John

Hi, welcome to the Pastor Talk podcast as we work our way through the New Testament.
Today, we are in the Gospel of John.
I appreciate you listening in,
and we hope there’s something helpful.
Michael, this is your day.
You’ve been chomping at the bit,
waiting for your favorite Gospel,
and here it is.
We’re going to jump right into it.
John chapter 1 is,
I think, a spectacular opening to the Gospel,
and you’re going to hear this in probably about 14 different
ways in this conversation.
If you started to get used to a rhythm of what the Gospels we’ve read before have,
maybe you are getting used to how they start and how they develop,
John is going to do something almost completely different at every turn from start to middle to finish.
And we have what is just an absolutely incredible start to the book.
In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
And we start with not just the idea of Jesus being
born, but we start with the idea of Jesus existing from before all time,
which already tips us off to
one of the major themes of John.
And that is not that we need a justification for the fact that
Jesus Christ is God.
John is a thorough case throughout from these very first words to the end,
that Jesus is the Son of God.
And we then need to look with eyes of faith to see Him in all of
His radiant splendor.
And if we do that,
we can see that Jesus has existed from even before the
foundations of the earth.
It doesn’t take long to get into the book of John and realize that it’s
something different than what you’ve seen.
It is not like Matthew,
Mark, and Luke, which is why it
is kept as the fourth Gospel,
leaving the three that are more like together as a unit.
It’s important to understand, I think, Michael, that John is not writing history in the way that Luke is.
He’s not obsessing over the details.
He’s not trying to convey the particulars of a historical account.
John is writing theology.
Everything he writes is in service to his main contention that Jesus
Christ is the incarnate Son of God.
And so, we start with this beautiful proclamation that the
Word becomes flesh.
It dwelt among us.
He is full of grace and truth.
As you go through John,
you’re going to encounter some significant differences from the other Gospels we’ve read.
Jesus doesn’t tell parables.
There isn’t going to be a Last Supper.
Many of the stories you’ve read
aren’t in John, and many of the stories you read in John aren’t in the other Gospels.
And, you know, I think some people read that and it troubles them.
But I would say read that with the permission
to just enjoy it.
John really is his own flavor, his own taste.
And dive into this book,
see where it takes you, listen to what it tells you.
And I would say,
by and large, I understand why scholars
do it, but I think as faith readers,
we probably do a disservice comparing this book to the others
because it simply shares a different intention.
-Yeah, I’m glad you say that,
Clint, because I think John is one of the Gospels,
one of the four,
that could be one of two things.
It could either be incredibly troubling for you to come to if you’re an analytical, scientific,
methodological thinker.
If you come to John and you’re trying to figure out how these stories fit within what you
see as a larger meta story,
this book is going to trouble you because John is not doing what we think
of when we think of historical,
biographical writing.
That’s not what’s happening here.
So if that’s the kind of personal bent you have,
or maybe even a theological bent,
this book is going to throw you a little bit.
It’s going to jar you.
If you come to this book, like you’re saying,
you use the word theological.
If you came to this book with more of a spiritual reading,
maybe another word to use, you’re going to see in this a great amount of poetry.
And what I mean by that is
there’s metaphors like crazy throughout the entire book.
In fact, we’re going to see that
already in verse nine.
John sets up this idea of Jesus being the light of the world.
Light and darkness will play throughout the entire book.
It’s not just an opening sort of poetic note.
It’s actually a metaphor that runs throughout the entire work.
So John is going to provide a kind of depth.
And I think that’s what draws me to it is if you are willing to sit in John for a little bit,
you’re going to just see limitless meaning to how John shows what Jesus taught and did.
But if you come to that with the idea of categorization and fitting it within sort of the synoptic or the
Matthew, Mark, and Luke stories, then you’re going to get caught up in that as opposed to what John has to offer.
And that would be a shame.
I think that’s fair.
I think that in some ways,
Matthew, Mark, and Luke walk us through the story to kind of confirm the idea that Jesus is the Messiah.
John starts there.
John proclaims from word one,
page one, Jesus is the son of God.
And then it’s as if he almost says,
“Now, let me tell you a bunch of stuff that proves that.”
And that’s, I think, the best way to read it.
Otherwise, you’re going to – if you try to
reconcile John with the other gospels,
as many have, you’re going to be frustrated.
