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If something is truly great, then you cannot have enough of it! When the world produces a book or movie or play that they deem great, there will always be a sequel. This lesson is less a sequel than a finishing of the thoughts of our first lesson. For those of you here for It's a Great Truth! part one, then you sort of know where we are headed. For those of you who missed it, I'll try to bring you up to speed quickly.

The word -- both in the Hebrew and the Greek -- is amen. It means "of a truth" or "very true!" and, by implication, "let it be as has been spoken." When the Word of God had gone forth, the people would respond to it with an "amen" meaning "it is truth and let it be as exactly as it has been spoken." Today we say "amen" or "alright," or that's exactly right" or "it's tight but it's right!" when the Word of God goes forth. Responding vocally to preaching with praise and affirmation is a scriptural principle! Preaching is not one way oratory with the preacher delivering a speech that is received by the people, but is really more of a conversation. You shouldn't interrupt, but you should be emotionally involved during the message. When you grasp the truth of what is being said, you ought to say amen, clap your hands, or at least wiggle your nose a bit. Preaching is only effective when it is responded to and chances are if you respond and are "into" the message during the preaching, you will likely respond at the end of the message! Somebody say, "amen!"

It got started in the Psalms -- the songs that were sung in the Old Testament temple. Since the songs that they sang were filled with spiritual truth straight from God's Word, it was customary to end the song with a rousing "amen." But there are a few times, where the truth being sung about in the music was so great, that it demanded more than the ordinary response, like the end of this Psalm:

The writer got so excited thinking about what it will be like when the Lord rules and reigns over all the earth so that the whole earth is filled with His glory, that he busted out with a "Amen and amen!" It was his way of saying "that's not only true, but it is very important and very, very true!" If something was a great truth, it demanded a "double amen!" If God has ever done something for you that demanded a little extra appreciation, then say, "amen, and amen!"

And so in the first part of this message, we learned that it was Jesus who took this "double amen" and used it in a unique way. And if you missed the first lesson, then bring your minds in here because this is what you need to understand: all of Jesus' words were true, but if Jesus wanted to really stress the utmost importance of something and make sure everybody understood that what He was saying was more important and a key, great truth to catch, then He would first say in the Greek "amen, amen." In the KJV it is translated as "verily, verily." In the ESV and NASU it is translated "truly, truly." The other translations do a poor job of bringing the double emphasis from the Greek into English. Jesus did this 25 times -- all in the Gospel of John, who obviously was the only one of the disciples who early on realized what Jesus meant by such a phrase. And every time that He used this "amen, amen" or "truly, truly," it was always to show us that what He was about to say was a great, and very important to catch, truth! And so what we did in the last lesson was begin to scan through the book of John and identify the great truth that was taught by Jesus at that point. We made it through chapter seven -- about half way -- and in this lesson, we want to finish.

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So open your Bibles with me to the Gospel of John, the 8th chapter and follow along as I point out the great truths that Jesus thought important enough to being with "truly, truly" or in the Greek, "amen, amen."

In the 8th chapter of the Gospel of John, we find another confrontation with the Jewish religious leaders and Jesus and He is teaching them that "if they will know the truth, then truth will set them free" and the religious leaders resented being told that they needed to be "set free." And the Bible records this:

11. It is a great truth that when we commit sin, we become enslaved to it.

Many Christians view sin as something light and something to be toyed with. They think that they can dabble in it without it consuming them or taking control of their life, but the truth is when you choose to willfully sin, even a little, it begins to take root in your life and does not stop until it enslaves you! Bro. Wallace used to say often, "sin will take you further than you wanted to go and keep you longer than you wanted to stay." That is a great truth that the devil does not want you to realize. Every alcoholic began with just taking "a little sip" and using it in "moderation." Every drug addict, began "just looking for a little high." Every lust-filled corrupt person began with "just a lingering gaze and fantasy." Every deceiver began with just "a little white lie," whatever that is. Sin starts small and seems innocent and seems fun and seems controllable but it does not stop until it has taken over your life and enslaved you. Egypt was a nice and fun place to live for Israel at first. They had the nicest land and the finest crops and the ear of the Pharaoh, but in time, they became slaves, whipped by their Egyptian taskmasters and forced to inhuman daily labor. It was then that they cried out to God for deliverance! Because what started out as a good time, ended up being extremely painful!

