On Sunday night, we're studying through the Bible
from Genesis to Revelation and currently in the
Gospel according to John.
And we left off with the second miracle
of Jesus in John's Gospel, the healing of
the nobleman's son.
And chapter 5 picks up with his third
miracle, 3 of 8, that are recorded in
the Gospel according to John and recorded for
the purpose that everyone who reads this Gospel
would come to the conclusion that Jesus is
the Messiah, the Son of God, and thus
believe in him unto salvation.
Now this, after this, that incident of the
healing of the nobleman's son, there was a
feast of the Jews.
And we don't know which of the three
major feasts it was.
John doesn't identify it here, but it was
during one of these feasts that Jesus went
up to Jerusalem.
What it does tell us about Jerusalem is
that the place would have been wall-to
-wall people.
Again, Josephus estimating, speaking concerning the Jewish population
that would come from all over the area
of Israel, literally from all over the world
at the time of the feast, would be
between 1 and 2 to 3 million people,
converging on what was a very, very small
city by today's standards.
So you've got a huge group of pilgrims
now just jamming Jerusalem.
And there is, in Jerusalem, by the Sheep
Gate, a pool.
Now the Sheep Gate there in Jerusalem, evidently
the gate by which the priests would, or
those that were working related to the priests,
bringing the sheep in for sacrifice during the
time of the feast, they'd be brought through
that gate.
But there by the Sheep Gate, there was
a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda,
having five porches.
And the term Bethesda means a house of
mercy or a house of pity.
John tells us a little bit about it
in terms of its architecture.
It was a place, it was a large
pool there in Jerusalem.
There were five porches, five places to get
out of the elements and to get out
of the heat in the summer is as
important in Israel as to get out of
the rain in the winter.
And so here is this, the pool described
in the shelter around the pool.
Now, those of you have been to Israel,
this is the area by St. Ann's Church
there, where you always go in and sing
that, you know, in there.
And then we come outside, that's the excavation.
And they know exactly where they've excavated this
site, exactly where the pools are and everything
as it's set here in Jesus's time.
And so having described and given the name
of the site and of the pool, it's
distinctive of five porches.
This is the population that found itself under
those five porches and around that pool.
In these lay a great multitude in the
ideas like wall to wall, a great multitude
of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for
the moving of the water.
And so you've got a multitude of just
the need of humanity, all just crammed wall
to wall in this place, every kind of
imaginable need as it's described here.
Now, they all had, for the diversity of
their diseases or the physical limitations, they had
a common denominator.
And the common denominator was they all had
the same hope in that setting.
And the hope was they were waiting for
the moving of the water for an angel
went down at a certain time into the
pool, stirred up the water.
And then at the stirring of the water,
whoever stepped in first after the stirring of
the water was made well of whatever disease
he had.
That's what they were waiting for.
Now, it's interesting.
Anywhere there is a rumor of healing for
diseases that are this desperate, deemed incurable by
man, you're going to get a desperate crowd
there and you're going to get a crowd
because what do you have to lose?
And so desperate crowds can, you know, really,
you can really manipulate them.
You can, you can do a lot of
things to a desperate group of people go
there, but here they are.
And this is the hope that they have.
Now I am personally inclined to believe, and
you don't have to agree with me.
I am personally inclined to believe that the
apostle John is merely recounting for us the
belief of the people around the pool and
not God's actual involvement in the moving of
the water.
I don't think God was associated with the,
whatever healings might've occurred in that pool or
were reported to have occurred.
And I don't believe he was a part
of the whole scene for a couple of
reasons.
It doesn't look anything like the God that
we know anywhere else in the scriptures.
It is a scene that has developed the
highest level of competition in the heart of
one human being against other human beings in
the same need.
So you have this great kind of competition
with my fellow man for what is believed
to be some, you know, scant manifestation of
God's power.
It is also a scene that not only
develops a me first attitude, because you'd notice
that there, whoever steps in first, it not
only develops a me first attitude, it rewards
it.
This flies in the face of all of
Jesus' teaching.
It's also a scene that's based upon works
versus grace.
You get rewarded by God by, by being
first.
It's also a scene where the strongest are
rewarded and, and the weakest are left without
God's touch.
And I think most powerfully as it relates
to what, what I would contend concerning that
is that when Jesus comes on the scene,
he completely ignores the pool and he has
come on the scene to do the father's
will, not only the scene of the pool,
the scene of planet earth.
And when he comes on that scene, he
reveals to us the father's heart and the
father's activity in the middle of that mass
of needy humanity.
And you can imagine how that place smelt.
I mean, just what a desperate, desperate scene
that it would have been.
So when Jesus comes on the scene, he
doesn't honor the pool deal in any kind
of, of a way at all.
And if the stirring of the water was
the father's gig, then Jesus would have been
a part of it, but he's not a
part of it at all.
And what does Jesus do on the scene?
