John Message #26, “The Day of the Lord”, Ed Miller, Sept. 11, 2024

Listen to the audio above while following along in the transcript below which is also available for download at www.biblestudyministriesinc.com

As we prepare to look in the word, there’s a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable.  Other principles are helpful, but this one you can’t live without, and that is total reliance on God’s Holy Spirit.  He’s the One that gave us the Bible and He is the One who must open our eyes to understand it.

I want to share this verse, two verses, Psalm 119:18&19, “Open my eyes that I may behold wonderful things from Thy Law.  I’m a stranger on the earth; do not hide Thy commandments from me.”  This Bible contains wonderful things.  We need our eyes opened, and only the Lord can open our eyes.  We’re going to be looking in the word, but only God can reveal God.  No person can.  Only the Lord can reveal Himself.  I may even use this passage to open next week’s study because we’re going to look at chapter nine, the healing of the man born blind, “Open my eyes.”  With that in mind, let’s just bow before the Lord…

Heavenly Father, we thank You that You’ve privileged us to gather again in Your name, trusting Your indwelling Holy Spirit to point out eyes to Christ.  So, we commit our little session unto You and thank You that You’re going to guide us because Jesus deserves it, and we claim it in His all-prevailing name.  Amen.

Okay, welcome back again to our Bethany.  We call this Bethany because that’s the one place in the Bible where Jesus was fully accepted, and we thank the Lord that He is fully accepted in this place.  So, we just call this Bethany.  I pray that you had a good summer and are refreshed with your physical family and your spiritual family.  For my Lillian and I we had a very, very busy summer.  We got to enjoy a part of our family we don’t see very often, and so we were very thankful for that.  Several times during the summer we were reminded how dependent we are upon the Lord for everything, and for every breath we’re dependent on Him.  The Lord didn’t disappoint us; He was faithful, and He is always faithful.  Psalm 37:3, “Dwell in the land and feed on His faithfulness.”  Only the margin says, “feed on His faithfulness.”  But that’s the original.  If you have the Riall Bible, that also has the New American Standard, but he has different cross references, so it’s not in the Riall.

Anyway, our family has been enlarged since we saw you last through marriage, and through new babies, and new acquaintances with God’s people, so we met some new Christians.  It’s just getting more and more wonderful.  One of our family members this summer has gone to be with the Lord, and so we’ve had wonderful experience, and the Lord has been unchangeably the same, faithful, faithful, faithful, but I’m glad, I’m happy that He’s graced us to be back; we missed you.  I’m happy that the Lord has arranged it again.

Let me attempt to pick up where we left off last time.  As far as our study goes, we’re in lesson #26 of the gospel of John.  Some that are here for the first time might say, “Lesson twenty-six; I’m going to be lost.  I need to get all that background.”  No, you don’t.  Every teaching stands on its own two feet, and the reason is it’s because we are presenting a Person, the Lord Jesus, and so if you came in today for the first time, we’re praying that you’ll see the Lord Jesus, and that will be true not only today but in every lesson.

I want to review just the prevailing message of the entire book of John, and then one little section, and we’ll get into our new material.  The prevailing message of the book of John, he didn’t leave us to guess, and he didn’t leave us to wonder.  He told us why he wrote the book, and that’s in chapter 20:31, “These have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name.”  What a wonderful book, because he tells you three reasons he wrote; #1 so you would know the Lord, #2 so you would trust the Lord, and #3 so you would enjoy the Lord.  What a book, to know Him, to trust Him and to enjoy Him!

I want to give one verse for each of those great truths.  John 17:3, “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”  So, knowing the Lord is paramount; it’s everything.  Paul was thirty years in Christ, and his prayer was, “That I may know Him.”  You’ll never stop knowing the Lord, and I’ll never stop knowing the Lord.  Psalm 62:8, “Trust in Him at all times, oh people; pour out your heart before Him.”  Not sometime, not pretty nearly all the time, but trust in the Lord at all time.  Then Psalm 87, the last part of verse 7, “All my springs of joy are in You.”  He’s the source of joy.  There are many expressions of joy: fellowshipping with Christians, family, and many expressions of joy.  But there’s only one source, and that source is the Lord Himself.  So, that’s why we have this gospel, to know the Lord intimately, to trust Him thoroughly and to enjoy Him constantly.  That’s what this study is about, and every time you attend, that’s what every study is about—to know the Lord, to trust the Lord and to enjoy the Lord.

