Derek: 00:28

Welcome back to the Fourth Wave Podcast. This episode is going to be a little bit different than a lot of the other episodes that we've done because this is actually a practice that I was doing for a sermon that I had the privilege of preaching. So it's not even the game day sermon, it's, you know, one of the earlier iterations of it. And it sounds like a sermon as opposed to some of the other styles that I've had on here, whether reading an article or having more of a script. I decided to tack this on to our season on Government as kind of one of the addendum episodes because it fits there, I think more than anybody anywhere else.

Derek: 01:12

And I'm doing it today. I've had it stored up for a while, kind of waiting for the right time to use it. And I'm doing it today because I think it fits perfectly to fall the week after the election here in The States. Now I'm recording this like a month away from the election, so I have no idea what's gonna happen. I don't know if the day is going to go off without a hitch.

Derek: 01:39

I don't know who's going to win. I don't know if we're going to be in the midst of a civil war and nobody's going to even have access to electronics at this point. I have no idea what's going to happen. Nevertheless, I thought that there's never, there's going to be some turmoil in the country and in people's hearts and with growing nationalism across the globe, it just seems like a really good time to talk a little bit about nationalism. Now the sermon that I did here was, I think I did it in the summer of twenty twenty three, yeah summer of twenty twenty three.

Derek: 02:18

So this is over a year old, about a year and a half old and I actually preached this in a Ukrainian church. A bunch of Ukrainian refugees had come down into Romania and our pastor had served in that church for a bit and kind of helped to fill in there. And so I was covering for him while he was out of the country. And so I was able to preach this sermon. Now I was already really nervous when I got ready to preach it because, you know, Ukraine is in the middle of a war that's just tearing them apart and it's a community of refugees that I'm talking to and I get handed this passage in John.

Derek: 03:03

And as I'm going through figuring out, you know, what to draw out of it, what it's saying, what the context is, it's like nationalism was just staring me in the face. And that's really nerve wracking to think about going to a group of people. And it would be hard either way, right? If you were in Russia and you had to go talk to Russians and they're kind of the, you know, more the aggressor, it'd be hard in its own right to talk to them because you can fear repercussions against you. But here, it's kind of a it's a fear for a different reason because you're speaking to a group who's been kicked out of their homes and to argue not to be nationalistic and to put your identity in your nation, I thought, Man, is this going to feel like you're getting kicked while you're down?

Derek: 03:54

And so there was just, there was a lot of trepidation there as I prepared to give this sermon and it made, it was even worse. I don't remember the exact timing, I think it was the like night before, the day before, where yeah, the night before because like that morning I woke up and we were told, Hey, Odessa, which is where the vast majority of the refugees were from, hey Odessa has just been bombed. And Putin had largely been avoiding bombing Odessa. It's a like sentimental place, it's where a lot of the Russians, you know, would vacation and stuff and so for whatever reason, they had avoided touching Odessa too much. And like the night before, they had bombed them and like significantly or one of the most significant up to that point.

Derek: 04:46

And I'm going into this sermon talking about, you know, not being nationalistic and I'm like, Do I go through with this? And so I got some counsel from people and told them what everything was about and they said, Yes, I think this is good to go forward with. So, did and it ended up being a very good thing and it was received very well and it was also like I cried while I was doing it because you are talking to these people and you know, telling them I know that what you are going through is hard but our identity is not in our nation. And so that's the context for this, like one of the toughest public speaking things I ever had to do. Fortunately there was a translator so I had time to kind of get my composure in between, sentences and I changed some things so this is not exactly how it was but it's largely the way that it was presented.

Derek: 05:53

And so in essence what you're going to get here is you're going to get a sermon about nationalism. How Jesus at His time, at the time of Hanukkah and at the time of His nation, where His nation is in history at this point, what all is wrapped up in the identity of nation and where the Jews found their hope and Jesus' response to that. And I think that this will be a something that we all, no matter what country we're a part of, something we all need to remember, but especially if you are here in The States and you are trying to find your identity in a political party or in our nation, you know, some lost ideal, make America great again, or some future hope. Like that isn't where it is, right? It's in the Kingdom of God that we are going to find our hope and this Kingdom is an all inclusive Kingdom.

Derek: 06:54

So, I think that's all the introduction this needs. Hopefully you are able to receive it. In the early nineteen twenties, a number of young healthy women started to come down with a really odd illness. Their teeth would start falling out of their gums, their bones started to break really easily, and they became weak and many of them actually died. Well, it didn't take too long for people to figure out that these women had something in common.