He does what he continually does through the
scriptures.
And that is, he goes to the person
with the greatest need at the scene.
Now that looks like the father and that's
consistent with Jesus.
Remember the man had the withered hand and
they put him with it armed there and
they put him in the synagogue as a
trap to see whether Jesus would heal him
on the Sabbath day and all.
Jesus walks into that room, into that synagogue,
and the first person he notices is the
person with the greatest need, the man with
the withered hand.
And then he addresses it.
He heals him on the Sabbath day.
I don't want to go into all of
that, but that's what he does.
He comes into the room where the greatest
need gets his attention.
I remember when I was in the Calvary
Chapel in Napa and we were before the
services.
We would do a little devotional study with
one another.
We're getting ready for the day and God's
people coming and all of these things.
And the first lesson they ever is that
you go ahead and do the devotional on
this Sunday.
And I taught on that man that was
in that synagogue.
Jesus looking at the greatest need.
And just for us to be sharp there
as the people are coming now, let's keep
our eyes on the greatest need in the
room.
And it's a comfort for you tonight.
If you're here tonight and you have the
greatest need, because the Lord's going to meet
your need.
And then the neat thing about that is
then somebody else now has the greatest need.
And I teach long enough for God to
work the whole room.
Yeah, you laugh now.
And so he goes over to that scene.
And now in verse five, there was a
certain man who was there who had an
infirmity 38 years.
He has been in the middle of this
mess with this infirmity 38 years.
That's six or seven years longer than Jesus
has been alive in his incarnation.
38 years, those of you who are 38
or older, that's a long time, isn't it?
That's a long time to be in that
kind of a condition.
And so he's been in this condition for
38 years.
He's a picture of hopelessness.
If you haven't gotten to the pool first
in 38 years, you're not getting to the
pool first.
If you couldn't muscle your way in when
you were 18 and you were a young
buck, you're not going to do it when
you add 38 years to 18.
You're a dead duck on that scene.
You're never going to get healed.
You have no hope in the middle of
that mass of humanity.
Not if that's the way that God works
here.
So he is a hopeless man in the
thick of a hopeless people.
And nothing's hopeless as long as God is
alive.
There's no beginning and no end.
So that's always going to be the case.
And when Jesus saw him lying there, he
knew that he had already been in that
condition a long time.
And Jesus said to him, do you want
to be made?
Well, that's the question that Jesus says.
I think it's an interesting one there in
verse six.
Do you want to be made?
Well, I've listened to teaching on this and
they said, I mean, what kind of an
obvious question is this?
You know, he wants to be made.
Well, you know, and the whole thing, that's
the, miss the point entirely.
Jesus comes in and he says, do you
want to be made?
Well, and the question seems like a needless
one.
Of course, the man wants to be made.
Well, but the fact of the matter is
in this life, not everyone wants to be
made.
Well, that's the way that it is through
the years.
I have met homeless people, street people here
in Modesto who are not interested one bit
in changing or being made.
Well, that does not characterize all homeless people
or all street people, but it does some
of them that I have met.
They like their life just fine.
They don't want to work.
They don't want to be disciplined in their
life.
They don't want positions of responsibility in their
life.
They're completely happy with the way that they
are.
And you can have all of the means
necessary.
And we have those means as a church,
you can have all of the means necessary
to help them become responsible citizens.
And some of them are not interested and
you can't help them if they're not interested
because they have to at least bring in
the words of the question, the want to,
to the table.
So Jesus asked him, do you want to
be made?
Well, you've got to at least bring that
to the table.
Anyone can bring that to the table.
Now the man's answer is an interesting one.
The sick man answered Jesus and said, sir,
I have no man to put me into
the pool when the water is stirred up.
But while I'm coming another steps down before
me.
Now he is intending to answer Jesus's question.
He's intending to answer it, but it's not
an answer, but this man does.
And it is fascinating to me.
He answers a question that Jesus didn't ask
him.
His answer goes with a different question.
And this is the question.
Why haven't you been made?
Well, but Jesus did not ask him why
you haven't been made.
Well, Jesus asked him, do you want to
be made?
Well, that's the question that, that, that he
asked there.
And I'll tell you the tendency, even for
those of us who are Christians to complicate
things.
One of the things that they tell pastors
is, you know, you need to answer questions
that people are asking.
And so find out what people are asking
and then answer those questions.
And sometimes though in the body of Christ,
we're answering questions that God isn't asking.
He'll need to know the whole story about
why I've been here for 38 years and
why I didn't get to the water first.
And of course, it's always because other people
haven't helped me as much as I needed
it.
And other people get the help, but I
don't get the help.
And so we're going to explain to him
all of the reasons why, and my background
and this happened to me, all of these
different things.
And on God says, listen, I never asked
you how you got in this condition.
I know how you got in this condition.
I have a simple question for you.
Do you want to be made well from
the condition that you're in?
I am a great complicator of things.
