Becoming Whole: Embracing God's Nearness and Purpose

We all kind of are thinking about, especially in the New Year, who am I becoming? Who am I becoming? Am I becoming somebody I want to become? It is kind of a time where just the world as a whole during the New Year time is asking questions. Who am I becoming? Who am I becoming and do I like that person? [00:24:19] (18 seconds)


Now, no matter our age, no matter how young you are, no matter how old you are, no matter where you are, all of us are in a constant state of change. Every single one of us is not who we were yesterday. And by even the smallest degree, tomorrow we will be a different person than we are today. That is something that we all need to know and understand, that we are all in a constant state of change, for better or worse. [00:24:37] (27 seconds)


The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. The Lord is near to all who call on him. God has not made it very hard for any of us to be close to him. He has not made it very hard at all. Actually, this verse, what it tells us is there's kind of, there's one qualifier, to call on God. [00:29:25] (22 seconds)


That's all that God has kind of required of us, at least according to the scripture. He's near to all who call on him. Now God offers his nearness to us. And you might be saying, hey, isn't God like everywhere? Isn't he omnipresent? Isn't that what the Bible says? He's everywhere. So he's already near to everything. There is a version of that in which God is, he's creator of all things and he's in all things. But also because God wants all of us to experience his close presence. He said, yes, I am everywhere. But I will also give you an experience. An experience of my directed nearness so that you might know that I am close to you. That's what God offers us. That's what he's chosen to do with his nearness. [00:30:19] (38 seconds)


When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked, do you want to get well? And I know what you're thinking. What kind of question is that? Jesus, you don't need to be God to know that the answer is probably yes. God, why would you ask this question? Because Jesus is fully man and fully God. And what we learn as we kind of begin to see the bigger picture of who God is, is that God, is an inviter into even our own experience of healing in his presence. He is an inviter. God will never force himself upon us. It's just simply not what we see. What we see is that the character of God is he invites us in and then gives us the authority and responsibility to make a decision. [00:35:48] (45 seconds)


This man's response, it wasn't an immediate yes. You know, to be fair, he didn't realize that it was God that was standing with him. He didn't realize that that's who Jesus was. But he doesn't respond with, yeah, I want to get well. Instead, his response is a bunch of reasons why his own efforts haven't worked. This is what he says. He says, sir, the invalid replied, I have no one. I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I'm trying to get in, someone else goes in ahead of me. [00:37:38] (30 seconds)


Behavior modification, all that stuff. It's not necessarily bad to be like, I'm going to create boundaries. I'm going to not do that. Those are good things. But they are not the places which we will find the full healing that God actually intends for us. It's not the place. You see, sometimes we need more than ourselves. And it is amazing. What God has done is that he's designed his church so that we would have more than ourselves. That we would have a community in which God has gathered together to be like, you can be with other people. I've designed my church so that you wouldn't believe the lie that you were alone. And that part of it, being together, is that we would be able to experience the presence of God with us as well. It's why we do things like life groups. It's why you are in life groups. So that we know that we're not alone. [00:39:43] (44 seconds)


Now, for this disabled man who had no one, everyone, everything was about to change because in a moment, God was gonna come near. Remember, Jesus, fully man, fully God, would come near to him. And while in that nearness, God directing himself towards being a physical presence in Jesus with this man, Jesus would speak and the voice of God would change everything for this man. [00:43:47] (23 seconds)


The voice of God speaking has the power to change things. For this man, it was a physical miracle. For us, it's often a miracle that takes place of a transformation inside. But God speaks and things change. And for this man, it was get up and walk. And he was cured. It said he got up, took his mat and walked, but it was on a Sabbath. [00:43:52] (26 seconds)


It's amazing what a moment can do. For this man, a moment in his life in time, has absolutely changed the rest of his life. And sometimes I think we discount what a moment with God could look like. Sometimes we say, well I don't do this all the time. It's like sometimes we forget what God can do in a moment and how he turns moments into milestones in our lives. I see that. I look back in my life and again, I'm not someone that's always followed Jesus. I did my own thing. I made a ton of mistakes. A ton of failures. [00:46:44] (32 seconds)


My father is always at his work to this very day. I love that Jesus begins to give us a picture of what God's work is. It is to bring healing and his presence to his creation. To this very day, God is bringing healing and his presence into those that call on him in truth. That is the only thing that God asks us to do is to call on him. [00:51:25] (24 seconds)