Becoming Like Jesus

By Pastor Samuel Chess

Grace Emmanuel Church

Port St. Lucie, Florida

 

In Search of a Creator

Introduction: We have been looking at snapshots of Jesus life and trying to see what about his character we have been called to absorb as children of God. I’ve so been anxious to talk about this particular snapshot, although you will be hard pressed until the very end of the sermon to see anything about the snapshot

I. In the beginning…In Search of a Creator

Here is the way the Bible begins..

(Genesis 1:1-3) In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. (NIV)

Pastor, if we are looking at snapshots of Jesus life; why take us clear back to creation? If you want to study the life of Jesus you have to start where the life of Jesus starts…… in the New Testament. That’s why it’s called New Testament because the old Testament is pre-Jesus, pre-Savior, pre-salvation and the New Testament is where the good stuff starts and Jesus, and salvation, and grace, and forgiveness arrive. The only problem with that type of theology is that it is hopelessly wrong. Let me explain why starting at creation itself….

Let’s look again at this first passage and see how the person of God is represented. It says: (Genesis 1:1-3) In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said……

Let’s list what aspects of God’s person we see in this passage:

1) God- Elohim- Generic plural form of God- Always refers to God the Father

2) Spirit of God- Holy Spirit hovering over the waters

So we have more than one God? Nooo.. They all said in unison…one God three distinct personalities: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

When we look at this story of creation we see the Father and the Holy Spirit involved in the process of creation and we say , aw shucks… too bad, for the sake of this series, Jesus wasn’t involved in the creation process too….

 

Are you sure he isn’t??? Look more closely at the Genesis passage…

 

(Genesis 1:1-3) In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said……

 

Gen 1:1- In the beginning God created…..and God said

John 1:1- In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

John is giving us some amazing new insight. Jesus didn’t start with the New Testament

He’s been around since at least the beginning….. In fact a little later on he would go on to record the exact words of Jesus when he said:

(John 8:58) "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!"

All those Old Testament examples when a visitor from heaven showed up like the fourth person in the fiery furnace with the three Hebrew children and the visitor to Abraham to announce the coming of a new nation. Turns out those select visits weren’t angels at all but were actually visits from the pre-incarnate Christ. Before Jesus was born onto this earth he wasn’t in a divine cocoon somewhere incubating until his arrival on earth. He was very active in the development of the world…we call his special appearances to men and women in the Old Testament, “theophanies”…visits from Jesus to this earth before he came as a baby.

Not only was he involved in the affairs of this earth but just how involved he was might actually surprise some of you…. John calls him:

The WORD…. the LOGOS- the Divine Expression

Every time in the Bible you hear God express himself in self revelation or divine truth for humanity that very expression is all wrapped up in the essence of who Jesus is.

Jesus isn’t just a proclaimer of the Word of God- Jesus is the Word of God!

The WORD isn’t just a set of sentences that carry some meaning, the WORD itself is throbbing with life. Every time a prophet in the Old Testament spoke the WORD of the Lord he was literally conveying the very essence of Christ himself to the people. The WORD of God carries inside itself such power that it has the ability to create life where there was nothing before. When God said… John says that those words were literally the very power and presence of Jesus himself.

You say, Pastor your getting a whole lot of mileage out of one word, perhaps you are stretching this thing a little too far.

 

John 1:4a) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life…..

How much did the WORD create?_____________________ all things

How much was created apart from his power?________ nothing

What did he make it all out of?____________ ex-nihilo

Where did the raw materials for creation come from? from within himself

(2 Peter 3:5-6) But they deliberately forget that long ago by God's word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. (NIV)

What/who is God’s word through whom the heaven exist and the earth is formed out of water?__________________________

(Hebrews 11:1-3) Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

What/Who is God’s command so that what is seen was made out of what was invisible? ___________________________

 

Example:

(Genesis 1:14-15) And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth." And it was so.

Let me read you some exerts from a song by Carman: 93 million miles from the blistering surface of the sun hangs the planet earth, a rotating sphere perfectly suspended in the center of the universe, the ultimate creation of an infinite mind.

The size, position, and angle of the earth is a scientific phenomenon to see. A few degrees closer to the sun we’d disintegrate, a few degrees further we’d freeze. The axis of the earth is tilted at a perfect 23 degrees. This allows equal global distribution to the suns rays making it possible for the food chain to exist.

Let’s go on with this approach: The combination of nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere happens to be the exact mix that life needs to prosper, it doesn’t happen on any other planet that way. If there is a design there is a designer, if there is a plan, there’s a planner, if there is a miracle, there is a God!

