Author: tpdrenoske

NO EXCUSE GIVEN — John 11:17-27

john 11:17-32, Uncategorized

What do you say if you are late for the funeral of a friend?  What do you say if the family of the deceased person asks you why you are late?  What do you say if you miss the funeral altogether?  You’d better have a really good excuse, right?  The funeral and burial of Lazarus occurred four days earlier and Jesus wasn’t present.  He and His disciples have been walking all day in the direction of the town of Bethany, and the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus is now in sight.  Does He have a good excuse ready?  As we study this next passage of Scripture, John 11:17-27, we are going to find that Jesus is too late to heal and too late for the funeral.  However, He does not give an excuse, nor is He asked to give one.

I.  THE SCENE AT BETHANY (verses 17-19)

Verse 17 says, “So when Jesus came, He found that he had already been in the tomb four days.”  That verse seems to imply that Jesus did not know that information since He found that to be the case after He arrived.  Once again, we are reminded that Jesus Christ was not all-knowing while He was on this earth.  His Heavenly Father told Jesus that Lazarus had died, but apparently didn’t tell Jesus on what day he died.  There is now no question in anyone’s mind that Lazarus was dead.  Jesus may have been given that information from someone they met as they approached Bethany.  It’s implied that Jesus did not know this information when He left for Bethany earlier that same day.

John gives us a brief geography lesson in verse 18 in order to help explain what follows.  The town of Bethany is located very close to the city of Jerusalem.  It’s just under two miles away.  The reason for verse 18 is found in verse 19, which says, “and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary, to console them concerning their brother.”  The distance between Bethany and Jerusalem was short enough that many of their friends and acquaintances must have decided to come to the funeral.  In first-century Palestine, the Jewish time of mourning was divided into three parts.  The first three days were days of weeping.  The next four days were days of heavy mourning.  Then there was lighter mourning for the rest of the thirty-day mourning period.  During the first week, visitors constantly came to their house to console the family.  Even though many of these Jews were hostile toward Jesus and His followers, there were those who showed the courtesy of paying a visit and offering comfort.  Jesus and His disciples would be coming to a house filled with sympathizers that day.

II.  MARTHA’S CONVERSATION WITH JESUS (verses 20-27)

Verse 20 tells us, “So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went out to meet Him, but Mary remained sitting in the house.”   From what the Bible says about Martha here and in Luke 10:38-42, she is a take-action person and a take-charge person.  She likes to be busy, making sure that everything and everyone is taken care of properly.  Someone must have told her or made an announcement that Jesus had arrived in Bethany and was headed in the direction of their home.  Martha was quick to her feet and on her way to meet Jesus.

Meanwhile, on the road to Bethany, Jesus and His disciples see a small cloud of dust in the distance.  It’s a woman . . . it’s Martha . . . she’s coming in a hurry!  If I were in that situation, my first thought would be, “What’s the worst thing that could happen?”, and then, “What am I going to say and do if it does happen?”  Can you feel the tension?  Have you been in a situation like this before?  Were you on the giving end or the receiving end?

In verse 21, Martha’s first recorded words to Jesus are. “Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.”  Does that sound like one of those greetings where the person pauses afterward, waiting for you to give your excuse?  Did you have one ready in your “bag of excuses” or was there a moment of silence . . . an apology . . . shame?

Martha may have rehearsed those words with her sister because Mary later says the very same words.  There may also have been a sense of regret in her words.  “If only you had been here, this tragedy would not have occurred.”  Martha knew that Jesus could and did heal sick people and wondered why He didn’t arrive in time to heal Lazarus.  You might think that Martha considered her brother Lazarus to be beyond hope now that it was four days after his death.

There was no long pause after Martha’s greeting.  Immediately after saying those words, we find that Martha makes a profession of faith and hope in Jesus.  Despite the “irreversible” condition of her brother in the minds of the people and their leaders, Martha makes a statement of faith in Jesus when she says, “Even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you” (verse 22).  Even in her desperation, there is a step of faith and there is a ray of hope.  After looking into Jesus’ eyes and seeing the humility, gentleness, and love mirrored there, how could Martha keep from growing in faith and from experiencing a greater sense of hope and peace?  The saying has been around for a long time and seems so appropriate for this moment:  “I can see it in your eyes”.

When Martha made her second statement, she was turning the focus of her attention away from the situation and placing it upon Jesus.  Even though she did not yet believe that Jesus was God, she did believe that there was a close relationship between Him and God, so close that God would answer any request Jesus might ask of Him.  She was now seeing this situation from a different perspective.  I recently read an illustration of another woman whose perspective was changed because of a dramatic incident in her life.  Many years ago the inhabitants of a small village were startled by a sudden earthquake.  The people were trembling with fear but were surprised at the calmness and apparent joy of an old woman whom they all knew.  Finally, one of them addressed the old woman and said, “Mother, are you not afraid?”  “No”, said the woman.  “I rejoice to know that I have a God who can shake the world!”  Has Martha come to the realization that she has a God who could raise the dead, even her own brother, Lazarus?    

Jesus encourages her faith and seeks to build upon that faith when He says to her, in verse 23, “Your brother shall rise again.”  Those words may have been a common phrase that was used during the mourning period to comfort and encourage the family during the mourning period.  However, Martha could tell from Jesus’ tone of voice that He was making her a promise.  He’s applying her words of faith to her brother’s condition.  Now we see that Martha’s words to Jesus, “I know that whatever you ask of God, He will give you”, were not meant to be applied to her brother’s situation.  God had never raised a person who had already been dead for four days.  The spirit of her brother had already left and his body was decaying.  It was too late for a healing miracle.

In an effort to understand Jesus’ words and agree with Him, Martha says, in verse 24, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.”  That’s what she had been taught from her Jewish upbringing.  She believed in a future resurrection of the dead.  Her hope for her brother Lazarus was now tied to the future, not to the present.

Do the Old Testament scriptures talk about a bodily resurrection?  Yes, they do, in several places.  The prophet Daniel said, “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2).  The prophet Isaiah said, “Your dead will live; their corpses will rise.  You who lie in the dust, awake and shout for joy” (Isaiah 26:19).  There are also many references to the resurrection in the Psalms.  Martha’s response to Jesus’ comment was true, but she didn’t understand how He could be referring to the present situation. 

With the exception of the Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead, most Jews during that period of time believed in a resurrection of the dead on the last day.  Jesus already said, in John 5:21, “For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom He is pleased to give it.”  Now Jesus makes it clearer and more emphatic when He says to Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25).  Once again, Jesus uses God’s special name:  “I am.”  He’s telling Martha that the resurrection isn’t just a doctrine.  It’s a Person, and He is that Person.  There is no resurrection and there is no life apart from Him.  Jesus is also saying that eternal life begins at the moment when a person believes in Him and follows Him [he who believes in me shall live even if he dies; and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die”]. Physical death has no effect on the life that Jesus gives.  Those words of Jesus must have been an encouragement to Martha.  He brought her personal understanding of the resurrection out of the future and into the present.  He told her that people are saved, not by words written in a book (the Torah), but by Jesus Himself, “the resurrection and the life.”

