Our scripture reading for this morning is Psalm 138 verses 1 through 8 that Elder Brian will do for us. This is the word of the only true and living God and I am reading from the book of Psalms And this is Psalm 138 in verses 1 through 8. And in the NASB 1995, it is headed as Thanksgiving for the Lord's Faith Favor. I will give you thanks with all my heart. I will sing praises to you before the gods. I will bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your loving kindness and your truth. for you have magnified your word according to all your name. On the day I called, you answered me. You made me bold with strength in my soul. All the kings of the earth will give thanks to you, O Lord, when they have heard the words of your mouth, and they will sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord. For though the Lord is exalted, yet he regards the lowly but the haughty he knows from afar. Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you will revive me. You will stretch forth your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand will save me. The Lord will accomplish what concerns me. Your loving kindness, O Lord, is everlasting. Do not forsake the works of your hands. Amen. Well, today, as I'm sure you all know, is the week of our national, today is a, precedes the national holiday, but it's a Thanksgiving week. And therefore, before we study our text of the Gospel of John this morning, I'm going to relate to you a small part of the history of our nation. And to begin with, I would like to quote you what President Woodrow Wilson said about knowing the history of our nation. And I'll read what he said here and begin this quote. A nation which does not remember what it was yesterday does not know what it is today nor what it is trying to do. And we are trying to do a futile thing if we do not know where we came from or what we have been about. How true that is today, isn't it? We've seen recently, in the last four years, destruction and removal of statues because people object to one or another. We've seen the attempts to erase our history And it's exactly, exactly what the far left progressives have in mind for us, to erase our history, to eliminate the value of family, to indoctrinate our children to believe in a godless society where we're all owned and controlled by the state. We're fully, The aim is to become fully dependent on our government for our well-being. A man-made utopia where the common individual has little or no value. That's what's going on today. So it's good to listen to what Woodrow Wilson had to say because we need to remember and remember and celebrate the day of Thanksgiving. It's our national holiday. Remember the pilgrims who left England moving to Holland for 12 years before they finally chartered two ships to carry them to our eastern shores. Queen Elizabeth was a Roman Catholic, and she insisted that, in England, that no one could preach there without a license, since the church and the state were one. Well, those who followed the Reformed Protestant faith, namely the Puritans, finding it only not difficult, but very dangerous to practice and preach their faith. So those who followed the Reformed faith struggled. And so ultimately, they left the shores of England and moved over to Holland. When When they decided to come over here, they were headed by Governor William Bradford, who wrote about this situation. I want to quote this, a small part of what he wrote. He said, they would not submit to their ceremonies and become slaves to them and their pulpish trash, which have no ground in the word of God, but are relics of that man of sin. They were pretty straightforward in those days, weren't they? They weren't worried about being politically correct. So in June, in June of 1620, the Mayflower, a large vessel of about 180 tons, was chartered by the group. And a man named Weston, who was with that group, kind of laughed at these people chartering such a great large ship. And so he convinced other small groups to charter a smaller vessel, which by the name of Speedwell, and they were to rendezvous at Southampton, England. And finally, in July 21st, 1620, the Pilgrims left their home in Leyden, Holland, to meet up with this full group in England, and they totaled 46 saints. Now, saints were the the puritans, the believers in Christ. 46 saints on the speed wheel, 16 men, 10 women, and 19 children when they arrived at Southampton to meet up with the Mayflower. Now problems arose. Unexpected funds had to be spent to repair this speed wheel and prepare it for this voyage. And so they were grumbling and annoyed because they hadn't anticipated this. August 5th, time is going by here. August 5th, the Mayflower set sail, and the speedboat followed, and there was a total of 120 passengers on board these two ships, and with about 90 on the Mayflower. The speedboat began to leak in the water, and it leaked so bad that they had to turn back for repairs. Not only once, but three times. So the first time, after two weeks, they set sail again. And again, that leaked so bad, they had to go back. And finally, finally, they decided to abandon this leaky old ship and leaving it behind with about 20 passengers and the others boarded the Mayflower. So now the Mayflower is crowded. It's now September 6th in 1620. Once again, excuse me. Once again, they're headed to the New World, and about halfway across the Atlantic, they ran into a tremendous storm. During that storm, where this Mayflower, this heavy ship, was on its rudder and on its bow—you've got to get the terms right here, but anyway—during that storm, the main beam of the Mayflower cracked, and it was in danger