What Would Jesus Say?

Sunday August 24, 2008

Hebrews 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Jesus is the same through time. He will say and do the same things He said and did when He
was here on earth – unless He explicitly changed something.

Some things He explicitly changed:

A. The audience to preach to:

Matthew 10:5,6
5 These twelve Jesus sent out and commanded them, saying: "Do not go into the way of the Gentiles, and
do not enter a city of the Samaritans.
6 But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

Matthew 15:24-26
24 But He answered and said, "I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
25 Then she came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, help me!"
26 But He answered and said, "It is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the little dogs."

Matthew 28:18-20
18 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the
Son and of the Holy Spirit,
20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to
the end of the age." Amen.

B. What to do when you go preaching:

Matthew 10:9,10
9 Provide neither gold nor silver nor copper in your money belts,
10 nor bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor staffs; for a worker is worthy of his food.

Luke 22:35-37
35 And He said to them, "When I sent you without money bag, knapsack, and sandals, did you lack
anything?" So they said, "Nothing."
36 Then He said to them, "But now, he who has a money bag, let him take it, and likewise a knapsack; and
he who has no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.
37 For I say to you that this which is written must still be accomplished in Me: 'AND HE WAS NUMBERED
WITH THE TRANSGRESSORS.' For the things concerning Me have an end."

Other than the things Jesus explicitly changed, we do not have the right to change anything He
said.

Jesus would say the same things today, which He said two thousand years ago.

Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.

So what would Jesus say?

1. When we question His willingness

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Matthew 8:2,3
2 And behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean."
3 Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, "I am willing; be cleansed." Immediately his
leprosy was cleansed.

When we cry: “Lord if you are willing, you can…”

Jesus’ response “I am willing be clean, be healed, be delivered, be prosperous, be
victorious,…”

The Greek word “sozo” is used in for being saved, salvation, etc in the New Testament about 110
times. It is a word that means to be saved from sin, healed, delivered, rescued, made whole, to
protect, to do well. Sozo means to be saved out from under the devil's power and restored into
the wholeness of God's order and well being by the power of God's Spirit.

God is more than willing to release “salvation” to all.

Comment about God’s Sovereignty, God’s Will and Our Appropriation of His Will.
God is Sovereign (Supreme ruler, Autonomous, Self-Governing). What ever He says, ‘goes’.
It is His will for all to be saved (Gr. Sozo) (1 Timothy 2:4)
Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved (Gr. Sozo) (Romans 10:13)
We know that all men are not saved. There are those who do go to hell.
And yet we do not change the will of God and say that because there are some people who do
not get saved, therefore, maybe it is God’s will to save some, and not save the others. The will of
God remains the same, that is, it is His will for all men to be saved. And God still is Sovereign! His
sovereignty is not undermined in any way.

Similarly it is God’s will for all men to be healed, delivered, to be made whole in every way, to
prosper. Now we know that all do not get healed, delivered, are not made whole or prosper. And
yet we must not change our statement concerning the will of God. His will still remains the same.
It is still His will for all to be saved, to experience sozo, which is complete wholeness in every
sense.

God is secure in His Sovereignty. We do not need to change His will to defend His sovereignty.
And neither must we change His will to accommodate our unbelief! While there may be several
reasons why every one does not get saved, healed, delivered, made whole, prospers – the truth
remains, that there is no failure on God’s part. He is the Saviour who has done all that is
necessary for all men to be saved (receive sozo). Any failure is therefore on our part, not God’s.

Let’s get rid of all the unbelief that has been preached to us about the will of God and all the
reasons why God is not willing to save, heal, deliver, prosper, etc. Let’s settle it once and for all,
that God is willing. He has been, and is always willing to save, heal, deliver, prosper, make whole
– every person. He is the Saviour of the world and He offers salvation to every one.

2. When we question His ability

Mark 9:22,23
22 And often he has thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if You can do
anything, have compassion on us and help us."
23 Jesus said to him, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes."