Where did we leave off in June when we broke for the summer?  We were in John 8, and we’ll invite you back there with your device or your Bible, or whatever you look at, or just follow along in the verses.  We’ve come to the heart of chapter eight.  There are two big sections in John 8.  The first twelve verses is the story about the woman that was taken in adultery, and that ended with the religious leaders wanting to stone her to death.  Then from verse 13 all the way to the end, all the way to verse 59, is the section, and it ends with the Jews wanting to stone Jesus.  John 8:59, “They picked up stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple.  In other words, the chapter begins, they wanted to stone the woman, and the chapter ends, they want to stone the Lord Jesus, and both, of course, fail.

Let me show you up front how I want to meditate today on John 8.  We finished the first twelve verses, the woman taken in adultery.  Now, the rest of the chapter, chapter 8:12-59, notice please verse 20, “These words He spoke in the treasury as He taught in the temple.”  The woman taken in adultery was in the outer court, and this is a different time, and this is a different occasion, and this is a different audience.  The remainder of this chapter, the Holy Spirit focuses on two things, growing opposition against the Lord Jesus, and why they hated Him like they did.  So, we’re going to look at those two things, the growing opposition and why they hated Him, but there will be things, of course, in between.  From John’s viewpoint, that overt opposition, as you go through John, it really starts in chapter 5.  They began to go against Him because He healed on the Sabbath Day and they thought that was irreligious, and He shouldn’t do that.  Then the opposition grows until now, in the end of chapter 8, they want to stone Him to death.  Once again, verse 59, “Therefore, they picked up stones to throw at Him, but Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple.”  You have to admit, if somebody is going to throw stones at you, they’re opposed.  That’s opposition. 

By way of review, let me read these machine gun style, the verses that show how the opposition started in chapter 5, and then it grew and grew and grew.  John 5:16, “For this reason the Jews were persecuting Jesus because He was doing these things on the Sabbath Day.”  John 7:32, “The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering about Him, and the chief priests and the Pharisees sent officers to seize Him.”  John 7:44, “Some of them wanted to seize Him but no one laid hands on them.”  John 8:20, “These words He spoke in the treasury as He taught in the temple.  No one seized Him because His hour had not yet come.”  And then, of course, in John 5:59, they pick up stones to stone Him. 

It’s clear that Jesus was very much opposed, and John 8 focuses on that.  Before I tell you why He was opposed, let me call attention to who opposed Him.  He was opposed in verse 3, and we read, “The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery.”  So, we know the scribes and the Pharisees, the religious leaders were opposing Him.  In John 7:32 it also mentions the chief priests.  So, the religious leaders opposed Him. 

Then there was another group, verse 22, “So, the Jews were saying, ‘Surely, He’ll not kill Himself, will He, since He says, “Where I am going you cannot come.”’”  Those who followed the religious leaders were called the Jews, and they opposed Him.  But there is another group, and that’s what I want to focus on.  There’s a third group that opposed Him, not only the religious leaders, not only the followers of the religious leaders, but another group, and it’s a surprise.  You wouldn’t expect this group to oppose the Lord.  You’d expect them not to oppose the Lord.  Listen to John 8:30, “And as He spoke these things, many came to believe in Him.”  Then in verse 31, “So, Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed in Him…” from this point on to the end of the chapter, He’s talking to believers; they came to believe in Him, and He addressed those who had believed in Him.

