Welcome And The Search For God

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My name is Stephen Feith, and I'm the lead pastor of Madison Church. Welcome to the Madison Church podcast. I know that most of us here listening online, we want to hear from God. Why else would we be listening or showing up on a cold Sunday morning instead of in our warm beds? We want to know what God's will is for our lives. We want to discover that. What is God's will for my life? How do I know that? And then and what do I got to do? But we come to that with a lot of already established opinions and beliefs. I mean, you and I, we're constantly forming beliefs about ourselves, other people, the other people we're in relationships with, and the world around us. We do this all the time. You might even not even realize that you do it. We scroll mindlessly, whether it's TikTok or Instagram, YouTube, whatever it might be. And while we scroll, there's an influencer who explains something about relationships that seems like it'll finally fix all my problems for days, weeks, months, maybe even years. Me and my partner, we've been having this relationship issue that always happens, and then bam, I just heard this, and it's gonna change everything. You're out getting a coffee or a drink with a friend, and they make a point about culture or politics, and it just clicks. All of a sudden, you see things more clearly now. Or you take a personality assessment, as many of us do, and it puts into words something we've experienced, like who we are, our identity. I am this way because I'm insert a number. I responded that way because these four letters. I'm this way because the stars were doing this on the day I was born. Now look at these insights, they can be helpful. But we've got to realize we've pretty much decided what we think about them by the time we think to ask what does God think about them? And to make matters more complicated, we can find, you can absolutely find a respected Christian thinker who is brilliant, who agrees with you. And now you have theological justification for why you don't need the change. Not only do you not need the change, but that thinker, that writer, that speaker has now given you a convincing argument why everyone else should see the world just like you do. Now, this isn't a new problem in the United States in the 21st century. It's been happening generation after generation, going back thousands of years. Long before anyone had the internet in their pocket, Christians were wrestling

How We Form Beliefs Fast

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with competing claims about God and who was speaking for him. And so we've been in this series going through first John, and that's where John takes us in our study today. How do we, you and I, distinguish what genuinely comes from God and versus what we simply want to believe? And so picking up where we left off last week, we're in chapter four, and I'm gonna read from verse one, in which John writes, Dear friends, do not believe everyone who claims to speak by the Spirit. You must test them, test them to see if the spirit they have comes from God, for there are many false prophets in the world. John continues to write affectionately to his friends, and and actually the Greek word that he uses is closer to beloved, my beloved. But in the same breath, he's also really serious. He says that there are false prophets that are out and about in the world. In that church community, there had been people making claims about Jesus, and they presented those claims with spiritual authorities. They were good thinkers, good speakers, maybe even good writers. And John doesn't tell them to stop listening to anyone in particular. It wasn't like, don't listen to that guy, don't listen to that girl, but instead, he tells them to rather test what they hear.

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I know that they're saying this, I know that they're saying that. Now test it.

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We continue reading in verses two and three. This is how we know if they have the spirit of God. This is how we know. If a person claiming to be a prophet acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the spirit of God. But if someone claims to be a prophet and does not acknowledge the truth about Jesus, well, that person is not from God. Such a person has the spirit of the Antichrist, which you heard is coming into the world and is indeed already here. So John writes that the Spirit of God acknowledges not just that Jesus Christ was here, but that he came in the flesh. And that gets us to one of Christianity's most foundational beliefs, and that is the incarnation. Incarnation is a word that simply means to take on flesh. You don't need to have gone to seminary to understand it. I'll explain a little bit, though, about it right now for those of you who are perhaps a little more unfamiliar with it. Christians, followers of Jesus, we don't simply believe that Jesus was an exceptionally wise teacher or prophet who knew God better than everyone else. That is the claim that others might make, other world religions might make about Jesus. But Christians believe that in Jesus, God the Son became human. Now, here's where it gets a little complicated because we don't believe that God stopped being God while he was human. It wasn't like he was in God in heaven

Test The Spirits In 1 John

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and then he came to earth and he was just human. As a human, he was still fully God. But he wasn't pretending to be a person, he was also fully human. See, it's it's kind of confusing. He wasn't 50-50, 50% God, 50% human. He was 100% God and 100% human. Now, the incarnation is a foundational belief for us for several reasons. The first being that God reveals himself to us through Jesus. Jesus doesn't just give us information about God. That's what a prophet or a teacher would do, right? They would say, This is God, this is what he's like, this is what he likes, and this is what he doesn't like. Do this, don't do that. But the incarnation goes way beyond that. It shows us what God is like.

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Not him telling us, him showing us through the people that he welcomed into his circles by the things that angered him, the way that he treats others, what he calls good.

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He also comes, and another point of the of the carnate incarnation here is that he shares in our humanity. God doesn't remain a distant observer of suffering. God doesn't just say, Well, I hope you guys figured it out and or will figure it out, but until you do, I'm gonna hang out way back here.

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God gets in the mess with us. He knows human vulnerability from within. I mean, the God who created the universe also knows what it's like to be hungry, to be exhausted and just need a nap. The ups and downs of friendship, grief, rejection, suffering, even death.

