 
THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

A Pastoral Commentary

by Edwin Walhout

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2014 Edwin Walhout

Cover design by Amy Cole

See Smashwords.com for additional titles by this author.

Biblical quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

CONTENTS

Introduction

Chapter 1 Prologue (John 1:1-18)

Chapter 2 John The Baptist (John 1:19-42)

Chapter 3 The First Disciples (John 1:43-51)

Chapter 4 The Wedding At Cana (John 2:1-12)

Chapter 5 Jesus In The Temple (John 2:12-25)

Chapter 6 Nicodemus (John 3:1-21)

Chapter 7 John The Baptist (John 3:22-36)

Chapter 8 The Samaritan Woman (John 4:1-42)

Chapter 9 A Royal Official (John 4:43-54)

Chapter 10 A Sick Man (John 5:1-47)

Chapter 11 Feeding Hungry People (John 6:1-14)

Chapter 12 Bread From Heaven (John 6:16-71)

Chapter 13 Jesus At A Festival (John 7:1-52)

Chapter 14 An Adulterous Woman (John 8:1-11)

Chapter 15 About The Father (John 8:12-30)

Chapter 16 About Father Abraham (John 8:31-59)

Chapter 17 A Man Born Blind (John 9:1-41)

Chapter 18 A Sheep Analogy (John 10:1-21)

Chapter 19 Jesus' Authority (John 10:22-42)

Chapter 20 Lazarus (John 11:1-45)

Chapter 21 Plans To Arrest Jesus (John 11:45-57)

Chapter 22 Jesus At Bethany (John 12:1-11)

Chapter 23 Jesus Enters Jerusalem (John 12:12-19)

Chapter 24 Greeks Seek Jesus (John 12:20-36)

Chapter 25 Jesus Explains His Mission (John 12:36-50)

Chapter 26 A Tale Of Two Disciples (John 13:1-20)

Chapter 27 More About Judas And Peter (John 13:21-38)

Chapter 28 Two Other Disciples (John 14:1-14)

Chapter 29 The Paraclete (John 14:15-24)

Chapter 30 Peace (John 14:25-31)

Chapter 31 Abide In Me (John 15:1-25)

Chapter 32 Paraclete (John 15:26 – 16:15)

Chapter 33 The Hour Has Come (John 16:16-33)

Chapter 34 Jesus Prays For Himself (John 17:1-5)

Chapter 35 Jesus Prays For His Disciples (John 17:6-19)

Chapter 36 Jesus Prays For Believers (John 17:20-26)

Chapter 37 Jesus Is Arrested (John 18:1-27)

Chapter 38 Jesus Is Tried (John 18:28-40)

Chapter 39 Pilate Continues The Trial (John 19:1-16)

Chapter 40 Jesus Is Crucified (John 19:17-37)

Chapter 41 Jesus Is Buried (John 19:38-42)

Chapter 42 Resurrection Day (John 20:1-23)

Chapter 43 After Resurrection Day (John 20:24-31)

Chapter 44 A Third Resurrection Appearance (John 21:1-25)

Chapter 45 Concluding Overview

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

INTRODUCTION

It will be helpful in our study of John's Gospel to understand a bit of John's circumstances when writing, and to ask the question of why he wrote this Gospel at all, given that there were already three Gospels in circulation, Matthew, Mark, and Luke.

Scholars are of the opinion that John moved out of the region of Palestine during the failed revolutionary war of AD 66-70. It is thought he moved to Ephesus and that he took Jesus' mother Mary with him, thus fulfilling Jesus' request from the cross.

The importance of this move from Palestine to Asia Minor is that he is moving from an area dominated by Jewish folk to an area in which Jewish people were in the minority, perhaps a small minority at that. John would have to adapt himself to a Greek world in which people as a whole had no notion of Jewish history or thinking or customs. When such persons became Christians they had no appreciation for the rich Jewish tradition of covenant; they would have to learn it all from scratch, all the while doing it from their former pagan outlook. John would be doing his pastoral teaching and writing in that setting.

It is probable that as time went on in that area John became an Elder in the church, and in all likelihood was regarded as a kind of bishop or area Elder for all the Christian churches in the province, that is, the churches he mentions in the opening chapters of the book of Revelation.

By this time, the latter decades of the first century, it was well possible that a significant number of church members in any given congregation here were of Gentile origin rather than Jewish. This would require the leaders of the churches to do a great deal of educating in the past history of the Jews and of Jesus.

Further, John would be writing now in the Greek language rather than Hebrew or Aramaic even though it was not the natural language of John and Jesus.

So now, if we ask why John needed to write another Gospel, a fourth one, we may speculate that John had been one of the original disciples of Jesus and that he remembered many things about Jesus that were not in the previous Gospels. Further, judging from the contents of his Gospel, it seems that John was somewhat more analytical than the other writers. He not only describes the incidents of Jesus' life but also often elaborates on their meaning in a way different from the other Gospels. We might say he was more theological in his writing than the others, more reflective.

There is a sentence toward the end of the Gospel in which John becomes specific about his reason for writing this Gospel. "Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name." (John 20:30-31)

We may note that John intends his Gospel to be a missionary document. He wants his readers to come to believe. He wants them to know who Jesus is in the plan of God. And he wants them to find a new life pattern because of their faith in Jesus.

Accordingly, when we study this Gospel we should remember that the incidents that John includes, as well as the explanations of what they mean, are designed to show that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that people should respond by believing in him, and then showing this faith in a transformed way of living. We will note this connection often as John describes what effect Jesus' actions and words have on the people who are listening to him. Some people believe in Jesus, some don't.

With that introduction we can proceed to examine how John begins his Gospel, what is usually described as the Prologue to the Gospel of John.

Chapter One

PROLOGUE

John 1:1-18

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

6There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him. 8He himself was not the light, but he came to testify to the light. 9The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.

10He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. 11He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. 12But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

14And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father's only son, full of grace and truth. 15(John testified to him and cried out, 'This was he of whom I said, "He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me."') 16From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. 17The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.

1. The first thing to notice about this Prologue is that it begins the same way the book of Genesis begins, with the account of creation. John writes in verse 3, "All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being." The Gentile readers would have no knowledge of Genesis unless they had read the Greek translation of it, the Septuagint. They would, on the contrary, be aware of lots of fables about the Greek gods but have no notion that there is only one God and that this God is the Creator of the entire world and of all peoples in it.

What John is doing here is to establish common ground, a point of contact between his Gentile readers and the entire Jewish tradition. He is affirming that all people are involved, no matter of what nationality or race. John is thus affirming also the universality of the gospel of Jesus Christ. In this sense he is a universalist. There is only one God, the Creator of all things, and John will go on to describe how God will use Jesus to accomplish his purpose for all people.

John wishes us all to know that God's purpose in sending Jesus is connected directly to the creation of the world. What was God's purpose in creation? What was his purpose in bringing the human race into existence within that creation? Even though we are now divided into numerous nations and races, what purpose does God have in mind for us all, and how does Jesus fit into all that? That's the way John wants our thinking to go, and that's why he begins his Gospel with this connection to the Genesis account of creation.

2. Also involved in this beginning of his gospel we may note that John's own thinking is vitally determined by the Hebrew scriptures. His whole world-and-life view is that of his Jewish ancestry, all the way back to their understanding of the beginning of the world. This is important to understand because he will be writing in Greek but thinking in Hebrew (or at least in Hebrew categories). He will be searching for Greek terminology to explain Hebrew insights.

As we all recognize, it is very difficult to find exact words in one language to translate into another language. There are always nuances and connotations that are difficult to catch in the process of translation. From our perspective, it is even a bit more compounded. We are reading an English translation of the Greek of John, and John is translating ideas from Hebrew into Greek. To get at his meaning accurately we will need to remember this difficulty in translation and do our best to adjust our understanding of what John is getting at. John has been searching for Greek words to express Hebrew ideas, and we in turn are trying to get at John's meaning using English terminology. It's easy to go wrong or to miss some of the nuances when moving from one language to another, so, recognizing that most of us are not linguists, our insights will need to be channeled through this linguistic process as best we can.

3. We will need to keep this linguistic factor in mind particularly in John's usage of the term _Word_. This is an English term translating the Greek term _logos_ , which in turn is John's choice to express the Hebrew of Genesis, _dabhar_ , translated, "And God _said_." Ten times in Genesis One that Hebrew phrase is used, "And God said," and that is the Hebrew context of John's thinking when he writes about the Logos.

So when John writes, "In the beginning was the Logos," he has Genesis One in mind, that God brought the world into existence in the beginning by speaking. In the beginning God spoke, and the various parts of the universe came into existence. That's what John means by calling attention to the Word by which God created the world.

This insight, that God created the world by speaking his word, became part and parcel of the basic Hebrew understanding of reality. For example, in Psalm 33:6, we read, "By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all their host by the breath of his mouth." And again, Psalm 29 rhapsodizes over the voice of the Lord, as in verses 4-5, "The voice of the Lord is powerful, the voice of the Lord is full of majesty. The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars, the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon." "He utters his voice, the earth melts." (Psalm 46:6) Numerous other instances could be cited.

The point is that Hebrew thinking involved not only that God created the universe by speaking, but that his word is constantly to be seen and heard in the structures of nature, such matters as the change of seasons, the growth of vegetation, the direction of human life and history, as well as such events as hurricanes, volcanoes, and all the other vicissitudes of nature. All of that is involved in John's selection of the Greek term, _logos_ , to convey to the Greek-speaking world that God controls everything by speaking, the world of nature especially.

"In the beginning was the Word." God controls everything by speaking, always has, from the very beginning of the world. That's what John is saying here in verse one of his Gospel. That is what John wants his Greek readers to understand already here at the very beginning of his explanation of Christianity, the same thing all good Jews already know. This is what all of us as human beings must do: listen constantly to what the Creator is saying.

4. The next thing we should recognize about this Prologue to the Gospel of John is that John is doing his best in the first few sentences to explain just how he is using the term _logos_. He knows full well how the term is used in ordinary Greek conversation and literature, and he knows those connotations are somewhat different from the connotations of the Hebrew _dabhar_. John does not want the Greek connotations to color what he says, so he goes out of his way to explain the Hebrew connotations that he has in mind.

He says, "The Word was with God, and the Word was God." What would John be wanting his Greek readers to understand by these comments? He would be distinguishing what he means from what ordinary Greek usage means. Ordinary usage in the Greek world would derive from its meaning in their literature, a meaning that recognizes that there is order and system in the world of nature. Originally the term _logos_ meant that order and system that everybody recognizes exists in nature. The sun comes up regularly. The seasons pass regularly. The leaves on the trees grow in the spring of the year and die in the fall of the year. The tides of the sea come and go regularly. All of this orderliness and regularity of nature is what the term _logos_ meant in its original usage. Many of our English scientific terms include this word, indicating a study of some aspect of nature: biology, zoology, anthropology, cosmology, etc.

John understands this original Greek meaning, and that is why he chose the word to describe the result of what God created. The world of nature is indeed characterized by system and order and regularity, including the storms that occur from time to time.

But John has more in mind for this word _logos_ than the usual Greek connotation. He wants his readers to think about God, not merely about nature itself. The Logos, he writes, is not merely to be associated with nature, but is to be thought of in connection "with God." The logos is not nature, it is God, God in the act of speaking. "God is the logos." John wants his readers to think of nature not merely as a self-existent entity, but as the product of the speech of God. Connect everything to God, not merely to nature or people.

John is a thoroughgoing Theist, and he wants his readers, now as well as then, to be theistic in their understanding of the world and humanity and Christianity and history. God not only creates all things by speaking, he also governs and directs the world by speaking.

5. With that in mind we can now recognize that John is not yet talking about Jesus. This is a common mistake that well-intentioned Bible students make. The idea is that in a few verses John will be saying, "The Word became flesh." So that clearly identifies the Word with Jesus; so, reading this insight back into the earlier uses of the term Logos it is easy to think John is saying God created the world by Jesus. But this is not John's intent. John is simply explaining to his non-Jewish readers the same thing that Moses wrote in Genesis One, namely that God created the world by speaking, by his Word. We will look at this insight again in verse 14.

6. Another item to notice in this Prologue to the Gospel of John is his usage of the terms _life_ , _light_ , and _darkness_. What has come into being in the Logos, that is the creation, nature, is life. Where does the life we see in the world of nature come from, the various forms of life, vegetation, giant sequoias, flowers, tiny ants, gigantic dinosaurs, human beings? Where has it all come from?

From the God who speaks. From the Logos of God. From the Word of God. God created it all by the inherent power of his speech. That's another thing John wants his Greek readers to understand. Not merely inanimate nature but all the wonderful forms of life.

John goes on to say that this life that God created is "the light of all people." Jewish Christians might pay close attention to this, because they had for many centuries considered themselves the chosen nation of God. They have been brought up since the time of Moses to think they were special, that they only were the recipients of God's blessing. But John is saying that God's care extends to all people because this life that God created is what guides everyone, Gentiles as well as Jews – the inherent light of nature that God created by his Word. That's the standard, the original standard, by which to evaluate what is happening in human life and history. How faithful are we, all of us, to that light of nature that comes from God?

But John knows, as do we all, that the light of nature has not produced the kind of world that is ideal. Everyone can see the faults and evils and sins that constantly characterize our lives and our countries. We just do not live up to the requirements that God has built into the world of nature and into our lives. We do not live in such a way as to be true images of God, reflecting God's intent for us. That failure is what we call sin.

7. Then, however, John affirms that "the darkness did not overcome it." Did not overcome the light. We may understand John to mean that our sin, that kind of darkness, did not extinguish the light that nature itself shines into the world. Sin did not blow out the candle. The light is still there even when we decide to live in darkness rather than in the light, when we decide to live by our own insights rather than God's truth, when we listen to the voice of the tempter rather than the voice of the Creator.

That is exactly what Theism requires us to understand. If God is indeed the Creator and the providential Lord of all, then nothing that he creates is capable of uncreating it, of deleting it, of cancelling it, of extinguishing it. We cannot uncreate the life that God created, destroy its light, or effectively block God's purpose and Word.

John's readers, if they get the point, will find great assurance in that message from John. We see all kinds of sin and evil in the world and we think sometimes the world is going to the devil. It isn't. God is in control. He knows what he is doing by creating us with a will, with the ability to choose, even if this choice is wrong. God's purpose is still there, still in effect. His Word is still operative, still in control even of our sin and evil. We cannot overcome or destroy God's built-in truth or light or life.

What we can do, as John will be explaining in great detail throughout his Gospel, is to listen to God, to his Word, to his speech, and do our best to believe and bring our lives into his order and requirements. But we begin with recognizing and affirming the natural basis upon which God is building his kingdom. Life comes into the world of nature from God; that life is the light that is sufficient to guide all people everywhere, but even when we violate that light and choose the darkness of sin we do not cancel out God's purpose and Word.

8. Now John introduces one human person, whom we know as John the Baptist. Why would the Apostle John introduce John the Baptist? Is he that important to the Christian readers of his Gospel? Would the Jewish believers need that testimony? Would the Gentile believers even care? What's the point of bringing John the Baptist into this very preliminary introduction to his treatise about Jesus?

Well, since he was "sent from God," as John explains, we need to ask the further question, Why did God send him? Could not Jesus have come and done his ministry without the Baptist?

John continues the theme of "light" to explain the significance of John the Baptist. John has just explained that the darkness has not extinguished the light, and now he wants to move beyond that observation to state that God was now about to send the light into the world in the form of one person. This person is not the Baptist, "He himself was not the light, but he came to bear witness to the light."

John the Baptist began his own ministry while his younger cousin Jesus was growing, and he had acquired a rather strong following by the time Jesus reached the age of maturity. So what happened was that the Baptist recognized that Jesus had been sent by God to be the Jewish Messiah, and he took it upon himself to transfer the allegiance of many of his disciples to Jesus, thus giving Jesus the beginning of a following that would grow to enormous proportions in just three years. That was the function of John the Baptist, giving Jesus what we might describe as a jump start.

9. We will want to consider now how John describes Jesus at this point, "The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world." The Baptist is not that light, but the person whom he will be introducing to the Jewish public is the true light.

John had written that the light of nature which God created in the beginning was sufficient to define how all human beings should live. He continued by saying that human sin (darkness) was not able to extinguish this natural light of creation. Now he is saying that that natural light, the true light which God created and which has not been annihilated, is now coming into the world. He means it is coming in the form of a human being who actually does live according to that original true light of the world. John the Baptist is not that person, but the person to whom he bears witness is, his younger cousin Jesus.

Later, in the body of his manuscript, John will quote Jesus as saying, "I am the light of the world." (8:12) What he says here in the Prologue is in preparation for that identification. God, having created the light by which humans should live, now arranges that that very light which has been darkened but not extinguished by human sin comes into the world as a human being.

We may extrapolate that this means that Jesus, incarnating that light of nature, becomes the beacon by which God intends to attract all nations. To follow Jesus means to follow the light of nature which God created in the beginning. The life that Jesus lived is the pattern by which all humans should live. Jesus incarnates the light of the world of nature, the light that beckons all of us to live as God created us to live.

10. We turn next to this sentence, "And the Word became flesh." (verse 14) What is John's train of thought?

He has said that God created the universe by his word, that is, by speaking. That includes everything, the human race as well (adam). Nature itself contains the light by which that human race should be living, but humans have not lived that way. Still, human sin does not eradicate the truth and light of nature. Now God is sending another human being into the world to demonstrate how that natural light of nature ought to be followed. That same word that God uttered in the beginning, the word of creation, the word that became the light of nature and of humans, he is now uttering again with the result that it produces flesh in the person of Jesus Christ.

We must see the parallel between the creation of the human race in the beginning and the "becoming flesh" of Jesus. Just as God created adam in the beginning by speaking, so now he is creating Jesus in the fullness of time, also by speaking.

The Greek word for _became_ is ἐγένετο (egeneto). It is of major exegetical significance that John employs this term several times in this prologue. This usage gives us important insight into John's meaning.

Vs 3: In verse 3 all things came into being, and nothing came into being without it.

Vs 6: In verse 6 John the Baptist came on the scene, sent by God.

Vs 10: In verse 10 the cosmos came into being.

Vs 12: In verse 12 people can become children of God.

Vs 13: In verse 13 people are born of God.

In each of these clauses John employs the term ἐγένετο or a cognate form of the verb. John's insistence throughout is that God is speaking and that this speaking produces results, whether the cosmos or John the Baptist or believers, or now in this verse 14, Jesus. The root of this Greek word means to be, and its cognates in English are such terms as gene, genetics, genealogy, gender, Genesis. Perhaps engender would be a more accurate translation than became, "the Word engendered flesh."

God spoke to the womb of Mary so that she became pregnant and eventually delivered a baby. That is how the Word became flesh. John's usage suggests that ἐγένετο means to come into existence, to be created, to exist by divine speech. It thus implies not only bare existence as such, but the process also of bringing such things into existence. The intent is to give birth to, or to give existence to, or to bring into being. John is saying the word of God has given birth to flesh, to Jesus, and we know how this was done from the accounts of Jesus' birth in Matthew and Luke.

11. In 1:17 John mentions Moses, "The law was given through Moses." Here we should recognize that John is bringing up the history of Israel. The Jewish Christians would, of course, know all about this, but the Gentile Christians would have to learn it. Perhaps non-Jewish believers would become knowledgeable about the rudiments of Jewish history at the time of their baptism, and if so would make this connection immediately. They would certainly know about Moses and the Law, the Torah.

John himself understands, as do all well-educated Christians, that although the old covenant based on the Law was good and necessary for the times, Jesus was bringing something much better. "Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." Under the tutelage of the Law the leaders of the Jewish people, as well as the majority of the people, turned against Jesus and clamored to have him crucified. The people must pass out from under the Law into the grace and truth of the gospel of the Lord Jesus.

So what was happening at the time John wrote these words was that more non-Jewish people were responding in faith than Jewish people. Gentile believers were finding that the way of Christ, even though it originated in the Jewish nation, was a much better way of living than they had known previously. Gentiles were gradually moving into the majority in the burgeoning Christian churches of the Roman empire, and by the year AD 390 the Christian religion became the only legal religion of the empire, so designated by Emperor Theodosius.

But by mentioning Moses John was reminding his readers that Christianity has a history. It originated in the purpose of God, its standard was the Word of God embedded in nature, its human beginning goes back to Abraham and Moses, it reaches its true effectiveness in the Lord Jesus, and its goal is to include the entire human race in the kingdom of God, just as God intended in creation.

12. One more interesting insight from the pen of the Apostle John in this Prologue. In 1:18 he writes, "No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known." We may understand that Jesus is the "only-begotten son" of God. This would be another way of saying what he had said earlier that the Word of God became flesh. Jesus is the only person who ever lived whose life was a perfect image of God. In that sense, and only in that sense, should we understand the term.

As such, as God's only-begotten, Jesus has made the invisible God known. How does Jesus make God known? What exactly does it mean to know God? If we cannot see him, or for that matter have any sensory contact with God, what could it possibly mean to know him?

The Greek word for "made known" is ἐξηγήσατο (exegesato). This is an interesting term. Our word _exegesis_ is a transliteration of its root. John is thus saying that Jesus _exegetes_ God his Father. What does he mean?

The root meaning of the word is to be a leader. It is used also to suggest what the leader says to his followers, setting forth in language what is desired. From this it is applied to a broader spectrum so as to mean a narration or telling of any kind. With this background John is saying that Jesus is the one who conveys to us the intentions of God. Jesus demonstrates in his own life and teaching what God wants, what God desires of us humans.

Connect this meaning closely with the term logos. God has spoken all things into existence. There is a reason, a logic, a meaning, a purpose in all of this. God does not do things at random without any purpose or meaning. But we humans, in our sinful rebellion epitomized in the Adam and Eve stories of Genesis, no longer listen to that divine purpose that is imbedded in the cosmos. We go our own way defining for ourselves what we think we want and what we think will bring us a good life. The result of our vaunted autonomy is the opposite of what we hoped for, disaster instead of success, hell instead of heaven.

God now sends Jesus to exegete his divine plan and purpose. Jesus is the messenger sent by the same logos by which God created the world and the human race. We need therefore to listen to Jesus, who is in the heart of God, and who authoritatively incarnates and explains what we need to do to achieve the purpose for which God created us. We need to receive him, believe in his name, and receive from him the power to become children of God. This is the way John begins his Gospel, applicable both to Jews and to Gentiles.

13. To sum up this Prologue to the Gospel of John. John has in mind both Jewish people who know the ancient Jewish scriptures and who have been shaped for centuries by the Torah of Moses as well as the multitude of others who know nothing of that. He wants to establish a connection between both of those groups, and he does this by going all the way back to the beginning of time, the creation of the world by the Word of God, the eternal Logos. God spoke all things into existence, John writes, including all human beings, and he provided sufficient guidance by this original word of creation for all human beings. All of us, Gentiles as well as Jews, should be guided by the inherent natural laws that God has spoken into existence.

We, however, all of us human beings, do not listen carefully to what the Creator God has determined to be the way for us to live so as to achieve the purpose for which we are created; that is, in such a way that we image our Creator. John expresses this failure in terms of the darkness of sin, and he explains further that our sinful darkness has not overcome, annihilated, extinguished, the natural light of nature that God intends to be our guide into a good life.

So now, in our time, John continues, God speaks again just as he spoke in the beginning, and sends one individual person into the world to incarnate that light which we sinful humans have so neglected. We must now come to him as the Light of the world, believe in him, listen to him, follow him, obey him, and in this way be restored to the light of nature for which we are all created.

That is the line of thought that John takes in preparing people to read what he will be saying in the various stories to come in his Gospel. Read, believe, understand, and find life from the Lord Jesus.

Chapter Two

JOHN THE BAPTIST

John 1:19-42

19This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, 'Who are you?' 20He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, 'I am not the Messiah.' 21And they asked him, 'What then? Are you Elijah?' He said, 'I am not.' 'Are you the prophet?' He answered, 'No.'22Then they said to him, 'Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?' 23He said,'I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, "Make straight the way of the Lord" ',as the prophet Isaiah said.

24Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. 25They asked him, 'Why then are you baptizing if you are neither the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the prophet?' 26John answered them, 'I baptize with water. Among you stands one whom you do not know, 27the one who is coming after me; I am not worthy to untie the thong of his sandal.' 28This took place in Bethany across the Jordan where John was baptizing.

29The next day he saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, 'Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 30This is he of whom I said, "After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me." 31I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.' 32And John testified, 'I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. 33I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, "He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit." 34And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.'

35The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, 36and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, 'Look, here is the Lamb of God!' 37The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. 38When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, 'What are you looking for?' They said to him, 'Rabbi' (which translated means Teacher), 'where are you staying?' 39He said to them, 'Come and see.' They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. 40One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. 41He first found his brother Simon and said to him, 'We have found the Messiah' (which is translated Anointed). 42He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, 'You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas' (which is translated Peter).

1. Author John has already introduced John the Baptist in his Prologue as the man who came "to testify to the light," meaning that God sends the Baptist to introduce Jesus to the people at the time when Jesus had grown up enough to begin his public ministry among the Jews. Now, as he goes into the larger substance of his Gospel, he spends considerable time in providing detail about just how the Baptist does this.

John the Baptist has already, in John's story, achieved a strong reputation as an itinerant preacher among the people. People were coming to listen as he excoriated them for their sin and shortcoming, and as he called them to repentance. We might think of him in similar categories that people of the past generation have thought about Billy Graham, a powerful evangelist calling people to repentance. John the Baptist, of course, did not have the full gospel to proclaim, but in other respects he had achieved a strong appeal so that people were coming to hear him wherever he went.

The point that John is making in this account is that the Baptist's popularity enabled him to recommend Jesus as a messenger from God who is more important than himself, and in this way to get Jesus started in his public ministry.

2. The specific event that John selects to describe this transition from the Baptist to Jesus is a query that the religious authorities in Jerusalem made. John the Baptist was preaching at the Jordan River and was baptizing anyone who came to him in repentance. The religious leaders in Jerusalem sent a delegation to him to find out what he was doing and why. "Who are you and why are you doing what you are doing, baptizing people?"

The delegation asked specifically, "Are you the Messiah?" What they meant by this question is, Are you planning to stir up the people to start a revolution against the Romans who are occupying our country? It is not clear whether they wanted this to happen or not, but since the Baptist was stirring up the people they at least wanted to know his intentions.

John the Baptist quoted the prophet Isaiah as his answer. Why am I getting people all upset by my preaching? I am calling them all to repentance, to return to faithful obedience to God. I am a voice crying in the wilderness of sin; make straight your crooked ways; get back into the path of God.

That did not satisfy the questioners. How come you are baptizing people? What's the point? You're gathering a following, but for what purpose?

I'm not the important one, the Baptist explained, because out there in the crowd is someone who is "coming after me." What I am doing is to rouse the people to look to him, not to me. I'm not worth anything compared to him. I can't even untie his shoes.

And that ended the conversation. We don't know what the questioners thought about it.

3. The second day. Jesus appears in the crowd listening to the Baptist preach. Jesus is the Baptist's cousin, but John the Baptist does not yet realize that Jesus is the person God is sending to be the Messiah.

But he hears God whisper, so to speak, in his ear, When you see the Spirit descend in the form of a dove upon a certain person, then you will know who the Messiah is. You will know who is the person to whom you must transfer your loyalty.

He sees this happen, and the person designated by the dove is Jesus his cousin. John the Baptist recognizes that Jesus has been baptized, not so much by the water of the Jordan River, but by the Holy Spirit of God. The Baptist confesses, "This is the Son of God." He means this is the person whom God is sending, the Messiah, to do the work that God wants done here and now. Nobody yet knew just how Jesus would do the work of a Messiah, but that is how Jesus was introduced to the people.

The term "Son of God" might occasion some concern for non-Jewish Christians. In Greek and Roman religions the term would mean a divine being such as Apollo or Mars or Pluto or any such divine being alongside the Father God Zeus or Jupiter. In pagan religion the term would connote polytheism, whereas in Jewish religion it always meant a special human being. In the Bible the term "Son of God" is used for Adam, for Solomon, for an unnamed king of Israel, for the entire nation of Israel, for Jesus, and for all believers, never for a second divine being. This difference in meaning caused great confusion in the theology of the early church.

4. The third day. John the Baptist is still conducting his preaching and baptizing mission at the Jordan River. Two of his followers (at least) were with him. The Baptist sees Jesus again in the crowd and comments to these two disciples, "There he is, the Lamb of God." The two young men are Andrew and the John who is writing these memoirs. They see Jesus, and on the Baptist's urging, follow him and want to talk to him.

Andrew and John spend the afternoon with Jesus and are convinced that Jesus has the potential to become the Messiah that everyone was looking for. Andrew then went to look for his brother Simon and said, "We have found the Messiah." Simon came to meet Jesus and Jesus renamed him Cephas (Aramaic for Peter).

They had been following John the Baptist in the hope that he would turn out to be the man who would lead them in revolt against Rome, that is, that he would be the Messiah. But when the Baptist pointed out someone else they turned to Jesus and were convinced that Jesus could do the job.

It might be worth noting that the term which the Baptist used for Jesus this time was not "Son of God" but "Lamb of God." That term would have definite Jewish connotations, bringing to mind the regular sacrifices that were made on the day of Passover each year. Whether this had any significance for Andrew and John at the time we cannot know, but for us it does suggest the crucifixion to come a few years later. Jesus was sacrificed on the cross and this signified the end of the old covenant and the introduction of the new covenant.

Chapter Three

THE FIRST DISCIPLES

John 1:43-51

43The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, 'Follow me.' 44Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. 45Philip found Nathanael and said to him, 'We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.' 46Nathanael said to him, 'Can anything good come out of Nazareth?' Philip said to him, 'Come and see.' 47When Jesus saw Nathanael coming towards him, he said of him, 'Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!' 48Nathanael asked him, 'Where did you come to know me?' Jesus answered, 'I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.' 49Nathanael replied, 'Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!' 50Jesus answered, 'Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these.' 51And he said to him, 'Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.'

1. The Fourth Day. The next day after Simon was brought to Jesus the story shifts away from John the Baptist to Jesus. Jesus decides to go back to Galilee, some distance north from where the Baptist was doing his preaching and baptizing. The Baptist has done his job of introducing Jesus to the people, and a few young men had decided to follow him. Author John now wants to begin the story of Jesus' ministry.

Back now in Galilee, Jesus has taken a certain amount of responsibility already for his God-given mission, accepting the followers that had come, and seeking even more. Just what Jesus had been thinking or feeling or debating with himself we do not know, but John is telling us that he had responded to his baptism by water and also by the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove. Jesus was ready to begin his public ministry. Just how he would do that he does not yet know, but he does accept the service of others.

2. They were in a town called Bethsaida where the brothers Andrew and Simon lived, and there Jesus was introduced to a man named Philip. John does not describe their meeting or their conversation, but Jesus invites Philip to join the small group of his followers.

Philip has a friend named Nathanael who appears to be somewhat of a cynic, for when he hears that someone from Nazareth was going to be the Messiah of Israel, he scoffed, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" Apparently Nazareth had a reputation of being backward, out of touch with life in the broader world. How can anything worthwhile come out of such a backwoods village?

Jesus could read Nathanael's demeanor because he had earlier heard about him and could see what kind of person he was. He would say what he thinks without beating about the bush. Anyway, after some conversation Nathanael was convinced and acknowledged that Jesus was the Son of God, the man God was sending to become the king of Israel after the Romans were expelled. So Jesus had two more followers, now five that John identifies.

3. John quotes an enigmatic saying of Jesus in his conversation with Nathanael, "You will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man." What was Jesus talking about?

We might invent some esoteric mystical explanation but more likely Jesus means simply that in the course of their contacts in the coming years Nathanael would see evidences that God was doing things in this world by means of Jesus. Angels are messengers of God, and Jesus would be saying to his followers that God would be sending his messengers to Jesus, not only telling him what to do but also to provide the divine power and authority to accomplish it. In the next chapter John will provide an example of just that when God enables him to change water to wine at a wedding reception.

4. Note particularly that Jesus identifies himself with another term, not yet mentioned by John, "the Son of Man." Jesus knows himself to be a special person in the plan of God, and this term suggests that he knows himself to be the person who incarnates the intent of God for all humans. In Hebrew the term adam means human. Jesus is the "Son of Adam" in the sense that he is the person that Adam and all humans were intended to be.

Chapter Four

THE WEDDING AT CANA

John 2:1-12

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. 2Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. 3When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, 'They have no wine.' 4And Jesus said to her, 'Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.' 5His mother said to the servants, 'Do whatever he tells you.' 6Now standing there were six stone water-jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. 7Jesus said to them, 'Fill the jars with water.' And they filled them up to the brim. 8He said to them, 'Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.' So they took it. 9When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom 10and said to him, 'Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.' 11Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

12After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother, his brothers, and his disciples; and they remained there for a few days.

1. This "third day" would be the third day after the conversation with Nathanael, or just possibly the third day of the week. The timing is not important here. What is important is the wedding to which mother Mary and Jesus were invited. Jesus took his new followers along. Why, John does not explain. They were all invited, and John employs the term "disciples" to identify these followers. So far as we know at this point there were only five disciples.

2. John reports a curious conversation between Jesus and his mother. Mary calls Jesus' attention to the fact that the wine has run out at the wedding reception. Jesus replies that it is none of their business, and then adds, "My hour has not yet come." What does he mean?

He means that he has not yet begun his public ministry. That hour had not yet come. Perhaps mother Mary knows better. Perhaps there was additional conversation that they had, but then Mary turns to the servants who are catering the reception and tells them to do whatever Jesus says. Mary seems to know that his hour is about to come here at the wedding.

3. Jesus notices there are several stone jars standing empty, and he then tells the caterers to fill up the large stone jars with water. They do this. Jesus then tells them to take a cup of that liquid and bring it to the master of ceremonies. They do this also. The MC tastes it, discovers it to be excellent wine, and rebukes the bridegroom for keeping the best wine for last.

Author John comments about this event saying, "Jesus did this, the first of his signs," and explains the effect, "his disciples believed in him."

4. So what we see here about the Gospel of John is a) that Jesus is beginning his public ministry, and b) that he did something that confirmed his first disciples decision to follow him in the path leading to a possible revolt against Rome. Anyone who can turn water into wine must have the extraordinary abilities to expel the Romans from our country.

Actually those few early disciples did not have much evidence to go on to convince them that Jesus could be the Messiah. Only some brief conversations. Now they had something definite and concrete to keep them loyal. This evidence of miracles, we might observe, is what kept them faithful to the end. Jesus would be doing all sorts of miraculous things, every one of which heightened the disciples' expectation that the revolt would come soon.

We may note also that this incident, the very first of Jesus' public actions, illustrates the purpose of John's Gospel as defined in chapter 20, that he writes these stories in order that people may come to believe and then to receive a new kind of life from Jesus. John says pointedly, "his disciples believed in him." That's the result of his first miracle. The "life" part of it will not come for the disciples for several years, not until that wonderful Pentecost experience that Luke describes in Acts. That's when their lives took on the spiritual change that transformed them from disciples (learners) to apostles (sent ones).

Chapter Five

JESUS IN THE JERUSALEM TEMPLE

John 2:12-25

12After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother, his brothers, and his disciples; and they remained there for a few days.

13The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money-changers seated at their tables. 15Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16He told those who were selling the doves, 'Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father's house a market-place!' 17His disciples remembered that it was written, 'Zeal for your house will consume me.' 18The Jews then said to him, 'What sign can you show us for doing this?' 19Jesus answered them, 'Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.' 20The Jews then said, 'This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?' 21But he was speaking of the temple of his body. 22After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

23When he was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in his name because they saw the signs that he was doing. 24But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people 25and needed no one to testify about anyone; for he himself knew what was in everyone.

1. It isn't clear why Jesus went to Capernaum "with his mother, his brothers, and his disciples." Had the family moved out of Nazareth to nearby Capernaum? We do not know, and John gives no indication of what they did there. Perhaps it was where Jesus and his brothers were employed in the building trades.

It's worth noting here that John mentions Jesus' brothers. John himself was one of the first two disciples, along with Andrew, so he would know first hand all about these events in Jesus' life. John writes from his memory of being there. So John would certainly know that Jesus had brothers. We would understand they were really younger half-brothers, since their father Joseph is depicted in Matthew and Luke as not being the natural father of Jesus, Mary being a virgin when Jesus was born.

2. Passover was an annual holy day for Jews then, and many Jews in the vicinity made it their practice every year to go to Jerusalem to celebrate the day that commemorated their exodus from Egypt more than two thousand years earlier. John went with Jesus to this celebration.

3. The Gospel of Matthew puts this incident of the cleansing of the temple at the end of Jesus' ministry, at the time of his so-called triumphal entry. John puts it at the beginning, the second story he tells about Jesus' ministry.

4. Jesus may not have traveled to Jerusalem for several years. There is an incident there when he was twelve years old; he is thirty years old now. Regardless, Jesus has now accepted mentally that he is and must remain a public figure, so he dares to do what John describes here. He drove out all the animals that were for sale and overturned the money tables of the merchants, scattering the coins all over the floor. He was obviously angry, "Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father's house a marketplace."

5. The temple authorities, as we might well expect, challenged Jesus. What are you doing? Who gives you authority to do this? They were angry as well, to see the mess that Jesus created in their temple.

We can well imagine that there was more conversation, perhaps shouting back and forth, until finally the authorities asked, What sign of authority can you give for what you are saying and doing?

Jesus' answer is surprising, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." John explains that Jesus meant his body, and was speaking of his future death and resurrection.

6. As we reflect on this confrontation we might ask who is right about the timing of the incident, Matthew or John. Both are members of the twelve disciples of Jesus. Matthew remembers it at the end of Jesus' ministry, John remembers it at the the beginning. In John's Gospel Matthew has not yet become a disciple, so Matthew could not have remembered it at that point.

John was writing about fifty or more years after the event and may simply have forgotten the timing, or perhaps he did not think the timing to be important. Perhaps he wanted to include the incident early, not for the sake of chronological accuracy, but to convey to his readers a broader perspective on Jesus' ministry.

Would Jesus himself have known this early in his public ministry how his life would end and how he would be raised from the dead? We can ask such questions but there is little likelihood of our ever finding answers. Only guesswork, speculation. It would seem, however, that both the cleansing of the temple and the conversation that occurred at the time fits better in the scheme of Jesus' ministry at the end rather than at the beginning.

7. It may be useful for us to reflect a bit more on Jesus' explanation about destroying the temple and raising it up after three days. There seems to be a parallel to the process described in the Prologue.

In the Prologue we are taught that God created the entire world by speaking, by his Word. This would, of course, include the human race, adam. John continues by affirming that the darkness has not overcome the light, meaning that human sin has not extinguished God's plan for his world, but that the light prevails over the darkness.

Now what Jesus is saying here is a direct parallel of that process. Jesus has come into the world as the incarnation of that light, but people would attempt to extinguish that light by putting Jesus to death. However, in three days Jesus would resurrect back to life, thus demonstrating that darkness cannot destroy light.

The further implication would be, as John will be explaining later, that all the followers of Jesus would themselves be the continuation of that light which God created in nature to begin with, and which Jesus himself incarnated and exemplified. Christians are the continuation of the work of God in creation and of Jesus in redemption.

That defines what we are, and what should control our lives. And that, now that we think of it again, may well be why John puts this incident so near to the beginning of Jesus' ministry. He wants his readers to understand how the process works: from God the creator, to Jesus the savior, to us as the agents of God (we might better say, to the Holy Spirit as he works in us, thus defining the work of the trinity).

8. As an aside observation: the Apostle John is a very philosophic theologian, as demonstrated here already in the opening chapters of his Gospel, certainly the equal of the Apostle Paul. John has very penetrating insights into the pattern by which God is working. He is a thoroughgoing and dedicated Theist.

9. Note again that John spells out the effect of this incident in the Jerusalem temple, "They believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken." This is another example of what John says toward the end of his Gospel, that he writes in order that people may believe in Jesus and find life in his name.

10. Now we will look briefly at that rather strange paragraph at the end of chapter 2, "When he was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in his name because they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to testify about anyone; for he himself knew what was in everyone."