Did you know the moon controls the tides, it’s the maid that cleans the oceans, even the waves don’t crash onto the shore in vain. It simply boggles the mind to think that the stars will rotate with such exact precision that the atomic clock with an error factor of less than three seconds per 1000 years is set by the way they move. Though they silently orbit, the sun, the moon, the stars are like silent evangelists above who circle the earth every 24 hours shouting in every language that there is a God!

It is God who creates… and God who is worthy of a thunderous ovation of praise!!!!!!!!!

II. After the beginning… In Search of a Sustainer

The Apostle Paul said:

(Colossians 1:15-16) He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him.

All things were created by him

In heaven….On earth

Anything with energy or power get it’s source from him

All things were created by him….. Agent of Creation

All things were created for him….. Goal of Creation

All things continue to exist because of him…. Sustainer of Creation

(Colossians 1:17)He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

(Hebrews 1:3) The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.

Illustration: On our trip to Alaska we ate lots and lots of Salmon. Dr. Joe Stoll talked to us about salmon, born in the heads of little tributaries in the inland passage of Alaska where we were. The fight there way to the ocean where they face something they are not made for…..salt water. The instinctively spend a week in the brackish water and their system slowly acclimates to the salt. They head out into the Atlantic and make their way to the Hawaiian Islands. Salmon tagged in that part of Alaska always end up, as a group in the shallows water off one of the islands of Hawaii. In the fall they make their way back to Alaska, spend a week acclimating again to fresh water, work their way back up through impossible currents and obstacles and end up exactly, in the very tributary where their life started guided by some divine “G.P.S.” system.

What is the guidance system of a Salmon or a dog dropped off miles from home, who tells the bear how and when to hibernate, who guides the weather patterns, who controls the tides and the rotation of the earth. By what powerful force are all these things held in perfect rhythm?

“in him all things hold together.”

“ The Son… sustaining all things by his powerful word.”

Illustration: I remember studying chemistry in college and my instructor was a PhD in chemistry who was a Christian and I remember studying the anatomy of the atom with its nucleus surrounded by electrons and we looked at the positive and negative charges within the cell and studied what happened when we split and atom. But I remember us reaching a certain point where it didn’t make sense what was keeping an atom from flying apart other than during an atomic reaction. We ask her what the glue was that held it all together and she said, no one, in science knows. We have a theological advantage over the best atomic scientist…… “in him all things hold together.”

If that’s true, the atheist who shakes his fist in God’s face and declares he doesn’t exist is only able to clench his fist into a ball because of the sustaining power of the very one he says doesn’t exist.

As we were praying, in the Friday morning prayer time (that is open to all) it occurred to me again how easy it was to get distracted from the one who’s very presence literally holds the cells in our brain together; How easy it is to use our bodies to commit sinful acts while the one we are committing the sinful acts against is the glue that holds us together so we can sin against him; How easy it is to feel like we are the “masters of our fate, the captains of our soul” when the molecules of the air we breathe and the cells of the lungs we use to breath them are gracious gifts from the creator and sustainer of all life!

 

III. The Word became Nothing

Let’s go back to the Gospel of John one more time and I will show you a great mystery…

 

(John 1:1-14) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it…… The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him……. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (NIV)

Can you imagine being the one our of whom came all of created matter. You literally were the one in whom was life, the very power of being resided in you. You spoke everything into existence from out of your existence. You spoke life, your life into the plants and you created ever more complex species of animals with an ever increasing likeness to your inner essence. Then as the capstone of all creation you made the ultimate creature in your very image and then you poured your love out on that creation.

Your creation, mankind, rejected your love, and arrogantly thought that the life and inner essence you had breathed into them was their own doing and they used the sustaining power you had invested in their bodies to commit sin , and more sin, and more and greater sin until they were completely sold out to rebellion against what you, their creator had asked of them.

You the creator of all matter. Every molecule in the universe had some of yourself in it and your ongoing presence was the very glue that kept every electron spinning around its nucleus and you knew the only way to redeem mankind was to empty out all of yourself, all of the power of being that you had invested in the whole universe, after emptying, and emptying, and empting, and emptying finally with nothing of yourself left, you crawl into a single human cell and begin the journey of splitting cell until you are an embryo, and finally a fetus, and then a baby and a toddler and an adolescent, and a teen, and finally a man who would then carry all the distortions of his creation, all the mangling of his perfection that he had invested, all the misuse of his sustaining power and pay the price for all the wrongs as if they were his own….All so that he could take this destruction of his perfect creation and recreated his very essence into those who would embrace his gift.

“Kenosis”- changes Jesus went through to become man…

(Philippians 2:6-11) Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.