Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – John 1:43-51

John 1:43-51. Please stand for the reading of God’s word. John 1 beginning in verse 43.

The following day Jesus wanted to go to Galilee and he found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.” Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathaniel and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses and the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” And Nathaniel said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.”

Jesus saw Nathaniel coming toward him and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed in whom is no deceit.” Nathaniel said to him, “How do you know me?”

Jesus answered and said to him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” Nathaniel answered and said to him, “Rabbi, you are the son of God. You are the king of Israel.” Jesus answered and said to him, “Because I said to you, I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You will see greater things than these.” And he said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, hereafter you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”

Let us pray. Father, we thank you for your most holy word. We pray that your holy spirit now would illumine this text for understanding, that we’d be transformed by it. We thank you, Lord God, for the tremendous love, mercy, and grace you exhibit to us in bringing us your word and giving us the strengthener, the Holy Spirit, who indeed takes this word and writes it upon our hearts. Help us, Lord God, then to be transformed by the word of your power. In Christ’s name we ask it. Amen.

Please be seated.

We have a wonderful if somewhat enigmatic text to deal with today—the providence of God. It’s a text that causes one to think and think and think, at least it did me. So much of the scripture is this way. There are depths to it that we cannot plumb. It’s written in such a way as to convey a great sense of importance in nearly every text one reads. And yet, recording very simple details here of yet another pair of disciples who come to Jesus and have their allegiance transferred, as it were, from John the Baptist to the great Messiah who has now come upon the scene.

Once more we have some very simple yet powerful words from our savior. Remember that his first words in this gospel are “What seek you?” He addresses men at their motivational level. He causes us to wonder: what do we seek? What is our motivation as we go through life? And here instead of querying, he gives a command to us: “Follow me.” And this will be the final command of our savior as well. In fact, the last words of Jesus recorded in John’s gospel is “Follow thou me.”

And here we have this short phrase, yet just power-packed as a commandment to us today to follow our savior. And I want to talk about that in today’s sermon in several aspects.

Now following Jesus produces light to us and involves under-shepherds. In John chapter 8 beginning at verse 12, Jesus spake again unto them, saying, “I am the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”

So to follow Jesus is to follow the source of light and life. And so obviously, outside of Jesus is darkness and death. To follow Jesus involves under-shepherds. In chapter 10 of John’s gospel, Jesus declares himself to be the door and the good shepherd. This is that discourse in John chapter 10, and in verse four when he puteth forth his own sheep he goeth before them. He says, talking about the shepherd and the sheep, “Follow him for they know his voice. A stranger will they not follow but will flee from him.”

Again, in verse 27 of chapter 10: “My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me and I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father has given them to me.”

He says, when we follow Jesus, we follow the only course of light and life in the context of our world. And we follow Jesus by following his under-shepherds. Remember in chapter 10—we’ve talked about that section before—”I have other sheep that I will call. And these sheep will hear my voice,” Jesus says. “How do you hear the Savior’s voice in order to follow him?” Well, you hear the Savior’s voice in the context of the preaching of the word. Other disciples are added. Other men will come. “How can they believe if they don’t hear? And how can they hear if God does not send a preacher to bring the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ to his sheep to follow him?”

I would say though that the under-shepherds that Jesus leads and directing his people to follow him also involve our parents and all involve other people that would command us correctly under the authority of God.

Sometimes I think that one of the great problems of manhood in America is an inability to follow. We become so individualistic and so desirous to throw off every restraint. And as a result, I think that men don’t develop the sense of holiness and following devoutly to the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, you little children today, you should understand that as you follow Jesus, it means to follow your pastors. Follow those that bring the word of Christ to you and you hear his voice in the context of that word, and understand that as your parents command you according to the precepts of our savior, you are to follow them, hearing Jesus’s voice in the context of your life.

Today’s sermon—the mandate from today’s sermon, the mission, as it were, to follow Jesus. And while we have various things to say about this, the primary way that I want to stress that we follow Jesus Christ is by not lying. Jesus—we have a behold statement. Remember John the Baptist: “Behold the lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.” And Jesus now: “Behold an Israelite indeed in whom is no deceit.” These are the ones who follow the savior, those who have no lying on their tongues.

