About This Guide: This weekly groups guide, “Life to the Full,” is designed as a companion to our Eastertide / Pentecost 2022 teaching series, fostering discussion, study, and prayer, especially in a group setting. Join a group for a meaningful way to connect to our community.
exploring Lies
Teaching Text: John 8:19-47
Then they asked him, “Where is your father?”
“You do not know me or my Father,” Jesus replied. “If you knew me, you would know my Father also.” He spoke these words while teaching in the temple courts near the place where the offerings were put. Yet no one seized him, because his hour had not yet come.
Once more Jesus said to them, “I am going away, and you will look for me, and you will die in your sin. Where I go, you cannot come.”
This made the Jews ask, “Will he kill himself? Is that why he says, ‘Where I go, you cannot come’?”
But he continued, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am he, you will indeed die in your sins.”
“Who are you?” they asked.
“Just what I have been telling you from the beginning,” Jesus replied. “I have much to say in judgment of you. But he who sent me is trustworthy, and what I have heard from him I tell the world.”
They did not understand that he was telling them about his Father. So Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me. The one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what pleases him.” Even as he spoke, many believed in him.
To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
They answered him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?”
Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are Abraham’s descendants. Yet you are looking for a way to kill me, because you have no room for my word. I am telling you what I have seen in the Father’s presence, and you are doing what you have heard from your father.”
“Abraham is our father,” they answered.
“If you were Abraham’s children,” said Jesus, “then you would do what Abraham did. As it is, you are looking for a way to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do such things. You are doing the works of your own father.”
“We are not illegitimate children,” they protested. “The only Father we have is God himself.”
Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me?Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”
Themes
Consider these themes and ask your group what else they see in the passage:
Lies
Deceit
The Devil
Freedom
Presence
Take a moment of silence and think about these questions:
Name the worries and distractions you may have right now.
Tell God how they worry you and ask him to lift the burden they are off your shoulders. Entrust the most significant parts of your life to him.
Confess any hopelessness and invite him to bring hope.
Formation
Thoughts and notes you can use for discussion:
[This story] is about a man facing a mob. Some of their leaders and opinion-formers have already decided that he is leading Israel astray and ought to be killed. Several of them are ready to get on with the job immediately. A party had already been sent to arrest him, but had failed to do so. The crowd in front of him now were ready to stone him. This is no gentle, devotional discussion of deep personal religious truth, set within a framework of civility and mutual respect: this is a man facing a crowd set upon lynching him, and bravely speaking up against their hypocrisy. NT WRIGHT
THIS CONVERSATION
makes us double take at Jesus
not only is it not a nice religious or philosophy debate
it’s more like trial or an hostile interview outside a courthouse with an accused criminal
there is death coming for Jesus (on the human level beaus of conversations like this), there is destruction coming to Jerusalem and the temple
they call him a bastard / he says they are children of the devil
Christianity, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important. C.S. Lewis
He is saying - if you want to know true freedom you have to know the son
without the Son you will live in various expressions of the same type of slavery
he is saying their really is a devil - as absurd as that may sound to you modern educated ears
he is giving us insights into the devil’s project and mode of operating from the beginning
he is saying their are lies that get entrenched in our hearts and in our society and we need freedom from them
This is an argument about where Jesus comes from and where he gets his authority and if he should be trusted or killed.
And in it he says there is a DEVIL, and the DEVIL’s way is to lie and to try and shape the world and our lives through those lies and the way to FREEDOM IS THROUGH TRUTH AND SPECIFICALLY THAT TRUTH EMBODIED IN THE PERSON OF JESUS.
HOW DO WE LIVE LIFE TO THE FULL? What stands in our way? And this week is kind of a framework message because one of the primary things that stands in our way is LIES
SO….JESUS SAYS… there is a DEVIL, and the DEVIL’s way is to lie and to try and shape the world and our lives through those lies and the way to FREEDOM IS THROUGH TRUTH AND SPECIFICALLY THAT TRUTH EMBODIED IN THE PERSON OF JESUS.
