A Changed Identity

A Changed Identity

Series: Changed

Verses used: John 5:1-18, John 1:12, 1 John 3:1, John 5:18-47, John chapters 1-5.

Supporting Media:

Brody's Testimony from Woodbridge Community Church on Vimeo.

Key verse: John 5:1-18

Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish festivals. Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool, which in Aramaic is called Bethesda and which is surrounded by five covered colonnades. Here a great number of disabled people used to lie—the blind, the lame, the paralyzed. One who was there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, “Do you want to get well?” “Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” At once the man was cured; he picked up his mat and walked. The day on which this took place was a Sabbath, and so the Jewish leaders said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.” But he replied, “The man who made me well said to me, ‘Pickup your mat and walk.’ ” So they asked him, “Who is this fellow who told you to pick it up and walk?” The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there. Later Jesus found him at the temple and said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you.” The man went away and told the Jewish leaders that it was Jesus who had made him well. So, because Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath, the Jewish leaders began to persecute him. In his defense Jesus said to them, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.” For this reason they tried all the more to kill him; not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

SERMON NOTES:

This chapter is about identity.

It is primarily about the identity of Jesus.

A Christian is not simply a person who gets forgiveness ,

…who gets to go to heaven ; who gets the Holy Spirit.

A Christian, in terms of their deepest identity, is a child of God!

Being a Christian is not just getting something ; it is being someone!

Being born again means becoming someone who is very different to what he/she was _ before.

SOME QUESTIONS FOR YOUR GROUP THIS WEEK:

What was something you learned or what stood out to you from the sermon on Sunday?

Why do you think Jesus asked the lame man if he wanted to get well?

From the lame man’s response, what did he not understand about Jesus?

Why do you think Jesus chose this man to heal? Why did Jesus not heal the others there who were sick or crippled?

The Jews sought to kill Jesus for 2 things that He did. What were they?

What was your identity in your High school/college years? How did people see you?

How do you think people see your identity now?

When did you really begin to see yourself the way God sees you as his child? What has your journey in heavenly identity been like?

Do you know of anyone who needs healing but is so discouraged they’ve given up hope? What could you do, as Jesus did, to help build their faith?

How can we be “stirring in” these verses into our lives this week?

SOMETHING TO PONDER:

Jesus asked the lame man a fair question, “Do you want to be healed?” Today, we all have issues in our life that need healing. What areas of healing would you like to see Jesus to do in your life?