He puts stories that are at the end of their gospel,
at the beginning of his gospel.
Half of John’s gospel takes place the last week of Jesus’ life.
His intention is not cohesiveness with the other
accounts.
He just wants to shine a light on the reality of who Christ is and point that out in
any way possible, I think.
In the other gospels,
again, particularly in Mark, we’ve talked about this idea of the secret and is Jesus the Messiah?
Is he not the Messiah?
This hangs over the narrative.
Not so in John.
In John, Jesus claims early on that he is the Messiah.
John the Baptist claims
that on his behalf.
The reader knows that already going in.
That’s true in the other gospels,
but it’s just blatantly obvious in John.
A couple of other things,
just in terms of
general stuff as you read the book of John,
I mentioned there are no parables.
Also, be on the lookout for seven “I am” statements.
Jesus says things like,
“I am the bread of life.
I am the light of the world.” There are seven titles that Jesus claims for himself.
There are also seven major miracles or what some people call the seven signs of John.
Those are miracle stories that happen within the first 11 chapters.
You’ll notice when you get toward the end of the
story, the Last Supper is told completely different.
There’s really no communion in the
book of John.
He tells us instead of the foot washing and Jesus as servant.
So, just a few things to be aware of as you enter this book and you’ll notice those things as you go,
I think.
You’ll also find that Jesus has a very interesting relationship with the Jewish leaders in the book
of John.
Those conflicts which we’re now used to from Matthew,
Mark, and Luke, those conflicts are in many ways here.
In fact,
Jesus clearing out the temple is moved all the way to the front
of John.
So, within the first two chapters,
Jesus has already gone to Jerusalem.
He’s already made a ruckus in the temple.
He’s already challenging the religious leaders.
And yet, as Jesus goes through this book,
the conflicts with the Pharisees and Zaggis continue to be front and center.
But in many ways,
they’re far more dialogical.
They’re far more theological.
And so, even after Jesus cleans out the temple,
chapter three,
Jesus is encountering Nicodemus,
who’s this Pharisee who needs to be pointed out.
He comes to Jesus at night.
John goes out of the way to point out
at what time of day this man comes to Jesus.
And that’s significant.
Pay attention to those
details in John.
When do people come to Jesus?
When does Jesus do the healings?
Is it in darkness,
or is it in light?
Is it at midday when the sun is up,
or is it in the midst of night when the sun
is down?
Because for John,
the sun illuminates.
And in darkness, we don’t see Christ.
The spiritual and the physical are always at play in this book,
and those aren’t accidents.
Sure.
And what did John tell us right away?
Jesus is the light of the world that shines in the darkness.
And whenever you see light, dark,
day, night in John, it means more than the words it’s
telling you.
It always harkens back to that idea of light and darkness and the profound proclamation
that Christ is the light.
I don’t want to jump ahead,
but when we get to the ninth chapter,
there’s that whole wonderful interplay about blindness and sight and day and night,
and John really does that well.
John also gives us some of Christianity’s best loved sentences.
I don’t want to call them sound bites.
That doesn’t do them justice.
But for God’s soul of the world that
He gave His only begotten Son,
Jesus wept.
There are these poetic verses,
“Feed my sheep” at the
end of John.
John does have a way,
in spite of sometimes assaulting us with text,
of dropping in these sentences or these verses that are memorable,
are deep,
are rich, profound.
And I bet a lot of people’s personal memory verses are highly vested in the book of John.
Absolutely.
We know a lot more John than we probably think we do,
just because of some of those verses.
Yeah, I completely agree.
And you mentioned it,
so as we make our way into the book,
it’s probably worth pausing and reflecting on.
This is, of course, the gospel from which we have
that large culturally known verse,
John 3.16.
And you mentioned before we started,
Clint, we probably should widen our view of John 3.16 a little bit if we’re going to do justice to the
actual gospel.
Yeah, I wish whoever had numbered the verses would have left 16 and 17 as one verse so that
everybody who knew 16 also knew the next part, which says, “Indeed,
God did not send His Son
into the world to condemn the world,
but in order that through Him the world might be saved.”
Verse 17 really completes verse 16.
And it’s unfortunate that so many people know John 3.16,
and really probably not many people know the second part of it,
which is I think just as
strong, but not as well known.
In every gospel,
there is a religious leader who comes to Jesus who has some measure of humility
and authenticity in asking Jesus questions.