I want to take you through several expressions to the end of the chapter to show you how He describes those believers.  John 8:32, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”  John 8:34, “And Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you that everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.’”  He had told them that the truth would set them free, and they just thought, on the level of earth, “We’ve never been in bondage.  What are you talking about?”  John 8:34 says, “I’m talking about the bondage of sin, and that’s what I want, and it’s not some abstract truth,” but later He says, “If the Son shall set you free, you’ll be free.”  It’s not abstract truth; it’s the Son.  Verse 37, He says, “You are seeking to kill Me because My word has no place in you.”  Well, if you were just reading that, you would think, “That’s the religious leaders.”  These are believers that are seeking to kill Him.  He’s talking to believers; He’s talking to those who had come to believe in Him, and the Holy Spirit focuses on that, and He says, “These people are slaves to sin.  These believers want to kill Me.”  That’s a strange thing, in my thinking, to say to believers that they are slaves to sin and they want to kill Jesus and they have no place for the word of God.  Listen to verse 42, “And Jesus said to them, ‘If God were your Father, you would love Me.’”  He’s suggesting that God is not their Father, and that they don’t love Him, and yet He said that they were believers.  He’s talking to believers; He made a big point of it.  He introduced it and said, “These are believers.”  Verse 44, “You are of your Father, the devil.”  Would you say that to a believer in Christ?  I don’t think I would, and yet we read this.  He’s talking to believers, He’s addressing them, and He’s saying these things about them.  Verse 47, “He who is of God hears the words of God.  For this reason, you do not hear them.  You are not of God.”  What a thing to say to believers, “You are slaves of sin.” You are related in the flesh to Abraham, but you are trying to kill Jesus. “God is not your Father.  You have no relationship with Him as Father.  The word has no place in you.  You are like the children of the devil, and you are doing the things that the devil does.  You are not of God.”  They are believers.  What does that mean?

And there’s more, verse 49, “Jesus answered, ‘I do not have a demon.  I honor My Father.  You dishonor Me.’”  Believers shouldn’t dishonor the Lord.  Verse 55, “You have not come to know Him.  I know Him, and if I say that I do not know Him, I’d be a liar, like you.”  If He was talking to the religious Pharisees, I would understand that, but He’s talking to believers, and He calls them liars.  “I don’t want to be a liar, a hypocrite like you.”  And then, finally, of course, you come to the end and it’s the believers that picked up the stones and wanted to stone Him.  So, clearly since they’re called believers, and it’s definitely stated in verse 31 that He was addressing them, the Holy Spirit wants us to focus on that and think about that.  Those descriptions don’t appear to be the descriptions of somebody who has just come to believe in the Lord, “You are slaves of sin, you are murderers, the word of God has not place in you, God is not your Father, and the devil is your father, you are not of God, you’ve dishonored Me, you don’t love Jesus, you’re a bunch of liars, you want to kill Me.”  They said, “You have a demon.”  That’s what they said about Jesus.

Earlier, Jesus warned them, verse 21 & 24, “He said to them, ‘I go away, and you will seek Me.  You will die in your sins.  Where I’m going you cannot come.’”  You will die in your sins was spoken to believers.  Alright, so now I’m going to try, to attempt to give some suggestions as to why God puts this in chapter 8, and why does He tell us about these believers that were acting like that?

Let me give three possibilities, and I incline to the last one, but all three are possible.  The first could be that He’s putting this in to warn us that not everyone that says, “I believe,” is a real believer, and not all belief leads to heaven.  There are some that say they believe, but they don’t really believe, and they’re hypocrites.  Everyone remembers James 2:19 that says, “You believe there is one God.  You do well; the devils also believe and tremble.”  There’s a belief that the devils had that’s not leading to heaven.  The devils are not going to heaven; they’re going to hell.  So, John 8 might be there just to warn, just because someone says that they’re believers, they may not be. 

