[0:00]Many of you know that the former Senator from Nebraska and former president of University of Florida, Ben Sasse was diagnosed last fall with pancreatic cancer and is not expected to live more than a few more months. He did a interview with Ross Douthat, which is posted on YouTube April 9, and I would just be curious if you've seen any part of that video, would you raise your hand? Good number. If you haven't by the time I'm done, I think you'll think, I should go look look it up. Just type in Ben Sasse into the search and it'll come. So at the end of that interview, Ross Douthat asked him, I mean, he looks like his face had been taken to a blow torch. You got to be careful. If you've got a queasy stomach, you might not want to look at this video. But he asked him, are you ever angry at God? And Ben Sasse smiled and said, no. And he said, not at all. I wouldn't want a sovereign God to defer to all of my prayers with a yes. I'm not omniscient. I don't know what the weaving together of the tapestry of full redemption should look like. But I know that the suffering I'm going through is a benefit because it is a winnowing and I am filled with dross. This suffering is not salvific, but it is sanctifying, and I'm grateful for it. I now in the midst of this disease know much more of my finitude than I let myself believe in the past. I can't keep the planet in orbit. I can't even grow skin on my face. Then Douthat asked how he would help a person who cannot believe this. Douthat says, for the listener or viewer who doesn't believe in God and finds your cosmic optimism admirable, but maybe he thinks you're deluding yourself on the brink of actual finitude. What would you say to that person? Now, this is the part that I want to talk about in relationship to our theme, believe it or not.
[3:20]And before I read his answer, think of Jesus. He's not Jesus, and that's not the point. Think of Jesus here, surrounded by scribes and Pharisees, who have read the books of Moses and the prophets all their lives. And who hear you, Jesus, talking about existing before Abraham, talking about dying, talking about rising again, talking about eternal life. And these Pharisees and scribes can't believe you. They think you're deluded. What, Jesus, would you say to them? Jesus, what would you say? That's where we're going in John five in just a minute. And I want you to compare Sasse and Jesus. Here's what Sasse said. How would you help them? They don't they think you're deluded. What would what would you say to them? He said, let's read the book of Romans together. I laughed out loud when I Who would say such a thing? What a great line. Let's let's read the book of Romans together. Paul says in chapter one, this is still Sasse now. Paul says in chapter one, there are lots of intellectual arguments you could make against God, but you have to start with the fundamental question about what to do with this moral issue of our own conscience. Does the individual in your hypothetical really start with the claim that things are right in his soul? Because I can't relate to that. Things are not right in my soul. My soul thinks Ben Sasse should be God. And I want that to die. Cancer sucks, but I'm pretty grateful that cancer is a stake against my delusional self-idolatry. End of answer. I was just in awe. Now here's what what in the world is the connection between that and the theme of this conference, which is Christ in all of scripture. And my topic in particular assigned to me by the president, Moses wrote of me, the Messianic hope of the law. The connection is this. Just as Ben Sasse was asked to speak into the unbelief of a person who can't see the beauty and worth and greatness of the reality that is holding up his remaining life. So Jesus in John five, which we'll look at in a minute, is speaking into the unbelief of the Jewish leaders who cannot see the beauty, the worth, the greatness of the reality right there in the book of Moses all their life. And now they can't see it when he's standing in front of them in the flesh.