So I don’t want to make it sound like this is a
completely unique aspect of John.
But Jesus’ relationship with Nicodemus is unique in the
gospel of John in the sense that here you have a highly credentialed,
very intelligent theological thinker,
a Jewish leader coming to Jesus.
And it is in the midst of his engagement
with Jesus, some of this being quite frankly,
a funny aspect of the conversation that essentially
Nicodemus at one point says,
“How can I enter into my mother’s womb again?
How can I be born again?”
It’s really almost a comical,
laughable sort of moment.
And yet it is out of the fruit of that.
John neither portrays Jesus as insulting Nicodemus,
nor do we sort of have a response there that is
light and comical.
Jesus responds with this incredible teaching.
And then John almost
parenthetically gives us what we know to be John 3.16 and what probably should be included is 17.
Yeah, and I think two things to follow up on that,
Michael.
In John, as I understand it,
the misunderstanding often leads to teaching.
So the woman at the well misunderstands what Jesus
is saying about water and it gives him the opportunity.
In the ninth chapter,
the Pharisees misunderstand what the blind man is telling them and that becomes an opportunity.
John often uses a moment where someone doesn’t get it as an opportunity for Jesus to provide some kind of teaching.
And then secondly, I think Nicodemus is a unique character in the Gospel in that we get
very little information about him,
but what we understand in it is significant.
So about halfway through the book, there are some Jews plotting against Jesus and Nicodemus says,
“Maybe God is doing something.
Maybe we don’t want to get in the way.
Maybe we should listen to him.” And they
silence him.
And then at the end of the book,
when Joseph of Arimathea comes to bury Jesus,
John points out that Nicodemus comes with him.
And the clear implication I think there is that
Nicodemus in the pages of John’s Gospel has had a journey of faith.
He’s had a growing awareness
of this reality of who Jesus is and we get to see that in very brief glimpses throughout the way.
And I think what John does with that character is really good.
You may also notice lots of
references to time or hour,
depending on your translation,
a significant theme in John,
that Jesus is moving toward his moment and often he will say,
“My hour has not yet come.” Or sometimes
John will tell us that something happened because it was not Jesus’ hour,
it was not his time.
And that time, as I understand it,
is always a reference to the cross,
to Jesus’ work in the crucifixion,
taking our place to the punishment for sin,
the redemption of God’s people.
And so this hour,
as you as you read through this,
you’re going to see that phrase,
“hour” or “time” depends what translation you use.
But know that John has in mind the cross.
And if you understand
that, you’ll see what he’s doing with it, I think.
Absolutely.
And we don’t want to get too deep in the weeds.
We don’t want to sort of jump into every story that you’re going to encounter in John.
But there are a few linchpin stories,
I think, in this book.
I think one worth bringing up for you
before you get to it is Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman in chapter 4.
It’s an important story for a number of reasons.
First of all, this is the only gospel that tells this story in this
way.
And it’s also important for where it’s placed because Jesus is encountering very early in his
in a Jewish audience.
And this is the person who Jesus has this deep conversation connecting back
to the idea of even the well in which the people have been getting water all the way back to Jacob’s time.
And then you have this encounter where Jesus says,
“I am the eternal living water.” And she
says, “Well, if you’re that water,” she misunderstands,
“If you’re that water,
then Jesus, you can come here and be our soda machine forever.
You know, we’ll never be thirsty.
We won’t even need to pull
water out.” And then Jesus makes it clear,
“No, I don’t mean physical water.
I mean that I will
bring life and water,
bring drink for you forever.
It’s living water.” And this woman, importantly,
then goes into her community.
And in just a few short verses,
she becomes in John this evangelist
to the Gentile, to the non-Jew.
And that happens already within the first four chapters of the book.
So that’s a John distinctive.
And it’s worth pointing out in verse 26 of that very chapter,
Jesus says to her,
“I am the one speaking to you.
I am he, I am,” which is this clear
point in reference to God’s name in the Old Testament and kicks John off with a huge bang
and all of the “I am” statements that follow.
Yeah, toward the end of that Doria,
verse 39, that many of the Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman’s testimony.
These are some of the earliest believers in the Gospel of John and they’re non-Jews,
and that’s significant.