I’m going to take one little aside.  What is it to really believe?  What is saving faith?  Is it a decision that we make for Jesus?  Some would say, “When you make your decision for Jesus, then you believe.”  We’re getting close to election day, and we’re going to choose a president and we’re going to choose a vice-president; we’re going to vote.  When I was a young Christian they called me “the walking track-rack”, and that was because I always had tracks in my pocket.  Every time I went to a restaurant I would hand them out.  Every time I saw someone of the street, no matter where I was, I’d be handing out tracks.  One of the tracks I had at that time that was my favorite was called “election”, and I would hand out my election track.  When you turned the first page it says, “God has cast His vote for you.”  When you turned the next page it says, “Satan has cast his vote against you.”  And when you turned the next page it says, “You have the deciding vote.”  The whole idea there was that salvation is a decision and it depends on your vote, and if you don’t vote the right way, then you are not going to be saved.  In other words, salvation in some way depends on what we do.  I think that’s a little scary.  I don’t teach that anymore.

There’s a warning here and we know that’s true to scripture.  The New Testament gives us plenty of warning.  2 Corinthians 13:5, “Test yourself, see if you are in the faith, examine yourselves, or do you not recognize this about yourself, that Jesus Christ is in you, unless indeed you fail the test.”  So, it might be there to warn us about the wrong kind of faith, maybe some decision we make or just because we line up with some system of theology.  Some people have the idea that you have to have the right teaching, orthodoxy is over against heresy.  You’ve got to be on this side, orthodox.  It’s not orthodox verses heresy; it’s the revelation of God verses human thinking, human wisdom, and that’s what it is.  I like to say it this way, salvation is a revelation and not a decision.  Saving faith comes from the Lord.  Paul gave his testimony so beautifully, Galatians 1:15&16, “When God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb, called me through His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the gentiles.”  That’s true of you if you know the Lord.  He’s been watching over you since you were born, and then one day He called you by His grace, and then He revealed His Son, and now it’s your privilege to manifest Him.  So, that’s my first suggestion.  Jesus calls these people believers because He’s giving us a warning.

There’s another possibility, and that is that Jesus may have seen something with His eyes, since He can see the heart, that we can’t see with our eyes.  We would look with these eyes and say, “They are unbelievers.”  He might look a little bit deeper, not a little bit deeper; He might look at the heart.  He made a comment in verse John 8:28, “And Jesus said, ‘When you lift up the Son of Man,’” that’s the cross, “’then you will know that I am He.’”  Maybe He saw the day that they would get saved.  He said that to Peter, you know, in John 1:42, “Peter, you are right now the son of John, you are Cephas, but you are going to be a rock.  I know what you look like now, but you are going to be…  You are, and you shall be.”  Maybe the Holy Spirit is describing that they’re being prepared, and maybe we don’t read that, but maybe Jesus saw that they would one day be true believers.  We know in Acts 6:7, it says, “The word of God kept on spreading, and the number of disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many priests were becoming obedient to the faith.”  After Calvary, after the cross, after Pentecost, many turned to the Lord, and maybe Jesus saw that in advance.

But let me give you a third possibility.  I think because it touches my own life so much that I incline to this but I’m not going to be dogmatic.  Did you notice that the first thing that Jesus said?  There’s a verse that says, “These are believers.”  What is the next thing that He said right after He said that?  John 8:31, “And Jesus was saying to those Jews who believed in Him, ‘If you continue,’” the American Standard of 1901 gives us the Greek, “If you abide in My word, you are truly My disciples.”  As soon as He said they were believers, He talked about abiding.  How soon after a person receives Christ or Christ reveals Himself, how soon should we begin telling them the message of abiding, abiding in Christ as the branch abides in the vine to produce fruit?  Are they ready for the message, as soon as they get saved?

Can a person, spiritually speaking, be delivered from Egypt and go right into Canaan without going through the wilderness.  I went through the wilderness for a long time, more than seven years.  Can a person just get saved and then enter into fullness?  I think they can, and I’ve known a couple that have done that, and it’s very wonderful.  What was the next word after “abide”? Verses 32-36, “’You’ll know the truth and the truth will make you free.’ And they answered Him, ‘We’re Abraham’s descendants; we’ve never been enslaved to anyone.  How is it that you say you’ll become free?’  And Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly I say to you everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.  If the Son makes you free you will be free indeed.’”  How soon after a person becomes a believer should they be given the message that Christ can deliver you from the indwelling corruption in your heart, and you can have victory over sin?  How soon do you give them the message of the exchanged life?