God works very hard to keep things simple.
And so he begins to talk about, I
haven't had the help and all, and perhaps
in his heart, he's thinking, all right, I've
got, you know, someone looks like he's in
his mid thirties that can probably help me
get to that pool, you know, at the
right time.
And you're going to think that that's the
best that Jesus is going to be able
to do for him.
However inadequate his answer is here, Jesus recognizes
a want to in it.
And Jesus says in verse eight, because he's
so gracious with this man, with me, with
you.
Jesus said to him, rise, take up your
bed and walk.
Rise, take up your bed and walk.
Now it wasn't a bed.
We have beds here that, you know, you've
envisioned some kind of a bunk bed or
something out of pottery barn or something that
he's got set up there with, you know,
some shabby chic thing that he's kind of
worked into the corner there, one of the
porches and all.
His bed was a mat.
It was just a pad.
And it's a scene that is played over
and over and over again in Jesus's contact
with a needy man who Jesus loves.
Jesus gives the command now to do these
things, something that is impossible for him to
do in his own strength.
But if he will just obey the command,
he will discover that God always couples with
his commands, the ability to obey the command
always does it.
Do you think that he's going to say,
rise, take up your bed and walk and
then watch the guy try and get up
and fumble and fall down?
And we say that's ridiculous.
That's a blasphemous thought concerning the Lord.
Then why do we think that that's what
he's doing behind his commands sometime in our
lives?
Because we can read the volume of the
book as rise, take up your bed and
walk.
And we look at the command that God
gives in terms of putting off and putting
on or not doing and doing this and
all of these things.
And we say, you don't know my story.
You don't know what I've been through.
You don't know what I've seen in all
of these things.
I got to lay all these things out
and I can't be like everyone else.
And I haven't had the help that everyone
else has.
And I know this works for everybody else
and all.
And it doesn't for me.
And God will never have one of us
step out on one of his promises and
ever be embarrassed for having done so.
And it's the moment of truth.
I have known it is to me the
great difference between those that I have seen
over the years in the body of Christ.
Exhibit wholeness and moving forward and fruitfulness for
the kingdom of God and those who don't.
It is those who look at his word,
acknowledge that it is a living word, step
out on that word, discover his power there
and continue in a life of that.
And the other group never moves.
And it's heartbreaking.
Because this is a scene, you know, here's
a scene that's a physical one.
It can be a moral one.
It can be a whatever kind of one,
certainly a spiritual one.
The Lord wants us.
He wants this man out of that scene.
He wants us out of these scenes.
But there is that moment of truth where
what has whatever has been my history for
38 years is here and God's command is
here.
And I'm going to believe one of them
or the other.
And if I'll believe God's word and step
out in it, I will discover his word
to be the truth about the situation.
The healing always comes and immediately the man
was made well, took up his bed and
he walked.
What a scene.
Rolls up his bed, I'm out of here.
But Jesus made two very big mistakes.
He did this on the Sabbath day.
Two mistakes.
Number one, he healed someone on the Sabbath
day.
For those of you who are new here,
I'm not saying he made a mistake.
He made a mistake in the eyes of
the religious leaders.
But first of all, is he healed on
the Sabbath day in violation of their interpretation
of the law?
And then the second thing he did is
not only heal the guy, but he told
him to take up his bed and carry
that man on out of here.
You're through with this scene.
And he caused the man to carry a
burden on the Sabbath day.
Imagine Jesus just acting like God and everything
there in that scene, you know, and being
so comfortable with it.
The Jews said to him who was cured.
Now here's a guy.
He has been lame, unable to walk for
38 years.
They see him walking with his tab.
He is not a part of the pilgrimage
crowd.
He's one of the guys that's there all
the time.
These religious leaders knew these guys.
What are you doing?
You're going on 38 years, aren't you down
there?
And here they see him coming, and he
is walking, and he is carrying his bed.
And the reaction of any kind of compassionate
person, religious or otherwise, would be, you're walking!
How does it feel after 38 years?
Was it like riding a bike?
Did it come back pretty quick to you?
Well, I'm so excited for you, you know.
Let me carry your bed for you, you
know.
And I mean, there were just normally there'd
be that kind of an excitement.
But these guys, they have lost, completely lost,
and it's lost, and I'm not even finishing
my sentences.
I'm so excited about it.
They have completely lost contact with reality.
And it can happen sometimes in religious circles
with just, man, you're so far out there,
you don't know what's going on, and the
normal emotions of a human being.
And so they see him coming, and they
said, it's the Sabbath, it's not lawful for
you to carry your bed.
What a reaction.
And he answered them, and he said, he
who made me well, said to me, take
up your bed and walk.
I am just obeying the one who healed
me.
The one who told me to arise and
walk also told me to take up my
bed and walk.
You had 38 years to do something for
me.
You did nothing for me.
And so I am going to obey the
one that not only gave me the command,
but then healed me as I obeyed the
command.
