Son of Light
Gospel of John

This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe.
John 1:7

God of Revelation

• The revelation of the Gospel of John by the characters introduced by the Holy Spirit.
  
  • John the Baptist
    
  • Mary as mother at the wedding
    
  • Nicodemus
    
  • Samaritan woman
    
  • the royal official
    
  • the paralytic at Bethesda
    
• Revealing the Divine perspective
• The four-fold revelation of God’s moral nature is continually revealed to us.
  
  • First in general revelation
    
  • Second in special revelation
    
• His general revelation to all humanity is expressed in Romans 1:17-20
  
  • Through creation
    
  • By our conscious, our moral center of right and wrong

Four Fold Revelation of the Moral Nature of God
Ezekial 1:10

• Matthew – Messiah King
  
  • He comes to rule and reign
    
  • Lion – Sovereignty
    
• Mark – Jehovah's Servant
  
  • He comes to serve and suffer
    
  • Ox – Humility
    
• Luke – Son of Man
  
  • He comes to share and sympathize
    
  • Man – Humanity
    
• John – Son of God
  
  • He comes to reveal and redeem
    
  • Eagle – Deity

Can I Get A Witness?

• John the Baptist {1st by name}
  
  • The original name is nearly lost:
    
    • In the Greek and in the Latin (Johannes)
      
    • Almost totally so in the English (John)
      
• The original name is Yehochanan
  
  • A name compounded of Yehovah chanan
    
  • The grace or mercy of Jehovah
    
• A most proper and significant name for the forerunner of the God of all grace.
• John the Baptist {2nd by calling}
  
  • It was John’s business to proclaim the Gospel of the grace of God
    
  • He was to point out that Lamb or sacrifice of God which takes away the sin of the world.
    
  • He was a prophet from a priestly family
    
• His message was of repentance
  
  • He announced the coming of the Messiah
    
  • He was privileged to baptized Jesus
    
• He was the last Old Testament prophet
  
• He was the first New Testament martyr, and was beheaded by Herod Antipas

Absence

Actually, sir, evil does not exist. Evil is simply the absence of God. Evil is a term developed to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. It isn't like truth, or love which exist as virtues, like heat or light. Evil is simply the state where God is not present, like cold without heat, or darkness without light.

The Revelation of Light

• John 1:7 “This man came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe.”
  
• John the Baptist – a witness to the light!

That They May Be One
Jesus’ Priestly Prayer ~ John 17:20-21

The Breathe of God
Ezekiel 37:1-6
God doesn’t breathe on anything that isn’t connected.

God’s Moral Character

• Nothing is accomplished outside of God’s design and character.
  
• Relationships flow from the moral character of God
  
• God doesn’t breathe on anything that isn’t connected.

Relationships flow from the Moral Character of God

• Genesis 1:26 “Let us make man on our image”
  
• The mystery of the Trinity is revealed in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
  
  • Three persons in One essence.
    
  • Perfect unity and order.
    
  • Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear Oh Israel, the Lord our God is One.”
    
• This perfect relationship is heaven’s core.

God’s Moral Character

• The enemy always moves in opposition to heaven – to divide
  
  • The Lord removed the disorder
    
• In God’s presence, only the principle of One is allowed to operate

How wonderful it is, how pleasant, when brothers live together in harmony!
For harmony is as precious as the fragrant anointing oil that was poured over Aaron's head, that ran down his beard and onto the border of his robe.
Harmony is as refreshing as the dew from Mount Hermon that falls on the mountains of Zion.
And the Lord has pronounced his blessing,
even life forevermore.
Psalm 133 NLT

The trumpeters and singers performed together in unison to praise and give thanks to the Lord. Accompanied by trumpets, cymbals, and other instruments, they raised their voices and praised the Lord with these words:"He is so good! His faithful love endures forever!" At that moment a cloud filled the Temple of the Lord. The priests could not continue their work because the glorious presence of the Lord filled the Temple of God. II Chronicles 5:13-14 NLT

On the day of Pentecost, seven weeks after Jesus' resurrection, the believers were meeting together in one place. Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm in the skies above them, and it filled the house where they were meeting. Then, what looked like flames or tongues of fire appeared and settled on each of them. And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages, as the Holy Spirit gave them this ability. Acts 2:1-4 NLT

Community – Reflected in:

• Unity of God – Genesis 1:26 – Triune God
  
• Unity with God – redemption & reconciliation
  
• Unity in Marriage – Set in divine order and flowing in grace & understanding
  
• Social Unity – Family Unity – ditto
  
• Unity ultimately in the church
  
• Christian Community is a covenantal experience in a consumeristic world.
  
• We must aim a connecting in a meaningful way

Reflecting God’s Character In Marriage

• Communication Building Blocks
  
  • Pray together regularly
    
  • Talk together
    
  • Get away together for a weekend or a vacation.
    
  • Make definite plans to spend well-used time together.

I am praying not only for these disciples but also for all who will ever believe in me because of their testimony. My prayer for all of them is that they will be one, just as you and I are one, Father—that just as you are in me and I am in you, so they will be in us, and the world will believe you sent me. John 17:20-21 NLT

I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. Ephesians 4:1-6 NKJ

“Blest Be The Tie That Binds”

Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love;
The fellowship of kindred minds
Is like to that above.

Before our Father’s throne
We pour our ardent prayers;
Our fears, our hopes, our aims, are one,
Our comforts and our cares.

We share our mutual woes,
Our mutual burdens bear;
And often for each other flows
The sympathizing tear.

When we asunder part,
It gives us inward pain;
But we shall still
be joined in heart,
And hope to meet again.

