Let's pray. Lord, we do thank you for a good semester together. We thank you for these these Thursday nights in which we could study your word in Which we could hear your voice perhaps dimly and and Not nearly as perfectly as we would like But yet really as you've spoken to us We ask Lord that now as we look at the gospel of John Truly a wonderful book that many of us already loved dearly that we would It would read a fresh that we would see things with discernment and understanding that you give us That we'd understand the great purposes that you have in the writings of the Apostle John We do pray Lord for I pray for this class as it finishes and I pray for The men and women about or also finish in the class on video. We thank you that they can go out to others And pray that we are blessing to them as well Lord in this season we are filled with gratitude for the gift of salvation in Christ And may we ever be filled with praise to you for all you've done for us in him amen But today we are indeed looking at the gospel of John Gospel John is The Forth in our Bible and probably the fourth to be written very likely written 75 80 85 even 90 AD when John the Apostle was an older man Perhaps finishing up his life's work and he tells us What he meant to do in his book near the end While you turn to John 20 verse 31 John 20 verse 31 I'll remind you That most of the gospels have a theme statement either at the beginning or at the end the theme statement of Luke we studied last week Luke chapter 24 Jesus came to preach the good news to the poor to proclaim the gospel to the poor Released to the captives to all sorts of people mark tells us that it is the gospel for very first verse It is the gospel Jesus Christ the son of God And then of course Matthew at the end tells us that this is what they should proclaim to make disciples of all the nations now what is the purpose of John he tells us very near to the end Verse 30 is where we'll begin Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples which are not recorded in this book But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the son of God And that by believing you may have life in his name that is the purpose Jesus did many things before many signs these are selected That you might believe and have life in his name Now this is a familiar saying to many of you Maybe memorize this long ago as children already But there are more than there's more than one thing that we could pause to ponder over a little bit and they both come from the Partly from reflection on the original Greek language The first thing is that John says these things are written that you might believe Now in the Greek the the way it's written It's not exactly clear Whether There are two options whether he says he is writing in order that people might begin to believe Or that people might be Continue to believe and be strengthened in their faith. Let me ask you right away. How many of you how many of you have heard primarily that John is an evangelistic gospel Written to lead people to believe for the first time Okay, a lot of you have heard that can you see That nonetheless the gospel John would be a wonderful book to confirm or to advance or to settle people in their faith I think a lot of you nod your head yes I certainly think the answer is yes, and I want to show you that indeed that's the case That it is written not only for beginners in the faith But is also can be extremely beneficial to people who are advanced because the gospel John operates on two levels a simple level And a deeper and more complex level with lots of illusions and hints and invitations to meditate on half buried themes Second thing that is found in the Greek here is that the actual way that it's translated is that you may believe that the Christ is Jesus The question goes like this what does the book intend to prove that Jesus is the Christ Or that the Christ is Jesus Now those you might say that's not the same thing. No one is the question. Who is Jesus? He's the Christ And that might be a very important thing to introduce to people who never heard the gospel before who is Jesus He's the Christ. He's the Messiah. He's the liver on the other hand Probably what John actually intends you to look very carefully at the at the grammar is to identify who the Christ is For you Jews for anyone who was waiting to see who the deliverer might be First century Jews the Christ is Jesus. He fulfills The hopes of the Jews if you were waiting for a deliverer Now what I'm saying is this if you want to read the gospel of John it's fine to read Good place to start if you've never read the gospel before But it's also true that the depths of John can only be probed by a believer Only a believer who has understood something of the Old Testament something of the hopes of the need for a Savior will really understand The gospel of John now. I'm going to show you that in just a little while That he is filled with John is filled with illusions to the Old Testament before we do that However, I want to just take a couple of minutes To address the question that we talk about over and over again And that is is this book reliable because just as people quarrel with Matthew, Mark and Luke and wonder if it's really reliable historically so people quarrel with John and especially quarrel with John even more than the others because they say it was written last Maybe it was written in the year 70 or 80 or 90 AD and wouldn't it be easy to forget things? Especially John's an old man some people of course think John didn't even really write it But especially you know we're 70 years or 60 years or 50 years after the events be so easy to forget right What's the answer to that question to that objection?