A nineteenth-century missionary to the South Seas by the name of John G. Paton met opposition to leaving his home in Scotland and going to preach to the cannibalistic peoples of the New Hebrides Islands.  A well-meaning church member said to him, “The cannibals, the cannibals!  You will be eaten by the cannibals!”  Without hesitation, Paton replied, “I confess to you that if I can live and die serving the Lord Jesus Christ, it makes no difference to me whether I am eaten by cannibals or by worms; for in that Great Day of Resurrection, my body will rise as fair as yours in the likeness of our risen Redeemer!”  The hope of the resurrection removed Paton’s fears and strengthened his commitment to serve the Lord.

Martha’s response to the claims of Jesus was also based upon genuine faith in Him.  In her answer to Jesus’ question, “Do you believe this?”, Martha said “Yes” and used three titles to refer to Him:  “Lord”, “the Christ”, and “the Son of God.”

CONCLUSION:

You may remember the famous words of the apostle Peter in Matthew 16:16, where he said to Jesus, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”  Let’s also remember the words of Martha, who said to Jesus, “Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God.”  They both came to the same conclusion and were encouraged and comforted by that knowledge.

Pastor and evangelist, Dwight L. Moody, told the story of a soldier at the Battle of Inkerman [November 5, 1854] who was just able to crawl to his tent after he was struck down.  When found, he was lying upon his face, his open Bible before him, his hand glued fast to one of the pages by his lifeblood which covered it.  When his hand was lifted, the letters of the printed page were clearly traced upon it.  And such words they were that they decided not to wash them from his palm when they laid him in a soldier’s grave.  The promise etched in blood was this:  “I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.”  Then Moody said, “I want a religion like that which can comfort even in death, that can unite me with my loved ones.  What a gloom and darkness would settle upon this world were it not for the glorious doctrine of the resurrection.”

Do you believe in the resurrection?  Do you believe in the One who said, “I am the resurrection and the life?”  The Lord Jesus Christ is the only true source of hope, peace, and joy in this life and the next.  Don’t let human reasoning keep you from knowing Christ as your Lord and Savior.  Take that step of faith by choosing to repent of your sins, believe in Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and follow Him in obedience to His word.

If you have already made that decision, then live in such a way that you never have to give an excuse for your actions but rather, a reason and a motivation.  As the apostle Peter said in 1 Peter 3:15-16, “but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence, and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.”

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

Thank you for visiting this site.  In this passage of Scripture, we are taking a closer look at Martha and her understanding of who Jesus is and what He can do.  We will be studying a demonstration of Jesus’ claims in the next passage of scripture.

THE DEATH OF LAZARUS — John 11: 1-16

John 11: 1-16, Uncategorized

Have you ever discovered, in your own life, that sometimes God’s love and God’s timing are difficult to understand and accept?  Has there been a recent event in your life that doesn’t seem to fit with your understanding of God’s love?  Are you still trying to make sense of it?

In this passage of Scripture, John 11:1-16, which deals with the sickness and death of a close friend by the name of Lazarus,  Jesus’ love and His timing were difficult to understand and accept.  Jesus is about to receive a message.  Let’s see how He responds, and let’s put ourselves in the situation, as if we were members of the family of Lazarus, or as if we were Jesus’ disciples, trying to figure out what is going on and trying to make sense of it.

I.  THE SICKNESS OF LAZARUS (verses 1-2)

Life is filled with surprises, isn’t it?  Do you like surprises?  What about unpleasant surprises?  That’s another story, isn’t it?  The eleventh chapter of John’s Gospel begins with an unpleasant surprise.  Verses 1-2 describe the situation in these words:  “Now a certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister Martha.  And it was the Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped His feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.” 

The apostle John is the only gospel writer who mentions this event.  He goes into considerable detail to make sure his readers know who he is talking about.  The name Lazarus is a form of the name Eleazar.  Martha appears to be the oldest, based upon her responsibilities in the family.  John uses an event that happens in the future to describe Mary.  The apostle John wrote this gospel several years after the death of Christ and he wanted to make sure his readers knew which Mary he was talking about in this verse.  There are several Marys who are mentioned in the New Testament scriptures.

II.  THE MESSAGE (verse 3)

At that point in time, Jesus and His disciples were still on the other side of the Jordan River in the land of Perea where John the Baptist had been baptizing.  Martha and Mary must have known this because they sent Him a message.  Verse 3 says, “The sisters therefore sent to Him, saying, ‘Lord, behold, he whom You love is sick.’ ”  The person who brought this news to Jesus must have been quoting the words that Mary and Martha asked him to say.  The words “he whom You love” are filled with meaning and emotion.  They aren’t implying that Jesus loved Lazarus more than others.  I think they are focusing on the fact that Jesus’ love for them is so much greater than their love for Him, that they feel so undeserving but so enthralled by His love.  Like the apostle John, who referred to himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved”, whenever they thought of Jesus or thought of themselves, they were reminded of, and amazed at, His love for them.

Hymn writer Philip Bliss, finished singing the hymn, “Oh, How I Love Jesus”, when he said to himself, “Those words are true.  Yet I feel guilty for having sung so much about my poor love for Christ and so little about His endless love for me.”  As a result, he wrote a song that is well known today.  Here is the first stanza:

“I am so glad that our Father in heaven
Tells of His love in the Book He has given,
Wonderful things in the Bible I see —
This is the dearest, that Jesus loves me.”

IV.  JESUS’ REPLY (verse 4)

Having considered the love of Jesus, how did Jesus respond to this bearer of sad news?  Did He stop what He was doing, accompany the person, and perform a healing miracle?  That’s what He usually did, but not in this case.  Instead, He gives some words of assurance for this messenger to take back to Mary and Martha.  In verse 4 Jesus said, “This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it.”  After spending the night with Jesus and His disciples, the messenger must have left the next morning reassured by that good news, and Jesus’s disciples must have been glad that there was nothing to be concerned about.  Everything was going to turn out alright.  That’s going to be true, but not in the sense that Jesus’ hearers understood it.  Not at all!

V.  LOVE AND DELAY (verses 5-6)

Verse 5 describes Jesus’ love, not only for Lazarus but for Martha and Mary as well.  The apostle John wants to make it clear to his readers that all three of them were equally the objects of Jesus’ love.  Then, in verse 6, Jesus does something that seems to contradict that love.  Verse 6 reads, “When therefore He [Jesus] heard that he [Lazarus] was sick, He stayed then two days longer in the place where He was.”  That doesn’t sound very loving, does it?  You would think that Jesus would have accompanied the messenger back to Bethany and healed Lazarus.  Why the delay?