"Well, I'm going to have a little fun, but I'll stop before I reap all the bad things." O foolish person! That's exactly what every other judgment-reaping sinner said when they started. When you give yourself to sin, you have no control over how long it keeps you unless you get God involved! You will eventually reap the things because he who commits sin becomes a slave to it! It's a great truth that it seems too many people learn the hard way!

Moving along, we find that Jesus continues later with another great truth:

The Jews thought that Jesus was crazy for such a statement. After all there were great men before Him that had obeyed God's Word and died. And even since there have been great men who obeyed God's Word and yet were buried. What did Jesus mean? First the point:

12. It is a great truth, that those who "keep the Word of God" will never see death.

Oh, your physical body may die and be buried in the ground. People may come and weep over missing your earthly presence, but you should know that to those who have fully obeyed His Word and who have been born again of the water and of the Spirit and walked as "He walked," that your physical extinguishing is referred to by God as a "time of sleep." Because it is only temporary and it is only for a short time before the trump of God will sound and you will forever be pulled from the clutches of death, never to dread it again! And He has gone to prepare a place for you to live with Him forever in a new heaven and a new earth! Death is not final and not "death" at all to those who live boldly in His Word!

If you do not obey God's Word, then death will be final. Because not only will you close your eyes in this life, but you will awaken to meet your Maker at the final judgment and then will depart from Him into a lake of fire which the book of Revelation calls "the second death." It might be unpopular to preach about, but it exists and it will be a living death away from God's presence and blessings for eternity! It is this second death that Jesus spoke of those who obeying His Word will never have to worry about or face! It's a great truth that we must be zealous to obey every word commanded to us in the scriptures!

When the Jewish leaders heard Jesus say such things, the scoffed and said "are you, then greater than Abraham, who was our father in the faith and yet died?" Oh, there was a great truth here for them to learn and here it is:

Notice that Jesus did not speak grammatically correct because if He wanted to just say that He existed before Abraham, the proper phrase would be to say "before Abraham was, I was." But that's not what Jesus said. He said "before Abraham was, I am", using the name of God under Moses' law, of "I am" or Jehovah God. And so here is the great truth that sadly, many religious leaders don't even realize today:

13. It is a great truth that Jesus is Jehovah God come in flesh!

Jesus is the "great I AM!" "He is the image of the invisible God, the first born of every creature" (Colossians 1:15). He was God manifest in the flesh (1 Timothy 3:16), the son prophesied about Isaiah who would be the "Mighty God" and the "Everlasting Father!" (Isaiah 9:6) He is truly Emmanuel, God with us! And as He said, "unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins!" (John 8:24)

And there's a little something extra here. Jesus said, "before Abraham was, I am." He used the name that matched the revelation that Moses had of Him and said that He was all of that before the time of Abraham! How many times have we found God to be exactly what we needed in a crisis or a time of distress and we got the revelation that He was truly a healer or truly the deliverer, and yet He was all of that before you ever got the revelation! You may not know it yet personally, but Jesus is still everything that you need, and has been even before you were born to be able to know about Him! Truly, truly, that's a great truth! God doesn't become what we need when we ask Him, but was already what we needed and was just waiting for us to ask! He doesn't create the blessing that we need when we ask, but already has it stored up and waiting and is ready to open the windows of heaven and pour it out if we will call to Him! What a great truth!