It would seem again that the timing is wrong. When John remembers that Jesus would not entrust himself to the people, he seems to imply that there are enemies out there looking to do him harm. But would this situation occur already this early in his ministry? Jesus has just begun his ministry by changing water to wine. He would not have become so well known yet in Jerusalem to have made such powerful enemies.

He would have had such opposition if the cleansing of the temple occurred years later as Matthew writes, but hardly yet here at the very beginning of Jesus' public life.

11. There is also that interesting comment, "He himself knew what was in everyone." How so?

John is saying simply that Jesus knew very well what people thought about him. He knew that some people believed but most did not. He knew certainly that the religious authorities, for the most part, did not believe he was their Messiah. So John is saying that Jesus could tell by looking at individual persons, or by what they were saying, what they thought about him. He did not need anyone to say outright precisely what they thought. He could read their minds by how they looked at him and by the kind of words they used in their conversation with him.

When you're a public figure you know some people affirm you and others reject you, and you soon learn to tell the difference. That's all John means to say about Jesus.

Chapter Six

NICODEMUS

John 3:1-21

Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. 2He came to Jesus*;) by night and said to him, 'Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.' 3Jesus answered him, 'Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.' 4Nicodemus said to him, 'How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born?' 5Jesus answered, 'Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. 6What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7Do not be astonished that I said to you, "You must be born from above." 8The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.' 9Nicodemus said to him, 'How can these things be?' 10Jesus answered him, 'Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

11'Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. 12If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? 13No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. 14And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

16'For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

17'Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.'

1. Here is a story that does not result in people believing in Jesus and coming to life because of it. Very likely John introduces it here precisely for that purpose, to illustrate why the Jewish leaders did not accept Jesus as their Messiah. John does not want to tell only success stories, but also the negative stories that present a realistic picture of the gospel. So the account of Nicodemus is an example of what John has described as darkness in his Prologue. Many of the other stories, the success stories, illustrate the opposite, that in spite of the prevailing darkness the light has not been extinguished.

2. So, who is Nicodemus? John describes him as a Pharisee and a leader of the Jews. Pharisees in Jesus' day were a type of Jew who took the laws of the Torah very seriously. That is, they were extra punctilious about making sure that they did not violate the rules in the least. Jesus, however, once complained about them that they were more concerned about outward behavior than they were about the inward condition of the heart.

Some of those Pharisees were prominent men who held positions of authority, and in the case of Nicodemus it is thought he was a member of the Sanhedrin, the body of Jewish men who had control of Jewish life under the Roman government.

3. The question Nicodemus asked shows that he was taking Jesus seriously as far as he could without really understanding Jesus' purpose. He acknowledges that Jesus has come from God because the miracles (signs) that Jesus has been doing provide proof of the power of God working in him. As John puts it, this is not a question, but Jesus understands what Nicodemus is getting at, and answers him from that perspective.

What Nicodemus wants to know is what all the Jewish people want to know. Granted that you are able to do all these miracles, what do you want to accomplish? Are you the person God is sending to drive out the Romans and restore the throne of David? Is that your intention? Are you planning to set up God's kingdom here in Jerusalem?

We might take note that Nicodemus approaches Jesus at night when it is dark and people will not recognize him. This may well mean that while Nicodemus is sincere in wanting to know what Jesus' intentions are, he expects that others have already made up their minds that Jesus is a fake, and that he will be in trouble if they know he is even bothering to talk with Jesus.

4. Nicodemus does not understand Jesus' reply, "No one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above." The reason why he does not understand is that Jesus has a very different view of the kingdom of God than does Nicodemus. Nicodemus expects the Messiah to drive out the Roman army by military force and set up a Jewish government that is established and maintained by military power, just as David did long ago and as the Maccabee brothers tried to do in recent times.

But Jesus' understanding of God's kingdom is radically different. It is the rule of God within people's hearts. Not compulsion but inner persuasion. That is what Jesus meant by explaining that we cannot even see the kingdom of God until that happens, until the Spirit of God gives us a new birth from heaven.

5. Nicodemus has never considered that view of how God rules. His model has always been that of King David with his military expertise subduing Israel's enemies by war and violence. How else can we get these pesky Romans out of our country? He has no vision of what Jesus is talking about, so he complains, "How can anyone be born after having grown old?" He has no understanding whatever about what Jesus means to be born from above.

6. We may wonder as we read the rest of this story how the Apostle John could remember the exact words that Jesus spoke on this occasion. It's about fifty years later; he could well have remembered the conversation and even its general content, but the actual words? He could remember because he has explained it many a time verbally in his pastoral ministry, and now he is putting it into writing.

Jesus explains that we "must be born of water and Spirit." Not physical birth but spiritual birth, something new coming to life within us, a change in the way we understand ourselves and the world. Jesus combines two things here: water and Spirit. The functional part is the Spirit; the symbolic part is the water. When a person believes truthfully in Jesus it is because the Holy Spirit is working in his or her mind and heart, and when this happens he or she is eligible for water baptism. The water by itself does nothing, but when it is properly administered it points to the inward birth of new life from heaven.

At this point we may recognize that baptism in its proper meaning refers to this work of the Holy Spirit, the giving of new spiritual life. That generation of inward life of the spirit is the heart of baptism, so that when the sacrament is administered it is nothing more than a sign of what the Spirit has already accomplished, creating a holy spirit in us.

7. Nicodemus is still bewildered by all this talk from Jesus. He just does not get it. "How can these things be?" he asks.

John now goes into a lengthy explication, and when he is finished he does not say anything more about Nicodemus and what he thought about it all. So what John is doing is trying to explain to his readers some important things about how God works; not for Nicodemus only, but for his readers.

8. In this explication John quotes Jesus saying something important but a bit obscure, "No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man." John wants us, his readers, to understand who Jesus is and why he is exercising such teaching authority. People in Nicodemus' day would be wondering who this stranger from Galilee is and what makes him think he is so important. So John has Jesus explain that he is "the Son of Man."

What does that mean, "Son of Man"? What first comes to mind is that Jesus is a human being, born of the virgin Mary. But John means much more, as we see when we consider the previous context of his Gospel, all the way back to the Prologue. Jesus is not only _a_ human being, he is _the_ human being.

Recall that John in his Prologue identified Jesus as the Word of God made flesh. Just as God spoke adam into being in the beginning, so too God spoke Jesus into being in the fullness of the times. The difference between the first Man and the second Man is that the first one did not live by the command of God, whereas the second one does so live. The first man Adam chose to live in violation of the truth of God and thus in darkness, whereas the second man Jesus is living in full obedience to the voice of the Creator. So that is the context of the term "Son of Man"; Jesus is the human being that God intends all humans to be.

John quotes Jesus as saying, "No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man." This curious statement means to say that only a person who has been born from above can understand the way God works. Jesus came from heaven in the sense that he is the incarnation of God's speech, and that is why he is able to ascend into heaven with these explanations of how God works in the world.

And John is implying that when we believe in Jesus, receive the working of the Spirit in our lives and are baptized with water and the Spirit, then we too have ascended into heaven in the sense of knowing by experience how God works down here in this world. We are no longer left in the uncertainty and bewilderment of Nicodemus.

9. John's mind is concerned for the moment with the thought of Jesus having descended from and ascended to heaven, and it triggers another way Jesus is to be understood. "And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up."

Of course John knows all about this, having lived through the traumatic ordeal of seeing Jesus arrested, tried, condemned, and crucified. So at this point in John's narrative this insight becomes a prediction from the mouth of Jesus himself. The Son of Man will be lifted up on the cross. Gentile Christians would have no prior connection with Moses and the serpent in the wilderness, so it seems as if this reference is made with the Jewish Christians in mind.

10. Then John gets back to his original train of thought, recalling how Jesus explained the purpose of God in bringing people into the new life of the Spirit. And that brings us to one of the best known and perceptive texts in the entire Bible, "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life."

John had written earlier in his Prologue that the darkness had not annihilated the light. Here John has in mind the same insight but with different focus. God loves his world, the world he created, even though human beings do not live in full obedience to his will. Human sin and evil do not cancel out God's purpose. God still loves the whole world. So it would be wrong to think the devil is in control of this world, or that God loves only part of the human race, or that God's purpose is to get people out of this world into some other world that he will create to replace this one. All of that is wrong. God created this world and this is the world that he loves still.

How do we know that? Because God sent his Son Jesus into this world to become the ideal Man, the person who incarnates entirely and completely the purpose of God for the human race. What Jesus calls us to do, what God calls us to do, is simply to believe in Jesus, follow him, obey his instructions, and live in his Spirit. That's the kind of life that God wishes for us and that keeps us from perishing in sin and evil.

We may note again that this is another way of saying the same thing that he wrote at the conclusion of this book, to the effect that John chose the stories he wrote in order that people may believe in Jesus and thus find a godly life through this faith.

Jesus affirms that God did not send Jesus into the world for the purpose of condemning it. He came precisely for the purpose of enabling us to become the kind of people God created us to be, that is, to find life through him. Jesus came to lead us out of the darkness of sin into the light of God.

Chapter Seven

JOHN THE BAPTIST

John 3:22-36

After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he spent some time there with them and baptized. 23John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim because water was abundant there; and people kept coming and were being baptized. 24John, of course, had not yet been thrown into prison.

25 Now a discussion about purification arose between John's disciples and a Jew. 26They came to John and said to him, 'Rabbi, the one who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you testified, here he is baptizing, and all are going to him.' 27John answered, 'No one can receive anything except what has been given from heaven. 28You yourselves are my witnesses that I said, "I am not the Messiah, but I have been sent ahead of him." 29He who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. For this reason my joy has been fulfilled. 30He must increase, but I must decrease.'

31 The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks about earthly things. The one who comes from heaven is above all. 32He testifies to what he has seen and heard, yet no one accepts his testimony. 33Whoever has accepted his testimony has certified this, that God is true. 34He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. 35The Father loves the Son and has placed all things in his hands. 36Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God's wrath.

1. So here are two men preaching and baptizing the people who come to hear them. An unidentified Jew notices that and wonders about it. Are these men rivals? Are they partners? So he asks John's disciples about it, commenting that so many people are going to Jesus rather than to John. How about that? They go to John the Baptist for an explanation.

2. John reminds his questioners that he has already told them not to follow him, thinking that he is the Messiah. He reminds them that he has "been sent ahead of him" precisely for the purpose of helping Jesus to make the transition from a private person to a public prophet. Accordingly, John explains, "He must increase, but I must decrease." He is the best man at a wedding; Jesus is the bridegroom.

That confession is a really hard position for anyone to take. People may see us as rivals, John says, each trying to get as many followers as possible. But that is not the case. I have done what God sent me to do, introduce Jesus to the people, and having done it I must now fade away and Jesus must come into prominence. John would soon have his head taken off by King Herod, but that isn't important. What is important is that Jesus has been exalted.

John's humility is an example for us all. We are all called to do what we can as Christians, whatever it may be that the Lord assigns to us in life, but it is important that we do not begin to think we are all that important in God's work. Jesus must increase because of our efforts, but at the same time we must decrease.

3. The Apostle John, philosopher that he is, now adds a paragraph of his own to further elaborate on this exchange between the Jewish questioner and John the Baptist. Who is Jesus and why is he more important than the Baptist? Because he "comes from above." Jesus comes from God and he speaks what God tells him. What Jesus says is what he hears from God. John the Baptist cannot claim that.

4. But, explains the Apostle, "no one accepts his testimony." But how can this be? If Jesus speaks for God how can it be that no one believes what he says? You would think people who believe in God would believe what God says. But John knows from his own experience way back fifty years ago that the Jewish people at large were not responding in faith; in fact John knows that the people will eventually come to hate Jesus so much that they will kill him.

Still, John does admit, some people "have accepted his testimony," and by doing so have confirmed that "God is true." What Jesus speaks is indeed the true word from God himself. We see in this observation of the Apostle John the same theme he is developing in his Gospel: the theme of reading the stories he writes, believing in Jesus, and thus coming to life through that faith. Or, for others, not coming to faith.

5. John further elaborates, "The Father loves the Son and has placed all things in his hands." What can that mean? Jesus is in control of everything? Even the people who despise him and want to kill him, as well as those who love him and follow him and see him as the Messiah? All things? What does John mean? Yes, all of the above.

He means the same thing that his fellow disciple Matthew had written at the end of his Gospel, where Jesus is quoted as saying, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me." God has placed all things in Jesus' hands, all things in heaven and on earth.

This is truly an amazing claim! There are all kinds of evil things that happen all the time all over the world; how can we say Jesus is in control when people by the millions are slaughtered for no reason other than their race? When a deranged man picks up a machine gun and shoots people at random in a super market? When women and children are systematically submerged into a male-dominated culture? When people still nurture intense hatred of other competing nations and do all they can to terrorize them? Jesus is in control? We might be tempted to think not even God is in control, much less Jesus.

Well, Yes. What John asserts here, and what Matthew affirms, is that God has entrusted control over all things to Jesus. In spite of appearances. Here we need to remember a piece of good advice that Moses gave to the Israelites at Mount Sinai, "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the revealed things belong to us and to our children forever, to observe all the words of this law." (Deuteronomy 29:29) There are always secret things that we do not know; we can trust God to do what he knows. What we go by is what we know, what the Lord reveals to us. We may not see very clearly how Jesus is exercising his authority, but we can live by the gospel that we do know and leave the rest to God.

Actually, there is something that we can see about how Jesus rules from heaven on earth. He does this by means of the gospel and the Holy Spirit. If we take a good Theistic look at how the history of the world has been developing since the time of Jesus, then we can see something of how western civilization has been shaped and formed to a large extent by the gospel. There is much more to be said about this but it would require another book to detail it. We may rest in the simple observation that God is guiding the course of human life and history by means of what Jesus has done and by the continuing power of the Spirit of Christ as it modifies our lives and shapes the cultures we create.

Human history is moving forward under the decisive impetus of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and it is moving toward the purpose, the end, the telos, that God has in mind and has stated already in Genesis 1, that humans will function in such a way as to image himself in their civilization. It may indeed be difficult for us to see this pattern, but we may be assured that it is there.

6. The last sentence of John's explanation deserves another look also, "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure God's wrath." Notice carefully that John is again combining the ideas of believing and of having life. It is another instance of the purpose of his book that we have noticed again and again. When a person believes in Jesus he has, present tense, "eternal life." We do not have to wait for it until after we die. The fact of believing carries with it the accompanying Spirit of Life.

The word "eternal" does not, accordingly, imply something that is everlasting even after we die. There is no suggestion in this about anything after death, but only about how our lives are changed when we begin to live according the the Spirit. Eternal life is the life that comes from God through Jesus and the Holy Spirit; it is what happens in us when we believe. It is what John wants to happen when people read this book of his.

7. John writes of enduring God's "wrath" when we fail to believe in Jesus. Elsewhere John will write that "God is love." So what does he mean here by saying that the God who is himself love has wrath? Aren't the concepts opposites? How can a God who is love exercise wrath?

God created us in such a way that if we live accordingly we will be happy and blessed, but if we do not we are unhappy and unblessed. If we do not live as images of God, doing our daily work without regard to our true God-given nature, things will go wrong in our lives and will create discontent and all kinds of other sins in us. That's what John means by the wrath of God. If we do not live according to the innate standards that God created in us we will necessarily endure the evil negative consequences. If we do not believe in Jesus we will miss out on the blessings and joys of holy living.

Chapter Eight

THE SAMARITAN WOMAN

John 4:1-42

Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard, 'Jesus is making and baptizing more disciples than John'—2although it was not Jesus himself but his disciples who baptized—3he left Judea and started back to Galilee. 4But he had to go through Samaria. 5So he came to a Samaritan city called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6Jacob's well was there, and Jesus, tired out by his journey, was sitting by the well. It was about noon.

7A Samaritan woman came to draw water, and Jesus said to her, 'Give me a drink'. 8(His disciples had gone to the city to buy food.) 9The Samaritan woman said to him, 'How is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman of Samaria?' (Jews do not share things in common with Samaritans.) 10Jesus answered her, 'If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, "Give me a drink", you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.' 11The woman said to him, 'Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12Are you greater than our ancestor Jacob, who gave us the well, and with his sons and his flocks drank from it?' 13Jesus said to her, 'Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again,14but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.' 15The woman said to him, 'Sir, give me this water, so that I may never be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.'

16Jesus said to her, 'Go, call your husband, and come back.' 17The woman answered him, 'I have no husband.' Jesus said to her, 'You are right in saying, "I have no husband";18for you have had five husbands, and the one you have now is not your husband. What you have said is true!' 19The woman said to him, 'Sir, I see that you are a prophet. 20Our ancestors worshipped on this mountain, but you say that the place where people must worship is in Jerusalem.' 21Jesus said to her, 'Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father seeks such as these to worship him. 24God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.' 25The woman said to him, 'I know that Messiah is coming' (who is called Christ). 'When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.' 26Jesus said to her, 'I am he, the one who is speaking to you.'

27Just then his disciples came. They were astonished that he was speaking with a woman, but no one said, 'What do you want?' or, 'Why are you speaking with her?' 28Then the woman left her water-jar and went back to the city. She said to the people,29'Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done! He cannot be the Messiah, can he?' 30They left the city and were on their way to him.

31Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, 'Rabbi, eat something.' 32But he said to them, 'I have food to eat that you do not know about.' 33So the disciples said to one another, 'Surely no one has brought him something to eat?' 34Jesus said to them, 'My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work. 35Do you not say, "Four months more, then comes the harvest"? But I tell you, look around you, and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. 36The reaper is already receiving wages and is gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. 37For here the saying holds true, "One sows and another reaps." 38I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.'

39Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman's testimony, 'He told me everything I have ever done.' 40So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them; and he stayed there for two days. 41And many more believed because of his word. 42They said to the woman, 'It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the Savior of the world.'

1. In Jesus' day there was no love lost between Jews and Samaritans. The reason for that goes back to the time of the Assyrian Captivity of the kingdom of Israel in 721 BC. It was the policy of the Assyrians that when they conquered some obstreperous nation they would transport the captives to some other region far away and replace them with foreigners being displaced from their country. So that's what happened when the Israelites were transported off to Assyria. Foreigners from elsewhere were brought into the area which was formerly the kingdom of Israel.

What happened then was that these foreigners amalgamated with the Israelites who had managed to avoid being transported away. In time the religious practices of the foreigners and those of the remaining Israelites merged so that the purity of Israel's monotheistic faith, as well as the dedication of the people to the Torah, was corrupted. Since the headquarters of this new combination of Israelites and foreigners was in Samaria, they came to be known as Samaritans, people whose religion the Jews in the kingdom of Judah regarded as an unacceptable mixture of truth and error.

That kind of attitude remained ever afterward, surviving even the Babylonian Captivity of Judah, all the way down to the time of Jesus. Samaritans were the despised people who had some remnants of the faith but corrupted by various kinds of pagan influences. So that is the setting for this story of Jesus meeting a Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob.

2. The Samaritan lady was surprised that Jesus, clearly a Jew, had broken the prejudicial Jewish attitude toward Samaritans by asking her for a drink of water. A conversation ensued in which Jesus used the occasion as a symbol of spiritual thirst. Jesus offered to supply the lady with "living water." If you drink this water you "will never be thirsty" again.

"Living water" in those days meant running water, as in a stream or river, as contrasted with stagnant water in a well. Jesus then adds that the water he can supply will function in anyone who drinks it as "a spring of water gushing up to eternal life." We may wonder what the lady from Samaria understood by that symbolic affirmation. Whatever may have gone through her mind, it sounded good so she asked Jesus to give her some.

3. But Jesus knew there was something in her life that prevented her from drinking the water he could supply, that is, the gift of faith. So he suggested that she go and get her husband and then they could both receive Jesus' gift. It seems, however, that the woman may have been promiscuous sexually, having had several husbands and now living with a man not her husband. This matter would have to be dealt with before she would be ready to believe.

Further conversation moved on to one of the main differences between Jews and Samaritans: where to worship God. We Samaritans worship God here on this mountain but you Jews worship in Jerusalem. Jesus steers this conversation into the larger question of what it means to worship God in the first place. He says that it does not matter where we worship God. What does matter is what is in our heart when we do so. "God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth." Not just go through the ritual motions of worship but sincerely and honestly worship from the heart.

After Jesus confesses to her that he is indeed the Messiah whom God is sending to his people, the woman went back into town recognizing that Jesus is a prophet, (we never do learn whether or not Jesus received his drink of water). She tells her friends all about her encounter with Jesus, convinced that Jesus was indeed the Messiah sent by God, giving as the reason that Jesus had told her everything she had done. And her friends then accompany her back to Jacob's well and Jesus uses the opportunity to explain the gospel to them. They come to faith along with the woman. Jesus stays two more days in Samaria, during which numerous people, Samaritan people, believed in Jesus, confessing that he is the "savior of the world," that is, of Samaritans as well as Jews.

4. Here in the progress of John's Gospel we see Jesus' first extension of his ministry beyond the nation of the Jews. He is the savior of the world, and this is his first excursion outside Judaism, into the hybrid nation of the Samaritans. While John does not explicitly say that the Samaritan believers found eternal life at this time, it is clearly implied in the earlier conversation to the effect that whoever drinks the water he provides will find it to be a spring of water bubbling up to eternal life.

The Apostle John, in telling this incident, is informing his readers in Asia Minor how the gospel has been spread outside of the limits of Judaism into the larger world of the Roman Empire. This is the beginning of that process.

5. Let's look back at one other thing in this story. Jesus explains to his disciples, who think he must be very hungry, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work." The focus of this story as John tells it is on the Samaritan lady. But this little incident about the disciples thinking Jesus needs to eat something to keep up his strength focuses on Jesus himself.

We tend to forget that Jesus was, after all, a human being. He was the incarnation of what a genuine human being is and ought to be. So he did, as the disciples recognized, get hungry. John tells us that the reason why Jesus was at this well in the first place was because he was "tired out by his journey." So it was certainly not wrong for his disciples to be concerned about his physical welfare.

But there was more going on in Jesus' life than his physical needs. Jesus knew he had a task imposed upon him by God. It was the task of getting people to straighten out their lives by repenting and bringing their lives under the control of God himself. That's what kept Jesus going even when he was tired and hungry and thirsty.

And that explanation of Jesus could very well serve us today as a kind of motto to focus our lives and our work. All of us as believers are ipso facto involved in helping to complete the work of God in the world. Our food is to do the will of God each day in everything we get involved in. Especially when life gets ugly and we get a bit depressed it's a good motto to remember. God gives us each his or her individual task in life, and even when it gets difficult for one reason or another, he also gives us the strength to see it through. Faith in Jesus is, as Jesus himself explained, a spring of water welling up in us to guide and sustain our life.

Chapter Nine

A ROYAL OFFICIAL

John 4:43-54

43When the two days were over, he went from that place to Galilee 44(for Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in the prophet's own country). 45When he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, since they had seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the festival; for they too had gone to the festival.

46Then he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine. Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. 47When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 48Then Jesus said to him, 'Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.' 49The official said to him, 'Sir, come down before my little boy dies.' 50Jesus said to him, 'Go; your son will live.' The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started on his way. 51As he was going down, his slaves met him and told him that his child was alive. 52So he asked them the hour when he began to recover, and they said to him, 'Yesterday at one in the afternoon the fever left him.' 53The father realized that this was the hour when Jesus had said to him, 'Your son will live.' So he himself believed, along with his whole household. 54Now this was the second sign that Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee.

1. John explains that the Galileans welcomed him, not because of the miracle in Cana but because they had seen him function in Jerusalem.

It's rather difficult to figure out the time sequence of these stories that John includes in his Gospel. This story is "the second sign that Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee." Was John's memory of those events going awry? Or was he just figuring out a way to proceed on what appears to be a topical rather than a chronological organization of his Gospel? It would seem that this incident, which occurs near the same village where he changed water into wine, would be better explained without that trip to Jerusalem in between.

2. An unnamed "royal official" is living in Capernaum, a village on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. Cana is some twenty miles away to the west. The official, hearing that Jesus is again in Cana, sends a message to him asking him to come and heal his little boy who appears to be dying.

Our problem with this is wondering how this official, probably part of the Roman government, would think that Jesus was capable of doing this. If this is the second "sign" that Jesus did, what was there in the first sign, changing water to wine, that would make the worried father think Jesus was a good doctor, able to heal sick people?

It would seem to us that Jesus had done a good many other miracles, especially healing miracles, for this official to send for Jesus to heal his son. Jesus must have gained a well-known reputation for healing miracles in order for this man to summon him as he did. But in the sequence of the Gospel of John there does not seem to be enough time for Jesus' reputation to have grown that far.

3. The official begs Jesus to hurry to Capernaum and heal his son. Jesus replies, "Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe." That's a rather curious response, is it not? The official is not concerned with believing Jesus to be the Jewish Messiah; he is concerned for his son to be healed. Why does Jesus give him this evasive answer?

We need to recall the purpose for which John is writing these memoirs. He wants readers to understand that everything Jesus does is for the purpose of persuading people to believe in him, and then to live in such a way that the Holy Spirit of God dominates their lives to produce a truly godly way of living.

In this incident John recalls that purpose in this answer from Jesus to the worried father. There was doubtless other conversation between the two, but John wants us to concentrate on Jesus' purpose. Jesus did not come to heal physical illnesses but to heal lives. The miracles of healing that are recorded in the Bible are not primarily concerned with our bodies but with our way of living. Jesus wants the Roman official to come to faith in him and is about to heal the man's son for that purpose.

4. We may note, accordingly, that the Apostle John is moving systematically farther away from the strictly Jewish environment that traditional Judaism operated in. Jesus begins with a miracle in the Jewish setting in Cana; he continues with a challenge to the religious leaders at the heart of Judaism in Jerusalem; then he goes to a hybrid nation, partly Jewish, partly Gentile, in Samaria; and now he deals with a person who is entirely non-Jewish.

So it is becoming more clear that John's pattern for writing his Gospel is not exclusively chronological. It appears that John's concern is for the Gentiles in the area of Ephesus, wanting to show them that what happened fifty years ago among the Jews in the land of Israel is designed from the beginning by God for the benefit of all people, not just Jews. John is showing how the message of Jesus is being questioned and doubted by such as Nicodemus and the Jerusalem priests, but that it is being accepted increasingly by the foreigners in the area.

John, of course, knows that the Jewish people rejected Jesus, and he wants to lead into that conclusion slowly, making a clear transition from the particularism of the old covenant to the universalism of the new covenant, showing how the Jew Jesus worked in order to draw all humans into the kingdom of God.

5. Jesus replied simply, "Go, your son will live." When the official returned home his servants informed him that the boy's fever broke about one o'clock in the afternoon, and the father realized that was the exact time Jesus had spoken with him about his son.

This was too much for the distressed parent to consider coincidental, as if the child might have gotten well anyway. He knew instinctively that divine power had gone out from Jesus in such a way that the child was healed at that moment – at long distance.

John reports, and that concludes John's story, that the official "believed, along with his whole household." Believed what? Not merely that Jesus had healed his son, but that he was a man sent by God in whom the power of God was operative. In other words, that this Jesus was indeed the Jewish Messiah. And that is another story about Jesus written by John so that readers might believe in Jesus and find life in his name.

Chapter Ten

A SICK MAN BY THE SHEEP GATE

John 5:1-47

After this there was a festival of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

2Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha,*;) which has five porticoes. 3In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. 5One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, 'Do you want to be made well?' 7The sick man answered him, 'Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.' 8Jesus said to him, 'Stand up, take your mat and walk.' 9At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.

Now that day was a sabbath. 10So the Jews said to the man who had been cured, 'It is the sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.' 11But he answered them, 'The man who made me well said to me, "Take up your mat and walk."' 12They asked him, 'Who is the man who said to you, "Take it up and walk"?' 13Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had disappeared in*;) the crowd that was there. 14Later Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, 'See, you have been made well! Do not sin any more, so that nothing worse happens to you.' 15The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well. 16Therefore the Jews started persecuting Jesus, because he was doing such things on the sabbath. 17But Jesus answered them, 'My Father is still working, and I also am working.' 18For this reason the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because he was not only breaking the sabbath, but was also calling God his own Father, thereby making himself equal to God.

19Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, the Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise. 20The Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing; and he will show him greater works than these, so that you will be astonished. 21Indeed, just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whomsoever he wishes. 22The Father judges no one but has given all judgment to the Son, 23so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Anyone who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. 24Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life.

25'Very truly, I tell you, the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26For just as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself;27and he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. 28Do not be astonished at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice 29and will come out—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.

30'I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I seek to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me.

31'If I testify about myself, my testimony is not true. 32There is another who testifies on my behalf, and I know that his testimony to me is true. 33You sent messengers to John, and he testified to the truth. 34Not that I accept such human testimony, but I say these things so that you may be saved. 35He was a burning and shining lamp, and you were willing to rejoice for a while in his light. 36But I have a testimony greater than John's. The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me. 37And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form, 38and you do not have his word abiding in you, because you do not believe him whom he has sent.

39'You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. 40Yet you refuse to come to me to have life. 41I do not accept glory from human beings. 42But I know that you do not have the love of God in*;) you. 43I have come in my Father's name, and you do not accept me; if another comes in his own name, you will accept him. 44How can you believe when you accept glory from one another and do not seek the glory that comes from the one who alone is God? 45Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father; your accuser is Moses, on whom you have set your hope. 46If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. 47But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?'

1. John remembers another occasion in Jesus' life that provides a good opportunity for him to explain in great detail just how Jesus understood his own responsibility before God. It happened in Jerusalem, so John simply asserts that "Jesus went up to Jerusalem." We do not really know when in chronological time this happened, only that it happened up there in Jerusalem.

John tells us also that this incident happened on the sabbath day. This was a holy day for the Jewish people, a day on which no one was to do any work. John will explain why it was important in this story.

2. In Jerusalem Jesus sees all sorts of ill people around a pool, on five porches. Somehow he discovers that these people are there for the healing powers of the water of the pool. Apparently from time to time the water in the pool became agitated, and this was a sign than someone could jump in and be healed of whatever ailment he was dealing with.

One man, aged 38, has been there for a long time but has never been able to be healed. Jesus inquires why not. The man answers that he himself cannot move quickly so that others who can walk better jump in before him. Jesus inquires if the man really does want to be made well.

Jesus says to him, "Stand up, take your mat and walk." The man does this, is healed, rolls up his mat, and walks away. And this event sets the stage for the main point of John's story.

3. The religious leaders of the city see the man carrying his mat and chastise him, "It is the sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your mat." Subsequent events resulted in the man identifying Jesus as the one who had made him well. The Jews then started opposing Jesus. Why? Because Jesus was violating one of the cardinal rules of the Torah, the Law of God, doing labor on the sabbath. Anyone who undermines the sabbath must be dealt with. If Jesus wants to heal people he had better do it on some other day than the day of rest.

John uses this incident to explain why the Jewish leaders did not believe that Jesus was their Messiah. John's original readers in and around Ephesus might have wondered about that. If Jesus was really the Messiah but his own people did not believe him, why should we believe? So John here begins a lengthy explanation of why the Jewish leaders opposed Jesus, explaining also why they were wrong and why everyone should believe in him.

4. So when the Jewish leaders rebuked Jesus for working on the sabbath, Jesus replied, "My Father is still working, and I also am working." What did he mean? He meant that God has not stopped working, and since Jesus was doing God's work he does not stop working either.

Jesus is implying that the constraints of the ancient Torah, the Law of Moses given at Mount Sinai, are not in force for him any longer. True, the Torah required people to do no manual labor at all, but Jesus does not consider himself bound by that rule. Jesus knows himself to come from God and to receive his authority directly from God. Because he sees himself that way Jesus does what God gives him to do regardless of the rules under which the Jews have been living for centuries.

The Jews are infuriated by this answer. They are deeply annoyed by Jesus' willingness to violate the Torah, and not only that but that he seems to make himself equal to God, God's Son no less. They can't imagine how anyone could be so assertive and independent as to put himself above the Law and claim a divine authority higher than God's Law.
5. At this point (5:19) John recalls as best he can how Jesus explains to the Jews the authority that he has from God. Since John is writing fifty years or so after the event, we should understand that John is writing what he remembers, not necessarily the exact words that Jesus used at the time. John is writing in Greek; Jesus was likely speaking in Hebrew or Aramaic.

We should also remember that John is writing as he does in order to instruct his readers, people who might wonder about such matters as why the Jews rejected Jesus. John wants them to see both sides of the issue, and be convinced that Jesus, after all the argumentation, is right.

6. "The Son can do nothing on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, the Son does likewise." Jesus explains to the Jews that God is still working in the life of the human race. God knows what he is doing, and he has appointed his Son to accomplish what God wants to be done. The Son does nothing but what he knows God to be doing. Jesus does not do anything on his own initiative, but only what God gives him to do. Jesus does not go around looking for things to do to further his own private career. On the contrary he recognizes circumstances that occur as he goes about his business that God puts in his way, and he then does what he hears God telling him to do.

We may recall the incidences that John has already described: the lack of wine at the Cana wedding, the visit of Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman at the well, the official's sick son at Capernaum, and now the paralyzed man at the well. These are all incidents that God brought into Jesus' attention and which became occasions for him to demonstrate God's power in their lives.

7. Further, Jesus goes on to explain what God's purpose is in these events. "Just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whomsoever he wishes." The purpose of God in sending Jesus to do these things is to give life to people. The Son gives life.

We need to be careful when we think about this. We are reminded, for example, of the difficulty that Nicodemus had when Jesus explained to him what it meant to be born from above. What Jesus is saying here is much the same as what he said to Nicodemus. To say that the Son gives life is much the same as to say we must be born from above. The life that Jesus gives is the same as the life that comes from above.

More specifically, Jesus does not mean physical life. He means holy life. We can live in one of two ways: the way God created us to live, or the way the devil wants us to live. God sends Jesus into the world to bring us out of the devilish life into the Spirit's life. All the people listening to Jesus already have physical life, sheer existence, but they need to be drawn out of the wrong way of life into the right way of life. This is what Jesus enables them, and us, to do.

Is Jesus implying that the Jewish leaders are living the wrong way? Yes, even though they cling so tenaciously to the Law of Moses given by God at Sinai. That Law, Jesus is now saying to them, has done its job to the best of its ability, but something better is now coming from the same God who gave that Law. We know, of course, that the Jews did not heed Jesus' instruction, but because of their steadfast adherence to the Law they eventually sent Jesus to death on the Roman cross. They refused to receive the life that Jesus was bringing, the holy life of the Spirit.

8. John quotes Jesus as saying that everyone who believes in him "has eternal life" and "has passed from death to life." It is easily possible for us to misunderstand Jesus here. Note carefully that Jesus uses the past tense in the phrase, "has passed from death to life." This is something that happens when a person believes in Jesus. If you believe in Jesus you already have life now, you have already passed out of death into life. You don't have to wait until after you die and are buried. It is something that happens after you believe, not after you die.

Jesus says, "Very truly, I tell you, the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live." That time is now here, Jesus insists. It is here because Jesus is here, because God has sent his Son to bring the gospel, because the gospel brings new life to all who believe. Then Jesus adds, "Do not be astonished at this; for the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice and will come out—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation."

We must take close notice of what Jesus means by resurrection. He speaks about the hour that is "coming," but he has already said that hour "is now here." The hour of resurrection has already come. Those who believe in Jesus and find new life in him must understand what has happened as a "resurrection of life." But those who reject Jesus and remain in their sin must understand that they have experienced a "resurrection of condemnation."

Everyone whom Jesus confronts must make some kind of decision about what they see and hear from him. That decision brings results. Something happens. If they repent and believe and find life in Jesus then they have experienced a transition from the death which is sin and evil into the new life of God. If, on the contrary, they reject the gospel they remain as they were before but with the added burden that they have closed off the way to life as it should be lived. One has been resurrected to life, the other has been resurrected to deliberate and decisive death.

We need to recognize, accordingly, that Jesus' concern – and of course God's concern – is to influence the way human beings live their lives here on earth, the way they conduct themselves in their daily activities as well as the kind of civilization they develop. It would be to miss Jesus' point if we understand him to be talking about life after death in heaven. The life after death that Jesus is talking about is what happens in the lifetime of believers: holy life after the death of unholy life.

9. We may infer that what John writes here in this pericope is the substance of a larger conversation that Jesus was having with the Jewish leaders. We may surmise that the Jews at this point were questioning the authority by which Jesus was saying and doing all these things. So John quotes Jesus as saying, "I have a testimony greater than John's. The works that the Father has given me to complete, the very works that I am doing, testify on my behalf that the Father has sent me."

Jesus is reminding the Jews that John the Baptist had introduced him to the people, thus beginning his public ministry. But Jesus recognizes that the authority of the Baptist wouldn't carry much weight with the people, so he added that it is God himself who testifies to his authenticity. How? By giving Jesus the power to work miracles. These very works, Jesus explains, ought to be enough to convince anyone that God has sent him and not merely that he was setting up on his own authority. It was, indeed, what we have read previously about why Nicodemus was seeking more information from Jesus.

When we read this from our perspective in the twenty-first century, and know how the ministry of Jesus ended, we can see how very important it was that Jesus did all his miracles. Not only for the Jewish leaders who, after all, decided against Jesus, but even more so for his disciples. The growing weight of evidence that Jesus was their Messiah came mostly from witnessing Jesus do all these miraculous things. That is the main reason the disciples stayed together after Jesus ascended into heaven, and why they were receptive to the Holy Spirit. Only one of Jesus' regular disciples abandoned him, even though he too saw all these mighty works. The majority were thoroughly convinced, in spite of their bitter disillusionment, that God had sent Jesus as the Messiah and they were willing to readjust their expectations accordingly.

10. Jesus knows very well that the Jews had something that was even more important to them than the authority of Jesus' miracles. It was the Torah, the ancient Law of God given to Israel at Mount Sinai. For centuries the Jewish rabbis had been reading and studying the ancient scrolls that we know as the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. The major emphasis of these studies was to discover exactly what it was that God required his people to do. The result was cumulative, new discoveries, new interpretations, new items that the people should be doing. Very detailed, very comprehensive, and very difficult to absorb entirely. We today call such dependence on the Law _legalism_.

Jesus now addresses this feature of Jewish religious life because it was this matter about which they were criticizing Jesus. Jesus had healed a man on the sabbath and in the judgment of the Jewish leaders this was violating one of the basic rules of the Torah.

So Jesus observes, "You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life." Jesus was telling them that the way they used the Torah was wrong. They were using it to get detailed rules about doing this or that, and they thus assumed that was the kind of life God wanted from them. They missed, however, the insight that people could obey all these stipulations and still have a heart that was far from godly.

Jesus insists that the main purpose of the Torah, and all the rest of the old scriptures as well, was not to provide rules, but to prepare the people for the coming of the Messiah. This time has now come, Jesus continues, for the kind of life that God requires is now being demonstrated to you. Believe me, follow me, and you will obtain this life that is pleasing to God. Obeying rules doesn't do the job. The scriptures testify to me but you are refusing to come to me. The life of God is available to you but you are rejecting it by rejecting me. That's what Jesus was telling the people.

Chapter Eleven

FEEDING HUNGRY PEOPLE

John 6:1-14

After this Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias. 2A large crowd kept following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick. 3Jesus went up the mountain and sat down there with his disciples. 4Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. 5When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming towards him, Jesus said to Philip, 'Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?' 6He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. 7Philip answered him, 'Six months' wages*;) would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.' 8One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said to him, 'There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?' 10Jesus said, 'Make the people sit down.' Now there was a great deal of grass in the place; so they*;) sat down, about five thousand in all. 11Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. 12When they were satisfied, he told his disciples, 'Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost.' 13So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets. 14When the people saw the sign that he had done, they began to say, 'This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.' 15When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself.

1. Whenever John wants to begin another story about Jesus he puts in a notice either about it being the next day or that Jesus goes to another place. In this case the previous story has Jesus in Jerusalem, but the story John wants to tell next has him on the other side of the Sea of Galilee. We have seen already that these incidents do not necessarily imply an accurate chronological sequence, so there is little point in trying to fit John's sequence into a time framework from the other three Gospels.

2. However, considerable time has elapsed in Jesus' public ministry so that people in general were getting acquainted with him because of his miracles of healing. Reports of those miracles had been circulating for quite some time, long enough now for huge crowds of people to follow him, hoping to see some great miracle.