Then we continue in verse 37, “Know that you are Abraham’s descendants, yet you seek to kill Me because My word has no place in you.  I speak the things which I’ve seen from My Father.”  How soon after a person gets saved do you tell them about abiding and about victory over indwelling corruption?  How soon do you tell them, “You’ve got to hear from God; you’ve got to hear from the Lord Himself?”  And then in verse 42&43, “If you are of God, if God were your Father you would love Me.  I proceeded forth and have come forth from God.  I’ve not come on My own initiative; He sent Me.”  How soon do we tell them that it’s all about relationship with the Lord, and it’s about loving Jesus?  How soon do they get that message?

Let me give two more.  Verse 46, “Which of you convicts Me of sin?”  How soon before we tell them about a holy life?  They are newly saved.  How soon do we tell them?  And then finally in verse 50, “I do not seek My glory.”  How soon do you tell a person that they have to live, whether they eat or drink or whatever they do, for the glory of God?  I’m going to give you the words, and I want you to think of the Christian life.  To these new Christians Jesus presented that you need to abide, you need to have victory, you need to be taught of God, you need to have a loving relationship with Jesus, you need to express His character and His holiness, and you need to live to His glory.  That’s the Christian life; that’s the exchanged life.  As soon as He called them believers, He touched on all of those great realities of what it means to be a Christian.

Why do I bring this up?  It’s because as far as my experience with the Lord is concerned, I came to the Lord in 1958, and that’s a lot of years ago.   The first seven years of my Christian life, plus there were other years where I was learning gradually, but for seven years I knew nothing about abiding in Christ.  I knew nothing about victory over sin.  I knew nothing about living in a relationship with God and knowing and loving the Lord.  I knew nothing about hearing from God and having the Holy Spirit reveal His word.  I knew nothing about holiness.  I knew nothing about living to the glory of God.  Do you know what makes that so bad?  I was a pastor; I pastored a church.  I was like these believers, and I didn’t know those things. 

It’s not that I didn’t teach anything.  I taught a lot of stuff.  I had a course on soul winning, how to win souls.  I taught about separation, “Don’t go here, don’t go there, don’t read that, don’t associate with this person, you need to get this out of your life, stop smoking, stop drinking,” and all of that stuff. I taught that.  I taught about, “You need to surrender, you need dedication, you need rededication, you need to be committed to the Lord.”  I taught doctrine, I taught theology, especially end times.  I think I told you, if you had come into my living room in those days, we didn’t have wallpaper.  We had my chart.  My chart went all around the room, and it told the whole thing, how it began from eternity past and all the events that are going to come and all of the verses.  I had it all drawn out.  It’s not that I didn’t teach anything.  I taught those things.  I taught ministry, I taught the importance of missions, I was a counselor, and I taught about Bible memory and how to have devotions and how to study and how to pray and how to fast.  I taught about the gifts of the Spirit and the fruit of the Spirit.  I just didn’t talk about Jesus because I didn’t know.  I didn’t know about abiding in Christ and having victory over sin, and having a relationship of love with Him, and hearing from the Lord.  That was strange to me; I never heard that, manifesting His life and holiness and living the exchanged life, living for His glory.  As a pastor, those poor people.  God was so gracious and so faithful.  I hope He protected them from all of the stuff.  It’s good stuff, but it’s not the Lord, and it’s not the Christian life.

Now when we get into John 8, we see that God describes that.  My third pastorate, I did that three times, He describes that as opposition to Christ.  Can you imagine teaching those things as being opposed?  Matthew 12:30, “He who is not with Me is against Me.  He who does not gather with Me, scatters.”  It’s not that I just missed the message; I substituted the message of Christ, and I sent them on their way knowing and learning and being able to do this and do that and carry this and carry that, and yet the truth of abiding in the Lord and how to have victory over sin and how to hear from God from heaven and understand, I was a stranger to that.