If we look through the gospels, we find that Jesus was not a “creature of habit” when it came to performing miracles.  He didn’t perform any two miracles exactly the same way.  Some of His miracles were done in very unusual and unexpected ways.  You might draw the conclusion that Jesus was a non-conformist who did things His own way, but that’s not a valid conclusion.  Jesus conformed to the will of His Heavenly Father, and when asked or challenged, He gave the credit to His Father.  In John 5:30, Jesus said, “I can do nothing on My own initiative. . . . I do not seek My own will but the will of Him who sent Me.”  In John 14:10, Jesus will be making a similar statement when He says, “but the Father dwelling in Me does His works.”  Jesus was on the Father’s timetable and acted according to the will and power of the Father, and for the glory of His Father.

VI.  THE TIME FOR ACTION (verses 7-10)

After two days of rest and relaxation, Jesus gives the exhortation, “Let us go to Judea again.”  Those words must have startled His disciples.  They just fled from there to save their lives and now Jesus wants to go back again?  What’s going on?  To get the full picture, let’s imagine what has been happening in Bethany during this period of time.  The messenger returned to Bethany the following evening only to learn that Lazarus had died while he was on his way to deliver the message to Jesus.  The messenger was alone; Jesus wasn’t with him.  Let’s try to imagine the conversation between them.

“Where is Jesus?”

“He’s still in Bathabara.”

“Is He coming?”

“I don’t think so.  He said, ‘This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified by it’.”

Can you imagine the shock when Mary and Martha heard those words?  Lazarus was already dead.  They already had the funeral service for him and had laid him in the family tomb.  Yet Jesus had not come, and His words to them didn’t make any sense.  They must have been devastated and wondered whether He was going to come at all.  There may have been a sense of abandonment in their hearts.

In spite of the shock and confusion this delay has caused in the minds of Martha, Mary, and Jesus’ disciples, Jesus had an important and necessary reason for the delay.  The climate in that region was very hot and only the rich could afford to embalm a dead family member.  It was a process that took months to accomplish.  The rest of the people endeavored to bury the body the same day or early the next day.  They also didn’t have the diagnostic equipment we have today to confirm that a person was truly dead.  As a result, there were cases where the “dead” person came out of his swoon or coma and came back to life.  In order to explain this phenomenon and keep it from happening again, the leaders came up with an explanation.  One popular opinion was that the spirit of the person hovered over the body until decay began to take place and then left.

That may seem to give a reason for the delay but I don’t think that reason aligns with the character of the Lord Jesus.  He was not one who would hurt His friends in order to bring more glory to Himself at their expense.  Jesus also does not confirm that view.  Remember, Jesus was not all-knowing, and His will was to bring glory to the Father as the Father revealed His will to His Son.  There were things that Jesus knew and there were things that Jesus didn’t know until the Father revealed them.  For example, Jesus probably knew about this “swoon theory” that I just mentioned.  He knew that any resurrection miracle would be questioned if the person hadn’t been dead for at least three days.  However, Jesus may not have known that Lazarus was already dead.  One thing we do know is that Jesus always did the will of the Father as the Father revealed it to Him, and until then, He waited.  For Him, it wasn’t a delay but an act of loving obedience to His Father.

With that information in mind, Jesus may have said those words:  “Let’s go to Judea again” immediately after the Father had told Him that Lazarus was dead and that it was time to return to the home of Martha and Mary.  Those words of Jesus in verse 7 were not the words that Jesus’ disciples wanted to hear.  It sounded like a death sentence and they were not ready to die.  They encourage Jesus to reconsider His plans, saying, “Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone You, and are You going there again?”  I see an exaggeration and an implication in their response.  First, they make it sound like this attempted stoning happened just a couple of minutes ago instead of a couple of days ago.  They seem to be saying, “Don’t you think you should give this a little more thought rather than react upon the first impulse?”  Secondly, they are giving Jesus a hint about their response to the idea.  When they said, “are You going there again”, they seem to be implying, “You’re on your own this time!”  It sounds like a stand-off, doesn’t it?  Jesus is ready to go and they are giving Him reasons to stay.  He doesn’t get angry with them because of their fears but uses this opportunity to build faith and trust in Him and His words.  His disciples are focusing their thoughts upon the situation rather than upon their Messiah. 

Jesus begins by giving them a lesson on how to tell time.  Can you remember learning how to tell time as a child?  I was a little slow to catch on at first.  Most of the clocks are digital now, but I grew up back in the day when all the clocks had an hour hand and a minute hand, and some of them even had a second hand.

In verse 9, Jesus answers their question with a question of His own, saying, “Are there not twelve hours in the day?  If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles because the light is not in him.”  Jesus uses a form of telling time that was common to the Jews of that day by stating that there are twelve hours of daylight and implying that there are twelve hours of the night.  If you’re going to take a walk, it is better to do it during the day.  They didn’t have street lights as we have today, so when the sun went down, it was really dark.  There was more that Jesus was trying to communicate to them but they missed it.  He told His disciples, in chapter 8, that He was the light of the world.  He had also mentioned that His hour had not yet come.  There was still work that the Father wanted Him to do.  Until then, they were safe with Him.  As King David said, in Psalm 27:1, “The Lord is my light and my salvation; Whom shall I fear?”

VII.  THE NEED FOR EXPLANATIONS (verses 11-15)

That answer received no response from Jesus’ disciples.  Their thoughts are still focused on what He is about to do, rather than on who He is and what He is able to do.  Jesus is trying to build faith and trust in Him as their Messiah and He is not about to give up yet.  In verse 11, Jesus gives them an explanation when He says, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go, that I may awaken him out of sleep.”

The response of His disciples seems to be appropriate.  Verse 12 reads, “The disciples therefore said to Him, ‘Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.’ ”  I wonder if their response to Jesus was one of relief rather than rejoicing.  In order to avoid the risks of going to Bethany, they are trying to convince Jesus that there is no longer a need to make the trip.  “Let Lazarus sleep undisturbed.  The sleep will heal his sickness.”  Jesus’ disciples are still in protection-mode and have misunderstood His words.  Over 35 times in the Old Testament scriptures, the phrase  “slept with his fathers” is used when referring to the death of someone.  The disciples of Jesus missed that association because none of them asked Jesus for clarification.

It’s time to head for Bethany so Jesus tells His disciples clearly and plainly what has happened to Lazarus.  In verses 14 and 15, Jesus said, “Lazarus is dead, and I am glad for your sakes that I wasn’t there, so that you may believe; but let us go to him.”  Jesus could have been there sooner.  He could have brought Lazarus back from the dead without going there in person.  But Jesus is glad at that moment, knowing that what His disciples are about to experience is going to stretch and deepen their faith in Him. 