They do see a miracle, but not a miracle of healing. Why John mentions that the Passover time was near is a bit problematic to us, but it seems to have something to do with the kind of food Jews were allowed to eat at the time. On Passover day they could only eat unleavened bread, whereas the miracle that John wants to describe here is of ordinary bread and fish.

3. It's getting on in the day and people are getting hungry. Jesus and the disciples have made no lunch provisions for so many people. The disciples were getting worried about it because they did not have anywhere near enough money to feed the crowd. Andrew discovers a boy who has five sandwiches and two fish. Jesus has the people all sit down on the grass, takes the boy's lunch (presumably with his permission), gives thanks to God, and distributes the food. Everyone has enough to eat. Jesus instructs his disciples to gather up the leftovers, and they fill twelve baskets (where they got the baskets and how large they were are not said).

4. John concludes this incident with an observation which by now we are coming to expect. The people in general say, "This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world." The previous story shows how the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem criticized Jesus and refused to recognize him as coming from God, but now here in the distant hinterland people in general are responding to Jesus because of his miracles and are already confessing that Jesus is the prophet that God is sending to be their Messiah.

We know something today, of course, that the people then did not know, and that is what being the Messiah really meant. At that time the public perception of the Messiah was a man to lead the country into rebellion against Rome and set himself up as king in Jerusalem. We know today that that was a false view of the Messiah. Jesus never did have any such notion in his own mind about driving out the Roman army by an army of his own. He would in time conquer the Romans not by military means but by the gospel.

Jesus did not tell the people these things, and the people for whom John is writing do not know this either. If Jesus had insisted that he would never gather an army, attempt to drive out the Romans, and set himself up as king in Jerusalem, the disciples as well as the people at large would never follow him in the expectation that he was their Messiah. So in the meantime Jesus had not only to win their loyalty on the basis of his miracles, but then figure out how to keep that support at the end when it would be clear that he was not about to lead a revolt against Rome. As it was he did lose the support of the people and one of his disciples.

5. The preceding paragraphs explain what Jesus did after this event of the feeding of the multitude. "When Jesus realized that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain by himself." Jesus knew that when the people perceived him to be "the prophet" they would see him as their coming king, and when he saw that the people were pressing him to get the revolution started, he withdrew from them and refused to respond to their entreaties. Jesus had no intention of starting an insurrection or of crowning himself king of the Jews, so he managed somehow to get away from the crowds and from his disciples as well, going off to a nearby mountain.

In terms of John's purpose in writing his Gospel, how does this story fit into the plan of his writing about Jesus? John has been showing how Jesus began his ministry with just a few disciples, then how he acquired public attention by miracles, then how people became excited to think their Messiah had finally come, then how the Jewish authorities began to criticize him and oppose him, and now he shows how the excited people are beginning to push Jesus into action against Rome. Jesus seems to be fulfilling their dreams of independence and self-rule; so they press Jesus to get the movement started. His miracles convince them that he is fully capable of doing what they expect him to do, successfully drive out the Roman occupation army.

John, of course, has much more to write about, not only Jesus' actions but his explanations as well. John will be reporting these conversations and sermonettes of Jesus again and again. He will eventually get to the climax of Jesus' ministry, and do so in such a way as to convince his readers, mostly Gentiles, that Jesus is the savior of the world, of all peoples not just Jews. All people can come to believe in Jesus and find the purpose and meaning of their lives in him.

Chapter Twelve

BREAD FROM HEAVEN

John 6:16-71

16When evening came, his disciples went down to the lake, 17got into a boat, and started across the lake to Capernaum. It was now dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them. 18The lake became rough because a strong wind was blowing. 19When they had rowed about three or four miles,*;) they saw Jesus walking on the lake and coming near the boat, and they were terrified. 20But he said to them, 'It is I; do not be afraid.' 21Then they wanted to take him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached the land towards which they were going.

22The next day the crowd that had stayed on the other side of the lake saw that there had been only one boat there. They also saw that Jesus had not got into the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone away alone. 23Then some boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. 24So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus.

25When they found him on the other side of the lake, they said to him, 'Rabbi, when did you come here?' 26Jesus answered them, 'Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. 27Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God the Father has set his seal.' 28Then they said to him, 'What must we do to perform the works of God?' 29Jesus answered them, 'This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.' 30So they said to him, 'What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? What work are you performing? 31Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, "He gave them bread from heaven to eat."' 32Then Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. 33For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.' 34They said to him, 'Sir, give us this bread always.'

35Jesus said to them, 'I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 36But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. 37Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away;38for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. 39And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. 40This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; and I will raise them up on the last day.'

41Then the Jews began to complain about him because he said, 'I am the bread that came down from heaven.' 42They were saying, 'Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, "I have come down from heaven"?' 43Jesus answered them, 'Do not complain among yourselves. 44No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. 45It is written in the prophets, "And they shall all be taught by God." Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me. 46Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. 47Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes has eternal life. 48I am the bread of life. 49Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. 51I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live for ever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.'

52The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, 'How can this man give us his flesh to eat?' 53So Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; 55for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. 56Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. 57Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me. 58This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live for ever.' 59He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.

60When many of his disciples heard it, they said, 'This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?' 61But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, 'Does this offend you? 62Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64But among you there are some who do not believe.' For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him. 65And he said, 'For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.'

66Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. 67So Jesus asked the twelve, 'Do you also wish to go away?' 68Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.' 70Jesus answered them, 'Did I not choose you, the twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.' 71He was speaking of Judas son of Simon Iscariot, for he, though one of the twelve, was going to betray him.

1. Here is an incident in Jesus' life that does not seem to have much to do with the long speech with which John concludes this story. John tells about Jesus walking on the water and then uses this event as the opening for long explanation that Jesus is the bread from heaven. It follows, to be sure, the feeding of the multitude a day earlier, but it is now the occasion to explain that God is not merely interested in food for the body but in food for the soul, for life.

2. Jesus has withdrawn himself from everybody after the feeding miracle. He wants to be alone, not subject to pressure from the people. Jesus didn't reappear so the disciples took their boat and rowed across toward their hometown of Capernaum. They had tough going because a little storm had arisen. During the storm they saw Jesus walking toward them on the water. They couldn't figure that out and were not a little afraid. But Jesus got into the boat and the wind died down so they could row to shore.

The people, however, kept looking for Jesus and finally figured out that he must have gone back to Capernaum with his disciples. So they found Jesus there in Capernaum and after they asked him how he got there, Jesus began a long explanation of what God was doing in sending him as their Messiah.

3. The substance of this speech of Jesus to the people who wanted to crown him king was that he was the Bread of Life that came down from heaven. "Jesus said to them, 'I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.'" The people, understandably, could not make any connection between what Jesus was saying and what they wanted him to do. What has bread from heaven to do with driving out the Romans?

The people wonder what he means and ask, Isn't this man the son of Joseph and Mary? We know who his parents are, so what could he possibly mean by claiming to be from heaven? But Jesus kept explaining it more and more. Just as our ancestors ate the manna that came down from heaven so too must you today eat the bread that God is now sending from heaven. I am that bread from heaven; you must come to me and believe. If you want to live, live the way God wants you to live, you must eat this bread that God is now sending to you.

4. What John is doing here is showing that Jesus, now well into his ministry, was compelling the people to make up their minds, to come to a decision about him. The people were rather offended by Jesus saying they had to eat the bread which was his flesh in order to be pleasing to God. How can we eat his flesh? They are having a problem understanding Jesus, similar to the problem Nicodemus had had earlier.

Actually many of the people were so offended that they gave up on Jesus. "When many of his disciples heard it, they said, 'This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?'" And then the things Jesus added to the conversation were so far out of their understanding that they turned away from Jesus in disgust and no longer followed him around.

"What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?" What is Jesus talking about? What has that to do with getting those pesky Romans out of here?

"What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?" What sense does that make? We know where he comes from: Nazareth of Galilee.

5. So the product of all this conversation, in which Jesus said all kinds of things that the people could not understand, and that had nothing to do with what they wanted to hear, was that many of the people who had been impressed by Jesus' miracles gave up on him and went away. "Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him."

We need to appreciate as much as we can the strategy of Jesus as explained by John in his Gospel. From small beginnings to widespread enthusiasm; and then at this peak of popularity Jesus presses the people for a decision. Will you come to me to have life or will you not? He says things that are meaningful to him but not to his hearers. Will some of them catch the significance of the symbolism Jesus uses, and will they stick with him? Or will it all wash over them in such a way that their own wishes prevail over what Jesus is saying? Many of them go back home, disillusioned. He's not the man we're hoping for.

6. And finally Jesus turns to his twelve close disciples and asks, "Do you also wish to go away?" Jesus is challenging them also to make a firm decision. They were likely as much confused as the other people there, but what will control their decision, what they see in Jesus' miracles or their own perplexity about what he is saying?

"Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.'" John has not told us in his Gospel that Jesus did have twelve close disciples, but it seems that they all looked to Simon Peter as the leader among them, so his reply spoke for all of them at the moment (Judas later recanted).

We must not read too much into Peter's words. At this time the disciples of Jesus had no notion whatever how it would all turn out, that Jesus would be arrested, tried, and executed, and then raised from the dead. So none of that is part of Peter's confession at this point. He is acknowledging, however, the very basic belief that they are convinced Jesus is the Messiah sent by God even though they don't understand much of what Jesus is talking about. They will stick with him even if many others go away.

7. There is another rather curious thing that Jesus says here, "No one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father." How so? Can't the people there decide for themselves whether or not they wish to believe Jesus? Do they have to ask God first if it is OK? And even if they did, how would they know whether or not God gives permission? What is Jesus talking about?

Jesus is a Theist, that is, a person who recognizes that God is in control of everything, so that everything that happens is somehow contributing to the purpose that God has in mind for the world and the human race in it. So Jesus is reminding his hearers, and John is reminding his readers, that there is more involved in whether or not a person believes in Jesus than simply our decision yes or no. If we find ourselves ready and willing to believe in Jesus we must understand that this is because God is working in us to do so. Likewise, when we see people refusing to believe in Jesus we need to understand that this too is somehow in God's plan.

This, of course, raises a difficult issue. Does God cause some people to not believe? If so, does this not take away our responsibility? Must we conclude that God creates some people to believe and have life, whereas he creates other people to not believe and not have life?

That cannot be true, simply because we know God created all human beings in his image, responsible for living accordingly. We are not robots doing only what we are pre-programmed to do. We are willful human beings, making decisions for which we are entirely responsible. So how do we understand what Jesus is saying?

God has created us in such a way that we are entirely responsible for the way we live. We can live a holy life or we can live an unholy life. That's the way God wants it. God allows us to make wrong decisions as well as to make right decisions. That's what it means to be human.

But now, more than that, God's purpose is that eventually all of us will learn by trial and error to choose to live holy lives. But that comes only when we learn from our mistakes. God allows us to make mistakes much as parents allow their children to learn that way also. So that is the way God trains us, allowing us to make mistakes, and then learning to avoid them.

But not only ourselves as individuals, but also as a human race. We humans have created civilizations that incorporate enormous errors, and sometimes we do learn from that to eliminate the things that are hideous and just plain unjust. Only as time goes on, centuries at that, can we see where some improvement is made in our common human civilization.

So God does have a purpose in allowing sin and evil to take place. Not that he wants it to be permanent, but that he wants it to be a catalyst for improvement. When you do something wrong it isn't because that's what God wants for you, but that it's what will lead you to repent and do better.

That then is the background for Jesus insisting that no one can come to him unless the Father draws him. How does the Father draw us to Jesus? By seeing that in Jesus we can come to a better life.

Chapter Thirteen

JESUS AT A FESTIVAL IN JERUSALEM

John 7:1-52

After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish*;) to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him. 2Now the Jewish festival of Booths*;) was near. 3So his brothers said to him, 'Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples also may see the works you are doing; 4for no one who wants*;) to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.' 5(For not even his brothers believed in him.) 6Jesus said to them, 'My time has not yet come, but your time is always here. 7The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify against it that its works are evil. 8Go to the festival yourselves. I am not*;) going to this festival, for my time has not yet fully come.' 9After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

10But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but as it were*;) in secret. 11The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, 'Where is he?' 12And there was considerable complaining about him among the crowds. While some were saying, 'He is a good man', others were saying, 'No, he is deceiving the crowd.' 13Yet no one would speak openly about him for fear of the Jews.

14About the middle of the festival Jesus went up into the temple and began to teach. 15The Jews were astonished at it, saying, 'How does this man have such learning, when he has never been taught?' 16Then Jesus answered them, 'My teaching is not mine but his who sent me. 17Anyone who resolves to do the will of God will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own. 18Those who speak on their own seek their own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and there is nothing false in him.

19'Did not Moses give you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law. Why are you looking for an opportunity to kill me?' 20The crowd answered, 'You have a demon! Who is trying to kill you?' 21Jesus answered them, 'I performed one work, and all of you are astonished. 22Moses gave you circumcision (it is, of course, not from Moses, but from the patriarchs), and you circumcise a man on the sabbath. 23If a man receives circumcision on the sabbath in order that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you angry with me because I healed a man's whole body on the sabbath? 24Do not judge by appearances, but judge with right judgment.'

25Now some of the people of Jerusalem were saying, 'Is not this the man whom they are trying to kill? 26And here he is, speaking openly, but they say nothing to him! Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Messiah? 27Yet we know where this man is from; but when the Messiah*;) comes, no one will know where he is from.' 28Then Jesus cried out as he was teaching in the temple, 'You know me, and you know where I am from. I have not come on my own. But the one who sent me is true, and you do not know him. 29I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me.' 30Then they tried to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him, because his hour had not yet come. 31Yet many in the crowd believed in him and were saying, 'When the Messiah*;) comes, will he do more signs than this man has done?'

32The Pharisees heard the crowd muttering such things about him, and the chief priests and Pharisees sent temple police to arrest him. 33Jesus then said, 'I will be with you a little while longer, and then I am going to him who sent me. 34You will search for me, but you will not find me; and where I am, you cannot come.' 35The Jews said to one another, 'Where does this man intend to go that we will not find him? Does he intend to go to the Dispersion among the Greeks and teach the Greeks? 36What does he mean by saying, "You will search for me and you will not find me" and, "Where I am, you cannot come"?'

37On the last day of the festival, the great day, while Jesus was standing there, he cried out, 'Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, 38and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, "Out of the believer's heart*;) shall flow rivers of living water." ' 39Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

40When they heard these words, some in the crowd said, 'This is really the prophet.' 41Others said, 'This is the Messiah.' But some asked, 'Surely the Messiah does not come from Galilee, does he? 42Has not the scripture said that the Messiah is descended from David and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David lived?' 43So there was a division in the crowd because of him. 44Some of them wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

45Then the temple police went back to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, 'Why did you not arrest him?' 46The police answered, 'Never has anyone spoken like this!' 47Then the Pharisees replied, 'Surely you have not been deceived too, have you? 48Has any one of the authorities or of the Pharisees believed in him? 49But this crowd, which does not know the law—they are accursed.' 50Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus before, and who was one of them, asked, 51'Our law does not judge people without first giving them a hearing to find out what they are doing, does it?' 52They replied, 'Surely you are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and you will see that no prophet is to arise from Galilee.'

1. Interesting! Jesus doesn't want to go to Jerusalem publicly because people up there hated him and were looking for an opportunity to kill him. His brothers, whom John explains did not believe in him, sarcastically suggested that if Jesus really wanted to gain publicity and support for a conspiracy against Rome he should go to Jerusalem and whip up some enthusiasm. So Jesus told his brothers he was not going with them, and after they left he himself went privately, without fanfare. He did not want his entrance into Jerusalem to draw attention prematurely. He had told his brothers, "My time has not yet come."

2. When the festival was well under way Jesus made his appearance in the temple and began to speak. The listeners are surprised that Jesus knows as much as he does, since he was not well educated. He says to them that he speaks only what God gives him to speak, seeking to promote God not himself.

Then he rebukes the people directly, "Did not Moses give you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law." What did he mean? Very likely Jesus was thinking in terms of the command to love God above all and then love one's neighbor as oneself. All the rituals and ceremonies and public displays of religion did not mean they loved God; only that they were obeying the rules. And they certainly were not loving others as much as they loved themselves.

The people know their leaders are trying to find occasion to arrest Jesus and kill him, and they wonder how it is that Jesus can appear and speak in public without the leaders doing anything to stop him.

3. The Jewish leaders then send the temple police to arrest Jesus, but when they tried to do so they were unable. Many people were accepting that Jesus was indeed the Messiah that God promised to send. Others were saying Jesus could not possibly be the Messiah because he came from an obscure area of the country, Galilee. There isn't anything in the scriptures, they thought, that predicts the Messiah will come from Galilee. How could this man be the Messiah? We know who his parents are and we know who his brothers are. No way is Jesus the Messiah. But the police listen to Jesus and just cannot get up the nerve to arrest him in the presence of the crowd of people listening.

John records some of the things Jesus says in reply. True, I am from Galilee, but I am also from God. God is sending me to do his will and to speak his message. If you listen to me you will be listening to God, but if you refuse to listen to me you will be refusing to listen to God.

4. Jesus has more to say. He says he will be around only a little longer. He will soon be going away and nobody will be able to find him. The people wonder where he is going. Away where? To the Greeks? Where could he possibly go that we could not find him? Does he plan to get the Greeks to rise up in revolt against the Romans and drive them out of the country? What's he talking about?

John then recalls Jesus saying something similar to his conversation with the Samaritan woman. "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink." And then John explains what this means from his own memory about subsequent events. He says Jesus is referring to the Holy Spirit, "Now he said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive; for as yet there was no Spirit because Jesus was not yet glorified." John knows about what happened after Jesus ascended to heaven, glorified. Pentecost happened. The Holy Spirit came upon them. And John knows that when that happened they were drinking the water that Jesus gave, the Water of Life. But that had not yet happened, so "as yet there was no Spirit."

5. We may note, again, that this incident of Jesus speaking in the temple results in some persons believing, others disbelieving. "So there was a division in the crowd because of him." John wants his parishioners in the Ephesus area to understand why and how this division of opinion had happened. John wants his readers to make up their own mind, based on what Jesus himself said. This too was written so that people may believe in Jesus and find life in him, the life of the Spirit which is the water from heaven given for us to drink.

6. One more interesting incident. About Nicodemus, the same leader of the Jews who earlier had come to Jesus by night inquiring about what Jesus was doing. Nicodemus wasn't ready to go along with the others who wanted to kill Jesus. This doesn't imply that he himself did believe yet in Jesus, though it seems that he was close to making that decision. He objected that they couldn't judge Jesus worthy of death without giving him a trial and making a decision after giving Jesus a chance to defend himself. Nicodemus didn't think they should proceed merely on the basis of what Jesus was saying in the temple, because that was confusing enough that they could not be sure what he was up to.

They accused Nicodemus of being on Jesus' side, and they challenged him to find anywhere in the prophets that said the Messiah would come from Galilee. Everybody knew, they insisted, that the Messiah would come from the city of David, Bethlehem. They did not seem to know that Jesus had been born there.

Chapter Fourteen

A WOMAN TAKEN IN ADULTERY

John 8:1-11

53Then each of them went home,1while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2Early in the morning he came again to the temple. All the people came to him and he sat down and began to teach them. 3The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery; and making her stand before all of them, 4they said to him, 'Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. 5Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?' 6They said this to test him, so that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, 'Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.' 8And once again he bent down and wrote on the ground. 9When they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the elders; and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. 10Jesus straightened up and said to her, 'Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?' 11She said, 'No one, sir.' And Jesus said, 'Neither do I condemn you. Go your way, and from now on do not sin again.'

1. Here we have another incident in the temple. John describes it as happening the next day after his encounter with the Jews who were trying to kill him. Though John does not say, we may assume that Jesus had friends living on the Mount of Olives, perhaps relatives or other friends, where he spent the night. Nor does John say this time what he began to talk about there in the temple.

John does have in mind an incident that he remembers happening in the temple, about a woman who was "caught in adultery."

2. Two items, however, before we study the incident itself.

a) We might today wonder about the man who must have been caught along with the woman. Wasn't he to be stoned also?

b) the footnote in NRSV says, "The most ancient authorities lack 7:53—8:11; other authorities add the passage here or after 7:36 or after 21:25 or after Luke 21:38, with variations of text; some mark the passage as doubtful." It seems as if this little story may have been written separately by someone else, and that when John read it he remembered the occasion and decided to include it in his memoirs of Jesus. Or perhaps the story offended some later scribe who expunged it from the manuscript he was transcribing. Who knows?

3. The scribes and Pharisees bring this woman to Jesus and ask him if she should be stoned to death. After all, they explained to Jesus, this is what God requires in the Torah. They were obviously looking for Jesus to say something for which they could have him condemned to death. If Jesus said yes she should be stoned, it might appear that he was insensitive to real people. If he said no he would be overruling the ancient Torah, the Law of God.

Jesus knew they were trying to trap him, so he stalled a bit to figure out a response, and then reversed the test to present a challenge to them. "Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her." Jesus was not denying the Law here but was challenging them to think that there might be other concerns to take into consideration than sheer disobedience to the Law.

But is there any other consideration that would justify us to set aside God's Law? Jesus knew they were strict legalists and would censure him for even an intimation that he did not take the Law, Torah, seriously. So of course Jesus knew they would hold even this evasive answer against him. Still he was forcing them to make a negative decision themselves.

4. None of his questioners dared to imply that he was without sin, so they, one by one, slipped away until none of them remained. Then Jesus, showing the compassion of God himself, advised the woman not to do it again, and the incident was over.

Does this way of dealing with adultery mean that Jesus is not serious about keeping God's law? The law was clear enough, but Jesus does not seem willing to enforce it. A woman caught in adultery must be stoned to death. That is not the question to ask. The question to ask is whether the woman's sin was serious enough to warrant death. Can it be forgiven so that the woman is saved from a life of sinful prostitution?

Jesus' handling of the situation suggests to us that, while the Torah's harsh punishment may have been necessary at the time it was given, the overall purpose of God is not to destroy people but to save them. Not to kill them but to enable them to live healthy and productive lives.

5. John does not record whether or not anyone believed in him as a result of this confrontation, not even the woman. So we may ask how does the story fit in with the purpose of his writing this Gospel?

It appears that John wants his doubting readers to understand why the Jewish authorities did _not_ believe in Jesus. Their orientation was the legalistic requirements of the ancient Law of Moses, the rules and regulations that now governed the religious life of the people. Jesus was coming to them with a bigger and broader message from God, a message that would make the Torah obsolete and would provide all people of whatever race the guidance they would need for becoming the kind of people God created them to be.

John has many more things to say in explication of Jesus' teachings and miracles, and this incident in the temple sets the stage for several more conversations Jesus has with the people in Jerusalem. These stories will, all of them, serve to explain why some people believed in Jesus while others sought to kill him.

Chapter Fifteen

CONVERSATION ABOUT THE FATHER

John 8:12-30

Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, 'I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.' 13Then the Pharisees said to him, 'You are testifying on your own behalf; your testimony is not valid.' 14Jesus answered, 'Even if I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is valid because I know where I have come from and where I am going, but you do not know where I come from or where I am going. 15You judge by human standards; I judge no one. 16Yet even if I do judge, my judgment is valid; for it is not I alone who judge, but I and the Father*;) who sent me. 17In your law it is written that the testimony of two witnesses is valid. 18I testify on my own behalf, and the Father who sent me testifies on my behalf.' 19Then they said to him, 'Where is your Father?' Jesus answered, 'You know neither me nor my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also.' 20He spoke these words while he was teaching in the treasury of the temple, but no one arrested him, because his hour had not yet come.

21 Again he said to them, 'I am going away, and you will search for me, but you will die in your sin. Where I am going, you cannot come.' 22Then the Jews said, 'Is he going to kill himself? Is that what he means by saying, "Where I am going, you cannot come"?' 23He said to them, 'You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. 24I told you that you would die in your sins, for you will die in your sins unless you believe that I am he.' 25They said to him, 'Who are you?' Jesus said to them, 'Why do I speak to you at all?*;) 26I have much to say about you and much to condemn; but the one who sent me is true, and I declare to the world what I have heard from him.' 27They did not understand that he was speaking to them about the Father. 28So Jesus said, 'When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things as the Father instructed me. 29And the one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what is pleasing to him.' 30As he was saying these things, many believed in him.

1. In this conversation Jesus claims to be the "light of the world." That is really an astounding claim to make. The whole world should follow him in order never to "walk in darkness"? This man whom we all know comes from nowhere and has no pedigree that anyone knows about?

The Pharisees voice this objection. You say so, but why should we believe you?

Jesus replies, Yes, I do say so. But there is someone else who also says so: God, my Father in heaven.

This conversation sets up the explanation that John wants to bring to his readers' attention at this point in his narrative: the question of the Father and how the Father is working in and through the life of Jesus.

2. Jesus has affirmed that everyone in the world should follow him since he is the light by which humanity should be living. The Pharisees have objected that he has no proof of what he is saying, and when Jesus cites the authority of the Father they present another objection. Who is your Father and where is he? We would like to interview him and hear what he says.

3. Jesus' answer is enigmatic, as often it is when conversing with Pharisees. If you recognized who I am you would have recognized who my Father is. Jesus means that God has sent him into the world to bring a divine message from God himself.

In the back of John's mind there is the situation that the Pharisees valued the Torah, the Law of God, very highly. They knew the God who gave the Torah. Jesus knows himself to be sent by the same God who sent the Torah, so if the Jewish leaders really knew God because of their devotion to the Torah they should also recognize that God also sent Jesus. God sent the Torah a millennium ago; he is now sending another messenger, Jesus. The same God. Jesus' Father.

But since the Pharisees do not recognize Jesus as coming from the same God who gave the Torah, they don't know the Father at all. That's the point of what John is writing in this section of his Gospel.

4. There is now a little break in the story that John is telling. (Perhaps it's the next day for John.) Anyway John picks up the story with Jesus saying, I won't be around much longer. I'll be going away and where I'm going you cannot come. You will never find me. You will die in your sin.

There is a double meaning in what Jesus says. Yes, he will be going away physically, but why this guarantees that the Pharisees will die in their sins is not clear.

There are two kinds of "seeking" involved in Jesus' meaning. After he is crucified, buried, risen and ascended nobody will be able to follow him there physically. He won't be available to lead an army against the might of Rome. But they can follow him in the sense of believing him and living in his light. This would be a moral or spiritual kind of seeking, not a physical seeking and finding.

So Jesus is saying to the Pharisees that even if they would eventually want to find Jesus and follow him as their leader into battle against Rome, they will not find him. But since they refuse to follow him in the moral sense they will die without finding the life Jesus provides; they will die in their sins.

5. The Jews ask Jesus directly, Who are you? They want to know if Jesus regards himself as the Jewish Messiah, the man to lead the nation into independence and who will then sit on David's throne in Jerusalem. Jesus does not give a straight answer, but in the conversation replies, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I am he, and that I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things as the Father instructed me."

The Pharisees would have no notion of what Jesus meant by saying, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man." Lifted up? How so? Lifted up to the throne in Jerusalem? Lifted up as the military general to lead the revolution? Jesus, as we know from later developments, meant lifted up on the cross to die.

Jesus is saying that the Jews would not understand who Jesus was, that is, what the true Messiah of the Jews was going to do, until after he dies. Until after he dies, but also until after God raises him back to life. They are not able to comprehend Jesus' words at the moment (neither can the disciples) but when the events of crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and Pentecost have transpired, then they will be able to figure out what God is doing through his Son, the Son of Man. They will be able to think back to these conversations and finally understand that it was indeed their God who sent Jesus as their Messiah.

6. "As he was saying these things, many believed in him." So here we have again the conclusion of the story that we have now come to expect. Many believed. We understand also that many did not believe.

If we today try to put ourselves into the mentality of John's first readers in Ephesus we will come to see that Jesus is gradually leading the Jewish people as a whole, as an entire nation, to come to the point of making up their minds about him. Are they going to accept him as their Messiah sent by God or not? Some people believe he is the Messiah, not only because of his miracles but also now because of his words of explanation.

None of them yet understand what God is sending the Messiah to do. They have that wrong but they are coming to believe that Jesus is genuinely the Man whom God is sending. John will be wanting his readers to come to that faith and also to a better understanding of the work of the Lord Jesus. The stories he tells about Jesus will gradually do for his readers what Jesus was doing for the Jews, challenging them to make up their minds about Jesus and about what God is accomplishing through him.

Chapter Sixteen

A CONVERSATION ABOUT FATHER ABRAHAM

John 8:31-59

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, 'If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; 32and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.' 33They answered him, 'We are descendants of Abraham and have never been slaves to anyone. What do you mean by saying, "You will be made free"?'

34 Jesus answered them, 'Very truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. 35The slave does not have a permanent place in the household; the son has a place there for ever. 36So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. 37I know that you are descendants of Abraham; yet you look for an opportunity to kill me, because there is no place in you for my word. 38I declare what I have seen in the Father's presence; as for you, you should do what you have heard from the Father.'

39 They answered him, 'Abraham is our father.' Jesus said to them, 'If you were Abraham's children, you would be doing*;) what Abraham did, 40but now you are trying to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did. 41You are indeed doing what your father does.' They said to him, 'We are not illegitimate children; we have one father, God himself.' 42Jesus said to them, 'If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and now I am here. I did not come on my own, but he sent me. 43Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot accept my word. 44You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. 46Which of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? 47Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God.'

48 The Jews answered him, 'Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?' 49Jesus answered, 'I do not have a demon; but I honor my Father, and you dishonor me. 50Yet I do not seek my own glory; there is one who seeks it and he is the judge. 51Very truly, I tell you, whoever keeps my word will never see death.' 52The Jews said to him, 'Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham died, and so did the prophets; yet you say, "Whoever keeps my word will never taste death." 53Are you greater than our father Abraham, who died? The prophets also died. Who do you claim to be?' 54Jesus answered, 'If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my Father who glorifies me, he of whom you say, "He is our God", 55though you do not know him. But I know him; if I were to say that I do not know him, I would be a liar like you. But I do know him and I keep his word. 56Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day; he saw it and was glad.' 57Then the Jews said to him, 'You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?' 58Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am.' 59So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.

1. Jesus begins this conversation with people who _do_ believe in him. But note well, by the time this story ends Jesus is arguing with people who _do_ _not_ believe. Not only do they not believe but they begin to stone him in utter disbelief. That violence presages the violence with which the nation will reject Jesus and maneuver to have him executed.

We may understand that although Jesus begins by instructing his followers, there are others present who listen in on the conversation and object to what Jesus is saying.

2. Jesus begins this conversation with a very profound observation, "If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." Earlier John has quoted Jesus saying, "I am the truth." Now Jesus is building on that fact. If people truly believe in Jesus they too will know the truth. To know Jesus and his purpose as given by God is to know the truth. Jesus incarnates God's truth, so to believe what Jesus is and says is to know God's truth.

The result of knowing the truth of God in Jesus is to be set free. That's what Jesus says. If you become Jesus' disciples, disciplined by his word, then what Jesus says will set you free.

2. Set free from what? It's a new concept for them, and as usual they didn't get past the physical aspect of it. They are under the control of the Roman occupation army, true, but that doesn't mean they are slaves. They do indeed want to gain their freedom from Rome, but how in the world can that happen just by listening to Jesus, by believing what he says? How will that drive out the soldiers and governors from Rome?

So they complain, we've never been slaves to anyone, not even now to Rome. We're descendants of Abraham, and except for that slavery of our ancestors in Egypt we've been a free nation. What do you mean, Jesus, by setting us free? Free from what?

3. Jesus answers clearly enough, "You are slaves of sin." Jesus does not want his hearers to think in terms of political or social slavery, nor does the writer John want his readers in Asia Minor to think so. Slavery is moral slavery, such things as addiction or idolatry or some false way of understanding life and its responsibilities.

It's this kind of slavery from which Jesus came to set people free.

4. Then Jesus addresses the subject of Father Abraham. At this point Jesus, as well as John, is concerned primarily with the Jewish self-image. Jewish people look to Abraham as the father of their nation, he being called out from Babylonian polytheistic religion, as well as being the original of the divine covenant by which the Jewish people practiced their religion. Jesus says, "If you were Abraham's children, you would be doing what Abraham did, but now you are trying to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did."

In these words Jesus is saying that Abraham did not reject the word of God when it came to him long ago. Rather, he heard God speaking and he listened and he obeyed. Jesus says God is again speaking to the people but they are not hearing God speaking and they are not listening and they are not obeying. Instead they are trying to kill the messenger of God who brings God's word. If you really are Abraham's children, Jesus is saying, you would not reject me, you would listen and follow me.

5. The conversation moves on from Father Abraham to Father God. The Jewish leaders imply that just as Abraham is the father of the people of Israel, so too is God. Perhaps they recall that God established his covenant with Abraham and again with Moses and the liberated slaves from Egypt. But Jesus replies that if they were really children of God they would recognize and listen to the voice of God, which they are not doing. "Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God."

Jesus is bringing the word of God to the people of Israel, but they are not accepting Jesus as the angel of God bearing the divine message of salvation. Instead they are close to killing the messenger. How can they be children of God if they reject the message of God?

6. To raise now an ancillary question: how is it possible for the Apostle John to remember after fifty or so years the exact words that Jesus used in his conversations? One solution might be that John remembers the conversation and the subjects being discussed, recalling also the general thrust of Jesus' answers, but not necessarily the exact sequence and choice of words. In that scenario we would understand that God inspired John to do precisely that, remember and report the substance of the conversation, if not the exact terminology.

7. The conversation now moves on to the subject of death, and Jesus speaks in such a way that the Jewish leaders are compelled to consider that Jesus is employing the term in a way that is unfamiliar to them. "Very truly, I tell you, whoever keeps my word will never see death."

Everybody dies, they replied, Abraham did and so did all the prophets. Who are you to say people who follow you will not ever die?

Of course, Jesus did not mean never die physically. He meant never die spiritually. Never live again under the domination of sin and evil and Satan. Then Jesus says some enigmatic words, "Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day; he saw it and was glad."

Now that really mystified his hearers. Abraham died long ago, how could he ever have seen you?

Well, Abraham did not literally see Jesus, he foresaw the time, the day, of Jesus. In his new orientation to life, Abraham could visualize a time when a large nation would come from his ancestors, and that this nation would become the holy nation that the monotheistic God whom he served would shape. Abraham would have envisioned what Jesus was doing, how God was forming a holy nation, and even beyond that, that God would expand this blessing to be a benefit to all nations. That is what was in Jesus' mind.

8. Still, the Jews did not understand. They did not understand that Abraham could foresee dimly what Jesus was doing. But was Jesus really saying he had seen Abraham? No wonder they were perplexed! Jesus simply was not alive yet when God called Abraham out of Babylonian polytheism. Jesus would have to be a lot older than fifty years if he were to have seen Abraham!

Jesus replied, "Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am." Jesus is not implying that he was alive as God at that distant time. He is implying that what God was doing then is coming to fruition now. What began with Abraham's promise that all nations would be blessed through him is now coming true. Jesus will be bringing life to all nations by means of the gospel. What Jesus is about now is what Abraham was about then.

And both of those endeavors existed in the plan of God from eternity, long before the time of either Abraham or Jesus. We might even suppose that in Jesus' mind, when he employed the term "I AM," he means the old Hebrew name for God, Yahweh. Even before Abraham lived, and certainly before I came along, God existed, and in his mind was everything that both Abraham and I are doing. Before Abraham, before me, God IS, and both of us are working out his eternal plan for the human race.

9. "So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple."

We need to bear in mind what the Apostle John is doing in his Gospel. He is trying to persuade his readers, especially those in his immediate area, to believe in Jesus. In order to do that he has to do at least two things: show the genuine purpose of Jesus clearly, and explain why his own people rejected him.

This conversation does both. Jesus explains how his own message is a genuine message from God, and he explains why the people misunderstood him and threw stones at him. God's purpose was always, all the way back to creation and Abraham and Israel, to the present message of Jesus, to bring the human race to a life of truth and justice and goodness of all kinds. The Jewish people simply did not get the point, thinking they already did everything God wanted, and so they refused to listen. But all those who do believe, who are convinced Jesus is right, do come to the light and do begin to live godly lives.

So sometimes John's stories end with people believing, but at other times the stories end with people throwing stones at Jesus, and later crucifying him.

Chapter Seventeen

A MAN BORN BLIND

John 9:1-41

As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2His disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?' 3Jesus answered, 'Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him. 4We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming when no one can work. 5As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.' 6When he had said this, he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and spread the mud on the man's eyes, 7saying to him, 'Go, wash in the pool of Siloam' (which means Sent). Then he went and washed and came back able to see. 8The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar began to ask, 'Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?' 9Some were saying, 'It is he.' Others were saying, 'No, but it is someone like him.' He kept saying, 'I am the man.' 10But they kept asking him, 'Then how were your eyes opened?' 11He answered, 'The man called Jesus made mud, spread it on my eyes, and said to me, "Go to Siloam and wash." Then I went and washed and received my sight.' 12They said to him, 'Where is he?' He said, 'I do not know.'

13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. 14Now it was a sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. 15Then the Pharisees also began to ask him how he had received his sight. He said to them, 'He put mud on my eyes. Then I washed, and now I see.' 16Some of the Pharisees said, 'This man is not from God, for he does not observe the sabbath.' But others said, 'How can a man who is a sinner perform such signs?' And they were divided. 17So they said again to the blind man, 'What do you say about him? It was your eyes he opened.' He said, 'He is a prophet.'

18 The Jews did not believe that he had been blind and had received his sight until they called the parents of the man who had received his sight 19and asked them, 'Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How then does he now see?' 20His parents answered, 'We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind; 21but we do not know how it is that now he sees, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself.' 22His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; for the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessed Jesus to be the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. 23Therefore his parents said, 'He is of age; ask him.'

24 So for the second time they called the man who had been blind, and they said to him, 'Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.' 25He answered, 'I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.' 26They said to him, 'What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?' 27He answered them, 'I have told you already, and you would not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?' 28Then they reviled him, saying, 'You are his disciple, but we are disciples of Moses. 29We know that God has spoken to Moses, but as for this man, we do not know where he comes from.' 30The man answered, 'Here is an astonishing thing! You do not know where he comes from, and yet he opened my eyes. 31We know that God does not listen to sinners, but he does listen to one who worships him and obeys his will. 32Never since the world began has it been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind. 33If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.' 34They answered him, 'You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?' And they drove him out.

35 Jesus heard that they had driven him out, and when he found him, he said, 'Do you believe in the Son of Man?' 36He answered, 'And who is he, sir? Tell me, so that I may believe in him.' 37Jesus said to him, 'You have seen him, and the one speaking with you is he.' 38He said, 'Lord,*;) I believe.' And he worshipped him. 39Jesus said, 'I came into this world for judgment so that those who do not see may see, and those who do see may become blind.' 40Some of the Pharisees near him heard this and said to him, 'Surely we are not blind, are we?' 41Jesus said to them, 'If you were blind, you would not have sin. But now that you say, "We see", your sin remains.

1. Here is another story to reinforce the general purpose of John's Gospel, namely to show how persons have been drawn into the faith and find life in Jesus.

2. Jesus is walking along the streets of Jerusalem and meets a young man who has been blind his entire life. This young man is well-known in the city because he has been on the street corner for years asking for alms to support himself.

The disciples are curious about this person. They want to know what purpose, if any, this blind man serves in the plan of God. Why did God make him blind? Why is he being punished? Whose fault is it? "Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" What is God saying to us by means of this blind man?

Jesus replied to their question, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him." The disciples had assumed that the young man's blindness was a punishment for some sin committed either by the parents or by the son himself. Not so, says Jesus. But what does Jesus mean by saying this young man is blind in order that God's works can be revealed through him?

For example, does Jesus mean this for every blind person or just for this particular man? Does Jesus intend this observation to apply to deaf people, to crippled people, to mentally retarded people, to sexually disoriented people, to everyone who has some physical defect? Or just to this one individual? How inclusive does Jesus intend this observation to be?

There does not seem to be any indication in the story at large to think Jesus has all defects in mind. It seems that he means only this one man, so that Jesus is saying that God gave this person blindness at birth precisely in view of the time later that Jesus would come to heal him and to thus bear witness to the glory of God and the integrity of Jesus himself.

