdom than if they had continued living.” Only God knows that, but I will say this, He has a plan, a purpose and out of tragedy will come good! Their life is not over, they just moved, they are with the Lord but their faith, their testimony lives on!
Their pastor said that after this tragedy, that following Sunday, the church was full of people, reporters from around the nation and more than 200 people requested more information in regards to the Gospel message. As Riggle came back into the church sanctuary that Sunday morning he saw two women waiting to talk with him. They explained to him that they had worked with Rick Husband at NASA and that he often invited them to church but they always declined. Then, finally, on February 2nd they accepted Husband’s invitation, they came to church because of what transpired the day before, and they responded to the Gospel presentation!
As Rick Husband committed his life to the Lord, He tells us of some of the struggles he went through, how he lied on the physical by wearing contacts and because of it, he was rejected even though he did pass the physical. He said:
. . . Over the next three years, I read the Bible, studied more and learned about God and how He wants me to live my life. I discovered Psalm 37:4 which says, “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart” (NIV).
I felt that God was asking me, “What are the desires of your heart?”
And immediately I thought, “Well, I want to be an astronaut.”
But as I listened more to God, He seemed to say, “No, really. What are the real desires of your heart?”
I started to think about it more. I came to realize what was more important than being an astronaut – my relationship with God and living my life as a godly man, as a godly husband and as godly father. I wanted my wife and me to do everything possible to teach our kids about Jesus and to bring them to the point that they would accept Jesus as their Savior.
When it came time for me to fill out the application for the fourth time, I felt the strongest prompting from God to tell the truth. In studying the Bible more, I had come across Proverbs 3:5-6 that says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight” (NIV).
It was as if God was saying, “Just trust me! You lied last time and didn’t make it. Try telling the truth this time and see what happens.” Finally, I had come to the point where I understood what it meant to give my life to God and to trust Him. I said, “OK, Lord. I want to do what You want me to do, and it doesn’t matter if I’m an astronaut or something else.”
I filled out the application truthfully, came to Houston and interviewed. I passed the physical and was hired to be an astronaut.
God says that we can trust Him, and we can.
- Decision, March 2003, pp. 24-25
What is the focus of your life? What are you leaving behind as a testimony of your faith in Jesus? These men left a powerful witness behind that continues to affect people even after their death, after they went to be with their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!
You see, what you believe will be manifested in your life! If you truly trust in the Lord, you will hold onto Him, and if you don’t, you will let go! Paul tells us in Hebrews 12:1-4, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.” Keep your eyes focused on Jesus and to do that you need to be walking with Him, in fellowship with Him. If you do that, you will leave a blessing behind; someone will be touched by your faith!
It is as C. H. Spurgeon said:
I would recommend you either believe God up to the hilt, or else not to believe at all. Believe this book of God, every letter of it, or else reject it. There is no logical standing place between the two. Be satisfied with nothing less than a faith that swims in the deeps of divine revelation; a faith that paddles about the edge of the water is poor faith at best. It is little better than a dry-land faith, and is not good for much.
- C. H. Spurgeon
For Rick Husband and Michael Anderson, they were sold out to the Lord and that should be our hearts desire. In a document that Husband had to sign before going on this mission, in case something happened to him, he left these words on the bottom of the page, on the bottom of this document:
“Tell them about Jesus. He means everything to me.”
Folk’s that is what I am telling you, Jesus means everything to me and I pray He means everything to you. He loves you more than you will ever know, thus, won’t you live for Him, impact your family, your friends, your co-workers for Jesus and when it is time to go, that you may leave behind a powerful testimony of your faith.
Let me leave you with these words from a man whose life was coming to an end, and he fought the good fight, he finished the race and he is admonishing us to do the same. Paul said in II Timothy 4:6-8, “For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved His appearing.”
I pray this that you do believe and your belief leads to godly living, a testimony of Jesus to others! The question is, “Do you believe?”