VIII.  THE RESPONSE OF THOMAS (verse 16) 

Jesus may be rejoicing at that moment but His disciples aren’t sharing the enjoyment along with Him.  They see this trip back to Bethany as a death sentence for all of them.  However, one voice responds loudly enough for all to hear.  It’s the voice of the apostle Thomas.  Verse 16 says,  “Thomas therefore, who is called Didymus, said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go that we may die with Him.’ “

The apostle Thomas is my namesake and most people refer to him as “doubting Thomas” because of his reluctance to believe that Christ had risen from the dead (John 20:24-29).  I’ve been called “doubting Thomas” many times in my life, but I would like you to think of the apostle Thomas as he is described here in verse 16.  His words are an expression of two of his character qualities:  loyalty and pessimism.  He was a loyal follower of Christ who was willing to face death along with Him. Thomas also encouraged the other disciples to do the same thing.  As we’ll see in the next passage of scripture, the other disciples followed his advice. 

CONCLUSION:                                                                   

This passage of Scripture points out that life isn’t just a series of events.  It is also a process.  There are issues to deal with, challenges to accept, responses to make, and things to learn.  God has designed the circumstances in our lives so that we might mature physically, mentally, emotionally, socially, and spiritually.  God orders those circumstances so that we might respond to Him by faith, trust, and obedience as He enables us and empowers us.  Jesus was going through a process also.  In verses 7-10, we learned that Jesus did not allow danger to keep Him from doing what He knew was the Father’s will for His life at that moment.  He was also willing to wait until the time was right.

It’s not always easy to wait, is it?  G. Campbell Morgan made the following statement.  “Waiting for God is not laziness.  Waiting for God is not going to sleep.  Waiting for God is not the abandonment of effort.  Waiting on God means, first, activity under command; second, readiness for any new command that may come; third, the ability to do nothing until the command is given.”

If you are not yet a committed follower of Jesus Christ and a true child of God, now is not the time to delay.  2 Corinthians 6:2 says, “. . . Behold, now is the acceptable time; behold now is the day of salvation.”  In these dark and perilous times, remember and respond to the words of Jesus who said, “I am the light of the world; he who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life” (John 8:12).        

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

 

 

JESUS, THE SON OF GOD — John 10:31-42

1 Corinthians 1:10-17, 2017 resolutions, John 10:31-42, John 10:31-42, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

Many years ago, there was a popular game show on television called “What’s My Line”?  Maybe you’ve seen it or have heard of it.  Each week they would introduce an individual who had an unusual occupation.  The contestants on the show would take turns asking this person questions in order to guess what this person did for a living.  The first contestant to guess the person’s line of work or occupation correctly would win the game and would receive the prizes.

In this passage of Scripture, the Jewish leaders seem to be playing a game similar to “What’s My Line”, only in reverse.  Jesus, who is the person being interviewed, has already told them several times who He is, yet they keep asking Him to identify Himself.  Now it’s Jesus’ turn to ask them some questions.

I.  JESUS’ FIRST QUESTION TO THEM (verses 31-32)

Verse 31 is a short intermission.  It says, “The Jews took up stones again to stone Him.”  They were in the temple so those stones weren’t on the ground at their feet.  They had to walk away from Jesus in order to find stones and pick them up.  These weren’t one-handed stones; they were two-handed, large, and heavy stones.  They were picking up those stones because Jesus said, “I and the Father are one.”  All of those Jews recognized that Jesus was claiming to be God when He made that statement.  While they are gathering the stones for His execution, Jesus calls out to them, asking His first question:  “I showed you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you stoning Me?”  Within that question, there are several questions that Jesus wants them to consider and answer for Him.  “Are you stoning Me to death because I gave sight to a man born blind?”  “Are you stoning me because I healed a man at the pool of Bethesda, who had been ill for 38 years?”  “Are you stoning Me because I cleansed lepers, raised the dead, and cast out evil spirits?”  “Are you stoning Me because I made the dumb speak, the deaf hear, the lame walk, and fed the multitudes?”  Jesus pointed to His mighty miracles which fulfilled prophecy and set Him apart as being from God.  How are they going to respond to that evidence?

II.  THEIR ANSWER (verse 33)

How do you answer a question that would prove you to be wrong?  How do you respond to a question that would make you look foolish?  Have you ever been in that situation?  There are many possibilities.  Let’s see which one they choose.  In verse 33, the Jews give their answer:  “For a good work we don’t stone You, but for blasphemy; and because You, being a man, make yourself out to be God.”  I call this the “shame on you for asking” approach.  In a loud and demeaning tone of voice, they are saying, “That’s a stupid question!”  “You’re not really serious, are you?”  “It should be obvious that we are stoning you for blasphemy because You, of all people, are claiming to be God!”  They have side-stepped Jesus’ question and His miracles in order to put the focus on Him and His claims.  By doing so, they are hoping to have the last word on that topic so they can proceed with their stoning.  However, the conversation isn’t over yet.  Jesus has another question for them to answer, and this time it concerns a passage of Scripture.

III.  JESUS’ SECOND QUESTION (verses 34-36)

Jesus responds to His accusers in an unexpected and unusual way, giving His answer in the form of a question to them.  He quotes from Psalm 82:6 saying, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I SAID, YOU ARE GODS’?”  Jesus is going to be using a form of logic called “reasoning from the major to the minor” (or from the greater to the less).  The focus of Jesus’ argument is going to be on one book of the Bible [the Psalms], one chapter in that book [chapter 82], one verse in that chapter [verse 6], and one word within that verse [the word “GODS”].

After quoting that verse, Jesus presents His argument in verses 35 and 36, saying, “If he called them gods, to whom the word of God came (and the Scriptures cannot be broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said ‘I am the Son of God’?”  There must have been many puzzled looks on the faces of His adversaries after Jesus presented that argument.

We see, in this verse, Jesus’ confidence in the inspiration, the authority, and the inerrancy of God’s Word.  He is saying that two things are certain:  the psalm calls them gods and the Scripture cannot be broken.  The Lord Jesus Christ is staking His life on the reliability, accuracy, and authority of just one word of Scripture, for His enemies were about to stone Him to death.

Down through the centuries, many ungodly people have tried to refute or destroy the Scriptures, but they have all failed.  The famous philosopher, Voltaire, held up a copy of the Scriptures and boasted that he would put the Bible in the morgue.  Before long, he was in the morgue and the Geneva Bible Society used his house as a Bible warehouse!

In Psalm 82, what did the psalmist mean when he used the phrase “you are gods”?  Who was he referring to?  He’s talking about the judges or rulers of the people of Israel.  They are called “gods” because they represented God as they judged the people of Israel.  It was God who put them in their positions of leadership.  In Exodus 7:1, God said to Moses, “See, I have made you a god to Pharaoh.”  In Exodus 21:6, as well as Exodus 22:8, 9, and 28, the word translated “judges” is the Hebrew word “Elohim” which literally means “gods”.  Jesus has brought His argument to its logical conclusion.  He is saying to His accusers:  “Don’t stone Me just because I use the word “God”.  Look at all the people in the Scriptures who were called “gods”, and the Scriptures can’t be wrong.”  Jesus didn’t have to prove what He said to them because they knew those Scriptures.  After hearing those words, the Jewish leaders started relaxing their grip.  I can envision those stones slipping from their hands and falling to the ground beside their feet.  You’ll see what I mean when we look at the next several verses of Scripture.  They have lost that argument and the crowd that has gathered around them knows it.