3. Jesus required the blind man to make a response of faith before being healed. He had to go to a nearby pool and wash the mud off his eyes that Jesus had put over them. The incident is reminiscent of the requirement that Prophet Elisha had made of General Naaman before that eminent person could be healed of his leprosy: go wash in the Jordan River seven times.

Jesus did not simply go about the country or city doing random miracles of healing just to get attention. Often he would require an action or word of faith and trust. In fact there is one instance where it is said that he would do no miracles in that city because of their unbelief. (Matthew 13:58)

John explains the situation in such a way that shows how the healing itself provided the occasion for the young man to testify to the power of Jesus. Are you the blind man who has been always sitting on the street corner begging? Yes, I am he. How then did you get your vision? The man put mud on my eyes and old me to wash in the pool of Siloam. Who did that? I don't know; some man.

4. There may have been a health regulation in those days that required a person who had been seriously ill to be brought to the authorities for certification of his healing. In any case, this young man was brought before the Jewish authorities and interviewed about how he gained his sight.

Who was it who healed you? I don't know.

But later in the day he met Jesus in the temple, ascertained that it was Jesus who had healed him, and then reported it to the authorities. The authorities do not believe his story, so they contact his parents and interviewed them. Such things simply cannot happen.

Is this your son? Yes. You say he was born blind? Yes. Well then, how is that he now can see? We don't know, ask him, he's old enough to answer. The parents may well have heard their son explain, but were intimidated by the authorities, fearful of some kind of punishment.

5. So the young man was called in for a second time and questioned again. But I told you everything already. Well, what do you think about this Jesus, who you claim healed you? I think he's a prophet.

Well, he can't be a prophet sent by God. We have Moses and the prophets and it just isn't possible that this Jesus comes as the messiah from God. He would not do these things on the sabbath day, breaking God's law, if he were from God.

You can say that, but isn't it strange that he did as a matter of fact give me my vision if he isn't from God? All I know is that once I was blind but now I can see.

6. They sent the happy young man out of the courtroom and he met Jesus again outside. Jesus asked him, "Do you believe in the Son of Man?" Jesus meant the messiah sent by God. The man wondered who this might be. Jesus explained that it was himself, the man who had healed him. The man who had been blind but who could now see said, "I believe."

7. And John then adds another point made by Jesus. That is why I have come into the world, so that the blind may see and those who think they see may realize they are blind.

The Pharisees who heard the conversation challenged Jesus, Are you implying that we are blind?

Jesus answered, Yes, you are still in the darkness of sin. People who do not live in Jesus, who is the Light of the World, do indeed live in the darkness, in their sin. John includes this comment from Jesus for the benefit of those original readers who themselves may still be undecided, indirectly suggesting that they too may be living in darkness. As, of course, for all who read it today as well.

Chapter Eighteen

A SHEEP ANALOGY

John 10:1-21

'Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.' 6Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them.

7 So again Jesus said to them, 'Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.

11 'I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. 17For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. 18No one takes*;) it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.'

19 Again the Jews were divided because of these words. 20Many of them were saying, 'He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why listen to him?' 21Others were saying, 'These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?'

1. Here John writes, not about a miracle leading to someone's conversion, but about the relationship between Jesus and those who do believe in him. He remembers this conversation when Jesus employed this well-known figure of speech: the relationship of sheep to the shepherd. People who believe in Jesus are like the sheep that confidently follow the man they know as their shepherd.

2. Clear though the analogy may seem to us, the people to whom Jesus spoke these words did not understand. So what was going through their minds? They were thinking of Jesus as a potential Messiah, a man who might be the person God is sending to drive out the Romans and lead us to national independence, the man who might soon become their king in Jerusalem.

So what does that have to do with herding sheep? What do sheep have to do with getting the revolution started? Gathering soldiers? Organizing an army? Stockpiling weapons? What are you getting at, Jesus, with this obscure figure of speech about sheep and shepherds?

3. So Jesus changes the metaphor a bit. He says, I am the gate for the sheep. And then Jesus goes on to talk in a context totally unfamiliar to his hearers. He talks about being saved, not about fighting the Romans. He explains in direct language why he has come. Not to fight for Jewish national independence, but "that they may have life, and have it abundantly."

What people have to do is not get ready for a long war but enter a gate. What gate? Jesus is the gate. They must first recognize Jesus for the person God is truly sending, and they must then believe in Jesus and follow him wherever he leads them.

Perhaps the people might understand a bit of that. They may have thought, OK, Jesus is getting ready for something and is asking us to follow him. We don't exactly know what he has in mind; he talks strange. But if he does turn out to be the messiah he wants us to follow him into battle against the Roman occupation army. He's the gate we have to go through to get to independence. OK, we can do that. But let him get to the point and let us know what he has in mind, how to get started.

If the people noticed the terminology Jesus used, words about being saved and having life, they would have been thinking of a glorious future when the throne of David would be re-established in Jerusalem and they would enter a glorious age of independence and domination of the area. Saved from Roman taxation, having life in a second golden age. But as we know, Jesus had none of that in mind.

4. Jesus revises the analogy once again. Now he is the good shepherd. He is not a hired hand. He is the owner of the sheep, the person whose livelihood depends on having the sheep and who therefore does everything necessary to protect and care for the flock. Not running away when the wolf comes, but staying even to the point of giving up his life.

So now what would the people think about that revised analogy? Our Messiah, when he comes, and just maybe this strange person Jesus will turn out to be the one, when he comes he will lead the battle. He will not run away like a mercenary soldier but will fight even to the point of being killed in battle. That wouldn't happen, of course, because the Messiah has to live to become our new King David. But he will be as dedicated to the people of Israel as a good shepherd is dedicated to his sheep. Very good.

But of course this is not what Jesus was telling them. He was already here intimating what the people will do to him once they are convinced he does not intend to lead a revolution against Rome. They will kill him. But the people, and also Jesus' disciples if they were there, missed his point altogether.

5. At this point John quotes Jesus specifying some implications of what he has said about laying down his life. "And I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold."

When we look back on these words from the vantage point of more than two thousand years later, we can see fairly clearly what Jesus meant. He is talking about non-Jewish people when he talks about other sheep who are not in the fold of the Jewish nation. But the people who were there at the time would have no such vantage point and so would have little notion of what Jesus meant.

They may have thought, Maybe he has in mind that some others, like maybe Samaritans, or possibly proselytes, can be part of the new kingdom he sets up. After all, there were some others who came out of Egypt with Moses at the time of the exodus, and David himself had some Moabite ancestry. So OK, a few others can be accepted. But the people would not understand at all what Jesus was predicting, that the gospel would be going out to the Gentile world.

6. John now recalls some very profound words that Jesus spoke, words that would certainly have totally baffled his hearers, though we today know how they were fulfilled. "For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father."

To best appreciate this conversation we need to put ourselves into the mindset of the people for whom John was writing in his neighborhood of Asia Minor. Many of them were likely hearing or reading this for the first time, not knowing perhaps what happened to Jesus, or why. Does John want us to believe in this man? We're not Jews. Why is he telling us this story about a Jew fifty years ago? What's so important about him?

John himself, of course, is writing things he remembers, and not necessarily all in the exact order Jesus spoke them. But John is putting together the story of Jesus, showing how he slowly but systematically led the people to come to a major public and even national decision about Jesus, all from the perspective of where the people were in their expectations for a Messiah. The climax would come when the people as a whole finally decided, in spite of the incredible miracles Jesus performed by God's power in him, that Jesus was a false Messiah.

Jesus refused to do what the people expected him to do as a Messiah, and when the people finally got the point they turned _en masse_ against him, clamoring to have him executed.

7. But Jesus explains that no one is taking his life away from him; on the contrary he is laying it down of his own initiative. Jesus knows that in order to accomplish what God wants him to do, namely bring the people to repentance, faith, and new life in the Spirit, he will have to let them do to him whatever they wish. So he puts himself at the mercy of the people, knowing all the while that they will turn against him and turn him over to the Romans for crucifixion.

The point is that the people will not come to faith until they see the enormity of their sin. And they will not see that until they see how totally contrary to the will of God their decision against Jesus really is.

8. And they will not appreciate any of that until they see that the man they put to death has been raised back to life. So Jesus explains ahead of time that he has the power to come back to life. God has given him this assurance. That is why Jesus willingly allowed the people to crucify him, knowing that this was the only way he could convince them of their wrongdoing after he rose from the dead.

After the resurrection the people will realize that God had reversed their decision. And when that happened, when they saw clearly that Jesus was God's Messiah, alive again after he was dead, they would be in mind to believe, repent, and follow him regardless of whether or not he would drive out the Romans.

So John writes this information for the sake of the people wondering why Jesus should be followed even if he was rejected by the nation of Jews a generation or two ago. They too must come to the point of genuine repentance and faith in Jesus. John is answering their questions about who this Jesus is and why things happened to him the way they did.

9. Backing off a bit, we may appreciate how John segues from the analogy of a shepherd willing to lay down his life to protect his sheep from predatory wolves into this conclusion about Jesus willing to die as a result of the peoples' rejection, only to raised back to life by the authority of God.

And also appreciate why John puts in at this point the information that Jesus has sheep in other folds, so that all his sheep, all who believe in him, will become sheep in one pasture, in one sheepfold. The Gentile people who read John's Gospel and come to believe and to share the life of the Spirit will become as much a part of Jesus' flock as the original Jewish people, most of whom chose not to believe, not to come to life in the Spirit, and thus not to become part of Jesus' flock. Everyone is welcome, regardless of national origin.

10. However, at this point in John's story of Jesus, the people had not yet come to a common decision about whether or not Jesus was their Messiah. Some said No; others said Maybe. "Many of them were saying, 'He has a demon and is out of his mind. Why listen to him?' Others were saying, 'These are not the words of one who has a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?'"

Author John would similarly be thinking to himself as he was planning and writing, someone who is reading this story could well be at the same point, arguing both sides in his own mind. Lots of things Jesus says make little sense, so why should I pay attention? Still, there does seem to be some meaning there that I don't yet understand, so maybe I should put off a rejection at least for now.

Chapter Nineteen

PROOF FOR JESUS' AUTHORITY

John 10:22-42

At that time the festival of the Dedication took place in Jerusalem. It was winter, 23and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the portico of Solomon. 24So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, 'How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.' 25Jesus answered, 'I have told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name testify to me; 26but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep. 27My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. 28I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. 29What my Father has given me is greater than all else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father's hand. 30The Father and I are one.'

31 The Jews took up stones again to stone him. 32Jesus replied, 'I have shown you many good works from the Father. For which of these are you going to stone me?' 33The Jews answered, 'It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you, but for blasphemy, because you, though only a human being, are making yourself God.' 34Jesus answered, 'Is it not written in your law, "I said, you are gods"? 35If those to whom the word of God came were called "gods"—and the scripture cannot be annulled—36can you say that the one whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheming because I said, "I am God's Son"? 37If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me. 38But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand*;) that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.' 39Then they tried to arrest him again, but he escaped from their hands.

40 He went away again across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing earlier, and he remained there. 41Many came to him, and they were saying, 'John performed no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true.' 42And many believed in him there.

1. Considerable time had elapsed since Jesus began his public ministry, perhaps most of three years. Jesus had been gaining public curiosity as a result of his numerous miracles all around the country, including the capital city Jerusalem. The Jews were getting "antsy," as we say, as to whether or not Jesus was really the Messiah that God was sending. Are you the messiah, they asked, are you the Christ?

Certain things about Jesus suggested, yes, he could very well be the Christ (Messiah). Other things suggested, maybe not. He had been working miracles of various kinds, so that seemed to suggest that God was indeed sending him. Ordinary people just did not accomplish such deeds; they could very well be signs that he came with the authority of God. On the other hand, Jesus did not seem to be doing the things that needed to be done if he was really preparing to gather an army to drive out the Roman soldiers.

So in this conversation recorded by John we see the Jewish people, presumably the leaders of the people, identified elsewhere as scribes or Pharisees or priests, challenging Jesus to say either yes or no, "Tell us plainly if you are the Messiah."

2. They are in Solomon's temple, having been refurbished beautifully by King Herod. Jesus replies, Why do you keep asking me the same question again? I've told you time and time again, Yes, I am the Christ who is sent to you by God. Why don't you believe me?

Jesus, of course, knows full well why they don't believe him. It's because their idea of a Christ, a Messiah, is not the same as God's idea. Jesus understands well enough that what his audience expects from a Messiah is not what God is intending the Messiah to do. There is a misconnect there. The Jewish people want their Messiah to set up an independent Jewish kingdom in which God's people can construct a nation on the basis of the Law of God, the ancient Torah of Moses.

God, on the contrary, is about to give the people something much better than the Torah; he is about to give them a new control, a new covenant, something which will actually make them a holy nation. The ancient Torah did what it could but was unsuccessful because just obeying rules did not change the heart; it produced outward conformity but not inner integrity. God was now sending Jesus as his representative to bring his people into a higher stage of obedience and holiness.

The Jewish people do not yet understand this, and Jesus knows this well enough. Further, Jesus knows that they will not understand until after they make a public decision about Jesus and afterward come to see that their decision was wrong. Only by making that wrong decision will they eventually see that Jesus was right and they were wrong, and then come to repentance and faith and a new spirit of obedience to God. The time for that decision is coming closer and closer. Soon Jesus will force the people into a time of public and corporate decision about Jesus, about whether or not he is God's Messiah.

3. The Jewish people pick up stones to throw at Jesus. Jesus asks, ironically, for which of his miracles are they stoning him? The people reply, Not for your good deeds but for blasphemy; you seem to make yourself equal to God. "It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you, but for blasphemy, because you, though only a human being, are making yourself God."

Why did they accuse Jesus of making himself God? Because Jesus had said, "The Father and I are one." As in so many other conversations the people did not understand what Jesus was saying. Jesus had no intention of saying he was God. He was saying only what he had said several times before, namely that what he said and did was nothing more than what God gave him to say and do. They were one, not in the sense of metaphysical existence, but in their respective purposes. Jesus was doing precisely and exactly what God gave him to do.

Jesus adds, I never said I was God, I said I am God's Son. And he explains that by saying he is doing the works of the Father, the things God gives him to do. "But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father." Jesus is urging them to recognize that the miracles he performs should be enough to convince them that he was in his Father's will and that God was indeed working through Jesus.

4. John ends this segment of his story by connecting with John the Baptist again. Jesus is at the Jordan River where John the Baptist had been preaching and baptizing, and some of the people remembered what he had said about Jesus. They remembered that all of those things were true, and they recognized that Jesus had done even more than the Baptist. "John performed no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true." Jesus had proved himself to be the Messiah, just as John the Baptist said, and had done so by his numerous miracles.

As we have seen repeatedly and now expect again, we read, "And many believed in him there." The testimony of John the Baptist has come to be recognized as actually true, and that led to their believing in Jesus.

Chapter Twenty

LAZARUS

John 11:1-45

Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha. 2Mary was the one who anointed the Lord with perfume and wiped his feet with her hair; her brother Lazarus was ill. 3So the sisters sent a message to Jesus, 'Lord, he whom you love is ill.' 4But when Jesus heard it, he said, 'This illness does not lead to death; rather it is for God's glory, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.' 5Accordingly, though Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus, 6after having heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.

7 Then after this he said to the disciples, 'Let us go to Judea again.' 8The disciples said to him, 'Rabbi, the Jews were just now trying to stone you, and are you going there again?' 9Jesus answered, 'Are there not twelve hours of daylight? Those who walk during the day do not stumble, because they see the light of this world. 10But those who walk at night stumble, because the light is not in them.' 11After saying this, he told them, 'Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.' 12The disciples said to him, 'Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will be all right.' 13Jesus, however, had been speaking about his death, but they thought that he was referring merely to sleep. 14Then Jesus told them plainly, 'Lazarus is dead. 15For your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.' 16Thomas, who was called the Twin,*;) said to his fellow-disciples, 'Let us also go, that we may die with him.'

17 When Jesus arrived, he found that Lazarus*;) had already been in the tomb for four days. 18Now Bethany was near Jerusalem, some two miles away, 19and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother. 20When Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, while Mary stayed at home. 21Martha said to Jesus, 'Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.' 23Jesus said to her, 'Your brother will rise again.' 24Martha said to him, 'I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.' 25Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, 26and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?' 27She said to him, 'Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, the one coming into the world.'

28 When she had said this, she went back and called her sister Mary, and told her privately, 'The Teacher is here and is calling for you.' 29And when she heard it, she got up quickly and went to him. 30Now Jesus had not yet come to the village, but was still at the place where Martha had met him. 31The Jews who were with her in the house, consoling her, saw Mary get up quickly and go out. They followed her because they thought that she was going to the tomb to weep there. 32When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, 'Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.' 33When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. 34He said, 'Where have you laid him?' They said to him, 'Lord, come and see.' 35Jesus began to weep. 36So the Jews said, 'See how he loved him!' 37But some of them said, 'Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?'

38 Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. 39Jesus said, 'Take away the stone.' Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, 'Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead for four days.' 40Jesus said to her, 'Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?' 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upwards and said, 'Father, I thank you for having heard me. 42I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.' 43When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, 'Lazarus, come out!' 44The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, 'Unbind him, and let him go.'

45 Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.

1. Jesus was a good friend of this family of three siblings, Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, who lived in Bethany, a neighbor of Jerusalem. When the sisters informed Jesus that Lazarus was severely ill, Jesus surmised that this illness of Lazarus would prove to be fatal, but also that it would provide him an opportunity to confirm by an incredible miracle that God was sending him as the Messiah. So Jesus delayed coming to Bethany for two days to let the illness take its natural course to death.

2. The disciples of Jesus were skeptical of going back to the area of Jerusalem where just a short while earlier Jesus was about to be stoned to death. After Jesus gave the disciples another enigmatic explanation, Thomas, one of Jesus' disciples, said, "Let us also go, that we may die with him." (John could include this information because he had been there and heard what Thomas said.)

How genuine the disciples' loyalty to Jesus was at this time is questionable; think of what did happen some time later when Jesus was arrested in the garden of Gethsemane. Did they really think the man they were following as the Messiah would actually die? How could he rout the Roman army if he was dead?

3. By the time Jesus arrived at Bethany Lazarus had been buried for four days and his body had begun to give off a foul odor. Sister Martha heard that Jesus was on the way and she rushed out to meet him, only to chastise him for delaying so long in coming, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him." Did Martha really think Jesus could do something after Lazarus was in the tomb for four days? Who knows?

4. Jesus knew of course, irrespective of what was going through Martha's mind. He knew God would give him the ability to raise Lazarus from the dead. So Jesus did some more teaching for the benefit of Martha, and John records the conversation for the benefit of his readers.

Jesus initiates the conversation about life and death. He assures Martha that her brother "would rise again." Martha, as we might suspect from other conversations that John records, misunderstands Jesus. She thinks this will happen "in the resurrection on the last day." Presumably there was a belief at the time that at the end of the world there would be a general resurrection, and Martha believes that this would include Lazarus also.

But Jesus corrects her misunderstanding. He says simply, "I am the resurrection and the life." Resurrection is not at the end of the world, Jesus tells Martha, it is right here, right now. So he adds by way of explanation, "Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die." Lazarus has died but he will live because I am the resurrection. I am also the life, so that when Lazarus receives his life again he will never die. Do you believe that, Martha?

5. What does Martha believe? This is what John reports, "Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Messiah,*;) the Son of God, the one coming into the world." Martha believes that Jesus is the Messiah, sent by God.

But that isn't exactly what Jesus asked, is it? Jesus asked whether she believed Lazarus would never die. But even with this confession of faith Martha is putting her trust in Jesus, whatever it is that Jesus means and whatever he intends to do. That is all we can expect from anyone at that stage of Jesus' ministry.

We are able to understand better what Jesus had in mind, because we live on the other side of his death, resurrection, ascension, and Pentecost. We understand Jesus has in mind the life of the Holy Spirit. Once the Holy Spirit begins his work in us the life he gives never dies away. The changed life that comes to us when we believe in Jesus will never die.

6. Jesus knows what he will be doing, and he knows that God will do what he asks. But in order that the people present will understand, he prays first. "And Jesus looked upwards and said, 'Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.'"

And then he said in a loud voice so that nobody could mistake his command, "Lazarus, come out!" And that's what happened. The man who had been in the tomb four days stood up and walked out.

Notice that if Jesus had raised him soon after burial people might have suspected that Lazarus had not really died but was only in a swoon, similar to what some people think about the resurrection of Jesus. But Lazarus had been dead long enough for his body to begin to decay and give off a stench. There could be no misunderstanding among those present that Jesus had indeed raised dead Lazarus back to life.

7. Author John appends the information we expect, "Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him." Believing in him, of course, at this point involved only that they believed God had sent Jesus to be their Messiah, as Martha confesses. It did not yet include all the significance of Jesus' death and resurrection and ascension. But even that beginning of belief would in most cases be sufficient to carry them through to the more enlightened faith for which Jesus was preparing them (it wasn't enough for Judas Iscariot, however).

8. Now let's stand back a bit and reflect on the way author John is developing his Gospel story. We may notice, for example, that in his depiction of Jesus' miracles there seems to be a progression of sorts. He begins with a story about Jesus' authority over water, making it into wine. He has other miracles also about feeding a large crowd with a boy's lunch. Then there some miracles over forces of nature, like stilling the storm on the sea of Galilee and walking on the water. Interspersed are the numerous accounts of healing people, and now as a kind of climax raising a man from the dead. From inanimate nature to humans, from healing disease to restoring life.

Then we may also note that since John knows the whole story from beginning to end, he is leading his readers step by step to understand the process by which Jesus is preparing the disciples and the Jewish people as a whole for what will be the ending: his death and resurrection. This story about Lazarus is a major step forward in that process; it prepares the people for recognizing that Jesus is in control of physical life as well as of holy life. The raising of Lazarus functions, accordingly, as a preview of his own resurrection to come in just a few weeks. The people will be somewhat prepared for it by this startling miracle of raising Lazarus. John is coming to the climax of his account of the ministry of Jesus, and he approaches it with clear intent.

Chapter Twenty-one

PLANS TO ARREST JESUS

John 11:45-57

Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him. 46But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what he had done. 47So the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the council, and said, 'What are we to do? This man is performing many signs. 48If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation.' 49But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, 'You know nothing at all! 50You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed.' 51He did not say this on his own, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus was about to die for the nation, 52and not for the nation only, but to gather into one the dispersed children of God. 53So from that day on they planned to put him to death.

54 Jesus therefore no longer walked about openly among the Jews, but went from there to a town called Ephraim in the region near the wilderness; and he remained there with the disciples.

55 Now the Passover of the Jews was near, and many went up from the country to Jerusalem before the Passover to purify themselves. 56They were looking for Jesus and were asking one another as they stood in the temple, 'What do you think? Surely he will not come to the festival, will he?' 57Now the chief priests and the Pharisees had given orders that anyone who knew where Jesus*;) was should let them know, so that they might arrest him.

1. This is a follow-up on Jesus' extraordinary feat of raising Lazarus from the dead. Some of Mary's friends who had witnessed the event did believe that Jesus was sent by God, but not all of them. Some reported the incident to the Pharisees who were known to oppose Jesus. The Pharisees in turn reported to the chief priests and the members of the Jewish Council, the Sanhedrin, which had limited responsibility under the Roman Governor.

2. John reports what was said at that meeting. How he knew we can only surmise. Perhaps he was there in person, perhaps someone told him. At any rate it is highly informative what was said because it explains clearly why these important leaders of the Jewish people opposed Jesus. "What are we to do? This man is performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both our holy place and our nation."

Note well that when these leaders spoke about believing in Jesus they meant believing he was the Messiah, which in turn meant believing Jesus would be leading them in rebellion against Rome. This was really what they were afraid of. They knew the Roman occupation force would be watching developments closely and if they detected any organized movement headed in the direction of revolution they would step in with sudden violence and crush the whole country. The leaders did not want this to happen.

As a sidelight we should recognize that thirty-five years later this actually did happen. The Jews started a rebellion against Rome in the year 66 and it was not until 70 that it was quelled. But in the meantime what the earlier Jews were afraid of did happen, the city of Jerusalem was destroyed and the nation was no longer functional. That was the time when John and Jesus' mother Mary moved away to Ephesus, where he is now writing this Gospel.

3. John records more that was said in the Sanhedrin. This time it is the High Priest Caiaphas who speaks, "You know nothing at all! You do not understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed." The High Priest is recommending that Jesus be put to death rather than letting his reputation increase to the point of drawing down Roman punishment on the nation for supporting revolution.

Caiaphas' advice carried the day at that decisive meeting. Once the Sanhedrin determined to have Jesus put to death nothing would change their minds, and there was no longer any possibility that Jesus would be allowed to gather an army and make preparations for revolt. Jesus may still be popular among the citizenry, and they might well push him to get started toward revolution, but the Sanhedrin would not allow that to happen.

4. John, however, put another twist on the words of the High Priest. John focuses on the words, "one man die for the people." There did come to be a meaning to those words that Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin did not suspect at this point.

Not only did Jesus die when all the people turned against him and clamored for his crucifixion, but John explains further than his death was for the purpose of "gathering into one the dispersed children of God." John is drawing attention to the larger purpose of God in sending his Son Jesus. Not to initiate armed rebellion but to attack sin and draw all nations into the kingdom of God.

It is somewhat ironic, is it not, that by the year AD 390 the Christian faith had conquered the Roman Empire to the extent that Christianity was declared officially to be the only legal religion in the empire. What the earlier Jews had wanted to accomplish by violence and warfare had been accomplished by the slow but powerful operation of the gospel of the Lord Jesus.

5. Knowing that he was in danger of being arrested Jesus "no longer walked openly among the Jews." We may understand that the time for this was not yet right. Jesus knew he would be arrested, tried, and executed, but not quite yet. He had to do something first to make sure his trial and execution would be a public affair, not something done in the shadows of obscurity.

Why must it be a public affair with the whole populace involved in rejecting him? Because Israel was God's people. God had been guiding the nation of Israel for centuries by means of the holy Torah, and now God had something even better to bring to them, and it was being delivered by Jesus. It must, accordingly, be the nation as a whole who responds to the message of Jesus, not merely a few individuals here and there. It must be all Israel, from the top officials down to the ordinary citizens.

So in a few days, or maybe weeks – the exact chronology is not that clear – Jesus will be doing something to force the nation as a whole to make a decision either for or against Jesus, and thereby a decision also for or against their God.

6. John explains in terms of the people's expectation. One of the annual feast days of the Jewish people had come and the people were wondering whether or not Jesus would show up. They were well aware that Jesus had become a _persona non grata_ among their chief priests and Pharisees. They kept asking themselves whether Jesus would somehow come and challenge the authority of the Sanhedrin. John does not tell us whether or not Jesus did show up – we may suspect he did not.

But in the next story that John writes Jesus does make a public appearance again, not in Jerusalem yet but in Bethany, the home of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. And that story will be the lead-in for the crucial events that bring on the conclusion of Jesus' ministry on earth.

Chapter Twenty-two

JESUS AT BETHANY

John 12:1-11

Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. 2There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. 3Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus' feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. 4But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, 5'Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii*;) and the money given to the poor?' 6(He said this not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief; he kept the common purse and used to steal what was put into it.) 7Jesus said, 'Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. 8You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.'

9 When the great crowd of the Jews learned that he was there, they came not only because of Jesus but also to see Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. 10So the chief priests planned to put Lazarus to death as well, 11since it was on account of him that many of the Jews were deserting and were believing in Jesus.

1. Bethany was close enough to Jerusalem for people to walk back and forth. That is where Jesus showed up after finding privacy farther away. As John knows, and also we know, this is the first step of Jesus toward the cross and the resurrection, just a week or so away now.

We might pause a bit here to reflect that this is the twelfth chapter of John's Gospel which has twenty-one chapters, so we are about half way through. It seems clear that John will go into much greater detail in the last half of his book, which covers mainly only a week, whereas the first half covered as much as three years.

2. Who was at the dinner given by Martha and Mary and Lazarus? John does not say, but we might guess that most if not all of the twelve disciples were present. Judas Iscariot only is mentioned by name.

Mary found a special way of welcoming Jesus. She was wealthy enough to possess a bottle of very expensive perfume. She took the bottle and instead of rubbing a bit of perfume into Jesus' skin, she emptied it totally on Jesus' head. The whole house smelled of it. What a weird thing to do! Was she in love with him, or only deeply respectful of God's Messiah? Then, of all things, she wiped up the moisture with her hair! John must have see it all.

John mentions two separate reactions by two of the persons there: Judas and Jesus.

3. Judas. Judas saw it as an enormous waste of money. All that expensive perfume just wasted by having it dumped on somebody's head – and a man at that! Could have been sold for a tidy sum of money and given to poor people.

John, knowing how the whole story would turn out, explains that Judas was not at all sincere in this comment. John knows that Judas is an untrustworthy treasurer of his group of disciples, occasionally pocketing sums of money that should stay in the common purse. Perhaps John makes this explanation in view of what he knows Judas will do next Thursday evening, betray Jesus.

4. Jesus. Jesus gives an alternate explanation of Mary's strange action. He describes it as anointing his body for burial! This was Jesus' way of trying to prepare everyone for the approaching time when he will be tried, condemned, and executed. His body is now anointed ahead of time for that burial ceremony.

Of course Jesus was not yet dead and buried, and so far as the disciples were concerned that just could not happen. How could he lead them against the Roman soldiers if he was dead? Maybe they thought even if he died he could be raised from the dead just as Lazarus had been. But certainly they were confused by these comments of Jesus about his approaching death. How could he become their king if he was dead?

One wonders also what was going through Judas' mind as Jesus made these observations. It is well possible that he was already doubting that Jesus would ever do what they all wanted him to do. He may have been close to rejecting Jesus already at this point. And of course Jesus would sense that.

5. Somehow the news that Jesus was in the vicinity spread around in Jerusalem. Crowds of people came out to see him. Jesus was now a public figure drawing the attention of the public at large. Not only did they want to see Jesus and watch the confrontation with the priests and Pharisees who everyone knew wanted desperately to arrest him, they also wanted a glimpse of the man Jesus had recently raised from the dead. Did that really happen? Could that man really have been dead and buried four days? Let's get a look at him. Is there anything different about him now?

6. And this incident serves John's purpose in writing the Gospel. The Jewish leaders see how popular Jesus has become because of this impressive miracle of raising Lazarus, so they add him to the list of people they have to get rid of. Lazarus, poor man, joins Jesus on the death list. We don't know whether or not they got to him as they did to Jesus.

The leaders of the Jewish nation have made up their minds. It remains yet for the public to make up their minds and then to get the deed done.

Chapter Twenty-three

JESUS ENTERS JERUSALEM

John 12:12-19

The next day the great crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem. 13So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting, 'Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord—the King of Israel!' 14Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it; as it is written:15 'Do not be afraid, daughter of Zion. Look, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey's colt!'

16His disciples did not understand these things at first; but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written of him and had been done to him. 17So the crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to testify. 18It was also because they heard that he had performed this sign that the crowd went to meet him. 19The Pharisees then said to one another, 'You see, you can do nothing. Look, the world has gone after him!'

1. A "great crowd" had come to the annual festival in Jerusalem. The news that Jesus was in the vicinity spread throughout the city, so when they heard he was on the way they went out to meet him. We may ask why?

The answer is in the things they shouted as they escorted him into the city. In their mind they were welcoming "the King of Israel." That was the general expectation regarding the Messiah that God would send. If this man Jesus is sent by God to be our Messiah, this is what he must do, he must become our king just as David was long ago.

We may well imagine that there might have been a bit of doubt in the crowd. Here's a would-be king. We'll have to wait and see if he does what a Messiah is supposed to do.

2. The other three Gospels tell the story in more detail, and we know it today as the Triumphant Entry. He finds a young donkey and rides in a kind of parade. John quotes from the Old Testament a prophecy that the king of Israel will come on a donkey's colt. (Zechariah 9:9)

It does seem that Jesus was concerned about continuity. He wants the people to know that what he is doing is altogether in line with what God has been doing in the past, and that he is indeed fulfilling the words of the ancient Hebrew prophets. Jesus knows that what the people are expecting him to do is not going to happen. Their expectations will not be met. Nonetheless it is important that they do accept at least this much, that God is indeed sending him. Jesus will find ways of building on that conviction even though the people will be nonplussed about it all.

3. John reminds us that even the disciples, of whom he was one, did not understand what was really going on at this point when Jesus was entering Jerusalem with so much public acclaim. "His disciples did not understand these things at first." John wants us to understand that even the disciples shared the public expectation that Jesus would be announcing that he was beginning a revolution.

They, together with the crowds, expected Jesus to enter the temple and with flaming rhetoric call the people to arms and thus get the war started. The Roman soldiers would try to quell the uprising. Jesus would have to flee to the desert or mountains, plan his campaign and strategy to fight for Jewish independence, and himself lead whatever army he could raise into actual battle.

So John is reminding his readers, both then and now, that nobody yet understood what Jesus was all about. Not until after all the disillusioning events of Jesus' passion would they be able to look back and figure out how it all fits together from Jesus' point of view.

4. John mentions again the incident of Lazarus. It was the miracle of raising this man from the dead that triggered the curiosity of many people in the crowd. Wow! Anybody who could raise people from the dead ought to be able to figure out a way to drive out the Romans. Who knows? Maybe he is God's Messiah after all! Let's go see anyway what he does now when he gets into Jerusalem and goes to the temple.

5. The Pharisees took it all in. They had already decided against Jesus but didn't have the courage to arrest him while he was receiving all that praise and adulation. John explains that what was happening is proof positive that they had to get rid of Jesus somehow. The Romans too will be seeing all this and they will take out their anger on all of us if we let Jesus start a rebellion. We simply must put a stop to it and the only way to do that is to put him to death. We can't do anything now so we will have to find a way to get the job done some other time.

Chapter Twenty-four

GREEK PROSELYTES SEEK JESUS

John 12:20-36

Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. 21They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, 'Sir, we wish to see Jesus.' 22Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. 23Jesus answered them, 'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

27 'Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—"Father, save me from this hour"? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. 28Father, glorify your name.' Then a voice came from heaven, 'I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.' 29The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, 'An angel has spoken to him.' 30Jesus answered, 'This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. 31Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. 32And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people*;) to myself.' 33He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die. 34The crowd answered him, 'We have heard from the law that the Messiah*;) remains for ever. How can you say that the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?' 35Jesus said to them, 'The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. 36While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.'

## 1. Why would Greeks come to Jerusalem to worship during the Passover festival? Presumably because they were what we today call proselytes, namely non-Jewish people who have been converted to Jewish faith. These people were accepted but not allowed to enter the inner courts of the temple.

## Why would they want to see Jesus? Presumably because they too were hearing incredible things about him and wanted to check them out also. Very likely they did not have the same notions about Jesus that the Jewish people had. They probably would have no expectations of the Jews becoming an independent nation, and they would be wondering what usefulness he might be to such converted Gentiles as they were. If Jesus is the Jewish Messiah that God is sending, what will that mean for us?

## 2. Jesus supplies a rather strange answer, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified." What did he mean by that? Regular Jews might have thought Jesus was about to announce himself to be king of the Jews, glorified in that sense.

## But Jesus explains further, using an analogy, "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit." Jesus is saying that for him to be glorified is not to be elevated to the Jewish throne, but to die. A farmer sows his seed, and when it decays in the ground it sends out new shoots and produces much grain. Jesus intends for the people to understand that when he dies he will be producing a great harvest.

## With this analogy Jesus wishes to have the Greek proselytes understand that his mission is not to become king on the Jewish throne, but something else. What kind of fruit will Jesus' death produce?

## He explains further, "Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life." John has quoted these words of Jesus before, and he means that Jesus' mission is to get people on the right track of godliness in their daily lives. Jesus will be dying soon physically, and he wants those who believe in him to die spiritually. But Jesus will also be rising again physically and he wants people to rise with him spiritually, converted from a life of sin to a life of holiness.

## Jesus sums it up with these words, "Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also." To follow Jesus is to do what he has just explained, to die with him and to rise with him. What Jesus will be going through physically must be paralleled by what believers experience spiritually, death and resurrection. And so the fruit of Jesus' glorification will be a great harvest of persons who do just that, move out of a life of ungodliness into a life of true godliness.

## 3. Jesus admits that his soul is troubled. John knows why because he was with Jesus all that time, and we know why because we have the whole story from the four Gospels. It was not going to be fun, as we might say, what Jesus knows will happen before the week is out. The people as a whole will turn against him when they finally see that he has no intention of doing what they expect him to do. They will join the Sanhedrin and the Pharisees in seeking his crucifixion as an imposter, and he will suffer the excruciating pain of slow death on a cross. I suppose most of us would be troubled if we knew that was in store for us.

## Jesus, however, will not seek to avoid that fate. He understands full well that this must be the climax of his ministry. He could not avoid the suffering without violating the reason God was sending him. He must continue to the end, knowing that the disillusionment about to come to the people must necessarily turn them all against him.

## 4. We may think about this a bit more. Jesus' goal was to have people move out of their sinful and idolatrous ways and into a genuine worship and obedience to the Creator God. But it seems the best he can do is to get the people so riled up against him that they do the exact opposite. They do not follow him, believe in him, but they reject him and kill him. Is Jesus then a failure?

## No, of course not. But Jesus knows that this is the only way for people to come to their senses. For he knows God will raise him from the dead, and this will be God's way of compelling the people to recognize that they made a great mistake. They chose to kill Jesus; God chose to reverse that choice, raise him back to life.

## Then people will repent of their wrong decision, find forgiveness, and believe in Jesus. This is what the Apostle John wants to convey to his readers. Just as God raised Jesus back to life, so too he will raise us to the kind of life he wants us to live, in goodness, holiness, righteousness, peace, joy, freedom. And note well: Jesus is not telling them they will go to heaven when they die, a promise of life after death, but he is talking about what happens in the here and now. They will find the life of the Spirit now when they turn from sin and believe in Jesus. Jesus wants people to be where he is now, that is, in perfect obedience to the Creator God his Father in heaven.

## 5. Jesus utters a brief prayer, "Father, glorify your name." That prayer summarizes the motivation that drives Jesus in this daunting prospect coming in less than a week. He wants to do only what God requires of him, regardless of his own personal feelings about it, even if it requires him to undergo the most humiliating death that people could invent.

## But how will Jesus' death produce God's glory? Does God glory in Jesus' death? Not in his death per se, but in Jesus' willingness to die so that people may repent and believe and come to the kind of life that they were created for. God is glorified, not in death, but in life; the life that comes when we live by his Holy Spirit.

## 6. Then Jesus makes a most interesting pronouncement, "Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out." What does he mean?" Who is "the ruler of this world?" How will he be driven out? Driven out of what?

## Jesus means the ruler of this Greco-Roman world. The Roman Empire was based on military conquest and brutal suppression of any and all indications of rebellion or resistance to Roman authority. In addition, political and economic and social components of that culture were such as tolerated brutality, slavery, greed, and other kinds of evil so long as Roman requirements were not abused overmuch. We talk today about the famous Pax Romana, Roman Peace, but tend to forget the conditions on which it was based, suppression, slavery, force, compulsion.

## Jesus is saying now something that people did indeed want: Roman authority will be driven out. The events that Jesus is even now triggering among the Jewish populace will be such as to terminate the reign of "the ruler of this world."

## But that will not happen in the way the people expect from their Messiah. It will happen in spite of it. Not by a Messianic-led revolution dependent on external military and political power but by the internal force of the Spirit of God enabling people to find a better way to construct their civilizations.

## 7. We may remind ourselves at this point of something no one then could know: the gospel of Jesus Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit working with the purpose of the divine Creator of the world, did in fact conquer the Roman Empire. By the year 390 Emperor Theodosius secured the passage of regulations that made Christianity the only legal religion in the empire. And, while that in itself was not yet a complete Christianization of the Greco-Roman culture, it was indeed the equivalent of driving out the previous ruler of the empire, Satan. It was accomplished not by military might but by the Holy Spirit working within the hearts of people who believe in Jesus.