So our mission for today is to follow the savior. Follow Jesus by not lying. And we follow Jesus when we follow the men that he has called and women as under-shepherds to him to guide and direct us. For children, that means parents. For the rest of us, it means friends who bring the word of God to us, preachers who preach the word of God.

Jesus now adds to his disciples one whom—whose life is characterized by this absence of deceit or guile. In the context of these days of discipleship as we’ve called them, we’ve come now in this text to another day. We have this sequence of days given to us. And on this particular day, we read that Jesus decides to go to Galilee. Galilee is in the north and he has been down in the context of John’s ministry in the south of the promised land, in the south of Israel.

And now he’s going to move up to the north, up to Galilee. And so there’s movement here, geography going on in verse 43. He wants to go to Galilee. And we don’t really know where he finds Philip. It could be actually up in Galilee, but he finds Philip and commands him to follow him. And then Philip, just like Andrew went and found Peter after he was brought to the Messiah, Philip now goes and he finds a friend as well.

And we’re told explicitly that Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. We’ll talk about that in a little bit too. Bethsaida means “house of nets” and it’s the fishermen that are found there, also up in the north in Galilee. And Philip finds Nathaniel. And later we’ll read in the gospel of John that Nathaniel came from Cana of Galilee, which is where the next part of the gospel of John takes place. Chapter 2 we had the wedding feast at Cana of Galilee. So we’re now moving geographically from the opening of the book into now events that are going to take place in the north. And these disciples are all from the north. And in point of fact, all of the disciples are from the north apparently, up in Galilee that region, apart from one, and that’s Iscariot.

So we have given to us here in these geographic markers again the antithesis that’s going to happen—is characterized by those in Judea, the Jews who reject Christ, and him receiving these disciples from up in the northern part of the promised land. So all the disciples except for Judas of Iscariot come from the north.

Now we assume that Nathaniel is a disciple. I said it’s an enigmatic text. It has things that make you go, “Hm, what is that about?” Angels ascending and descending, a true Israelite. Here he’s referred to as the king of Israel. And finally, our savior identifies himself as the Son of Man. What does it mean he saw Nathaniel under the fig tree? Lots of things here to make you stop and meditate and chew on God’s word. And that is a good thing to do.

And one of those things is the identity of Nathaniel. There is in the list of the 12, no one named Nathaniel in the synoptic gospels, the other three gospels. So people have wondered, “Well, maybe he’s not a disciple. Maybe he’s one of the disciples that we don’t know about. Maybe he’s another name for John, the disciple John.” Probably not.

The most likely explanation of who this Nathaniel is, is Bartholomew, whom we normally think of as Bartholomew, one of the 12. Bartholomew is a last name, a patronymic. It means “the son of Talmay.” And so Nathaniel is a first name. It means “gift of God.” And so people say, “Well, we have one of the 12 who has just his last name given, and so here’s a guy with a first name, and that’s one reason to conclude he may be Bartholomew.”

More than that though—Nathaniel is linked to Philip here, and in other places Bartholomew in the synoptic gospels is linked to Philip in various places. He comes in the list alongside of Philip, and so it seems probable that this Nathaniel is identified as Bartholomew in the other gospels. So we think he’s a disciple.

And so we see here continuing then our savior showing us a couple of things in what is still in a way part of the prologue of this gospel, and I’ll explain that in a minute. He’s showing us discipleship. He’s showing us evangelism, in a sense, actually taking men who are committed to Messiah and the scriptures and developing them and maturing them. He’s also showing us leaders of the church. He’s gathering disciples who are going to become the leaders of the church when he has finished his work and hands over the church to Peter and Peter’s assistants in the context of the disciples.

So he’s showing us all those things, and I made reference to this being in a way still part of the preamble of the book. And let me explain why I think that. You know how in Shakespeare plays there’ll be like a little prologue that sort of sets everything up? And here we saw that in verses 1 to 18 of chapter 1, right? The prologue is this structure that is literature that’s not narrative.