of sinking. One of the passengers had loaded up what they called a very large iron screw. I can't imagine what this was. It was some big iron device. They took this screw and propped up the cracked beam with it, reinforced the beam, and they were able to continue their voyage. A lot of difficulties. They could not step on the dry land once they got there. It was early in the morning when the lookout spied land, a very thin shadow of land in the distance. And he, of course, shouted, land ahoy. And one of the people rode after her, and long beating at sea, They had reached the point of Cape Cobb, 98 days out of Southampton. Can you imagine being on that ship that long? Which, by the way, it was cold. It wasn't like a yacht. There was water splashing around. It was cold. They were jammed together. Pretty miserable. There was a whole lot of business to attend to before they reached agreement as to what they were going to be doing once they set foot on ground. And it was at this time on the Mayflower that the Mayflower Compact was authored and signed. That later became known. Excuse me. That later became known. as a great charter of freedom. Did you guys know that? No. You ever read Mayflower Compact? No. Just once. I didn't bring it with me. The Pilgrims experienced a whole lot of difficulty during their first year in the New World, and somewhere between September 21 and November 21 of the following year, They held their first three days of Thanksgiving with about 90 Indians of a tribe called the Wampanoag people, I think it's pronounced. They held this celebration at what is now called Plymouth, Massachusetts. So later, President George Washington declared Thursday, November 26, 1789, a day of public Thanksgiving. So there's a whole lot more to this story, but I wanted to give you sort of a brief view of what happened when these persecuted people, the Puritans, left England, moved to Holland, and then came over here. And what I would recommend to you, if you're interested in history, there's a book, it was kind of ironic, Evelyn and I were up traveling up the coast, west coast, a long time ago now, many years ago now. And we stopped at a little town. And I don't remember if it was in Oregon or California. It was early in the morning. The stores were not open yet. And we were walking down the street. And there was an old bookstore with a kind of an alcove that you walk into. And there was a stand out there that says, something with books for sale, honor system, throw in a dollar, take a book. And so I saw this book and it's called Saints and Strangers by George F. Willison, written in 1945. And it contains a fantastic amount of well-researched history about the Puritans from the time they left England to the time that they came over here and met up with Indians, and the story goes on. But if you're interested, you can find that book online, I believe. And it's a tremendous book. What's the author again? I'm sorry, what? The author's name again. The author's name is George F. Willison. W-I-L-L-I-S-O-N. Copyright 1945. So, with that, have a great Thanksgiving as we remember the roots of our freedoms. Because those are the roots. So, we'll go from there to our study in John. John chapter seven, verses 19 to 24. And today's message is entitled Judging Rightly. Last Sunday we left Jesus in the temple in Jerusalem. He had arrived in Jerusalem about the time the Feast of Booze, or the Feast of Tabernacles, as it's also known, began, and perhaps just a little while afterwards, because he did not want to attract public attention. But now that in the middle of the feast, in the middle of the feast, Jesus decides to go to the temple in Jerusalem, and he begins to teach. And he's being questioned by the religious authorities but not about his teaching. They were amazed at his teaching. He is being questioned, and they're attempting to discredit him because he lacked education under the authority of the respective rabbis. They didn't recognize him. They didn't recognize who he was. In fact, they still haven't allowed him So Jesus then referred to the highest of all authority, and he replied to the Jews, because they were asking him about this, and John 7, 16 says, so Jesus answered and said, my teaching is not mine, but him who sent me. In other words, he's referring to his teacher being God the Father. And Jesus reminds them about their own unwillingness to do the will of God, but instead, Instead, they were seeking their own glory. We can choose to do either the will of God or seek our own glory, and that's what they were doing. In John 7, verses 17 and 18, Jesus goes on, if anyone is willing to do his will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is God or whether I speak for myself. And he who speaks from himself seeks his own glory, but he who is seeking the glory of the one who sent him, he is true and there is no unrighteousness in him. So that brings us up to our text for today, where Jesus reminds the Jews of the fact that they're quick to judge others for the very same things that they themselves do. You ever run into that? quick to judge others for the same things the accuser's doing. You're going to find as we read the text together that Jesus is pointing to the Jews' legalism and the hypocrisy that it breeds. And before we read our text, let me define legalism from a theological standpoint. Legalism is when a person or a group seeks approval by God by depending on strict obedience a moral law including man-made regulations, rituals, ceremonies, rather than faith in Jesus Christ and his love and mercy and grace that was poured out on his people through his crucifixion and resurrection. Basically, legalism