IV.  A CONCESSION (verses 37-38)

Now that Jesus has deflated their argument for stoning Him to death, He makes them a concession in verses 37-38.  “If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father.” Jesus knew that, if they would believe His works, it wouldn’t be long before they would believe in Him.  This was the case for one of the most well-known illusionists in the world.  Early in his career, Andre Kole considered himself to be an atheist and he was skeptical of Christianity.  He was challenged to investigate the miracles of Christ with the intent of proving them to be illusions or tricks and exposing Jesus Christ as a fraud.  However, his quest had the opposite result.  Becoming convinced that Jesus’ works were genuine miracles, Andre became a devoted follower of Jesus Christ and used his abilities as a means of presenting the Gospel message to thousands of people around the world.

More recently, a well-known Christian illusionist and escape artist, Brock Gill, set aside his personal beliefs to explore the miracles of Jesus Christ objectively for a BBC television company.  In every case, Gill concluded that Jesus could not have tricked people into believing they had experienced a miracle.  There was no doubt in his mind that the mighty works of Jesus were actual miracles.

V.  THE RESULTS (verses 39-42)

Verse 39 tells us what happened after Jesus finished speaking.  It says, “Therefore they were seeking again to seize Him, and He eluded their grasp.”   Notice that it says “seize Him”, not “stone Him”.  As I mentioned earlier, the stones that were in their hands have already fallen to the ground.”  Now the Jews want to take Him into custody while they figure out what they are going to do next.  That plan didn’t work either because Jesus eluded their grasp.  His time had not yet come.

Jesus and His disciples escaped.  They left Jerusalem and went to a place of refuge.  Verse 40 says, “And He went away again beyond the Jordan to the place where John was first baptizing, and He was staying there.”  The place the apostle John is referring to is on the other side of the Jordan River and about twenty miles from Jerusalem.  Why did He choose to go there?  There may be several reasons.  It was a place of safety because the Jews wouldn’t pursue Him that far from Jerusalem.  It was also a special place for Jesus.  His betrayal, arrest, and crucifixion were only a week away, and Jesus has returned to the place where His public ministry began.  He was baptized here by John the Baptist, and it was here that John the Baptist proclaimed Jesus to be the Messiah and urged his own disciples to follow Jesus.  Possibly the main reason Jesus decided to go to this particular region is given in verses 41 and 42.  “And many came to Him and were saying, ‘While John performed no sign, yet everything John said about this man was true.’  And many believed in Him there.”  These people must have listened to the preaching of John the Baptist while he was in their neighborhood, preaching and baptizing.  Some of them may have been baptized by John.  It is now almost three years after the death of John the Baptist, yet these people still remember John’s words to them, and everything he said about Jesus has been proven to be true.  As a result, many believed in Him.  John the Baptist didn’t perform any signs (miracles), but he spoke about Jesus in such a way that people wanted to find out if what John said was actually true.

Bible commentator, Leon Morris, shares the following story about a ringing telephone.  A harried housewife picked it up and shouted, “Sorry, I can’t talk now.  Our white mouse is loose in the kitchen and I have to catch him before the cat does.”  She left the receiver dangling, and strange noises filtered through for the next five minutes or so.  Then she picked up the phone and heard a strange voice say, “Excuse me, lady, I know I have the wrong number.  But I just had to find out.  Who got the mouse?”  Like this lady, John the Baptist was not a person of eloquent speech, but He spoke about Jesus in such a way that his hearers wanted to find out more about Him.  Therefore, the Lord Jesus found genuine faith among these people.  They came to the realization that everything John the Baptist said about Jesus was true, so they put their trust in Him because of who He was, not because of what He did.

CONCLUSION:

This event in Jesus’ life tells us a lot about His own view of Scripture.  He held the Scriptures in the highest possible esteem.  No one has ever had a deeper reverence for God’s Word than Himself.  He read it, studied it, memorized it, meditated on it, obeyed it. and shared it often from memory.  Jesus believed in the inspiration, the authority, and the truthfulness of all the Scriptures, and He came to fulfill the Scriptures.

What is your attitude toward God’s Word?  It is a reflection of your attitude toward Jesus Christ because He is the main focus of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.  If you’re not sure of your relationship to God and are not very familiar with the Bible, I challenge you to read the Bible and take a good look at what it says, as Andre Kole did.  Investigate the life of Jesus Christ, His miracles, the prophecies He fulfilled, His death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven.  Visit it, not as a tourist, but as an explorer.  There are two ways you can study the Bible:  studying it with your mind made up, or studying it to let it make up your mind.  If you will take that second approach to God’s Word, you will find every word of it to be true.  You will find Jesus to be all that He claims to be.  Your life will be changed when you turn it over to Jesus Christ.  You haven’t really lived until you’ve done so.  You have yet to learn the meaning of true joy and purpose in life.  You have yet to experience the relationship that gets better every day and never ends.

Fellow Christian, there’s gold and precious stones between the pages of God’s Word, but you’ve got to dig for it.  The deeper you dig, the more spiritual riches there are to be found.  Then, follow Jesus’ example and share the wealth with others.

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

Thank you for visiting this completed construction site:  John 10:31-42.  There are over 150 messages on this blog site and you are welcome to visit them all.  I’m sharing the wealth with you.

SAY IT! WE DARE YOU! — John 10:22-30

John 10:22-30, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

Do the words “I dare you” bring back any memories from your childhood?  Were you being challenged or coerced to do something you really didn’t want to do or say something you really didn’t want to say?  Was it something that might get you into trouble?  Did you give in to the pressure and take the dare?  Were there negative consequences?  Did you wish you hadn’t given in to the pressure?  Or did you refuse the dare in spite of the things people said to you?  Most of us have been in that situation at some point in our lives, haven’t we?

Jesus was no exception.  In this next passage of Scripture, John 10:22-30, we are going to see how Jesus responds to such treatment directed at Him.

I.  THE SETTING (verses 22-23)

The scene hasn’t changed, but the time has.  Verse 22 begins about two and a half months after verse 21.  The apostle John is going from one feast to the next.  Verse 22 begins with the words, “Then came the Feast of Dedication at Jerusalem.”  This was not one of the Old Testament feasts that God required the Jews to celebrate each year.  This feast celebrates the cleansing and rededication of the temple in 164 B.C. after the Maccabean revolt ended the harsh rule of Antiochus Epiphanes, the king of Syria.  It is still celebrated today as Hanukkah (“To dedicate”).  John probably tied these two feasts together because Jesus is, once again, going to be using the metaphor of the shepherd and his sheep.