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So in the incarnation, we we see what God is like, and in the incarnation we know that God has experienced everything we have experienced as as human beings. But another thing is that the incarnation reconciles us to God. You see, it is through Jesus' not just his life and not just his death, but Jesus' resurrection. If Jesus had just come and lived and died, we wouldn't be talking about him today. But it is it is his resurrection, in which Jesus not only confronts sin and death, but he defeats their power in our lives and over our lives, and he opens up a new way of life. God doesn't just show us the path, say, you know, don't again, don't do that, do this, and and maybe at the end of your life you'll be good enough or you won't be as bad, and and you can get in. Rather, God creates the path. He comes to us and he takes our hand and he says, follow me. And that's why I gotta believe John draws a line here, and not just me, but but scholarship believes that John is teaching,

Why The Incarnation Matters

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and what he's teaching, this isn't a secondary issue. What these other people are are doing, it distorts the identity of God himself. In short, if you change who Jesus is, you change what you're saying about God. And if we keep reading verses four, five, and six, John says, But if you belong to God, my dear children, my beloved, you have already won a victory over those people because the spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world. Those people belong to this world. So they speak from the world's viewpoint. And the world listens to them, but we we belong to God, and and those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us. That is how we know if somebody has the spirit of truth or the spirit of deception.

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Now, after a warning like that, you might expect John to scare his readers.

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I mean, maybe you feel a little bit anxious now. You've you've heard this verse taken out of context, and and and usually something like, don't see that movie, don't listen to that kind of music, don't do that, because those are things of the world, and we are not of the world, but that's kind of a a misreading in the context of what we're talking about. I mean, first and foremost, John doesn't do it to scare them, he he does it to reassure them. He says, You belong to God, and there's the reassurance. And because you belong to God, what you already possess, what is already within you, is greater than any threat or enemy that comes against you or opposes you. When John says that those who know God listen to us, he is not giving pastors or clergy or mature Christians kind of a license to say, well, you got to listen to me or you don't listen to God. Again, this is another misreading and a misapplication of the passage. You absolutely can question clergy and pastors and our ideas. You certainly can. What John is talking about here, though, are these original disciples, and he's calling out those who question their actual lived experience. I mean, that's audacious, isn't it? John, Peter, James, they all walked with Jesus for years and years and years. And then there are people who never met Jesus who are then coming and saying, No, those guys are full of it. They don't know what they're talking about. Listen to me instead. And John is saying, No, if they're saying that, you know, they're liars, they're deceivers. It goes back to this idea that we started with and we've already revisited. This is the Jesus we have seen, we have heard, we have, we have touched. John wants people who can recognize error without becoming consumed by fear. That's what he wants. We don't need to be scared. We can have confidence, we can test the waters, we're not going to lose our faith, we're not gonna wander away.

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And that's because of God.

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Not our confidence in ourselves or how smart we are, it's that we belong to God and God has given us a spirit of discernment. We have the spirit and we can discern, we can test. Now, John's instruction has a complication because while he tells us to test what we hear, we're the ones doing the testing. And as I already established, we we began this way. We are not neutral. We're not neutral at all. We are not blank slates. So I've been reading this book called Mistakes Were Made, but not by me, in which two psychologists explore the extraordinary lengths you and I and people all over the world will go to avoid admitting that we are wrong. One concept that you're probably familiar with is uh cognitive dissonance. And cognitive dissonance is the discomfort that we experience when something contradicts what we believe about ourselves or the world. And we are all remarkably good at making that discomfort disappear. Rather than reconsider what we believe, we would change the story to tell our the story that we tell ourselves so we can keep on believing it. In other words, we we don't correct the mistake, we just find a way to live with it because that's less work, that's easier work rather than when we're confronted with something that, well, we believe this, but now we're confronted with facts

Reassurance Without Fearful Faith

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that say we shouldn't. What's easier? To kind of explain away or to do the deep work of not just deconstruction. There's a lot of that going on, not just deconstruction, but the reconstruction to build something down and to rebuild it. Now, for example, I can see someone working on something and think, well, I I could probably do that a little bit faster, and and I could do that maybe a little bit better than them. And so I jump in, I take over, I get it done, and and maybe I am a little faster, maybe not, and maybe it is a little bit better, but maybe it's not. However, in that process, I've made somebody feel unimportant or incapable. I I've jumped in, and some of you, you have a boss like that, and it drives you nuts, right? Now, that genuinely bothers me because I do care about people and I care about how I make them feel. I care about what my actions, uh, how that impacts other people. And so when I realize I do it, I apologize. I'll get the feedback, I'll I'll put some effort into changing. And look, being honest and humbly so I've gotten a little better over the years. Not a lot better, but a little better. Because when the pressure is on again, I can hear myself. This is the cognitive dissonance making those same arguments. I might, we're running out of time, and and I can do this faster. I mean, somebody has to get it done, and and I'm the guy for the job, and and I do it again, and then I gotta apologize again.

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And you know, the things I tell myself often are at least partially true. And that's what makes the justification so convincing.

