Gods Ambassador for the Gospel

(John 12:44-46)

I. Introduction.
A. Orientation.
1. Last week, we saw
That even though Jesus gave the Jews
Powerful and irrefutable evidence
Through His miracles,
Even though He had an impeccable character
And preached perfectly the message
That was in perfect agreement
With the message Messiah was supposed to bring,
The Jews still didnt believe in Him.

Now there were those who did

Many of the rulers believed
But even they were afraid
To confess Him
Because of the threat
Of being thrown out of the synagogue
Of being excommunicated from Israel.

2. We also saw why the Jews didnt believe:

Because of judicial hardening

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The Lord had blinded their eyes
And hardened their hearts
Much like He did to Pharaoh
During the time of the Exodus
So that they wouldnt see and understand,
Turn to the Lord, and be saved.
He didnt create that evil in their hearts,
But used the evil that was already there.
He simply withdrew His Spirit
Because their hearts were already hard
And let their sin have its way
So that they would reject Jesus
And hand Him over to the Romans for crucifixion.
Remember, this had to happen,
So that we could be forgiven.

B. Preview.
Does this mean the Jews were excusable for rejecting Him?
That they werent responsible for their crime?
No, they were responsible.
It was their sin that brought Gods hardening judgment on them.
It was their sin He let go of to turn them further against His Son.
The fault was entirely theirs
Because the sin was theirs.

We now see how Jesus responds to their sin:

This morning,
He reminds them of three things:
Who it was that sent Him,
Who He is,
And why He came.

This evening,
Well see what He has to say
About what will happen to us
If we dont believe Him,
Turn from our sins,
And receive Him as our Lord and Savior.

The thrust of this

Is that He was here now to save
Not to judge.
But the time was coming
When He would no longer appear as Savior
But as Judge.

II. Sermon.
A. Jesus first tells us who sent Him:
It was the Father;

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He is the Fathers ambassador.
We read in verse 44, And Jesus cried out and said, He who believes in Me, does
not believe in Me but in Him who sent Me.

1. Notice first that Jesus is said to have cried out

Which means He spoke loudly.
But how did He speak?
Sometimes its hard to know the exact tone He used.
When God came down to walk with Adam
After Adam had sinned and was hiding among the trees
He called out to Adam, Where are you? (Gen. 3:9).
What tone of voice did He use then?
He didnt ask this question
Because He didnt knowHe knew what had happened,
That Adam was hiding,
And where he was hiding.
He was calling Adam to come to Him.

But was this a voice of compassion,

Calling the man back to Himself?
Or was it a call of judgment,
Demanding Adam appear that He might pronounce sentence?
If Meredith Kline was right
And he may well have been

It was a call to judgment.

Moses wrote, They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in
the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the
presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden (v. 8),
Kline believed
That the Lord had appeared,
Not in the cool of the day,
But in the Spirit of the Day
That is, the Day of Judgment.
This could well have been a summons
To appear before Gods throne of judgment.
They had broken the covenant,
And now it was time to face the consequences.
This could also explain
Why they hid when they heard Him in the Garden
They were ashamed
Because they sensed
They no longer had a pure heart
But they were also afraid
Afraid of Gods judgment.

What tone of voice did Jesus use when He cried out?

The word can refer to speaking in a demanding or commanding way
Calling on them to listen

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Because this is what God requires.
Or it can refer to an urgent appeal
A prophetic declaration
To listen to what He has to say
For their own wellbeing.

The weight of the evidence

Falls on this second option.

Jesus hadnt come to bring judgment,

But to preach peace
The Good News of reconciliation.

The New Covenant He was bringing

Was of a different character
Than the Covenant God made with Adam
Where our salvation depended on Adams perfect obedience,
Under penalty of death if he failed.
It is a covenant of grace
Based on the certainty of His obedience
Making sure that all who receive Him
Would receive the promised blessing.

Jesus was bringing the Good News

Of Gods willingness to be reconciled to us

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If we would only repent and believe in His Son.

Jesus hadnt come for judgment

At least not yet
He had come to save.
Thats what He wanted them to know:
And so He called out to them
With a voice of urgency.

2. What did Jesus cry out?

He says, He who believes in Me, does not believe in Me but in Him who sent
Me (v. 44).
He points to His true authority:
He hadnt come in His own name,
But in the name of His Father.
He didnt come with His own message,
But with the message He gave Him to preach.
He is the Ambassador of their God
The God of Israel,
The Lord, Yahweh
Sent with His message of reconciliation.

What this means is,

If they believed in Him
If they received His message

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They wouldnt be merely believing in Him,
But also in the One who sent Him
That is, in the Father.

When we trust in Jesus,

We are trusting in the Father.
Jesus is still the object of our faith,
But if we trust Him,
Were also trusting the One who sent Him;
If we receive Him,
Were also receiving the Father.
We cant have One without the other.
But we also cant have the Father without Him.