The rest of verse 22 says, “It was winter”.  John may have written those words to confirm that it was no longer the Fall season, and as an explanation for Jesus’ presence in Solomon’s colonnade.  Jesus was poor and may not have possessed any cold-weather clothing.  Solomon’s colonnade, unlike the various courtyards in the temple, had a roof over it and offered some relief from the cold weather outside.

II.  THE CONFRONTATION (verse 24)

Jesus’ time of meditation comes to a quick halt as the Jewish leaders close in on Him and surround Him.  They have been planning and waiting for the time when Jesus would be back in their neighborhood again.  They’ve been rehearsing the question they want to ask Him, how they want to say it, and how they are going to respond to His answer.  Now Jesus was trapped within their circle and His forward progress had come to a sudden halt.  The leaders of the Jews had maneuvered themselves around Jesus so that escape was impossible.

In verse 24, they say to Him, “How long will you keep us in suspense?  If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.”  They phrase their words in such a way as to put the blame on Him, and they are saying, “How long are you going to disturb and upset us by your teachings?  It’s your own fault that we don’t believe you.  If you’re the Christ, then say the words:  ‘I am the Christ [the Messiah].’  We dare you!”  They are “twisting Jesus’ arm”, so to speak, in order to get Him to say what they want Him to say.

III.  JESUS’ INITIAL RESPONSE (verse 25)

When you were growing up, can you remember hearing the words, “I told you already but you weren’t listening”?  If you’re a parent, you may have said those words to your children.  It’s humiliating and embarrassing to be on the receiving end of those words, isn’t it?  How about the phrase, “How many times do I have to tell you!”  That one really makes you feel ashamed.  Jesus is about to give these leaders a “gentle scolding”, at least that’s how it starts.  He looks around at them and says, “I told you, and you do not believe”.

When did Jesus tell them that He was the Messiah?  That’s a question that needs an explanation.  Jesus never said to the Jews, “I am the Messiah”.  Only in His conversation with the woman at the well in Sychar, did Jesus say, “I who speak to you am He” when she spoke of the coming Messiah (John 4:26).  However, the word “Messiah” had a different meaning to the leaders of the Jews.  They believed the Messiah would come suddenly with the armies of heaven to conquer the Romans.  They pictured Him as a handsome, distinguished man dressed in Royal robes.  The Lord Jesus was the opposite of that description.

When Jesus said, “I told you”, He may have been referring primarily to the description He gave them of Himself two months earlier, right there in the temple.  At that time, they were listening as Jesus referred to Himself as the true shepherd and called Himself “the door of the sheepfold”, and “the good shepherd”.  There are many Old Testament scripture passages that refer to God as a shepherd, such as Genesis 49:24; Psalm 23, Isaiah 40, Jeremiah 23; Ezekiel 34, and Zechariah 11.  They were familiar with those scriptures.  They knew those words were the equivalent of calling Himself the Messiah.  The word “shepherd” was often used as a figure of speech, referring to the ruling king (1 Kings 22:17).

In the rest of verse 25, Jesus continues by saying, “the works that I do in My Father’s name, these bear witness of Me.”  Not only did Jesus tell them, but He also showed them by His miracles that He was the promised Messiah.  Many of His miracles fulfilled the prophecies that were made about the Messiah in the Old Testament scriptures.  Isaiah 35 speaks of the coming of the Messiah, and in verses 35 and 36, the prophet Isaiah describes the miracles He will perform saying,  “Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.  Then the lame will leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb will shout for joy.”    Isaiah mentions these miracles several times in his book of prophecies, and he wrote those prophecies down over 700 years before the birth of the Lord Jesus.  The Jewish leaders were very familiar with those prophecies.  They also knew that Jesus performed every miracle on the list.  Those amazing miracles, along with many others, offered conclusive evidence that Jesus was the promised Messiah, yet they refused to believe and chose to oppose Him all the more.  The problem wasn’t a lack of evidence, but a lack of faith in spite of the evidence.  Why didn’t these leaders become convinced by the evidence and respond to Jesus in faith as other people have done?

III.  THE CAUSE OF THEIR UNBELIEF (verse 26)

In verse 16, Jesus gave them the reason for their opposition to Him.  He said, “But you do not believe because you are not My sheep.”  Others have believed based upon that evidence, so the problem wasn’t a lack of evidence.  Notice what Jesus did not say.  He didn’t say, “You are not My sheep because you do not believe.”  In that one sentence, Jesus is communicating the God-ward and the man-ward aspects of salvation.  They were not chosen to be His sheep and given the gift of faith, and they chose not to be His sheep by their unbelief.  From a human standpoint, a person becomes His sheep by believing, but from the divine standpoint, a person believes because he or she is God’s sheep.  Divine sovereignty and human responsibility are wrapped up in those words of the Lord Jesus (John 6:36-37; John 8:47).

IV.  THE RESULTS OF FOLLOWING HIM (verses 27-29)

In verses 27-29, Jesus proceeds to tell them what they are missing.  I consider these three verses to be the strongest and clearest passage on the assurance of salvation in all the scriptures.  Jesus begins by saying, “My sheep listen to my voice.”  They listen with the desire to obey their shepherd.  Then He says, “I know them.”  Jesus has a personal relationship with each of them.  They are special to Him.  Just as He said in verse 14, “I know my own and my own know me.”  For these reasons “they follow me”.  They trust their Shepherd and follow Him wherever He leads them.  Jesus is speaking of those who have placed their trust in Him, yielded their lives to His control, and seek to be led by Him and imitate Him.

Now Jesus describes to his listeners the greatest miracle that He has ever performed.  It is greater than all of His physical miracles because it is a spiritual miracle and it lasts forever.  It’s a miracle that He continues to perform in the lives of people today – people He knows intimately and has drawn to Himself.  The Lord Jesus begins His description of that miracle in verse 28 when He says, “and I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of My hand.”  Eternal life sounds like a good deal, doesn’t it?  But it’s not just the length of life but also the quality of life, both now and forever.  King David gives us a taste of heaven in Psalm 16:11, where he says, “Thou wilt make known to me the path of life; In Thy presence is fullness of joy; In Thy right hand there are pleasures forever.”  Heaven is not only going to be a place of eternal life, but also of eternal enjoyment.  When we think about what we will be missing, it adds to the enjoyment of what we receive by the grace of God.  Jesus said, “. . . they shall never perish”.  The word “perish” means to be destroyed forever, to be punished in hell for all eternity.  That is what we all deserve because of our sins, and that is what Christ delivers us from when we choose, by His enabling, to follow Him.

All of us like the feeling of security, don’t we.  We like to feel secure in our jobs and in our relationships with people.  Here is an example of the loss of security.  The sales manager of a company and one of his sales representatives stood looking at a map on which colored pins indicated the company representatives in each area.  “I’m not going to fire you, Wilson”, the manager said, “but I’m loosening your pin a bit to emphasize the insecurity of your situation.”  There’s one employee who went home feeling anxious and insecure!  If you are a devoted follower of Jesus Christ, you can rest in the fact that your eternal security isn’t pinned to a wall;  it’s nailed to the cross of Christ.  He did it all.