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Moving on, we find Jesus using the analogy of a sheepfold to represent His kingdom and in the tenth chapter of John, we find this:

The disciples did not understand the analogy so later, Jesus came back and explained it further, again inserting the "truly, truly" to indicate its importance:

14. It is a great truth that Jesus and His teachings and words are the only entrance into eternal life.

All others methods of trying to attain eternity are simply imposters and people trying to steal from the Great Shepherd. They are thieves and robbers because by convincing people to believe otherwise, they cause those people to be lost and "sheep" are stolen from His eternal fold that should have been there. We tend to emphasize at teachings such as these that Buddha, Mohammed, Krishna, etc... won't save you and aren't the door. But let me point out that the same is true for Christian ritual and traditions of men that cause a person not to believe the clear teachings of Jesus Christ. Beware lest men and their ritualism rob God by teaching you something other than the truth of scripture and causing you to be lost! Water Baptism is necessary for salvation according to the Word of God! Living a holy and separated lifestyle is important if you want to see Him. Receiving the Holy Spirit is not an added blessing, but is the means whereby we receive power of His resurrection to be witnesses and to conquer our flesh and to one day fly out of here! Some people will be robbed of their eternal life because they chose to believe what men said about Jesus and His Word more than the actual words of scripture themselves! But you'd better remember that a particular denomination or religion or church or preacher is not the way into eternal life, only Jesus and His doctrines are the door! That's a great truth!

And so we advance to the last week of Jesus' earthly life. And in those final days before His death, it seemed that Jesus was trying to stress the most important points to His followers and thus the "truly, truly" -- "amen, amen" -- become more frequent and closer together. In the 12th chapter of John, we find this:

15. It is a great truth that to obtain eternal life, we will have to die out to some things in this life.

All of us are born with a will that lives for its fleshly desires and for an agenda that is not like Christ. All of us -- if we are to obtain eternal life, must cause that will to die! All of us through life develop at times habits and lifestyles and attitudes and characteristics that are against the Word of God. If we are to obtain eternal life, then we must be willing to die out to such things and let His Word live through us! I must not do everything that I like, because there will be some things that my flesh likes that are not beneficial to my walk with God, and if I am to obtain eternal life, then I must be willing to lose this life and I must live for the life to come! That truly, is a great truth!

And in the 13th chapter of John, we find Jesus washing the feet of His disciples -- even Judas Iscariot -- in a mighty example of humility and when He is finished, He speaks:

In other words, "if I -- your very Creator come in flesh and Master -- am willing to do certain things while on this earth, then certainly if you are my servants, you will also do them."

16. It's a great truth that Jesus was our example of how to live in this world, and that we who claim to follow Him as our Master must do as He did.

That includes serving our fellow believers and humbling ourselves before them -- even those who betray us. That includes praying for our enemies and turning the other cheek. That means we must forgive even the people who hurt us most, even as they are doing it. That means that we must pray and fast. That means that we must be a constant witness day in and day out. That means that we must be baptized both with water and the witness of the Spirit. That means that we must always respond to temptation with the Word of God. That means we must do the heavenly will for our lives, even if it means forsaking mother, brother, sister, or whatever! That means we must be willing to go all out for God's plan for our life and fulfill it completely! If our Master was willing to do such, God forbid, that His servants would not be willing to do such!

And the next use of His signature phrase goes right along with such a thought:

17. It's a great truth that we are to be the representatives of Jesus to this world.

Jesus equated their receiving you with their receiving Him. Paul talked about how the church is collectively the "body of Christ." He went away in physical form and came back in spiritual form to live within His believers (see John 14:17-18). That means that our hands are the only hands that Jesus has in this world, and our feet are His feet, and our mouth, His mouth. If that be true, then we had best be acting as He would have acted and reaching out as He reached out! We cannot let rejection cause us to stop reaching for another because in truth this world is not rejecting us but Jesus Christ. When they reject truth, they reject the truth giver not the truth messenger! We cannot take it personally if some do not accept His great promises and commandments, because we are His ambassadors and His representatives. If you quit, then they no longer have mercy reaching out to them! If you stop making an effort to win them, then they no longer have salvation beckoning to them! We must remember that it is about Him and not about us!