So really quick THE DEVIL - are you serious? yes
An actual spiritual being created by God but living in rebellion who has real and wide ranging influence in the world
The devil was created by God - so it not God’s equal rival - but his creation in rebellion
he was perhaps involved in worship leading in heaven
he fell from heaven through pride and rebellion against
he was perhaps involved in testing humans for their spiritual formation (in job)
but we got way from that into straight up temptation and deception
he is a deceiver - his main way of operating is lies - that is his native tongue
he is involved in temptation
“Jesus came “to destroy the devil’s work.” To bind “the strong man” and set humanity free. He did this first through his defeat of the devil in the desert, then through his teaching and exorcisms, and finally through his death and resurrection and exaltation, in which he “disarmed the powers and authorities” and “made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” JOHN MARK COMER
“For Jesus, the secular theories that attempt to explain evil as simply a lack of education, inadequate wealth redistribution, Marxist power analysis, or even the toxicity of religion gone bad all fall short of explaining reality. The only way to make sense of evil in all its malevolence—from large, global systems of evil, such as systemic racism or economic colonialism, to much smaller, human-scale evil, such as our inability to stop our self-destructive drinking or hold back biting comments toward our friends—is to see an animating force behind it, adding fuel to the proverbial fire. Dividing humanity against itself in a kind of societal suicide.” JOHN MARK COMER
The three main categories of resistance to God and His Kingdom in the world are summarized in Scripture as:
The FLESH our internal desires to be our own god and go our own way
The WORLD the systems of the world that prop up lies and damage our souls
THE DEVIL the lies and influence of this enemy of our souls
DECEPTIVE IDEAS —-> DISORDERED DESIRES —-> NORMALIZED LIFE AWAY FROM GOD
Deceptive ideas - LIES
LIES - a statement or depiction of unreality - something that does not accord with reality
The devil can’t make us do anything as followers of Jesus.29 We have to choose it. To get us to choose evil, our enemy has to fool us into walking down a path other than the one Jesus laid down for us, thinking it will lead us to happiness. His primary way of doing this is through illusion. One way to think about temptation is to see all temptation as the appeal to believe a lie, to believe an illusion about reality. JOHN MARK COMER
Examples of lies:
Busyness is equal to value and importance
Consent is all that’s needed for casual sex not to be damaging
The more money and possessions I have the happier I will be
Selfish indulgence can lead to inner peace
Revenge violence can resolve a problem
“I can’t trust my wife; she’ll cheat on me just like my mom cheated on my dad.”
Good things don’t happen to me, so why even try to be successful?
I can’t say or do anything that will make people upset with me.
My best days are all behind me.
“If anyone actually knew me, they would reject me.”
Which of these do you feel like are more prevalent in your thinking and belief?
“What’s been passed down from the postmodern heyday is sarcasm, cynicism, a manic ennui, suspicion of all authority, suspicion of all constraints on conduct, and a terrible penchant for ironic diagnosis of unpleasantness instead of an ambition not just to diagnose and ridicule but to redeem. You’ve got to understand that this stuff has permeated the culture. It’s become our language; we’re so in it we don’t even see that it’s one perspective, one among many possible ways of seeing. Postmodern irony’s become our environment.” DAVID FOSTER WALLACE
“Our [environment] is one in which a battle is raging between truth and lies, and truth is losing. Disinformation—or in the language of Scripture, deception—is at the root of almost every single problem we face in our society and our souls.” JOHN MARK COMER
The Lie of the Neutrality of the World
The Lie that What You See and Perceive is all there is
The Lie that Coping is Thriving
The Lie of Reputation as Life
The Lie of Fear as Wisdom
THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CONFRONTS LIES AND THE LIFE OF LIES
WITH BREAKTHROUGH AND HABITS
Jesus breaking the power of lies - by offering us a true look at reality in his life and teaching
Jesus as a lens to see the world - the Kingdom God and God’s promises
Jesus promise of Gods presence - salvation offers us forgiveness and friendship
MERCY and UNION
Look at the temptation of Jesus as and example of BREAKTHROUGH and HABITS
Surrender - Identity - Empowerment - these are often found in breakthrough moments
Prayer - Scripture - Dependance - these are the habits of Jesus life
LIES ARE NOT PRIMARILY REMOVED - THEY ARE REPLACED
TO DO: Choose one lie and write down what you imaging a replacement truth might be.
Love
Read these notes and discuss the questions below:
Spiritual practices for this series: Gratitude and Generosity
During this series we will explore and practice together aspects of these two practices. It begins within our own hearts, cultivating Gratitude in our own hearts, yet it does not stop there but ultimately overflows and results in the practice of acts of generosity.
Gratitude: Our world tells us incessantly how much we lack. Every ad, social media and our hearts alone are huge contributors to us believing a narrative that we dont have enough and that God has not been faithful.
Make a list of 10 things in your life you are grateful for.
Mention them all to God in an expression of that gratitude.
Generosity: Often we say or subconsciously believe that we don't have enough to be generous with, and that It will leave me lacking if I am generous. Our world then convinces us to hoard, to hold on, to self preserve.
The Kingdom of God is different from this. King Solomon describes the way the kingdom of God works in this way: One person gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty. Proverbs 11:24
As an Act of Faith:
Look at that list of blessings in your life and see if there is any way you can use any of those to bless others.
This might bring fear or anxiety to you as you need those thing. Here are a few thoughts:
You were given those things in the first place. They are gifts.
When we are generous we share in the nature of God
God is far more generous than we can ever be.
There is great joy in letting go of things we try hold onto.
Pray for one another in the group.