I love the imagery that Jesus used here in verse 28, and also in verse 29, to describe the security of the believer in Him.  He said, “no one shall snatch them out of My hand.”  We use our hands to hold and secure an object.  Likewise, we are safely and comfortably in His grip, and nothing or no one is going to be able to pry us loose because He is never going to let go of us.  But Jesus doesn’t stop there in His description of our security as His sheep.  He adds, in verse 29, “My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all.”  We were a gift from the Father to Jesus before the foundation of the world (John 17:9-10; Ephesians 1:3-6), and His Father is “greater than all”.  He is the greatest power in the universe and He cares about His sheep and loves them also.  The proof of the Father’s love and care is found in the next statement made by Jesus:  “no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”  If you’re a true child of God, evidenced by a changed life, you’re in the best of hands.

Why did Jesus change His imagery from the shepherd to the imagery of hands?  Didn’t the shepherd imagery convey protection and security strongly enough to his listeners?  As always, Jesus has a good reason for what He says and does.  Once again, Jesus is taking the minds of these leaders of the Jews on a journey back into the Old Testament scriptures, this time to the Psalms.  There are many places in the Old Testament that speak about the hand of God but there are four verses from three different psalms that are directly related to Jesus’ use of the word “hand”, and He is refreshing their memories.  The first verse is Psalm 119:173, which says, “Let your hand be ready to help me.”  The Psalmist is saying, “I need your hand” – “I need the security of knowing that you are near and prepared to act on my behalf because you care about me.”  In Psalm 115, the psalmist contrasts the heathen idols with the Lord, and in verse 7 he says, “They [the idols] have hands, but they cannot feel.”  Idols have no feeling in their hands because they aren’t alive.  They lack emotions and sensitivity.  The last verse ties directly into the passage of scripture we are studying.  Psalm 95:6-7 says, “Come, let us worship and bow down; Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.  For He is our God, and we are the people of His pastures, and the sheep of His hand.”   Then, in verse 8, the psalmist says, “Don’t harden your hearts.” 

Jesus brought those psalms to their minds for a reason.  He’s saying to His listeners, “Your Maker and your true Shepherd is standing in your midst.  You’re surrounding Him!  Come close to Me and worship Me with humble and joyful hearts, as the psalmist said.”  “Obey the words of the psalmist and don’t harden your hearts to Me and My words.”  Jesus is giving them an invitation to worship Him, and He adds to the words of the psalmist when He says, in John 10:30, “I and the Father are one.”  He and the Father unite their hands of protection because they are one and the same God.  Charles Spurgeon said, “It’s like the church bells ringing, calling out and inviting the people to worship.”

CONCLUSION:

Are you a worshiper of God?  Are you a worshiper of Jesus Christ?  You can’t be a worshiper of the true God if you are not a worshiper of the Lord Jesus Christ because He is God (John 1:1-3, 14).  All of us are worshipers.  We all worship someone or something.  We all value something more highly than anything else.  Each of our lives is oriented in a particular direction and this orientation affects our thoughts, our motives, and our priorities.

Do you hear the “church bells” ringing in your heart?  Is God inviting you and drawing you to worship the only true God?  That’s the proper response to the Lord Jesus Christ because He is God.  As the psalmist said, “Don’t harden your hearts.”  Respond to His leading and draw close to Him.  Make Him the object of your worship today.

If you are a devoted worshiper and follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, you can learn from Jesus’ example as He responded to the external pressures exerted upon him by the Jewish leaders.  He didn’t give in to their demands but stood His ground as they tried to force Him to say things that would be misinterpreted and used against Him. The Lord Jesus always did the will of His heavenly Father while He was here on this earth.  That was His delight because of the closeness of their relationship.  As His sheep, it should be our delight to follow Him in spite of opposition because our closest and most secure relationship on this earth is with Him.  

Here is a true story of how sheep reacted when others were trying to lead them astray.  During World War I, some Turkish soldiers tried to steal a flock of sheep from a hillside near Jerusalem.  The shepherd, who had been sleeping, suddenly awakened to see his sheep being driven off on the other side of the ravine.  He could not hope to recapture his flock by force single-handedly, but suddenly he had a thought.  Standing up on his side of the ravine, he put his hands to his mouth and gave his own peculiar call, which he used each day to gather his sheep to him.  The sheep heard the familiar sound.  For a moment they listened and then, hearing it again, they turned and rushed down one side of the ravine and up the other toward their shepherd.  It was impossible for the soldiers to stop the animals.  The shepherd was away with them to a place of safety before the soldiers could make up their minds to pursue them — and all because his sheep knew their master’s voice and wanted to be with him and follow him.

When others try to manipulate you or lead you astray, remember whose sheep you are and choose to follow closely after Him.  You’ll be glad you did, and so will He. 

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

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THE GOOD SHEPHERD — John 10:11-21

Good Shepherd, John 10:11-21, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

One of Billy Graham’s evangelistic films Is based upon the true story of a Christian man who became a hero.  Over one hundred years ago, this young man, whose real name was Nagano Massao, was working with a railroad company in Japan, far away from his fiancee.  He worked hard every day and finally the time came to go back to his fiancee and marry her.

On his way back home, just before the peak of a steep hill, the train suddenly shook hard and stopped.  When this young man went to the front of the passenger car, he found that it was disconnected from the rest of the train.  It then began to roll backward down the steep slope.  Since he had worked for the railroad, he knew there was a sharp curve behind them that the passenger car could not handle.  It would be thrown off the tracks, killing the passengers.  He tried to stop the car with the hand brake, but he failed.  Then he remembered his favorite verse in the Bible:  “Greater love has no man than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”  Although this man had everything to live for, he jumped on the train tracks and stopped the passenger car with his body  He literally laid down his life to save the lives of many.  The film, based upon that true story, is entitled, “Shiokari Pass”.

Nagano Massao (whose name was changed in the movie), voluntarily sacrificed his own life to save the lives of the other passengers on that railroad car.  It was the only way, and he chose to follow the example of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  In the passage of Scripture we are now studying, John 10:11-21, Jesus continues to use the analogy of a shepherd to describe Himself.  We are going to see what Jesus meant when He called Himself the good shepherd.

I. ANOTHER COMPARISON (verses 11-13)

Jesus is once again comparing Himself to the Jewish leaders of that day.  He says, “I am the good shepherd”.  This is the fourth time that the Lord uses the words “I AM”, telling his listeners that He is the One who spoke to Moses saying, “Thus you shall to the sons of Israel, I AM has sent me to you” (Exodus 3:14).  Then Jesus calls Himself the “good shepherd”.  There are several words for “good” in the Greek language.   The word that is used in verse 11 is  “kalos”, which means “beautiful”, “excellent”, “good by nature.”  It describes the ideal, the perfect example to follow.  We get the word, “calligraphy”, which means “beautiful writing” from the word, “kalos”.  Why is that word used?  We find the answer to that question in Mark 10:17-18.  A man comes to Jesus and calls Him “Good Teacher”. Jesus responds to him by saying, “Why do you call Me good?  No one is good but God alone.”  He is saying to the man, “To call me ‘good’ is to call Me ‘God’.”

