ICHTHUS - Sinless, Human, God

More Icthus: YEAR ONE – ICHTHUS – SAVIOR Supply you'll need: TUBE OF EPOXY INTRODUCTION We’ve been looking at the old Christian symbol, the fish, to help us understand some very important things about Jesus. Today we’re going to pull them together by looking at the final word “Savior”, and I think you’ll see that all that we’ve learned so far – that Jesus is the Son of God and that he was fully human – are absolutely necessary for him to be our Savior. Let’s first look at the word Savior. Let me read you a sentence, and tell me what you think the word “savior” means in it. As the fireman pulled the woman out of the burning building and safely down the latter to an ambulance, she began to cry and said – you’re my savior! So some of the important ideas of savior are: Rescuer someone in real trouble You know from all we learned this fall that the greatest danger that you and I, and every human being is the danger of eternity without God. Sometimes that is called condemnation, or hell. That’s what we have earned for ourselves when we sin. And the Bible is clear that every human being is a sinner – well, except just one human being – and we’ll talk about that in a minute. But you look around this room, to both kids and adults, and we are all sinners. Sin is anything we think, say or do that breaks God’s word. Now God would have been a totally just judge if he just made us take the consequences of our sins. That’s justice. You get what you deserve. That’s life. Don’t do your homework – what happens? Rob a bank? What happens? And justice is a good thing. Imagine if evil happened and there was nothing to stop it! What if someone hurt you horribly and you had no hope that that person would ever have to face the consequences of what he or she did. That would be a horrible world to live in! But God is just, and he promises that he sees everything that happens, and he will judge every evil deed and will punish evil. Now on one hand, that’s great. But on the other hand, that’s a hard truth. Sin isn’t just what other people do – it’s what I do. But there is a wonderful, and totally unexpected part of God and that is that He is amazingly merciful. He is just, but he also finds a way for mercy to happen. And we see that wonderful mercy of God most clearly in (point to IXTHUS) Jesus, who is Savior. Now what if I – Mary McCormack - said to you – Andrea, I love you so much. I know you’re a sinner, and that God must punish sin. I know that the wages of sin is death. But because I love you, I will rescue you and I will take all the punishment for your sins. What’s wrong with trying to do this? • I have my own sins to die for • It’s a nice idea, but it’s my idea, not God’s – I’m powerless to do this So a sinner cannot die for a sinner. So that means the only way some kind of switch or substitute could work is if God put a plan into motion and found a substitute who is acceptable – someone who is a human and is not a sinner. That kind of narrows down who might be eligible, doesn’t it? That kind of eliminates me, and you and you and you. We humans were helpless to help ourselves. (Hebrews 4:15) But if Jesus were just human and sinless, how could he possibly bear the condemnation of not just one person’s sins but the sins of every human being who has ever lived? The only way Jesus could do this is if he was so mighty, so powerful. Here’s a simple example – I have a special kind of glue here called epoxy. Epoxy is really really strong glue. But it has an unusual thing about it. You can see from these 2 tubes that there are 2 parts to the glue. You create this strong glue, you have to mix these 2 parts, and you can only do that when you’re ready to use the glue. Now this epoxy mix is so super strong that it can actually hold 4,000 lbs. If I tried to use just one of these parts of the glue to hold something, it wouldn’t work at all. The two parts have to be mixed to create the super glue The only way that Jesus could bear our sins away was if he was a special mix, kind of like the epoxy. He had to be human – but a one-of-a-kind human – one who never sinned. But he also had to be God. That’s exactly why Jesus came to earth. Does this mean it was easy for Jesus? (How do you know it wasn’t – Garden of Gethsemane suffering, truly human and felt pain, what must it have been like for God the Father to pour out all the punishment for sins upon Jesus?) Was Jesus able to take away the punishment for my sins, your sins, everybody’s sins? Jesus tells us himself. Look at John 19:30 – Jesus’ final words tell us that Jesus said, it is finished. Here’s another way we know that Jesus did take the sins of the world away – his Resurrection is proof that he was stronger than sin and death. So first of all, as we finish with ICHTHUS, I want you to think about God’s great gift of Jesus when you see that fish in different places. I also want you to remember how this sign began – as a way for Christians who lived long ago to identify other Christians in a time when they risked their lives to believe in Jesus. Finally, I want to ask you – have you put your trust in Jesus as the one who alone can take away your sins.