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And the same thing for you. When we got that feeling of cognitive dissonance, when we tell ourselves things that are really believable, that's why we keep doing it. Now, closely related to cognitive dissonance, and trying to move quickly here, is confirmation bias. And this is our tendency to favor information that supports what we already believe. It might not be the whole truth, but it's at least enough of the truth that convinces me that I'm good to go and I don't need to change. For example, some people are really, really good at keeping their peace, and that's really important to them. They don't like conflict. I mean, I would argue that not a lot of people actually like conflict, but there are some people who really don't like conflict and they would rather let something go and bury it and never think about it again rather than make themselves or anyone else uncomfortable. It's not always a selfish thing. But then that happens

Cognitive Dissonance And Confirmation Bias

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when somebody points out a problem and suggests that, hey, this actually does need to be addressed, and then you or if you're this person, you know, you find yourself thinking, oh my gosh, they're overreacting. It's not a big deal at all. And maybe you're venting, you're like, oh gosh, this person, they brought this thing up, and and and they're making it a whole issue. And and then that other person says, You're right, they should just move on. It's not a big deal. Why are they why are they making a mountain out of a molehill or something like that? And now all of a sudden, you're like, man, this this friend is really smart, she's really smart. And that's confirmation bias. And then you find yourself now frustrated, more frustrated with the person who wants to address a problem than the problem itself. Well, everything was fine until you just started to pick a fight with me. Now you've convinced yourself that avoiding conflict keeps the peace. And never consider perhaps that you're actually just letting the problem continue. Now, both of these kind of sound ridiculous as we explain it and talk about it, and yet multiple times a day, we will engage. Both will welcome confirmation bias and we'll get really good at justifying why we act the way that we do. And that's what makes this whole thing so difficult. We're not trying to lie to ourselves, we've just become really good at believing whatever allows us to keep doing what we're comfortable doing. We don't just need discernment because of other people. We need discernment because we deceive ourselves. C.S. Lewis, I think, speaks to this a little bit. And I love what he writes in his book. He's wrestling with grief. The book is called The Grief Observed, and he writes that my idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. I love it because he's saying, like, how I think about God, and when you apply it to your life, how you think of God, and how we think of God, that's not a divine idea. That's not an untouchable thing. As a matter of fact, C. S. Lewis, he encourages not just himself, I think, but but all of us. He says, shatter it, break it, deconstruct it over and over and over again. Again, because what we think about God isn't a divine idea. Now, some good news today as we wrap up. You know, we don't do this alone. I again, I mentioned we have the Spirit of God in us. In John 16, verses 13 through 14, Jesus tells his disciples that the spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit, will guide them in the truth, and that that spirit will glorify me. In the incarnation, God reveals himself in Jesus. Following Jesus' death, resurrection, and ascension, glorification, the promised spirit comes and continues to draw his followers toward him. The spirit doesn't come to replace Jesus. The Spirit isn't here to rubber stamp every strong feeling or religious conviction we have.

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The Spirit points us back to Jesus. Now, listen, most of us we're not going to encounter someone this week who explicitly denies that Jesus came in the flesh.

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I think historically that's pretty you know, that's determined there was a man named Jesus in the first century, but every day we will hear messages about power, success, relationships, politics, masculinity, and how other people deserve to be treated. Those voices may not call themselves spiritual teachers, but they form us all the same. Think about political commentary. Someone we support speaks about the opponents that they have with cruelty or contempt. I mean, all the commercials right now are hit pieces, right? Now, do we weigh that behavior against the Jesus who calls us

Three Questions For Daily Discernment

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to love our enemies, or do we find a reason to excuse it because we already like the person who is saying it, or we really also don't like the person they're talking about? I I know Christians, we're not going to agree on every political policy, and that's okay. I talked about that a few weeks ago. But our loyalties don't get to exempt our beliefs from examination. Test them, John says. Now, here's the more difficult part for you and me and some of us is that we tend to recognize the problem quickly when it's somebody else. It gets harder when it's us. And so this week, when a claim catches your attention, whether that's on social media or in a conversation with someone, especially one that confirms what you already believe, you find yourself nodding enthusiastically, you you're you're gearing up to share it to your close friends and or post it on your story. I would invite you to ask a few questions. The first is, is this consistent with Jesus? Not the version of Jesus I find convenient or the one that I've come to believe strongly in, but the Jesus revealed in the gospel, his teachings, actions, how he treated people. So is it consistent with Jesus? And then we ask, is this grounded in scripture? And not just an isolated verse, because you can find a verse for everything you want. But I'm talking about a verse, a passage in context, and the conversation of the broader biblical witness, the arc of scripture is what we'll call it. Is it grounded in scripture? And finally, what is this even forming in me?

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Greater humility, compassion, courage, or faithfulness, or pride, contempt, fear, a growing need to win.

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Now, you know, these three questions is it consistent with Jesus? Is it grounded in Scripture? What's it forming in me? This isn't like a foolproof formula, but they are habits of discernment that help us become more open to correction and more faithful to Jesus. As we head into our time of self reflection and examination today, ask yourselves where have I been asking Jesus to affirm what I already believe rather than allowing Jesus to change what I already believe.