But the one who was healed did not
know.
Oh, excuse me, verse 12.
And they asked, who is the man who
said, do you take up your bed and
walk?
And the man who was healed, he didn't
know who Jesus was.
They knew nothing of Jesus.
Jesus just comes on the scene, for Jesus
had withdrawn a multitude being in that place.
So crowded during the feast days, Jesus healed
them, and they just simply disappeared.
And afterward, Jesus found him in the temple.
Now that is a good place to start
a new life.
He's going to go where he can worship
God and thank God for what he knew
God had done for him.
Only God can heal like that.
Only God can heal.
And so he goes into the temple and
Jesus finds him in the temple.
And he said to him, see, you've been
made well.
I like that.
You've been made well, haven't you?
No psychosomatic thing involved in that, is it?
It's a real deal.
You really got healed, didn't you?
You're a really healed person.
And I love it as it relates to
our own Christianity.
I mean, for those of you who've walked
with the Lord and all, and to look
at your life, you know that it wasn't
some kind of a phase or some mind
over matter thing that's an explanation for the
difference in your life.
God did something real in our lives, changing
us.
So he said, see, you've been made well.
And then he said, sin no more, lest
a worse thing come upon you.
Now, this man evidently was in that infirm
condition of because of sin.
Now, not everyone is sick because of sin
or has an infirmity because of sin, but
we do know that there are consequences to
sin.
Alcoholism has physical consequences to it.
Drug abuse has physical consequences to it.
Sexual immorality, there's consequences to it.
Whatever it might be, the sin, there's always
a consequence to these things.
And so he had borne the consequences of
whatever it is that he was engaged in.
It resulted in an infirmed life here.
And Jesus said, sin no more, lest a
worse thing come upon you.
I love that phrase, sin no more.
I like the strength of it.
You notice Jesus doesn't come and say, now
sin as little as possible.
Now, I know for a fact on the
teaching of the scriptures, that every one of
us try as hard as we might, we
will sin every day, should not be willful
sin.
But since perfection is the standard, Jesus is
the standard, then we are going to, in
some way in the course of the day,
be less than Jesus in our actions, in
our words, in our thoughts, in our motives,
not only in the things that we do,
but the things that Jesus would have done,
but we didn't do in the course of
a day.
Sin of omission.
And so there is that realization that until
we're in heaven's glory, we're always going to
fall short in this life.
But it should never, that realization that keeps
me out of condemnation, should never keep me
from growing in holiness.
And Jesus is coming to this man and
saying, I want you to treat holiness as
a precious thing.
And he raises that standard.
Don't make the standard today, I'm going to
sin as little as possible.
Make the standard, sin no more.
Go into life, go into a day with
as high a standard as it can be.
Jesus speaks to this man and as he's
healed the man, he doesn't want the man
just to think that, oh, well, you know,
this is easy come, easy go.
God can always do this for me again
if I go back into sin and all
of these different kinds of things.
And he doesn't want this man to misunderstand
his healing in his life as minimizing the
seriousness of sin.
And he's telling this man, don't assume that
there will be a miraculous healing again if
you go back to the old ways.
Treat what God has done for you in
a changed life as the precious thing that
it is and protect it.
And if you do that, then you won't
need a second healing as it relates to
these things.
So I'm not to presume on or sin
against God's grace.
Paul wrote to the Romans and he said,
what shall we say then?
Shall we continue in sin that grace may
abound?
He said, certainly not.
How shall we who died to sin live
any longer in it?
And so he speaks to this man, says,
don't go back there.
Don't go back there.
It's as bad and worse as when you
left it.
And what happened to you before physically will
happen to you again.
The man departed and then told the Jews
that it was Jesus who made him well.
So a public testimony of Jesus.
It was Jesus.
He's excited.
I know who it was.
It was Jesus.
And for this reason, the Jews persecuted Jesus
and sought to kill him because he had
done these things on the Sabbath day, a
purely rational reaction to what Jesus had done
there.
And they want to kill him.
They're just not a little steamed.
They want to kill him because he had
done these things on the Sabbath day.
But the thing is, is that God gets
to do whatever he wants to do on
the Sabbath day.
As Jesus declared in Mark chapter two, the
Sabbath was made for man, not man for
the Sabbath.
Therefore, the son of man is also Lord
of the Sabbath.
God gets to do what he wants on
the Sabbath, but he knows to be his
limitations or what he knows to be his
right to do on a Sabbath.
God doesn't feel constrained by their interpretations related
to the Sabbath.
And Jesus is the son of God.
Didn't in God, the son didn't feel constrained
either, but they're pretty steamed about all of
this.
And so Jesus wants to have a conversation
with them.
And so he begins to address these religious
leaders in verse 17.
And Jesus answered them.
My father has been working until now, and
I have been working.