In His final words to His disciples, we find Jesus continually emphasizing the importance of what He was saying:

He, of course, was speaking at the time of Judas Iscariot, but:

18. It is a sobering but great truth that there will be some who claim to follow Jesus yet who betray Him in the end.

What strikes me about Judas' betrayal is the timing of what He did. Judas Iscariot has sacrificed as much as the other disciples. He has labored and learned the same lessons as the other twelve. For the vast majority of Jesus' ministry, Judas was faithful, but just at the end did he allow a little greed; a little sin to slip in and steal the relationship that he had worked so much towards!

If it were so in Jesus' day, then it is possible to happen now! No matter how long you have lived for God or had a relationship with Him, we must guard ourselves carefully lest a little root of bitterness or a seed of sin would slid into our lives and steal our relationship with the Master at the end. As the great Apostle Paul told the Corinth church:

I don't want to be faithful only to give up the prize of eternal life at the end!

When Simon Peter began to boast that he would never betray Jesus even if it meant death, we find the next use of "truly, truly:"

How ominous and sobering that the very next use of the phrase after Judas would be about Peter's denial! And so:

19. It is a sobering but great truth that there will be some who claim to be totally committed who deny Christ in tough situations.

We must realize that the test of our relationship with God is not what we confess when the going is smooth, but rather how we respond when the times get tough! Being faithful is not just about saying you'll do something, but about when you have every reason not to do something, you still do it!

And let me say this, if you have messed up and denied Christ, then be sure to follow the actions of Peter who wept bitterly for forgiveness and did not allow his mistake to kill his future in Christ! What Peter did was no better or worse than what Judas did, but the difference between betraying Christ, and denying Christ, is what you do after the fact! Those who have betrayed Him, hang themselves on the slipknot of guilt and refuse to keep serving God. Those who have denied Him, like Peter get up and let God use them anyway and next time do differently! "For the righteous falls seven times and rises again" (Proverbs 24:16) --that's a great truth!

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After such sobering truths, you will be gladdened to know that the next three uses of Jesus' signature phrase are positive. For the sake of time, we will touch on them only briefly:

20. It is a great truth that the true believer has a very bright future in the power of God!

Don't judge your power by what you have seen in the past, because the true believer "will also do the works that I do and greater!" If you are living according to His principles in faith believing the Word of God, then you will see great things come to pass in the kingdom of God!

Someone said, "well I am truly a believer and I have not seen them yet." Well, whatever you do, keep believing and keep trusting because it is inevitable -- eventually the supernatural will come and be demonstrated in your life!

And let me say this: if you have received the Holy Spirit or prayed through someone to it or taught someone a Bible Study on it before they received it, then you have already done greater works than Jesus Christ, because the Holy Spirit was not yet given until after His ascension! We should change the way we view the power of God; which is greater: that the lame man should get up off of his bed, or that someone have their sins forgiven, their past washed away, and be filled with the Spirit of God!? If eternity and heaven have any say so in the matter, the greatest miracle is the latter!

21. It is a great truth that sorrow and bad circumstances will always eventually turn around in a true believer's life.

God never promised that you would not go through things, but He did promise you that joy would come in the morning! A child of God always can look forward to a brighter day, because as long as they serve Jesus, things will always change for the better! Truly true is the scripture:

With God involved, your sorrow will always turn into joy!

22. It is a great truth that there is power in praying in the name of Jesus.

You may already know it, but it will not hurt you to be reminded of it! I could preach an entire sermon on the great power and possibilities that come with praying in the name of Jesus! Let us never forget that it is not the method that we pray, or the words that we use, or how we utter the phrases that make our prayer effective. Furthermore, it is not the inflection of our voice, the position of our hands, the vocabulary that we use or the emotions that we feel that cause our prayers to be powerful. Moreover, it is not the force of the arm, our good works of a life, or our ministry that causes such prayers to be performed. Rather it is the lovely, gracious, and powerful name that we pray in: the name of Jesus! Truly it is the name above every names and that is a great truth!

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And so finally we come to the last time that Jesus used His signature phrase calling attention to the great truths of His speech. You would expect the last time to be something profound and it is.