Now we’re moving to narrative in chapter 1. So we have this non-narrative portion at the beginning of John’s gospel, and now we have this narrative, but it’s sort of separated too, in a way. And in chapter 2 begins the actual work of the Lord Jesus Christ in terms of manifesting his glory. The first of his miracles to manifest his glory we’re told happened at Cana of Galilee. So the doings of Jesus sort of start up in full in chapter 2.

Additionally, if you look at verse 51 here, at the conclusion of this section, this day, and as a result of this sequence of days when Jesus calls the disciples to him, there’s a change in the Greek grammar here that I referred to last week, but again this week. Verse 51: “He said to them, ‘Most assuredly I say to you, hereafter you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.’”

Now, in the verse just before that, he told Nathaniel, “You will see greater things than these.” And that’s a singular you. But when it says in verse 51, “He said to him, most assuredly I say to you,” that is a plural you—to you all, in southern parlance. And so at the end of this collection of the disciples, our savior makes this wonderfully evocative statement about angels ascending and descending upon the Son of Man, taking us back to Jacob’s ladder and many other associations. And he puts that in the context not just of Nathaniel, but he brings the reader into it.

When it’s put in the plural here, it’s almost as if you’re reading this account about someone else and him gathering disciples, but it becomes very personal here in verse 51. You, as the reader or hearer of the text, are brought into it. So it’s as if you’re watching a play and Jesus is talking to Nathaniel: “You’ll see greater things than these.” And he continues to talk to him, but he also moves his attention to you, the readers, and to millions of people since then as readers, and says, “You all hereafter shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”

End of scene. And the next scene we’ve moved to Cana of Galilee. And what do you see? You see the effects of heaven opened in the transformation of water to wine, in the transformation of a marriage into greater joy in the context of that marriage, and in the manifesting of the glory of the Son of Man.

And so this is in a sense the end of the extended introduction to the gospel of John. And what he tells us here at this pivotal point is that we’re going to see tremendous truths in the Gospel of John. We’re going to see heaven opened by our savior and his presence on earth. And we’re going to see angels ministering in the context of his work, and the centrality of that work, and these various miracles and things that he does as the Son of Man, who affects the opening of heaven for his people.

And so we have that beautiful introduction to the rest of the gospel account. And that happens here in the context of this story of the call of Philip and Nathaniel.

Jesus commands us to follow him, and we want to talk about our following the Lord Jesus Christ in several specific ways. We want to say that Jesus commands us to follow him in mission—evangelizing people and maturing them in the faith. Well, Jesus commands us to follow him in the context of our character, exhibiting the character of Nathaniel, the true Israelite.

Jesus commands us to follow him in terms of suffering—first the cross, then the crown. And Jesus wants us to follow him in terms of victory, all from this text. So let’s move into the specific details.

First, Jesus commands us to follow him in terms of mission, speaking with others about the savior. And here, as I said, just as we saw Andrew who, being brought to the savior and brought to the savior through the ministry of John the Baptist pointing out our savior to him, went and found Peter. And here we have Philip being commanded to follow him. And immediately Philip then goes and finds someone else.

As one commentator named God put it, “One lighted torch lights another.” And our savior is setting up a truth here for us that we as his followers are to follow him in speaking to others about the savior. It is our great delight what we have found in the context of meaning and purpose in our life and what life is all about and how we’re to structure our life. And we should want to tell other people about the Lord Jesus Christ, the way Philip exemplifies this kind of action by him telling others about Jesus.

Oh, who should we tell about Jesus? Well, should we tell our friends about Jesus? Yeah. Should we tell others about Jesus? Yes. Should we tell others about the Lord Jesus Christ in the context of the word? Yeah. That’s what Philip does here, doesn’t he? He says, “We have found him of whom Moses and the law and of the prophets wrote.” So he talks to people about the word of God. And should we invite people to church? Yes. Because he tells Nathaniel, “Come and taste. Come and see for yourself.”

Philip brings a report that we found the one whom the word of God tells about to Nathaniel. And Nathaniel says, “Well, I don’t read anywhere in the word of God that a guy comes out of Nazareth.” And then Philip says, “Well, come and see.” And so this is a model for us that we’re to go and tell others about the Lord Jesus Christ. We do that by telling them about the word of God, which reveals Christ to us. And we also do that by bringing people into the context of the gathered church for worship and joy and fellowship. And they see—they come and see the sort of life that Jesus produces.

