Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches special Monday Morning Coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right. With look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it further and better work the applications into our daily lives . Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And, he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday Morning Coffee with Mark.

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast for Monday, July the seventh. I am Mark. I'm drinking some very smooth coffee this morning out of my favorite Texas Rangers mug. This is the mug that commemorates Cory Seeger's home run the bottom of the ninth in game one of the World Series last year. Set the Rangers on course to be world champions. Love every bit of that. Love remembering that love drinking coffee out of this mug. And I really love talking about the Bible with you daily Bible reading, looking back at yesterday's sermon, I've got it all. We're done with the 4th of July weekend. Hope that all of that was really good for you. You had a great holiday, but we're ready to get the week started in the very best way. Let's dive in. We'll begin that as we always do with a quick look back at yesterday's sermon yesterday I talked about the future of the church and I wanna share just a couple of extra notes here. First, I'm gonna start from Ephesians four 14. This is from the New Living Translation. Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won't be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever. They sound like the truth. Sometimes people criticize the church because it's slow to change and to adopt new methods. And you know, here we are over here using flannel boards and chalkboards and everybody else has used PowerPoint projectors and is doing all this new technology stuff. And I would acknowledge that sometimes that can be true. But I also want to say we ought to remember that the church is not supposed to constantly pivot to whatever is shiny and new. Sometimes trendy is exactly that. It's here today and it's gone tomorrow. Sometimes trendy is fake and false and that means we want no part of it even if it isn't gone tomorrow. I am old enough to remember the explosive group in Gainesville, the Crossroads Church of Christ and their phenomenal growth that they had there just church was just blowing up. They seemed like they were baptized everybody. And then that whole concept got transplanted to Boston and they were blowing up tons of baptisms, lots of conversions, and people got very, very excited and they wanted, they wanted every congregation to go for that whole hog. But I also remember that there were many wise people saying that their means and methods weren't biblical, that that was essentially a cult. They were using the age old techniques that cults always employ that Christ wouldn't be pleased with that and that it wasn't going to last. And you know what? It didn't last. It imploded. And now there are no longer even a subject of discussion. And many of you listening to this podcast don't even know what I'm talking about when I talk about the crossroads movement or the Boston Church. So I'm glad that we use PowerPoint projectors at West Side . Chalk is messy and flannelgraph guys, they never did stick on that flannel material for me like I wanted them to the middle of your lesson, Elijah's falling off onto the floor. But I'm also glad that at Westside we're not constantly chasing whatever is new and exciting and promises to revolutionize everything. We need enthusiasm, but we also need wisdom. And in Christchurch we can have both so that we're not blown about by every wind of new teaching. Ephesians four 14. And if we're going to be rooted in what is not new and trendy, that means we'll need to be rooted in the word and we're doing that now as we continue reading in the gospel of John. So on Monday we're continuing this section in John chapter five where Jesus is in trouble for doing a healing. Our reading today is John five 30 to 47 and especially since it's been a holiday and there's been a weekend I've slept, I hope you have slept since the last time we read last week. Then let's see here if we can get situated. Remember in chapter five at the beginning Jesus heals a man at the pool of Bethesda and that man rats Jesus out in verse 13 when he tells the authorities Jesus is the guy who told him to carry his mattress and that ends up causing a controversy about healing on the Sabbath, which is just outrageous. I talked about that last week. They're asking all the wrong questions and it's all about their rabbinical traditions. Jesus begins to answer that in chapter five in verse 19. So what we're reading today continues Jesus's teaching or answer to these false charges that begins in five 30. I can do nothing on my own. Jesus is talking about how he does the works of the Father and then he says he has two that bear witness. If I bear witness verse 31 about myself, my testimony is not true. The SV here is is very good. You need witnesses in a court of law. You can't just end up and say I didn't do it. And everybody says, oh well you know he said he didn't do it. No, you need witnesses to verify your testimony. So then Jesus cites the witness of John the Baptist and then more importantly in verse 36, the testimony of the Father that is superior to John the Baptist testimony obviously. And then he says, there's a reason why you don't accept what is so clearly true about me. And that is because even though you read your Bible, you are missing the point. They think life is found in knowing the word of God and that's not where life is found. Life is in the sun . Life is when we read the Bible to know the sun , not to pat ourselves on the back because we know so much Bible. Lemme share with you a quote, wonderful quote from a scholar here, the best Bible students in the world, people who meticulously and continuously read scripture rejected Jesus. How could that happen? One thing is clear. They read scripture in the wrong way. They read it with a shut mind. They