Now, what Jesus does now is he now
addresses the things that these religious leaders should
have learned about him or understood about him
on the basis of this miracle and others.
But things that they refused to learn, Jesus
is going to just spell it out for
them.
They should have understood what this miracle was
revealing about him.
And so he says, my father has been
working until now, and I have been working.
And what he's doing here is he's declaring
himself equal with the father.
Equal in authority over nature.
He's saying what I just did in the
healing of this lame man for 38 years,
I did in perfect harmony with the father.
Now, these religious leaders are going to oppose
Jesus because they think that Jesus is doing
something contrary to the father, their understanding of
the father, which is a misunderstanding.
So they see Jesus and the father working
out of harmony with one another.
He comes in.
Jesus says, listen, what I just did here
now, I did in harmony with the father.
He works on the Sabbath.
I work on the Sabbath.
Wouldn't it be terrible if God took a
Sabbath off?
Wouldn't it be terrible if God took a
day off?
He holds your very breath.
Be a bad day, wouldn't it?
He'd only take one day off and you'd
all be dead.
Me too.
Jesus holds the entirety of the universe together.
By him, all things consist.
He takes a day off and these guys
don't have to worry about nothing.
There's nothing to worry about.
There's nothing left.
These are funny things to me, you know,
in all of this.
So they're thinking, you know, what you're doing
is in violation of what the father has
taught and what the father would do.
And he said, we've both been working.
We were both at work in the healing
of this lame man.
Now you put your name in what Jesus
said in verse 17 and it's a farce.
My father's been working until now.
And I, and Damien Kyle's been working too,
at the healing of a man lame for
38 years.
Sure was a father, but I was in.
Because nonsensical, doesn't it?
Because I'm not equal with the father.
And they understood that he was making himself
equal with the father.
Verse 18.
Therefore, the Jews sought all the more to
kill him because he not only broke the
Sabbath, their interpretations, but also said that God
was his father making himself equal with God.
Now, this is an interesting verse as it
relates to the Jehovah witnesses who claim that
Jesus never declared concerning himself that he was
divine.
He never ascribed deity to himself.
That is the contention of the Jehovah witness.
And yet here you have a statement that
he makes.
It is an all Jewish confab that's going
on here.
They understand exactly what Jesus is saying to
them.
And Jesus knows that they are understanding it.
He is making himself equal with the father.
They got it.
And so they're upset now because he's made
himself equal with God.
And then Jesus answered and said to them,
most assuredly, I say to you, the son
can do nothing of himself, but what he
sees the father do for whatever he, the
father does.
The son also does in like manner for
the father loves the son and shows him
all things that he himself does.
And he will show him greater works than
these that you may marvel.
And so in verse 19, Jesus again declares
that what he was doing in complete harmony
with the father, oneness with the father.
And then in verse 19, he declares that
the father loves the son.
Why?
Because these religious leaders claim to love the
father, but they hated the son.
And so Jesus is telling them, you're, you're
missing this.
The father loves the son.
And again, and he shows him all things
that he himself does.
And he will show him greater works than
these that you may marvel for as the
father raises the dead and gives life to
them.
Even so the son gives life to whom
he will now inject your name in there
again, becomes nonsensical again.
So here he is.
He's claiming equality with the father.
He is claiming that all that he is
doing and has done is in perfect harmony
with the father.
And so, uh, Jesus, the father raises the
dead.
Jesus raised the dead.
He would raise the dead in the course
of his public ministry.
We get to John chapter 11.
There's a raising of Lazarus from the dead.
And then in verse 22 for the father
judges, no one, but has committed all judgment
to the son that all should honor the
son, just as they honor the father.
He who does not honor the son does
not honor the father who sent him.
There's the repetition of the word honor.
Isn't there in conjunction with what the fact
that Jesus is the judge.
Then this culture, what happens when you're in
a courtroom, what do you call the judge?
Your honor.
Why?
Because whoever has the position of judgment, you
want them happy with you.
You show them respect was interesting.
Wasn't it?
M and M's recent trial.
Here's this rapper, you know, this bad boy,
this blah, blah, blah, and all this thing
and everything.
And he gets this weapon charge and he
goes in there and you know, puffy comb,
same thing.
And they end up in court, but M
and M ends up in court and the
whole deal.
And then you see the pictures in the
newspaper, then he's got his hair all just
right.
And he's got a suit on a product,
you know, $2,500 suit.
And what's he saying in that courtroom?
Yes, your honor.
No, your honor.
Yes, your honor.
None of those on those albums.
But you know what he has a sense
for, for context, doesn't he?
I thought he was trying out to become
a leader for a boy scout pack or
something like that.
The way he cleaned up.
He's no stupid person though.
When someone has a position of judgment in
your life, even on a temporal level, on
the human level, human being to human being,
you, if you're smart at all, you show
that judge respect how much more when the
judge is the one who will judge you
as it relates to eternity.
And they are despising the son before whom
they will one day stand.
