Three brothers all got married about the same time and were sitting together bragging about how they had given their new wives duties. The first man had married a woman from Oklahoma and had told her that she was going to do dishes and house cleaning.
It took a couple days, but on the third day he came home to a clean house and dishes washed and put away.
The second man had married a woman from Louisiana. He had given his wife orders that she was to do all the cleaning, dishes, and the cooking.
The first day he didn't see any results, but the next day he saw it was better.
By the third day, he saw his house was clean, the dishes were done, and there was a huge dinner on the table.
The third man had married a girl from Texas. He told her that her duties were to keep the house cleaned, dishes washed, laundry washed and hot meals on the table for every meal. He said the first day he didn't see anything, the second day he didn't see anything, but by the third day some of the swelling had gone down and he could see a little out of his left eye - enough to fix himself a bite to eat and load the dishwasher.
Don’t you hate when people brag? And I will admit, in Texas we do a lot of bragging. You’ve heard it said that it ain’t bragging if it’s true, right? No. It’s still bragging and nobody wants to hear that. Do you know what people brag about? They brag about whatever is most important to them. If you want to know what you or anybody else thinks is most important in this world, listen to what is bragged about.
If I were to ask you today what is the most important thing in your life, you might say something about God or Jesus or going to Heaven or something like that. Those are good churchy answers but if I were to ask you at the store in the middle of the week, would your answer be different?
Scripture warns us in several places about bragging. Proverbs 27:2 says, “Let another man praise you, and not your own mouth; a stranger, and not your own lips.” Matthew 6:2 says, “So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.”
But there is one place that says we have something to brag about and I want you to see it. Turn to the Old Testament book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah is between Isaiah and Lamentations in a part of your Bible that probably doesn’t see much daylight and probably not the first passage you think of on Easter but with God’s help, I think we can tie it all together. We are finishing up our series on apologetics today. Hopefully we have given you some ammunition to use as you talk to your unbelieving and skeptical friends and neighbors about the Lord.
While almost nothing spiritual can be proven mathematically or scientifically, we have shown why we believe that the universe was created by God, that Jesus is the only way to Heaven and why we believe that scripture is the inerrant Word of God among other things. So, building on those foundations, we will show what we believe and why we believe it when it comes to the subject of God’s existence.
Just like believing in Jesus or the Bible or almost anything else, if somebody just doesn’t want to believe in God, you are wasting your time arguing and debating with them about His existence. But if an unbeliever has an open mind and is willing to accept some answers that will change their life, then Jeremiah 9:23-24 is a good place to start. So, let’s do that right now.
Now, if you read this passage to an unbeliever and they continue to not believe what Jeremiah said, don’t worry. It is hardly the first time that somebody disregarded what Jeremiah said. In fact, in forty years of preaching and prophesying what God wanted Jeremiah to say, not one person believed him. Not one person was saved. Not one person repented or had their lives changed so don’t be surprised if somebody receives this with a hard heart and a stiff neck. Everybody else did. But, like Jeremiah, we have to keep preaching it and being obedient because we also know that God’s Word will never come back void. (Isaiah 55:11)
Jeremiah 9:23-24 says, “This is what the LORD says: "Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or the strong man boast of their strength or the rich man boast of their riches, 24but let the one who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight," declares the LORD.”
Now, I don’t know about you but I think that sounds like big talk. Jeremiah says to brag about knowing and understanding God. That’s serious bragging even for a proud Texan. In fact, I thought we couldn’t understand God. I thought God said His ways were above our ways and His thoughts higher than ours as it says in Isaiah 55:9. Can both be true? Let’s look at it closer.
Those two words, “understand” and “know” mean basically the same thing as Jeremiah spoke them in ancient Hebrew. The original word for understand is “shakak” and the word for know is “yada.” They both mean to observe or to see, to pay attention to, to ponder and in doing so, to prosper.
Now, if scripture is true (and we hopefully showed why we believe it is absolutely true and inerrant last week) then how could you possibly know and understand or pay attention to something or someone that didn’t exist? Jeremiah tells us to pay attention to God. Understand Him. Know Him and in doing so, you will prosper. Now, don’t get too anxious about that word “prosper.” We will talk about that in a minute. For now, let’s think about how we know that God exists.
I would say that first off, we know God exists because the Bible that we know is true tells us He exists even right here in this passage. In fact, God Himself gives us one of His many “I Am” statements in verse 24. God says, “I Am the Lord.” If scripture is true then God exists because God says He exists.
An atheist was rowing on the Loch Ness in Scotland one day, when suddenly the Loch Ness monster attacked and grabbed him from his boat. He panicked and shouted "God, please help me!", and suddenly, the monster and everything around him just froze. A voice from the heavens boomed "You say you don't believe in me, but now you're asking for my help?" The atheist looked up and said, "Well, ten seconds ago I didn't believe in the Loch Ness Monster either."
Some people wouldn’t believe in God even if He spoke to them but God tells us right here that He exists. Secondly, we can know that God exists is because nature declares He exists. Romans 1:20 is so plain when it points out that “since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities-his eternal power and divine nature-have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.” We can “see” God at work in nature. We can “see” Him and observe Him and pay attention to Him when we see a sunrise or sunset or when we see a flower or a newborn baby.
If you could talk to a person in the deepest, darkest part of Africa who has never heard the name Jesus or formally been taught anything about God, they would almost certainly tell you that there is some kind of higher power just because of what they see around them in nature. If something is created, there has to be a Creator.
