Today's scripture reading is found in the Gospel of John. It can be found on page 1063 in your Pew Bible. If you don't have a Bible, please take the one in front of you. That's our gift to you. We want the Word of God in the hands of every person. We believe that it is truth and life. John chapter 1, starting in verse 35. The next day, John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, look, the Lamb of God. When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, what do you want? They said, rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying? Come, he replied, and you will see. And so they went and saw where he was staying and they spent that day with him. It was about four in the afternoon. Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who had heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus. The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, we have found the Messiah, that is the Christ. and he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, you are Simon, son of John. You will be called Cephas, which when translated is Peter. The next day, Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, follow me. Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, We have found the one Moses wrote about in the law, and about whom the prophets also wrote. Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. Nazareth? Can anything good come from there? Nathaniel asked. Come and see, said Philip. Do you remember the good old days when you went out on the ball field as a child and you had a group of kids together and you decided, we're going to choose up teams and decide how to play a game together. And so two of the older kids, of course, would become the de facto captains and they'd start picking people for their team. And if you were one of the younger members of the squad, you may remember not being picked first or second or third or fourth or maybe toward the end they'd say, well, I guess I'll take Dana on my team, you know, that kind of thing. Some of you may have had that experience as well. You know, you just stand there hoping that someone wants you, that someone will invite you to play with them. What an embarrassing thing not to get invited to a special event. you know, something special is coming up and you're waiting for that invitation to come in the mail or now by Facebook and you're wondering, why didn't I get the invitation? Now I have to confess, like for a wedding invitation, I'll just confess here, guys and gals see this differently, okay, just so that you are understanding. So when a wedding is coming up, the wives are looking forward to this invitation. The husbands are saying, we didn't get an invitation. dodged that one, right? Okay, I'm just saying, some of you are thinking that, right? Okay, I know you're too embarrassed to admit it right now, but when your wives ask you later, you'll have to tell them the truth about that. Sometimes that happens, right? But we wonder, why didn't we get the invitation? Historically, there was a great, great athlete by the name of Jesse Owens. Some of you remember his story. He starred in the 1936 Summer Olympics. right in the middle of Nazi Germany. African American, middle of Nazi Germany. Great story, won four gold medals in the Olympics. And as he reflected on the events that followed that, Owens made this comment at one point. He said, Hitler didn't snub me. It was our president who snubbed me, he said after the games. The president didn't even send me a telegram, no invitation to the White House, no telegram, no acknowledgement from President Roosevelt. He said that was the most disappointing part of all those wins. Not getting an invitation sometimes can hurt, doesn't it? I'm so glad that Jesus has given us an invitation. And that's an invitation to all of us. And we find it in the pages of scripture. I've been thinking about this message outline for some time, and just am eager to share with you some of these statements that come from Jesus Christ. And it all comes around this little word, come. come. Jesus has this gentle invitation for us to come. And as we approach the new year, I think it's an appropriate time for us to think about these invitations that Jesus gives to us. This gentle invitation to draw close to him. This gentle invitation to come alongside of him. And the question that we would ask ourselves is, will we accept his invitation? We begin in John chapter 1 in this passage that Pastor Chris just read for us. It's a wonderful passage, Jesus inviting some of those very first disciples who are going to be followers of him. And as they see Jesus Christ, as John the Baptist points to Jesus and tells his followers, there's the one, the Lamb of God, some of those disciples of John then go over to begin to follow Jesus. And as they go over to see him, they ask him this question in John chapter 1 verse 38. Jesus turns and sees them and asks them, what do you want? And they said, Rabbi, where are you staying? And Jesus replies, come and see. Come and see. What a wonderful invitation. Come and see. If we scan down a little bit farther than that, we find out that one of those earliest disciples, Philip, goes to a friend, Nathanael, and says to him, we have found the Messiah. And Nathanael says, really? How can you have determined that? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? And Philip repeats that invitation. Come and see. And it's a wonderful invitation to receive and to extend to others. Come and see. Come and see who Jesus Christ is. Jesus invites us to come and see. And I think that that very basic and gentle invitation is one that Jesus extends to us and to friends and neighbors around us as well to say, Check it out. Take time to observe, to evaluate in your mind. Most people are not going to come to Christ the first time they hear about him. They're going to need to know more about him, learn about him along the way. And so Jesus invites us to come and see. When we come to see Jesus, when we come and observe him, what are we going to discover? What will we find? Well, my mind went back to Psalm 27, verse four, which is just a neat little description of what we might see when we come and see Jesus. Psalm 27 verse 4 says, one thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life and gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. To gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. When we come and see Jesus, what we're going to find is something beautiful. To gaze on the beauty of the Lord. Now, if we are thinking in terms of physical appearance, we understand from scripture, Jesus was an ordinary man, in human form, ordinary, in fact, not attractive in any particular way physically, but there was something attractive about him. There was a beauty about him that reflected, if you will, the beauty of creation and the universe, because he's the God who made it. And those who came to see Jesus would recognize a beauty in His person, something unique and outstanding about Him. We might use words like the splendor or the glory or the radiance that's beyond compare when we think of Jesus Christ. And if we if we just for a moment think in our minds, what is one of those beautiful scenes we've ever seen? Is it a mountainscape or a great desert valley or ocean views? These kinds of things that just give us a sense of awe and a wonder and respect for God's creation. And we're just overwhelmed by the beauty of God's creation, looking into the stars at night. We begin to get a little picture of what it might be like if we just stood back for a moment and paid attention to Jesus. because scripture tells us there's a beauty about him, a majesty about who he is. When we look at Jesus, we would take time then to look at his birth, his life, his death. his resurrection, his ascension, his return, the whole gamut of his existence in human form. And we think, what a remarkable individual. This one who came in such humble fashion, who worked such powerful miracles, who taught such meaningful truth, authoritative truth, who willingly gave his life on the cross for your sins and for mine. rose triumphantly from the grave, who's seated at the right hand of the Father and who is coming back one day. We see Jesus, we begin to see, wow, this is someone worth observing. This is someone who has the truth. And we begin to think of Jesus in a new light. Come and see, Jesus said. And the question we can ask ourselves is are we longing for truth? Are we really in our hearts longing for truth? If we are, take a look at Jesus Christ. Take a look at him. Come and see. That invitation spills over to a second invitation that we find in Matthew chapter 4 verse 19 and other passages as well, but I'll pay our attention to Matthew 4, 19. After the disciples had come and seen Jesus for a while and began to follow him and listen to his teachings and so forth, we read that Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee and he saw Simon and Peter and Andrew and they were there doing their fisherman thing and and he'd had acquaintances with them before. This wasn't their first exposure, of course, we know from John chapter 1. But as he comes along this time, he says to them in verse 19, come, follow. Come, follow me, Jesus said, and I will make you fishers of men. Come and follow. Come and see. We've had an opportunity to observe the beauty of Jesus Christ and to understand his great splendor and his great sacrifice and his great love for us. And when we've done that, well then why wouldn't we want to take the next step with Jesus? Come and follow. come and follow him. And in doing that, Jesus says to his disciples, I'm going to make you fishers of men. I'm going to give you a real purpose in life. Something greater than what you're doing right now. You're fishing for fish, but I'm going to make you fishers of men. I'm going to make life so much more meaningful to you than you can even imagine. I'm going to give you a purpose that's outside of yourselves. and it's going to be a grand and glorious purpose that you're going to experience. Now if we take a moment to look at Matthew chapter 19 verse 21 we see that Jesus extends this same invitation to another man. The man came to Jesus and said what do I need to do to earn eternal life and Jesus recited some of the law to him and the man said well I've kept all the law all my life and Jesus says to him, well, what about your possessions? In Matthew 19, verse 21, Jesus said to the man, if you want to be perfect, then go and sell your possessions and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven. And