And Jesus will be judge at that place
here.
They're thinking they're judging him and they got
a little power there and Jerusalem and all,
and they've, they don't understand what's going on
at all.
And so Jesus is speaking to them about
this.
Listen, you despise me.
You scorn me.
I am, I have the position of judge.
And of course, everyone will have one of
two relationships with Jesus as it relates to
the eternal judgment.
And that is, we will know him either
a savior or judge.
There's nothing else in between.
And so here he speaks to them.
Father has entrusted judgment to him.
And then he said, most assuredly, now he
tells them how they can avoid facing him
as judge.
Most assuredly, I say to you, verily, verily,
that's kind of a listen up as if
you need something, a little oomph to listen
up to when God is speaking.
But, but he knew how to gather their
attention.
Verily, verily in the old King James, most
assuredly in the new King James, most assuredly
I say to you, he who hears my
word and believes in him who sent me
has present tense everlasting life and shall not
come into judgment, but has passed from death
into life.
And he's saying, you better believe what I'm
telling you.
And you better trust in God's way of
salvation, which involves me.
And most assuredly, I say to you that
the hour is coming.
And now is when the dead, and this
seems to refer to the spiritually dead, dead
in trespasses and sin will hear the voice
of the son of God as Jesus proclaim
the gospel in his public ministry.
And those who hear will live for, as
the father has give has life in himself.
So he has granted the son to have
life in himself.
And so here they are again from John
one, Jesus is declaring himself to be eternal
and self-existent something no mere human being
is.
He said, um, and has given him verse
27 authority to execute judgment because he is
the son of man.
So you've got the son of God, son
of God, son of God, son of God,
son of God, son of God, son of
man sticks out like a sore thumb, doesn't
it?
And what it's saying in the context of
judgment is that Jesus is uniquely qualified to
be judged over man because he's the great
God, man, all God, all man, all at
the same time.
And do not marvel at this for the
hour is coming in which all who are
in the graves will hear his voice and
come forth.
Those who have done good to the resurrection
of life and those who have done evil
to the resurrection of condemnation.
And so here Jesus is talking about when
he went, uh, three days and three nights
and the heart of the earth.
Remember he goes down there, has a little
retreat, you know, every good retreat is three
days and three nights.
And he goes down there.
What does he do?
He preaches to those who have died prior
to his coming.
And you've got in Luke chapter 16 there,
Abraham's bosom.
And then you've got the hot side.
Lazarus is in Abraham's bosom and the rich
man is in the hot side and all.
And when Jesus at the end of, of
his declaring himself, I'm the Messiah that you
were looking ahead to when he clears out
Abraham's bosom, he takes the captives from their
captivity.
What does he do?
He clears out the faith side.
He clears out the Abraham's bosom side.
And we read in one of the synoptic
gospels, what the patriarchs were walking through the
street, following his resurrection in Jerusalem.
So he cleared that, that side out.
And so that resurrection is an ongoing resurrection,
the resurrection of the just Jesus was the
first fruits of that resurrection.
And so that resurrection continues on until the
end of the age, the second resurrection, which
is for those that have rejected Christ.
And as a result have lived life and
evil life, that's a resurrection to condemnation reference
to the white throne judgment.
Jesus said in verse 30, I can of
myself do nothing doesn't mean, Oh, I can't
do anything.
I'm powerless or anything like that.
He says, I can't do anything independent of
the father.
We are so intertwined again, the, the, the,
the issue of equality and harmony running through
the whole thing.
He said of myself, I can do nothing
because everything that I do is in unity
with the father.
As I hear, I judge and my judgment
is righteous because I do not seek my
own will, but the will of the father
who sent me.
And then Jesus declares four witnesses to the
truthfulness of what he was saying about himself
in verse 31.
He said, if I bear witness of myself,
my witness is not true.
That doesn't mean that Jesus could lie or
it all, but he, the context is the
Jewish judicial system under the law of Moses.
You could not one witness alone was not
enough to establish a fact in a Jewish
court of law.
It took two witnesses or more.
So Jesus comes in and says, he said,
he said, if I bear witness of myself,
I am the only witness to what I'm
saying.
Then my witness is not true.
In other words, it's not valid as testimony.
And he's talking to religious leaders who are
very, very legal in their thinking.
They low law know the law of Moses
and they need proof and witnesses and all
this kind of stuff.
They're trying Jesus.
So Jesus is going to turn the whole
thing around on him.
He's going to bring four witnesses to the
witness stand, so to speak, to testify to
the fact that he is who he says
he is.
And the first witness he brings to the
witness stand is John the Baptist.
Therefore, there is another who bears witness of
me.
And I know that the witness, which he
testifies of me is true, that he is
in capital letters.
And there it's talking about the father who
ministered through John the Baptist, but in verse
33, clearly he's talking about John.
You have sent to John and he has
borne witness to the truth yet.