Derek: 07:29

They were all workers in the same industry. They were dial painters of watches. They would paint all of those numbers and and marks on watches and clocks. And recently, they had started to use a new sort of paint, a paint infused with radium which would help the the numbers and the marks to glow at night. And to help them paint those really fine precise numbers, they would actually lick their brushes to make the tips of their brushes, be able to to, precisely paint all of the little marks that they had to paint.

Derek: 08:08

Now, dial painters weren't the only ones experiencing negative effects because since radium was was discovered and started to be used in in around 1898, radium was used in a lot of different things. It was used in medicines, in cosmetics, and even in cocktails. I mean, thought that something so beautiful and so powerful, it had to be good for you. Right? But in the end, they discovered that really when handled without care, radium was a substance that led not to life, but to death.

Derek: 08:45

Now we probably would be ask our asking ourselves, why wouldn't people back then have a caution with something so new? And we're so much smarter than them. Right? But the way that they handled power back then really isn't different than the way that we are handling power today or how we've always handled it. We humans often think we are invincible.

Derek: 09:10

We think that we know how to wield power, believing that we know what is beautiful and what leads to life. But so often, when we rely on our own wisdom and our tendency to judge by outward appearances, we end up producing death and destruction. The path we think leads to life so often leads us to death. Today, I want to talk about a similar power. I want to discuss a power that promises life, but really leads to death when it's mishandled.

Derek: 09:43

It's a power that we see long ago, and a power that we see still today. It's the power of kingdoms, the power of nations. And this power was the Jewish hope that we're gonna take a look at here in John chapter 10. They believed that having their own earthly kingdom and their own land, just like they did in the Old Testament, was the ultimate source of power, meaning, and life, the mark of God's salvation. Because of this vision of life that the Jewish people had, they were constantly in revolt.

Derek: 10:22

But in reality, clinging to their Jewishness and to their view of a militaristic nationalistic Messiah as their hope, it was more like licking radium from a paintbrush. It was actually leading them to destruction and death. Today, I want to explore this false promise of life that actually leads to death and contrast it with the true life that Jesus came to give us. First, let's look at the life which leads to death. The substance or idea which promises to give us life, but actually tends to bring destruction.

Derek: 10:59

In verse 22 of John 10, John starts to give us some seemingly unimportant details or at least details that might be hard for us to to really figure out why they're important. So first of all, John tells us that this is the time of the festival of dedication. And if you haven't heard of that before, you may have heard of Hanukkah, which is just another name for this. And Hanukkah just celebrates the the victory of these two brothers, the Maccabees brothers, who led the Jewish nation against the oppressors of Greece, Syria, and they conquered them. They defeated them.

Derek: 11:38

They kicked them out, and they regained their temple and dedicated their temple again, which is why it's called the Festival of Dedication. And the Maccabees brothers were celebrated with palm branches reminiscent of what we see in in Jesus' triumphal entry. And the the Jews were so happy at this victory that in the book of Maccabees, they actually have this this prayer to God. And they they say that we never again want to be handed over to the blasphemous and the barbarous nations. So Hanukkah was was a joyous time of celebration of the Jewish nation, national victory, and for the temple, and for the freedom of the Jews.

Derek: 12:26

So that's that's a really emotional time. Right? And a really joyous time. But at this time in Jewish history when when Jesus comes on the scene, it's actually also a really tragic time. Because when the Jews are celebrating Hanukkah in Jesus' day, they are now under a new oppressor.

Derek: 12:46

They're under the oppression of Rome. And so not only was Hanukkah at this point a celebration of past victory, but it was also a a petition to God of a current hope for a Messiah who would come and and bring life back to the Jewish nation. More than any other time of the year, this was a time of the year when the Jewish nation was longing to be free again. So it's no surprise then that at this time of the year, the Jews really wanted to know about the Messiah. And this is when the Jews gathered around Jesus.

Derek: 13:25

And some some of your translations would actually use the word, they surrounded Jesus, because the word is is kind of a a powerful one. If you look at a lot of its usages throughout the Septuagint and then in the New Testament, it's a lot of times used in a powerful way, often of, like, armies circling and surrounding a city to attack it, or also you can see it in Jonah when the water engulfs Jonah, it just comes around him. It's it's all encompassing. It's a very powerful word. So these Jews come and they they surround Jesus, and they ask Him a question.

