From Religion to Relationships II, Capture the Passion

God, maybe they just need to renew that relationship, fresh and new, maybe there's been a barrier between you and them, that God just needs to be removed today. So God, I pray that you would just hear the desperation of our prayers to you and our cries to you. God, you are all that we need. Help us to draw close to you as you draw close to us, for it's in your name, Jesus. Amen. Why don't you be seated together? We sing those songs of intimacy like that, it seems at times so contrary to sing to the creator God that has all authority in his hands and all power and is so worthy of our worship and adoration, our reverence, and yet he talks in his word so clearly about how he longs to be our friend. How he longs, not because he's lonely, not because he's depressed, but because God really loves us, just like you love to be with the people you love with. You love to talk with them. You love to just be with them and be in fellowship and be in relationship. God's made us in his image and he loves that relationship too. And we've been talking in this series about capturing the passion and overcoming the obstacles that keep us from knowing God. And sometimes one of those obstacles that keeps us from knowing God is the word religion. Because we kind of stop there and we don't take our knowledge of God and religion and we take it to a place of relationship. And many of you in this room know what that's like. You've been at that place and at some point in your life, maybe even one of these services, at the end of the services, Jay often does when he prays that prayer and says, I want to invite you into a relationship with Jesus Christ. You've prayed that prayer and you kind of stepped into that new place in your journey with God. And we've got all kinds of stories in North Way about folks that have done that. Today we want you to meet someone who's really struggled with that whole issue of religion and stepping into relationship. And about a year ago did that very thing in one of our services. And I want you to meet him this morning and hear his story as it continues together. Will you just walk with me today, Dr. Adam Miller, as he comes to share. Give him a big North Way welcome and be willing to come up and share. Thank you. Thanks, brother. I appreciate it. Good morning. For the past year, I've been growing in a relationship with God. It is a real blessing to be here. I was so relieved when Bob Zahns contacted me and asked that I share with the congregation. Relieved because I had legitimate excuses not to be here. And probably wouldn't have ever come unless encouraged. The honor was clear, but hospital call, job negotiations, and a lack of time to prepare gave me the easy out. Yeah, it felt good to know that I was meeting the approval of Pastor Jay in some way. The religion I grew up with was based on seeking approval. In my small traditional church, you did good things. And through acceptance and recognition, you realized a slow ascent. But an ascent to where? I would have never considered a binding relationship with God. Yet it was exactly that relationship that urged me to accept Bob's proposal. I was reminded of something I had written to a friend just 12 hours prior. We need to turn our energy away from ourselves and focus on doing great works. That statement suddenly did not feel as comfortable now that I had to act on it. God, through Bob's pestering, was calling me to the floor. And it was frightening. It still is. No white coat to shield me. No authoritative titles, algorithms, nor expertise to lean on. But I do not stand alone. I am starting to understand what John meant when he said, he must become greater, I must become less. Becoming less is not easy. I made my first visit to North Way about a year ago, and I was immediately agitated. Hands in the air, laughing, clapping. Where was the discipline? Entering my sixth and final year of surgical training, I walked into North Way as a man hungry for power. My life had been about conquering mountains. And at the top, I expected peace, security, and dreams. I had put myself through school, including two doctorates. I had married the girl everyone wanted. The world approved of me. My agenda was progressing. But to where? See, my degrees did not love me. The relationship with the girl had failed. After that, contact with my family had disappeared. I was nearing the highest peak I could get to on my own. And at the end of each day, I was lost. Lost and much too proud. Christianity was no place for me to turn. The church I knew was full of hypocrisy. It was a crutch and not cool. So I interviewed Jews, Hindus, atheists, and others. I told them how the Bible was used as a weapon by people close to me. And at times, even against me. It is only through the love of my friend Jesus Christ that I gave North Way a chance. As a lonely skeptic, I sat in the back of the church one Sunday, listening to Jay. He was talking about the different hearts that come through that door. As he described the group with the closed hearts, my tears were relentless. Not very cool, Dr. Miller. Paranoid that someone from the hospital might see me, I left feeling weak. But the next Sunday, I returned. And at one inopportune moment, I was stretching out my arm. Or maybe it was an involuntary reflex, I'm not sure. But at that moment, Jay agreed