Some things are so memorable they are emblazoned upon your mind. That's a clever phrase Graphic language There are some things you cannot forget I told you about the time I was taken into police custody for murder right But I didn't tell you about my dad did I tell you about the time my dad was taken into police custody No, it's just the two of us my other brothers are fine now the truth is my father actually I I mentioned that I'm not Italian. Could I tell you that? Yeah, okay, and on my father's side. I'm Russian Jewish My father was born in America, but they went to Italy actually my grandfather was an opera singer and they went to Italy when he was just about 25 years old To they didn't have graduate school, but you would just sing under the mastery. No kind of an apprenticeship Situation and while he was there in the late 19 teens now, you know like 1915 The word came to him that my grand great grandfather was almost executed During the Bolshevik revolution in Russia. He was actually just minutes away from being shot and You know he had a nervous breakdown his property was looted and so forth And so my grandfather with my young dad in tow went back to Russia to get him back on his feet and you know They had some money give him some money and you know just be there for him and when they got there The government was then Led by the communists and they didn't know any better. This is 1918 1920 19 1920
I said welcome back comrades and they kept them there for 12 years Took all their documents took their papers and held them illegally for 12 years My parents is my father not my parents my mother's scutters. My father escaped Around the year end of 1934 beginning of 1935 now here's the thing Almost nobody was escaping from Russia then When when my father talks to Russian Jews and he says when he got out They don't they don't quite believe it Only a couple hundred people got out around then virtually nobody and You know they had to be really well connected. My father isn't really well connected And so his story is doubted by some people but But although it happened when he was 20. He's now 81 years old Although it was a long time ago. He can still tell the story now I would admit to you the story changes a tiny bit depending on what moody's in But there are some things There's some things that never change For example, they had one piece of identification that proved the American citizenship and they hit it In and it's best this Cup at the bottom of their furnace Where would you where would where would you search last for precious documents if you were if you were searching somebody's house Probably you wouldn't search in the furnace would you see that never changes every time he tells the story it's there And every time he tells the story he's hauled into the office of a kernel of the secret police and the kernel Is thinking about shooting him For various reasons because he's accused of stealing some documents Which indeed he did steal or somebody helped him get anyway and
You know the kernel waves a seven round revolver adam And we say dad My brothers and I say you know there aren't any seven round revolvers. This is part of the story that you know He's just embellishing a little bit But you know what when you go to check the story out You know there was a revolver called the Nagant that was the revolver in the Soviet Union in the 19 teens And it had seven rounds So if you have a seven round revolver waived at you maybe you don't forget that Especially if you're guilty of that for which you are being charged Of course they couldn't prove it and he knew that but There's some things you just don't forget you know if you're 80 years old you still remember Having a gun wave that you if you're 80 years old you still remember Them slipping Truth serum in your beverage when you barely turned your head in time to see it So that's my basic answer for the gospel you can you we can relate to this can't we There's some things I don't care how old John was there's some things especially when you're helped by the Holy Spirit You're not going to forget So the gospel John I say is reliable and in your notes I have a large number Of and I'm not going to read them or go over I'm just going to ask you to take a look at them and and you can check them out as you wish But a large number of of customs or items from the social and religious setting the geography the architecture the topography of Palestine and of Judea That are mentioned in the gospel John and they can all be verified just as um, you know my father says The warrant for our release from the Soviet Union was signed by mr. So and so and you know what I mr. So and so was in charge of Internal affairs in that office in the year 1934 for eight months Can you can prove it see so you can check some things out and they prove and then you remember the memory holds and so there you have it So here we have dozens of things you can be you can verify from the gospel of John And then we say memorable things like turning water into wine and feeding 15,000 people. How could you ever forget that And so we have two lines of Argument to show that John is indeed an eyewitness John says he's an eyewitness John says in chapter one Verse four of his first epistle That he reported what we heard what we have seen with our eyes and what our hands have Handled key of them what you think you let me do this to you for a second what our hands have handled now He uses a strong word here the word handled means to to grip the grabs you i'm feeling him here Here's his clavicle yeah see there's his deltoids triceps He's not a weakling you know i'm touching him see there's flash there's bone what he's saying is i saw him I heard him i touched him not just i touched him like this see I