Derek: 14:04

They say, How long will you keep us in suspense? Are you the Messiah? And that's that's a powerful question in and of itself, but if you take a look, it it's actually also a Greek idiom. And this idiom literally translates to something like, how long will you take away our life? Or how long will you take away our soul, our being?

Derek: 14:29

That's powerful. The Jews were desiring freedom, national freedom. They wanted a Maccabean Messiah. And so they said, tell us Jesus, are you the Messiah who will deliver us from these Gentile oppressors? Are you the one who will give us the life of the nation back?

Derek: 14:48

Powerful stuff. But John gives us one more detail that might seem unimportant, but I think kind of helps to to fill out the picture here. He tells us that this is happening on Solomon's Porch. Now, Solomon's Porch was a part of the temple, but it was a part that was right off of the the Court Of The Gentiles. And so it was a place where everybody could come, unclean, women, Gentiles, Jews.

Derek: 15:17

Like, everybody could be there. So it was it was a very inclusive place. So to kind of put put all of these things together, it's a really emotional season of joy, but also longing and hope for future victory for the Messiah. There were probably a mixture of people groups standing around as the Jews surround Jesus, and they ask Him, Will you conquer our enemies and give us our life? And by life, the Jews meant nation, military, vengeance against enemies, power, freedom, all of these types of things were encompassed in in that idea.

Derek: 16:01

But this vision of life to destroy others, enemies, it wasn't what Jesus came to give. And not only did this false vision of life seek to destroy others, it ended up destroying the Jewish people from within. This type of life that they thought they were handling was actually something that led to corruption and death. And we we know that it eventually led them to crucify Jesus as we'll talk about in just a minute, and it also led to the destruction of the temple in seventy AD and the dispersal of the Jewish nation. Nationalism, freedom, power, all of those things, they promise life and fulfillment and comfort.

Derek: 16:50

These substances animate the actions of of many towards what they think is life, But these things, when they become ultimate goals, are really false hopes that lead to death and destruction. We're willing to sacrifice anything to that which we make a God, to that which we view as as something ultimate. And the Jewish leaders were even willing to sacrifice the Messiah himself to their vision. We think that our formula for life will bring us peace and comfort, but really, when we do this kind of thing, we're just painting with radium. While the Jews were focused on a vision of life that would actually lead to destruction and death, Jesus came to give true life, a life that wasn't built on hatred and vengeance and exclusion.

Derek: 17:38

Do you remember the question that the Jews asked Jesus, how long will you take away our life? How long will you keep us in suspense? Well, Jesus' response to that question in verse 28 is really, really fascinating because he actually answers both of the questions, the literal question, but also what the question means. Right? Let listen to what Jesus says.

Derek: 18:02

Talking about his sheep, Jesus says, I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. So think about this. Jesus is saying, no one will take them from me. Right?

Derek: 18:21

I give them eternal life. He answers both of those questions. He says, I am the Messiah who came to bring life, and nobody takes that life away. That's profound and that's good news. Right?

Derek: 18:37

The Jews should have been really happy. The Messiah has finally come and He is bringing life to His people. But the Jewish leaders run into a problem here because they realize that Jesus' definition of life really conflicts with their definition. Jesus' definition did not mean ethnicity and nation in the way that the Jewish identity meant. Because back in verse 16, Jesus said, I have other sheep that are not of the sheep pen.

Derek: 19:06

I must bring them in also. Jesus' plan as the Messiah was not to fulfill Israel's vision of liberation from Roman occupation, or the establishment of a Jewish state, or the protection of the temple. Jesus didn't come to fulfill these good but secondary visions of life. He didn't come to establish an earthly kingdom, but rather a heavenly one, a kingdom composed of every tribe, tongue, and nation. But the Jews could not put down that false vision of life.

Derek: 19:41

To them, that kind of preaching sounded like death. I mean, you remember what the Maccabean brothers had said was the worst thing that could happen, To be taken again by blasphemous and barbarous nations? Well, Jesus is telling the Jews that some of those from the oppressing group, the Gentiles, are to be included in the sheep pen. Well, Jesus knew the power of identity. He understood that it was really difficult for a lot of the Jews to to put down this kind of thinking.

