The Debbie Taylor Williams Podcast

Debbie Taylor Williams: This was for the Jewish people gathered just like they would've been gathered in John 7. So when you open your Bibles to John 7 this morning, and you think about the Jews who were gathered, that is where they would have been gathered. Those are some of the songs they would have sung, and those are the people, the very people, that the next day, October 7th, Hamas brutally went in and murdered and raped and beheaded and did so many atrocities to these people.

Some of these very people in the videos may have been the ones who were killed or who were kidnapped. We don't know, but it's not unlikely that it was perhaps some of them after they had gone back to their homes. I wanted you to see it because what we are seeing in the news today, these are Jesus's people. These are God's people. This is this nation. This is this race. And it is very important that we don't just study these scriptures like they were some historical documents and old scriptures from the Bible.

It's very important that we are watching. We are living in biblical times today, you and me. We are living very likely in the end times. So envision those people that you saw on the screen and know that those are the people who are right here who had gathered to seek the Lord's presence during that Feast of Tabernacles, during that Feast of Booths. They had been praising God for the harvest that they had. They had been praying for rain.

And then it was on the last day of Sukkot that they just finished. That was from the very week. It was September 29th through October 6th right here, right there. So let's pray now and ask the Holy Spirit to truly transport our minds and our eyes and our hearts back to what the experience was then for that crowd, for Jesus's family, for the pharisaical Jews and, most importantly, for Jesus and the invitation he gave us.

Father, Lord God and Jesus, these are your people. This is your nation that you have preserved as other nations have risen and fallen. You have kept the Jews. You have kept the parcel of land that's been reserved. We pray for the peace of Israel. Awaken our eyes and hearts to the spiritual battle between you and the devil. And let us represent you well through the power of your Holy Spirit. For it's in Jesus' name we pray, Amen.

We'll go ahead and continue. I've already mentioned to you about Sukkot and how it was the Feast of Tabernacles, and I'm so glad you're here this morning so we can study God's word together and delve deep into it. On your listening guide, it includes that it wasn't just a seven-day festival. The Jews would erect, and they still do to this day, temporary houses, as if they would have had them when they were wandering for 40 years.

They would have temporary dwelling places that they would make out of palm branches and limbs and things like that. So even today in Israel, they will do that, and they'll meet and they may eat and they may share a meal with people, or some of them do it as a family, and they may even spend the night out in this tent, this tabernacle, as a reminder of God's deliverance for the Jewish people from Egyptian bondage, their wanderings in the wilderness for 40 years, and then God bringing them into the Promised Land.

Even though they had been a disobedient people, and that's why they had had to wander for 40 years, it's an incredible picture of God's goodness, his faithfulness, and it's a huge time of celebration. But we see it's so interesting. The last day is an eighth day, and some people include it as this week and others see it as its own distinct festival. But it's called the last day, Hoshanah Rabbah, the Great Salvation, and it is the water-pouring ceremony.

It's at this water-pouring ceremony that we're going to see how Jesus stands up and invites people to come to him. It is such an incredible passage that we're studying. The song that they were singing may have been based on Psalm 118:25 that says, "Oh Lord, do save. We beseech you, oh Lord, we beseech you, do send prosperity." And of course, they were singing one thing: we desire is to dwell in the house of the Lord, to dwell in your most holy temple.

And certainly, God will not forget his people as he has promised. I know you studied Isaiah 12:3, but I want to go ahead and turn to that passage because our scriptures are so rich in the Old Testament. If you think about how often the Old Testament is referenced, it's exciting because we see how important the Old Testament is and Jesus fulfilling it. Isaiah 12:1 says, "Then you will say on that day, 'I will give thanks to you, oh Lord, for although you were angry with me, your anger is turned away and you comfort me.

Behold, God is my salvation. I will trust and not be afraid, for the Lord God is my strength and song, and he has become my salvation.' Therefore, you will joyously draw water from the springs of salvation. In that day, you will say, 'Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name, make his deeds known among the peoples, make them remember that his name is exalted. Praise the Lord in song for he has done excellent things. Praise the Lord in song. Let this be known throughout the earth. Cry aloud, shout for joy, oh inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the holy one of Israel.'"