The third reason we know God exists is because man’s heart declares that He exists. You don’t have to raise your hand but how many of you were not raised in church and went through most of your life trying your best to do what you thought would satisfy you? You tried drugs, booze, sex, rock ‘n roll and maybe even driving a Ford and nothing satisfied you.
In all of that, you knew there had to be something more. There had to be something else, something better. Finally, one day something happened that made you turn to God and you found the satisfaction you were looking for. You have heard it said before that there is a God-shaped hole in your heart and nothing else will fill it but when it is filled, you know it.
One last and best reason that we know God exists is because He wants us to know Him. There is a view of God that, while acknowledging that God truly exists, says that He is distant and removed from creation. He started creation, wound up the clock, and then left. He is sort of an absentee father. This is known as deism. But nothing could be further from the truth. Those Hebrew words translated “know” and “understand” in Jeremiah 9 mean to have an intimate and personal knowledge of. We look at, observe and have personal knowledge of God.
What a mind-blowing thought! I understand why some people want to explain that away because it is hard to believe. It is hard to believe because we can’t understand why holy God would want to have a relationship with us. We can’t believe He would want us to know Him and fellowship with Him. And do you know how we know that we know that God wants to have a relationship with us? Because He sent His Son Jesus to provide the way to do it.
If you still have your Bibles handy, turn to the Gospel of John, chapter 20. We don’t know a lot about Mary Magdalene. She is mentioned several times in all the Gospels but we don’t know a lot of details about her. She obviously loved Jesus and was one of the few who was around to show it in His life, death, burial and resurrection. She had spent years watching Him, observing Him, paying attention to Him and pondering what He said and taught.
But even she didn’t understand why He had to die. She was crushed. If you have lost a close loved one, you know what feels like having a lung pulled out when they die. This was how Mary was that Sunday morning as she went to the tomb of Jesus. She didn’t understand. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. The trials were a sham. They were illegal. Everybody knew it and yet they still pronounced Him guilty and killed Him on a shameful cross.
If we can attempt to put ourselves in Mary’s shoes we have to understand that her grief was absolutely overwhelming. She couldn’t eat. She couldn’t sleep. She wasn’t thinking straight. All she could do was cry. But first thing Sunday morning, as soon as she could, she made her way to the tomb. She just wanted to pay her respects and remember her friend but when she gets there she sees the worst has happened. It looks like somebody had rolled the big stone away from the tomb and when she looked inside, it’s obvious that somebody has stolen the body.
Can’t you imagine? Now she’s sobbing. She can’t breathe. The pain is more than she can handle. Maybe you have been there. Let’s pick it up in John 20:10-18. Then the disciples went back to where they were staying. 11Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. 13They asked her, "Woman, why are you crying?" "They have taken my LORD away," she said, "and I don't know where they have put him." 14At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. 15He asked her, "Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?" Thinking he was the gardener, she said, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him." 16Jesus said to her, "Mary." She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, "Rabboni!" (which means "Teacher"). 17Jesus said, "Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, 'I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'" 18Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: "I have seen the LORD!" And she told them that he had said these things to her.
"I have seen the LORD!" She had spent years with Him, listening, watching, observing but now she can truly say she has “seen” Him. She understands Him now and is now prospering for it. Do you remember how the words in the passage in Jeremiah tell us to know and understand God and if we do we will prosper? This is what prospering looks like.
It is what Job said in the last chapter of his book (Job 42:5) after his long ordeal and having everything taken away from him but knowing in his heart that there was still a God. He said, “My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.” He wasn’t talking about seeing God physically. He knew God existed like Mary Magdalene knew God existed because they had seen Him work in their lives in personal and intimate ways.
We prosper when we truly see God through His Son Jesus. We may have everything taken away from us. We may lose our best friend. We may contract an unseen virus or any number of other bad things may happen to us but it is always in the bad times that we are able to truly see God. When we understand that Easter is not for bunnies and egg hunts and pictures and big hats (okay, nobody wears big hats anymore anyway) we start to see that Easter means Jesus is alive and well and provides a way for us to have a relationship with and spend eternity with God the Father in Heaven. That is prospering.
How do we know that God exists? I can’t prove it mathematically or scientifically, at least not in a way that will convince someone who doesn’t want to believe. But I know because my lighthouse in the storm, my Bible, tells me that Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life and no man gets to the Father except through Him. (John 14:6)
Because there is an Easter, we celebrate Christmas. Because there is an Easter, we celebrate every Sunday. Because there is an Easter, because Jesus rose up alive out of that grave and defeated death and Hell and sin and Satan, I can have a relationship with God. I can have forgiveness of my sin. I can have peace and joy in this life and assurance of eternal life in Heaven with Him and I celebrate that every day and I say with Mary and Job and Jeremiah and every other true believer, I have seen God!
How about you? Have you seen Him? Again, I don’t mean physically. I mean have you seen Him in a way that you know that you know that he is real and is at work in your life? Have you gone through the rough times and come out on the other side by His grace and mercy with a renewed passion for Him, prospering in this life? You can.
Let’s bow our heads and pray right now as the music plays. If you have that relationship with Him, just spend a minute thanking Him for what Easter means to you. If you don’t, then right where you are, go to God in prayer and tell Him just like you would tell a friend that you need forgiveness. Tell Him truthfully that you want to turn away from that sinful lifestyle and want to turn to Him, believing in His name and in His power that you can. Do that right now.
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