is saying, I have to earn my salvation through my works. So let's read our text for today. Jesus continues his discourse of the Jews and they question his authority and his qualifications to teach so John 7 verses 19 through 24 And it begins did not Moses give you the law and yet none of you carries out the law Why do you seek to kill me? The crowd answered you have a demon Who's who seeks to kill you? Jesus answered them I did one deed and you all marveled. For this reason, Moses has given you circumcision, not because it is from Moses, but from the fathers. And on the Sabbath, you circumcise a man. If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses will not be broken, are you angry with me because I made an entire man well on the Sabbath? Then he finishes, do not judge according to appearance. but judge with righteous judgment. So there's something going on here that the Jewish authorities fail to recognize. They believe that they are examining him to discredit him as a teacher, but Jesus is actually examining them. They didn't realize this. He's pointing to their lack of concern for those who are in need of healing along with their hypocrisy. Jesus is exposing them for what they really are. The majority of people in the world do not concern themselves with who Jesus is. They really don't. Some, like a few of the Jews, say he's a good man. Others say he's a good teacher. He was a good healer. He did all these miracles. Still others say Jesus was insane. or he was a myth. You hear that stuff. Or that he never existed. Even Christians sometimes forget his attributes. As God, he knows it. As God, he knows us inside and out. He knows our heart. He knows all the things about us that are hidden, things that remain, what, unrevealed. He knows our smallest and greatest sins. He knows our innermost thoughts, everything about us. We can pretend with others, we can put up a big pretense in this world, but we cannot pretend with Christ. You can't deceive Jesus Christ. So Jesus knew that the Jews' pretense, their self-righteousness, their inability to keep the law they pretended to live under. He knew this. He's confronting him with it. And yet, when Jesus said they wanted to kill him, they simply denied the accusation. Oh, you have a demon. But they were planning to kill him. The Jews at the temple listened to him. knowing he was an excellent teacher, more wisdom than any rabbi, and yet they discredited him because why? Because he lacked an education in their culture. He lacked that diploma. You don't have that diploma? Discredited. They got bogged down by the fact that he healed a man on the Sabbath, which was an irrelevant detail, while ignoring the fact that they would at times break the Sabbath themselves by circumcising a boy on his eighth day of life. The Jews that Jesus spoke to demonstrated a lack of humility when confronted with their hypocrisy. Instead, they accused him of having a demon, proving their unbelief and dishonesty. Unbelief and dishonesty, by the way, go hand in hand. Jews judged Jesus on an outward appearance, a lack of approval of rabbinical education, no diploma, no acceptance. Their judgment proved to be superficial. It's the same today in our modern world. Christianity is judged by the, Christianity is, if I can find my place here again, Christianity is judged by superficial reasons rather than facts. You find that? And when facts are dismissed, unbelief finds reason to exist. There's people that you can present all kinds of facts to and they will ignore them. And you hear that Hebrew term, yabut. Yabut this, yabut that. I recently referred to the problem of unbelief as described in Apostle Paul's epistle to the Romans. And I want to quote that scripture again. I think it bears repeating Romans chapter 1, verses 18 through 23. has to do with unbelief. Beginning in verse 18 of chapter 1 of Romans. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. Because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world, his attributes, his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks, but they become futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. And professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchange the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. So Paul is saying here that unbelief leads to false religion and it leads to idolatry. Why? Because man's gotta worship something. So the unbelief leads to false religions and idolatry both which will lead to condemnation and destruction. So in continuing his confrontation with the Pharisees and scribes, Jesus reminds them of an event that took place about 18 months ago when he healed a lame man at that pool at Bethsaida. Remember when we covered that? He came into Jerusalem and there's a pool and there's a lame man there. The guy had been there for 38 years. And Jesus says, well, do you want to get well? And instead of saying yes, he says, well, no, I don't have anybody to drag me down to the water. So Jesus went ahead and healed him, and that got him in a lot of trouble. He did this on the Sabbath. He healed a man on the Sabbath, and that was a big no-no. He's proving that their concern for the common man, the ill, the people, It was not there. They had no concern. They were more concerned about their status in life and culture. Concerned more about what they know and who they know. So in verse 21 of our text, Jesus says to them, I did one deed and you all marvel. And for this reason, Moses has given you circumcision, not because it's from Moses, but from the fathers. And on the Sabbath, you circumcise a man. And if a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses will not be broken, are you angry with me because I made an entire man well on the Sabbath? Jesus was pointing out to them their inconsistency. According to biblical law, a Jewish baby boy must be circumcised on the eighth day of his life after birth. If the eighth day fell on the Sabbath, they circumcised the boy, actually breaking the Sabbath by doing the work. But they believe that the circumcision took priority over the Sabbath because the boy was made whole through circumcision. This covenant with God took priority over the Sabbath. So Jesus says, Oh, I healed a man. I made the whole man whole. And you get upset with that. He did not object to this practice of circumcision. What disturbed him was the fact that they could not see the same principle in his healing a man on the Sabbath and making that man whole. We find then that the Pharisees were hiding behind their legalistic interpretation of the law in order to hate him, ignoring their own hypocrisy. Their interpretation of the law given to Moses had degenerated into a religion of self-righteousness, self-glorification as Pharisees who looked down on common people and caring little about their spiritual or physical needs. We can certainly understand then why Jesus did not hold back when he confronted the Pharisees. There's an interesting thing here in Matthew 23, in verses 23 to 25, there's a confrontation. Again, Jesus was not concerned about being politically correct here. He was hitting them right between the eyes with the truth about themselves. And it goes like this, beginning in verse 23 of chapter 23 of Matthew. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you tithe mint and dill and cumin and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law, justice and mercy and faithfulness. But these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others, you blind guides who strain out on that and swallow a camel. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, for you claim the outside of the cup and of the dish, but of the inside, they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish so that the outside of it may become clean also. Think about that. What's on the inside? What's on the inside? That's what Christ is saying. That is the important thing, not what's on the outside. So we conclude our worship service today. There's something I want to point out about God, our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The inspired word, the inspired word of God, our Bible, is God's full message to mankind. It's his message to the church. and he is absolutely serious about his message. Our final verse in our text today is this, verse 24, do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment. So what are we to do? What can we do? The very first thing we are to do before judging others is to judge ourselves. Remember Christ talked about that, right? Do you have a splinter in your eye? Let me remove it. He said, wait a minute, first pull the log out of your own eye. The Pharisees failed to do that. And when they heard Jesus' judgments about themselves, all they could think about was to kill him. We don't want to hear truth, we want to kill you. That is church. As His church, we are to encourage one another, to love one another, to help one another, and yes, even to correct one another in gentleness. That's what we're supposed to do. We're taught that in Scripture. In the world, we hear a whole lot about one attribute of God, that He is love, love, love, right? We hear that all the time. God is love. We have churches right here in Reno that preach this. God is love. They forget all about teaching about the repentance of sin. Just believe in God, you'll be fine. Don't be concerned about your sins. That's a false teaching. That is a false teaching, by the way. Following will lead people to destruction. God is also a righteous God. He hates sin. He hates hypocrisy, and Scripture confronts all types of sin. along with teaching us about God's love, mercy, and grace. As a church, we are to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ that he offers salvation to the world, right? We're to do that. He offers forgiveness of sin and eternal life. That's his love, mercy, and grace. But part of his gospel also teaches us about sin and repentance and faith, and we're to teach Right, not part of the gospel, but the full gospel. Part of the gospel teaches sin, or to confront sin. Oh man, don't tell me that. We are to urge faith in Jesus Christ and repentance of sins, and that may make us unpopular as it did with Jesus. We are to judge righteously, as Jesus did, but we cannot do that until we first judge ourselves. By doing so, we change. We actually change. The Word of God changes us. We don't change ourselves, but the Word of God changes us. And by abiding by His Word, what happens? We become then true disciples. Christ taught that. You can't be my disciples unless you obey my commandments. That should be the goal of every Christian. And with that, enough food for thought for this morning. Let's pray. Our Father, we do truly thank you for your word. We thank you, Father, for the joy of your Word, and we thank you also when your Word becomes uncomfortable. We thank you that as the Word goes in, we know that the Holy Spirit convicts us of those things that we need to change in our lives, and we thank you for that. And we look back and we see that your Word truly does change us. that change is not for the detriment of ourselves but for the good and so we thank you father for your word we thank you for the lord jesus christ for the indwelling of the holy spirit and for our salvation and finally father we we thank you