handled him he says if they bump into each other on boats if they you know I don't know how or when but he says you know this was not just an incidental grays i touched him It the gospel John is the sensory gospel I'll put it that way he says i handled him and there are lots of other he's sensory details In the gospel of John how about the death of Lazarus In the king James version it says you know don't roll the stone away because he stinketh Now we don't we don't say that anymore he stinks That's what it means and you you know most if you've ever been near something that died Or i'm assuming you know maybe something like a you know an animal that dies in your house You know a little chipmunk can make your whole house wreak for days Right Says lord he stinketh You know we're there we were getting ready for the blast on the nose that's what he's saying Not only the nose and the touch which we just talked about but the sense of sight A John says you know we ran ahead to the tomb and we peered in and we saw the clothes line there we saw the headpiece twirled up in a separate place i saw it He says how about the feeding the five thousand we tasted that bread
We touched the scene with Thomas Thomas says unless i put my Hand he doesn't say finger The real translation unless i put my hand in his side The idea is though the wound was so big and Thomas sawed or heard about it But the wound from the spear in his side was so big that he knew he could stick his whole fist in it Says i've got to stick my hand in his side or i won't believe I've got to put my finger it says literally in the Greek into The the mark made by the nails if you know he knows that went in inches. I want to stick my finger I don't want to touch it. I want to stick my finger into it Then i'll believe So it's a gripping tactile report That we have John was There he knows of what he speaks The gospel of John Well, what does John speak about he introduces what he's speaking about in his prologue chapter one chapter one of john the prologue uh Introduces the themes and i have a few of them there in your notes as well I'm not going to go through them completely But it goes like this there's something called i haven't used this word with you before a chiasm a chiasm I'm going to put something on the board here maybe just in a moment In john chapter one it goes like this we have statements about jesus pre-existence In the beginning was the word and the word was with god the word was god He was with god in the beginning through him all things were made without him nothing was made that has been made in him was life That life was the light of men so the first thing we hear is something about jesus pre-existence and then that goes on for a few verses and then we come next to a line of teaching that gets us to it really goes from verses one to five and then in verses six to eight We enter into history now there was a man sent from god named john he was a witness to testify to the light he wasn't the light He was a witness to the light the true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world so the second thing we hear is that jesus Came into the world So he's pre-existent but he also enters into the realm of human Action and discourse and then the third thing that we read is that the world didn't receive him He came into the world he was in it, but he was unrecognized versus 9-11 He came to his own, but his own The world did not recognize him he came to his own his own did not receive him So jesus came into the world and third is jesus was was not received To say rejected would be a little bit too strong, but that's what we have in 9-11 and then the fourth thing that we have is Yet to all who did receive him to all believe in his name he gave the right to become children of god So as a whole he was not received but those who did receive by faith Have the right to become children of god and then what he does
So i'll say jesus believed and then we're children of god And that is verses 12 to 13 Then what we have in the next section is a repetition More briefly of points 1 2 and 3 in reverse order 3 2 and 1 in the next series of verses so in verse 14 We have Sorry not miss something In verse 14 It doesn't really quite say explicitly that jesus wasn't received but he says you know he made his dwelling among us We saw his glory implying maybe that others did not and then john testifies Uh, concerning this he cries out. He says there's one greater than he was coming This is the historical entry of jesus into the world that he's the fullness of grace and blessing and truth and then back to jesus pre-existence No one has ever seen god But the god the one and only who was at the father side he has made him known so we go back to jesus pre-existence Now the way kias and works is But the thing that's in the middle the thing that is not repeated is the most important That's just the way that's the way that particular mechanism operates And if you think about it you can see that indeed verses 12 to 13 are the most important They tie in with the purpose statement at the end of john that all these things are written that we might believe Right and have life in his name So john tells us Something at the beginning of the end that we know it's very important That by believing you become a child of god by believing you have a life in his name the gospel john is the gospel faith That gives life remember the word for that Something the statement that comes to the beginning and end of something remember Incluzio very good Incluzio Something's repeated at the beginning and the end It means it all cohere so john is telling us that he has a plan. This isn't just a bunch of stories This is a plan with a thematic unity Question about that Yes, I called that incluzio if you Oh kiasm. This is kiasm when you go one two three four three two one kiasm is spelled i-a-s-m That they're they're very common in Old Testament poetry and there's some of it in New Testament poetry in the gospels here and there Not a lot if you take another course on Old Testament history of poetry. There's more in the Old Testament than there is in the New Testament But I want to introduce that to you So that's john's yes Jennifer