And then maybe even more significantly at the end of that section,
verse 42, they tell the woman,
“It’s no longer because of what you said that we believe,
for we have heard it for ourselves,
and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”
John does this wonderful theme throughout the book of believe or not believe,
those who believe and those who don’t.
And sometimes people switch sides like doubting Thomas and we see this
constant interchange between belief and non-belief.
And here the people say,
“We believe in Jesus for
ourselves, not simply because you told us.” And remarkably,
the first successful evangelist is a
foreign woman with questionable living arrangement.
And I don’t know where,
I mean, the equivalent of that doesn’t exist in the other Gospels.
Yeah, I’d say that’s true.
And John,
sort of like Luke,
at the beginning of Luke’s Gospel,
tells us sort of why he’s writing.
He sort of gives that purpose statement.
John has a very
similar kind of purpose statement.
This is why I’m writing this Gospel,
except John’s is at the end.
So we have to skip ahead to that story that you just referenced,
and that is Doubting Thomas and
that encounter with Jesus post-resurrection.
And the Gospel writer John recounts this.
“Jesus says to Thomas,
‘Because you have seen me,
you have believed.'” Once again,
that idea of belief.
“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” Now those are the words of Jesus.
What follows is John’s writing.
“Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples,
which are not recorded in this book,
but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is
the Messiah, the Son of God,
and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Which,
by the way, that should make all of us think back to Jesus’s conversation with Nicodemus and John 3, 16, and 17.
Right?
The idea is that this book exists and was even crafted.
John just said these were written
so that you would believe these stories were picked,
these stories were told,
and they were picked for the purpose of providing us what we need to believe in Jesus.
And by the way,
this great promise that Jesus gives that blessed are those who haven’t seen and yet believed.
Blessed are those who receive these words and faith comes to them through it.
Is it obvious that I like John?
It might show a little.
You mentioned, and I think we another linchpin story of John is chapter 9.
It’s the man born
blind and you have to know that blindness and darkness come together.
And so, that physical act of healing is a significant feature of this book.
Yeah, this is a great chapter.
You know, when John dedicates an entire chapter to a story,
you should pay attention to it.
And so, we begin this story with that loaded question from the disciples.
They see a blind man and they say,
“Teacher, why is he blind?
Did he sin or did his parents sin?” And this is the common wisdom of the
day.
And Jesus said neither,
but in his blindness,
there’s an opportunity to glorify God.
He heals him with this, again,
strange detail that he makes mud and saliva.
He sends him off to go
wash in a pool and then he can see.
Now, is this symbolic of baptism?
Some have argued yes,
maybe it is, but it’s a rather elaborate healing compared to most of Jesus’ healings.
And then we get told that this causes a conflict.
It was a Sabbath day and so now the Pharisees
are investigating this and they’re asking questions about Jesus and who he is and what he’s done.
And you have this wonderful,
this beautiful irony that a blind man is answering questions about
Jesus for the religious leaders of Judaism.
The blind is leading the sighted toward Jesus,
except they’re not interested in going toward Jesus, but attacking him.
But it’s a poetic that,
again, we have the most unlikely evangelist spreading word to religious leaders who don’t
get it.
The blind guy gets it,
but the experts don’t.
And later on, verse 30, he said, “This is an astonishing thing.
You don’t even know where he comes from,
but he opened my eyes.”
So, this contrast between the religious with all of their passion and none of the power to help
and forgive and move people and Jesus who changes lives and yet is in conflict with those who want
to control him and judge him.
This is great.
I love chapter 9.
Probably my favorite part of
the Gospel of John.
You know, the book continues on.
There’s this really incredible account of
Jesus’s resurrection of Lazarus.
In this story, we have really an unprecedented
kind of long-term engagement with the idea of Jesus’s resurrection power prior to the cross.
And John puts that front and center here right in the middle of the Gospel.
Yeah.
In the conversation with the sisters,
if you had been here,
he wouldn’t have died.
I know that he will rise again in the resurrection.
And then we have the fifth “I am” statement,
“I am the resurrection and the life.
Those who believe in me,
even though they die, will live.
Everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” We have this interchange,
light, dark, here it’s life, death, but we have that duality which is ultimately the power that governs human life.
And for John, it’s no contest.
Jesus has power even over the grave and not just the grave,
but the four-day old corpse who the sister says will stink by now.
And Jesus calls him out.