with me. Christ was lifting my arm and my heart to a new place. Like a proud man falling in love, I was without control and frustrated. I remember telling Jay in my first meeting with him, I need to sit this guy named Jesus Christ down right here and now. We need to play 20 questions. Otherwise, this is just a story. Well, Jay's knowing stare but quiet posture ruffled me. For a moment, I thought he might actually produce the Holy Spirit right then. What I came to realize is that God was already there, asking me to surrender. And it's a simple request when I look at what God was waiting to give me. Within days after meeting with Jay, I received an email from him directing me to my spiritual leader. Dr. Dave Lewis is a man of honor and influence who not only witnesses my walk with Christ, but also has truly demonstrated the difference between seeking approval and having a loving relationship. I am forever grateful. Last Thanksgiving, I hosted my parents at my apartment. There has never been more peace and love in my family. In unprecedented fashion, my heart has opened, and I've even been a witness to others. Wow, the greatest moments in my life have been delivered through this church. I'm still doing surgery, but the mountains I'm looking to climb now have names like faith, love, and discipleship. My journey has just begun, and like many of you, my life is filled with uncertainties. But I am now on a walk with God out of the valley of power and loneliness. In relationship with Christ, I'm experiencing excellence and love never imagined before. Thank you. Morning. How do you feel when you hear a story like that? How long ago was that your story? Maybe it would be your story today. I never get tired of those stories. That's what keeps many of us here at North Way going, is realizing that there are atoms that come across our path every single day. And that's the mission of our church. That's, in my humble, theologically trained opinion, that's the only reason why we're here. Right? Why not just come to Christ and go to heaven? It has to be because they're people that God wants us to touch. Well, we're in a series that David mentioned that began just last week, so if you're new, you only missed one message. And we have been talking about the encounters that individuals had along the way up to and following Easter. Each one of these characters represents people like us trying to make sense of our lives and the issues that we face. And I want to remind you of a statement I made our first week together in this year of 2005. If you recall it, I began by saying that every one of us faces issues. And friends, I want to underscore that. I face them. You face them. I'm talking about relationships. I'm talking about dreams. I'm talking about ambitions. I'm talking about kids and family. I'm talking about finances. I'm talking about disillusionment, pain. And we've decided this year to put those things in the light and not be afraid to look at them and understand what God has to say about them in His Word. Now, last week, we looked at the first character, a man by the name of Simon of Cyrene. If you were here, remember the story. Simon was a guy that was sitting along the sidelines. And here's a little clip of the video that we showed last week. And he was called out of nowhere to help Jesus carry the cross the last several hundred yards, perhaps a quarter of a mile or so, up the hill of Golgotha. And then when he had that moment, when he looked into Jesus' face, he was transformed. He realized from that moment that he wouldn't be the same. And we discover after that, even though we never hear another word about Simon, that his wife and his son become members of the church. And Paul later writes of them in Rome. And so his legacy was sealed because he had an encounter with Christ. And we focused on the power of going from the sidelines to significance. We talked about the only way that that could happen was that you don't love God dispassionately. You have to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And we said that was what the Bible meant when it called us to love God passionately. And remember, we used these balloons last week. And I wanted to bring them out again just to remind those of you. On any given weekend, there's at least a third of you or more that weren't here last week. I tied them together because they were going all over the place last night. But we had a red balloon that signified just being full of God's Spirit and really alive. And then we had a green balloon that just sort of hung around and went with the flow. And some days was up, and some days was down. And sometimes you felt the Spirit, and sometimes you just... And then a few of us just, you know, that was us. We're bumping along the ground. We're just trying to make it day to day. And we said it's real important you honestly identify where you are. Not to judge yourself, but to say, God, this is the material I've got to give you. And by the way, don't think that this is just for a few, you know, iconoclastic monks that get away from it all and get to be spiritual. No, the Spirit-filled life, think about it. Spirit-filled, say that. Spirit-filled, what does that imply? That, you know, you're up. You're soaring. You're moving with the power of God in your life. Paul says as much in some of the epistles. If you look in your outline with