selections from John
September 4, 2022
preached by Pastor Chris Audino
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Time of Reflection Quotations

“…if two thousand years of pious handling had not dimmed both John’s story and its demand, this gospel would still be seen as the burning outrage it continues to be, a work of madness or blinding revelation.”

~Reynolds Price (1933-2011), professor, literary scholar on the Gospel of John

“…the mystery…that Almighty God would come down…in the person of Jesus Christ and became one of us…. There is really nothing like that incredible social inversion of Almighty God coming here and living with us and dying with us.”

~Anne Rice, author of The Vampire Chronicles

“The heart of Christianity is a myth which is also a fact…. By becoming fact it does not cease to be myth: that is the miracle…. Those who do not know that this great myth became Fact…are, indeed, to be pitied. But Christians also need to be…reminded that…[Christianity] carries with it into the world of Fact all the properties of a myth. God is more than a god, not less…. We must not be ashamed of the mythical radiance resting in our theology.”

~C.S. Lewis (1898-1963), writer and academic at both Oxford and Cambridge

“People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”

~Carl Jung (1875-1961), Swiss psychiatrist

“… if we would see the glory of God, it appears most in grace, and mercy, and lovingkindness, and such sweet attributes…. We must take God, not as considered [abstractly]…, but God in Christ; for other notions of god are terrible.”

~Richard Sibbes (1577-1635), English theologian

“The Gospel of John opens with Jesus Christ in the bosom of God, and closes with the sinner in the bosom of Jesus Christ.”

~D. L. Moody (1837-1899), founder of Northfield Mount Hermon Schools (MA)

“Because Jesus Christ is a man, He feels what we feel. Because He is God, He can do something about it.”

~Tony Evans, pastor and author

Sermon Passage

selections from John (ESV)

John 1

⁹ The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. ¹⁰ He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. ¹¹ He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. ¹² But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, ¹³ who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 13

³¹ When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. ³² If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once.

³³ Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’ ³⁴ A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ³⁵ By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John 20

³⁰ Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; ³¹ but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.