How Can I Receive Christ?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:04.000 | Whoever has the Son has life.
00:00:08.000 | And whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
00:00:12.000 | That's 1 John 5, 12.
00:00:14.000 | But what exactly does it mean to have the Son of God?
00:00:17.500 | How do we come into possession of Jesus?
00:00:21.000 | And if we don't possess Him, we remain dead in our trespasses and sins.
00:00:25.500 | So this is one of the most important questions in the universe.
00:00:30.000 | The answer was expounded by John Piper in a 1985 sermon.
00:00:33.500 | The following sermon clip is also a rare example of Pastor John drawing out metaphors from a contemporary movie.
00:00:40.000 | A movie titled "A Passage to India" which was released in 1984.
00:00:44.500 | It's a widely celebrated film, nominated for 11 Academy Awards.
00:00:49.000 | So again, what does it mean to have the Son of God?
00:00:53.500 | Here's Pastor John in 1985.
00:00:56.500 | In the film "Passage to India" there was a doctor, an Indian doctor, that is, a doctor who lives in India.
00:01:07.000 | He was arrested by the British colonial powers,
00:01:12.000 | thrown in jail under the alleged claim that he had assaulted a British woman.
00:01:20.000 | The case becomes an extraordinarily tense point of conflict between the people of India,
00:01:30.500 | who want to be free from the British rule, and the British colonial powers,
00:01:36.500 | who were ruling very insensitively over the Indian people.
00:01:43.000 | And the whole colonialist power structure seemed to make the doctor's case utterly hopeless.
00:01:50.000 | In jail, no advocate, no money, and they were going to get his flesh.
00:01:58.500 | However, the most famous and able lawyer in India gets word of this.
00:02:05.000 | He has a reputation for liking to take on the British and for standing up for the Indian underdogs.
00:02:12.500 | And for me, one of the most powerful scenes in that movie was where two friends of the doctor come to him in jail.
00:02:24.500 | He is utterly dejected and frightened.
00:02:28.500 | He has no way out and he is surrounded by wolves.
00:02:33.000 | And their faces are bright.
00:02:35.500 | They have good news.
00:02:37.500 | And they come to him and say that this lawyer is willing to come and try your case and stand in for you.
00:02:49.500 | And his face doesn't lift.
00:02:52.000 | And then they say, "And he won't take a fee!"
00:02:58.500 | And it transforms the man.
00:03:00.500 | Now the doctor has a lawyer.
00:03:04.000 | I say, "He has a lawyer!"
00:03:08.000 | The lawyer's thing will now be done for this doctor.
00:03:12.500 | All his eloquence, all his skill, all his reputation will be funneled in one channel.
00:03:21.000 | Liberate this doctor!
00:03:24.000 | How did the doctor come to have a lawyer?
00:03:29.000 | He was broke.
00:03:31.000 | He was miles away from this lawyer.
00:03:36.000 | They didn't even know each other.
00:03:38.500 | And all of a sudden he can declare to all of his British enemies, "I have a lawyer!"
00:03:44.500 | How did that happen?
00:03:46.500 | Well it started with the motive of the lawyer.
00:03:50.500 | This lawyer is interested in two things.
00:03:54.000 | The liberation of India from the British and the magnification of his skill on behalf of underdogs.
00:04:05.000 | Now I don't know if you remember, I don't know how many of you saw this picture, but another scene that I loved was in the courtroom where there was utter pandemonium.
00:04:15.000 | It was chaos!
00:04:17.000 | And this lawyer was sitting there laid back in his chair utterly composed.
00:04:23.000 | As though to communicate sovereign control over the situation.
00:04:28.500 | What that lawyer wanted to communicate in the little role he played in that movie was,
00:04:35.500 | "I magnify my skill by not accepting pay for my services, because that might compromise my allegiances."
00:04:51.500 | "I'm for the liberation of India, and I'm for the exaltation of my own skill on behalf of underdog patriots."
00:05:00.500 | "I don't give a rip about your money."
00:05:03.500 | And so it is with the Son of God.
00:05:06.500 | How does it come about that you can say, "I have the Son of God"?
00:05:12.000 | Well it starts with the motive of your divine lawyer, an advocate.
00:05:16.000 | He has two things that he's after in this world.
00:05:19.000 | One, the liberation of his people from sin and death.
00:05:23.000 | And the other is the glorification of his power and his skill on behalf of underdog people.
00:05:31.500 | That's the origin of salvation, that's the source of eternal life.
00:05:35.500 | He loves to show that he loves the liberation of his people and the magnification of his skill.
00:05:42.500 | And therefore, his services are not for sale.
00:05:48.500 | You can't buy Jesus.
00:05:53.000 | So how do you come to have the Son of God?
00:05:55.500 | He makes you a free offer, and you accept the offer and trust him.
00:06:02.500 | The doctor trusted the lawyer, and the lawyer was willing to stand in for the doctor.
00:06:08.500 | Of course there are at least three ways you can reject the offer of the lawyer.
00:06:14.000 | He could have done it in the movie, we could do it to Jesus this morning.