The last ones were Jesus is indeed pre-existent. That's verse 18 and you just repeat them see his pre-existence verse 18 He's with a father He's at the father's side eternally and then he's in the world is His verses 1516 17 He we've received fullness of grace from him the law was given through Moses grace and truth came through Jesus Christ So he came into the world to give us grace and truth and then number three doesn't work quite as well cannibly verse 14 Jesus not receive isn't stated that strongly in verse 14 But it does say that he made his dwelling among us. We saw his glory and it maybe implies that others didn't But certainly these are very clearly also there Toward the end of the prologue which runs from one one to one 18 So that's his introduction he came into the world Not received by many but to those who did receive eternal life The very idea This chiasm is kind of a Jewish thing as I said lots of it in the Old Testament But john does a unique thing that that we all need to think about and I wish I could tell you how he does I Know that he does it and I almost need to say to you you think about it those of you heard in ministry. Here's what he does John grew up in Judea But then his later life he lived in Gentile lands Tradition strong tradition is that he spent his last years in Ephesus the area around Ephesus Remember the story. You know that he was exiled to the island of Patmos, which is off the Coast and the agnc by Ephesus So his early years were with Jews and his later years were with Gentiles and it seems to me Did he write to gospel that would appeal very much to a Gentile without the Jews minding And would appeal very much to the Jew without the Gentile minding And that's one of the great tricks if you've taught Having an audience that's mixed you know has some advanced people and some people who are not advanced And to try to reach them both simultaneous some of you know what I'm talking about It's a very difficult it's a very difficult and important challenge So here's how he reaches the Gentile the word that he uses at the beginning in the beginning was the word Is a favorite that word for word Is logos and that was one of the favorite terms in in Greek philosophy The term logos I'll put it up there if you like in Transliterated form if you know Greek it looks like that The term logos meant The rational organizing or ordering principle of the world Stolic philosophers in particular believe that there was a rational principle in the universe that gave it Structure organization and rationality also people if you know ancient philosophy like Heraclitus And Xeno and a Jewish philosopher who lived outside of Israel his entire life named Filo used the word logos to describe God's Instrumentation and rational power in creating the world So when when John begins in the beginning was the logos and all the philosophers and thinkers would say oh Interesting we'll read about this Then when he goes on to say the word became flashed and they might not be so sure about that but he constantly uses terms That would be of interest to a Gentile reader and he also keeps things simple So that the novice will not feel that it's going over his head On the other hand John writes for Jews He writes for Jews by putting very few quotations the quotation could put off somebody You know, it's like using big words or quoting the Bible or saying you know Here's verse such and such to a total novice they don't like that when you do that in a Bible study So John already knows that you need to hide things a little bit so people aren't put off And so he puts not quotations of the old testament so much he puts a few but not many But many illusions to the old testament Though he picked up by a Jew let me give you an example You can do the first one yourself. Where's the first illusion to the old testament in the gospel of John John one one in the beginning In the beginning god created heaven earth in the beginning was the word now those obviously sound quite a bit like each other And then chapter one verse 14 the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us the word for made his dwelling Is the word for pitching a tent which i imagine many have heard he pitched his tent and the word that's used for that is the word used for the Tabernacle in the old testament so some people translate he tabernackled or Pitched his tent among us. So what he's alluding to is the idea that if the tabernacle signifies a god dwells with Israel symbolically in this one place through the glory cloud Then Jesus is the real thing the tabernacle is the symbol of god's presence Jesus is god's presence Walking must not a cloud but a human being The god man Walking in our presence He's the lamb of god Read also in chapter one the lamb of god that takes away The sin of the world the true lamb many lambs were sacrificed in the old testament ritual This is the real lamb the lamb that truly I get rid of sin by offering the sacrifice Jesus in his first miracle turns water into wine. We'll talk about this in a little bit But wine was a symbol of the messianic age Now a Jew would get this maybe we don't maybe Jew Gentiles wouldn't And We really could go on and on from there. Maybe i'll just mention one other Jesus says in chapter 10 i am the good shepherd. What does that remind you of?