Now John 8 is an extreme example.  I think I opposed the Lord.  I didn’t pick up stones to stone Him.  I don’t think I hated Him, but by preaching a message that was not Christ, I was opposing the Lord, and maybe that’s why He talks about, “They are believers.”  Maybe He’s just warning us, “Don’t have the wrong kind of faith.  They are believers.”  Maybe He saw in their hearts what they would be.  They are believers, and maybe they were uninstructed in the great realities of the Christian life.  I wanted to call attention to that because I thought it was very curious that the Holy Spirit would mention that these people are believers, and then describe it that way.

I want to move to the end of John 8, verse 58, Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am.”  When we closed in June we discussed the “I am”, and so I don’t want to go over that again, but I want to call attention, that was clearly the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back, that’s when they picked up stones.  I want to make one more comment about “I am”, and then I want to give the end of the chapter to show how He brings everything to a climax and answers the question, “Why do people oppose Jesus?” 

John 8:56 He says, “Your Father rejoiced to see My day.  He saw it and was glad.”  I’m going to attempt to explain what did Jesus have in mind when He said, “Abraham saw My day.”  But first, let me make this comment about “I am”.  Notice He didn’t say, “Before Abraham was born, I was born.”  He didn’t say that.  He said, “Before Abraham was born I am.”  He’s not saying, “Abraham lived two thousand years ago; I’m older than Abraham.  Before Abraham was born, I’m older than Abraham.”  He’s not talking about priority of existence.  When Jesus said, “Before Abraham was born, I am,” He didn’t say, “Before Abraham was born, I was born.”  There’s a time when Abraham was not; before he was born he was not.  There was a time when I was not.  Before I was born, I wasn’t.  There was a time when you were not.  There was never a time when Jesus was not.  He is everlastingly the Lord, and He’s not saying, “I’m older than Abraham.”  This is the eternity of His existence, and that’s why they picked up stones to stone Him.  They thought that was blasphemy, “Who is this calling Himself God?  He can’t be God.  We know He can’t be God.  We know His mother, and we know His father, and He worked in a carpenter shop.  He’s our neighbor.  He can’t be God.”  When He said, “Before Abraham was, I am,” oh, they hated it, because they said, “There is only one God, and He doesn’t have a Son.  He’s just God.”  So, they were religiously going against Him.  They understood it, but for them to hear Jesus claim to be God Almighty, the first and last, the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, the present tense God who always was and who always is, that’s what got them.

Hold that a moment, and once again, verse 56-59.  I’m just going to focus on verse 56, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; he saw it and was glad.”  What did our Lord Jesus have in mind when He said, “Abraham saw My day,”?  What is “the day” that Abraham saw?  According to the Bible record, Abraham lived 175 years.  So, the question is, “Was there some event in that 175 years where Abraham said, ‘Oh, I see it!  That’s the day of Christ!’”  What did Jesus have in mind when He said, “Abraham saw His day and rejoiced?”

Commentators try to answer that by going through Abraham’s life and say, “That’s when he saw His day.”  Another one says, “No, no, no; that’s when he saw His day.”  Another one goes to another event, and they comb through the record and they say, “That was what Jesus had in mind.”  I’m not going to develop each one, but I’m going to give you the five most common things commentators say, “That’s His day.”  I’ll just very briefly mention each one.  Some go to the first mention of Abraham, and the first mention is not in Genesis.  The first mention of Abraham is in the book of Acts.  Acts 7:2, “And he said, ‘Hear me, brethren, fathers, the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, when he was in Ur of the Chaldees.”  They say that’s the day of Christ, the first time God appeared to Abraham.  According to Hebrews 11:9&10, that turned him into a pilgrim.  As soon as he saw that, he lived as an alien in a foreign land, a land of promise. So, that’s when he saw the day of Christ.  He never owned anything on the earth.  He did own one thing.  He owned a grave.  That’s the only thing this world has to offer us is a grave.  That’s the only thing this pilgrim ever owned.  They say, “That’s the day of Christ.”

