Michigan Camp Meeting 2016: The Harvest is Great

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Michigan Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Personal Encounters with Jesus

Doug Batchelor

1. A Cold Confession

2. A Tree of Life: Zacchaeus

3. Seeing Is Believing: The Man Born Blind

4. The Secret Christian: Nicodemus

5. Finding Living Water: The Woman at The Well

Well, I'd like to have you turned with me to a familiar verse in the Bible.

Who knows what the most often thought of verse is in the Bible?

It's actually Genesis 3 where he said, I was naked so I hid myself.

John chapter 3, And I want to start from the beginning.

Actually, you know what the most often quoted verse is?

Because a lot of lost people in the world know that verse.

There was a man of the Pharisees whose name was Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.

Now, the name Nicodemus means victory of the people.

You've probably heard of Nike shoes and Nike means victory in Greek and his name is related.

His name is only mentioned 5 times in the Bible.

All 5 times are found in the book of John.

1 commentary in history tells us that Nicodemus, and this is coming from Adam Clark's commentary, was the son of Gorion.

He's mentioned in the Jewish writings he lived during the time of Vespasian.

And it's said that he was so rich he could support all the inhabitants of Jerusalem for 10 years.

He wasn't just a Pharisee and they were the most religious and fastidious and zealous of the law.

But he was a ruler meaning he was part of the Sanhedrin.

Later in the Gospel of John, during 1 of their Sanhedrin was the 70 elders that were the Supreme Court for the Jewish nation.

During 1 of their hearings, Nicodemus speaks up in defense of Jesus.

He has been impressed that there's something extraordinary about Jesus There's something honest in his heart.

And so He evidently has a relationship with the apostle John through common relatives.

You remember during the crucifixion, John says he was akin to someone that kept the door for the high priest, so they let John go in to the judgment hall.

He went all the way in, Peter stayed outside and hung out with the servants and ultimately denied Jesus.

But so John had this connection and maybe through John, that's why it's in his gospel, John arranged for a secret private interview.

Now the reason Nicodemus wanted to meet with Jesus at night, it was hard to see very well back in Bible times at night, their artificial light was lamp light.

When Judas came to betray Jesus, they said you better go right up to him and kiss him because it's dark and we're not going to know which 1 it is.

So he wanted to meet secretly because Jesus at this point was very unpopular among the other Pharisees in the Sanhedrin.

They were already beginning to plot his death.

And he thought, look, if I'm going to meet with Jesus, I'd like to talk to him alone because it could be bad for my reputation.

Do you know there's no such thing as a secret Christian?

Because if you try to be a secret Christian, your secrecy will destroy your Christianity.

Or if you're a genuine Christian, your real Christianity will destroy the secrecy.

So if you think you're getting by as a secret Christian, you're probably not a Christian.

Because a real Christian has a hard time keeping it secret.

First thing that happens when a person is born again is they wanna tell somebody else.

So Nicodemus, he's kind of riding the fence, comes to Jesus at night, and he begins to shower Jesus with platitudes.

He said, rabbi, calling Jesus a teacher, we know who's the we in this story.

We know that you are a teacher come from God, for no 1 can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.

And Jesus said, look, if you don't believe me, believe for the miracle's sake.

And even in our study last night about that blind man, blind from birth, had his eyes open.

And the blind man said, we know that someone has to be from God if they can do something that is an act of creation like this.

And before he can really get to his first question, Jesus gets right to the heart of the matter.

And you read in the previous chapter, John chapter 2, it tells us there that Christ said, He did not commit, and this is verse 24, John 2, Jesus did not commit himself unto them because He knew all men.

And he needed not that any should testify of man, for he knew what was in man.

1 of the things that makes God, God, is because God can read your heart.

The devil can tempt you and stand back and look at your expressions, But the Bible says God and God only knows the thoughts of men's hearts.

And 1 evidence that Jesus is God the Son is because he frequently knew what people were thinking.

He did it at the feast in Simon's house because he knew Simon was thinking this man, if he was a prophet, would know who and what manner of woman this is that's touching him, for she's a sinner.

When he sat in Peter's house, and that paralyzed man was let down through the roof, and he said, son, your sins are forgiven, Then those who around him reasoned among themselves, who is this man that speaks blasphemies?

And before Nicodemus even got to the question, Jesus got to the heart of the answer.

He said, most assuredly, I say to you, unless 1 is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Now Jesus didn't say, it's helpful if you're born again.

Jesus didn't say it will improve your odds if you're born again.

Jesus did not say it is recommended that you're born again.

Jesus said it is absolutely essential that you are born again because if you are not born again, you cannot enter the kingdom of God.

So if you're to evaluate your preparedness for Christ's coming, the most important litmus test would be, have you been born again?

Number of years ago, the Gallup Survey Company put that question to a number of Americans that profess Christianity, and only 30% of professed Christians said, I am born again.

Matter of fact, Jimmy Carter was the first American president being a Christian that said, I am a born again Christian.

Up then it was considered, oh, you know, that sort of sensational feeling, These kinesthetic Christians all talk about the new birth.

Jesus said, unless you're born again, do you know that you're born again?

How many of you know you've been born once?

I just wanna make sure you're all still with me.

But the Lord says you need to be born twice.

If you're only born once, you will die twice.

But If you are born twice, you'll die once.

You may not die at all if you're alive when Jesus comes.

When Chad and Carrie McCartney say that their infant daughter, Macy Hope, was born again, they're not referring to religion.

Their miracle baby really was born twice.

During Carrie's 23rd week of pregnancy, the couple went to their obstetrician's office for a simple ultrasound.

They wanted to know was it a boy or a girl?

But at that time, they discovered that McCartney's baby girl had a non-cancerous but deadly tumor growing off of her tailbone.

The fast-growing tumor was robbing vital blood from their baby, and the doctors were sure without medical intervention, their unborn child had no chance of survival.

It was going to rob all the blood from the baby.

Series

Personal Encounters with Jesus

4. The Secret Christian: Nicodemus

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

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Plenary

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