And then there’s this wonderful almost throwaway line at the end where Lazarus comes out of the
tomb and Jesus says,
“Unbind him and let him go,” which on one hand simply means take off the
grave clothes.
On the other hand is an entire theology of what Jesus does.
This is John’s, again,
this is that wonderful encapsulation of what Jesus does.
He unbinds people and he
sets them free.
That’s what his mission is.
You know, in one way, the prior Gospel writers
leave resurrection to the end as this master stroke of revelation of who Jesus is.
Jesus performs miracles.
He proclaims the kingdom of God.
Jesus teaches.
Jesus has conflicts with religious leaders.
Jesus is crucified.
Jesus is resurrected in this master stroke in those
Gospels of God proclaiming, showing,
doing resurrection.
God completely reconfiguring reality as we know it.
It lives at the end of that story.
It lives post-cross.
In the Gospel of John,
John isn’t interested in making a case for the fact that Jesus is the Son of God,
not in that sense.
Jesus is on display.
Resurrection is put in the middle of John.
Jesus is doing resurrecting
things because Jesus is the Son of God.
Jesus is God.
There’s no apology needed for that.
There’s no argument needed.
Jesus is walking around.
Lazarus is dead for four days.
Jesus raises him from the dead.
Resurrection is something that John is going to throw right here in the middle of this story.
And so it’s not even a surprise when we get to Jesus’s resurrection.
We’ve already encountered that.
That’s something that’s already in the midst of it because,
quite frankly, there was no other way that Jesus’s story was going to go in John.
Death wasn’t going to hold Jesus down.
Resurrection power is alive and real.
And that’s the end of the story.
And if you’re interested
in the literary piece of this,
I mentioned there were seven signs.
This is the seventh.
So this is the culminating miracle that Jesus does.
He calls Lazarus to life.
And not only that,
but in the next chapter,
we read that so powerful is that sign in verse 9 through 11 of chapter 12.
It compels people.
It says that people are deserting.
They’re leaving the folds of the
religious leaders and they’re following after Jesus because this sign is so remarkable.
And I don’t think I’ve ever noticed this before,
Michael, in the Gospel of John,
that the Jews then put Lazarus on the hit list,
that they say we not only have to get rid of Jesus,
we have to kill Lazarus because too many people are seeing what happened and following Jesus because of Lazarus.
And I don’t know that I’ve ever noticed that Lazarus was included in the plan
as one who needed to be gotten rid of.
Yeah, absolutely.
And in all of the Gospels now,
you’ve gotten used to that idea of Jesus going through Galilee,
teaching, preaching, comes to the Passover in Jerusalem,
and you have that triumphal entry.
In John, that immediately follows this passage of Lazarus.
Jesus gives this seventh I am.
He shows power, yes, even power over death.
And then boom,
now we’re in Jerusalem.
Now we’re going to hit the big time,
the large stage.
And like you mentioned earlier,
Clint, we’re only 12 chapters in, right?
A lot of this last part
of Jesus’s ministry is reserved for this part of the telling of the book.
And so Jesus demonstrates
this significant power, even power over death,
and now we’re set up for the long discourses and
teaching and encounters that Jesus is going to have,
both with his opponents,
the Jews, as John would say,
but also his disciples.
And that’s setting up the stage for the second half of the book.
Yeah. And to your comments a moment ago,
is it fair to say that in the other Gospels,
they tell us what Jesus did in service to telling us who Jesus is,
but John doesn’t draw that distinction.
Who Jesus is, is what he does.
And what he does is testimony we’re
about to get into a ton of testimony language,
but what Jesus does is the evidence of who he is,
but it seems to me that that’s more tightly connected in John than in the other Gospels.
In the other Gospels,
it’s who Jesus is,
and that’s why he does what he does.
In John, he does what he does as an extension of who he is.
Does that make any sense?
It does.
That’s a very nuanced comment though, because in John,
there is this sense in which
Jesus is the light in the darkness,
that Jesus is being his essence,
his light givingness, is inextricably linked to the light that’s shining from him.
Absolutely. Yeah. And so when John has Jesus say,
“I am the resurrection,” it’s not that I do
resurrection or I can resurrect people.
I am.
That’s an extension.
That’s part of who I am.
And I think that’s just more tightly woven together in John.
In the other Gospels,
we get glimpses of what Jesus does and who Jesus is.
In John, those are always looking through the same lens.