then come and follow. Come and follow me. What a wonderful invitation. That gentle invitation to this man who apparently did not follow through with that. He instead went away sad because he was a very wealthy individual, wasn't willing to part with the things of this world to follow after Jesus. God had offered, Jesus had offered him this grand purpose outside of himself as well, and he would have to release those things that were holding him back, and this man was not willing to do that, but Jesus is offering freedom from bondage to the things that hold us down. And so when Jesus says, come and see, he's saying, take time to observe, see if I'm worth following. And what we discover is, yes, he absolutely is. And so then the next invitation is to say, well, then come and follow. And if you come and follow, I'll give you a purpose that's outside of yourself that's bigger and grander than anything you can imagine. And I will release you from the bondage of the things that hold you back in life so that you can truly be a follower. Following Jesus is a wonderful metaphor that challenges us to walk as closely to Jesus Christ as we can. Here's how I picture following Jesus Christ and discipleship is following Jesus Christ. Here's how I picture it. When our children were little, it was very easy for us to be walking through a store or through a park or some place and And as children will, they'll get distracted by things, and so we'll be walking along, but the children will kind of go off this way or that way, and they'll, you know, be slower, and we'll say, come on, catch up, and then they'll kind of catch up for a while, and then they drift back a while, and there's this back and forth. I mean, a walk is never a walk when you have preschoolers, right? It's just that kind of activity that takes place. And that's so much what it's like to be a Christian. We're to follow Jesus Christ. And Jesus says, come follow me, and he begins the walk, and we begin to follow, and at first we think, wow, I'm gonna be right up, I'm just gonna be hand in hand with Jesus Christ, but then something catches our eye, and we drift to the side, and we slow down, and we drift back, and then we try to catch up a little bit. And I think Jesus Christ is constantly saying, come on, get a little closer. Catch up, catch up. There's things to do, things to see. And when we linger back and when we let so much distance develop between us and Jesus Christ, we miss out on the things that Jesus has for us. This is what I think a backsliding Christian is like, someone who just slides so far back that they forget that Jesus is even the one they're following. They still belong to Christ, but the following isn't going so well. And Jesus says, come on, follow me. And so we could ask ourselves the question, are we following Jesus? Are we close to him? Are we developing our spiritual life in such a way that we're as close to Jesus as we possibly can? Are we setting aside the sin issues of our life as the man who was covetous, would not give up his wealth? Have we given up things for Jesus? Are we so concerned about him that we want to be close to him? Are we seeing in Jesus Christ a grander purpose outside of ourselves? And so we ask ourselves the question, are you following Jesus? Are we following him closely? Come and see. Come and follow. A third great invitation that Jesus gives then to those who become followers of Jesus Christ, his disciples, He gives this grand invitation in Matthew chapter 11, verse 28, and this is an invitation to rest. Sometimes we forget that Jesus invites us to a place of rest. Matthew 11, 28, Jesus said, come to me, come, come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. We know that our culture is so easily described as a culture of busyness and activity, and it seems like if we're not doing one thing or two or three at a time, then we're just not being productive, and it's all about how active we can be, how busy we can be. And you ask the average friend, how was your holiday season? They say, oh, it was busy. You know, we had so many things going on. We're exhausted. We need a vacation from our vacation. We hear that sometimes, don't we? And Jesus has this gentle invitation. He says, come and rest. Come and rest. To be a follower of Jesus Christ, yes, it has its demands. Yes, it can be grueling at times. It can be difficult and the road can be bumpy along the way. But Jesus, from time to time, says it's time for a little rest. And he says, I'll take your burdens. I'll lift your burdens for you. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I'm gentle and humble in heart. My yoke is easy. You're carrying your yoke. I'll take that. I'll give you mine, which is easy. My yoke is easy. My burden is light. And you'll find rest, not just the physical rest, though we need that, but also the rest for our souls, that settledness of our spirit that says, I'm at peace with God and things are right in my relationship with God and my relationship, therefore, to the world around me. I like the way that Jesus handled his disciples as they were very busy in ministry at many times and as Jesus himself was very active and constantly being besought by others to have his help. And we read in Mark chapter 6 verses 30 and 31 that the apostles gathered around Jesus and reported all they had done and taught. They had gone off and they had done great things and they came back from that very busy season of ministry. And then Jesus says, because there were so many people coming and going that they didn't even have a chance to eat, he said to them, come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest. Do you need some rest? Is there a time in your life when you give yourself rest? Jesus very much supported the idea of rest from our burdens. We talk about the Sabbath, that's an Old Testament concept, we know, legal concept of the Old Testament, taking that one day in seven, but it's a spiritual principle as well, isn't it? That our bodies need rest. And if we're going all the time, we're never going to refresh our bodies or our minds or our souls. And Jesus, when he taught, he said that he is the Lord of the Sabbath. It means he's in charge of the Sabbath. He's in charge of the rest that we need. And so when we come as followers of Jesus Christ, he says, now as a follower, I am giving you the gift of rest. And he insisted that there would be times for us to rest in him. And so we need to be careful with our schedules and set aside some times for rest, don't we? For many, that day of rest can easily be Sunday, can't it? The time to come together and worship with friends and family, to go home and relax and enjoy a meal together, to take the tensions off the normal routines of the day. So important for us. And yet if we're going and going and going all the time, we realize that we are violating this gift and this invitation that Jesus has given to us, to have physical rest and rest for our minds and bodies and soul, that's so refresh and recharge us for the rest of the week. And so we need that, and Jesus offers that to us, and he says, come and rest. And not just that physical rest of Sabbath, but there's that spiritual rest, and that relief from a troubled heart. Because so often our hearts are agitated about the things that are taking place in our world, and we go over them over and over again. In John chapter 14, verse 1, Jesus said that we are to follow after him and to recognize his gift of rest for us. Come to me all you... Well, he says in John chapter 14 that we have... Let me read it here, right? Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God. Trust also in me. Don't let your hearts be troubled. So that trouble of heart can hold us back. Come and rest. Come and see. Are you looking for truth? Come and follow. Are you following Jesus? Come and rest. Are you looking for peace? Peace within our hearts and peaceful life with Jesus Christ? That's all offered to us through Him. A fourth gentle invitation, one I love, in John chapter 21, one of my favorite chapters of the whole Bible, John chapter 21. Come and eat. was after Jesus had been crucified, he rose from the dead, he began to appear to his disciples in various settings, and one of those settings was at the Sea of Galilee. And Jesus, as he looked out, he saw the disciples, several of them had gone back to fishing, and they're out fishing, and Jesus is on shore, and he appears to them there. He calls out to them and asks, have you caught anything? And no, not much luck in the fishing world Well, throw your net on the other side. This is what he'd done originally with his call to them, right? And they threw the net on the other side, came up with so many fish, they couldn't hardly haul them in. And they realized this is Jesus on shore. And they come into shore, and they are ready to be with Jesus again. And so he says to them, bring some of the fish that you've caught. And he has the fire going. And what a beautiful setting. Seaside breakfast, fresh fish, friendship, Jesus. And then there's this wonderful verse, John 21, verse 12, where Jesus says to them, come and eat, come and have breakfast. One translation says, come and eat. The disciples didn't quite know what to do with that. Just come, sit down, come and eat. What a wonderful invitation. It reminds us that Jesus Christ alone can satisfy our spiritual hunger. That there's this deep longing in our hearts for fullness of life that cannot be satisfied apart from Jesus Christ. Come and eat. This is why Jesus in John chapter 6 referred to himself as the bread of life. Because he is the one who sustains and gives life and gives strength and fills our hearts and fills our lives with meaning. Come and eat. I think that when we come before the Lord's table from time to time, we're reminded of this invitation of Jesus, come and eat. Around the Lord's table, he instructed his disciples to take the bread, it's his body broken for us, come and eat. It's a reminder to us when we take the body and the blood of Jesus Christ, the bread and the cup, that we have received Jesus into our life by faith, and that we need him to fill us. To touch every cell of our bodies, every cell of our being belongs to Him. And so Jesus says, come and eat. Meals are so important in scripture and in society. The times that we sit together at meal, that we enjoy times of conversation around food. These are special times. And this is what Jesus engendered to his disciples as he comes along the Sea of Galilee and he says, come and eat. We're together. And it's that togetherness and that sharing together