The Lord is my shepherd Psalm 23 and beyond that the general idea that god is the caretaker for Israel Jesus uses and of course there wasn't just that but there's also a good shepherd bad shepherd theme in the bible Bad shepherd to describe in is equal 34 and germine And god says the he will bind up Israel's wounds and in chapter 9 and 10 We in fact have Bad shepherds of Israel the Pharisees beating the sheep and Jesus binding up the wounds If a Gentile doesn't know Ezekiel and Psalm 23 and germine 9 you know it's not going to hurt him He's still going to get the basic idea But if you've been looking for a true shepherd of Israel if you're a Jew and know the hopes and aspirations and know what it's like to be beaten by a bad shepherd What it's like to wait for a good one Then the whole story has a much greater depth as you read it. So John is writing for Gentiles In terms they would understand light and darkness truth and the lie and so forth Is writing for Jews with dozens of illusions to the Old Testament Let me stop there and see if anybody has a question or comment they'd like to make
It shall be plunge in to the gospel John and stand
The question is why doesn't John say who he is and um Stan said I wonder what the speculation is and see that's exactly what it has a speculation You know why didn't you say X is one of those unanswerable questions, isn't it? Have you read anybody say to you? Well, why don't you say this? Well, because I said something else That's just I didn't think of it at the time or whatever. It's it's speculation, but um
One possibility is that you know Paul was not one of the original twelve and so he seems to have received certain opposition uh almost chronically throughout his career because he'd been an opponent of the church and so forth so he had to insist on his apostolic authority Just a lot more than Then the others did it seems like he he knew that he was known If you read especially chapter 20, but it looks like like he assumes that everybody who's reading his gospel knows exactly who he is And so why prove it why say more Well John chapter one introduces Jesus ministry and it introduces it first of all with the prologue I am not however going to stress the prologue, but rather move on In my notes and your notes to Jesus signs Now one way of dividing up or looking at the book of John is to See a sort of a big plan a meta plan to the gospel John and the meta plan would go like this we have a a prologue In chapter one and we have an epilogue In chapter 21 and then we have two other parts of the whole book and they are Sometimes called the book of signs
And the book of glory the book of signs covers chapters two to eleven in the book of glory 12 Through 20 the book of signs is largely dominated by the signs the miracles of Jesus for form and the conversations that they caused The debates or discourses the book of glory focuses on the death and resurrection of Christ Both the trial and the arrest and the crucifixion resurrection and the discussion that Jesus had with his disciples to prepare them for it That's what's happening in chapters 12 and 20 In two through 11 of the dominant thing is indeed the signs
The signs present Jesus claims to the world The signs however by themselves is crucial by themselves do not engender Faith they don't prove they don't require they point just think with me For one moment about a sign let me just define a sign first signs are miraculous deeds That demonstrate if you have eyes to see That God is working in the world through Jesus But now you just think about signs is a little bit more the word is sign what signs do you encounter what signs that you encounter today What okay stop sign and there's another science that we don't call it a sign There's another one you all encountered well A traffic light the traffic signal right and you might have also seen yield signs Did you yield or did you merge tell the truth How many use sometimes merge when it says yield Okay, how many of you sometimes slow down a whole lot when it says stop
See the sign points to Assign can't make you stop A sign says in our society we have a convention if you have a red octagon with white letters And it has the letters as T.O.P. on it you're supposed to do something when you approach an intersection But the sign can't make you do it right And likewise a traffic light now probably less of you violate but how many you've ever How many of you have deliberately run a red light how many of you have How many of you know what what the signs what the different colors really mean green means Go very good red means stop yellow means speed up and hope you make it Right Okay, what is orange use what does it really mean it really means clear the intersection means if you're already in your lot to finish So even that doesn't it's a sign that can't compile us to do right And that's the way the signs of Jesus are they point to something but they don't compile anything they don't force you They indicate they don't require okay. What's the first sign That they they point to Jesus deeded their tokens of his deity's power But here's the first one Turning water into wine In Galilee now people cite this because they say this proves that Jesus approves of of marriage Which is true, but that's not the main thing that's going on here The main thing that's going on here is the Jesus is simply out of wedding It's just a fact the point is not to get a theology marriage. He's just in a wedding Maybe he's related somehow to the people it's possible because Jesus mother seems to have some responsibility When they run out of wine and seems to think that Jesus should get involved in solving the problem But at any rate There's a wedding and the wine runs out weddings usually lasted a whole week Certainly several days and you had to prepare for years to get the food and the beverages Shall we say together for this and if you ran out it was a major social disgrace that would haunt you Rest of your life Mary sees that the wine is running out and so she Takes matter into her own hands by putting them into Jesus hands and says
They have no more wine Verse three Now I notice that it says Jesus mother said to him they have no more wine now. I'm going to have to talk to you about Greek again The next person in an IV says dear woman why do you involve me the word dear is not there in the Greek Of Greek says Literally what is there between me and you woman?