Is that fair?
Oh, I think absolutely.
And I think in John,
one of the things I love
about this book is John is just unashamed of who Jesus is.
Now, the disciples don’t always get it,
and certainly the Jews don’t get it.
There’s all of this darkness,
even though the light is there.
But when Jesus shows up on day one,
he is perfect.
He is absolutely all-powerful and all-knowing.
And there’s no buildup to that.
That’s day one.
Well, early in the book,
John told us Jesus always
knew what was in people’s hearts and what they were thinking and why they were doing things.
There’s no discernment for Jesus.
He knows these things.
When we get to the end of the gospel,
particularly what Jesus says from the cross in John,
I think we see it very clearly again.
John doesn’t have those moments of,
“Take this cup from me if you can.
My time has come.
My face is set.
You’re not stopping me.” Jesus is not vulnerable in that sense,
which is odd, given that John is the only gospel that tells us about Jesus weeping,
and there is a nice tension there.
But when it comes to any kind of doubts,
any kind of struggle,
any kind of question,
Jesus doesn’t have that in John.
Yeah, and I hate to spoil it,
so I won’t jump ahead too far.
But I will say,
all of the people of power in John,
and by that I mean worldly power,
or just caricatures of people.
They’re just little puppets on strings.
Jesus is large and in charge
at every step of this book.
No question.
There’s really not the political intrigue that you have
in some of the other gospels.
When Jesus shows up,
if Jesus wants to go up on the cross,
Jesus is going up on the cross.
If Jesus doesn’t want to,
they didn’t stand a chance from day one,
and John’s not apologetic about that.
Yeah, Jesus is not a pawn.
He’s not manipulated.
There’s no weakness.
No.
Just John’s Jesus really does not present weakness.
He doesn’t get hungry.
He’s got food you don’t know about back in the earlier story.
He’s much more impenetrable.
And by the way,
that’s exactly why this book has been critiqued in the past.
And Clint, I think that’s a nice way to say it,
is that the impenetrable-ness of Jesus is something that
also historically the church has said,
but let’s not take that too far, right?
That fundamentally,
we want to make sure that we all understand Jesus was fully man and fully God.
So we should never
read John unto itself and start creating a superhero-like person for Jesus because his
humanity is wrapped up in all four of these gospels as well.
That’s worth saying that some
people have fallen into that ditch and we should be careful to not go too far.
Yes. Some of the early church heresies neglected or negated our humanness.
In other words, to be faithful was to live beyond our humanness,
to divorce ourselves from needs,
to not need physical comfort or physical pleasure or food even.
And John has through those lenses been
critiqued for presenting a Jesus who doesn’t seem particularly human.
But I think that’s
a misunderstanding.
I don’t think it’s fair to the gospel of John.
And again, scholars, that gives them something to do.
But I think for us as we read it,
it’s enough to know that John
seems attracted to the parts and highlights the pieces of Jesus’ story that show who he is as Son of God.
And given the two sides of that coin,
that’s the side John’s always going to show us.
Absolutely.
And I would just say proportionally,
three to one is probably a good proportion.
Yeah, right.
Matthew, Mark, Luke,
John.
And you know, I think the three to one thing works really well.
And you should read John with that in mind.
And if you do,
I think this is going to be just a really
enlightening kind of experience for you.
So a couple of things,
Michael, should point out that verse 27 of chapter 12,
Jesus says, “I have come to this hour,” sort of the time has arrived.
It is now set in stone.
Things are in motion.
They’re not going to change.
Chapter 13, a wonderful chapter,
John’s version of the Last
Supper, we get the foot washing.
I don’t think there’s anything there that you couldn’t gain by
reading it, but it is a wonderful text and a nice balance to the story we have in the other gospels.
Here, Jesus kneels before the disciples,
takes upon himself the very lowly task of washing their feet.
And we see here that he glorifies himself in service,
in giving himself.
And that’s a paradigm for the cross, for John.
Going down that road,
once you get to chapter 14 and more,
if you have a red leather Bible,
there’s going to be a lot of red.
There’s a lot of Jesus who is
large and in charge.
He knows that his hour has come.
He knows what’s right around the bend.
So this is sort of his in the locker room before the big moment.
This is the speech to the disciples.
And if we remember what John says at the very end of this book,
that this is about us believing.
This is selected so that we can believe.