I do not receive testimony from man, but
I say these things that you may be
saved.
He was a burning and shining lamp and
you were willing for a time to rejoice
in his light.
So he comes the first witness of the
truthfulness, a witness independent of me, so to
speak, but not independent of the father.
The first witness I called the witness stand
to testify to the truthfulness that I am
the promised Messiah and I am the son
of God and God the son is John
the Baptist and John the Baptist had declared
these things to them.
And so that was the other witness.
There is kind of a emotion there in
verse 34.
That's interesting as Jesus says, and yet I
do not receive testimony from men.
In other words, I am what I am.
It doesn't matter what anyone says, but he
condescends.
To these men, who do they think they
are?
They're putting them on this trial and he
said, but I say these things that you
may be saved.
I mean, here they are.
The God who created the heavens and the
earth is before them.
They not only don't believe him, they reject
him.
They want to kill him and all of
these things.
And Jesus said, the reason I deal so
patiently with you is so the light will
go on for you and you'll get saved.
Now, was God patient with any of you
before you came to know the Lord?
No.
Look to the left, look to the right,
look to the left.
Very patient.
I'm amazed at what nonsense he was willing
to find himself in the middle of while
waiting for the light to go on for
me.
Verse 35, John the Baptist was a burning
and shining lamp.
You're willing for a time to rejoice in
his light.
In other words, they loved John the Baptist
as long as he was saying things that
they wanted him to say.
But the second he began to say things
that didn't fit what they wanted, then all
of a sudden they rejected him.
Then the second witness is the witness of
his miracles in verse 36.
But I have a greater witness than John's
for the works which the father has given
me to finish.
The very works that I do bear witness
of me that the father has sent me.
Now, between the time, the end of the
Old Testament and Jesus's, John the Baptist coming
and Jesus's birth in the New Testament, there's
a 400 year period where nothing was happening
in terms of miracles and these kinds of
things among the Jewish people.
So it wasn't like Jesus came on and
started to do a bunch of miracles, but
like there were just a bunch of miracles
going on every day anyway.
There hadn't been anything going on for hundreds
of years.
He comes on the scene and all of
a sudden he starts to do these things
and they were intended to cause people to
stop and go, wait a second, this is
the Messiah.
This is what God told us would be
true of the Messiah when he came that
he would do these miracles.
That's why in John chapter three, when Nicodemus
comes to Jesus, he said, we know that
you are come from God because no one
can do the works that you do.
And I say, we're come from God.
And Nicodemus knew that the works themselves testified
to what Jesus was saying they ought to
have, but they didn't.
And then witness number three, the Jesus pulls
to the witness stand, so to speak, is
the father himself and the father himself who
sent me, has testified of me.
You have neither heard his voice at any
time nor seen his form, but you do
not have his word abiding in you because
whom he sent him, you do not believe
here.
They are these experts, so-called experts in
the Bible, and, and they have missed the
whole intention of the Bible.
You notice as he moves now from the
testimony of the father now to the testimony
of the scriptures as being a witness to
the fact that he is the Messiah, that
he is the son of God.
You search the scriptures and they did for
in them.
You think you have eternal life, but these
are they which testify of me.
The entirety of the book testifies to Jesus
Christ as the Messiah, the Old Testament, the
Messiah and Savior promised, the New Testament, the
Savior, the son of God come and revealed.
The Bible is not a terribly complicated book,
though it is that in some respects, but
it is essentially a record of the creation
of man, the fall of man, and the
redemption of man.
The creation of man, Genesis 1 and 2,
the fall of man, Genesis chapter 3, and
from Genesis chapter 4 on the entire theme
supremely God's intent for the book is it
is a story of his redemption.
And he begins even there in chapter 3
to begin to speak of the virgin birth
of the Messiah who was to come, the
seed of the woman.
And so it's possible and there are people,
I've run into people that they know the,
they know the Bible like crazy as a
textbook or something.
And they got these weird, I mean, weird
deals about the whole thing versus coming in
their mind and the whole thing and everything.
And they have no, no belief in Jesus
as the Messiah.
They've missed the whole thing.
You search the scriptures for in them you
think you have everlasting life, but these are
they which testify of me.
And then he said now in verse 40
to the end of the chapter, let's really
talk about honestly why you have rejected me.
It isn't all of these other things.
The reason that you're not willing to come
to me, and there's four of them.
He said the reason that you haven't come
to me, verse 40, but you're not willing
to come to me that you may have
everlasting life.
The problem with them was not a scriptural
problem as it related to Jesus.
They just weren't willing to come to him.
And you know why they weren't willing to
come to him?
They didn't like the way he did things.
They didn't like the Messiah that the father
sent too bad.
Be thankful there is one.
Be thankful there is a savior.
But they weren't willing because God wasn't doing
things the way that he wanted.
You look at the multitude of people that
want anything to do with Jesus.