Did I get a couple who's out of that? Now here's the thing the word woman today can be pretty rude But the truth is woman is sort of halfway between man and woman To call somebody woman would be very neutral It wouldn't be a rebuke or a slap but it would not be polite in particular either it would be just A pure address a little bit like sir you could put sir you could put a little twist on and say sir Or you could say sir Neutral or you could say it with respect you really can't tell so a woman Dear woman is not right woman And what is there between me and you is language that Establishes distance Do you know when the demons approach Jesus and they say don't bother. This is not the time one of the things they say is What is there between me and you we have no relationship? That's what they mean leave us alone. We're doing our demon thing. You're doing your healing thing That's fine. Just keep it that way What is there between me and you means I have no relations with you my time has not yet come You don't know what you're asking you're asking me to break my schedule You're you're out of line is what he's saying Not real mildly but not real sharply either Then it says in verse five his mother said to him Whatever he says to you Do now we've seen this before haven't we Where somebody asks for something from Jesus Jesus rebuffs them and then they persevere Now what she does is very subtle But I think I think it's definitely there they were very attuned to the nuances of of discussions as we'll see a little bit later yet again He's he's establishing that Mary bends to Jesus see one person put it this way when Mary comes to Jesus as his mother With a claim on him she is rebuffed But then when she acquiesces when she approaches as a believer she's approved. He says she says whatever he tells you He says the servants do whatever he tells you if he wants to say do something more Doing and if he doesn't find it's up to him I leave it with him She bows we might say even to the supremacy of her Sun now of course these are wonderful words they go beyond what Mary meant whatever he tells you do Is good advice and I think more than good advice is required
And then one starts to establish Jesus takes action He says he sees that six stone jars are nearby The kind used for ceremony of watching now that's a detail that matters each one held 20 to 30 gallons The Jews had little cubicle sort of just small little areas where they would wash themselves for ritual cleansing Before going to the temple or various other purposes This would be about 120 gallons to 180 gallons of water. It's a lot of water They would get down in and immerse themselves Jesus says let's take those fill them with water fill them to the top Fill them to the very top And then we don't know when exactly but we don't know and we don't know exactly how But the water changes to wine and they take it to the steward and the steward says You've saved the best for last This isn't the way it usually works usually you get people drunk and then you bring out the cheap wine But but you have saved the best for last first ten Because Jesus does everything first rate
This is the first of his miraculous signs thus he revealed his glory now if you're like me You're thinking Isn't this great He went to a wedding and he changed water to wine and and it's a sign What does this signify? How many what is this signify? How do you wrestle with this one? I'll guarantee I'll tell you candidly. I've wondered for years What this sign signifies. I mean, why would you start your career of ministering in this particular way The answer is that you have to know the background Wine was a sign free flowing abundant wine was a sign of the messianic age in Israel In fact, I think I'm going to get somebody to help me out just a little bit with somebody read Amos chapter 9 Versus 13 and 14 somebody have that verse somebody be brave Well, I get it. Somebody raise your hand Great. Thank you Linda and Josef 14 verse 7 who's got it
Okay, read with a loud voice. These are two of a series of passages. We could quote about wine in the messianic age Amos 9 13 and 14
Okay, new wine will flow from the mountains will drip from the hills Keep going Okay, when the people have got our restored they'll rebuild their houses Oh, they will plant vineyards and drink their wine the day when God restores Israel Jennifer Josef 14 seven
Okay, so again when God restores his people they will they will plant vineyards and they'll drink wine again when God's blessing flows upon Israel Again and it's not just that this is a sign of the messianic age But I think it's it's significant You know John doesn't waste details that this is something that he you he takes water for ceremonial washing And changes that you see the day for rituals for ceremonial cleansing the day for the temples kind of cleansing Is gone because the Messiah is here with the full blown restoration that he has to offer including spiritual Restoration The the Messiah will deliver the entire creation we read Isaiah chapter 35 verses one and two a while ago, but in the healing of the nations the healing the blind and the lame and all the rest Is part of his remaking of the entire universe that's what the Messiah does all things set right disease removed Starvation and want is gone a season of plenty is coming at the restore all restoration of all things and