10th Anniversary
Celebrating God's Faithfulness

History Pictures

Vision Statement

The Next 10 Years?
“Fruit That Remains” ~ John 15

Attitude & Assignment

• Live like this is the day of Jesus return but plan and work as if we have another hundred years! (Build for low tide!)
  
• I Corinthians 4:1 “Let a man so consider us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God.”
  
  • We are going to continue to grow in serving, the greatest call in the Kingdom of God.
    
  • We will continue to pursue the revelations of God and the transformation of HIS Word.
• Matthew 6:33 – Be about the Father’s business –the King and His Kingdom
  
• The good life – Micah 6:8
  
  • Our way, our walk with the King
    
  • Matthew 5:16 “Let your light so shine before men that they will see you good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

The Churches Greatest Challenges

• Romans 12:2 NLT
  
  • “Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect his will really is.”
• Challenge
  
  • An increased and ongoing influence of the world’s pressure on believers and the church to be pressed into its mold.
    
  • The resulting influence of this worldly pressure is resulting in the exclusion of the church from her influence in the world.
• In John 15:19 Jesus said, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.”
  
  • The church is moving dangerously toward becoming an insignificant sub-culture that is “of the world, but not in it.”
• There is a significant rise of the influence and disproportional dependence on government, “the state.”
  
  • First, this is a national problem
    
  • Second, this problem is increasingly growing into a global problem.
• The result:
  
  • A greater resistance to the gospel
    
  • An increase in dependence on the government for all needs will grow exponentially
    
  • The nations morals will continue to be defined by radical evolutionists deductions which are of an antichrist spirit

I have told thee, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of thee, but to do justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God.
Micah 6:8

LivinLife On Purpose
From Denial to Peniel

Intentional Christianity

• Be Intentional – The choices we make determine the substance of our life.
  
• Living intentionally is to:
  
  • take action deliberately or intended.
    
  • live life with a plan in mind, a life of meaning.
    
  • to stretch toward a thing in order to fulfill a larger function

Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will know what God wants you to do, and you will know how good and pleasing and perfect His will really is.
Romans 12:2 NLT

We are not today what we were yesterday. We will not be tomorrow what we are today. We are in the process of being changed. This change for believers is not the change of mere difference, but a transformation. We are becoming like Christ.
Living the Life You Were Meant to Live by Tom Paterson

The Two Camps - Mahanaim

• Genesis 32:1-2 “So Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him. When Jacob saw them, he said, “This is God’s camp.” And he called the name of that place Mahanaim.”
  
• When God breaks in, we have a revelation of His presence and we can sense His pleasure.

A common response to life: “I’m Fine.”

• Feelings Inside Never Expressed
• Freaked out Insecure Neurotic Emotional

Genesis 32:24-31

• Peniel – The face of God
  
• “Then Jacob was left alone; and a Man wrestled with him until the breaking of day.”
  
• “I will not let You go unless You bless me!”
  
  • We have sought the Lord in fasting.
    
  • We have opened our hearts to the plow of the Holy Spirit to come and break up the fallow ground.

Removing the Roadblocks

• What hinders us with God & His ways?
  
• Four words:
  
  • Worries
    
  • Wrongs
    
  • Wounds
    
  • Wishes

Worries and Distractions

• One of Satan’s top strategies is to clutter our minds with so much stuff that our connection with God weakens.
  
  • What do I need to surrender to God?
    
  • What are the things that consume my thoughts?
    
  • Don't let your worries get the best of you; Remember, Moses started out as a basket case.
• Psalm 55:22 NCV “Give your worries to the Lord, and he will take care of you.”
  
• I Peter 5:6-7 NKJ “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.”
  
• Two key words: Trust & Rest

Wrongs

• What WRONGS do I need to surrender to God?
  
  • These are the things that you have done to others.
    
  • These are by commission or omission!
    
• I John 1:9 NCV “If we confess our sins, he will forgive our sins. . . and cleanse us from all the wrongs we have done”.
  
• God grades on the cross, not the curve!

Wounds

• What WOUNDS do I need to surrender to God?
  
  • These are the things that others have done to you.
    
• Psalm 147:3 NCV “God heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds”
• I Peter 2:24b NKJ “…by whose stripes you were healed.”
  
• We need a revelation of the cross!
  
• His brow – For peace
  
• His back – For healing
  
• His hands – For forgiveness
  
• His feet – For victory
  
• His head – For blessing
  
• His side – For inner healing
• Proverbs 3:5-6 NKJ “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own under-standing; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.”
  
• Isaiah 53:5 NKJ “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.”

Wishes

• What WISHES do I need to surrender to God?
  
  • These are the things you dream of, the desires of your heart.
    
• Proverbs 16:3 NIV “Commit to the LORD whatever you do, and your plans will succeed”
  
  • But sometimes we don’t surrender them to God because we want to control them.
    
  • Because when we’re in control, things seem safe.
• It’s okay to wish, and it’s okay to dream. But God just wants to dream and wish with you.
  
• Psalm 37:3-5 “Trust in the LORD, and do good; Dwell in the land, and feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the LORD, And He shall give you the desires of your heart.”
  
• The Will of God never takes you to where the grace of God will not protect you.

Your Life Review

• New LifeBuilder Group
  
  • On Wednesday evening we will look at, review, and redefine:
    
    • The Center of My Life.
      
    • The Commitments of My Life
      
    • The Core Values of My Life.
      
    • The Community of My Life.
      
    • The Contribution of My Life.
      
    • The Communication of My Life.