Let's say, well, what God would you have
anything to do with?
They begin to describe them and you realize
they're describing themselves.
That's what they wanted.
They wanted a God that they could kind
of fashion and all, but that's not the
way the universe works.
And I'm thankful for it.
And he said, I do not receive honor
from men, but I know you that you
do not have the love of God in
you.
And the second reason that they had rejected
is they did not have the love of
God.
They did not have a love for God
in them.
If they had truly had a love for
the father in them, then they would have
had a love for the son.
What they really loved was they loved position.
They loved their little spiritual kingdom.
They love their power that they had on
all that kind of stuff.
That's what they really loved.
And they didn't really love God though.
They gave all of these outward indications that
they did.
Jesus said, I have come in my father's
name and you do not receive me.
If another comes in his own name, him,
you will receive speaking of the antichrist that
who will one day come when you, when
you, when you reject the true Messiah, which
is what Israel has done as a nation.
And the Jews have in large part done
is a people.
When you reject the true Messiah, all you're
left with now is a false Messiah.
That's all that, that, that you've taken the
off the board, the right one.
Now you are completely set up to believe
in the wrong one.
The antichrist is going to come on the
scene and he's going to allow him to
build the temple and all these different things.
And as, as you're well aware, you know,
in Israel today, when they, when you talk
to people about how they'll recognize the Messiah,
when he comes, they do, we've had this
conversation in Jerusalem over it.
He will allow us to build our temple.
And we know from the new Testament, there's
going to be the antichrist that allows them
to rebuild the temple.
And then partway through halfway through the great
tribulation, he will go into the Holy of
Holies and demand to be worshiped as God.
Then the Jews will realize we have chosen
the wrong one.
And he's come now in his own name.
And then all of a sudden everybody's running
for the Hills.
And so Jesus warns them of the consequence
of rejecting him as the Messiah.
It leaves you set up for deception.
How can you believe who receive honor from
one another and do not seek the honor
that comes from the only God they rejected
Jesus because they loved honor from men rather
than honor from God.
That was their main concern was that people
would honor them rather than having God honor
them.
And, uh, and so that, that kind of
set them up for the same thing.
Whenever my greatest concern is what people will
think of me rather than what God will
think of me, then all of a sudden
I'm going to have to choose one way
or the other.
As we said this morning, those two groups
are God isn't really a group, but those
two are going in two entirely different directions.
And so I'm going to have the praise
either of this world and sinful man.
I'm going to have the praise of God.
There's, there's no, I'm not going to get
both of them out of it.
And so they wanted the praise of their
fellow, uh, religious leaders and, and they weren't
willing to make the stand, lose that in
order to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah.
And again, um, when Nicodemus in, in John
chapter three comes to Jesus and he comes
as a Pharisee and a member of the
Sanhedrin.
Again, it's interesting to remember that when he
came to them, he said, we know that
you are come from God.
Not I know that you're come from God.
We know that you're come from God because
no one could do the miracles.
There was a widespread understanding of who Jesus
was apparently among the religious leaders, but they
were unwilling to give up the honor they
were receiving from men in order to accept
the truth and follow the true Messiah happens
all the time today.
Just not a necessarily a religious context, but
a secular context in this world.
He said, do you think, do not think
that I shall accuse you to the father.
There's one who accuses you, Moses and whom
you trust.
And they were the great students of the
law.
So they thought in their own minds, we
trust in Moses and Moses and Moses were
experts in Moses and all of this.
And they thought that Jesus and Moses were
out of harmony with one another.
And so here Jesus comes in and says,
do not think that I shall accuse you
to the father.
I don't need to do it.
I, the one that you trust the most
accuses you.
And that's Moses.
If you had believed Moses, you would believe
me for he wrote about me.
But if you do not believe his writings,
how will you believe my words?
They didn't believe Jesus because they didn't believe
Moses's writings.
And when Jesus told them that you don't
believe in Moses, that had to seem like
the craziest thing that anyone could say to
them.
We're the experts on Moses, on the law
and on the prophets.
But Jesus has been declaring through this entire
section.
What he has been declaring equality and harmony
with the father.
What did Moses declare in Genesis chapter one,
verse 26, he declared there is the record
God speaking.
Let us make man in our image, according
to our likeness, revealing what the plurality within
the Godhead.
And if they had been honest students of
the law of Moses, then they would have
recognized when Jesus came on the scene and
declared himself to be equal with God, to
be God, the son, to be operating in
harmony with the father.
It should have been like, wow, I could
have had a V8.
You're the guy that we've been waiting for.
We wouldn't have accepted anyone who made a
lesser claim concerning themselves.
Then of course, God, as the record goes
on in the very next verse, and that
first book of Moses in Genesis.
Where the Lord then declares, and so God
created man in his own image and in
the image of God, he created them.
Let us make man.
They had been careful students of the law
of Moses, then they would have recognized him
to be the Messiah.