read it not to search for God but to find arguments to support their own positions. They did not really love God. They loved their own ideas about him. Water has as much chance of getting into concrete as the word of God had of getting into their minds. They did not humbly learn a theology from scripture. They used scripture to defend a theology which they themselves had produced. There is still danger that we should use the Bible to prove our beliefs and not test them . That is a fabulous quote, especially for people like you and me who are very concerned that we do all things with Bible authority, that we have a thus say the Lord, that we for all that we do. So we are concerned about proving that our beliefs come from scripture, but we need to make certain that we're reading the Bible for the right reason, not to back up what we have already decided, but to see what God has said and that we are really genuinely doing that. And we need to see Bible reading, daily Bible reading as a means to an end. I want to know the Son , the Son is where life is. When you don't do that, then you can be deceived. Verse 43, others are gonna come and you'll receive him. And it is absolutely true. In the 80 70 result revolt, they followed a bunch of false messiahs and then they turned around in a 1 32 and did it again. They did it again because verse 44, when you seek the approval of others that blocks real faith. What a challenging reading for us today. Read it. Read it from two translations, read it and pray about it. Life is in the sun, not in mastering Bible trivia. See you tomorrow. It is Tuesday and today we begin reading John chapter six, one of the most important chapters in the book of John. Our reading today is John chapter six, verses one to 14 . This begins the feeding of the 5,000. Actually we're covering the feeding of the 5,000 today and then begins the discourse, the teaching that Jesus does based off his multiplication of the loaves, the famous I am, the Bread of life sermon. There are a couple of things that ought to stand out about the miracle of the feeding of the 5,000. And I should not use the M word in John's gospel. The sign of the feeding of the 5001st it's unusual because it's a Galilean sign and John is not much concerned about Galilee. He lets Matthew, mark and Luke cover that and it is also covered in Matthew, mark, and Luke. And John usually does not talk about something that is found over in the synoptic gospels, but the long sermon that Jesus preaches coming off this sign is very important to John and the effect that it has. Remember we're in the section of the gospel where people turn away from Jesus and what happens here ought to cause huge crowds to throng to Jesus. But when Jesus is done and when we're done with this chapter, people are bitterly walking away from Jesus. Let's work that out as we pay particular attention to the idea of eating and drinking the blood of Jesus, eating his flesh, drinking his blood. What does that mean in John chapter six? And how can you and I do that? So chapter six, verses one to 14 today is the coverage of the sign itself. There's a lot in verse two in those words following him because they saw that he was doing those words denote continuous action in the New Testament Greek. So the multitude kept following because they continually saw that he habitually did these things. So Jesus is doing a lot of signs, again not covered in John's gospel, but he's doing a lot of signs in Galilee. Go read Matthew, mark and Luke and a lot of people are coming to Jesus. Verse four gives a time track . The Passover of the feast was at hand. John track's Passovers. The first Passover is John two at the beginning of his ministry. Then the third Passover is at the time of his death. So this puts this in the middle of Jesus's ministry about a year away from the cross. And if you would remember, Passover is a time when Jewish nationalistic fervor has a tendency to go into overdrive. This is a time when people are thinking, when will we be independent again? When will we be our own nation like we were when we exited Egypt? So Philip , of course, verse five is the natural person asked about food because he is a native of nearby Beth Saya chapter one, verse 44. And then did you see verse six? Look at that. There's a johanan reflection. There's that parentheses. John is explaining what's going on. And the denarius in verse seven is important here because it shows that Philip is thinking only at one level and it is saying that there are a ton of people here . It would take about eight months salary to feed all these people. This is a big potluck. And the barley lows in verse nine, that that's poor man's bread and the fish would be probably salted and pickled. And the point of this not nearly so much, the number of what he's got is just to say it's pitifully small. There is no chance that you can feed verse 10, 5,000 people. 5,000 men. So there's probably what, 10 to 20,000 people here and all. When you count women and children, there's no way you can feed that many people with this little lunch. And then Jesus just does it. He just does it. And it's so obviously a miracle verse 13, because they pick up more than they started with. And when people see it, they say, this is the guy, we need this guy. If he can do this with food, think about what he could do with a sword. Give him one sword. We'll all have swords. Let's go. This is the one to lead us in a revolt against the Roman army and against the Roman occupation. Jesus realizing that. Well, that's tomorrow's reading. Don't forget, we have zoom tonight West siders and we get to talk more about John chapter six, the rest of you. I'll see you tomorrow as we continue our reading on Wednesday. What a pivotal chapter. We want to move further in John chapter six and we'll do that on Wednesday. It is Wednesday and we are continuing our summer series tonight at Westside. Nathan Hersey will be speaking tonight on the parable of the unforgiving Servant. Nathan, tell us a little bit more about what you want to focus on this evening.