## And while we are reminding ourselves of important developments, here is another reminder. One of the last things that Jesus said to his disciples as he was defining their apostolic duty was that all authority in heaven and on earth was now his. (Matthew 28:18) The claim might seem totally incredible, but here is one of the first major evidences: the capitulation of the Roman Empire to the gospel.

## 8. Let's go back to Jesus' explanation that "now is the judgment of this world." We today are accustomed to think of the final judgment at the end of the world. Jesus does not have that in mind here at all. He has in mind the judgment effectuated by the gospel.

## At that moment, of course, the gospel was not available, because Jesus had not yet been crucified and risen, but when the gospel is later proclaimed it will provide the occasion for people to repent of their rejection of Jesus and to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. That is the judgment Jesus has in mind. The judgment proclaimed by the gospel that the way of sin is wrong and the way of Christ is right, pronounced effectively by the transforming power of the Holy Spirit.

9. Jesus says more, "And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people*;) to myself." John explains that this was Jesus' way of preparing the people for the way he would soon die. But the people do not think their Messiah is supposed to die.

But Jesus has in mind what he has just been saying, that when the people choose to put him to death and God reverses that decision by bringing him back to life, then the incentive will exist to repent of their decision and come to believe in Jesus. That will be how Jesus will draw all people to himself. It won't be done in a year or a century or even a millennium, but the process will be started and will continue for as long as God deems necessary. All people, regardless of nationality, Gentiles and Jews.

## 

## Chapter Twenty-five

## JESUS EXPLAINS HIS MISSION

## John 12:36-50

After Jesus had said this, he departed and hid from them. 37Although he had performed so many signs in their presence, they did not believe in him. 38This was to fulfill the word spoken by the prophet Isaiah: 'Lord, who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?' 39And so they could not believe, because Isaiah also said, 40 'He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, so that they might not look with their eyes, and understand with their heart and turn—and I would heal them.' 41Isaiah said this because he saw his glory and spoke about him. 42Nevertheless many, even of the authorities, believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; 43for they loved human glory more than the glory that comes from God.

44 Then Jesus cried aloud: 'Whoever believes in me believes not in me but in him who sent me. 45And whoever sees me sees him who sent me. 46I have come as light into the world, so that everyone who believes in me should not remain in the darkness. 47I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them, for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. 48The one who rejects me and does not receive my word has a judge; on the last day the word that I have spoken will serve as judge, 49for I have not spoken on my own, but the Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment about what to say and what to speak. 50And I know that his commandment is eternal life. What I speak, therefore, I speak just as the Father has told me.'

1. Author John inserts an explanatory comment here, something that Jesus did not himself say, but that ties in with the ancient Jewish faith. He quotes a well-known prophecy from Isaiah 53, "Lord, who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?"

While Isaiah himself could not have known five hundred years earlier exactly what would happen when God sent the Messiah, he did know how the people of Judah and Israel responded to the prophets God sent to them. They did not believe them and decided simply to go their own way.

Extrapolating from this experience Isaiah prophesies that something similar is likely to happen when the Messiah comes at some future date. Who is going to believe? Who will even recognize what the arm of the Lord is doing? Isaiah puts it even stronger. He affirms that God "blinded their eyes and hardened their heart." They disbelieved Jesus and put him to death.

2. But here we have a conundrum. May we even say that God hardened their heart? Isn't that what Satan does, not God? Why would God want to blind them, harden them?

Perhaps the best we can say about this is that God allowed Satan to do what he does for the time being, in order that the difference between ignoring God and obeying him may come to be seen more clearly. That is what actually happened, is it not, in the case of the crucifixion and resurrection? Crucifixion is what the people did, and resurrection is what God did. What greater contrast can be imagined?

Both of those things had to happen before the people could see what the arm of the Lord was doing, and then change their minds from disbelief to belief. How else could God persuade them to believe?

3. John does report some success for Jesus at this point. "Many, even of the authorities, believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue."

Interesting. Official decisions were against Jesus so that even when some of the leaders did believe they were afraid to acknowledge it. Why? Because they were good Torah-observing Jews and they were not ready to make a break with the synagogue, meaning with traditional Jewish faith. They wanted to keep both, belief in Jesus a possible Messiah and their customary religious practices.

Jesus had not yet demonstrated that he was their Messiah, since he had done nothing yet to gather an army, stack weapons, or gather funds for revolution. He had done a lot of preparatory things to convince people he could do it, but he had not yet started the movement against Rome. So when John reports that some of the leaders believed in Jesus, that is what they meant: he is our Messiah, that is, capable of leading a successful revolution.

4. We should pay special attention to what the Apostle John writes next. He quotes Jesus as saying, "Whoever believes in me believes not in me but in him who sent me." Really? When we believe in Jesus we are not really believing in him but in God the Father who sent him? What does Jesus mean?

John makes a big point of affirming this, but why does Jesus say this at this particular juncture of his life?

Probably because he himself will soon be gone from the earth, so he wants his disciples to understand there is more going on than what they can see in Jesus himself. God is doing his thing, even through the traumatic events that are about to occur. The disciples must recognize that what Jesus is doing is but a part, an important part but still a part, of what God is doing to make the human race into a functioning image of God. Jesus is doing his part, but there are greater things yet to take place in the future as the gospel is spread over the earth and the power of Jesus' spirit ranges wider and wider within the human race. It is important that the disciples know and believe this greater vision that moves well beyond the earthly presence of Jesus.

5. Interesting: Jesus is not Christocentric but theocentric. He does not put himself in the center of Christian faith but puts God there. Jesus is a theist, as were all good Jews of the Old Testament period.

And it is important for us also in the twenty-first century to remind ourselves again and again that to be a Christian does not end in our relationship to Jesus but in our relationship to the Creator of the world. God created all things, including the earth and nature and the human race. He sent Jesus into the world to bring us into the kingdom of God. He controls the progress of history and of human civilization, moving inexorably if slowly toward the goal he defined already in Genesis One: a human race subduing the earth in such a way as to image its Creator.

Christianity is God-centered, not Christ-centered, not Bible-centered, not gospel-centered, not church-centered, not Spirit-centered, not salvation-centered, surely not self-centered. Sad to say this perspective that Jesus enunciates so clearly here in John 12:44 seems to have been snowed under by the welter of man-centered emphases like those mentioned above. We do well to try to regain the theistic, God-centered mentality of Jesus.

6. One of the implications of the theo-centrism of Jesus is this astounding insight, "I came not to judge the world, but to save the world." Just a bit earlier, in 12:31, he had proclaimed, "Now is the judgment of the world, now the ruler of this world will be driven out." How is it, then, that Jesus could say also, seemingly contradictory, that he came not to judge the world? On the one hand he claims to be throwing out the ruler of this world as a divine judgment, and on the other hand he is saying he is not bringing the world under judgment.

It seems Jesus is using the term "world" in different senses. In the first instance "this world" means the regime currently in control of life and civilization, the Roman Empire. In the second instance the term "world" – not _this_ world – means the human race as such regardless of political or ethnic variety.

So in the first instance Jesus is saying that his mission on earth involves terminating the control of the Roman Empire, but the second instance means this termination will open up the way for the human race as a whole to be saved. The gospel removes the tyranny of one group of people over another, and thus enables people to be governed by the Creator rather than an oppressive human power.

Note well that Jesus refers to both of these sayings as "judgment." Through the work of Jesus on earth God is bring his judgment to bear on human developments. God is overthrowing the diabolical control that one nation has succeeded in gaining over other nations. He is judging this to be wrong. At the same time God, through the same work of the Lord Jesus, is opening up the way for nations to learn how to obey God himself rather than some usurping human government.

7. There should be no objection therefore to the use of the term _theocracy_. As currently used this term implies that a group of religious leaders succeeds in controlling the political and social affairs of a given country, so that as often as not such leadership results in religious tyranny no better than the military or political tyranny so often seen. The term theocracy ought not to have that implication.

On the contrary, theocracy is the condition in which nations choose to obey God directly, without political or military or clerical compulsion. A theocratic nation is one in which the people themselves have chosen, freely and without external pressure, to do whatever the Creator of the world wants them to do. This is what Jesus Christ has in mind, and what the gospel's work is in the process of accomplishing.

The most obvious case in point is the downfall of the Roman Empire just decades after the Roman government adopted the Christian faith as its official religion. Christianity is incompatible with the power politics upon which the Roman Empire was based. With the fall of Rome the then ruler of this world was thrown out. Thus the way was opened up for the gospel to work with the barbarian nations of Europe, so that by the end of the first millennium almost all of the tribes of Europe had freely adopted the Christian faith, willingly accepting the religious supervision of the Bishop of Rome.

The critical point here is the willingness of the barbarian tribes to put themselves under the tutelage of the Roman Bishop. While it is true that subsequently the Roman Catholic Church did exercise a very powerful form of religious authority, we should remember that the nations had freely accepted this religious compulsion precisely because they had committed themselves to be followers of Jesus. The church, in exercising that authority, was fulfilling the second part of the Great Commission, teaching the nations how to obey the Lord in their daily occupations. First baptism, then teaching.

Ideally, of course, a true theocracy would not need such human intervention by priests or ministers, relying entirely on the inner power of the Holy Spirit. But this ideal is something we are working towards, and what happened in the Middle Ages in the conversion and disciplining of the European peoples is a major step in that direction.

8. There is another interesting statement near the end of this section, "I know that his commandment is eternal life." God's commandment is eternal life. Just what did Jesus mean, and why did John recall this statement in this context?

We should take this statement in its broadest possible meaning. What is God's intent in creating the universe in the first place? For what purpose did he bring human life into existence? In this context the term "his commandment" would mean God's ultimate purpose, as if to say, the reason God created humans is that they may have eternal life.

But the term "eternal life" has more meaning than mere continued existence; it implies also a certain quality of existence. We may take a clue as to this purpose of God from Genesis One, where God defines the human task. We are created in order to sub-create a civilization from the givens of God's original creation, and to do this in such a way that we image the way the Creator did his work. Jesus is now saying to the disciples and to all who believe that this is God's purpose, to shape a human race in such a way as to produce this kind of a world, a world in which human life in its entirety is producing a human culture that genuinely images the original Creator in its overall goodness.

We note accordingly that Jesus' intent is not to speak of individuals but of the human race as an entity. Jesus is not implying that each of us humans will live forever in some otherworldly context, say heaven or hell. He is saying that it is God's purpose that the human race will continue, always drawing closer and closer to the full intent of God to have creatures image him in gaining control over the natural forces of the universe.

## Chapter Twenty-six

## A TALE OF TWO DISCIPLES

## John 13:1-20

##

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. 2The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. 5Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. 6He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, 'Lord, are you going to wash my feet?' 7Jesus answered, 'You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.' 8Peter said to him, 'You will never wash my feet.' Jesus answered, 'Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.' 9Simon Peter said to him, 'Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!' 10Jesus said to him, 'One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you*;) are clean, though not all of you.' 11For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, 'Not all of you are clean.'

12 After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, 'Do you know what I have done to you? 13You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. 14So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. 15For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. 16Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. 17If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them. 18I am not speaking of all of you; I know whom I have chosen. But it is to fulfill the scripture, "The one who ate my bread*;) has lifted his heel against me." 19I tell you this now, before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe that I am he. Very truly, I tell you, whoever receives one whom I send receives me; and whoever receives me receives him who sent me.'

1. What John writes here summarizes the point that he has been making in his account of the mission of Jesus: one person rejects Jesus, another one believes. If we take a birdseye view of John's Gospel we see that the main thing he wishes to accomplish is to persuade those who read what he writes to believe in Jesus and come to a better life because of it. But he also has to explain why the Jewish people as a whole rejected Jesus.

So here he addresses both of those results, rejection and acceptance, in terms of two of Jesus' chosen disciples, Judas and Peter. Of Judas he writes, "The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him." Why would Judas, after being with Jesus, observing his astounding miracles and listening to his perplexing parables, finally after three years, decide to betray Jesus to the enemies who were trying to find an occasion to arrest him and possibly put him to death?

Note, incidentally, that Jesus says that it was the devil who put this into his heart, not God. We do have to understand, however, that God is sovereign and that God will weave even this dastardly act into his own divine purpose. Nothing ever happens that is outside God's inscrutable plan for the human race, not even Jesus' crucifixion.

So, why did Judas Iscariot betray Jesus? Obviously because he was disillusioned and could not find a satisfactory way to deal with it. The other disciples would also become disillusioned when they saw Jesus dead and buried, but their modicum of faith in Jesus was sufficient to carry them through the trauma until God made it plain what was going on.

So then, further, why was Judas so disillusioned that he rejected Jesus? Because it had become plain to him since the preceding Sabbath day that Jesus had no intention of leading the Jews in armed rebellion against Rome. That was, after all, what the Messiah was supposed to do, restore the throne of David. After Jesus did the innocuous thing of merely overturning some money tables in the temple, rather than issuing a ringing call to arms, it is eminently understandable that Judas would give up on Jesus: Jesus had no intention of doing what Judas expected the Messiah to do. All his time of attending on Jesus had been a mistake. The prophets were clear enough that God would send a Messiah to restore the throne of David, and just as David had to become a military genius in warding off the enemies of Israel, so too the Messiah would have to employ soldiers and armies and weapons of war to drive off the Roman occupying force and to set up the Messiah as the new king of the Jews. But it had become clear enough to Judas that this would not be happening with Jesus. So obviously Jesus isn't the Messiah. Get what you can out of the whole fiasco, Judas, thirty pieces of silver. Better than nothing.

2. The other disciple whom John singles out for attention in this story is Simon Peter, one of the very first of the men to follow Jesus. Perhaps Peter was the oldest member of the group, or perhaps the most vocal. He seems to be the most dominating in the sense of being a leader.

Jesus, knowing instinctively what Judas would soon be doing, does something entirely unexpected and inexplicable from the disciples' point of view. He washes their feet. What's the point?

Jesus might well sense that, given Judas' intention, the other disciples would be dealing with the same sense of disillusionment. It would get even worse when they saw Jesus dead and buried. There couldn't be any more convincing way of proving that Jesus is not their Messiah – their understanding of the Messiah – than to see him on the cross. So Jesus wants to do something that they would remember later and that might carry them through the next few hours and days of disillusionment. But why wash their feet if, as John intimates, this was Jesus' motivation?

Jesus had in mind what the rest of the disciples were thinking, that when the Romans were driven out and Jesus was sitting as king on a throne in Jerusalem, that then the disciples too would be in privileged spots in Jesus' administration. Writer John, of course, would know about this, for that was his hope also at the time. Somewhat earlier John's mother had approached Jesus and tried to exact from him a promise that her two sons, James and John, would have positions at Jesus' side when he came into the kingdom, one at his right and the other at his left. Jesus would now, by washing the feet of the disciples, demonstrate that nothing of the sort would be happening in the future. Instead of having strong and influential political assignments, they would be reduced to foot-washers. No political clout whatsoever.

3. It is doubtful whether the disciples got the point immediately, "You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand." At the time John was writing this Gospel, perhaps fifty years later, he had all these things in perspective. He well understood why Jesus was speaking to them at the time the way he did. It was to help them understand that their notion of a Messiah was wrong and that in the climactic events then taking place God's purpose in sending Jesus would gradually become clear. They would remember all the strange things Jesus had said earlier and slowly put them all together to form a vastly different way of thinking about God and what God was doing in the world.

4. So now Peter comes into the picture. Jesus was going around the room doing menial duty, washing the feet that were soiled from walking in dusty paths. Peter was nonplussed. Jesus shouldn't be doing this. He is here to rule not to do slave's work. "Peter said to him, 'You will never wash my feet.'" You will never, he meant, be my servant. I will be yours but never you mine.

So Jesus explained further, but not much more clearly, "Unless I wash you, you have no share with me." Peter would have no notion whatever of why this would be so, but he trusted Jesus enough to affirm, then don't do my feet only, do my hands and head also; I am totally dedicated and devoted to you in whatever you choose to do, whether I understand it or not.

What Jesus was doing was symbolical. It was much more than a physical cleansing, but an affirmation that they were clean in the sight of God. Something like what they might have felt after bringing a sin offering to the temple: a sense of being right with God, of having their sin washed away. Jesus meant the foot-washing to show the disciples that a new way of becoming right with God was about to take place; not by animal sacrifices but by the blood of Jesus about to be shed within twenty-four hours. Of course, the disciples would have no way of sensing this at the time. But later, when they remembered what Jesus had done, they would come to appreciate the symbolism.

So Jesus explains to Peter, "One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean." The symbolism is that if a person has committed his life to the Lord, this is what counts, this is what makes a person clean and pure before God. Jesus wants them to understand that, except for one of them, the act of washing their feet is the promise that they are servants of God, they are now reaffirmed to be genuine disciples and are called to persevere in that path. Judas has already in his mind resolved that Jesus is a fake, never will be our Messiah; so he doesn't respond inwardly the way the others do. Jesus knows this but there is nothing further that he can do to change his opinion. But he does want the eleven others to be reassured, even not understanding, that whatever happens in the next twenty-four hours will not negate their status in God's purposes.

5. Afterwards, as they were all seated around the table for the meal, Jesus explained something of what the footwashing means. "So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. 15For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you."

It is interesting that some groups of Christians have made this instruction of Jesus into a sacrament. One wonders why the church has not designated footwashing as a sacrament. Jesus did instruct his disciples to do this, did he not?

There is much more significance, however, in Jesus' instruction than merely rote footwashing, as if that act might accomplish something important all by itself, _ex opere operato_.

Jesus has shown the disciples that they must not expect to exercise controlling power over others, but on the contrary to acquire the stance of servanthood. Others do not serve me as slaves or even as servants; I serve them to make their lives better.

So that is what Jesus is requiring of us all, all who believe in him and follow him as Lord. All authority both in heaven and on earth belongs to Jesus, as Matthew writes in his Gospel, but he exercises that authority in such a way as to promote the welfare of all. That's the attitude Jesus wants us to cultivate.

6. John concludes this section of his writing by informing the group of disciples that not all of them will respond in this way, by accepting the posture of a servant. Jesus does not at this point identify who is the renegade, but he does say, "The one who ate my bread has lifted his heel against me." Jesus knows that Judas has already decided privately in his own mind that he is not amenable to the way Jesus is pursuing his calling as the Jewish Messiah. Judas wants authority and power and prestige, and he has already determined that he is not going to get it by following Jesus.

Jesus wants the disciples to know that he knows. What Judas is about to do is not something he springs upon Jesus unprepared. Jesus knows full well what will be happening in a few hours, and he makes this explanation to assure the disciples that he will not be surprised by the coming events. "I tell you this now, before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe that I am he."

7. Jesus here reminds the disciples of their intensely theocentric life. One of the disciples will be leaving their group, but Jesus will be accepting, and soon sending, the rest of them to bring the gospel. "Very truly, I tell you, whoever receives one whom I send receives me; and whoever receives me receives him who sent me."

They must therefore understand that all whom Jesus does accept and send do so because they receive Jesus as Messiah. Further, when they understand this they must also understand that this faith in Jesus involves also faith in God the Father who has sent Jesus. Understand, accordingly, that they must all live in such a way as to trust that their Creator God is the one who is constantly in control of events on earth, even such a tragedy as will soon involve Judas Iscariot. God sends Jesus, and Jesus will be sending the faithful disciples.

## Chapter Twenty-seven

## MORE ABOUT JUDAS AND PETER

## John 13:21-38

21 After saying this Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, 'Very truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me.' 22The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he was speaking. 23One of his disciples—the one whom Jesus loved—was reclining next to him; 24Simon Peter therefore motioned to him to ask Jesus of whom he was speaking. 25So while reclining next to Jesus, he asked him, 'Lord, who is it?' 26Jesus answered, 'It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.' So when he had dipped the piece of bread, he gave it to Judas son of Simon Iscariot. After he received the piece of bread, Satan entered into him. Jesus said to him, 'Do quickly what you are going to do.' 28Now no one at the table knew why he said this to him. 29Some thought that, because Judas had the common purse, Jesus was telling him, 'Buy what we need for the festival'; or, that he should give something to the poor. 30So, after receiving the piece of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night.

31 When he had gone out, Jesus said, 'Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. 32If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. 33Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, "Where I am going, you cannot come." 34I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.'

36 Simon Peter said to him, 'Lord, where are you going?' Jesus answered, 'Where I am going, you cannot follow me now; but you will follow afterwards.' 37Peter said to him, 'Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.' 38Jesus answered, 'Will you lay down your life for me? Very truly, I tell you, before the cock crows, you will have denied me three times.

1. After explaining the significance of the footwashing incident, Jesus is troubled in his mind. He knows intuitively that the great climax of his ministry is about to take place, and he knows how it will be induced. Judas Iscariot will betray him to the authorities who are trying to arrest and kill him.

So Jesus wants to do what he can to prepare the other disciples for the coming trauma that will see him permanently separated from them. He tells them straight out, "One of you will betray me." What did he mean?

He meant that one of the twelve disciples had in his own mind decided Jesus will never become our Messiah, had learned that a reward would be given to anyone who showed the authorities how to arrest Jesus secretly, and had determined to do that this very evening.

Why would Judas, after having been with Jesus three years, want to do this? Because he was disillusioned. He had followed Jesus faithfully, even becoming the group's treasurer, with the firm expectation that Jesus would soon be challenging Roman authority on the battle field. When, just a few days earlier, on what we call the Triumphal Entry, Judas had observed Jesus passing by this glorious opportunity to rouse up the people against the occupation army, and doing nothing significant in that direction, he finally gave up on Jesus, resolving to salvage what he could from the debacle (he did get 30 pieces of silver for his trouble but didn't live to enjoy it).

2. Well, of course the disciples were curious. Who wouldn't be with such an announcement? So they all wondered who Jesus was talking about. The disciple John, author of this Gospel, seems to have been especially close to Jesus and was sitting next to Jesus at the supper table. Peter nudged him and suggested that John ask Jesus outright who he was talking about. One might think Peter could have done the asking himself if he was the speaker for the group. So John asked Jesus who it was and Jesus answered, "It is the one to whom I give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish."

Even after Jesus identified the betrayer, Judas Iscariot, by giving him the bread, the other disciples would not know anything more than that. They would not know when Judas would do it; they did not know how he would do it; they did not know even what betrayal meant in concrete terms. So John reports that when Jesus sent Judas out to do his infernal errand the others still thought he was going to do something Jesus had ordered him to do. They had no notion about what would be happening only a few hours later. That would come as a total surprise.

3. "So, after receiving the piece of bread, he immediately went out. And it was night." John does not report exactly where Judas went and what he did, but we can well surmise from what happened in the Garden of Gethsemane on the hill of Olivet just outside Jerusalem, that Judas went to the residence of the high priest, contacted the authorities, and promised to lead them to where Jesus was.

We do not know if Judas had a hard time persuading the temple authorities of what he told them, or if he had to prove he knew what he was talking about. How would they know who he was? But persuade them he did, and John will report several chapters later what actually happened (in chapter 18). We may guess that it took the priests a few hours to get the temple police lined up to find Jesus and arrest him as Judas leads them to a spot where he knows Jesus will go after the meal is finished.

4. That is all we read about Judas at this point. Jesus then turns his attention to the rest of the disciples and begins a long conversation designed to explain as clearly and carefully as he could how they must think about what will soon be happening. We call this the Farewell Discourse, and it will continue through chapter 16; and then in chapter 17 John will record what we have come to describe as The High-Priestly Prayer.

5. Jesus tells them directly, "I am with you only a little longer." Jesus could read the handwriting on the wall, what the events happening at the time indicated, but the eleven disciples could not. Jesus knew the forces that would soon bring him to the end of his ministry on earth were already in motion, so that it would be only a few hours until he would be arrested and imprisoned.

He explained further, "Where I am going, you cannot come." Into death. And then into resurrection and into the clouds to God's right hand. The disciples could not follow him in that path. But of course the disciples did not yet have an inkling of that. They were convinced Jesus would find a way to do what a Messiah is supposed to do, lead Israel into a great future of Jewish independence. When what did happen later that night and the next day, arrest and trial, the disciples were thoroughly disillusioned; the rapid sequence of events leading to Jesus' entombment were totally unexpected. They had, at the time, no resources for handling the disaster other than a basic confidence that Jesus was indeed God's Messiah.

6. Jesus, however, did give them one important piece of advice that they must practice in order to keep them together as a group. "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

It is conceivable that with Jesus dead the disciples would give up on Jesus altogether and go back to their previous occupations completely defeated and despondent, their experiment with Jesus a failure. If that happened there would be no such thing as Christianity, no such things as Christian churches. God's purpose in sending Jesus would have been thwarted. If the eleven disciples had joined Judas Iscariot in rejecting Jesus altogether, the world would not be what it is today where the gospel is helping to shape the progress of human life in many areas of the world.

But of course God would not let this happen. Isaiah reminds us that the word of the Lord never goes out without doing that for which it is sent, coming back to him without accomplishing his purpose. That never happens simply because God is the almighty Lord of heaven and earth. He not only created the world, he guides it constantly toward the goal that only he knows.

Think, accordingly, that Jesus himself is the Word of God incarnate. This means God sends Jesus into the world to accomplish something. God will not allow it to happen that Jesus accomplishes nothing. And so Jesus gave the disciples one very important command that would at least keep them together as a group. Love one another. If they did this all through the traumatic events to come they would remain Jesus' disciples and would continue to follow him even after he was taken from them.

7. John has some more to write now about Peter. Peter was a very confident person. He knew what he wanted and he would put himself wholeheartedly into the project. He thought that Jesus would need his support when the time came to get the revolt started. He would make a good general in the army fighting the Roman soldiers. Why else would they be laying the groundwork for rebellion?

So Peter put into words what the rest of the disciples were thinking. "Peter said to him, 'Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.'" Peter could not imagine any circumstances where Jesus would not need the assistance of the disciples, especially himself. Even if, when the war began, a battle might go bad, Peter assured Jesus that he would willingly go to death if that would be needed. He could not envision any circumstance where Jesus would be killed; Jesus had to become king in Jerusalem when the Romans were expelled.

8. None of the disciples had any idea of what Jesus' real purpose was. They all expected him to fill the role of Messiah, restoring the throne of David. Peter as much as anyone. So Jesus gives him a real come-down. You will give your life for me, will you? No way. Before this night is over you will have denied even that you know me.

We may wonder how Peter responded to that rebuke. We know how he felt after it actually happened, but how did he feel at the time? Probably that Jesus doesn't realize what a strong person I really am. What he says could never happen. But of course it did.

## Chapter Twenty-eight

## TWO OTHER DISCIPLES GET INVOLVED

## John 14:1-14

Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. 2In my Father's house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. 4And you know the way to the place where I am going.'*;) 5Thomas said to him, 'Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?' 6Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.'

8 Philip said to him, 'Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.' 9Jesus said to him, 'Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, "Show us the Father"? 10Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. 12Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If in my name you ask me*;) for anything, I will do it.

1. It will be useful at this point to remind ourselves again of the "game plan" of the Apostle John in writing this book. He wants to show non-Jewish persons why they should follow a Jewish Messiah, one whom the Jews themselves refused to follow. That would not be easy to do. John will have to show compelling reasons why anyone should believe in Jesus, while at the same time addressing the reasons why so many people did not believe in him.

So, on the one hand John tells about concrete instances when certain persons were actually persuaded to believe in Jesus at the time when Jesus was alive, and on the other hand he includes instances when certain persons refused to believe. John has to be honest and forthright about both responses, and he tells the stories in such a way that they are eminently believable.

But crucial to his plan, John must show how Jesus managed to persuade a very few Jewish men to stick with him during that terrible period of disillusionment when they finally realized Jesus was not going to be the Messiah they had thought he would be. And that is where we are in the Gospel of John right now.

The disillusionment will set in before a day has passed. And Jesus is now meeting with the disciples for the very last time before his death. John considers the conversation that occurs now to be of extremely important value. Jesus is telling the disciples everything they should know prior to the events of the next twenty-four hours, insights they will remember after he is gone and which will enable them to ride the storm into a greater faith and understanding than before.

We who read this account will be able to do the same, ride out the storm of questions that we ourselves might have, digesting what Jesus has said, and then responding in a stronger faith than before. That is the result Author John wants us to have when we read believingly the assurances and promises and instructions that Jesus gives his disciples here at the Last Supper. Jesus is indeed the Messiah sent by God himself to be the savior not only of Jewish people but of the whole human race.

2. At this point, after Jesus has sent Judas Iscariot to do his nefarious nocturnal mission, and has dealt with Peter's impetuous boast, Jesus understands it is necessary for him to say something that will truly be helpful to the group of disciples. By now they were thoroughly confused by Jesus' words that he would be leaving them and they couldn't come along. So he says, "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me."

First, "believe in God." Jesus is a dedicated theist. He relates everything to God from the very beginning. Jesus wants his disciples to do that also. He wants them to be absolutely convinced that what will be happening is exactly what God is doing. Nothing is out of his control. Even the way Jesus will be leaving them.

Second, "believe also in me." It's one thing to believe God is in control of everything that happens, but how do we know God has even sent Jesus? Is this all a mistake? Could Jesus be a charlatan after all, a false Messiah? So the disciples will have to remember the astounding miracles Jesus performed so often in their presence, the very reasons why they did become so assured that God had sent him. Regardless of what happens, Jesus wants them to know, Jesus is the true Messiah of God. Let nothing cast doubt on that.

Believe in God first, and then also in Jesus. That's good advice for us too.

3. So, Jesus has already informed them that he is going away, and that they cannot come with him. Now he adds a bit of what he will be doing while gone. "In my Father's house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?" Jesus will be going away in order to "prepare a place" for them in the "Father's house."

Ordinarily this is understood as referring to going to heaven after we die. There is, however, a better understanding of what Jesus is getting at. Jesus does not so much want to prepare them for life after death as to prepare them for life after his ascension. Jesus wants his disciples to weather the coming storm of disillusionment in such a way that they will be energized for the task they will receive after Jesus is gone. They must acquire the inner conviction and divine drive that will transform them from timid disciples into aggressive evangelists. That's what Jesus has in mind here in everything he says in this Farewell Discourse.

So what is the "Father's house?" What are the "places" Jesus is preparing for them? Exactly what is described in the preceding paragraph. The Father's "house" is his purpose for the human race; the "places" are the functions that the disciples will be filling the rest of their lives within that purpose of God.

God wants the gospel of Jesus Christ to be spread throughout the world. There must be real live persons to do this. So that is the task the disciples will have once they survive the tempest to come. Each disciple will have his unique role to fill in this task, and the task is still continuing. Author John wants each of us who read this Gospel to follow those same steps and come to the same mission, filling our "place" in the overall "house" of God.

4. "I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also. And you know the way to the place where I am going." Here we generally miss Jesus' intent completely. We normally understand Jesus to be talking about heaven. He will take us all to heaven after we die.

But Jesus has in mind what the disciples will be doing after he leaves them. He wants to prepare them for getting through the next few days and weeks, and then what will they do the rest of their lives? So Jesus' intent becomes clear in that context. Jesus wants the disciples to be "where I am." Where Jesus is in his task of promoting God's kingdom, not a place outside this world.

Jesus wants the disciples to acquire the same vision of the messianic kingdom that he has; that is where he is and that is where he wants his disciples to be. They must be brought out of their mistaken idea of a political kingdom set up by military power, and into the vision of a kingdom within the hearts and minds of people, created not by weapons of war but by the Holy Spirit.

So when Jesus says he "will come again and take you to myself" he is not talking about what we call the Second Coming and the resurrection of the dead and the initiation of heaven and hell, he is talking about coming back in the form of the Holy Spirit and taking them into his own vision of the kingdom. Jesus will, in fact, be having much more to say about the Holy Spirit in the remainder of this final conversation with the disciples.

If these insights seem uncongenial to you, please remember that the purpose of Jesus here in this conversation at the Last Supper is to prepare the disciples to weather the storm about to break and in which their confidence and loyalty will be tested to the breaking point. Peter will in actual fact break, but he will also come to repentance, something Judas did not do. Jesus simply has no interest here at all about telling them about life after they die. He simply wants to make sure they make the transition out of their current mistaken notions of a messianic kingdom into the vision Jesus has himself of the kingdom of God within the hearts and lives of all who believe.

5. Thomas can't figure out what Jesus is talking about. "Thomas said to him, 'Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?'"

Where is Jesus going? He is going to the cross, then to the tomb, then to resurrection, and then to ascension to the right hand of God in heaven. The disciples cannot follow him on that road. But Thomas and the others are thinking Jesus might be going to disappear in the desert, perhaps to En Gedi, perhaps to Masada, perhaps to some other undisclosed destination. Maybe to Tyre and Sidon. Why can't they come with him? Thomas is baffled. What does Jesus have in mind anyway?

Especially if Jesus has some secret plans to get the revolution started. We've been supporting you all this time as you're getting ready for the battle to oust the soldiers of Rome. Are you abandoning us now after all our loyalty and support? That wouldn't be fair. There is certainly some anxiety in Thomas' question about their place in Jesus' future plans.

6. What Jesus says in reply doesn't seem to be a direct answer, but it is precisely what the disciples need to figure out. "Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.'"

There are numerous implications in this short reply of Jesus to Thomas. Thomas wants to know the way for the disciples to go when Jesus moves out. Jesus replies, I am the way. Not a road to Jericho or a journey to Damascus, but just Jesus. I am the way. The way to where, the disciples might wonder. Jesus doesn't say. Jesus means to tell them, just keep following me, even to a destination you don't know. Stay with me as best you can and you will eventually come to the destination God has in mind for you.

I am the truth, Jesus says. You don't need to wonder if maybe you have made a mistake in following me all these years, that maybe Judas is right in abandoning us. Stick with me and you will stay in the true path that God is showing you.

I am the life, Jesus adds. In a few hours Jesus will be dead, but he assures the disciples that nonetheless he is Life. The true way to the kind of life that God wishes all people to have is to be found in believing in Jesus. Jesus will be saying a great deal more about this in the remainder of this conversation at the Last Supper, information about the Holy Spirit, but here already he wants to assure the men that true life is to be found by steadfast faith in Jesus. Don't give up on me.

7. "No one comes to the Father except through me." Here is one of the most controversial statements in the entire Bible. There is no other way to God than through Jesus. It's very difficult to understand this saying. Everyone has to be a Christian in order to find God? What about all those devout patriarchs of the Old Testament? How could they believe in Jesus when he had not yet been born? What about sincere Buddhists or Hindus or Moslems? How about the millions of people who have never heard of Jesus? Do none of them come to the Father?

Jesus does not mean "the Father" in the sense of what we sometimes mean by "God." Many moderns think of God as a nebulous noumenal Something that exists way beyond anything we can access by our ordinary senses. They use such terminology as The Absolute, Being In Itself, The Unknowable, The Incomprehensible, Ultimate Reality, That Upon Which We Feel Absolutely Dependent, The Holy, the Ground of Being, and numerous other designations all of which imply some impersonal existence beyond our sensory capabilities. Jesus does not have such a category in mind.

What he does have in mind is the traditional Jewish mentality, the God who is the Creator of the world, and who is also the Creator of the human race. This Creator God is the Father of Jesus who sent Jesus into the world precisely in order to bring the human race more fully into the kind of existence that he created them for.

And if we pursue this insight farther we come to the definition of the human task given already in Genesis One. God created us in his image with the mandate to do what humans do in such a way as to image the way God has created the world: in sum, good. God created all things good and he requires of us to do the same as we create our civilizations; do it right. All of that is in Jesus' mind when he insists that no one can get into this frame of mind apart from himself. No one can do what the Creator requires except in the way Jesus demonstrates. In still other words, no one can enter the kingdom of God except via Jesus.

8. I now wish to do some theologizing about this, suggesting one way of understanding Jesus' words in terms of our contemporary religious and theological world. We need to understand that God works in a developmental way. We sometimes think of Adam and Eve as the first humans in history and understand the image of God as describing how that first pair actually lived. Prior to the Fall.

However, this understanding needs revision. We should understand that the stories of Adam and Eve are not historic but symbolic. The Apostle Paul writes that Adam was a type of Christ. (Romans 5:14) So we may extrapolate from that insight that what we read in the early chapters of Genesis does indeed describe humanity as a whole, but without implying that Adam and Eve were real historical persons. We may understand that when God created humans in his image with the mandate to dominate the earth the intention was to suggest that the goal toward which they should work was to create a civilization that was not merely the work of specialized animals but which was a reflection of the Creator himself. In other words, we must work in such a way as to create our cultures as good as God did his original creation. That is the goal toward which we must work, and it implies process, development, step by step getting closer to the goal.

So we need to understand Jesus in that setting. God has sent Jesus into the world as the incarnation of his Word, that is, as the historical demonstration of the word that brought humans into existence, of what Adam was to become. Jesus is what the original creative Word of God intended Adam to be, that is, all of humanity. That is what the process of history is all about, and that is what Jesus is all about in the middle of that process. Jesus is showing us, all humans, what it means to live as an image of God in the process of building a human culture. There is no other way of doing it. No one can come to the Father except by Jesus.

God works in a developmental way. He takes us step by step, slowly over the centuries, and enables us to move a bit closer to the kind of humanity he wants us to become. God has all the time in the world to do what he purposes to do with the human race. If he took fourteen billion years or so to make the world what it is today, who can complain that it is taking him thousands of years to shape us into his image?

9. There is still another thing Jesus says in this particular answer to Thomas. "If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him." If Thomas knows Jesus he will by that very fact know the Father as well. In fact, Thomas, you do know the Father and you have seen him.

It's rather doubtful that Thomas got the point at that moment. Very likely he would need some time to think about it and to assimilate what Jesus meant.

Some modern theologians understand that the unknowable God becomes incarnate in the human person of Jesus. In their way of thinking this is why Jesus can say that to to know Jesus is to know the Father. If Jesus is the incarnation of the Father then the only way to know the Father is to know him in his incarnate form Jesus.

But this is not what Jesus means. Jesus is speaking about knowing the Father's will, what the Creator wants from the human race. So Jesus is telling Thomas and the other disciples that if they truly know Jesus and what he is about they will have understood the Father's purpose.

Jesus is not saying that to see Jesus is to see the Father in the modern neo-orthodox sense, but to see the purpose of the Father in Jesus. "From now on," Jesus explains. After they realize Jesus is not going to drive out the Roman occupation army by force. After the Holy Spirit enables them to see what the purpose of Jesus really is, to show them the way to the kind of life that God the Creator desires for them. From then on they will know God and will have seen his eternal divine purpose for them.

10. Philip does not understand any of this, and complains that Jesus has to show the Father to them. Jesus seems to be a bit exasperated with this complaint. I've been with you all this time and you still don't see the Father? Why not? You should have seen him long ago.

In his reply to Philip Jesus explains, "Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these...."

Jesus is "in the Father" and the Father "is in me." What does Jesus mean?

Understand that Jesus is speaking as a human being, as the man who incarnates the eternal purpose of God, his Word. He is saying therefore to Philip that God's purpose is demonstrated definitively in himself. God is working in Jesus in such a way that the true character of human life is actualized in him. Consequently Jesus, as a human being, is "in the Father" in the sense that he is living within the purpose of the Creator. The apostle Paul explains in Colossians 1 that the fullness of the deity is at work in Jesus, and in such a way that Jesus demonstrates the fullness of humanity. That is what Jesus is now explaining to Philip.

That is why it is so appropriate for Jesus to call Philip's attention to "the works that I do." He tells Philip that even if he finds it difficult to believe what Jesus is saying – because he doesn't understand what Jesus is getting at – he should at least believe "because of the works themselves." Jesus is not talking about knowing God in the abstract but about knowing God in what God wants to achieve by creating a human race; not God in himself abstractly, but God in his works concretely.

The disciples have been impressed again and again with the mighty works that Jesus performed, all kinds of miracles. It was this that kept them as faithful as they were. If Jesus can do such impossible things, surely he can drive out the Romans when the time comes for him to act. That would be their mentality still at this late stage of their association. So Jesus is building on that kind of confidence; believe what I say even if you don't understand it yet, believe simply because you know that God is at work in me. Trust that God knows what he is doing, especially soon when I will be taken away from you.

11. But what is very interesting is Jesus' additional comment, "Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these." If you believe in Jesus you will do the same works that Jesus has done. Not only that but in fact "will do greater works" than Jesus has done. Come again? Christians will do greater works than Jesus? How so?