You know, in the context of the growth of our church, I think most people come to RCC because they taste and see that what God has done is transform lives here in a wonderful way, and we enjoy each other’s company on the Lord’s day, and our children love to be together, and that’s perfectly proper for people to come in that sense. Come and see what the Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished.

We are to follow Jesus in mission, speaking to others about the savior. We are to follow Jesus in mission in reaching the objects of Christ’s foreknowledge. Jesus says that he already knew Nathaniel before Philip calls him. The word foreknowledge in the Bible speaks of God’s fore-love. Knowledge is love in the scriptures. God loves those whom are going to be called into the gospel of the kingdom.

And we can be confident when we talk to others about Christ that those who are foreknown by the Father, those who Jesus loves ahead of time—sees in the context of Nathaniel, calls a disciple, that he knows will be commissioned then to go and reach Nathaniel. We, in our telling others about the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, will be effectual in reaching those who are known by him.

The whole process here doesn’t start with us. The whole process in this particular story begins with Jesus finding Philip and Jesus knowing ahead of time Nathaniel before Philip called him. So our savior takes the great initiative in this, and yet it is his delight, it’s his wisdom, it’s his love to use us as his vehicle to then call other people to follow the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we do that. We tell others about Jesus and we reach those who are already the objects of Christ’s foreknowledge, his love ahead of time.

And we urge men to taste and see that the Lord is good. Some commentators have talked about this where Philip says, “Come and see.” No one’s been argued into the kingdom. People are brought to the Lord Jesus Christ in the context of the word and the context of the church and lives transformed by him. And that is the best apologetic that we have to offer in the context of our evangelism. Come and see.

Consider what the Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished in the context of men’s lives. Come and see him in his word. Come and see him in the worship service and the beauty of holiness. This is the most simple and yet the most profound apologetic or evangelistic method—to urge others to come and see.

And we are committed to bringing people to Christ, in spite of us being poor dunes. Again, this is an enigmatic passage. There are things that you kind of ponder over. Philip says some odd things here. Philip says “we have found him.” Well, did Philip find Christ or did Christ find Philip? Well, in the technical sense, Christ found Philip. It says “he found Philip,” and then Philip says “we found him.” You see? And there’s a sense in which that’s true. But it seems like the text wants us to think, “Well, that’s not quite right. Philip, Jesus found you.” And then he says, “We found him of whom Moses and the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”

You think, if you know your Bible, “Well, what? The law, Moses and the law and the prophets wrote Jesus of Nazareth or the son of Joseph? How does that work? Where in the prophets or in Moses do we find Jesus predicted as Jesus of Nazareth or the son of Joseph?” I think we can probably find a pretty obscure reference to Jesus as the son of Joseph, which we’ll get to later in the sermon.

But at first blush, commentators have noted that Philip seems to get things a little confused here—not knowing who found who—and you know, not really expressing himself well, maybe. And not seeming to understand that Jesus really didn’t come from Nazareth. Jesus was born in Bethlehem, which is recorded in the law and the prophets. Bethlehem, a fra, is the place of Jesus’s coming. And Jesus isn’t the son of Joseph. Joseph is not his father in the biological sense or in the ultimate sense. He’s the son of God.

But what we have here, I think, and I’m not sure what all this means, but certainly what we can imply from this by way of application to our lives is that we get mixed up too in the way we express ourselves to others. And we may not know our Bibles as well as we should, and we may not get our theology correct, and still God wants us to tell others about the Lord Jesus Christ. Still God wants us to talk to others and encourage them to come and see and taste of the Lord Jesus Christ and see that he is good.

Now I use the phrase “poor dunes” here. I wouldn’t use that term, but Calvin did, and so that’s okay with me. Calvin wrote this. He says: “There are many poor dunes in the present day who, though ignorant and unskilled in the use of language, make known Christ more faithfully than all the theologians of the Pope with their lofty speculations.”