Hi, my name is Nathan Hersey and I'm going to be preaching on the parable of the unforgiving servant for Matthew chapter 18. We're gonna talk a little bit about forgiveness and how important it is 'cause Jesus says it himself in verse 35, that we should forgive our brother from our heart.

Thank you Nathan. I am sure we are all interested in what it means to forgive from the heart. Just a little reading today, John chapter six, verses 15 to 21 . This is Jesus walking on the water. Maybe before we get Jesus on the water, we ought to pay more attention to verse 15, which goes a little bit with what we read yesterday. Look at the kind of king they want. They will take and make him king by force . And so Jesus withdraws to the mountains by himself. What they are looking for is a military leader. They are looking for that military kingdom. One writer said Jesus would go to Jerusalem not to wield the spear and bring the judgment, but to receive the spear thrust and bear the judgment. They're just going in the entirely wrong direction with this whole business of being a king and having a kingdom. And Jesus knows that. Lemme grab a little coffee here. So now we get Jesus walking on the water and this is the fifth sign in John's gospel, but it is very compressed as compared to the other gospels who talk a lot more about Jesus walking on the water and of course Peter coming out to Jesus and all those things. It seems almost in some ways that John is including this only to explain how they got across the sea of Galilee. I would say this verse 16, it does seem like when Jesus is absent, there is darkness. When evening came, his disciples went down to the sea. Galilee lies about 600 feet below sea level. I've mentioned this before. It's like a bowl. And so the wind can come pouring over the hill and just turn that bowl up in a very big hurry and you get a squall here. The sea became rough when they had rode about three or four miles, verse 19. They're just having a hard time going. And then there's Jesus, they see him. He says, don't be afraid. I like verse 21, I wonder if John is intentionally making a play here. They were glad to take him into the boat. Verse 20 one's expression, take him. There is the term that's translated receive in chapter five and verse 43, I've come in my father's name and you do not receive me. You won't take me in the disciples, take Jesus in. I wonder if John is pushing that idea, making a play there to show some receive Jesus and some will not receive Jesus because tomorrow Jesus starts preaching and a bunch of people will not take him in. We'll see that on Thursday. Welcome to Thursday. We read today in John chapter six, verses 22 to 34 , and we finally get this sermon started that I'm so anxious and eager to talk with you about. This sermon builds off of the feeding of the 5,000, the feeding of the 5,000 points to Jesus' ability to give the whole world true bread. And you might note, just skip down to verse 59, verse 59, Jesus said these things in the synagogue as he taught at Capernaum, a bunch of this sermon happened in the synagogue. I have a tendency to picture this Jesus on the hillside and he's just teaching away. At some point, Jesus moves the conversation to the synagogue in verse 59, tells us exactly that. So the crowd sees Jesus isn't there. So they rush around and they don't know how Jesus got there. And so they ask verse 25, rabbi, when did you get here? And Jesus just ignores that question. He just ignores that question. It's not an important question. He moves on. Maybe I'll lean on that kind of idea. Sometimes in Bible class I ignore questions because we need to move further in the text or we're straying away from the main point of the text . And Jesus is driving people to think about his identity, who he really is. And the reality verse 26 is some of you just want a free meal. Some of you are just here for lunch. And that just shows that sometimes miracles instead of being a help to genuine faith can actually be a barrier to faith because they focus people's attention on the wrong thing. The physical attribute, the physical thing that you got, the healing or the bread. We want more of that. And sometimes people do come to Jesus because they want something from Jesus. They don't want to give their life to Jesus. They don't want to follow Jesus. They want Jesus to fix their life. And if you watch, when you see advertisement for various churches and what they're offering, lots of it is about Jesus can fix you. And I think that fits into John 6 26, very, very well. Then you get the not but construction in verse 27, don't do this, instead do this. And it doesn't mean don't work for food. Verse 27, Jesus is not forbidding us to labor. Of course he's saying, that's not our emphasis. That's not where we should put all of our concern and all of our priorities and our energy and our resources. No . Instead, we