I think this in John functions as really a heart to heart
this is us sitting in that room,
getting to hear Jesus’s heart for us.
And if we receive that in
that way, I think this is a beautiful section of and it’s a really unparalleled kind of discourse from Jesus.
Nothing like this in the other gospels and some wonderful verses.
“Peace I leave you,
my peace I give to you,
not as the world gives.
Do not let your heart be troubled.
Do not let them be afraid.
I am the true vine.
This is my commandment.
Love one another as I have loved you.
No greater love than this has a person to lay down one’s life for their friends,
those who abide in
me, abide in love, and I abide in them.” This section is filled with some beautiful stuff,
some hard stuff as you move into chapter 16,
late 15, the world’s hatred and sorrow turning into joy.
Some of that chapter 17,
the longest prayer recorded in the gospels and I think most of it
is something that people can read.
And again, if you read it carefully,
I think you’ll find just
a lot of depth in it.
Absolutely. And just a word of maybe recommendation,
don’t try to read this
middle passage here.
Don’t try to read 14,
15, 16.
When you’re late to get to an appointment,
you’re trying to knock this out.
It’s worthy.
There’s a lot of just sheer words in this section
and you’re going to do yourself a large favor to have a quiet moment and the luxury of a little
bit of time or you’re going to be tempted to speed through this.
I might even suggest if there was a
place that an audio Bible would make sense,
listening to those chapters read by someone else
or spoken by someone else might be helpful.
We get through this beautiful discourse.
We come to that part of the story that by now we all know very well,
this encounter with the religious
leaders, though John is going to give us some new details.
We’re going to hear some new aspects of
the story.
One thing I’d point out in that regard,
if you’re looking at John chapter 18,
I’m looking at verse 19.
Jesus makes it abundantly clear.
I’ve spoken openly to the world.
Why are you pulling
me in in darkness?
Why are you pulling me into questioning in secret?
I taught in synagogues or the temple.
I’ve been wherever the Jews are.
I’ve done nothing in secret.
So why are you questioning me?
Jesus does not pull punches in John.
Jesus puts it out there.
Hey, I’ve been in public the
whole time.
Everybody has had access to see that I’m the light,
that I’m the Son of God.
So why are you all trying to cover it up?
There’s no meekness in that way in John’s telling of this.
No,
not at all.
And Jesus bears up under questioning.
He’s beaten, but he’s not bowed down.
He’s not broken.
He’s not weakened.
In fact, the more they do to him,
there’s a sense almost in which the stronger he gets.
I like the way that John in chapter 18 gives us the cut scenes between Peter’s denial
and Jesus’ punishment and almost has a kind of a movie quality to it.
You’re seeing the two things
happening at the same time so that as Peter’s denying Jesus,
Jesus is being beaten.
And then we flash back to Peter who unknowing or uncaring that Jesus is taking that abuse betrays him again.
It’s really, it’s well written.
A few things to make the case that we’ve already said.
Jesus is always in charge of this process.
Jesus says to the religious leaders,
“If I said something wrong,
tell me what it is.” This is verse 23 of 18.
“But if I spoke the truth,
why are you hitting me?”
This isn’t a guy who’s afraid and being beaten.
Then Jesus comes before Pilate.
Remember,
Pilate represents the greatest military power of the time.
Pilate represents the height of human authority.
And Pilate, verse 37 of chapter 18 says,
“You are a king then.” And Jesus says,
“Well, you say that I’m a king.” Once again,
this isn’t a thing that you do when you have a prisoner and a person of
authority that just keeps going.
Chapter 19,
Jesus says to Pilate,
“You would have no power over me
if it were not given to you from above.” This is a spectacular telling of someone who’s not only not afraid,
but someone who has chosen this as,
like you said, Clint,
his hour.
This is Jesus’ hours.
He chose it.
He’s in charge.
And then in the next couple of verses,
there’s a fascinating thing that John does, Michael.
Verse 12 from then on,
Pilate tried to release Jesus.
And we saw this
in the other Gospels,
but here it crescendos.
It elevates.
And Pilate says, “I’ll try to release
him.” And the Jews say,
“No.” And he says,
“Here’s your king.” And they say,
“Away with them.
Crucify him.” And Pilate says,
“Should I crucify your king?” And then this verse is stunning,
the chief priest.