It would be good to pause

Just for a moment,
And remind ourselves
Of the Fathers involvement in our salvation
And certainly that of the Holy Spirit.

We often think about Jesus sacrifice

And how much we owe Him for this.
But sometimes we forget
The other two Persons of the Godhead
Are also involved.

It was the Father who sent His Son

For God so loved the world
That He gave His only begotten Son (John 3:16).
The Son was anointed by the Spirit above measure
That He might do His work,
And that He might become
The source of the Spirit to all who believe,
That they might go into all the world
And make disciples of all the nations.

All the members of the Godhead are equally involved,

They are all equally God,
And so are all to be equally honored.

B. This brings us to our second point:

Who He is.
Jesus is more than a mere Ambassador:
He is God in our nature
The perfect image of the invisible God.

Jesus goes on to say, He who sees Me sees the One who sent Me (v. 45).
An ambassador comes
With the authority of the one who sent him,
But he doesnt necessarily share the same character.

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But Jesus does share this with His Father,
Because He is God, the Son
The eternal Son of God.
Remember what John wrote in John 1:18, No one has seen God at any time; the
only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him.
Jesus will also shortly say to Thomas in John 14, If you had known Me, you
would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen
Him. Philip said to Him, Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.
Jesus said to him, Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to
know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say,
Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father
is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but
the Father abiding in Me does His works (vv. 7-10).
Looking at Jesus, we are looking at the Father
He who sees Me sees the One who sent Me (12:45).
Jesus isnt taking about His divine Being
God isnt a man
And Hes not saying they are the same person
The Father sent the Son,
As weve just seen
Hes talking about His moral character:
He shares this in common with the Father,
Because He and His Father share the same divine nature.

This is what makes Him the perfect One

To make the offer He does
On behalf of His Father,
Which is what we see next.

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C. Lastly, we see why He came:

To be Gods Ambassador of salvation.
Jesus says, I have come as Light into the world, so that everyone who believes in
Me will not remain in darkness (v. 46).
He came to reveal Gods truth
Light being a metaphor for truth.
The truth about our condition
That we are lost and without hope
The truth about salvation
That He provides it
And willingly gives it
To whoever will receive it.

He came so that if we would believe in Him

If we would turn from our sins
And trust in Him
We would not remain in darkness
Darkness being a metaphor for ignorance, sin and judgment
But would have light
The Light of His truth,
And the light of the hope of eternal life,
If we will only trust in Jesus.

D. In closing, lets consider some applications:

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1. The first is,

If you havent trusted in Jesus,
Youre still in the darkness of ignorance and sin;
Youre still under Gods judgment
And you have no hope.
Jesus came for people like you
He came as Light,
So that if you would listen to Him
And believe in Him,
You would not remain in darkness,
But have the light of life.
Do you want the hope He brings?
Do you want to see light at the end
Of the tunnel of the darkness youre in?
Then you need to turn from your sin
And trust in Him
He will give you hope;
He will be your light
To guide you safely through this world to the next.

2. Have you already received Him?

Then there are a few things here for you as well.

a. First, the Lord doesnt save anyone

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That He doesnt at the same time

Make His personal ambassadors
This is what weve been looking at on Wednesday evenings:
We are His stewards,
Entrusted with His goods,
To do His work on earth;
But we are also His ambassadors
To share His light/truth with others:
Thats what the Great Commission is all about.
Thats why He calls us the light of the world (Matt. 5:14).

We are those He has commissioned

To bring His Gospel to others.
In the same way that those
Who received Him, received the One who sent Him,
So those who receive us, receive Him.
When Jesus sent the seventy out
To preach the Gospel,
He said to them in Luke 10:16, The one who listens to you listens to Me,
and the one who rejects you rejects Me; and he who rejects Me rejects the
One who sent Me.

b. But how can we measure up to this call

So that we dont do more harm than good?
After all, Jesus could do it so much better

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Because He is the perfect image of God.

When the Lord saved us,

He also gave us His Spirit
So that we too might share His image.
If were trusting in Jesus,
We are all like Him to some degree
We have already been equipped
To bring the Good News to others.

Can we be better than we are now?

Yes: the more we are filled with His Spirit
The better ambassadors we will be.
And so lets take to heart
What Paul wrote to the Ephesians,
And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the
Spirit (Eph. 5:18).

Lets also not forget

That a persons turning to Jesus
Doesnt depend on us
As much as it depends
On the work of the Spirit in their hearts.
If we are at all like Jesus,
And share His Gospel with others,

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His sheep will hear His voice

And they will come to Him.

c. Lastly, since the Lord has called us

To love our neighbors
As much as we love ourselves,
And has given us a message
Which if they believe
Will save them,
Lets follow Jesus example
Of entreating others
Of pleading with them,
Of begging them to come
That they might be saved,
Remembering that if they dont,
They will perish forever. Amen.

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