Another commentor, then, would say, “No, that’s not really what it was.  Genesis 18:1 at the Oaks of Mamre, “Now, the Lord appeared to him by the Oaks of Mamre while he was sitting at the tent door in the heat of the day.”  This has to do with the time he got the promise about Isaac, “You are going to have a son.”  He mentions it other times but he spells it out at the Oaks of Mamre.  The promised child would be supernaturally born, according to Genesis 11:30, “Sarah was barren; she had no child.”  She couldn’t have children.  Then in verse Genesis 18:11, “Abraham and Sarah were old and advanced in age; Sarah was past child bearing.”  She not only was barren, but now she’s too old.  So, it’s going to be a miracle birth.  So, they say, “Oh, that might be the day of Christ, because He’s going to have a miracle birth.”  Genesis 12:3, “I’ll bless those who bless you.  The one who curses you I will curse in you,” and that’s talking about the seed, all the families of the earth will be blessed.  Who is the seed?  Abraham’s child that’s going to bring a blessing to every family on earth.  Galatians 3:16, “The promises were spoken to Abraham and his seed.”  He does not say to “seeds” referring to many, but rather to one, “to your seed”, and that is Christ.  So, they say that’s the day of Christ, that supernatural birth of Isaac, and that Isaac was the seed, one of the sons was Jacob, and it was Isaac picturing Christ.  So, we can see why commentators say, “It happened in Macedonia when he first got the glorious revelation.”  “No, no, no, it was by the oaks of Mamre.”  Some would say, “Do you know where he saw the day of Christ?  It was Mt. Moriah.  That’s when he took his son to sacrifice him, and that was all a picture of redemption, the loving father giving his only son, the son being willing to die, coming back in resurrection; that was the time that he saw the day of Christ.”

Well, was it Macedonia, was it the Oaks of Mamre, was it on Mt. Moriah?  Some say, “No, no, it’s Genesis 14 when he saw Melchizedek, the priest, because the war was over; he had just delivered from Sodom, that great war was over, and what was after the war?  The priesthood, and Calvary was the great war, and the war is over, and now he’s a priest; that’s when they saw the day of Christ.”  That was the Valley of Sheva where that took place, or the Valley of the Kings, and there are finally commentators that say, “No, that wasn’t it.  What was the day of Christ?  The answer is Genesis 24 when Isaac, picturing Christ, received all the wealth of his father, and he got him a bride, and Elimelech picturing the Holy Spirit, brought him a bride.  That’s the day of Christ.

Which is it?  Was it there at Ur at the Chaldees, was it by the Oaks of Mamre, was it Mt. Moriah, was it the Valley of the Kings, was it Beer-lahai-roi where Isaac got his bride? When I study the Bible, I study the life of Abraham.  There are so many events, twenty-four events.  I’ll study event one, and I’ll see Jesus.  I’ll study event 2, and I can see Jesus.  Event 3, I see Jesus.  If I can study Abraham’s life and see Jesus, couldn’t he live his life and see Jesus?  I don’t think it was one event.  I think Abraham saw the day of the Lord; he saw Christ all his life from that first revelation on.

You know, this is not the only time we read about the day of the Lord.  That expression, day of the Lord, is in Isaiah, it’s in Ezekiel, it’s in Joel, it’s in Amos, it’s in Obadiah, it’s in Zephaniah, it’s in Zachariah, it’s in Malachi, and it’s in the New Testament, in 2 Corinthians 1:14, “the day of the Lord Jesus.”  It’s in the book of Corinthians, it’s in Philippians, it’s in 2 Timothy.  Usually, it’s the end times, the millennium when Jesus comes to reign.  Sometimes it’s next to the end, including the tribulation period.  Some include the rapture.  It’s the rapture and the tribulation and the end times.  Sometimes it’s positive, and sometimes it’s negative, judgment, “Beware, the day of the Lord is coming.”  So, that expression, and Abraham had a foretaste of the day of the Lord.  What I’m suggesting is that all of Abraham’s life…  We say, “Can’t wait until the millennium when Jesus reigns as King,” He’s reigning now.  “Can’t wait until the millennium until Satan is bound.”  In my life he’s bound now.  “Can’t wait until the millennium until the word of God covers the earth like the waters cover the sea.”  That’s true now.  Some say, “Are you pre-mil?”  I’m pre-pre-mil.  I believe in the millennium, but I also believe I can experience it now. 