When we cry: “Lord if you can do something, do something, help!…”

Jesus’ response “If YOU can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”

www.apcwo.org / [email protected] 2 All Peoples Church & World Outreach, Bangalore, India
It is no longer a matter of whether God can do something…..of course He can.
His response still is “If you can believe….all things are possible…”

The beautiful part of this story is that the Lord responded to whatever little faith that this father
had. The boy’s father said: “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief”. Perhaps, the failure of the
disciples had left some doubts in the father’s mind. So he cried out “Lord I believe, but help me
with my doubts”. Jesus responded to that faith and brought salvation!

3. When we cry out for help in the middle of life’s storms

Luke 8:24,25
24 And they came to Him and awoke Him, saying, "Master, Master, we are perishing!" Then He arose and
rebuked the wind and the raging of the water. And they ceased, and there was a calm.
25 But He said to them, "Where is your faith?" And they were afraid, and marveled, saying to one another,
"Who can this be? For He commands even the winds and water, and they obey Him!"

When we cry: “Lord I am sinking, help!…”

Jesus’ response “Where is your faith...”

Jesus said the same thing to Peter:

Matthew 14:29-31
29 So He said, "Come." And when Peter had come down out of the boat, he walked on the water to go to
Jesus.
30 But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink he cried out,
saying, "Lord, save me!"
31 And immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him, and said to him, "O you of little faith,
why did you doubt?"

4. When things go from bad to worse

Mark 5:23,35,36
23 and begged Him earnestly, saying, "My little daughter lies at the point of death. Come and lay Your
hands on her, that she may be healed, and she will live."
35 While He was still speaking, some came from the ruler of the synagogue's house who said, "Your
daughter is dead. Why trouble the Teacher any further?"
36 As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, He said to the ruler of the synagogue, "Do not be
afraid; only believe."

From being at the point of death, things got worse where the little girl died.

When things go from bad to worse…

Jesus’ response “Fear not, only believe”

Jesus had a similar response to Mary and Martha when Lazarus, their brother died.

John 11:21,40
21 Now Martha said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.
40 Jesus said to her, "Did I not say to you that if you would believe you would see the glory of God?"

Jesus did not give an explanation of why things went from bad to worse. He did not explain why
He arrived “late”. He just told them to believe! Some times we get more preoccupied with trying
to find an explanation of “why” some thing is happening instead of believing God for a positive
outcome!

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5. When we want to see something done on earth

Luke 9:12,13
12 When the day began to wear away, the twelve came and said to Him, "Send the multitude away, that
they may go into the surrounding towns and country, and lodge and get provisions; for we are in a
deserted place here."
13 But He said to them, "You give them something to eat." And they said, "We have no more than five
loaves and two fish, unless we go and buy food for all these people."

When we cry “Lord something must be done here on earth…in my city, my world..”
Jesus’ response “You do it. You make it happen”

We are co-workers with Him.

It is not about us sitting back and just waiting for God to do something. We need to step out
with our “five loaves and two fishes” and then He undergirds it with His power to release a
supernatural work here on earth!

Things don’t happen on earth just by us complaining to God about how bad things are and how
urgent things are and all that needs to be done. Things happen when we step in to our God
ordained role of being co-workers with Him and begin to move in our God given authority to see
things accomplished.

Summary
One of the key things I’ve discovered from this is that the Lord does want us to have faith – in
His willingness, in His ability and to step out on that faith.

So much of today’s theology is a mis-representation of God that makes us comfortable in our life
of unbelief! It robs us of so much that God wants to release in to our lives!

Jesus would say the same thing today as He did two thousand years ago!

Let’s stir our selves up. Let’s get rid of unbelief and come into faith. We will see God move
powerfully in response to faith in our hearts!

www.apcwo.org / [email protected] 4 All Peoples Church & World Outreach, Bangalore, India
 Sermon Notes

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