This was prophesied, and now here Jesus is, the holy one, and he is saying, "I'm the fulfillment from whom you're able to draw the water of living water." It's this water that you and I also drink, this same water. In John 7:1-19, we're going to see how Jesus teaching at the Feast of Tabernacles astonishes the Jews. They're amazed at his teaching. And then in 20 through verses 36, Jesus is accused of having a demon. How ironic.

And the Jews tried to seize him. And then we're going to see in 37 through 53 that Jesus cries out on the last day of the great feast to come to him, the living water, the spirit who was to be given to those who believe in him. Let's read part of this very first part because we are going to see in this passage that Jesus is going to respond to his family, he is going to respond to the fickle crowd, and he is going to respond to his foes.

What we are looking at through Jesus every week is what it means to live a spirit-controlled life. Say that out loud with me: spirit-controlled life. Because people can be possessed. You can either be possessed by evil and do the kinds of things that Hamas just did, you can be possessed by your own natural spirit. If it's not an evil spirit, you can be possessed by just your human spirit, and I don't know how well your human spirit works out for you.

I've got a pretty cranky natural-born human spirit. Or you can be possessed by the Holy Spirit. Who do you want to be possessed by? We want to be possessed, not demon-possessed, we want to be Holy Spirit-possessed. And he possesses us in that he has come into us and saved us. But too often as Christians, we forget that he gives us the honor and the choice to yield our lives, the full possession of ourselves, our time, our money, our body, our being, our thoughts, our day, our will.

He allows us to yield the possession of ourselves to him. I want to be fully possessed, do you? We are able to see through Jesus what a fully possessed, Holy Spirit-possessed person looks like in their family, with a fickle crowd and people, and with even enemies. So first of all, we see that Jesus was walking in Galilee because the Jews were seeking to kill him, verse 1 tells us, and the Feast of Booths was near, and his cranky, ugly, tacky brothers said to him, "Why don't you leave here and go up to Judea and show everybody what a big deal you are?"

They were not believing in him. Have you ever had a cranky brother, sister, parent, in-law, person? How do you respond to that person? Jesus shows us how we respond to somebody, and he explained, "My time is not yet here, but your time is always opportune." And he goes on and he says, "The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its deeds are evil." Would you say that with me: the world's deeds are evil.

That is what Jesus said because he has come from heaven and seen that. And he said, "Go up to the feast yourselves. I do not go up because my time has not yet come." And saying these things, the first thing if you want a tip on how you can respond to family who may not understand your walk with the Lord or any other issue, he responds by saying he's going to follow his father's will. Family may not understand.

He is going to follow his father's timing, and that is a big one. And he is going to speak the truth. And I think that's something that all of us can take home with us. What you do, family, is what you do. But I am possessed by the Holy Spirit, and I choose to follow my father's timing, my father's will, and as God gives the opportunity, speak the truth to family in love. Jesus says the world hates him because he testifies that the world's works are evil, and that is from the word that means of the devil.

The world is the cosmos when he uses this word world here, and the word world is used 57 times in the book of John. Jesus is giving you and me as his disciples a heads-up about this tension that we live in between trying to follow him yet living in a world that is of the devil and whose deeds are evil. And we're going to need to know how to navigate this more all the time because the world at large without Christ is hostile toward the cause of Christ because it's under the reign of Satan.

Holiness came into the world, Jesus planted his holy feet right there in the middle of it, and they hated him. Can you imagine looking from heaven and then seeing this world that's being ruled by the devil and just saying, "I have to do something about it. I'm going to do something about it"? And as he has said so many times coming into the world, in 11 through 35, we see how Jesus responds to fickle people.

And we see that fickle people, some of them said, "Well, he's a good man," and others said, "Well, he's a deceiver, he leads people astray." And then others were saying, "Well, he's an amazing teacher," and then somebody else is saying, "Well, he's demon-possessed." If I was Jesus, I would just be like, "You're making me want to just pull my hair out. I am not a good man. I'm God. Quit calling me a good man. And I am not a deceiver. You are so deceived even calling me a deceiver. And you're going to have the gall to come out of your mouth that I have a demon?"

Jesus is just in the midst of this fickle crowd. And friends, you and I need to be very aware when we're talking to people, you cannot have somebody tell you Jesus was a good man but he's not Lord and Savior. A good man doesn't lie. A good man doesn't say, "Come to me and I'll give you eternal life." You're either, as Josh McDowell framed years ago, you're either the Lord or you're a lunatic or you're a liar. You can't be all of those.