After Jesus' resurrection, but before His ascension, the Master appeared to His disciples on the banks of the Sea of Galilee. Here He addresses in particular Simon Peter who had denied Him three times a few weeks earlier and commands him to feed the flock of God. Jesus then speaks a word of prophecy about Simon Peter's last years of life:

This was not what Simon Peter wanted to hear from Jesus, but the truth is very evident:

23. It is a great truth that it is not up to us to choose what our future may hold, but rather we must simply "follow Jesus!"

It could be that some of you will end up life poor and in ill health: regardless, keep following Jesus! It could be some of you end up this life rich with this world's wealth -- if so you will have a harder time being saved than the poor man -- so to you I say: keep following Jesus! It could be that your life will turn out just as you had planned and that you will see all of your goals and dreams fulfilled: if so, keep following Jesus! It could be that unexpected bumps and storms will cause your life to end up vastly different than you expected: if so, keep following Jesus! Regardless of how your life plays out here and what the future has in store, if you will keep following Jesus, the reward will be the same for forever! It's a great truth that no matter what come what may, we must just keeping answering His call to "follow me!"

Let us never forget the great truths of the teachings of Jesus:

1. It is a great truth that those who respond to the simple, everyday proofs of God will eventually see the greatest possible signs and wonders. (John 1:50-51)

2. It is a great truth that to be a part of God's kingdom, you must be born again of the water and the Spirit, regardless of how good a person you are or what great religious and devout things you have done in the past. (John 3:3-5)

3. It is a great truth that even though you cannot see or fully understand why a spiritual command is important, it is still very important to obey it because if you could see all things through spiritual eyes rather than earthly eyes, you would immediately see why. (John 3:10-12)

4. It is a great truth that Jesus Christ only acted during His lifetime within and from the perfect will of God. (John 5:19)

5. It is a great truth that we must believe the teachings of Jesus and His doctrine in order to be saved. (John 5:24)

6. It is a great truth that it is not enough to just take in Jesus' teachings, but we must obey them in order to live spiritually! (John 5:25)

7. It is a great and sobering truth that some people will only be attracted to Jesus for what they can receive and not for what God can do through them. (John 6:26)

8. It is a great truth that great men of God are only being used of God when great things happen through them and we should take care to follow God and not men lest we miss what God is doing now! (John 6:32-33)

9. It is a great truth that just like the manna of old was to the Israelites so is Jesus Christ to the believer today. (John 6:47-48)

10. It is a great truth that to have eternal life we must eat Christ's flesh and drink His blood, and continually do so to abide in Him! (John 6:53-56)

11. It is a great truth that when we commit sin, we become enslaved to it. (John 8:34)

12. It is a great truth, that those who "keep the Word of God" will never see death. (John 8:51)

13. It is a great truth that Jesus is Jehovah God come in flesh! (John 8:58)

14. It is a great truth that Jesus and His teachings and words are the only entrance into eternal life. (John 10:1, 7-9)

15. It is a great truth that to obtain eternal life, we will have to die out to some things in this life. (John 12:24-25)

16. It's a great truth that Jesus was our example of how to live in this world, and that we who claim to follow Him as our Master must do as He did. (John 13:16-17)

17. It's a great truth that we are to be the representatives of Jesus to this world. (John 13:20)

18. It is a sobering but great truth that there will be some who claim to follow Jesus yet who betray Him in the end. (John 13:21)

19. It is a sobering but great truth that there will be some who claim to be totally committed who deny Christ in tough situations. (John 13:38)

20. It is a great truth that the true believer has a very bright future in the power of God! (John 14:12)

21. It is a great truth that sorrow and bad circumstances will always eventually turn around in a true believer's life. (John 16:20)

22. It is a great truth that there is power in praying in the name of Jesus. (John 16:23)

23. It is a great truth that it is not up to us to choose what our future may hold, but rather we must simply "follow Jesus!" (John 21:18-19)

It's a great truth!