That’s true today too, isn’t it? There are many poor dunes in the church today. I’m one, and probably most of you are one, who are not skilled necessarily in communication and don’t get our theology right and don’t get all of our facts right or communicate in a way that’s confusing to people. And yet, if our intent and goal is to bring Jesus’s people to the Lord Jesus Christ for further maturation, development, or for salvation, God blesses our efforts. He uses crooked sticks to deliver straight blows, as it were.

This should be a tremendous encouragement to us, and it should be a tremendous encouragement to our children. Now, we don’t want to get lazy and sloppy about it. We don’t want to say we don’t need to study the Bible and how to communicate better. No, that’s the other ditch in the road. But a ditch that we too often fall into, I think, in terms of sharing the gospel, the great news of Christ’s salvation, is we’re not trained well enough. We don’t know our theology. We sort of stutter and stammer.

Well, here we have Philip doing some odd things, and God says, “Well, you may be a poor dune, but I’m going to use you to bring people to the Lord Jesus Christ.” Calvin went on to say, “This passage therefore warns us that any unsuitable language has been employed concerning Christ by ignorant and unlearned men. We ought not to reject such persons with disdain, provided they direct us to Christ.”

See, that’s the other thing this passage does—is say it’s easy for us to be judgmental of one another, trying to share the gospel of Christ, and think poorly of one another when we make mistakes. And Calvin says, don’t do that. You know, if your brother is trying to bring people to Christ, pray for him, encourage him. You might want to straighten out his theology in private, but try to be an encouragement to him.

And on the other hand, as we said, we want to know God’s word. Well, if we don’t know a lot about the Bible, we should still talk to our friends about Jesus. Invite them to church, invite them to our homes to talk about Jesus and about his scriptures.

Now, I’ve sort of gone a little tough on Nathaniel—or Philip here—but notice that both Philip and Nathaniel know their Bibles. I mean, maybe the “Jesus of Nazareth” thing was improper communication, whatever, but see, what Philip was looking for was the one whom the law and the prophets spoke of. He had exposed himself to the scriptures. And Nathaniel—his remark. I don’t think we have any evidence that Nazareth or the Nazarenes were looked at poorly or something. Some people have talked about that. I don’t see any internal evidence in the scriptures.

It seems like what Nathaniel is responding to is this reference to the law and the prophets. And Nathaniel knows his Bible well enough to know that no good thing, Messiah or his prophets, they don’t come out of Nazareth according to the scriptures. And so both of these men are an inducement to us to speak about Jesus when we’re somewhat unlearned. But on the other hand, to know the scriptures well, to be able to see in the claims of men whether they’re approved by the scriptures or not.

And so there’s a great inducement here to us to know the scriptures. You see, God uses the grace of his word and knowledge of that word to lead us in our following of Christ. I’d ask you today, how well do you know the Bible? How well have you applied yourself to Bible knowledge? Reading the scriptures, thinking about them, trying to understand what they say. Do we know our Bibles as well as Nathaniel or as well as Philip? Maybe not. As well as these fishermen. They had vocations, but they still were studying the scriptures in the context of John the Baptist’s ministry. They knew their Bibles.

And then finally, we’re to follow Jesus in terms of mission by discipling the nations. Here, with this movement to Galilee, we have a reference in the scriptures to Galilee. It’s found in Isaiah 9:1. And Galilee is referred to as “Galilee of the nations” or “Galilee of the Gentiles.” And there’s always this association with Galilee that it’s kind of up there in the north, kind of in the vicinity and the way to all the nations.

So as Jesus moves his discipleship, his ministry rather that way, we get the beginning glimpses here that he will indeed draw all men unto him as he is raised up. And we also see that in Philip in chapter 12. This Philip here that we talked about in the context of this who came from Bethsaida of Galilee. He is the one that the Greeks approach, the Gentiles approach at the feast of tabernacles.

In John 12, it’s Philip. Philip goes and gets Andrew, and these men though get Jesus and have the Greeks talk to Jesus. And specifically in the text, it tells us that these Galilees—the Greeks rather—came to Philip who was of Bethsaida of Galilee. The same reference, geographical reference, that’s given to us here in this passage of scripture. So we see the mission of Christ is going to be to go beyond the borders of Israel.

And right away we see that here. He’ll be discipling the nations in the context of his work.