Jesus said to this fickle crowd, "My teaching is not mine but his who sent me. If anyone is willing to do his will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from myself." And so Jesus says that a person can come to the truth, not only can they, they will come to the truth. Anybody who really wants to know the truth about who Jesus is, they will come to the truth if they are willing to do God's will.

The problem is a lot of people don't want to change, as we know from our study of John. Jesus responds to fickle people who judge, and I put in parentheses "we" who judge Jesus and others. These people were judging Jesus's behavior of healing a man on the Sabbath, and these very same people who were judging him would circumcise a boy on the Sabbath. Although it was considered work to circumcise, it was also important to get that baby circumcised on that eighth day, and so if the Sabbath fell on that eighth day, they would go ahead and do that work.

But oh my goodness, Jesus, you heal a person? No, no, no, no, no. You just violated one of God's laws. And Jesus just says right here in this verse, "Judge with righteous judgment." Judge with righteous judgment. How do we judge with righteous judgment? And the reason I put "we" in here is because I think sometimes you and I can judge God. Why did you let this happen? Why aren't you answering me, Jesus, like I want you to when I want you to?

We're not treating him as Lord. We're telling him he's not doing things right according to our rules, our standards, our laws that we have within ourselves. And also, you know what? I find that I am real good at judging other people. I can see everything wrong somebody else does. Can you at all be like that ever possibly, just a little bit? That natural spirit in you? Yes, we can judge other people very well.

So how do we judge with righteous judgment? Jesus says, "Stop judging according to appearance and judge with righteous judgment." And how do we do that? Number one, we cling to Christ's amazing teachings. We seek God's glory. And three, most importantly, we recognize our hypocrisy when we point out someone else's sin when we are still sinning.

And friends, if you recognize you have a critical spirit toward someone, then guess what? You're the one with the log in your eye. When we have a critical spirit toward someone else, we need to judge righteously and we need to ask the Lord what's going on in us that is not pure and holy. And if you go before the Lord and you ask him that, he will probably say, "Well, you're being really judgmental of that person, and guess what? You're not perfect."

And he may just point out that area of imperfection. Now Jesus responds to these foes, and he invites anyone, foe, friend, family member, whoever you are, and he says to them, "Come." Let's look in verses 37 through 53. The Jews said to one another, "Where does this man intend to go?" Because Jesus had said, "Where I go you cannot find me and where I am you cannot come." And the Jews said, "Where does this man intend to go that we will not find him? Is he intending to leave the country?"

And Jesus in verse 36 said, "What is this statement that he said, 'You will seek me'?" Now verse 37: "On the last day, the great day of the feast," those images that you just saw of the Jews gathered together in Jerusalem, picture that scene. Jesus stands up in those people's midst. The water pouring ceremony has already happened. The water pouring ceremony was where the priest would go to the pool of Siloam, and they would gather up water from this gushing pool.

And this pool gushed with water, and they would gather up the water, and they would take it and they would walk around the altar and they would pour the water on the altar symbolic of this living water that Isaiah prophesied about. How God provided water for them when they were in the wilderness. How when the people were grumbling and God told Moses to strike the rock and water gushed forth.

This pool of Siloam gushing forth water symbolic of the rock, and they would go and they would be reminded not only with their booths and temporary little tent dwellings that they would put up of the wilderness wanderings, but the water pouring ceremony was also a reminder to them of how God provided water from the rock when they were in their wilderness wanderings. And the same Jesus who was the rock and the manna in the wilderness for 40 years, who led them by day and was a pillar of fire for them by night, that same Jesus that had been with those grumbling people for 40 years in the wilderness, this same Jesus is with this same but different generation of people.

And he is going to be struck and as a result send forth the spirit, the living water, to all of us. This same Jesus whose feet were with them, but they couldn't see his feet, but he provided the manna and he provided the water from the rock, is this same Jesus who is in this scripture is with these same people, and he is saying, "Come to me." He's the rock of salvation. He's the wellspring of water.

And so he stands and he is not hiding on this last day of the great day of the feast, and Jesus stood and he cried out, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, from his innermost being will flow rivers of living water." Oh friends, the question is: do we come to Jesus? If you're here and you're a Christian, yes. Did you drink of the rivers of living water? Yes, you received the Holy Spirit when you professed your belief in the Lord Jesus as Lord and Savior.