We tend to think of such miracles as healing the sick, feeding multitudes, stilling a storm, walking on water, raising the dead. Jesus tells the disciples they will do greater works than these. But Jesus does not have such things in mind for the disciples. The Bible does inform us (in Acts) that the disciples did heal people, but Jesus has other things in mind. He has in mind the spread of the kingdom of God.

The significance of Jesus' work on earth is not to be seen in miracles of a physical nature. These were important, not primarily for themselves, but for securing the allegiance of the disciples. What was important was showing the way for the human race to enter the kingdom of God. The disciples would do much more than Jesus accomplished in drawing people into the kingdom. The gospel would spread over the whole earth, and this is what Jesus has in mind with this promise.

12. We sometimes take this next sentence out of context and make it mean something altogether different from what Jesus intended: "14If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it." We sometimes think that if we pray sincerely for something to happen Jesus will make it happen. But that is not what Jesus is telling the disciples here.

The clue is the words, "If in my name." He means anything that is involved in accomplishing Jesus' purpose, namely drawing people into the kingdom of God. But even here, does it really happen? If we pray that some person we know and love shall be converted and become a believer, is Jesus promising to do it? We know that doesn't happen. So what does Jesus mean?

Jesus means if the disciples ask for something that is already in his purpose, in his name, he will do it. He is not promising them to do anything the disciples want to do, but only when they ask for what is in the purpose of God himself.

We may indeed extend that promise to ourselves. But be careful not to pray for something you want, hoping that God wants it too, but always with the proviso, "Your will be done."

## Chapter Twenty-nine

## THE PARACLETE

## John 14:15-24

15 'If you love me, you will keep*;) my commandments. 16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever. 17This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in*;) you.

18 'I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. 19In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. 20On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.' 22Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, 'Lord, how is it that you will reveal yourself to us, and not to the world?' 23Jesus answered him, 'Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. 24Whoever does not love me does not keep my words; and the word that you hear is not mine, but is from the Father who sent me.

1. "I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you for ever." Here are some rather confusing words that John quotes from his memory of that solemn occasion of the Last Supper. No wonder Judas (not Iscariot) didn't understand what Jesus meant.

The disciples would not be confused about Jesus urging them to keep his commandments, but they certainly would by what Jesus says about "another Advocate." This is the first of several usages of this word. Actually this term, Advocate, is a poor translation of the Greek original, _Paraclete_ , which literally means someone called to be alongside, or with. The term Advocate suggests a lawyer, someone to plead their case and protect them. Other translations use the term Comforter, suggesting someone to soothe their feelings when they realize that Jesus is gone. Neither of those terms capture Jesus' intent.

The idea that Jesus has in mind is a substitute, a replacement, a person who comes to continue what his predecessor has been doing. Jesus is telling the disciples here simply that God will send someone to take Jesus' place after he leaves them, someone to be their leader and guide. Jesus is assuring them that "I will not leave you orphaned." He will send a replacement, a Paraclete, to lead them after he is gone.

John will be quoting many other things Jesus said about the Paraclete in the remainder of this final speech of Jesus in preparation for his passion. This is the first mention. We know, however, something the disciples at that time did not know. We know who the Paraclete is. It is the Holy Spirit. So it isn't surprising that the disciples are bewildered by what Jesus is saying here. They might be thinking of some other man to lead the revolution against Rome, perhaps even Simon Peter or Simon the Zealot.

2. Jesus explains, "This is the Spirit of truth." But does this explanation really help the disciples? Jesus informs them that he is going away; they cannot come with him; but God will send a Paraclete who is the Spirit of truth to take Jesus' place.

You can just feel the spirit of the disciples fall through the floor. What's all this about? A spirit of truth is going to become our leader? Makes no sense whatever. How will that get the Roman army out of our country? The disciples have no notion whatever of what Jesus is saying.

3. We may recall that John is writing these things from the perspective of fifty years after the events. He knows everything that has happened since that time, so that when he quotes Jesus' words he knows perfectly well what they mean because he himself has lived through the intervening years and has seen how they were fulfilled. So John now quotes Jesus as saying, "I am coming to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live."

Here Jesus does not say, "I'm going away", but, "I'm coming to you." This would surely have gotten the disciples all mixed up. You're going away, but you're also coming to us? Author John will know what that means fifty years later, but at the time he surely must have been as confused as Judas (not Iscariot) was when he complained, "How so?"

Jesus explains that in a little while nobody will see me; but you will be able to see me. Why? Because I will still be living and you also will be living. We today may suspect that explanation didn't help much, probably even made the conversation more obtuse. What might Judas think? Nobody in the world will be able to see Jesus, but I will? I will also be alive because Jesus will be live?

John knew at the time he wrote these things that Jesus would die and later arise and ascend into the clouds, so that nobody would ever see him again. But he also knew that Jesus was talking about being alive, not physically as they all were, but spiritually. Jesus rose from the dead as a kind of picture of what would happen when the Paraclete came on Pentecost Day and enabled the disciples to move out of their mistaken notions of what the Messiah should be doing. Not a military revolution against Rome, but an opening up of the kingdom of God, learning how to serve the Lord from the heart rather than simply according to the laws of the Torah. In that sense the disciples would be coming alive, living spiritually because Jesus arose from the dead and sent them his Spirit as their Paraclete. Judas and the other disciples would then be able to "see" Jesus in the full light of the Spirit of truth, his true messianic mission.

4. It's quite interesting what Jesus says the disciples must do to carry them through the major trauma that is about to come upon them, the death of Jesus. "Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them." They must love Jesus and remember his teachings. Regardless of what will be happening, and in spite of their doubts and uncertainties, the disciples must keep loving Jesus and keep remembering the things he has told them. That is what will carry them through successfully; something Judas Iscariot did not do.

Judas did not keep loving Jesus and did not keep thinking about the strange things Jesus had been saying. On the contrary, Judas kept thinking about what he wanted Jesus to do, and about how Jesus wasn't doing that, and about what a fool he had been for following Jesus.

Jesus assures the disciples that if they do love him and remember his words that God will be with them. Jesus was thoroughly God-centered, theocentric, in his life and teachings. He does nothing but what God tells him to do, and he wants the disciples also to develop that same characteristic. Most Jews of the time thought in terms of the old covenant, that is, that to be pleasing to God they must rigorously obey all the detailed provisions of the ancient Torah, including the innumerable explanations that various rabbis had taught during the centuries since Moses. Jesus is about to liberate God's people from that covenant, a covenant which had virtually become a meaningless set of legalistic requirements.

The disciples will learn that to be obedient to God does not require all that legalism. It requires simply to love Jesus and follow his teachings. Both God and Jesus will "make their home" with them if they do this faithfully. And of course the same holds true for us still today in the twenty-first century.

## Chapter Thirty

## PEACE

## John 14:25-31

##

## 'I have said these things to you while I am still with you. 26But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. 27Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. 28You heard me say to you, "I am going away, and I am coming to you." If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I. 29And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe. 30I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no power over me; 31but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us be on our way.

##

## 1. Here is a second mention of the Paraclete. This time, however, John quotes Jesus as identifying the Paraclete. He is the Holy Spirit. "The Advocate [Paraclete], the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you." This is an insight that is important for us to remember as we seek to perceive the way in which God and Jesus were working.

## At the time Jesus was speaking these words the disciples had not yet come to a correct understanding of what Jesus intended to do. His miracles had persuaded them that Jesus was indeed the Messiah whom God had promised to send. But their notions of what a Messiah was supposed to do were vastly different from what God's purpose was. God did not send Jesus into the world to raise an army to drive out the hated Romans. He sent Jesus into the world to open up the way into the kingdom of God, to write God's law on the hearts of people so that they would obey the Lord from within rather than just do what the laws required.

Jesus knew all this. He knew the disciples would have to unlearn a lot before they could become apostles preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. They would have to learn something new, namely that Jesus came to save sinners and to enable people to enter God's kingdom. They would have to revise their entire way of thinking.

And that is why Jesus is so much concerned here at the Last Supper to explain as best he could what was about to happen beginning in just a few hours when he would be arrested, tried, and executed all in one day. After it was all over the disciples could start remembering the strange things Jesus was now saying and they could then come to understand what Jesus was getting at. But at the moment when Jesus was talking they were all confused and uncertain about anything other than that Jesus was the Messiah, however difficult he was to understand.

2. "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled." Don't get upset, Jesus is telling the disciples. Don't worry about what is happening. Be at peace with yourselves and with God and with me in spite of the troubling things that will soon be happening.

Jesus wants the disciples to understand that God knows what he is doing. Nothing that is about to happen is outside God's will and his control. Even if it appears a disaster to you, have confidence in God and in me. It's all going to come out right, even if you can't see how it could. That is something we all need to remember when things seem to go wrong in our lives. There is no disaster that occurs that can ever change God's plan and purpose for us. When we are in the middle of some depressing event in our lives we need simply to turn our eyes back to God and to Jesus and know that somehow God will pull us through and enable us to persevere in the faith. God is always in control and he always knows what he is doing.

Jesus assures the disciples that he does not give peace "as the world gives." How does the world give peace? Only by wishful thinking, not by reality. It's easy to say "shalom" (peace) merely in the hope that things will get better, but with no real assurance that they will. But if our peace of mind comes from trust in God and in Jesus then we can know that the reality of justice and righteousness and truth will prevail.

3. Here is something a bit strange for Jesus to say, "If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, because the Father is greater than I." If you really love me you would be happy that I'm going away. Why should they be happy that Jesus will be leaving them?

Really loving Jesus would include understanding what he is doing, and the disciples do not yet understand that. Jesus is very near to completing the task for which God sent him into the world, but the disciples do not sense that at all. The Romans are not yet driven out; the throne of David has not yet been restored; it just isn't time yet for Jesus to go away. There is a lot to do yet. It isn't time yet to be happy for a job well done.

But why does Jesus add, "the Father is greater than I?" He wants the disciples to look away from himself – with their inadequate ideas of what they expect him to do – and look instead to God. What does God want Jesus to do? What are God's instructions to Jesus? It is not Jesus himself who decides what he wants to do, but God who gives him a task to perform. God's purposes always supersede human desires. The disciples must learn that, so when their own human expectations come crashing down they will then look above, to God and to what God will be doing. They must then revise their own expectations to agree with what they see God doing.

4. Jesus is, however, well aware of the thinking of the disciples. He knows what Judas Iscariot is even now doing, going to the Jewish leaders to tell them how they can arrest Jesus. He knows how troubled the rest of the disciples are because of Jesus' inaction, his failure to get the revolution started. So he assures them, "And now I have told you this before it occurs, so that when it does occur, you may believe."

That explains this entire long speech of Jesus at the Last Supper, just hours before his arrest and trial. Jesus is doing his level best to prepare the still-faithful disciples, uncertain and unhappy as they were at the moment, to weather the most strenuous storm they had ever encountered. Their whole reason for following Jesus was now about to disappear, the highly anticipated revolt against Rome shut down before it even started, their powerful hopes for Jesus dashed to smithereens without a spear thrown. Was their entire devotion to Jesus useless, a sad mistake, Jesus an utter failure?

Jesus was now, with these final explanations, doing his best to prepare them to survive the wreckage of their hopes, and thus to muddle through until their eyes would be opened by the coming Paraclete.

The term that Jesus uses is interesting, "that you may believe." The disciples belief in Jesus at the moment was confidence that he, as the Messiah sent by God, would be able to drive out the foreign occupation army from Rome. Let us recall, in addition, what author John has in mind as he writes his Gospel. He is writing these stories in order that non-Jewish people may believe and that believing they may come to life through their faith in Jesus. (20:32)

So, if we might wonder why John does not say, "that you may _understand_ ," we may see how he is also working out his own purpose in writing this Gospel. John is doing all he can to persuade non-Jewish readers why it is important to _believe_ in Jesus and in this way discover the purpose God has in mind for all humans.

5. So Jesus brings his talk to a conclusion, "I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no power over me; 31but I do as the Father has commanded me."

"The ruler of this world" means the political power of the time, in this case the Roman government, led in Jerusalem by Pontius Pilate, but also the motivations that make people misunderstand the purpose of God and the instructions God gives to Jesus. Both the disciples and the Jewish religious leaders have missed the actual intent of God and the mission of Jesus. In this sense "the ruler of this world" is not only at work among the Romans but also among the Jewish people.

So Jesus tells his disciples that "the ruler of this world is coming." Judas is out there doing his nefarious betrayal; the Jewish authorities will very soon now be looking to arrest Jesus; and the disciples will be totally flabbergasted by events. Jesus knows this and explains that, in spite of appearances, what is happening is entirely under God's control and well within Jesus' own decision. The ruler of this world "has no power over me."

Jesus is going into this disaster with his eyes open, knowing full well what God is requiring him to do. "I do as the Father has commanded me." Jesus wants the disciples to understand very clearly that what is about to happen is what must happen and they should not be upset to the extent that it has upset Judas. Everything is well under God's control. Jesus knows that everything will turn out exactly right in the end, and he assures the disciples of this sense of being under control.

## 6. "Rise, let us be on our way." Author John has apparently exhausted his memories of what Jesus said at this Last Supper fifty or more years ago. Jesus is about to lead the disciples away from the Upper Room where they had been eating. They will be going home, wherever that might be, probably in the nearby town of Bethany, to sleep. But on the way they will pass through a grove of trees to rest, the area we know as the Garden of Gethsemane on the hill called Mount of Olives, or Olivet. John will be telling about that soon.

## 

## Chapter Thirty-one

## ABIDE IN ME

## John 15:1-25

##

'I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower. 2He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. 3You have already been cleansed*;) by the word that I have spoken to you. 4Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. 5I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. 6Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. 7If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. 9As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. 10If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. 11I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

12 'This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. 14You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15I do not call you servants*;) any longer, because the servant*;) does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 16You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.

18 'If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you. 19If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world—therefore the world hates you. 20Remember the word that I said to you, "Servants*;) are not greater than their master." If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. 21But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. 22If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23Whoever hates me hates my Father also. 24If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. 25It was to fulfill the word that is written in their law, "They hated me without a cause."

1. Author John has reported that Jesus and his disciples had finished their conversation and had left the upper room where they had eaten what we call the Last Supper. "Rise, let us be on our way." But here in chapter 15 Jesus continues his conversation, seemingly still in the upper room.

We might imagine Author John taking a break from writing his memories of Jesus at this point, thinking himself to have said all he knew about it. But when he took up his pen again he had thought of several other items that Jesus had spoken in this farewell speech, and so he simply continued on with the things he remembered. Whatever the situation may have been at that time we may appreciate deeply the things that John now adds to his memoir of Jesus.

This is one way of viewing the setting. John has been away for a long time, perhaps weeks, from his writing desk. When he returns he remembers that he was writing about the Farewell Address of Jesus, but does not remember exactly how far he got. So he sits down and writes, but some of what he writes is a bit repetitious because he does not recall exactly everything he wrote earlier, and perhaps does not even have those papyrus pages handy to review. But he does want to make sure that everything he can remember gets into his book. He remembers that Jesus said much about the Paraclete, and he wants to include everything Jesus said about it.

2. "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower." The disciples, sitting around the dining-room table, might not have appreciated the full thrust of this figure of speech from Jesus. What does that have to do with setting up an independent throne here in Jerusalem? But Jesus wanted them to be able to call the simile to mind after all the coming events are ended and Jesus is gone to heaven.

God is the vine-grower; Jesus is the vine itself; and the disciples are branches in the vine. What was Jesus' point?

Jesus is doing everything he can to impress on the disciples that they must retain their faith in him even through the intensely trying hours now at hand. Judas has already left; the others are extremely bewildered by Jesus' reluctance to get the rebellion started. When, a few hours later, they will see Jesus arrested, tried, and condemned they will be at the breaking point. But Jesus wants to assure them that it will all turn out well, provided they manage to preserve their confidence in God and in Jesus. Abide in me. Stay with me even if you don't understand what is happening. God is tending his vineyard; he will carry us through.

We may note again the importance of being God-centered here in Jesus' words. Jesus is not urging the disciples merely to have faith in him, but to raise their sights also to God himself. God has created the world; he is in charge of what happens in the world; he has sent his Son Jesus to do something important; have confidence that God knows what he is doing even when we don't understand why. Jesus himself is thoroughly theistic and he is able to face the prospect of a sad and difficult death because he does have perfect trust in his heavenly Father.

3. Jesus adds, "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love." Note again the theocentric orientation. Everything stems from God the Father. Jesus passes on the love that God has for his creatures, and the recipients of that love have the responsibility to remain in that love.

Note also the emphasis Jesus is putting on the need to persevere, to abide, to remain, to stay. Jesus knows they will be sorely tested in the next few days, not understanding why the true Messiah sent by God is being rejected and tortured and executed. How can he get the kingdom of David going again if he is dead?

Jesus knows full well that the disciples will have to undergo a huge reversal in their way of thinking about the kingdom of God. They will have to unlearn just about everything they think they know about it, and they will have to learn to see it in a way they never have thought of. Jesus knows it will come, but not to Judas Iscariot. The others must resolve even now to abide in the love of God and of Jesus.

4. "You did not choose me but I chose you." Interesting! But this story did begin, did it not, with Andrew and John looking for the Messiah? John the Baptist had pointed out Jesus to them, and they went looking for him. And after they talked with Jesus for a while they hurried home and excitedly told Peter and their friends they had found the Messiah. Isn't that the disciples finding Jesus and choosing to follow him?

The disciples had to learn to be consistent theists. That is, they had to learn that in ways beyond our understanding it is God who is in control of human life, our history, our individual character, the things we choose to do. This does not mean, of course, that we are not responsible for the things we choose to do. But when we choose to do what is right we should understand that it is God himself who is working in our thoughts and feelings. Several years later the Apostle Paul would write to the Philippians, "Work our your own salvation, for it is God who is at work in you both to will and to do."

That is what Jesus had in mind by telling the disciples that they did not choose Jesus but Jesus chose them. They must realize that God has chosen them, not to do what they so much wanted to do, but to do what God wanted them to do. And we today need also to know the same. We are called to obedience, to yield our own desires to the divine will and purpose of God. "I appointed you to go and bear fruit."

5. Jesus knows, however, that the disciples would not only have a hard time getting used to the true idea of the kingdom of God, but perhaps even more getting used to the idea that instead of coming to prestige and glory and recognition and honor in the new kingdom of David they would encounter resentment, opposition, hatred, possibly even death.

So Jesus tries to prepare them for the eventuality also, "If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you." All the while the disciples had expected to receive high honor and prestigious governmental positions in the new kingdom of Jesus. They would, however, get the opposite, and Jesus is doing his best to prepare them for it.

Note particularly the term "world." Theologians may debate the precise meaning of the term, but it means simply popular opinion. When the time came for the Jewish people to make a decision about Jesus – Is he our Messiah or is he not? – they decided against him, "Crucify him." The Roman authorities, knowing the decision was unjust, went along with that choice and nailed him to the cross.

That rejection of Jesus, hatred, carried over when the disciples began talking about Jesus after the next Pentecost observance. They were bullied, imprisoned, threatened, killed, but they were not stopped. So Jesus' advice already here did have its effect in helping to carry the disciples through the hatred they shared with Jesus. Christians today do well to keep this instruction from Jesus in mind when they see so much ridicule and misrepresentation in modern society.

6. We may pause again here to review the Apostle John's purpose in writing this book. He wants to show his readers why they should believe in Jesus even though his own countrymen rejected him. To do this John repeatedly insists on a theistic point of view. This may well be what people have done about Jesus, but this is how God overruled the human decision. This will be seen much more dramatically when it comes to the human decision to crucify Jesus, followed by the divine decision to raise him back to life.

So this is why John is at length remembering the various ways in which Jesus prepared the disciples to get through the traumatic events of the next few days. Jesus warns them that people will reject him and that the disciples will receive the brunt of that hatred also. John's readers will be able to follow all that quite clearly, understanding that the purpose of God supersedes the sinful decisions of people. They will see how the work of God overcomes the hatred and opposition of the world and thus be drawn into the kingdom of God through faith in Jesus and the inner persuasion of the Holy Spirit.

Note also the trinitarian structure of God's work. God is in control of what happens, Jesus is the human incarnation of what God wants to happen, and the Holy Spirit is the agency to accomplish it in our hearts.

7. Continuing the theme of hatred, Jesus climaxes this segment of his conversation with a rather bold and comprehensive claim, "Whoever hates me hates my Father also." If you are against me you are by that very fact against God.

In our modern twenty-first century world a common opinion is that there are numerous avenues to God, none of them exclusive or definitive. Whatever works for you makes it true for you. Buddhism is as valid a route to God if it works for adherents as is Christianity or Islam or Hinduism or any other religion. But Jesus is saying that if you reject Jesus you are rejecting God.

The problem today is the common notion about God that he is a remote, noumenal, esoteric Being far beyond any possibility of any valid knowledge on our part. How can we contact that far-off Being? Any way that works for you. Or, for that matter, forget any such Being and find a satisfactory purpose in life entirely on your own. In any case such a view of God is wrong.

The very first thing the Bible teaches us is that God is the Creator of all that exists, including all of us as human beings. That also is the first thing that Christians confess in the reputable Apostles' Creed, "I believe in God the Father, Creator of the heavens and the earth." When we make this confession we are affirming that we can and do know God. We know him in his activity, in his work. When we see how nature works and when our scientists penetrate in microcosm and the macrocosm, we are learning to know more about God and how he works. Everything that happens in the world of nature is God at work, actually God speaking. When we listen to nature we are ipso facto listening the Creator.

So that is the background of Jesus' insistence that to reject him is to reject God. God has sent Jesus into the world to embody and exemplify exactly what God wants all humans to be, so that if we reject Jesus or merely bypass him we are rejecting or bypassing the God who not only created the world but who is actively guiding it every moment of every day.

## Chapter Thirty-two

## PARACLETE

## John 15:26 – 16:15

##

'When the Advocate*;) comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf. 27You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning.

1'I have said these things to you to keep you from stumbling. 2They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, an hour is coming when those who kill you will think that by doing so they are offering worship to God. 3And they will do this because they have not known the Father or me. 4But I have said these things to you so that when their hour comes you may remember that I told you about them.

'I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. 5But now I am going to him who sent me; yet none of you asks me, "Where are you going?" 6But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your hearts. 7Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8And when he comes, he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: 9about sin, because they do not believe in me; 10about righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will see me no longer; 11about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.

I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

1. As mentioned earlier, the Greek word translated as Advocate here is Paraclete. Neither the more familiar term Comforter nor this term Advocate is a satisfactory equivalent of Paraclete. The Greek term means, in this setting, simply someone to replace Jesus. Jesus will be going away but he will send someone to replace him, a Paraclete. Such a term as Replacement, Substitute, Alternate, Surrogate, Proxy would capture the intent better. But for our purposes we will simply transliterate the Greek term into English letters, Paraclete, and understand something the disciples did not yet know, that Jesus means the Holy Spirit.

Jesus promises to send the Paraclete to the disciples "from the Father." It is important for the disciples to know this. Jesus insists that they are constantly God-centered, knowing deep down that not only Jesus but they themselves are responsible to God directly. So just as they have come to believe that Jesus as a man has been sent by God, so too they must continue to believe that even when he is gone his replacement will also be sent by God to continue the work that Jesus began.

Why would that be important to know for the disciples (and for us)? Because there are then no human or finite tests for obedience to God, only what we have called in traditional theology the inner work of the Holy Spirit. The Old Testament people of God had the old covenant, the Torah, to guide them. The disciples had Jesus as a man to guide them. But now they must transition to having no finite guide, but the Spirit of God only. The Holy Spirit will come to them from the Father in heaven.

So that is why, at this Last Supper and last opportunity of Jesus to prepare the disciples for his coming passion, Jesus speaks so much about the Paraclete. Jesus wants his disciples, even if they do not get the full thrust now, to be able to remember these things after the Holy Spirit does come upon them – as we know -- at Pentecost. From then on the disciples, and all Christians, must be guided by the internal work of the Holy Spirit in their minds and hearts and lives.

2. Jesus describes the Paraclete as "the Spirit of truth." "The Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf."

Earlier, we may recall, Jesus had said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Now, about to leave the disciples, Jesus is saying about the Paraclete, he is the "Spirit of truth." It will be important for us, as well as for John's original readers in the Ephesus area, to understand as best we can what this means.

The term "truth" can have various connotations. We can speak of logical truth, that is, statements that are logically coherent and not contradictory. Or we can speak of scientific truth, that is, statements that reflect accurately how the world runs. Or, in our modern times, we sometimes speak of personal truth, that is, one's own perception of the meaning of life. Or perhaps one might suggest doctrinal truth, meaning the theological statements that any given religious group accepts as definitive.

Jesus would not have meant any of these alternatives, or any similar to them. Jesus would have understood the term truth in a God-centered way. He would have meant that it is the Creator who determined just how the universe would run, including how the human race would develop its own history and civilization. Truth thus originates in God's act of creation and is gradually revealed as time and history slowly pass. That is to say, God knows from the beginning where the process of time and development is going, the destiny of the universe, the solar system, planet Earth, and the human race. God is, in fact, guiding these factors in the continuing acts of providence, slowly shaping his creation in the way he has determined.

That, then, would be the context of Jesus' usage of the term "truth." And it would be the meaning of his description of the Paraclete as the "Spirit of truth." The function of the Paraclete would then be to guide the disciples to begin to understand what God is doing by means of Jesus and the gospel which will soon be entrusted to them. Jesus has begun to do that, but as yet none of the disciples really got the message; they were still functioning with the mistaken notion that the kingdom of God is to be established by the use of force and weapons of war. The Paraclete will, when sent, guide them out of that notion into the truth that the kingdom of God is within.

3. You will be better off with me gone, says Jesus. "I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you." The disciples would hardly understand how this could be. Better off with you gone? What are you talking about?

Note particularly that Jesus is presenting an "either/or" situation. I must go away in order for the Paraclete to come. "If I do not go away, the Advocate will not come to you." Either Jesus or the Paraclete. Interesting, is it not? The disciples cannot have both Jesus and the Paraclete. One but not both. Is that the way we understand it today? We cannot have Jesus and the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, at the same time? Why not?

The disciples cannot have Jesus in the flesh without thinking, as they did, that Jesus in the flesh will be leading them into successful revolt against Rome. So long as Jesus was with them tangibly, a person they can see and talk with, so long it would be impossible for them to break out of their belief that he would lead them to set up a powerful political kingdom in Jerusalem. That's the only reason they had to follow him as they did.

Accordingly, the only way Jesus could force them to abandon that notion was to leave them physically. If he was gone he could not lead a military army against Rome. But of course then the problem for Jesus would be how to sustain their faith in him as the Messiah sent by God. And that is what this lengthy conversation with his disciples is all about. Preparing the disciples to be able to persevere in the faith without succumbing, as did Judas Iscariot, to the power of disillusionment.

So Jesus now puts it directly, I'm going away but I will send you a Paraclete, and you will be better off because of it. It is to your advantage that I go away. At the time, surely, the disciples would not understand how this could happen, but they did have enough trust in Jesus to accept what he said simply because he said it.

4. Reflecting on this promise by Jesus to the disciples, we might wonder how Jesus was able to predict this outcome of his death and resurrection. How could Jesus know that the remaining disciples (minus Judas Iscariot) would sustain their faith and come out of the experience with a radically different idea of the kingdom of God?

Jesus knew this was the only possible outcome for the disciples, granted that they had come thus far with him. He knew they were all sorely tempted, fully as much as was Judas, to leave and go back home. But they had not done this up to this point, and that was enough for Jesus to conclude that they would indeed weather the storm about to break over their heads. They would not be able to make any sense at all of the tragic crucifixion, or even of the happy news of resurrection, but even so they would flounder through until the light dawned and they could make sense of what had happened. Until the Paraclete led them into all the truth of what had happened.

And when that happened they would be transformed from uncertain flounderers to confident apostles. Jesus could see these developments already now and was doing his best to tell them things they would remember, things that would enable them later to understand God's purpose in what Jesus was doing. "I have said these things to you so that when their hour comes you may remember that I told you about them."

5. Jesus continues with three affirmations about what the Paraclete will do. "And when he comes, he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: about sin, because they do not believe in me; about righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will see me no longer; about judgment, because the ruler of this world has been condemned."

## Sin. The Paraclete will prove the world wrong about sin. Let us understand the term "world" to mean, as above, popular opinion. Popular opinion at the time was that Jesus was a false Messiah. But when the Paraclete comes it will become clear that the reverse was true: popular opinion was wrong. The Messiah did not come to drive out the Romans by force but to set up the kingdom of God in our hearts.

## Righteousness. The Paraclete will prove the world wrong about righteousness. Popular opinion was that a person was righteous if he or she obeyed the Torah faithfully. But it was the same people, those who made the Torah a vast set of rules, who had rejected the Messiah God sent. They were wrong; righteousness does not come by meticulous obedience to a set of rules but by serving the Lord from the heart.

## Judgment. The Paraclete will prove the world wrong about judgment. Popular opinion judged that Jesus was a false Messiah, but the Paraclete, working within our hearts, assures us that that judgment is incorrect. Jesus is the true genuine Messiah.

## 6. Jesus continues his explanation of what his replacement, the Paraclete, will do when he comes. "When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth." At the time, the disciples did not know the truth about the function of the Messiah. They thought in terms of military conquest, but when the Paraclete came on Pentecost he showed them the truth. The kingdom of God does not come in visible ways, with observation, but in inner spiritual ways; it is within you.

Be careful not to misunderstand when Jesus says, "He will declare to you the things that are to come." Jesus is not talking eschatology, not explaining about the end of the world. He is talking about what the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, will do for the disciples when he comes. At the moment the disciples do not understand what is going on in Jesus' life. They will understand even less in the next few weeks, but when the Paraclete comes he will enable them to understand it all. Jesus' intent is immediate not futuristic.

And again Jesus takes pains to put the entire matter of the Paraclete in a clearly theistic setting, "for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears." We must understand everything Jesus says here in a trinitarian way.

Jesus speaks of his Father, "All that the Father has is mine." He means that God's eternal plan for his creation is coming to fruition in himself and in his ministry. So then the Holy Spirit "will take what is mine and declare it to you." What starts with God, and what continues in Jesus, is now explained by the Holy Spirit to the disciples and to us. So we must not miss the theistic and trinitarian understanding of Christianity and of living in the Spirit.

## So, taking all of that into consideration, we can well understand Jesus when he says, "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now." No way could the disciples assimilate the things that we now know about Jesus' passion. And that in turn will explain why the Paraclete's coming is so necessary. The Holy Spirit will do for the disciples what Jesus in the flesh could not do. It will indeed be to their advantage that Jesus goes away and that he sends a Paraclete to replace him.

## 7. It will be useful for us now to reflect a bit further on Jesus' insistence that the disciples would be better off with Jesus gone. We may ask, Is that still true today for us in the twenty-first century? Are we better off with Jesus gone from earth? If so then why do we wish him to return? I leave you with this question without attempting an answer.

## Chapter Thirty-three

## THE HOUR HAS COME

## John 16:16-33

16 'A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me.' 17Then some of his disciples said to one another, 'What does he mean by saying to us, "A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me"; and "Because I am going to the Father"?' 18They said, 'What does he mean by this "a little while"? We do not know what he is talking about.' 19Jesus knew that they wanted to ask him, so he said to them, 'Are you discussing among yourselves what I meant when I said, "A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me"? 20Very truly, I tell you, you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice; you will have pain, but your pain will turn into joy. 21When a woman is in labor, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world. 22So you have pain now; but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. 23On that day you will ask nothing of me. Very truly, I tell you, if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.

25 'I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures, but will tell you plainly of the Father. 26On that day you will ask in my name. I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf; 27for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world; again, I am leaving the world and am going to the Father.'

29 His disciples said, 'Yes, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure of speech! 30Now we know that you know all things, and do not need to have anyone question you; by this we believe that you came from God.' 31Jesus answered them, 'Do you now believe? 32The hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each one to his home, and you will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone because the Father is with me. 33I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world!'

1. Much of what John writes here is repetitious. Jesus has already informed the disciples that he will be leaving them soon. So when he says, "A little while, and you will no longer see me, and again a little while, and you will see me," he is reinforcing what he has already told them; he will be going away. We might, perhaps, imagine that again some time has elapsed since John last picked up his pen. But no matter, the point does bear repeating.

But what exactly does Jesus mean by adding, "again a little while, and you will see me"? The disciples would be getting more and more confused by all these things. The first "little while" and Jesus will be gone. Another "little while" and they will see him again.

Judging by what did actually happen we can see that Jesus may have had two things in mind, his resurrection and his ascension. He would be leaving them when he dies on the cross, but they will see him alive again after the resurrection. But then he would be leaving them again, this time permanently by his ascension into the clouds. In that case, again in a "little while," they would see him not physically but spiritually, in the form of the Holy Spirit.

2. Jesus assures the disciples that "your pain will turn into joy." After each of the two "little whiles" the disciple would indeed become very happy. After the resurrection they were delighted to see Jesus, thinking that now for sure we can get the revolution started. Anyone who could come back to life after he was killed would surely be able to figure out a way to get the Romans out of the country.

So even at the very moment of Jesus' ascension the disciples were pressing Jesus to tell them when he would be starting the revolt. There would have to be a second "little while" for the disciples to gather their wits about them trying to figure out what God was doing. And then the Holy Spirit came and it all became plain – resulting in the disciples' pain turning into joy permanently.

3. But then Jesus promises them something that we even today can hardly understand. John has hinted at it earlier (15:16). "On that day you will ask nothing of me. Very truly, I tell you, if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete."

The disciples may "ask nothing" of Jesus, but they may ask "anything" of the Father in Jesus' name. "Ask and you will receive." Really? Anything? They don't pray to Jesus directly but to God the Father?

Understand that the disciples will not be asking Jesus for anything. Why not? Because he will be gone. They will no longer be able to talk with him or ask questions. Instead they must now concentrate, not on a human tangible visible person, but on the invisible Creator God. They must transition from being dependent on another human being to being dependent on the Father in heaven.

Jesus has just explained in some detail the coming of the Paraclete. And this is what he has in mind in this further conversation. It will be better for the disciples to move on beyond dependence on some other person, even Jesus, and become dependent on the Spirit of God working powerfully within their minds and wills. They must learn how to obey God, not by listening to other humans, but by sensing directly the Spirit of God leading them into all the truth.

4. But what about that "anything"? Ask for "anything" and you will receive it? Well, maybe I would like to have a higher salary so as to be able to afford a new car. Or maybe I have a chronic illness and pray to have it healed. If I pray sincerely will I get it?

No. That is not what Jesus had in mind for the disciples or for us. Those examples are not praying in the name of Jesus. But what if I do say those words at the end of my prayer –I pray in the name of Jesus, Amen -- I'm praying in his name am I not? No, you aren't.

You are praying for what you want, not for what Jesus wants, or for what God wants. We need to take our cue from the petitions in the Lord's prayer, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done." We need to pray for what God wants, not what we want. That's what it means to pray in Jesus' name.

But how do we know what God wants? Does he want me to have the promotion that I pray for? Does he want me to be healed from my heart disease? Does he want my wife to take on more church work? Does God want my daughter to get A's in her schoolwork? Does he want the Republicans to elect the next president? How can we know such things?

If we don't know, then we pray, "Thy will be done." And leave it at that. We then live by what we do know, and leave what we do not know to God. That's all God asks of us. To trust that even when things go wrong and we can't figure out what God wants us to do, God knows what he is doing. And we wait patiently for his will to become clear. Live by that faith.

5. Jesus explains to the disciples, "I have said these things to you in figures of speech." Not only now at the Last Supper, but all during his ministry, Jesus has been using parables to try to get his point across to the disciples. Why?

Because if he told them straightforward that he had no intention of leading a revolution against Rome they would desert him immediately. The disciples must be convinced Jesus is from God and is their long-expected Messiah. But they must also learn that God has no intention for Jesus to start a revolution. So that is why Jesus had to resort to indirect ways of communicating with the disciples, making them think about things in a different way but without alienating them altogether.

Jesus does add, "The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures, but will tell you plainly of the Father." The time is coming, but it is not here yet. The time when they understood plainly that Jesus would not fight against the Roman soldiers did not happen until Jesus left them altogether, at the ascension. And even then they had to process that knowledge until the Holy Spirit enlightened their minds on the coming Pentecost celebration. So long as Jesus was with them they did not get the point of Jesus' ministry, but afterward they could begin to understand the meaning of his figurative language.

6. "His disciples said, 'Yes, now you are speaking plainly, not in any figure of speech!'" But Jesus knows the disciples do not yet understand. They seem to understand what Jesus is saying, but they do not at all sense what is about to happen.

So Jesus responds, You think so? In just a few hours you will all scatter and run away and leave me alone.

But I won't really be alone. God the Father will be with me, and that is all I need. Jesus knows events to happen later that evening will be so bad that the disciples will be surprised and will not know what to do but to escape and save their own skins. They think they now understand Jesus, but Jesus knows they do not.

7. "I have said this to you, so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution. But take courage; I have conquered the world!"

When we read these words we have some fairly accurate idea of what Jesus is saying to the disciples, because we know what happened. But if we try to put ourselves in the mentality of the disciples, we can understand that they still did not get Jesus' meaning.

You are going to face persecution. The disciples would think military opposition. You may have peace. Yes, after the revolution is successful and Jesus is installed as the king of the Jews. I have conquered the world. Of course, we can go on to extend the kingdom of Jesus to control a lot of other nations, the way David and Solomon did. Take courage. Excellent; we will follow you Jesus into battle confident that you will defeat the enemy.

Jesus is doing his best to prepare the disciples, first to be disillusioned, second to retain confidence in Jesus in spite of appearances, third to stay together long enough for the Paraclete to come and make everything plain, clearing their minds to unlearn their previous ideas and to replace them with a more accurate vision of Jesus' ministry and purpose.

Persecution will come from their own countrymen, not from military opposition. Peace will come, not from victory in warfare, but from understanding how the power of God works in their lives. Jesus conquers the world, not by military success but by converting people. Courage, they will then understand, is to follow Jesus wherever and however he leads.

8. We must extrapolate carefully from these conversations. In many parts of the world, new Christians are severely persecuted. They will need great assistance from the Holy Spirit to know how to deal with it. They will persevere in the conviction that Jesus has indeed conquered the world, that is, conquered the powers that are making life difficult for them. And they may have deep internal peace that to follow Jesus to the only way to serve the Lord God.

Millions of other Christians never face such open opposition. But it is happening that Christianity is more and more being thought of as one option among many. If being a Christian is getting to be a chore for you, well, try something else. There may be something attractive in Buddhism or in Islam or even in Hinduism. Or if all of this religious paraphernalia is getting to be obnoxious to you, well then forget religion and church altogether. Make your own way through life without the fetters of religion.

So we do need to be reminding ourselves constantly, first, of the God who created the world and who is in charge of the way it is developing; second, of the fact that the Creator sent Jesus into the world in order to save it from the ruination that sin brings upon us; and third, that God sends his Paraclete into our lives in order to enable us to be the best kind of human that we can be, made into God's image by faith in the Lord Jesus.

9. Let us emphasize again this affirmation from Jesus, "I have conquered the world!" We are tempted to think of Jesus' words in a purely universal sense, thinking "world" means the entire earth or the entire human race. While it may well be true (and it is) Jesus' use of the term "world" is more nuanced. It means the powers of the world that oppose the truth about God and about Jesus, the forces that produce persecution, opposition, misunderstanding, and whatever else may be inimical to the gospel.

Jesus does say elsewhere (Matthew 28) that all authority both in heaven and on earth has been entrusted to him by God. But here in John 16 Jesus is talking about the people who will soon be shouting to have Jesus crucified and later will be persecuting the disciples. By "world" Jesus means those forces, and he wants the disciples to know ahead of time that Jesus has defeated them and will defeat them in the disciples' lives as well.

Jesus' promise extends to us as well. Whatever opposition Christianity may face or that we as individual believers may encounter is bound to fail in the long run. God has his purpose, that is, to fashion the human race into his image, so that somehow in God's providence even opposition has its purpose, as Jesus' death and resurrection demonstrate. It is in that confidence that Christians of every age must persevere.