All right. So we’re to follow Jesus in mission. We’re also to follow Jesus in character, exhibiting in our lives the character of the Father. And I want to take some time here. This is the central part of the sermon. The application here, again, the mandate for today, the mission for today, is to follow Jesus by not lying, by not having deceit or guile in the context of our character.

Nathaniel is pointed out as an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile. Wednesday night teens and people that come to the Wednesday night study—this is an important reference here. In the next few weeks, about 3 or 4 weeks from now, we’ll be moving on to another area of what our church teaches. We’ve been talking about eschatology, and that’s related very directly to our understanding of who the church is.

Dispensational theology teaches that Jews are here and the church is here and never the twain shall meet. But the word of God, we’re convinced, says no. This isn’t true. In Romans chapter 9:6 we read that “not all who are of Israel are Israel.” That’s not the definition just through physical lineage or cultural background. And in Romans 2:28 and 29 we read, “He is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not of the letter, whose praise is not of men but of God.”

So the true Israelite, the true Jew, is the churchman of today. Nathaniel is a picture not of some Old Testament saint that’s not connected to the church. He’s a model for us. He’s the true Israelite. He’s an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile. And as such, he’s commended by Jesus.

You know, it’s another one of those behold statements. First we have “Behold the lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world” by John the Baptist. And now we have Jesus: “Behold an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile.” And a very important thing—this comes about because of the work of the savior who removes the sins of the world, and the sins of the world are deceit and untruthfulness. Satan is the father of lies, and in the garden those lies are perpetuated by him.

So here Nathaniel is addressed as an Israelite indeed, and we should want to in our character exist as the character of the one who was an Israelite indeed. In other words, if you’re a churchman or an Israelite here today, are you one because you become a member? No. Are you one because you’ve been baptized, ultimately? Well, really not. Our savior just warned us through Paul that circumcision is of the heart, not of the flesh. Lots of men were circumcised, but they weren’t all of Israel.

And so our being an Israelite here, the essence of the Christian faith is boiled down to having this character that Nathaniel exhibited in the context of his walk with the Father. Now, Nathaniel’s character wasn’t just about deceit. He was committed to the Father’s word. So that’s the first application: we’re to follow Jesus in character by being committed to the Father’s word.

I touched on this already, but Nathaniel had a great advantage in increasing his knowledge of the savior because he made good use of the knowledge that God had given to him in the scriptures. Nathaniel had understood the prophets and the law and Moses enough to know that he wasn’t supposed to come from Nazareth. So he knew what the scriptures taught about Messiah. And as a result, he was prepared then for his maturation and development by him becoming a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And so when we come together to receive further maturation, we should come together with a basic knowledge of the word that’s growing as we grow older in the faith. We should be committed to the Father’s word in the context of our character. We should have a love for God’s word that drives us to it and sees it as the necessary preparation by which we’re to mature in our understanding and obedience to the savior.

Secondly, Nathaniel’s character is one who is committed to the avoidance of deceit. This word, deceit or guile, means no guile towards men—a man without trickiness or designs, a man that one may trust. No guile towards God—that is sincere in his repentance for sins, sincere in his covenanting with God, sincere in his conversation with God and men. No deceit.

Children, you know, if you do nothing else as a result of today’s sermon but strive diligently to not be characterized by deceit and be characterized instead as having a soul that hates deception, hates guile or deceit, then you’ve heard the basic thrust of this sermon.

And I want to go through several things the scriptures teach us about deceit.

First of all, deceit defiles the man. In Mark 7:22, our savior is talking about the things that defile us. Lots of people today are worried about what they put into their bodies, what do they eat? You know, there’s a lot of good to that, but there’s a lot of evil to that. There’s a lot of thinking that somehow we can get long life through what we eat. And you know, God said in the Old Testament that the life of the flesh is in the blood. And if you want to eat things, you have to take all the life out of it. You got to drain all the blood out. You’re supposed to eat things that are dead—not nearly dead, but not mostly dead, but dead. The life is removed. Why? Because it’s the grace of God that gives us strength and life from dead things. That’s the whole picture of food.