And now keep in mind,
this is the chief priests of the Jews who hate the Romans and who live under Roman occupation.
And John puts these words in their mouth,
“We have no king but the emperor,”
which is very close to blasphemy for a Jew.
That is almost the harshest criticism,
I think, that John can give is that the Jews here have abandoned their true king and are,
in fact, crucifying their true king because they are in league here with earthly power.
And then to your point that Jesus is relentlessly in charge of this situation,
Jesus says three things in John,
but listen to them.
“Woman, here is your son,
disciple,” he says to the disciple,
“Here is your mother.” So,
here we have Jesus caring for his mother,
wrapping up details, doing what a son is supposed to do.
From the cross,
by the way.
This wasn’t like on the way.
From the cross.
Then he says, “I am thirsty,” but John makes it clear he says it to fulfill the Scripture.
Not actually thirsty or at least potentially he’s not thirsty, he’s fulfilling Scripture.
And then most telling of all,
Jesus received the wine and said,
“It is finished.” Then
he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
In John,
Jesus even decides when it’s time to die.
Death doesn’t just come on him at its time.
It happens when Jesus says,
“I’m ready for it to
happen.” I think that’s just indicative of how John tells the Jesus story.
Jesus decides when it’s finished.
In the interest of time here,
we maybe move through the resurrection story of Jesus
again.
John tells it in a unique way.
When the disciples get word that the stone has been moved,
the tomb is empty or at least open,
they run.
Peter and the other disciple and late in the
Gospel of John, we get essentially John calling himself the other disciple or the beloved
disciple.
At least it’s always been thought that that’s a self-reference and they run together.
And the other disciple, John,
outruns Peter and got to the tomb first.
He looks in, but he didn’t go in.
Then Simon Peter comes in and he went in the tomb and he saw the linens lying there and
the grave cloth that had been on Jesus’ head,
not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up or
the word can actually be translated,
folded up by itself.
And again,
what a John detail that at the resurrection,
Jesus doesn’t scramble out of the tomb barely defeating death.
He gets up, he puts away the grave clothes and by the way,
the head cloth, he folds it.
He’s done with it.
It’s just complete victory here.
He’s just cleaning up the tomb before he leaves.
There’s no urgency.
There’s no danger.
John has Jesus above all of that.
There are some great stories that wrap up in John.
I think if I was going to point out,
I think you should definitely be attentive to chapter 20,
verse 29 and 30,
that whole section.
In fact, you know what, before you start John,
read that.
That’s not a bad thing to read before you begin.
And I’d also point out that John is in some ways unique in that at the very,
very end, the last verse,
verse 25 of chapter one,
Jesus did many other things as well.
And if every one of them were written down,
I suppose that even the whole world would not have room
for the books that would be written.
And I find in that really just a nod to those of us who have received this book,
John saying,
“Hey,
I wasn’t trying to be like the other guys.
I wasn’t trying to write an account like they did.
You could fill every book in the entire world with the stories
of who Jesus was and what he did.
I wrote this so that you would have exactly what you needed to
know who he was and to know what the nature of the light of the world is.” And John’s contention,
what John wants us to know is this is enough.
This is all that we need.
And when we put that
in conversation with the other gospels we’ve already read,
I think that this is clearly a
beautiful telling of Jesus’ story and a wonderful place to live and to grow in.
Yeah, it’s a great ending.
Chapter 21 is wonderfully done.
The reinstatement of Peter,
the strange story about the disciples fishing and Peter jumping in the water to get to Jesus quickly.
When they get to shore,
Jesus is next to a charcoal fire,
which is the exact word that John
had used of the fire that Peter was standing by when he denied him.
And so there’s this wonderful
sort of balance that comes through the story,
“Feed my lambs, feed my sheep,
feed my sheep,
tend to my sheep.” John doesn’t have what Matthew has.
The big sending,
what John has is more
personal than I think what we saw in Matthew.
So yeah, a wonderful ending, lots of good stuff.
Hope you will enjoy reading it.
Hope you will be challenged by it and be directed by it,
be fed by it as John intended.
Next week we turn to Acts,
which is a continuation of Luke’s telling of Jesus’ life.
And we then hear the story of the church and Jesus’ work and life in that realm.
So join us again next week.
We look forward to seeing you next Saturday.
Until then, enjoy reading the book of John.
Thanks, everybody.