## Chapter Thirty-four

## JESUS PRAYS FOR HIMSELF

## John 17:1-5

After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, 'Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you, 2since you have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him. 3And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. 4I glorified you on earth by finishing the work that you gave me to do. 5So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed.

1. In chapter 17 Jesus prays: a) for himself, b) for the disciples, and c) for future believers.

2. Jesus prays to the "Father" and refers to himself as the "Son." We need to be very careful not to misinterpret what this Father/Son relationship involves. Jesus is a human being praying to God. He is about to leave the disciples to the guidance of the Paraclete. Jesus will no longer be with them as a man among men. Only his spirit will remain as their guide.

God sent Jesus into the world, as John reminds us, as the Speech of God in human flesh, demonstrating the purpose of God for the human race as a whole. Jesus is the human being that the entire human race is destined to become, the perfect image of God.

Accordingly it is important for us to understand that Jesus is praying as a human being, so that the term "Son" implies only his human relationship to God as his "Father." We need, consequently, to avoid thinking here of anything like deity for Jesus.

It is true that in the Greek religion of the day the term "Son of God" meant a divine being. But the Hebrew/Christian faith is strictly monotheistic in contrast to the Greco/Roman faith which is polytheistic. If Greek philosophers or priests heard the term "Son of God" applied to Jesus they would have thought immediately that Jesus was a second god, comparable say to Apollo or Ares or one of the numerous other gods who were sons of Zeus and Hera.

But that is not how writer John employs the term, and not how Jesus does. Jesus is praying as the human Son to the divine Father.

3. "The hour has come." Jesus knows the end of his life is at hand. He also knows he has done all he could to fulfill his mission. He has prepared the disciples as best he could to carry on the mission: they would survive the trauma to come tomorrow. He has forced the nation as a whole to make a decision about him: is he our Messiah or isn't he? They would decide tomorrow.

Judas would shortly be leading the temple police to the place that he knew was a favorite place for Jesus to rest, and Jesus would knowingly be going right there even though he could easily avoid it. So indeed the hour has come and by this time tomorrow he would have cried out from the cross, It is finished, I've done everything God has required of me, and he would die.

4. "Glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you."

Jesus is totally and consistently theistic in his understanding of his mission in life. God has sent him into the world to show the way to eternal life, to open up the kingdom of God so that God's original purpose in creating humans will be furthered. So what precisely does that term "glorify" mean? Jesus wants God to glorify him, for the purpose of ensuring that Jesus glorifies God. What is Jesus asking? How would what is coming tomorrow, nailed to a cross, be glorifying him?

Jesus has in mind not only the ignominy of being rejected by his own people but what will happen soon after that. We know what that is; the disciples did not. God raised Jesus from the dead. The people will not glorify Jesus, but God will. That is what Jesus is praying. He is praying that God's will be done. Jesus knows it is God's will that the decision of the people will be reversed and that they will recognize their own error and come to genuine faith and enter the kingdom of God.

5. "You have given him authority over all people, to give eternal life to all whom you have given him." Here Apostle John is recalling Jesus' own definition of the purpose of his mission, "to give eternal life to all whom you have given him." So just what is this "eternal life" that Jesus mentions?

"And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." "Eternal life" is to know God and to know Jesus Christ. The Hebrew term for "know" which John may well have had in mind is _yada,_ which carries a much richer connotation than what we might call propositional information. It involves a strong inter-personal connection in which two lives are closely connected in mutual love, respect, and cooperation. When we believe in Jesus and in the Father who sent him, then we are absorbed into their work as well. We understand ourselves to belong not to ourselves but to God and then understand the purpose of our existence is to be useful in the work of God, making the world just a bit better because of the way we conduct ourselves in our daily work, the extension and strengthening of his kingdom.

That is not what we normally think of when we speak of eternal life. We normally think of living forever in heaven after we die on earth. But just a little thought about this will show us that Jesus would have no intention of saying anything like that to the disciples at this critical time in their lives. Jesus is not preparing them to go to heaven after they die; he is preparing them to survive the next few days and weeks so that they may continue the work that he has begun.

The disciples will be able to continue that work only if they truly know God and Jesus, that is, know what God and Jesus are all about. They do not know that yet. They will not know it until the Paraclete comes to lead them into all the truth.

And the same is true for all who come to Jesus in faith. They will receive, already now, the life eternal that Jesus has come to give. It will be the kind of lifestyle that God created us all to have, that of imaging the Creator in the way we live. This will come when the Paraclete leads us into the truth about what God wants to have happen and into the truth that Jesus' mission was to show us the way. And that in turn will come only by complete faith in Jesus.

6. The last thing Jesus prays about himself is rather enigmatic, "So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed."

The difficulty is connected particularly with the phrase, "before the world existed." This NRSV translation, as well as most others, affirms the pre-existence of Jesus before the creation of the world. But is that what Jesus had in mind, that he would resume his divine status after this brief interlude of being human? It is very questionable that Jesus has such esoteric thoughts in mind.

Jesus' main concern in this Farewell Address to the disciples, and now in this prayer to God, is the continuation of God's mission by the disciples. He has done all he could and now the work will have to be carried on by others. That is the mindset of Jesus that John wants his readers to understand.

In that context Jesus is thinking, not of himself, where he is going, but of God's eternal purpose for creating a human race and of his own function within it. He would then be thinking of what it was that existed "before the world existed," namely what God intended by creating a world and a human race. What was in God's mind even before he created the world? It was to have a human race to imitate him in the way it went about developing the natural potentials of the world.

Jesus would know his own place in the execution of that eternal goal of God. And he knows that his own participation in it has come to its climax. So, as he contemplates that conclusion to his ministry, and its transfer to the disciples, he prays that God will enable this transition to take place effectively so that God's eternal purpose will be promoted.

This is the end of Jesus' prayer for himself.

## Chapter Thirty-five

## JESUS PRAYS FOR HIS DISCIPLES

## John 17:6-19

6 'I have made your name known to those whom you gave me from the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. 7Now they know that everything you have given me is from you; 8for the words that you gave to me I have given to them, and they have received them and know in truth that I came from you; and they have believed that you sent me. 9I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. 10All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. 11And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one. 12While I was with them, I protected them in your name that*;) you have given me. I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled. 13But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves. 14I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. 15I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. 16They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world. 17Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. 18As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. 19And for their sakes I sanctify myself, so that they also may be sanctified in truth.

1. This is a rather surprising prayer for Jesus to make. We might have expected Jesus to pray that the disciples will be able to survive the difficult time ahead: Lord give them strength of faith to resist the temptation to abandon me.

But he says, "I have made your name known." Jesus is explaining what he has been doing for the past years with respect to the disciples. He has been making God's name known to them. But we can read all four Gospels and there doesn't seem to be any specific spot in any of them where Jesus is explaining that the name of God is Yahweh. Of course all Jews knew that. So what does Jesus mean?

By the word "name" Jesus means everything we can know about God, who he is, what he has done, what he is continuing to do, what he wants us humans to do, what he will do in the years to come – everything. Jesus wants his own God-centered mindset to become the mindset of the disciples as well, and that is what he means by affirming that he has made God's name known.

2. Jesus then prays, "They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word." Earlier in this Gospel, John has described how the first disciples came to be followers of Jesus. It was because they figured Jesus could become the Messiah to lead them into victorious revolt against Rome. That was the human motivation.

But Jesus knows there is more to the story than human motivation. Much more. There is God's intent, God's providential control over the development of human life and history. God was using this human motivation, flawed as it was, to accomplish his divine purpose. God would use their misguided but sincere motivation to confirm strong loyalty to Jesus, and then when the time was right, God would lead them to better insight.

So Jesus could say that the disciples were first God's choice, and that it was the inner work of God to bring them to Jesus, and now to keep them faithful to their divine calling. "They have believed that you sent me." So Jesus is, after all, praying for the disciples, for God to keep them faithful and obedient.

3. Jesus is still reviewing the past, that is, his method of preparing the disciples to carry on the work after he is gone. He adds in his prayer for them, "All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them."

Jesus has been "glorified" in the disciples? How so?

He means that what he has been trying to do with the disciples has been successful. Whatever the precise implications might be for the Greek term here, we can detect that Jesus is satisfied that the disciples will be able to survive the huge disappointment and disillusionment that is now at hand. That would be what he has in mind by saying he has been glorified in the disciples.

4. Here is a transition prayer. Jesus has been reviewing the past, how he has been training the disciples, but now that time is past and we need to look to the future. He prays, "And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you." Jesus will no longer be around to guide and teach the disciples, for he will be leaving the earth and ascending to the Father.

So now that Jesus will no longer be present with them, it will be up to God to carry on his guidance in the years and centuries to come. He prays, "Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one."

In order for the disciples to be able to carry on the mission that Jesus began they must be protected. Protected from what? From the same forces that persuaded Judas to betray Jesus – which is what Judas was doing at that same precise instant. The rest of the disciples, sharing the same basic mindset with Judas, must not succumb to it but persevere in their confidence in Jesus and in God. The disciples did not yet understand Jesus and his purpose, so they must be protected from doing what Judas was doing, forsaking the Lord.

5. Let's take another look at the words, "So that they may be one, as we are one." Recall that Jesus is praying as a human person on earth to the Father God in heaven. He affirms their unity. What unity?

Not ontological or metaphysical unity, but agreement in purpose. God has his own eternal purpose in creating the world and in guiding the development of the human race, and Jesus understands this full well and governs his own thoughts and actions accordingly.

Now Jesus is praying God to create the same kind of unity in the disciples, that each of them and all of them together may likewise understand the purpose of God and of Jesus and may together work in such a way that God's will may be done.

6. "I guarded them, and not one of them was lost except the one destined to be lost, so that the scripture might be fulfilled." Judas Iscariot is the "one destined to be lost." Be careful not to read into this terminology more than Jesus intended. Jesus is not saying anything about going to heaven or to hell. He is saying simply that Judas has abandoned Jesus and the disciples. He is lost to the work of God, lost to the band of disciples, lost to the church that would soon be started, lost to Christianity.

Jesus explains that Judas was destined to be lost. We may wonder why Jesus has to remind God of this; wouldn't God know it already? Whatever we may think about that we can understand that author John phrases Jesus' words in such a way that they may make sense to us as well. John wants us who read what he writes to understand that everything is in the plan of God, including this rejection by Judas.

Further, John wishes us to understand that Judas' betrayal is according to the scriptures. This item would not be especially significant for Gentile readers who would have no contact with the Jewish sacred literature, but it would be important for Jewish readers who are consciously dependent upon those scriptures for guidance as to God's will. It would help them to reconsider their notions of what a Messiah is supposed to do, and how it would all work out. What is happening is foretold by scripture, not something entirely unexpected.

7. "I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world." The "word" and the "world"; be careful to understand what Jesus means by those terms.

When Jesus prays that he has given the disciples "your word," he does not mean the scriptures per se. He means God's message. It is true, of course, that the scriptures do bring God's word, but the word of God is much bigger than the Jewish sacred literature. It was by speaking that God created the world, so that the universe itself is the objectification of God's word. The word has created the world, and that is where we must listen to it as well as in the sacred literature.

And here in this prayer for the disciples it is clear that when Jesus uses the term "world" he does not mean the visible universe, he means the spirit of the times. The spirit of the times among the Jews was that the Messiah would be the person God sends to drive out the Roman occupation army and restore the throne of David in an independent kingdom of Israel. That's what the Old Testament prophets promised and what all good Jews, except Jesus, believed. At the moment the disciples had not yet been delivered out of that mindset, so they too were still in the "world" in that sense.

But Jesus knows that in a short while the Paraclete will come and draw the disciples out of the "world" and into the true messianic vision of the kingdom of God. They will no longer be part of that spirit of the times and hence the people who are still in that mentality will "hate" them. The book of Acts will detail that result. Even now in this prayer Jesus is anticipating that result and is praying that God will sustain them in the trials they too will be facing.

8. "15I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one. They do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world."

There seems to be some kind of ambiguity here regarding the term "world." The disciples do not "belong to the world," yet Jesus is not praying that God take them "out of the world." One would think that Jesus does indeed want the disciples to come out of the "world" if by that term he means the spirit of the times.

What Jesus is praying is that the disciples, having been brought out of their disillusionment regarding Jesus' purpose, will not go off and become hermits or start a monastery somewhere. The disciples must not withdraw from the society of the "world" but remain within it to help others gain the vision of the kingdom of God. So Jesus is praying that God protect them from the evil one, the Satan who destroyed the faith of Judas Iscariot. The disciples will have a hard time of it, but they will persevere under the divine tutelage and protection of God himself. They do not belong to the world, but their mission is to work within that community of the world.

And of course that is the perpetual mission that all Christians have: to live as children of God in the middle of whatever mentality their countrymen may have.

9. Jesus prays, "Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth." Do not limit this to the Bible. The documents we now have in the New Testament were not written yet at the time Jesus prayed this prayer. God's word is God's speech anywhere and any time and to whom and however he speaks it. Wherever there is truth, there is the word of God.

So Jesus is praying God to sanctify them in the truth of what God is saying anywhere and everywhere. Specifically now in the case of the disciples Jesus would have in mind that when the Paraclete comes upon the disciples they will see the new vision of God's kingdom, and that in the months and years to follow they may mature in their understanding, always kept in the way of truth by the inner workings of the Holy Spirit.

We too must constantly be aware of this inner guidance of the Paraclete as the Spirit guides us slowly but surely into the significance of the gospel for the lives of humans everywhere.

10. The disciples must understand that their task in life is to continue the mission of Jesus. Jesus prays to God, "As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world."

The mission is first of all God's mission as defined already in Genesis 1. God created the human race for the purpose of imaging him in the way they go about the distinctively human task of gaining dominion over the earth.

This is the goal also for Jesus in the way he went about his messianic mission. He wanted people to enter the kingdom of God. And his ultimate goal, exactly the same as the Creator's goal, was for the entire human race to function in a godly way, a truthful way, as a collective image of God. Jesus is sending the disciples into "the world." In this case he means not only the local Jerusalem "world" which is where the disciples must begin, but into Judea, Samaria, Syria, Egypt, and eventually to all the nations on earth, even Rome.

11. We may take special note that when Jesus prays that God will not take them out of the world, and that he prays that he is sending them into the world, the implication is clear enough that the purpose of God is not to get people out of this world in the sense of going to heaven or hell after they die. God's purpose is to keep them in this world for the purpose of gradually shaping human life and culture into the image of God that Genesis speaks of. There are no overtones of heaven and hell in this prayer of Jesus, and we should be careful not to introduce them into it.

## Chapter Thirty-six

## JESUS PRAYS FOR ALL BELIEVERS

## John 17:20-26

'I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, 21that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us,*;) so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, 23I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. 24Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

25 'Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me. 26I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.'

1. Here Jesus extends his prayer to include people who will believe, not because they have known and talked with Jesus directly, but because of the compelling message that the disciples will be bringing. There was no way in which either Jesus or the disciples would know exactly what the future would see in terms of the spread of the gospel. We who live later can see the astounding growth of the faith even in the intense persecution from the Roman Empire, and its phenomenal spread in Europe.

So Jesus does not engage in prediction in this prayer, the kind of predictions that some theologians like to indulge in. Rather, he keeps the prayer to the very basics of what it means to believe the gospel. "I ask... that they may all be one."

What must we say then when we look at Christianity today? Are we "one"? Great divisions exist, Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic, Protestant and Catholic, Lutheran and Calvinist and Baptist, and the innumerable smaller divisions within Protestantism. What does that mean in terms of what Jesus was praying for? Where do we see the oneness of the church that the Apostles' Creed affirms, "one holy catholic church"?

Many church leaders have recognized this anomaly in past centuries, and many artificial techniques have been employed to try to rectify the situation and achieve greater church unity. But none of them have produced the oneness that Jesus is praying for. We are, if anything, more divided now than ever before. What is even worse, we are exporting our ecclesiastical divisions by way of our mission work in foreign countries.

2. Jesus spells out the basics of unity in the prayer, "As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us." The kind of unity that exists between God and Jesus needs to be copied and reflected in the unity believers have with God and Jesus.

So just how is the Father "in" Jesus, and Jesus "in" the Father, the relationship that is the paradigmatic pattern for all believers?

Note carefully that this unity is not in the first place between ourselves as believers, it is our unity with God and with Jesus. We do not start with trying to break down barriers between churches or denominations. We make sure our personal faith in God and in Jesus is accurate, that is, comparable to the unity of Jesus and God. Unity begins with oneness with Jesus and God, not with oneness with one church to another, or with one believer to another.

3. How are Jesus and God united, "in" each other? Think of God as the Creator and Governor of the world, and of Jesus as the human person born of the virgin Mary. Jesus as a man is perfectly tuned to the will of the Creator of the world. He understands perfectly what God wants humans to be, for he himself is the perfect incarnation of that purpose.

So the point is that Jesus and God want all human beings to share that purpose, to live in such a way that they embody all the human traits that do as a matter of fact image God. God wants all humans, individually and collectively, to live in such a way that it could be said of them, "Behold, it was very good." Create a civilization in such a way that it images the way God created the world. God wants all of us to be like Jesus, incarnating the will of God for human life on earth.

4. When that relationship has been established, the result will be that Christians perceive that whatever other differences they may have, they are nonetheless brothers and sisters in Jesus. In his prayer Jesus puts it this way, "The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one."

What this requires of us, therefore, is that we do not place our differences first, but our unity with God and with Jesus. We will understand that our differences must be traced to our own personal shortcomings. If we all understood perfectly, as Jesus did, what God wants, we would have no differences worth talking about.

So we do need to be patient and forgiving of one another. How sad it is when Christians not only can't seem to get along with one another, but engage in bitter recriminations and accusations unworthy of the Holy Spirit.

5. I insert a purely personal observation at this point. I think God is now, in the twenty-first century, calling us all to take a long and critical view of our traditional theology. God is revealing all kinds of unsettling information to our scientific community, much of which calls into question the accuracy and relevance of our Systematic Theology.

In fact, it is my judgment that we need to employ an entirely new paradigm around which to construct our understanding of the gospel, namely the idea of development. This is not the place to expand that insight, but I am suggesting that our traditional theology is fast losing touch with the modern world and needs a comprehensive review and reconstruction. Only then, it seems to me, will the gospel reclaim the positive attention that it must have to capture the mind of modernity. I would like to think that such a reconstruction of theology will also tend toward the unification of much of the ecclesiastical difference that now plagues the church world – in other words, the unity of Christians with God and Jesus.

6. Jesus continues his prayer for future believers, "Father, I desire that those also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory, which you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world." Jesus wants us to be with him where he is. To see his glory, no less. What does he mean?

Ordinarily we might think of going to heaven after we die, since that is where Jesus is after his ascension. It is highly unlikely, however, that Jesus means that. Where is Jesus when he prays this way? He does not mean in Jerusalem or in heaven, he means where he is in relation to God. Jesus consciously and intentionally does his best to incarnate the will of God for a human being. He reflects the character of God in the way he speaks and lives. He is the exact image of God, reminiscent of Genesis 1. And that is what Jesus wants for all of us. To be where he is in relationship with the Creator. To be intentionally and believingly doing our best to incarnate the divine virtues such as truthfulness, love, justice, patience, respect and so forth. And to do what we can to shape our civilizations the same way.

But what about that phrase, "before the foundation of the world"? The only thing that existed before the foundation of the world was God, including in that term everything that was in his mind to accomplish by creating a world with human beings on it: his purposes. In God's sovereign plan for the universe, and for the human race he would put on the earth, Jesus will play a critical part. He will be the one single person who puts the entire human race on track to become the image of God. So in that sense God loved Jesus even before he created the world.

So Jesus could not mean that he existed as a divine person alongside God before the foundation of the world. Jesus is not talking metaphysical union with God here, but historical fulfillment of God's eternal purpose and plan. We see Jesus' glory when we catch a glimpse of the way in which God is slowly, in our human history, working out the details of his eternal sovereign purpose for us.

7. Presumably God knows everything that Jesus is praying, so we may understand that the prayer, though addressed to God, is at the same time intended to be a reminder to the disciples who are there to hear it. The disciples must bear in mind as much as possible what Jesus is saying, not to them but to God, about his purpose in life. "Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you; and these know that you have sent me."

When Jesus says that the world "does not know you" he is implying that the public opinion about what a Messiah is supposed to do is wrong. The Jewish people in general do not know that God's Messiah will not set up a kingdom like that of David, using military and political means. They do not know, as Jesus said elsewhere, that the kingdom of God does not come with observation, but is within them.

Jesus also is well aware that the disciples are still in that frame of mind. They too share the mentality of "the world." But what they do know, and still hold firmly, is that "you have sent me." That knowledge would be sorely tested in just a few hours, but Jesus has worked hard at confirming the disciples in the faith that Jesus is the true Messiah sent by God. It will be that conviction that will carry them through the next several weeks and months.

What a minimal faith, is it not, that the disciples had at this point? We have our creeds and confessions, our Systematic Theology books, centuries of theological work, huge tomes of religious insight, and long lists of things that we think every Christian ought to believe. But the disciples had none of that, and what they did have in terms of the old covenant of Torah they will have to unlearn. Simple confidence that whatever else might happen, Jesus is sent by God our Creator. And that is where it all must begin for every one of us, confidence that God is at work in Jesus and in the gospel.

8. "I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them." Jesus includes a lot more in the word "name" than merely the word itself. To make God's "name" made known is not merely a single word, but the vast array of God's plan and purpose as well. Still, what the disciples understood at this point is not much. They were able to see Jesus do the great signs and wonders that the Gospels record, and they were able to listen, most of the time uncomprehending, to what Jesus was saying in parables, and of course there was much in his sermons they could absorb, if only into their inadequate notions of what a Messiah is going to do.

But the application that Jesus draws here in this prayer to his Father in heaven is worth noticing. It is "that the love with which you have loved me may be in them." Not a theological creed, not a social improvement goal, not some internal feeling of psychological warmth, but mutual love reflecting the love of God for Jesus. The disciples must not withdraw from one another, as did Judas Iscariot, nor must they resort to mutual criticism and bickering about this that or the other thing; they must remain united in mutual love and respect because they want to reflect the love they see demonstrated in Jesus. Whatever else they may do in the days and weeks to come, they must work hard to retain this mutual love and cooperation that Jesus is praying about.

One wonders today whether we have ourselves understood this prayer of Jesus adequately. Church history shows altogether too much unlovely bickering and infighting between people who claim to serve the Lord Jesus. But, on the other hand, it does seem that there is another tendency blowing in the wind of denominationalism today, a growing recognition that we're all in it together, so that rather than fighting each other we ought to be standing together to fight the good fight of the faith against the powers of darkness and unbelief.

## Chapter Thirty-seven

## JESUS IS ARRESTED

## John 18:1-27

After Jesus had spoken these words, he went out with his disciples across the Kidron valley to a place where there was a garden, which he and his disciples entered. 2Now Judas, who betrayed him, also knew the place, because Jesus often met there with his disciples. 3So Judas brought a detachment of soldiers together with police from the chief priests and the Pharisees, and they came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. 4Then Jesus, knowing all that was to happen to him, came forward and asked them, 'For whom are you looking?' 5They answered, 'Jesus of Nazareth.'*;) Jesus replied, 'I am he.'*;) Judas, who betrayed him, was standing with them. 6When Jesus*;) said to them, 'I am he', they stepped back and fell to the ground. 7Again he asked them, 'For whom are you looking?' And they said, 'Jesus of Nazareth.' 8Jesus answered, 'I told you that I am he. So if you are looking for me, let these men go.' 9This was to fulfill the word that he had spoken, 'I did not lose a single one of those whom you gave me.' 10Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it, struck the high priest's slave, and cut off his right ear. The slave's name was Malchus. 11Jesus said to Peter, 'Put your sword back into its sheath. Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?'

12 So the soldiers, their officer, and the Jewish police arrested Jesus and bound him. 13First they took him to Annas, who was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, the high priest that year. 14Caiaphas was the one who had advised the Jews that it was better to have one person die for the people.

Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus. Since that disciple was known to the high priest, he went with Jesus into the courtyard of the high priest, 16but Peter was standing outside at the gate. So the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out, spoke to the woman who guarded the gate, and brought Peter in. 17The woman said to Peter, 'You are not also one of this man's disciples, are you?' He said, 'I am not.' 18Now the slaves and the police had made a charcoal fire because it was cold, and they were standing round it and warming themselves. Peter also was standing with them and warming himself.

19 Then the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his teaching. 20Jesus answered, 'I have spoken openly to the world; I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all the Jews come together. I have said nothing in secret. 21Why do you ask me? Ask those who heard what I said to them; they know what I said.' 22When he had said this, one of the police standing nearby struck Jesus on the face, saying, 'Is that how you answer the high priest?' 23Jesus answered, 'If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong. But if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?' 24Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

25 Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They asked him, 'You are not also one of his disciples, are you?' He denied it and said, 'I am not.' 26One of the slaves of the high priest, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, asked, 'Did I not see you in the garden with him?' 27Again Peter denied it, and at that moment the cock crowed.

1. Jesus has done all he could to prepare the disciples for the traumatic experience they will be encountering, all their hopes for a revolt against Rome shattered. Over the years he has convinced them that he is indeed the Messiah sent by God, but they had yet to understand just how Jesus would fulfill that assignment. Jesus has just now explained clearly that he is about to leave them in the hands of a substitute, a Paraclete, who would do what is necessary to get them to see what Jesus is all about. He will lead them into all the truth. And Jesus has put the entire matter into the hands of God the Father by means of prayer. God will surely accomplish the purpose he has intended from eternity and will bring the disciples through so that they will be able to continue the work Jesus began.

2. The Last Supper in the upper room has been finished, and now Jesus leads his disciples out on the way back to the place they were staying, perhaps the home of Lazarus, Martha, and Mary in Bethany, perhaps the home of Mary, mother of John Mark. Jesus, of course, never gets there, but perhaps the disciples did eventually.

On the way the group stops to rest in what we know today as the Garden of Gethsemane, on the hill called Olivet just east of the city of Jerusalem. Judas Iscariot is well acquainted with this place, having rested there with Jesus many a time. He leads a small group of soldiers, temple police, and Jewish dignitaries to the garden, where they arrest Jesus.

3. Peter, still impelled by the idea that the messianic kingdom will be achieved by force of arms, draws a small sword and begins to fight back to protect Jesus. He slices the ear of Malchus, one of the slaves in the arresting party. Peter, remember, was the disciple who boasted earlier that he would die for Jesus if it came to that. But Jesus puts a stop to that and tells Peter to put up his sword.

4. "Jesus said to Peter, 'Put your sword back into its sheath. Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?'" Jesus knows that it is God's will that he submit to whatever his enemies might have in mind, submit without resisting or seeking to escape.

But the disciples, including Peter, are flabbergasted. Aren't we going to start a revolution? Aren't we going to drive out the Roman soldiers? Why then can't we protect you, Jesus? They stand there completely clueless, with no notion whatever of what they're supposed to do now.

So, as Jesus is led away as a prisoner the disciples slink away and we hear no more about them. Where do the temple authorities bring Jesus? Not to a jail in the Roman headquarters, but to the home of the Jewish high priest Annas.

5. At this point I would like to do some theologizing, taking into account also what John will be telling us in the remaining chapters of his Gospel.

Why did Jesus have to die? Why did God require Jesus to "drink the cup" that God has given him, the cup of suffering, ridicule, and crucifixion?

Theologians from time immemorial have wrestled with that question, and have come up with a variety of answers, all of which might well contain elements of truth. Yet, in the immediacy of the moment at that time, it was necessary to do that because of the disciples. The work that Jesus began must continue in the long ages to come, and Jesus must make sure that there are people who are properly prepared to do so.

So Jesus gathers a group of disciples, lets them believe whatever they will about the Messiah, but persuades them by means of his miracles that he is indeed sent by God as the promised Jewish Messiah. But once this conviction is thoroughly established in the disciples' minds Jesus has to find a way of disillusioning them. Jesus must find a way to have them unlearn what they believe about the Messiah, and to learn something altogether new and unexpected about the kingdom Jesus is establishing. How can he do this?

Only by leaving them. If he is no longer around to lead a military revolt, then obviously it won't happen and the disciples would be forced to do some serious rethinking. Judas did and rejected Jesus. The rest of them muddled their way through as best they could until the light dawned on them on the day of Pentecost.

But Jesus had more in mind than simply the small band of disciples. He had the entire nation of Jews in mind as well. It wasn't enough that the disciples were convinced that Jesus came from God; the entire Jewish nation must be challenged to believe. So Jesus, in his own way, was challenging the Jewish people to make up their minds about him being the Messiah. As it happened, they rejected him, thus making a collective decision against Jesus.

But this was necessary for the people to do from the point of view that they would be convicted of their error when God raised Jesus from the dead. The people chose against Jesus in the crucifixion, God chose for Jesus in the resurrection. The way was then open for them to recognize their error, repent, and be baptized as believers in Jesus. So this was the way in which Jesus managed not only to get a small group of men ready for their evangelistic task but also to prepare a nation to listen, repent, and follow Jesus.

So whatever further theological implications we may wish to derive from this episode we ought not to extract those doctrines from the intense existential pressures of the times, the realities of human feelings and decisions and of how God was employing them to get his will done.

The Apostle Paul teaches that Jesus died for our sins. We may ask, What were the sins of the disciples at the time of Jesus' death? Besides the personal failures and transgressions that each of them undoubtedly had, they all had in common the basic sin of the Jewish nation at the time: failure to sense the spiritual nature of the kingdom of God. They all wanted a political government established and maintained by military force. That sin must give way to Jesus' explanation that the kingdom does not come with observation but is within them, established by faith in Jesus and maintained by the inner power of the Paraclete.

We may well ask ourselves as Christians in the twenty-first century whether something like that sin may be still common among us today. Do we think of the churches, the local congregations with their buildings and their programs, as the kingdom of God to be established by us and maintained by rigorous church discipline? Or are we free to allow one another to follow the leading of the Paraclete into whatever aspect of truth he has in store for us at the moment?

6. Where did the soldiers bring Jesus? To the home of Annas the high priest. We may assume that Annas summoned an emergency meeting of the Sanhedrin, the body of Jewish dignitaries who were responsible for the religious affairs of the country, subject of course to the overall supervision of the Roman government represented by Pontius Pilate.

Though John does not say, it appears that the Sanhedrin debated for hours, perhaps much of the night, about what to do with Jesus. They had no authority to put anyone to death, though that is what they wanted, but to do so would involve trouble from the Roman Governor.

As it turned out, they found it difficult to come up with a valid reason to ask Pilate to execute Jesus. The Sanhedrin was a religious body, but Pilate would not care one whit about religious reasons to do away with Jesus. Later they would come up with a reason to persuade Pilate, but they were not yet ready to adopt it at this point.

7. "Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus." We assume the other disciple here is the one who is now writing this memoir, the Apostle John. The two of them gain entry into the courtyard where Jesus is being tried. Why? Presumably they wanted to know what would happen to Jesus.

Where were the other disciples? Why did they all not follow him into the city to see what would happen? Probably because they were afraid. If their leader is arrested and condemned, what evil might soon happen to them as well? So they faded away from sight, leaving John and Peter to dare the investigation.

But Peter is also deathly afraid of being arrested also as a follower of this condemned man. Three times he is recognized and challenged as to his being a disciple of Jesus, and three times he denied it. "Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They asked him, 'You are not also one of his disciples, are you?' He denied it and said, 'I am not.'"

Just a few hours previously Jesus had predicted this would happen, and at the time Peter could not believe it would happen. But now it did happen.

8. What's the point of the incident? Why does John record this sad event? Why do we have to know about Peter's abject failure?

Recall John's purpose in writing this book. He wants to persuade his readers in and around Ephesus to believe that Jesus has been sent by God and that by believing they may find a new life in him. Part of what John writes then is to show how easy it is to miss the point of the gospel and to simply switch one's loyalty from one thing to another, depending entirely on one's own will power.

Peter had all the advantages of being with Jesus for three years, and he even appears to be one of the leaders of the group, under Jesus of course. So he boasts, and is entirely sincere about it, that he will go to the death for Jesus if that is necessary. But he makes this boast from within an inadequate understanding of the kind of kingdom Jesus is setting up. His world-and-life-view, so to speak, needs to be changed before he can understand what it is all about.

So, until Peter really understands that Jesus will not be needing swords and spears he will be relying on his own will power and not on the reality of God's purpose. He will need to perceive the nature of God's kingdom, and then of his own function within that kingdom, before he can do anything useful in it. As it turned out, drawing his short sword and cutting off a man's ear did not do anything useful for Jesus.

That was hard enough for Peter to do, put away his sword, but now, in the priest's courtyard to risk being arrested himself was more than he could take. I don't know the man. Never met him. You're wrong thinking I'm a disciple of his.

So the point is that we too need to get farther than to rely on our own will power. It will let us down if we do not understand what God is doing and if we are in fact simply affirming our own religious desires. We certainly do need to exercise our responsibility to believe and to follow Jesus and to work diligently for him, but only after we have truly died to our own desires and have seen and accepted God's will for our lives. Relying on our own strong will power simply will not do the job.

9. John does not record much of the trial of Jesus before the Sanhedrin. He wasn't there inside the house, but outside with a crowd of people waiting to hear what was happening inside. "Then the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his teaching."

One of the temple police thought Jesus was not respectful enough in his answer to the high priest. Jesus had said, Why don't you ask the people who heard me in the temple? They know what I said. So Jesus got a slap in the face.

And that's about all we know from John about what happened inside from the Sanhedrin. We can deduce a little more, however, from the fact that they sent Jesus on to Pilate. The Jewish leaders wanted to put Jesus to death but they did not have authority to do that. They had to get it from the Roman occupying government. So that is what they were now doing, sending Jesus to Pilate with the recommendation that he be executed.

## Chapter Thirty-eight

## JESUS IS TRIED

## John 18:28-40

28 Then they took Jesus from Caiaphas to Pilate's headquarters. It was early in the morning. They themselves did not enter the headquarters, so as to avoid ritual defilement and to be able to eat the Passover. 29So Pilate went out to them and said, 'What accusation do you bring against this man?' 30They answered, 'If this man were not a criminal, we would not have handed him over to you.' 31Pilate said to them, 'Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law.' The Jews replied, 'We are not permitted to put anyone to death.' 32(This was to fulfill what Jesus had said when he indicated the kind of death he was to die.)

33 Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, 'Are you the King of the Jews?' 34Jesus answered, 'Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?' 35Pilate replied, 'I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?' 36Jesus answered, 'My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.' 37Pilate asked him, 'So you are a king?' Jesus answered, 'You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.' 38Pilate asked him, 'What is truth?'

After he had said this, he went out to the Jews again and told them, 'I find no case against him. 39But you have a custom that I release someone for you at the Passover. Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?' 40They shouted in reply, 'Not this man, but Barabbas!' Now Barabbas was a bandit.

1. "Then they took Jesus from Caiaphas to Pilate's headquarters." It isn't clear whether or not the Jewish leaders thought they had a sufficient reason to demand that Pilate order Jesus to be killed. They had in their own minds sufficient reasons, a variety of religious reasons, but whether these were enough to persuade Pilate was another matter. They had debated the matter most of the night and now the next morning, Friday, they took the case to Pilate.

Pilate, as expected, asked the leaders what charges they were bringing against Jesus. John, writing this Gospel a long time later, doesn't specify any reasons, merely that they assured Pilate, "If this man were not a criminal, we would not have handed him over to you." Of course that was not enough for Pilate who did have some sense of criminal justice. So he dismissed the petition by telling them to take care of it by themselves; it isn't anything we Romans want to get involved in. You've got your own religious rules; do what you wish about it. There was no evidence that Jesus was indeed a criminal requiring Roman justice.

2. "Then Pilate entered the headquarters*;) again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, 'Are you the King of the Jews?'" After ascertaining what the leaders wanted, Pilate proceeds to interview Jesus directly. By this time Pilate has heard something about Jesus claiming to be a king. Pilate was not concerned at all about whether or not Jesus violated some Jewish religious rules, but he had to determine whether or not Jesus had become a threat to Roman control.

Doubtless Pilate knew something of the Jewish passion for a Messiah to come and lead the people in revolt. He would have to head that off and terminate whatever threat there might be from that angle. If Jesus really was intending to raise an army, collect weapons, solicit funding, and start an insurrection, then Pilate would nip it in the bud right away. So that is what Pilate was trying to find out when he asks Jesus if he considers himself a king.

It isn't clear how the Apostle John knew what went on inside Pilate's courtroom. Was it an open trial with other people present, or was it a private interview between just Pilate and Jesus?

Jesus does not give Pilate a direct answer in the way John reports it, "Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?" Pilate responds, Am I a Jew? Do I know all the ins and outs of what you people believe and don't believe? Of course it was your accusers who told me.

3. Jesus takes the occasion to explain to Pilate the nature of his kingdom; really, God's kingdom.

"My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here."

Jesus, while admitting he is a king, explains that the kingdom he is bringing is not a competitor of the Roman Empire. His kingdom is not "from this world." Jesus will be the king of all who believe in him, not in a political sense, but in the sense of receiving their ultimate loyalty. They will be ruled by God's Paraclete when they commit to believe in Jesus, and that divine rule will trump any other form of this-worldly political or military authority.

So when Pilate then asks whether Jesus admits to being a king, the answer is in whatever Pilate thinks about what Jesus said. If what I said means to you that I am a king, then I am. What is your definition of a king? I agree that the term is appropriate but not in the sense of a political ruler dependent on military force.

4. Jesus employs the word "truth" in his reply to Governor Pilate, "For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

There is a great deal more to Jesus' answer than the simple affirmation that he is telling the truth. Jesus is defining – for John's readers and for us – the divine dimension of that term. Truth does not merely imply that a person is accurate in his descriptions, but that there is an aspect of truth that is greater than human integrity in speech.

Truth in its broadest and most comprehensive meaning is the way God created the world to run, including the human race. Truth is therefore not merely about what we say or think or put into creeds, it is what God keeps saying since the foundation of the world. God has a plan for the universe and he has a future for the human race. But it all takes time to accomplish, much much time.

That is the context of Jesus' insistence that this is the reason for his coming into the world, to testify to the truth. Not only to testify, in the English sense of the term, but to do something about it, to bring God's purpose one step forward, to make the critical expansion of God's purpose from one nation to the entire world. Anyone now, Gentile or Jew, who wishes to live in the truth may do so by listening to the voice of Jesus.

5. Pilate is not convinced. He complains cynically, "What is truth?" Perhaps for him truth is anything you want somebody else to believe. Perhaps he knows that in any argument there are two sides, and both sides claim theirs is the truth. Pilate seems to relativize the concept truth, thinking there is no way anyone can accurately decide that one statement is true and another not true.

So it is important that we too learn Jesus' lesson. We may not be able to determine exactly what is the truth when we argue and disagree. But God does know, and that is what counts. If things are not clear to us we need to be charitable and respectful, letting the matter be decided in whatever way God allows. And even when we are sure a mistake has been made, we can still be sure that God will in his own time and in his own way make it right, make it become part of the way he is guiding the human race.

6. Pilate finds nothing in his conversation with Jesus to justify what the Jewish authorities are requesting, that Jesus be condemned as a criminal. "I find no case against him," he says.

Let us remember the reason John is writing this memoir; it is to persuade readers to believe in Jesus and to find a new path of life by doing so. Readers would wonder why they should believe in someone who has been executed as a common criminal. John is explaining here that the Roman judge had found Jesus perfectly innocent of anything violating Roman civil law. Jesus may have violated Jewish religious law but that did not count for anything in Pilate's court. So the fact that Jesus was eventually crucified does not carry with it the implication that he was a criminal.

7. Pilate suggests a course of action that seems to him to be a reasonable compromise. "But you have a custom that I release someone for you at the Passover." This custom may well have originated from the desire of Pilate to keep on good terms with the people whom he was responsible for governing. He knew the Jews hated the Roman occupying forces, and he may have thought this releasing of some prisoner would be a means of ameliorating their animosity.