And we’re caught up in a culture today that, you know, health food and all this stuff. And boy, you know, eating is the key to everything. You know, “you are what you eat.” But our savior said, you know, you shouldn’t worry relatively speaking about what goes into your mouth. What you should be worried about is what comes out of that mouth. And what comes out of your mouth is a reflection of who you are as a person.

And what he said was: “Out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit or guile, lasciviousness, and evil eye, envy, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness. These are the things our savior said that defile you.” Deceit is in that list. It’s one of those horrible things that if you have in the context of your being is a defiling presence. God says in the context of your heart.

Secondly, it’s—we got to be warned against deceit because it actually works for a time. Deceit works. Our culture is pragmatic. Pragmatism was one of the great gods of our culture. “If it works, we’ll do it.” Well, believe me, the scriptures confirm the fact that deceit works. We read in Jeremiah 5:27 that “As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit. Therefore, as a result of their deceit, therefore they become great and wax rich.”

Deceit works. You can get stuff by fooling people, by lying to them. But if you have deceitful business practices, it works. That’s why it’s such a temptation to men. If it didn’t work, it wouldn’t be a temptation.

The same word, deceit, that’s used in the Old Testament of deceit or guile is used to talk about a deceitful balance. Proverbs 11:1, for instance: “A deceitful balance with guile is an abomination to the Lord, but a just weight is his delight.”

He preaches to their shortcomings or difficulties or temptations. They were tempted to be improper in their evaluation of market transactions. The balance is an evaluation of market transactions. “What is this worth? What is this worth in comparison to it?” And specifically, you could take a balance and have weights that are certified as one weight, but shave them down or add to them to make it a deceitful balance with guile. That’s what the idea is here. And when you do that, you get the better part of the transaction, you see. So it’s a way to get money for nothing.

And so, but beyond that, you know, this truth that if you’re going to be a Christian indeed, you’re not to have guile means that men in their vocations and their evaluation of market transactions are warned from God’s word to not enter into deceit in market transactions. And you have to be warned because, as I said, deceit works.

Deceit works. “Liars never prosper.” Well, that’s not true. The Bible says it’s not true. Says the people that lie in market transactions actually get quite wealthy. Thank you very much. So we have to be warned against that because our children are going to be tempted by those facts.

However, our children should know, third, that deceit characterizes the enemies of our Lord Jesus Christ. In Matthew 26:4 as well as throughout the gospel accounts, the enemies of Christ are those who attempt to arrest him and kill him by deceit, by guile—by this same specific word. The enemies of Christ. Those that crucify our savior are those who are unlike Nathaniel. They are men of deceit and guile.

For great judgments accrue to those who practice deceit. Our children should know this. We should know this. In spite of the fact that it looks like liars prosper in the long haul, God’s great judgment is upon deceivers.

In Genesis 34, you remember the story of Levi and Simeon. Remember, they go into the promised land and don’t get any land. They’re cursed. Why are they cursed? Well, because they exercise subtlety or deceitfulness in the matter of Shechem and Hamor and their relationship to Dinah. They deceive them by getting them to circumcise themselves as if they’re going to bring them into the family. And then they kill them all while they’re sitting there circumcised. Deceit.

Jacob’s sons here exercise great deceit. And because of that, the curse of God comes upon them. They turn the curse into a blessing by being good servants in the context of the promised land. But originally the reason why the Levites get no land in the promised land is because they were deceitful in the matter of Shechem and Hamor.

Job brings upon himself an imprecation. He says in chapter 31: “If I’ve walked with vanity or if my foot has hasted to deceit, if I’ve been deceitful, if I’ve been characterized by deceit.” And then in verse 8: “Then let me sow and let another eat. Yay, let my offspring be rooted out.”

Think of that, parents who love your children dearly. Job recognizes that if he’s a man of deceit, his offspring will be rooted out. He says, “Okay, that’s what God says, but I’m like Nathaniel. I’m a true Israelite. I’m a true believer in God. I have no guile. If I have guile and deceit in my heart, and if this characterizes my life, then indeed I will lose my children either through them abandoning me or being killed or whatever it is.” Our children are affected by our deceit or our guile.