that's A theme is the first sign that fits in in the first great theme about Jesus ministry And that is that his ministry is one of Restoration of being done with what is old and starting something new now very quickly and to go through some others chapter two Versus 13 to 21 the old temple is replaced by the new temple which is his body The old temple couldn't really cleanse sin, but his body can And when his when the temple is Destroyed he'll raise it up in three days because that's the real place where God's dwelling and God's cleansing takes place then in the Nicodemus chapter we have the teaching the statement that the old birth physical birth is Replaced by the new birth and then we have in chapter four the old water that people draw from wells Is replaced by new water that wells up from within and gives eternal life And in chapter four verses 15 to 24 the old places of worship Whether in Jerusalem or on Mount ebal and garrison whether in in In Samaritan terror Jewish terror will be removed and restored by the new place of worship All who worship him all who worship in spirit and truth are true worshipers wherever they may be So chapters two and three and four show that Jesus is bringing the age of new things the age of completion And that is how this is his first sign and odd sign we don't get it at first and we need maybe to realize Hey, you know these are signs we better work to find out what they signify they signify that the age of the Messiah and all the new things he brings That age has come You know may pause there for a question or for a comment Yes Yes, it is only revealed to a very small number of people this John chapter the question is Why does Jesus only reveal this to a few people there were other people know Jesus does say my time is not yet come I find it intriguing that he wants to we might say hide himself from the first audience but John does not want to hide this from The every other audience that ever lived So we might say a few people missed it and billions get it
He it was not yet his time as the short answer is it wasn't his time But it was loaded with significance that John saw a new and wanted us to receive as he organized his book Good question. Well, that's the first sign that Jesus performed I would like to talk also about the first discourse that Jesus had Now at the end of chapter two It says that after the cleansing of the temple That many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name That's chapter two verse 23 implies that Jesus performed certain other signs as we know he did That John isn't telling us about he's just telling us about a few But Jesus now it says he The people saw the signs and believed okay But Jesus would not a good translation here would be believe them I know your antivis says and trust himself to them or trust them But the word that's used for and trust is the same as the word for believe so they believe in him, but he didn't believe them Is what John is saying why not Because he knew all men He did not need man's testimony about man because he knew it was in a man. In other words John is telling us something There are different kinds of belief There is a superficial kind of belief in which somebody Superficially trusts or is amazed or says I believed Jesus is the Christ. That's not enough And Jesus knows that and doesn't trust superficial Confessions What comes next Chapter three now bear remember careful what you just read and tell me what you notice Chapter three now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus You see what's odd about this phrase what's odd about this phrase Isn't this a strange way to introduce somebody a man of the Pharisees? Why don't you just say he was a Pharisee or his name was Nicodemus It's the only time in the whole Gospels that somebody's called there was a man of the Pharisees What are we supposed to get out of this odd little thing? There was a man of the Pharisees think what is it supposed to tell us What do we just read in chapter two? Jesus knew what was in a man There was a man of the Pharisees therefore Jesus knew what was in this man Now that's important if you understand the conversation with Nicodemus and the strange turn of events of that Happens in it Here's Nicodemus. I want you to picture pretend you were there If you will even try to pretend you're Nicodemus. Can you do that? You're Nicodemus I don't know if you're too tired to be Nicodemus
Okay, if you play Nicodemus you may live in up a little bit. Okay So here we go. You're Nicodemus You're best He came to Jesus at night Maybe not to be seen maybe because he just wanted to be alone with him. He came at night He says Rabbi we know that you're a teacher who has come from God for no one could perform the miraculous signs you're doing if God were not with him Now Nicodemus verse 10 says is the teacher of Israel the teacher of Israel One of the if not the greatest one of the greatest teachers in all of Israel And he's a rabbi and he says Jesus. I'm a rabbi. You're a rabbi. Let's do the rabbi thing. Let's have a conversation I'm a man of God. You're a man of God. Let's talk about it
I know you're a man of God. You know, I'm a man of God. That doesn't even have to be stated, huh
Jesus says Nicodemus I tell you the truth no one can see the kingdom of God unless he's born again Now if you're a Nicodemus, what are you thinking right now?