00:06:18.000 | You could say, "I can handle this case by myself. I don't need a lawyer."
00:06:24.000 | You could say, "I am a nobody. He's a world-class attorney. He will not come.
00:06:30.000 | There's no point in responding to the telegram. There's no point in putting trust in him.
00:06:34.000 | He ain't gonna come. Why would he bother with me?"
00:06:37.000 | Or you could say, "Sure, I'll trust him. Let him come.
00:06:41.000 | But he better not tell me to do anything stupid in that courtroom because I'm not gonna do it."
00:06:45.000 | There are people here this morning who need to have the Son of God.
00:06:49.000 | And you can have, have the Son of God, if you won't use any of those three escape devices.
00:06:59.000 | So let me just show you why you shouldn't use those three.
00:07:03.000 | Don't say, "I can handle this case by myself. I can handle my life by myself.
00:07:09.000 | I was talking to a man the other day who was dealing with a man who had cancer
00:07:13.000 | and trying to witness to him in the hospital and the man said, "I can handle this by myself."
00:07:17.000 | John Boleyn, 8 o'clock yesterday morning, couldn't handle it.
00:07:21.000 | And when you get there, you won't either.
00:07:24.000 | If you don't have an advocate, if you don't have the Son, it's over.
00:07:30.000 | You'll stay in that jail or go to the gallows, period.
00:07:34.000 | You can't handle life on your own, no matter how strong you feel right now.
00:07:40.000 | You see, that poor guy was innocent and he was about done for.
00:07:44.000 | We're guilty. We are done for.
00:07:47.000 | Our advocate better be a lot better off than the one in the movie
00:07:50.000 | because he's got to pull off a miracle because we are guilty and the judge is just.
00:07:57.000 | Second, don't say to yourself, "I'm a nobody. He'll never come. Why would he bother with me?
00:08:04.000 | I mean, I've committed so many sins. I've failed so many times. He is a world-class God.
00:08:09.000 | There's no reason why he would bother with somebody like me."
00:08:12.000 | Now, the reason you shouldn't say that is not because you're not a nobody,
00:08:16.000 | but because you don't understand grace.
00:08:19.000 | Jesus Christ speaks like this. He says to you, "I don't come to you because you're somebody.
00:08:25.000 | I come to you because I'm somebody and I like to glorify my somebody-ness by helping nobodies like you.
00:08:33.000 | So quit thinking you've got to measure up. The only people I help are nobodies.
00:08:37.000 | If you think you're somebody, you don't qualify.
00:08:40.000 | The good news, people, is the lower you have gone, the better candidate Jesus thinks you are
00:08:48.000 | because he can congratulate himself or magnify himself in the world
00:08:54.000 | by pulling off the most amazing trial upset imaginable.
00:08:59.000 | If you're not very guilty, any lawyer can handle that.
00:09:04.000 | But let's put that one aside. Sure, you're a nobody. That's the point.
00:09:09.000 | And he's ready. And don't say, "Oh, sure, I'll trust him. I'll take the offer. Let him come.
00:09:17.000 | He just better not tell me to do anything stupid in the courtroom because I ain't going to do it."
00:09:21.000 | Brothers and sisters, that is not trust.
00:09:27.000 | You can't keep a lawyer that way.
00:09:30.000 | Maybe one time you could say it to a lawyer. You say it to a stage two times,
00:09:34.000 | "I don't take your advice. I've got a better idea." He'll say, "You get another lawyer."
00:09:39.000 | Brothers and sisters, don't evade the summons to trust by just going halfway and saying,
00:09:47.000 | "Sure, I'll take the bail, but not the advice."
00:09:53.000 | You're not trusting him if you say that.
00:09:56.000 | So I close this morning by simply holding out to you the free offer that comes from this world-class Son of God
00:10:03.000 | who can stand in for you and will stand in for anybody who trusts him.
00:10:08.000 | He who has the Son has life, and you can have the Son if you trust the Son.
00:10:16.000 | Hard to find a better illustration of Christ magnifying himself in the salvation of sinners
00:10:21.000 | and all for their shared joy together.
00:10:25.000 | Great stuff.
00:10:26.000 | This excerpt is taken from John Piper's sermon from June 9, 1985.
00:10:30.000 | It's titled, "He Who Has the Son Has Life," and you can find the entire thing online at DesiringGod.org.
00:10:38.000 | Thanks for listening.
00:10:39.000 | If you haven't done so, get our new episodes as we release them by subscribing to Ask Pastor John
00:10:43.000 | in your favorite podcast app and Spotify, or by subscribing to DG's YouTube channel.
00:10:47.000 | To find all 1,500 of our past episodes or to submit a question of your own,
00:10:51.000 | go online to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn
00:10:56.000 | Well, what is grace?
00:10:59.000 | What is grace?
00:11:02.000 | How do we define it?
00:11:03.000 | It seems like such a simple question, and it's actually got a lot of angles to it,
00:11:08.000 | as we will see next time on Friday.
00:11:10.000 | I'm your host, Tony Garenke.
00:11:11.000 | We will return with Pastor John in the studio next time.
00:11:14.000 | We'll see you then.
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