But how much are we drinking? How much are we guzzling? Here's the question: when you get up in the mornings, are you just saying, "Lord, thank you for this day"? And you've got a little thimble that you just want to look outside and say, "Oh, it's a beautiful day. Isn't God good?" And so you've got your little thimble filled. And so that's what you go around with, the awareness of the spirit, your little thimble that you can drop off later.

Or you may be somebody who says, "Oh, I'm going to have my devotional while I have my cup of coffee." There's that answer. How long is it taking to finish these questions? There's that answer. I wish he wouldn't make us go the Old Testament too, I wish we could just stay right here in John 7. I've thought the same thing. There's a point. So you've got your coffee cup of the spirit.

But you know what? What if you left here today, or even right now today, and you went to Jesus and you say, "Jesus, I don't know that I know what it is to be possessed by your spirit in the fullness of your spirit. And Jesus, I come to you, and I know there is nothing good in and of me of myself except you. Oh Jesus, would you fill my whole being? I just want you to wash out, Lord, anything in me that is not holy, that little debris, that attitude, that critical spirit where I think I can judge others or I judge you, Lord.

Get it out of me. Just wash it out of me. I want to be clean and I want to know you in the fullness. Lord, just fill me up, gush me full of your Holy Spirit." This is what I want to walk around with today. This is what I want to carry. This is what I want to slosh over on people that are nice, rude, whatever. This is what I want to slosh over on them, Lord. Because if he is who he says he is, rivers of living water, then it is a continual flow.

If you could just imagine that this was a hose just fixed from heaven's gates just going into you, just filling you up continually with the flow of his Holy Spirit. That's what he is saying: rivers of living water can flow from us. And friends, if ever there were a time that you and I need to be fully possessed by the Holy Spirit, it is now. Because we have people walking around in our nation, walking around in other countries, who are fully possessed by evil. It is a battle.

And God has trusted you and me for this time in eternity's span to stand on the word of God for the cause of Christ. But you and I, if we are only getting a little thimble maybe every once in a while of singing a praise song or hearing something or looking at the pretty sky and that's it, we're not a warrior. You and I will only be a warrior when we are filled and flowing and sloshing over on people: Jesus.

Which do you want? Do you want a thimble, or do you want a coffee cup, or do you want every bit of this river of living water possible? There's a basic principle here: you are what you drink. You are what you drink. And this is what I want to drink. Do you? This is what I want to drink because this is who I want to be. I want to be fully possessed by Jesus. As we close with some encouragement, would you read these out loud with me if they're what you believe based on our study of God's word?

I can respond to family by following God's will and timing and speaking the truth.

Guest (Female): I can respond to family by following God's will and timing and speaking the truth.

Debbie Taylor Williams: I can respond to people by explaining Jesus cannot simply be a good man. He is either who he says he is, God, or he is a deceiver or mentally unstable.

Guest (Female): I can respond to people by explaining Jesus cannot simply be a good man. He is either who he says he is, God, or he is a deceiver or mentally unstable.

Debbie Taylor Williams: I can respond to foes by speaking truth and inviting them to come to Jesus and receive his life-changing spirit.

Guest (Female): I can respond to foes by speaking truth and inviting them to come to Jesus and receive his life-changing spirit.

Debbie Taylor Williams: I can judge with righteous judgment, not judge Christ when his ways are different than mine, not judge others by a standard of perfection I don't keep. Take the log out of my eye. Can I hear an amen on that one?

Guest (Female): Amen.

Debbie Taylor Williams: I can come and drink daily of the life-cleansing, empowering spirit. Oh, amen. So this is a question: will you every morning come thirsty to Jesus? Come with his word, come ready to learn, come willing to confess sin. Come thirsty.

Father, thank you that you explain through Jesus' feet on the ground right there in Israel, and now your spirit on the ground in us. Thank you. Oh God, I pray that everyone in this room, in this sanctuary of yours, will ask for you to fully possess them every day and throughout the day when they sense their old nature or the enemy coming at them. Thank you that you are a continual flow of eternal life and Holy Spirit that we can come to continually. We love you and we thank you. In Jesus' name, amen.

Oh ladies, I almost let you leave without your golden nugget. Write down your golden nugget on your listening guide real quick before you leave, would you please? What's your takeaway from today?