me, he... Writing to the church in Ephesus, he says, Instead be filled, picture the red balloon, with the Spirit. Speak to one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make merry, music that is in your heart to the Lord. Always giving thanks to God, the Father, for everything. And the same thing to the church at Colossae. I want to be honest and tell you, I was in the middle of a very difficult week this week. Circumstances I won't get into, but things that just were pulling all the air out of my balloon. And I wasn't even aware of it until Carol asked me yesterday, Gee, did I feel ready for today? Or for last night's service and today? And I realized just like an emotional sort of bomb went off. Like, wow, I don't even know. Because you see, there are all these things that are constantly working against us in our lives. And you have to understand that the reason why we come together every week consistently, and I hope you make this a discipline in your life, is because we gain the sense of common strength and common passion to sustain one another as we journey together along this road. God longs for us all to walk in that fullness. And by the way, one of the ways that most effectively helps us do that is this small group component of our life at North Way. And this isn't some kind of, you know, sales pitch thing. It's just a reminder that if you're not in a group, then you miss out on probably the most effective way to stay full of the Spirit. And that is by engaging with other believers who just rub off on you. It's an important thing every week to sit with somebody who's like you and going through the things that you're going through and get encouragement and, you know, find yourself having someone care for you and pray for you and sometimes irritate you when they're late and talk the whole time. And that just kind of rubs you a little bit. It just reminds you that you're part of a group of folks that are journeying together. But at the end of the day, it always comes down to this matter of what is going on in your heart. It comes down to moving from just believing something about God and about Jesus and about church and about eternity and spiritual things. Listen, friends, many people believe. The Bible says that even the demons, James 2.19. The Bible says that even demons believe. So don't think that just because you have it up here you get it. What's important is do you love what you believe? Put that on your outline. Do you love what you believe? You get the difference? It's one thing to believe something. It's another thing to be in love with what you believe. I believe America is a great nation. How many believe America is a great nation? I encourage you sometime to go on a mission trip 12,000 miles around the world and I went over to India and I've been there a couple of times and you get so far out there where you feel and this is the primary thing. It's not so much the food that you can't eat or the water you can't drink or the stuff that you encounter. It's the weird spiritual weight that you feel. I mean, you feel this sense that there's an oppression and you can't put your finger on it. And I remember every time I've been out of the nation coming back in and loving America. Loving the fact that there's an open sort of window in the spirit. And I know this is a little mystical, but I'm just telling you. How many of you know what I'm talking about? You've been out of the nation, you feel it. And when you come back, you love America. That's what I'm talking about. I don't just believe it's a great place. I know it is and I love it because it's free. And the windows are open to make communication with God. I encourage you. That's the difference between just believing and loving. That's the difference between religion where you've got these doctrinal things all lined up. It's amazing to me how important people make doctrine. And I'm not discounting it. I spent a number of years studying it and trying to get it all figured out. We had a 101 new members classes. It was a great class. I encourage you to take the discipleship journey series. But one of the very common questions that we get is, what does North Way believe? And I always say, well, let me think. North Way doesn't really believe anything, but the people who lead the church have put together a statement of faith. And they say, what do you believe about communion, for example? Is it really the body and blood of Christ? Or is it, what do you believe it is? And what do you believe about baptism? And what do you believe about the Bible? And what do you believe about eternal life? And these are all important things that you should understand. But friends, it's not what you believe at the end of the day, it's what you love. Because I've discovered this, once you fall in love with Jesus, believing is easy. But believing does not make you fall in love with Jesus. And that's what we need to just kind of look at today and unpack a little bit more. Now we're going to focus our attention today on a man by the name of Nicodemus. So if you have your Bible, turn to John chapter 3. Nicodemus is a guy that we've heard mentioned from time to time, he's been around. But he's like many of you. He's like many people that you know. He's an unusual sort of person in some ways. And he's all of us in other ways. And the first thing we see about him, John chapter 3, let's read it together. I think we'll have it on the screens for you. If you don't have your Bible, let's start. John chapter 3. Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you were doing if God were not with him. So the first thing we notice is that Nicodemus came to Jesus at night. That's your first blank and your first point in your outline. Nicodemus came to Jesus at night. That's where the Nickelodeon people got the name of the show, Nick at Night. And he shows up. Catch a couple things here. He was a Pharisee. Pharisees, if you recall, those were the people, in this case they were all men, who had set themselves or been put in a position of spiritual authority over the Jewish traditions and heritages and laws. The Pharisees were the spiritual leaders of the Jewish people. And notice this. It says he was a member of the ruling council. So Nicodemus was a Pharisee, that was high ranking. The ruling council, that's another level up. That's the Sanhedrin. These were the people who called the shots for the Pharisees and everybody below. And a little later on, down in verse 10, Jesus calls him, you are the teacher in Israel. So even Jesus recognized that this guy Nick had a lot going for him. He was highly regarded. He was the kind of guy that when he walked into a room, people made, they made space for him. He was the kind of guy that got the preferred seats, you know, at the sporting events, at the restaurants. He was the kind of guy that probably had a vanity plate on his chariot. I mean, he was hip. Nicodemus was a power broker in the culture of his day. But isn't it fascinating that he comes to Jesus under the cover of night time. That's so important that you see, like so many people that we know. He was afraid that perhaps by identifying himself as a seeker, Adam referred to not wanting to be seen in the process of trying to discover Jesus. Many people are like that. Many people just sort of afraid to really get there in the face of it all and work it out because they're afraid, what? Of what other people think. Nicodemus was right there. He was afraid of what the other Pharisees would think, the other people that would see him. But there's another side of this. I hope you'll just maybe grab a hold of this. It fascinated me when I studied this this week to realize that not only did Nicodemus come to Jesus at night time, but Jesus met Nicodemus at night time in the darkness. Remember in that culture, when the sun went down, activity stopped. Generally speaking, people had their meal, they reclined and then they went to bed because they got up at dawn. It's interesting to me, friends, that Jesus went the extra distance into the darkness of Nicodemus' confusion. And it's a metaphor for the fact that Jesus Christ does not fear your darkness. And there might be a few of you today who think, you know, it's great to hear stories like that, but you don't know the kind of stuff I've been into. You don't know how much I've put God out of my life. You don't know the things that I've done. And I want you to know that Jesus is not afraid of your darkness. He's not afraid of it. He'll meet you in your darkness if you'll open the door to Him. And then He says this interesting question to him. He says, we know that you're this teacher because no one can do the science that you're doing. And all we know that we'd seen, at least John recounts, is he'd seen the water turn to wine. Probably he'd seen some other miracles. We don't know about, they're not recorded, but other gospels record them. And Nicodemus says, well, you gotta be, you know, you gotta come from God. We know that much. And Jesus answers, verse 3, I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again. And right there, John 3, 3, an entirely new paradigm is introduced into the spiritual world as we've ever seen before. It's never been there before. Jesus, in a moment, says, you know what? It's not about the things you think, Nicodemus. It's not about keeping the laws more perfectly. It's not about trying to be more pleasing to God in your ritual sacrifices and all the rest. He's saying, you can't see what spiritual life is all about. You cannot understand why I'm here. You cannot get the kingdom of God unless you're born again. Now, it's interesting, isn't it, how misunderstood that term is in our culture. It's interesting how belittled it has become. It's interesting how people just sort of delight in making fun of people who claim to have had an experience of being born again or having a spiritual experience of some kind. I was sent this interesting little clip from Bill Maher who's, you know, a pretty well-known guy out there. I mean, he was on quite a few cable outlets and so on and done different programs. And he was just recently quoted as saying this on February the 18th. You know, he says, we're a nation that's unenlightened because of religion. I believe that. I think that religion stops people from thinking. I think it justifies crazies. I think religion is a neurological disorder. When people say to me, you hate America. I don't hate America. I love America. I'm just embarrassed that it's been taken over by people like evangelicals, by people who do not believe in science and rationality. You're in trouble, Adam. And so am I. And so are a lot of thinking people, if that's true. One of the discoveries I made as a student, I was a chemistry