Derek: 20:16

And such a thing is powerful then and it's still powerful today. I mean, you all know this force all too well because this type of national pride and desire to obtain power has caused so much pain for you as Putin and many of the Russian people have allowed their faulty vision of life to destroy your peace. While we may identify more with the Jews in in this story, with the group being occupied by an invading army, the group being wronged, it's important to see that the hearts of the religious leaders in this story weren't much different than the hearts of the oppressors, if different at all. Because only a chapter later, we see that they used their power against Jesus as well when his vision of life conflicted with theirs. I want you to listen to John eleven forty seven because the the this is right when the Pharisees are are meeting together after Jesus has raised Lazarus from the dead.

Derek: 21:18

His greatest miracle, His greatest sign, amazing, right? A resurrection of somebody from the dead. That should have been a catalyst for people to believe in Jesus, but it's actually what made them seek to make sure that He died. Why? How does that make sense?

Derek: 21:35

Listen to John eleven forty seven. Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. What are we accomplishing? They asked. Here is the man performing many signs.

Derek: 21:47

If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation. Then one of them named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year spoke up. You know nothing at all. You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish. This response to Jesus is almost exactly the prayer that the Jews had been echoing for two hundred years since the Maccabean revolt.

Derek: 22:16

Let the Jews not be handed over to the blasphemous and barbarous nations. And such a sentiment was especially stirred up at at Hanukkah. I mean, the Jews were occupied. They were taxed. There was great injustice.

Derek: 22:31

All that they had left was the temple and this idea that they were clinging on to of the Jewish nation. And God forbid that they lose those two things, that they lose their temple and their nation. But how did they not see at least Jesus' works as life? How can they see it? I mean, they saw that He healed the unclean.

Derek: 22:56

They saw that he gave hope to the poor and the outcast. They saw that he called in the foreigner and the gentile. They saw that Jesus' words and works were life. But in seeing all of those things, they were blind because it wasn't what they wanted to see. They didn't see a national identity that Jesus came to give them, and so to save that vision that they had, Jesus had to die.

Derek: 23:24

Now, it's really easy to judge the religious leaders at this point, right? But at the same time, when you look at Jesus' words, they're really hard, aren't they? Two weeks ago, we discussed allegiance. Jesus says that we have to forsake our families, ourselves, and all things. And that all things includes our national identities and our our ultimate allegiance to our nations because our ultimate allegiance is to Jesus.

Derek: 23:53

Who can believe this always? And how how is such a thing how does that provide us any hope at all? It seems hopeless. Yeah. Just where we find the words of Jesus are heavy, we have to always recognize the likeness of his burden.

Derek: 24:10

Jesus may call us to forsake our blood relatives, those 10 to 20 people that we might think of as our close families. But what does Jesus do? He multiplies our families exponentially because he declares that whoever does the will of my father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. All the people of God are our family. We can forsake our families because Jesus gives us them back, plus so much more.

Derek: 24:39

And Jesus may all also call us to put aside our our nation, our focus on our nation, that tiny little sheep pen. But that's only because Jesus has something so much bigger for us. He calls us to lay aside our hopes in earthly kingdoms, but when we give our allegiance solely to the King of Kings, our hope is no longer tied to a piece of land, to power, to armies, or to vengeance. Our hope is instead tied to something which can never be reduced, never taken away to the finished work of Jesus. We are in the sands always.

Derek: 25:18

Nobody can ever take us away from him. Today, we have the opportunity to choose to embrace a life that really isn't any life at all, but actually leads to death, or we can embrace what seems like death, but leads to true everlasting life. My challenge to us is that we would trust Jesus' words that He is true life and that no one can snatch that life away. If we are his sheep, we are secure in him. I want you to choose to live unto true life and to demonstrate that true life to others.

Derek: 25:59

Most of the world right now is walking around dipping their paintbrushes into a radium infused paint, and they're using that to color the canvas of their lives. They think that the beauty which comes in the power of a substance that only reveals itself when the lights are turned off, when it glows faintly in the pitch blackness of night, they think that's life, that's power. But Jesus is the light of the world. He doesn't merely shine dimly in the dark, rather he drives the darkness away. Where Jesus is, there is no need for substances that mimic the power of light, especially substances whose mimicry is fueled by the power of death.

Derek: 26:43

For as John says, in Him was life and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. This is your hope, Christian. Not that you might one day have life, but that it is guaranteed to you now if you would only listen to your savior's voice and trust Him for life. No matter where you are, not only is is this your hope, it's also your call.

Derek: 27:15

For you, Christian, are also the light of the world, and you are called to let that light shine before others. So as you leave today, embrace the light of life and let your light so shine.