Resurrection requires death

When Greeks Come Looking for Jesus

In John chapter 12, verses 20-21, we find a fascinating moment during Jesus' final week before the crucifixion. The passage tells us, "Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, 'Sir, we wish to see Jesus.'"

These weren't Jewish converts - they were still Greeks who had come to Jerusalem for Passover, drawn by something they'd heard about this teacher named Jesus. Philip went and he told Andrew, and Andrew's response was perfect: "Let's go ask Jesus."

I could preach a whole message on just those two statements: I want to see Jesus and I don't know the answer so let's ask Jesus. You could fix a lot of your life. And I could have fixed a lot of my life if I had asked Jesus first, even when I knew the answer, because sometimes even when I've known the answer, it's been the wrong answer.

The Hour of Glorification

When Philip and Andrew brought this request to Jesus, His response seems to ignore their question entirely. In John 12:23, Jesus declares, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified."

"Isn't it just like Jesus to not answer a question?" But Jesus was answering - just not the way they expected. Jesus was answering their question with a statement: ’I want to answer how you see me by teaching you something.

Jesus knew that His "glorification" meant His crucifixion. "I'm here to tell you this morning, the only way to see Jesus is to experience his crucifixion, to accept him as the way, the truth, the life that no man comes unto the Father but through him."

The Grain of Wheat Must Die

Then Jesus shares one of His most profound teachings in John 12:24: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone, but if it dies, it bears much fruit."

This isn't just about salvation - it's about transformation. "The grain, the piece of grain is unfruitful until it dies. But not only when it dies, it has to remove itself. It doesn't die on the stock. It has to fall to the ground."

Jesus is saying, "If you really want to see me, then you've got to be like a grain of wheat that separates from the stock that falls to the ground that dies. Why? That you might live that you might bear fruit."

Separation from the World

"We must be people who separate ourselves. Holiness is separating myself from the world. I do not look like the world. I do not act like the world. I don't think like the world. I don't talk like the world. I don't do what the world does. I am different."

For too long, the church has bought into the lie that we need to look like the world to reach the world. "That's bologna. You don't have to look like the world. The early church did not look like the world to save the world."

When people looked at the early church in Acts, "they looked at them and said, 'You guys are different.' They were in awe of the church. I've never seen anybody be in awe of somebody who's normal."

Death to Self-Will

But falling away isn't enough. There's a protective covering over grain. So when the grain falls, if it does not shed that protective covering, it just remains on the ground. No amount of water, no amount of sunlight, no amount of anything can transform the grain.

Jesus explains this further in John 12:25: "Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life." When we dig into the original Greek, this becomes clearer: "Whoever loves his psyche, his will and desires will lose it. But whoever hates his psyche, his will and desires will keep it for eternal Zoe" - God's eternal life.

"We have to lose the love for our will. We have to lose the love for our desires. We have to lose love for that which we think is good for us and say, 'Not my will but yours be done.'"

The Difference Between Habits and Transformation

Here's where many of us get stuck. "We think transformation too often is just changing my habits... I'm going to start reading my Bible more often. That's great. I'm going to go to church more often. That's great. I'm going to pray more often. That's great. But it's a habit. What's the problem with habits? They're easy to break."

I learned something interesting about this recently. As a kid, I loved strawberry milk, but now my body can't tolerate lactose the way it used to. "Most adults begin to stop producing the enzyme lactase... We've actually changed. Do you realize that your body, without your permission, began to change? And then here's the thing. I can't go back to that because I'm no longer that who I was."

"That's our problem. We don't know what we truly need. And we try to go back to that which we were. The habits only last us so long... But what Jesus is saying when you die, you cannot go back to what you were."

Four Requirements for Following Jesus

In John 12:26, Jesus says, "If anyone serves me, he must follow me." Based on His teachings and example, following Jesus requires four things:

SELF-DENIAL

"It's a simple question. Do you obey the voice of God? When he tells you to do something, do you question him? Do you fight with him? Do you argue with him? Do you try to convince him? Or do you do what he said to do?"

SERVICE

"Are you engaged in helping the less fortunate? And let me just lay this out. Giving money is not engaging. When's the last time you've touched somebody less fortunate?" Jesus reached out to lepers, to the lowest of the low, and touched them.

HOLINESS

"You have to be separated. One mindset. I'm here for the kingdom." Even Jesus' enemies "could find no fault in him because he was holy. He had separated himself."

FAITHFULNESS TO GOD'S WORD

"Jesus, the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us." We must become people who rely on "what thus says the Lord." The Bible is either God's word or it's not God's word. If you find something in here and go, I don't think that's God's word, then you need to find a new religion because this is God's word."

The Promise for Those Who Die

Jesus doesn't leave us without hope. He promises in John 12:26, "Where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him."

"The concept of the father honoring is as if you've got a son of the father. And the son of the father has a servant. And that servant has done something for the son. And the father looks at the servant and says, 'No longer are you my servant. You're my son.'

Transformation Is Not Optional

"But here's the deal. You don't want to hear this, but I'm going to tell you, transformation is not an option. It's not an option." Jesus made this clear when He spoke about lukewarm believers - those who think they can have salvation without transformation.

"I want to tell you this morning, resurrection is not possible until you die. You can't be a new creation if the old creation is still alive. You can't become new unless... the old is gone."

The problem with American Christianity is that "most of us have never died. We've never truly experienced brokenness." Not just brokenness from life's circumstances, but "brokenness where you come to the altar, you come to God and you say, 'God, I can't do it any longer.'"

My Moment of Death

I can tell you about my own moment of brokenness: "I could tell you right where I was, what I was doing, and I was as small as a ball as possible... just weeping and mourning... because I just realized I wasn't good enough any longer. I thought I was a Christian. I thought I was good. But I realized in that moment of brokenness that I had to get broken."

"It was in that moment when I said yes God, whatever your will, whatever your way, that's the moment that I experienced resurrection. That's the moment that God began to change all those things about me that I didn't enjoy about myself and some of the things I did enjoy about myself."

Things like my horrible temper - "it wasn't until that moment on that carpet wrapped up as tightly as I could where God began to heal my temper."

Next Steps: Your Daily Death

"Church, you need to die daily." Jesus said to take up our cross daily - "What is he saying there? You need to learn to die daily."

"Can I challenge some of you? Some of you, you never died. You continually do your way, your thoughts, your opinions, and every once in a while you insert God specifically when things get too rough for you. But God says, 'You must die.'"

Are you like those Greek people who said, "We wish to see Jesus"? "Is that really what you want? Or do you want to just enjoy the benefits of salvation? Do you want to see him in the fullness of his glory, the fullness of his power?"

"Your family is waiting for you to die. Your lost loved ones are waiting for you to die. The people you're working with right now are waiting for you to die so that they can see a transformation in you. Not a habit change, but a transformation."

The choice is yours: Will you remain a grain on the stalk, or will you fall to the ground and die so that you might truly live?ph with bold text.