So off his rock or what what do you I want to talk about rabbi stuff I want to talk man to man rabbi to rabbi man of God to man of God teacher to teacher You might even say Nicodemus can easily be upset because after all Nicodemus is a great teacher He probably studied for years and had to work and toil for maybe even decades to gain his status And he freely be quits it in an act of generosity to Jesus. You are a rabbi. I'm a rabbi. I call you a rabbi But Jesus seems to reject this Must be born again now we're very familiar with the idea of being born again But I want to tell you something the phrase born again was not used in Israel at that time When Jesus says you must be born again Nicodemus had no way of knowing There would be any future illusions to Chuck Colson And books if he would write about his prison experiences He had no idea Nicodemus didn't In fact, if anything, it might even seem rude because Nicodemus says the superior in the conversation So he would think would have the right to establish the terms of debate the topic for discussion to refuse the debate Or to refuse to discuss the topic of discussion proposed by the superior man is an act of rudeness
And Nicodemus sputters How can a man be born again when he is old? You expect me to climb into my mother's womb a second time. What are you talking about? paraphrasing slightly Maybe he's mocking maybe he's feigning confusion, but I think not I would be surprised if I heard something like that if I were there So Nicodemus begins with generous praise, but he's quickly confused Jesus in the third place instructs him Instruct him first of all by ignoring his air and simply says listen I want to tell you I tell you the truth no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he's born of water and the spirit For flesh gives birth to flesh, but the spirit gives birth to spirit You should not be surprised at my saying you must be born again because you see the wind blows wherever it pleases You hear it sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it's going So it is with everyone born of the spirit now. I don't know about you But if I'm Nicodemus, this isn't helping a lot I think there be a few things we could understand You have to have this to see the kingdom. You can't enter the kingdom. You have to be born again or you can't enter a sea And what you need is two births. That's becoming clear a birth of water which would be euphemistic for natural generation which is so we might say a process that involves liquids or a watery sort of process The watery birth would be the first natural birth and then the birth of the spirit is the second birth You'd have two births that might be clear to Nicodemus But all this business is about the spirit or the wind blowing the word for spirit and wind is the same in Greek and Nicodemus says, how can this be? What are you talking about? And Jesus says Your Israel's teacher and you don't understand these things and Nicodemus is probably thinking That doesn't help at all That's what I just said. I don't understand. Don't rub it in And then Jesus goes further he says Well, we speak of what we know and we testify to what we've seen, but you don't accept our testimony I have spoken you of earthly things and you don't believe what if I spoke you of heavenly things and that doesn't help Verse 13, no one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven the son of man Who's the son of man? Verse 14, just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert so the son of man must be lifted up But if I'm Nicodemus I'm saying what Are you talking about and that's the point See what Nicodemus needs is to realize that he doesn't realize The lesson that Nicodemus is That he thinks he can come into Jesus and have a conversations teacher to teacher and great man to great man and Jesus says no, we can't You're not my peer The first thing you need to learn if you want to learn anything is you don't know anything And you need to be humbled And you need to be born again. You got to start all over again Then maybe you can begin to learn