So he suggests releasing Jesus, whom he calls "the king of the Jews." That was surely ironic. Any kind of king Jesus was, so far as Pilate was concerned, was totally inconsequential to him. You are bringing this man to me and condemning him because he claims to be, or wants to be, a king. I find no sense whatever in that accusation. I'd like to release him as is the custom every Passover season.

8. "They shouted in reply, 'Not this man, but Barabbas!' Now Barabbas was a bandit." We might note the crowd psychology involved. Less than a week earlier the crowds had welcomed Jesus into Jerusalem as the son of David, the Messiah of God. Now, after Jesus has clearly refused to do the things the crowds expected him to do, they turn against him with the same enthusiasm with which they had earlier welcomed him.

John does not specify here that it was the crowds, only the Jewish leaders, but the other Gospels spell it out in terms of the people in general. They were so disappointed in Jesus that they preferred to have a known criminal released rather than Jesus. We may today well be suspicious of crowd psychology and be careful not to be swept along by it to attitudes and actions we may soon regret.

Jesus of course was well prepared for all this confusion and hatred. He had, in fact, precipitated it by the way he conducted himself in the previous three years. His miraculous deeds aroused the positive sentiment among the people that he was surely capable of becoming their Messiah from God, capable of leading a ragtag army against the Roman soldiers and setting himself up as the new king of the Jews. But in his own mind Jesus knew the time for disillusionment must come. Sooner or later, when the time was just right, Jesus must make his decisive move, either in accordance with the people's wishes or against them.

That move has now been taken: Jesus refusing to rouse the people to revolution, gather an army and destroy the Romans. All the years of feverish anticipation on the part of the people (and the disciples also let us not forget) had drained away into disgust, disappointment, and disillusionment. If you aren't going to be our Messiah then away with you. Crucify him! And Jesus took it all without complaint. He knew it was coming and he accepted it calmly in the sure confidence that everything was in God's hands.

## Chapter Thirty-nine

## PILATE CONTINUES THE TRIAL

## John 19:1-16

##

Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. 2And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they dressed him in a purple robe. 3They kept coming up to him, saying, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' and striking him on the face. 4Pilate went out again and said to them, 'Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no case against him.' 5So Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, 'Here is the man!' 6When the chief priests and the police saw him, they shouted, 'Crucify him! Crucify him!' Pilate said to them, 'Take him yourselves and crucify him; I find no case against him. 7The Jews answered him, 'We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has claimed to be the Son of God.'

8 Now when Pilate heard this, he was more afraid than ever. 9He entered his headquarters again and asked Jesus, 'Where are you from?' But Jesus gave him no answer. 10Pilate therefore said to him, 'Do you refuse to speak to me? Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?' 11Jesus answered him, 'You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above; therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.' 12From then on Pilate tried to release him, but the Jews cried out, 'If you release this man, you are no friend of the emperor. Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor.'

13 When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus outside and sat on the judge's bench at a place called The Stone Pavement, or in Hebrew Gabbatha. 14Now it was the day of Preparation for the Passover; and it was about noon. He said to the Jews, 'Here is your King!' 15They cried out, 'Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!' Pilate asked them, 'Shall I crucify your King?' The chief priests answered, 'We have no king but the emperor.' 16Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.

1. We may suppose that writer John was there in the crowd outside Pilate's court house, so he would be as much an eyewitness as anyone could be, though of course he could not have heard the conversation between Pilate and Jesus inside the building, or seen what was done there. So what he reports here is a combination of what he himself had seen and what he may have learned from others afterward about things he had not himself witnessed.

Pilate was between a rock and a hard place. He judged Jesus to be innocent of any crime worthy of death, but he had those pesky Jews outside clamoring to have Jesus executed. He tried a middle way: punish Jesus physically and then let him go. "Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they dressed him in a purple robe." The soldiers slapped him around a bit and then led him outside to let the people know Jesus had been punished. Pilate said, Here's the man, your king all dressed up in royal clothing. He hoped it would satisfy the bloodthirsty Jews out there.

It didn't. It infuriated them. Pilate was mocking them: Here's your king. Pilate explains again, "I find no case against him." But the Jewish leaders are not satisfied; they want Jesus put away, not released. "Crucify him!" Not just stone him to death. Not behead him. Not stick a sword into his heart. Nail him to a cross and let him suffer for hours until he's dead.

2. Pilate is exasperated. I can't in good conscience sentence this man to death; he hasn't done anything to violate Roman law. So he gives up his own prerogative of judgment and says, "Take him yourselves and crucify him; I find no case against him." I cannot do what you are demanding, sentence him to death. So you do it; you crucify him. I won't.

3. But hatred for Jesus is so strong, and the stubbornness of the Jews is so violent that they just will not give in. They complain to Pilate, You know very well we aren't allowed to do that. Only the Roman authority can do that. But our law does judge that Jesus is worthy of death, because he claims to be a Son of God.

Well now, that's a different matter for Pilate. This man is a Son of God? Pilate had been thinking in terms of Roman law not Jewish law. But it doesn't make it any easier for him. Actually it makes it harder. John reports that "when Pilate heard this, he was more afraid than ever." Why afraid? Well, if this Jesus is indeed a god come down in human flesh, then they are asking me to kill a god. How can I do that?

Pilate goes back inside and decides he has to get more information from Jesus. Is he really a god come down from Mount Olympus in the form of a man? (Which he may have been thinking; or, since he was a Roman, whatever the equivalent might have been in Roman religion.)

4. Pilate resumed his interview of Jesus and asked Jesus, "Where are you from?" He wanted to know from Jesus himself if he came from the realm of the gods; if he were himself a god in human flesh.

But Jesus gave him no answer, and that annoyed Pilate. "Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?"

Of course Jesus knew that, but he also knew there was a still higher power than that of Pilate. "You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above." Jesus was a thoroughgoing theist and he was reminding Pilate that he too had a responsibility to that power from above. Pilate may well have authority to put Jesus to death, but he also has responsibility to discharge his duties honestly and justly, responsible to God himself.

Actually Jesus was doing the judging here. He explained to Pilate that the people who had brought Jesus to trial were more guilty than was Pilate himself. Why? Because there simply was no good reason for them to want Jesus terminated. Their decision was unjust and they were pressuring Pilate to join them in their unjust behavior.

Pilate did get the point. "From then on Pilate tried to release him." He well knew there was no valid reason why Jesus should be executed.

5. The Sanhedrin officials, however, were not to be put off. They kept demanding that Pilate order the soldiers to crucify Jesus, "Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!"

And they finally came up with an argument that forced Pilate to do what he knew was wrong. "If you release this man, you are no friend of the emperor. Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor."

Pilate would not respond at all to the previous religious arguments that the Jewish leaders made against Jesus. He cared nothing about whether or not Jesus violated some of their religious customs. So the Jews switched accusations from the religious one to the political one.

Pilate, you'll get in trouble with the emperor when he hears that you let someone who tried to become a king get away when you could have stopped him. Be sure we'll let the emperor know, and your career will be over. Your job is to keep the peace and here's a man who regards himself as a king and who wants to start a rebellion against Rome. If you don't do your duty here we'll get you recalled and dismissed. Crucify him, or else!

6. So the political argument persuaded Pilate to do the injustice he well knew was wrong. But once more he tried, "Shall I crucify your King?" Pilate was appealing to their political sense here, not to their religious sense. If this is the man you all believe is your Messiah, destined to lead you into rebellion, why do you want to kill him? Isn't that what you all want?

The chief priests rejected Pilate's insinuation about the function of a Messiah, and they affirmed something that must have come with a great deal of inner turmoil and doubt. They answered, "We have no king but the emperor." Really? Did they not all want somehow to regain their political independence and have their own king again, like in the golden years of David and Solomon? But it was expedient for them to say, at least for the time being, that their political loyalty was to the emperor in Rome. At this point they would say almost anything to force Pilate to yield to their demands.

7. Pilate finally capitulated. "Then he handed him over to them to be crucified." And by doing so he gained entrance into the one creed accepted by almost all Christians, the Apostles' Creed, "Crucified under Pontius Pilate." The only person named in the creed besides Jesus himself.

8. It bears mention, however, that the responsibility for the crucifixion is shared with the Jewish leaders, and for that matter with the Jewish populace as a whole. It is important, accordingly, to recognize that the entire human race was represented in the decision to reject Jesus. Pilate represented the Gentiles and the chief priests represented the Jewish people. In that larger sense, even though only a relatively few people were there, the entire human race is included in its significance. Jesus' death was occasioned by both Jews and Gentiles, and in this way God was bringing the entire world under judgment.

It will not be apropos at this point to review the numerous theories that try to explain the significance of Jesus' crucifixion, other that to make this basic point, that God in his sovereign direction of human history was at this point doing something of significance for the entire human race. The events that John will be reviewing in the remainder of this Gospel will go far toward explaining that further.

## Chapter Forty

## JESUS IS CRUCIFIED

## John 19:17-37

So they took Jesus; and carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha. 18There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, with Jesus between them. 19Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross. It read, 'Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.' 20Many of the Jews read this inscription, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek. 21Then the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, 'Do not write, "The King of the Jews", but, "This man said, I am King of the Jews." 22Pilate answered, 'What I have written I have written.' 23When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four parts, one for each soldier. They also took his tunic; now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. 24So they said to one another, 'Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see who will get it.' This was to fulfill what the scripture says, 'They divided my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots.' 25And that is what the soldiers did.

Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, 'Woman, here is your son.' 27Then he said to the disciple, 'Here is your mother.' And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.

28 After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), 'I am thirsty.' 29A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth. 30When Jesus had received the wine, he said, 'It is finished.' Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

31 Since it was the day of Preparation, the Jews did not want the bodies left on the cross during the sabbath, especially because that sabbath was a day of great solemnity. So they asked Pilate to have the legs of the crucified men broken and the bodies removed. 32Then the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first and of the other who had been crucified with him. 33But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34Instead, one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once blood and water came out. 35(He who saw this has testified so that you also may believe. His testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth.) 36These things occurred so that the scripture might be fulfilled, 'None of his bones shall be broken.' 37And again another passage of scripture says, 'They will look on the one whom they have pierced.'

1. John does not go into a great deal of detail in describing the crucifixion of Jesus. Jesus carried his own cross to a place called Golgotha; two other persons were crucified at the same time. Two items get a little more attention.

Pilate identifies Jesus as "The King of the Jews" in a placard affixed to the cross. The Jews complain about it, not recognizing Jesus as their king. But that was the political reason the Jews adduced to persuade Pilate to allow Jesus to be executed, so he simply replies, "What I have written I have written." The priests could push Pilate only so far, and they must confront their own reasoning, like it or not. Pilate knows all the details of this affair would eventually make their way to Rome and to Caesar, and he is covering his own reputation by insisting on this as a valid reason for executing this man. Caesar could not chastise him for an unjust crucifixion when he was simply protecting the authority of Rome by destroying a man who might well have started a revolution otherwise.

Also, the soldiers gamble for Jesus' tunic, not wanting to destroy its value by tearing it to pieces. John explains that this is to "fulfill what the scripture says." He refers to Psalm 22:18, "They divide my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots." This incident would have little importance for non-Jewish readers, other than a coincidence, but it would have enormous value for Jewish readers who relied so greatly upon the teachings of the Torah and the ancient scriptures. Jesus is not some self-appointed Messiah but the person whom the scriptures predict God will send.

2. John was there, watching the events along with several women, undoubtedly grieving deeply and wondering about this sudden wrenching turn of events. All the hopes and expectations with which they had followed Jesus – what was going to happen to all that?

Among these women was mother Mary. Jesus, knowing he would not be able to care for her, entrusted her future to John, speaking from the cross. "Woman, here is your son." And to John, "Here is your mother." While there is no Biblical evidence for it, the common opinion among scholars is that, having taken mother Mary into his home, John eventually moved with her to Ephesus. There had been a military revolt against Rome some thirty years later – the same thing Jesus refused to undertake – about the year 66, and when the Romans destroyed the city of Jerusalem it is thought John fled far away to the province of Asia Minor in what is now Turkey, where we now find him writing this Gospel.

As an aside, one wonders why Jesus committed the care of mother Mary to John and not to one of his brothers. His brother James, for example, seems later to have become one of the important leaders in the church in Jerusalem, so why was he not assigned this responsibility? Perhaps it may have been because at this moment James had not yet been converted. Perhaps James needed to witness the resurrection before being convinced that his brother was God's Messiah. But this is all speculation.

3. It is difficult for us living so far away in such different circumstances to appreciate Jesus' frame of mind through all this culmination of his career. There is a real sense that Jesus remains in control of events even as they seem to make him a victim of jealousy and hatred. Jesus could have escaped all this if he wanted to. He could have taken evasive action when he knew Judas Iscariot was plotting to betray him. He could have fled, as did the disciples, when the temple police came to arrest him in Gethsemane. For that matter he could simply not have come to Jerusalem at all to begin with, knowing the feelings of the Jewish authorities.

So we need to understand that Jesus was deliberately provoking the people to come to a genuine decision about him and about his messianic qualifications. And he knew full well what that decision would be. He knew it would go against him and that he had all this pain and anguish unavoidably ahead of him. But he did it anyway, knowing that an agonizing slow death awaited him.

4. It is in that context that we should understand Jesus' cry when he was at the point of dying, "It is finished." And then he died.

What was finished? His life, of course. But more than his physical life, he had finished all he could do as the Messiah sent by God to open the way into the kingdom of God. Recall that the previous evening he had assured his disciples that it would be to their advantage that he go away, and that he would then send a Paraclete to replace him as their leader.

So now Jesus was expressing his deeply felt conviction that the purpose for which God sent him into the world was accomplished. I have finished the task which the Father has assigned to me. He was ready to die in the full confidence that he had been faithful to the end in the unenviable task entrusted to him. From now on it would be the task of the Holy Paraclete to lead God's people into the future.

5. We know there was still a bit more that Jesus had to do, namely be raised from the dead and then in a few weeks to ascend into heaven, and then to send the Paraclete. But we do need to take seriously Jesus' own understanding of his mission. The transfer of authority will soon be made from a man among men to the authority of the Paraclete of God working within the minds and hearts of all who believe in Jesus and who thus enter the kingdom of heaven. Jesus has completed all that the Father sent him to do. Jesus' work on earth is finished.

6. It may be well at this point to pause in our study of the Gospel of John to reflect a bit more on the significance of the crucifixion.

It seems at times that we make the crucifixion to be the central and decisive event of Jesus' mission. We make the cross to be the symbol of Christianity as a whole. But if we think about it a bit more, we ask what role then does the resurrection play? Or the ascension? Or, for that matter, the sending of the Paraclete? One would think that all of these events, taken together, each of them essential but none standing alone, make up the heart of the gospel and of the significance of the work of Jesus.

To get a realistic appraisal of the significance of the crucifixion of Jesus we should begin with the effect it had on the disciples. They did not in any way welcome that event. It was not a good thing for them, at least as they saw it at the time. It meant the destruction of all their hopes for a messianic revolution to regain Jewish independence.

It was only after the other events, resurrection, ascension, Paraclete, that the disciples could understand why Jesus had to die. They then could see how wrong their previous notions of a messianic kingdom were. Only if Jesus left them entirely as a man among men would those false notions die, and only after the arrival of the Paraclete would the new vision of God's kingdom replace them.

So we should avoid the impression that the death of Jesus accomplished his purpose all by itself. At the moment of his crucifixion the disciples certainly felt no advantage, no sense of their sins being forgiven, or of release from whatever burdens they were bearing. Much more analysis is, of course, necessary, to explore the full significance of Jesus' ministry and of how it contributes to the working out of God's purpose for the world, but we should always be thinking concretely, historically, down-to-earth, in terms of real life situations. The cross, all by itself, had no benefit for the disciples at the time, but only as preparation for the equally significant events still to come.

7. John now proceeds to finish the story of Jesus' death on the cross. The Jewish leaders did not want the dead bodies to remain on the three crosses on their holy day of sabbath, so they asked Pilate that the soldiers make sure all three were dead, so that their bodies could be removed. The soldiers, after breaking the legs of the other two men to make sure they would die, came to Jesus, discovered he was already dead, and to make sure they pierced his side with a spear. "But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. Instead, one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once blood and water came out."

And John explains further that both of these items also were predicted by the ancient Jewish scriptures: no bones broken predicted in Psalm 34:20, and his side pierced in Zechariah 12:10. Believers of Jewish background would find these evidences more compelling perhaps than those of Gentile background.

## Chapter Forty-one

## JESUS IS BURIED

## John 19:38-42

##

## After these things, Joseph of Arimathea, who was a disciple of Jesus, though a secret one because of his fear of the Jews, asked Pilate to let him take away the body of Jesus. Pilate gave him permission; so he came and removed his body. 39Nicodemus, who had at first come to Jesus by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds. 40They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews. 41Now there was a garden in the place where he was crucified, and in the garden there was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. 42And so, because it was the Jewish day of Preparation, and the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there.

##

## 1. We should note well that John makes a special point of insisting that Jesus was really dead and not just in a swoon resembling death. The soldiers see that Jesus is dead so they do not break his legs to hasten death. Instead they pierce his side with a spear and the blood drains out, indicating death. And now John provides details about his burial. Jesus would not be buried unless everyone knew he was dead, including Pilate and the soldiers who crucified him.

## 2. Two men, Joseph and Nicodemus, presumably both being members of the Sanhedrin, took the responsibility of getting Jesus' body off the cross and transported to a nearby tomb. They wrap up his body and anoint it in the same manner that they bury anyone else. "They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it with the spices in linen cloths, according to the burial custom of the Jews."

## Both were secret disciples of Jesus, in the sense that they too were convinced that somehow Jesus was coming to them with a message from God, and that they had better listen to him. What they thought now that he was dead we do not know.

## But it is interesting that now, with Jesus dead, they seemed to be willing to go public with their respect for him. While he was alive Nicodemus was afraid to talk to him in the daylight, and John informs us that Joseph feared the Jews but was a secret follower of Jesus. Somehow both of them were willing now to take part in the burial of Jesus without their previous fear of what might happen to their reputation.

## 3. We may also take note that the Apostles' Creed makes separate mention of Jesus' burial. And in connection with his death and burial it adds, "He descended into hell." The ostensible significance of this controversial affirmation is to provide a contrast to the the statement, "He ascended into heaven." This is not a suitable place to examine those items in detail, but it is nonetheless useful to understand something of what that pair is intending to confess.

## Basically they are saying that Jesus went as low as it is possible for a human being to go, only to go as high as it is possible for a human being to go. From the depths of human misery to the heights of human glory. Theologians may well expand on that theme considerably more, but for our general purposes it is enough to see that God's plan for Jesus was such as to include both: first to reduce Jesus to abject humiliation as a common criminal unjustly condemned, but for the ultimate purpose of raising him out of that mess and exalting him to his right hand in heaven.

## And that pattern should say something to each of us Christians as well. Progress in our lives is not simply moving from one good thing to the next, but almost always involves some kind of humiliation or failure, out of which the Lord leads us to a more realistic appreciation of his grace.

## Further, we may extrapolate out of this pattern also a vision of how the Creator is shaping the human race into the image of himself that he so desires. History isn't merely moving steadily forward and upward, but is a constant series of ups and downs, mistakes and learning from mistakes. Study history in this light, also church history. We try this and we try that, both in politics and in church life. Sometimes things work out fairly well, sometimes they don't. But always the Lord is teaching us by trial and error what is right and what is wrong.

## The paradigm of Jesus moving from the depths of hell to the heights of heaven is the paradigm that should provide for us the pattern for understanding not only our own individual lives but also the ongoing process of history under the sovereign direction of the Lord of all.

## Chapter Forty-two

## RESURRECTION DAY

## John 20:1-23

##

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. 2So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, 'They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.' 3Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went towards the tomb. 4The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. 6Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, 7and the cloth that had been on Jesus' head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. 8Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; 9for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10Then the disciples returned to their homes.

11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; 12and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. 13They said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping?' She said to them, 'They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.' 14When she had said this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15Jesus said to her, 'Woman, why are you weeping? For whom are you looking?' Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, 'Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.' 16Jesus said to her, 'Mary!' She turned and said to him in Hebrew, 'Rabboni!' (which means Teacher). 17Jesus said to her, 'Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, 'I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.' 18Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, 'I have seen the Lord'; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

19 When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, 'Peace be with you.' 20After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21Jesus said to them again, 'Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.' 22When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. 23If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.'

##

## 1. The "other disciple" mentioned here is the person who is writing these memoirs, the disciple John. He uses indirect terminology always in his Gospel when referring to himself.

## We might notice also that here as earlier John associates himself with Peter. Peter was the brother of Andrew, and John was the brother of James, but somehow these two seem to be more closely attached to one another than to their biological brothers. We will recall that it was also these two who followed Jesus as he was led as a prisoner to the house of Caiaphas, and that they were together outside waiting to hear what happened there. Here they are together when Mary Magdalene told them the tomb was empty.

## 2. There has been a lot of speculation over the centuries about Mary Magdalene and her relationship to Jesus. Some people have suggested that they were somewhat more than close friends, even to the extent to suggesting that Mary may have borne an illegitimate child fathered by Jesus.

## It would be disrespectful to speculate that way, but it is certainly possible that Mary was benefitted in her life by the pastoral care of Jesus, and that she may well have cared for Jesus in return.

## At any rate, John reports that it was Mary Magdalene who first discovered, before the sun came up on Sunday morning, after Jesus was in the tomb all day Saturday, that the tomb was empty. There may well have been other women there, since Mary says, "We don't know where they have laid him."

## 3. Surprised, Peter and John run to the tomb. John is younger and faster, and he arrived at the tomb first. He looked in and saw nothing but the "linen wrappings" that Joseph and Nicodemus had wrapped around Jesus' body Friday evening.

## When Peter arrived he didn't just look in but entered the cave. He too saw the linen wrappings as well as the headdress that was around Jesus' head. John then went in also, and both of them saw that Jesus' body was not there.

They did not know what had happened, "for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead." As they went back home they probably discussed what had happened, who did it and where did they bring the body? Perhaps they thought Joseph might have transferred the body to some other more suitable tomb farther away. Or maybe that Pilate had ordered the body to be destroyed. Who knows what other options they may have suggested to themselves.

4. John continues the account by detailing what Mary Magdalene did. Apparently she had gone with Peter and John back to the tomb, and she stayed outside weeping for sorrow. After the men had gone away, Mary stayed outside and soon also looked inside again.

Surprise! There were "two angels in white" sitting there on the ledge where Jesus' body had been. They see that Mary is weeping and they ask her why? We may wonder what went through Mary's mind when she saw those two angels inside. Who are they? How did they get there? Why are they here? Incidentally, there is an interesting comparison with the other three Gospels: Matthew says there was one angel at the tomb; Mark says there was one man; Luke says there were two men; and John here says there were two angels.

Regardless, Mary Magdalene said to the angels, "They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him." Mary does not yet know God has raised Jesus from the dead, and that at that very moment Jesus was right there outside the tomb. Mary must learn, as must the disciples, and all of us as well still today, that God had sent an angel – however we might wish to explain the matter further – to unwrap the corpse of Jesus, breathe into him life from God and bring him alive out of the cave.

5. We may understand that Peter and John had departed for home while this experience of Mary Magdalene was taking place. Undoubtedly John is relating the story just as he remembers Mary telling him about it at a later point.

Mary turns around and sees a man she assumes is the gardener, and asks, "Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away." How she might manage to do that we do not know. She was so distraught that she simply wanted to know where he would be permanently buried, so that she might sorrow over his grave.

But of course it was not the gardener, it was Jesus. Mary had not looked carefully at his face so she did not recognize him. So Jesus simply said, "Mary." She immediately recognized his voice and said in astonishment, "Teacher!"

6. John does not mention this but we assume Mary attempted to hug Jesus. Then Jesus says some enigmatic words, "Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father." At first reading it seems that this reason Jesus gives for not hugging him is unrealistic. How could she hug Jesus after he ascended to heaven?

The point, however, that she and all of us have to learn is that Jesus' physical presence is no longer important. Jesus had taken great care to explain to the disciples that he was leaving them physically and that he would supply them with a substitute Paraclete, not a human person but the very Spirit of God. They must learn to be led, not by a human person, but by God himself. We must not, as Mary was here attempting to do, try to re-establish a physical relationship with Jesus. We "hold on" to Jesus now, after he has ascended into heaven, by following in faith the leading of the Paraclete.

7. In the same vein Jesus instructs Mary to return to where the disciples are staying and tell them, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." That seems to be a rather odd thing for Mary to tell the disciples. Actually what John reports Mary as saying is simply, "I have seen the Lord." She did, apparently, also tell them what Jesus had told her to say.

But at the moment it was the physical reality of Jesus alive that was uppermost in her mind, and very likely also in the minds of the disciples when they heard about it. Jesus is no longer dead. He's alive again. Yes, he's still saying things hard to understand, but Wow, we aren't all done in yet. Who knows now what we can do to those Romans? They can kill our Leader, our Messiah, but they can't keep him dead!

It was the renewed physical presence of Jesus that was so exciting then, but Jesus was still trying to tell them not so. He must leave them by ascending to the Father in heaven, and they must transition away from his earthly presence to the spiritual presence of the Paraclete.

8. John now jumps from morning to evening of that Sunday, resurrection day. The disciples have not dispersed; they are still together but huddled away in a locked room for fear they might still be arrested as accomplices of Jesus. All of a sudden, Jesus is there in the room with them, and he says, "Peace be with you."

It isn't difficult to imagine how startled the disciples were. Jesus showed him his wounds, the nail holes in his hands and feet, the spear thrust in his side, and they could not dispute that it was indeed the same person they had been following for three years, the same man crucified just three days ago. Here he is, in the flesh, the same person we knew as Jesus, dead but now alive again.

Nor is it difficult to imagine the resurrection of their messianic hopes. How sad they felt when their hopes for a restored kingdom of David were dashed a few days ago; now, however, how glad they felt when those same hopes revived along with the revival of Jesus in the flesh. Now we can really get going. They can't keep our Leader down!

9. But, even in the middle of all that rejoicing, Jesus still had some words to say that just did not fit into their revived messianic expectations. "As the Father has sent me, so I send you." As of yet the disciples had no notion of what Jesus expected of them, or to what task he was commissioning them.

At this point we may compare what John reports with what Matthew reports in 28:18-20. Both authors are original members of the twelve disciples of Jesus, both of them eyewitnesses. Matthew's report is what we call the Great Commission, but what John reports here is the equivalent, expressed in different words but with the same intent. God sent Jesus into the world for a purpose. Jesus has fulfilled that purpose to the extent he was capable of doing. Now that purpose is entrusted to the disciples who, in a matter of a few weeks, will have been initiated into it. Matthew puts more content into that commission than does John, but the intent is the same. Jesus has completed his work on earth; now the task of promoting the kingdom of God is in the hands of those who believe and follow Jesus.

10. But Jesus has still more to say to them and to do for them. "When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit."

John recalls the resurrected Jesus breathing on the disciples, himself included. The meaning of it Jesus also explains. Jesus is transferring his own Spirit into the disciples. While the disciples certainly did not understand what that involved at the time, we can understand it from our vantage point in the twenty-first century, guided also by what Luke writes in the book of Acts about the happenings on the day of Pentecost. Receiving the Holy Spirit would involve, among other things, a more accurate understanding of the kingdom that Jesus is setting up. Not a kingdom based on military and political prowess, but a kingdom built from the inside by the Spirit of God sanctifying their lives.

John is well acquainted with the book of Genesis, and it may well be that he has in mind what the second chapter of Genesis tells us about how God created humans, that is, by _breathing_ into the "dust of the earth" in such a way that adam became a living being. Just as God breathed into that lump of clay and made it a living human being, just so now Jesus breathes upon the disciples in such a way as to make them alive to the true nature of God's purpose for the human race. God breathed his own spirit into adam, and Jesus is breathing his own spirit into the disciples.

11. It is also of major interest what Jesus says will happen as a result of receiving the Holy Spirit, "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." This is worth thinking about more intensely.

Jesus is not saying, or implying either, that human beings are given the capability to forgive sins. Nor is Jesus saying that God will stand behind anything and everything that the disciples choose to do. In no way is Jesus transferring the authority of God to mere human beings. So how does this work: if you forgive anyone's sins, they are surely forgiven?

Forgiveness of sins is obtained, to begin with, when a person repents before God. It is God who grants this forgiveness. So how does a person come to this point of requesting God for forgiveness? By believing in the Lord Jesus and honestly following wherever he leads by means of his Paraclete. And how does a person come to believe in Jesus? By hearing others tell the gospel. And that is what Jesus is implying for the disciples. They will be telling the story of Jesus; some of the hearers will be persuaded and will believe; they will turn to God in true faith and will find forgiveness from God.

So when this happens, Jesus is saying, as a result of your evangelizing effort, the sins of believers on earth will surely be forgiven also in heaven. What you do in telling about Jesus will surely result in believers having their sins forgiven by God when they believe.

## 

## Chapter Forty-three

## AFTER RESURRECTION DAY

## John 20:24-31

##

But Thomas (who was called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. 25So the other disciples told him, 'We have seen the Lord.' But he said to them, 'Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe.'

26 A week later his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, 'Peace be with you.' 27Then he said to Thomas, 'Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe.' 28Thomas answered him, 'My Lord and my God!' 29Jesus said to him, 'Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.'

30 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. 31But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

##

## 1. This incident takes place a week later with the disciples still in Jerusalem. For some reason Thomas was not with the group a week earlier when Jesus joined them in a locked room. Thomas had not yet seen Jesus after the resurrection, so he was disbelieving when the others told him they had seen Jesus alive. Thomas insisted on seeing the evidences of crucifixion before he would believe: nail marks and a spear hole.

## But Thomas had not disassociated himself from the other disciples, as Judas Iscariot had done. He was now with them a week later as they gathered, presumably in the same place as a week ago. Again "Jesus came and stood among them" even though the doors were shut. He said again, "Peace be with you." Jesus did not want the disciples to be unduly excited about his appearance. Stay calm.

## 2. Then Jesus addressed Thomas directly, "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe." John does not report whether or not Thomas did so, but he does record what Thomas said, "My Lord and my God." Thomas does believe.

## This quotation is often utilized to prove the deity of Jesus. One does not, however, need to draw that conclusion from Thomas' confession. He confesses his own faith in Jesus as his Lord and as God's Messiah to the people. He knows full well, as did all the other disciples, that God was functioning in and through Jesus, and that this is now abundantly clear by the resurrected presence of Jesus among them. Nothing but the divine power of the Creator could bring a dead man back to life. So Thomas is confessing belief both in the Lordship of Jesus and the sovereign power of God.

## 3. Then John recalls a very significant comment by Jesus, the comment which has shaped the structure and development of his Gospel from beginning to end. Jesus said to Thomas, "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe."

## We have noticed this theme over and over again as we worked our way through the Gospel of John. John has been selecting incidents in Jesus' ministry that illustrate how various persons come to faith in Jesus, as well as incidents that show how others reacted negatively to him. Here now we see an example of someone very close to Jesus who would not be convinced of the actual bodily resurrection of Jesus unless he had tangible sensory evidence for it.

## Jesus knows that as time passes that this tangible sensory evidence will no longer be available to the generations to come. Jesus will have ascended to heaven. If people in the future will come to faith in Jesus it will not be because they could put their fingers into the nail holes in Jesus' hands and feet. It will be because they believe the witness of those who were able to do this.

## 4. It is this incident of Thomas' temporary disbelief that triggered John to formulate the entire reason for his Gospel, the statement we have recalled numerous times since the very beginning of our study of it. "These are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name." The people in and around Ephesus are precisely the people Jesus had in mind when he blessed those who would come to faith without sensory evidence. And, of course, that category includes all of us living in faith in the modern world. From the first century Jesus blesses us across the centuries.

## 5. At this point it may be useful to address a question that is raised constantly but which John does not address in his Gospel, the question many raise as to the historicity of Jesus' resurrection. I cite an incident here from my own personal experience during my learning years. I was in a post-graduate program which involved a class of about twenty-five ordained ministers in one of the older established seminaries in the eastern part of the United States. At one of these meetings the professor asked for a show of hands of any members of the class who did believe in the physical resurrection of Jesus. I and one other minister raised a hand. All the rest either disbelieved it or doubted it or didn't care one way or another. Many ministers in active parish churches do not believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus.

## So we do need to ask seriously whether the bodily resurrection of Jesus is important to Christian faith or not. It is difficult to imagine that the disciples did not believe in the physical presence of Jesus when they saw him appear in the locked room. While it does seem obvious that Jesus was somehow different from what he was before, it is difficult to think that his appearance was merely an illusion or some kind of temporary manifestation that was not truly human and physical.

## In the next chapter John will be telling another incident that involves Jesus eating breakfast with the disciples. It seems evident also that the resurrection of Jesus formed the heart of Paul's message, for example, in Acts 17:31, God "has fixed a day on which he will have the world judged in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead."

So, while we do need to acknowledge that the incidents recorded by John suggest that there were significant changes in Jesus' body, for example, being able to appear suddenly in a locked room, we can hardly deny the impact of Jesus' confrontation with Thomas' disbelief. Jesus' resurrection is real and it is physical, even though there are questions we cannot answer about it. Let us be content with Moses' instruction to the ancient Israelites at Mount Sinai, "The secret things belong to the the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and our children, that we may do all the things of this law." (Deuteronomy 29:29) What we do not know we can well leave to God; but we do need to go by what God has revealed, and that includes the physical resurrection of Jesus.

## Chapter Forty-four

## A THIRD RESURRECTION APPEARANCE

## John 21:1-25

##

After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way. 2Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. 3Simon Peter said to them, 'I am going fishing.' They said to him, 'We will go with you.' They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

4 Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5Jesus said to them, 'Children, you have no fish, have you?' They answered him, 'No.' 6He said to them, 'Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.' So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. 7That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, 'It is the Lord!' When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the lake. 8But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off.

9 When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. 10Jesus said to them, 'Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.' 11So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. 12Jesus said to them, 'Come and have breakfast.' Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, 'Who are you?' because they knew it was the Lord. 13Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. 14This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

15 When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?' He said to him, 'Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my lambs.' 16A second time he said to him, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' He said to him, 'Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Tend my sheep. 17He said to him the third time, 'Simon son of John, do you love me?' Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, 'Do you love me?' And he said to him, 'Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.' Jesus said to him, 'Feed my sheep. 18Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.' 19(He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, 'Follow me.'

20 Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them; he was the one who had reclined next to Jesus at the supper and had said, 'Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?' 21When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, 'Lord, what about him?' 22Jesus said to him, 'If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!' 23So the rumor spread in the community that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, 'If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?'*;)

24 This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true. But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.

##

## 1. Seven disciples had gone back to Galilee where they had come from to begin with. What they planned to do we do not know; John does not tell us. John, by the way, is one of the "sons of Zebedee" that he mentions; James is the other. Perhaps Andrew, Peter's brother, was one of the unnamed ones. We may as well recall at this point that on the day of Pentecost, several weeks later, according to Luke they were all back again in Jerusalem.

## Peter, ostensibly the leader of the band, decides to go fishing. They all traipse along and spend the night fishing. But they catch nothing. John, we know, has a reason for introducing this story. They catch nothing; which is in contrast to what Jesus will soon be telling them. Soon you will be catching people.

2. At any rate, Jesus appears on the lakeshore, but unrecognized. The disciples did not expect to see him there. He wasn't with them all the time as he was earlier before his resurrection. So, it's a stranger accosting them. I see you haven't caught anything. Is that right? You're right; we caught nary a fish.

Try casting your net on the other side of the boat. They do and they catch a whole net full; they count 153 when they get to shore.

John, our author, now recognizes Jesus and whispers it to Peter. Peter, impulsive as always, puts on his clothes, jumps into the water and wades to shore, leaving the others to muscle the boatload of fish to shore.

It's a bit curious, what Peter is doing here, is it not? It wasn't too long ago that he denied even knowing Jesus. Now he is eager to see him? But again, John has a reason for describing this event. Soon Jesus will be forgiving Peter and commissioning him to his apostolic role.

Jesus has breakfast ready for them: fish and bread. Where he got the food John does not say. After breakfast Jesus has some things to say.

3. "When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?'" Jesus has in mind Peter's repeated denial back after his arrest and during his trial before the Sanhedrin. Has Peter changed his mind? Is he repentant, sorrowful? Is he ready to listen now to what the Lord is requiring of him? Is his cowardice ready to be changed into confidence? Three times Jesus asks him what is virtually the same question, to force Peter to confront the three times he denied Jesus.

Peter "said to him, 'Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.'" And three times Peter gives Jesus the same answer. Peter is annoyed at Jesus' repetition of the question, forcing him to repeat his answer. But he knows he deserves it. Jesus is beating down in Peter his characteristic self-confidence, requiring Peter to acknowledge that he too needs the help and strength of God to do what is required of him. Peter will no longer rely upon his own strong will power, remembering his abject failure, but will become more and more willing to listen to the guidance of the one whom Jesus has called the Paraclete.

4. Jesus has more to say to Peter, and it is interesting that John remembers all this in such a way as to describe it in his memoir of Jesus. Jesus says, "When you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go."

John explains that this was Jesus' way of telling Peter how he will die. But we may see in it also a hint that Peter must follow a path similar to that just followed by Jesus. Jesus was arrested, tried, and killed. This will also happen to Peter. The details may be different, but the pattern is there. Jesus wants Peter to know that his will power is not going to sustain him, but he will be taken by others where he had not chosen to go. We wonder today whether John knew something he does not report: how and when and where Peter died. Tradition says he was crucified upside down in Rome by Emperor Nero. If so, this would have happened not too many years ago from John's point of view.

5. But Peter is still a bit brash. He sees John nearby and queries Jesus: Well, what about him? Jesus replies, "If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? Follow me!" Peter, that is none of your business. Your business is to follow me and not worry about what happens to John. Peter still needed a bit of a put-down.

John adds a bit more explanation. He is aware that a rumor was going around that Jesus meant that John would never die. John, of course, repudiates that notion. Jesus meant only that John's fate was in God's hands just as everyone else.

6. And so John comes to the end of his memoirs. We may wonder why there is nothing about the things Luke explains in the early chapters of Acts, about Pentecost and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, Jesus' Paraclete. But John is sticking to his basic purpose, explaining as best he can why people should believe in Jesus and how they can come to a useful and godly life through that faith. He has already defined that purpose, and now he closes his manuscript.

John attests to his own veracity, "This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true."

And he also acknowledges that he has not made an attempt to include everything that he could think of about Jesus, but only such items as would show how people responded, either in faith or in rejection. "But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written."

## 

## Chapter Forty-four

CONCLUDING OVERVIEW

John begins his wonderful Gospel by reminding us all, Gentiles and Jews, that there is one God who has spoken all things into existence. He does not want anyone to think there is a Jewish God or a Greek God or a Roman God or a Christian God – there is one God only who is responsible for the creation of the whole world. John puts special emphasis on the insight that God speaks: he has spoken all things into existence in the past; he is speaking now in a special person he has sent, namely Jesus of Nazareth.

John wants all his readers to understand that God has a purpose in sending Jesus into the world. It is to show the way to live, the way all human beings should live. Jesus brings life, life as it ought to be for everyone, into the world. This presupposes, of course, that people need what Jesus brings, that they do not actually live the way their Creator intends. This would be true for Gentiles who construct a polytheistic society that enables people to imitate the gods in all their wicked ways, and it is also true for Jews who, though having the Law of God, have nevertheless not entered into the spirit of it.

So John then begins a long series of stories about how some persons came to faith in Jesus, along with stories about how opposition to Jesus kept growing. John wants his readers to consider the facts of the matter in the life and ministry of Jesus, consider what he has done, what he has said, and eventually why he was put to death and raised back to life. John wants to lead his readers to a decision, hopefully a decision to embrace Jesus and find a good and satisfying life in that faith, but if not, a clear decision to reject Jesus and thus symbolically to crucify him afresh. Perhaps in time, as it did for thousands of Jewish persons at the time, that negative decision will be rescinded and genuine belief embraced.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Edwin Walhout is a Minister Emeritus of the Christian Reformed Church, currently living in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He draws on lengthy experience in teaching, pastoral ministry, editing, and writing to prepare this pastoral commentary on the Gospel of John. If interested further, you may find over two dozen books by this author at Smashwords.com.