need to be thinking about eternal life. And the son of man will give that. In fact, you need to believe on the Son of man verse 28 29. And that is said here to be the work of God. Notice how in scripture, Jesus never tells people not to do in salvation. That has become such a driving force in so much discussion of salvation today. You can't do anything. You can't earn salvation. You can't merit salvation. And I have to talk about that from time to time because so many people are talking about that. But that actually is not talked about in scripture at all. There's very, very little of that that comes from a misunderstanding of what faith really is all about. It really rolls out of Martin Luther and some of the problems that he had with Roman Catholicism. And that's just not a New Testament emphasis. It's not an Old Testament emphasis either because faith always includes obedience, faith and O and obedience go together. Faith in many, many, many places is a bucket word. You can put a lot of things into that bucket and doing what God says is part of that. And John 6 29 gives you a really good look at what that means. And in fact, this business that we can't do anything in our salvation and that God has to enable us through the Holy Spirit that is pure Calvinism and it is pure bunk . Why is Jesus telling people to do something that God is going to do because they are born depraved and they can't do it? Stop it. John. Calvin, you're completely wrong. There is, as they continue to push Jesus for more bread, there is some evidence that in the time of the New Testament, the thought was that there was hidden manna. Maybe Jeremiah had hidden that and that the Messiah would find it and call it or call it down from heaven. And so maybe that's what they're going for. If you're the Messiah, you need to produce this hidden manna. Look at the stupid remark. Verse 34, give us this bread. Always. Jesus says, we're paying way too much attention to Moses. Verse 32, we need to pay more attention to God. And what God is doing that is consistent with his message that he has sent from God and he is doing the work of God. We'll get more of that in Friday's reading. See you tomorrow. It is Friday. And again, a short reading. John 6 35 to 40 is our reading for today. Here we get the first I am statement in the gospel of John, Jesus said to them, verse 35, I am the bread of life. And the idea here is that this is bread that doesn't have to be given again and again, like manna, Jesus is the bread. There will no longer be that core emptiness when you are filled with Jesus. And notice here, it's not the one who eats, but the one who comes to him and the one who drinks him, the one who believes. That is very important. As we work through John chapter six, there's a lot of misunderstanding about what it means to eat and drink Jesus. We'll continue to work with that as we push through John chapter six. Look then at verse 36, I said to you, you've seen me yet you do not believe this is the section of disbelief. All they see is the potential military ruler. If Jesus will not do that, they are not interested in that. And so the Father gives all that. The Father, verse three , seven gives will come into me. And once again, Calvinism is coming into play, predestination and all of those sorts of things. But what we'll see here and what what we have in this text is that people are drawn to Jesus through teaching. If we adopt Calvinistic predestination that God has to act directly upon someone to come to Christ, then the natural question is, well, how come God doesn't act on everybody? So everybody comes to Christ. What? What's the deal with that? People being lost is God's fault, not their fault? Why doesn't God just save everybody? And then of course, whatever happened to free will you get this predestination thing? Then where is free will? Why are we preaching to anybody? No, no. Get out, John Calvin. Go away. Complete fail. Verse 37 is just saying Jesus doesn't fail. Doesn't fail. And the idea in verse 38 of coming out from heaven is repeated seven times in this chapter seven times. And there's a lot of emphasis here on now in the gospel of John, but there's a lot of emphasis here in what's going to happen in the future as well. That is our reading for today. Not a long reading as I said, but that finishes up the podcast for this week already looking forward to being with you in John chapter six more next week. But I do thank you for listening to the podcast. If the podcast is helping you tell somebody about it, leave us a rating and a review, make sure you're following or subscribe to it. So until Monday when we'll open our Bibles together again, get some coffee and think about John chapter six. I'm Mark Roberts and I want to go to heaven, and I want you to come to I'll see you on Monday with with a cup of coffee.

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