I think Abraham was experiencing the day of Christ all his life.  Now remember, Abraham was not an angel.  He saw God reigning, He was ruling the good and over-ruling the evil, and he was over-ruling Abraham’s blunders when he lied about his wife and when he took Hagar into the tent and at the wrong time he sent the bond woman and her son away.  He saw God reigning, and as he thought of his life, as I look at my life, man I messed up so bad.  You guys don’t know the half of it.  My Lillian knows, and she better shut up!  She knows, but the Lord has reigned.  The Lord is in control, and I look at my life like Abraham and I see the day of Christ, and I rejoice, like Abraham rejoiced.  That’s what brings on the opposition.  When God brings you to the place where you see Christ in control, ruling the good and over-ruling the evil, that it’s not up to you, and it doesn’t depend on you, and Christ is preeminent in your life….

I want to go one more step and then we’re done.  I’m going to show you how John 8 presents the Lord Jesus because that’s someone that lives in your heart, and that’s the One that they hate.  How he presents the Lord Jesus, that’s the One that lives in my heart, and that’s the One that they hate.  I’m just going to run through these verses.  John 8:12, He claims to be the light of the world.  In verse 16, He said that He was representing God the Father.  In John 8:23, “You are from below; I am from above; you are of this world; I am not of this world.”  John 8:26, He claimed He only said what He heard from the Father.  John 8:46, He claims He lived a perfect life, a holy life.  John 8:29, “I always please Him.”  John 8:28, “I initiate nothing.”  John 8:54, “I seek His glory.”  He lives in you as the light of the world, the One that’s sent by God, who is not of this world, who speaks only God’s word, who lives a holy life, who always pleases Him, who doesn’t initiate anything, who seeks His glory, and that’s when He followed it up with, “I am what I am, and I’ll never stop being that.  I’m unchangeably that.” 

In Galatians 4:29, “At that time he who was born according to the flesh persecuted Him who was born according to the Spirit,” so it is now and nothing has changed.  People don’t hate you for being a Christian.  They hate Jesus who lives in you.  You claim to have the message.  You have the light of the world.  They don’t want to hear that.  You’re out there saying, “The Lord sent me.”  They don’t want to hear that.  You say, “I’m not from this world.  You’re from this world but I’m from above.”  You’re weird and you’re peculiar, and they don’t want to hear that.  They don’t want to hear you say that you have victory over sin, and you only live to please the Lord, and everything is redemptive in your life.  They don’t want to hear that because they hate the One that lives in your heart.

I’ll close with this.  Jesus called these people in verse 39, “Jesus answered and said, ‘If you are Abraham’s children, do the deeds of Abraham.’”  The Bible says that if we’re of faith, we’re children of Abraham.  If you are a child of Abraham, do what Abraham did.  What did Abraham do?  He saw the day of Christ and he rejoiced.  Do what Abraham did; you are his child, and I’m his child, and Abraham saw the day of Christ and he rejoiced, and because of that, don’t think you are not going to be opposed.  Sadly, to go back to my own testimony, don’t think you’re not going to be opposed by believers.  You are going to be opposed by those who claim to be trusting the Lord.  They’re going to try to get you in another direction than just to know the Lord and abide in the Lord, and have victory in the Lord and walk with the Lord and trust the Lord and enjoy the Lord.  That’s why you’re saved and that’s why I’m saved.  May God help us do the works of Abraham, and see the day of Christ and rejoice in the day of Christ!  Let’s pray together.

Father, thank You for John 8, not what we think what it might mean, but everything You know that it means.  Will you please work that in our hearts?  We thank You, Lord, that we can trust You to do this.  Turn our eyes in a fresh, living way to the Lord Jesus again this morning.  We ask in Jesus’ name.  Amen.