Psalm 50—”You hate instruction and cast my words behind you.” And then in verse 19: “You gave your mouth to evil and your tongue frameth deceit or guile.” Same idea here in Nathaniel’s absence of guile. Here, the tongue that frames deceit is the person that’s being spoken of in Psalm 50 rather. “You sit and speak against your brother. You slander your own mother’s son. These things hast thou done and I kept silent. Thou thought I was altogether such a one as yourself. But I will reprove thee and set them in order before thine eyes. Now consider this ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.”

Great judgment to men that are deceitful.

In the Proverbs and Psalms, the deceitful man is also the flattering man. Lots of warnings about flattery. People start giving you a lot of compliments. Watch it. Put your hand on your wallet, metaphorically speaking, because deceit and flattery are sort of linked together in the Psalms and Proverbs.

And while cheaters prosper in the short term, in the long term, God warns those amongst us who would be deceitful that he will come and tear you in pieces and there’ll be none to deliver from the great judgment that comes upon you.

Paul, when he uttered the imprecation, New Testament imprecation of wrath upon the magician in Acts 13, he says: “Oh full of all subtlety and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord? And now behold, the hand of the Lord is upon you, and you shall be blind, not seeing the sun for a season.” And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness. And he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand.

Why? Because he says here, “You’re full of all subtlety.” It’s that same word. “You’re full of guile, you sorcerer. And as a result, the strong judgments of God are come upon you and you’re going to be struck blind to be led about.” And immediately it happens. That’s New Testament age of grace sort of language. And it’s language that should frighten us if we have deceit in the context of our hearts.

And he calls him here the “child of the devil, full of all deceitfulness and mischief. You’re a child of the devil. Who’s the father of lies? Satan is the father of lies. And when we tell lies, we are in essence following Satan. And when we estew away, when we lay aside guile and deceit, we are following the Lord Jesus Christ.

Indeed, in Romans 1, we read the verse 32 that “those who know the judgment of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death.” We know—we take that as the idea that openly practicing homosexuals correctly have the death penalty or should be subject to the death penalty who flaunt it in the context of a Christian culture and Christian laws based upon the law of God. This is a New Testament verse again, and we talk about that a lot.

But the list that precedes this judgment of God unto death includes things other than homosexuality. Says: “You with all unrighteousness, fornication, again, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, debate, and deceit, malign. Deceit brings upon us the great judgments of God.

On the other hand, truth speaking, being men without guile, like Nathaniel, accrue great blessings to the church. Great blessings are promised to those with no deceit, no deceit. Psalm 32: “Blessed is the man unto whom Jehovah imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.” Summary statement of the man who is blessed is the man like Nathaniel, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no deceitfulness or guile.

Turn to Psalm 34. It’s almost like we have a commentary on our text in Psalm 34:8 and following.

Psalm 34 beginning in verse 8: “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. How blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints, for to those who fear him there is no want. The young lions do lack and suffer hunger. But they who seek the Lord shall not be in want of any good thing.”

So you see, it’s kind of following here. Some of those who seek the Lord, who follow the Lord Jesus Christ, they’re commanded to follow, tasting and seeing that the Lord is good. Philip said, “Come and see. Nathaniel, follow Jesus. Seek after him. Come and see.” And then verse 11: “Come you children, listen to me. Follow me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. Who is the man that desires life and loves length of days that he may see good?” All these blessings.

Verse 13: “If you want these blessings, if you want life, if you want a good life, if you want the abundant life that Jesus promises to his people, verse 13, keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Depart from evil and do good. Seek peace. Pursue it.”

You see, so great blessings are pictured here to come to those who abhor deceit and abhor speaking deceitfully or slanderously.

Sixth, deceit is old man’s stuff that we are commanded to lay aside. 1 Peter 2:1: “Wherefore laying aside all malice and all guile, same word, deceit, and hypocrisy, and envy, and all evil speakings, as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby—lay aside deceit.”

We are positively commanded to lay it aside. How much deceit should we lay aside? Most of it. So our lives just aren’t characterized by it. But okay, it’s sometimes okay to talk a little deceitfully, to have a few hidden agendas, a few things up our sleeve, you know. No.