that's so important. It's that sense of acceptance. that we experience. And so, come and see, are you looking for truth? Come and follow, are you looking for purpose? Come and rest, are you looking for peace? Come and eat, are you looking for acceptance? We have that in Jesus Christ. And finally, Matthew chapter 25, we have this invitation, come inherit. come inherit." Matthew chapter 25 verse 34. Here Jesus is sharing by way of a parable what it's like for him to be going away and that he says this king who goes away will come back and will judge those who have served him and who haven't. And in verse 34 it says, the king will say to those on his right, come you who are blessed by my father take your inheritance the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world those who rejected him of course have no such invitation they're left out at that point of the invitation they step into judgment but at this point those who have followed after Jesus who have seen him followed him found rest in him and dined with him now have this opportunity to inherit with him he says to them come and inherit the kingdom prepared for you." Do you realize that once we have become followers of Jesus Christ, we become heirs with Jesus Christ. The Romans chapter 8 verse 17 describes us as heirs of God and co-heirs with Jesus Christ. That is all that God the Father is going to bestow on Jesus Christ by way of glory and splendor and all these things. We get to participate in all of that as co-heirs with Jesus Christ. And it's a wonderful reality. We are heirs together with Jesus Christ. 1 Peter 1.4 puts it this way. Peter says that we have been born into a living hope through the resurrection of Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish or spoil or fade that's kept in heaven for you who through faith are shielded by God's power. This inheritance reserved for us in heaven. We have the hope of heaven. We have the anticipation of being in the presence of God for all eternity because God has made us co-heirs with his son, Jesus Christ. And so Jesus can say, come inherit. Come inherit with me the glories of eternity. The glories of eternity, by the way, will eclipse all suffering we have experienced here in this world. In Romans chapter eight, Paul says that he considers the sufferings of this world to be not worth comparing with the glories of heaven. In some miraculous way, when we arrive in God's presence in eternity, all the things we've suffered and gone through in this life, the difficult things, we'll look back and say, that really wasn't all that big of a deal, was it? Because the glories of heaven will so eclipse the suffering, the difficulties, and the challenges of this life. And those challenges we know in this life are very straining at many times. I know you go through difficult things. You may be going through difficult challenges right now. You wonder how you'll get through them, and yet we look ahead and we say, there's hope. because we're heirs with Jesus Christ. And one day all these things will seem so insignificant to us, we'll wonder why we ever worried, because Jesus is with us. Co-heirs for all eternity, the glories of heaven and eternity will eclipse all suffering, because we will be with him, come inherit. And so we ask ourselves the questions, are you looking for hope? We find it in Jesus Christ. I'd suggest to, responses to this message this morning. First, Accept Jesus' gentle invitation to life. Accept his invitation to life. Jesus came to give us life. He died on the cross for our sins, he rose from the dead to give us that life, and he says, come, come to me. And if you haven't yet expressed your faith in Jesus Christ to him, you need to say to him, Lord Jesus, I believe, I'm your follower, I'm coming, I'm going to follow you. I've come and I've seen and I want to follow you and I want to be in your presence. Thank you for accepting me. Forgiving my sins and making me right with you. Accept Jesus' gentle invitation to life. And then, second, accept Jesus' gentle invitation to follow him in all his ways. We're starting off a new year. What a great time to sort of hit the reset button. and to say, okay, Lord, starting again, a new fresh start, to say, Lord, I'm gonna be a follower of you, I'm gonna be close to you, I'm gonna walk with you, I'm gonna be in your word, I'm gonna be in prayer, I'm gonna be in the family of God and the church, and I'm going to be in the community as a witness, I just wanna be close to you, because you have invited me to come, come, come, come, come. By way of conclusion this morning, Revelation chapter 22, the end of the Bible, if you will, verses 12 through 17. These are the words that we read. Jesus says, Behold, I am coming soon. My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may go through the gates into the city. Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. But I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright and morning star, and then the Verse 17 says, the spirit and the bride say, come. And let him who hears say, come. And whoever is thirsty, let him come. And whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life. Come, come, come. Jesus invites us. We're not excluded from his invitation. We're right in the heart of it. Will you come to Jesus?