major in college and I had sort of a rational mind, the whole thing. I discovered that the smartest people that I ever studied were Christian theologians who had wrestled to the ground the cosmological issues of why we are here and what life is about. And I just challenge any of you who think, well, you know, this is, you know, to be a Christian, you put your mind in the shelf. It's actually the opposite. To be a sincere follower of Christ engages all the senses and all the resources and all the faculties of your mind. God is the God of our mind and our heart. And it's just sad. The reason he doesn't, I mean, and this made me chuckle, made me mad. And then I realized, well, the reason is because he doesn't see it. He's not been born again. Now, Nicodemus quickly says, well, wait a minute. Let's read it. How can a man be born when he is old? Now, what is he thinking about? In what realm is he thinking? Physically, right? He's thinking, how can he go back in the womb and start over again? Well, of course, that's not what Jesus is talking about. He's talking about this. He's basically saying that the human condition is so fractured, sin has so twisted the DNA of the spirit that the only solution is that the spirit has to die as we know it and be born again by the power of God. And the wonderful truth of this is, and we could look at those next verses and pull them all apart. He talks about being born of the spirit, born of water, and I'd love to go down that road a little bit. But here's all you need to know. All you need to know is that you can be born again by the power of God. You can find yourself with eyes to see what God is doing if you're willing to simply say, Lord, I want to be born again. I need to have a renewing of my spirit. I need to be made new on the inside. See, today, there's so many people out there that are saying spiritual life is about greater virtue and increasing tolerance. And we're just being pulled into this dialogue about all the other religions of the world and all their virtues. And we're told that if we just keep doing more things that'll help us understand the continuum of the faiths of the world. And we're talked about and told about, well, you know, if you just get more meditative and more contemplative, and you do all this. And you know what? The reason why Jesus was so condemning of the Pharisees is this, and I'll use a little bit of a picture here. It was like the Pharisees and like the mystics of today keep saying, just keep adding all these things to the horizontal pursuits of your life. Just keep adding to the, you know, the virtues that you pursue in your life and to the disciplines that you pursue and to the ways that you work toward being a better person and all these horizontal activities that seem to be good and feel right, but don't change the fundamental thing that's wrong with you. Friends, listen, please. Many people spend their entire lives in churches like Adam described, and this is where they go. They go horizontal. And at the end of their lives, they don't have any more connection to God because what Jesus says is, you don't need more of this. He said, what you really need is you need an invasion that's vertical. You need to have the power of God come down. And that's exactly what the cross of Jesus does. It invades the horizontal existence that we all know with the direct power of God and enables us to tap into life in a way we've never known. That's what we're talking about. And by the way, we're not just talking about it for those of you who've never been in the faith. We're talking about it for those of you who maybe have slipped into a horizontal oriented existence. Make no mistake, when you hear the word revival, what does that mean to you? Someone that was alive and what? Is made alive again. A revival is, I'm alive and now I'm alive again. And the reason why we get old and stale and dry, the reason why some of you have not really sensed the power or presence of God in the last months or maybe even years is because you need a vertical invasion of the power of God into your little horizontal life. You need to be born again, again and again. Nicodemus didn't understand that. So he chose to hang around on the periphery and just sort of see what was going on. Months go by. Let's follow it. Months go by. He's watching all these different things. He sees the miracles of Jesus going on. He sees him feed the 5,000. He heals the man at the pool who'd been crippled for 38 years. He hears about Jairus, the ruler's daughter. He hears the teachings that Jesus gives and all these different things about him being sent from God and having life and all this. And then turn your outline over. Nicodemus has a moment when he can stand for Jesus. And turn to John 7 now. Here's the second reference to Nicodemus. In John chapter 7, the Pharisees are getting really frustrated at all the people that are following Jesus and they send out some guards on the day of the great feast, feast of the Passover, to tell the guards to bring this Jesus in. We've had enough of him kind of messing up with our plans. And verse 45 of John 7. Here we go. Finally, the temple guards went back to the chief priests and Pharisees who asked them, why didn't you bring him in? And here's what they said. Well, no one has ever spoke the way this man does. You mean he's deceived you also? The Pharisees retorted. Has any of the rulers of the Pharisees believed in him? Notice that. Has any of the rulers? Do you see how pervasive unbelief can be? Fear of man can be. None of the Pharisees were openly believing. Now the Bible tells us that some were secretly believing, but none were openly believing. No. But this mob that knows nothing of the law, they are pointing down at the people, there's a curse on them. Look at this. Verse 50, John 7. Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier, so now we know it's the same guy for sure, and was one of their own number, asked, does our law condemn anyone without first hearing him to find out what he is doing? They were shocked. Nicodemus, are you slipping into his camp? Verse 52. They replied, are you from Galilee too? Well, look into it, and you'll find that a prophet does not come from Galilee. All of a sudden, Nicodemus has moved from just being curious and questioning to being on the fence about who Jesus is. Nicodemus has more doubts about what he was believing than who Jesus is proving to be. And this is an amazing moment because Nicodemus, like many people that you know, had one foot in the religious world and now another foot in discovering that Jesus was the Messiah. And friends, watch now. You cannot go on spiritually with one foot in the world and one foot in the kingdom of God. You cannot sit on the fence and find God for who He really is. You will find yourself in a very uncomfortable position. And one day you'll just get split wide open like a wishbone. Can't do it. I mean, just a little bit later, Nicodemus was around when this guy named Lazarus was raised from the dead. Remember that in John 11? Imagine being at a tomb where a guy had been laid for four days, so much so that they were afraid that he would smell. And Jesus calls this dead man back into life. And here's a moment when, I don't know about you, but if I'd seen that, Lazarus comes walking out and peels off these grave clothes four days after he was dead. I don't know about you, but that would kind of seal the deal on what I believed, okay? I'm with the guy who can raise someone from the dead. I don't really care what he teaches. I mean, isn't that the bottom line? I mean, isn't that what we're all really trying to do is figure out what happens after this life? Turn to your neighbor and say, I'd like to be alive forever. Go ahead, tell him. I'd like to be alive forever. Is that true? Then you need to put your faith in the one, the only one that ever brought someone back from the dead. But even at that, the Pharisees, instead of seeing that for the miracle that it was, they were upset. And if I took you to John 11, I could show you how they began to figure out, well, even at this, we've got to stop this Jesus because he's going to mess up our temple and our nation. Friends, religion, tradition seeks to secure itself and its stuff. And isn't it ironic that in the day in which we live, even here in 2005, in our nation, you know, every major denomination in America is either plateaued or declining in attendance and support. And yet people look at a church like North Way and other churches like us around the nation and they point fingers and they say, well, they're weird and they're doing strange things. And that's actually the saddest commentary of all about the condition of tradition. Now, tradition is not a bad thing if it's appreciated, but it's a horrible thing if all you're doing is looking backwards and saying, well, we're not moving because this is the way we've always done it. That's what Nicodemus was stuck on. He was stuck in the fence. He wasn't moving. The reason why many of you are here is because you have found tradition to be lifeless and dull and boring. When Jesus said, I've come that you might have life and have it abundantly. And the difficulty is that it costs you something to leave that tradition. I was with a young couple about nine months ago. They had a lovely family and they met me in the lobby and they said, you know, we really like this church, Jay. And we've been coming, we're thinking about doing the new member's custody. They said, but our whole family, and they named the kind of church they were part of. Our whole family is this traditional background. And here's what they said. If they knew we were coming here, they would probably, this is where they used, they would probably disown us. And I had this moment when I had to say, well, yeah, I just, I wouldn't upset my family then. I just, and I couldn't say that. Would that have been right to say that? I said to them, well, I have a great deal of compassion for what you're going through, but you've got to follow what's in your heart. You've got to go where there's words of life. But you see the power of fear is very strong. And it's been a few months, probably since Thanksgiving, since I've seen that family here. Because we want that approval. We want people to say, well, I approve of what you're doing. Final place we see Nicodemus on your outline is this. Months pass, probably not too many months. And we find Nicodemus standing at the foot of the cross of Jesus Christ. He's now gone through his terrible passion, his brutal beating, his unthinkable crucifixion. And in John 19, turn there with me, please. John 19, 38. The last reference in the Bible of Nicodemus is right here. John 19, 38. It says later, Joseph of Ari