FHBC Sermon Notes

Jesus is here to execute God's plan, but that plan can only be executed in God's timing.
1. Sometimes God uses harmful effects to keep us in our present ministry.
We all have a ministry. As christians we are all called to minister.
V1. Jesus did not go about in Judea because the Jews seeking to kill him. He knows that he is ultimately going to be killed, to be killed on a cross. Throughout the gospel here He has a keen sense of the direction He is going.
V.11 The Jews are seeking with zeal to find him at the feast to kill him.
We are a fickle people, always looking for the next best thing. If God does not move us himself, we need to be about ministering, working to please the Father where we are at, not dreaming of what we wish we were doing.
2. Sometimes we tempted to deviate from God's purposes for our own selfish motivations. V9.
Feast of Booths - An eight day feast in late September and early October. It was to remind the people of the time that they spent in the desert, and the abundant fruits that God blessed them with after saving them from the desert.
One of three major feasts, the feast was a great gathering for the nation. Jesus' brothers are trying to convince him to go and make himself know. Like the presidential campaigns that are starting this year, they wanted him to announce.
Why are they trying to convince him to go?
A. There had been a large exodus of disciples. (John 6) Figuring if he went elsewhere he could get his ministry, his following going again. Sometimes more is not more. He could make the whole world follow him, but if there were no change of heart, if they were made new, then what would be the benefit.
B. This would have been a PR boon for him, because it would have been the biggest stage he would have been on to date.
C. Jerusalem was the center foe Judaism. If he wanted to have a great effect, then he would have to go there. "Show yourself to the world," they say.
Jesus does eventually show himself to the world, not as they wanted and suggested, but as a sacrifice for many, bleeding on a cross and risen from a grave. His cross would draw people to himself, not platitudes and miracles and signs.
How often God puts on our hearts that mission that desire? How often do we rush forward to do it on our own strength in our own timing? My I wait on you Father. Help me to know your time.