In the rest of verse 11, Jesus states His reason for calling Himself the “good shepherd” when He says, “The good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.”  The word “for” means “in place of”.  Bear in mind that Jewish shepherds in Palestine did not tend their sheep in order to slaughter them unless the sheep were used as sacrifices to God for the forgiveness of sin.  They shepherded the sheep in order that the sheep might give them wool, milk, and lambs.  Jesus is saying that He is the good shepherd because He Himself is going to be that slaughtered lamb who will give Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of His people.  When He talked about laying down His life for the sheep, His listeners must have thought He was crazy.  A shepherd might risk his life for his sheep, but in his mind, he thinks he’s going to win the fight.  If he didn’t think he was going to win, he would let the wild animal kill one or two sheep while he protected the others.  Soon that animal would be on its way with a full stomach!  But Jesus said He was going to intentionally lay down in front of that wild animal and say, “make a meal out of Me instead of My sheep!”  That’s ridiculous!  He would be killed and His sheep would be without a shepherd!  They would all be killed by other wild animals and he would be to blame for it!  The Pharisees couldn’t grasp the meaning of His metaphor, so, once again, Jesus brings them back into the picture by way of contrast to Himself.

In verses 1-10, Jesus referred to them as thieves and robbers.  Now He has another name for them.  In verse 12 He says, “He who is the hireling, and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, beholds the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep, and flees, and the wolf snatches them, and scatters them.”  Here, Jesus refers to the Pharisees as “hirelings”. After having called them “thieves and robbers” in verse 8, this new description almost seems like a compliment!  However, the context has changed.  Not only are they not part of His sheepfold, but they are also not worthy to be called shepherds.  They are hirelings and the worst and lowliest of hirelings.  They don’t care about the sheep.  All they care about is their pay and their own selfish interests.  They didn’t receive “hazardous duty pay” or a bonus for protecting the sheep so when danger came, they fled, leaving the sheep alone and defenseless.  The Pharisees demonstrated that attitude by the way they treated the blind man and his parents.  As you can see, Jesus knew how to rebuke those who needed it.  He had a way of bringing people back to reality whether they wanted to see it and acknowledge it or not.

II.  HIS KNOWLEDGE OF THE SHEEP (verses 14-15)

In verses 14 and 15, Jesus talks about His personal knowledge of the sheep.  In this computer age, it’s easy to begin to feel like a number instead of a person.  We are identified by our social security number rather than our name.  We get “junk mail” addressed to “resident” or “occupant”.  We get promotional emails from people we don’t know and who don’t know us.  Such impersonal methods may cause some people to conclude, “Nobody cares for me.”  But that’s not true.  Jesus Christ knows who you are.  He knows your name.  You matter to Him.

Edward VII was the king of England from 1901 to 1910.  One day he was visiting a city to lay the foundation for a new hospital.  Thousands of school children were present to sing for Him.  After the ceremony, the king walked past the excited youngsters.  Soon after he had passed by, a teacher saw one of her students crying.  She asked her, “Why are you crying?  Didn’t you see the king?  “Yes”, the little girl sobbed, “but the king didn’t see me.”  King Edward couldn’t have taken notice of each child in that crowd.  The Lord Jesus, however, knows each one of us.  Though we can’t see Him, He sees us, knows our names, and cares for each one of us individually.  He not only knows our names, but He also knows our needs and everything about us.  2 Timothy 2:19 says, “The Lord knows those who are His.”

In verse 15, Jesus compares His knowledge of us to the knowledge that He and His Father have of each other.  It is complete and perfect knowledge.  After making this comparison, Jesus goes on to say again, “I lay down my life for the sheep.”  His knowledge of the Father is tied to His obedience to the Father.  He knows that it is the Father’s will that He lay down His life.  That decision was made by God before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:3-7).

For most Jews during that day and age, killing a lamb and offering it as a sacrifice to God for one’s sins was not much of an ordeal.  But for a shepherd to kill a sheep from his own flock, a sheep he had known since its birth, a sheep he called by name and cared for daily, it must have been a difficult and tearful experience.  With his own hand, he was killing something that he knew and loved.

The following story left a deep impression on the father of a young child.  When telling his young daughter the story of Abraham and Isaac, a father related how God had finally told Abraham not to kill Isaac and had provided a sacrificial lamb instead.  The little girl looked up with a sad expression and said, “I don’t like killing lambs.”  The father was speechless for a moment and then realized what traumatic and memorable events sacrifices were.  How serious the killing of an innocent lamb for sacrifice, and how destructive the reason for the sacrifice:  sin.  If the killing of a pure white lamb seems horrendous, how immeasurably more was the crucifixion of the Lamb of God.

III.  THE FOLD AND THE FLOCK (verse 16)

In verse 16, Jesus stretches the imaginations of His listeners even further when He says, “And I have other sheep which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they shall hear My voice, and they shall become one flock with one shepherd.”  There is a big difference between a fold and a flock.  The “fold” is Judaism, as in verse one.  The term “fold” refers to the enclosure or structure that contains the sheep, or the people of Judaism in this case.  The “flock”, on the other hand, focuses upon the shepherd and all the sheep that belong to him.  So, when Jesus refers to other sheep, He is referring to the Gentiles, those who are not Jews.  He demonstrated His love for the Gentiles when He witnessed to the Samaritan woman at the well, and then to all the men of the city of Sychar in Samaria.  Jesus is going to be drawing people from the sheepfold of Judaism and from the sheepfolds of the Gentiles also.  They will come together as one flock (the Church) and Jesus will be the Shepherd of that whole flock.  All this will happen as a result of His atoning death for sin and His resurrection from the dead.  In Jesus’ flock, there is no difference between Jew and Gentile, between races, between sexes, or between social classes.  They will all have the same relationship to the shepherd.  All who are Christ’s sheep belong to His flock, and what an enormous flock it has become!

IV.  HIS VICTORIOUS DEATH (verses 17-18)

In verses 17 and 18, Jesus talks about His death for the third time, saying, “I lay down my life”, and goes on to give further explanation.  You would think that they would be catching on to what He is saying.  There’s a lesson to be learned from these repetitions:  When Jesus repeats Himself, pay attention!  Repetition implies importance.  There is something that He wants His listeners (and His readers) to understand.

Jesus is telling His listeners, in advance, the answer to the age-old question:  “Who killed Jesus?”  Was it the Jewish leaders and the Romans?  Did they murder Jesus?  They had something to do with it, but Jesus laid down His life voluntarily.  He wasn’t murdered because a murdered man is a helpless man.  Jesus’ life wasn’t taken from Him against His will.  He came from heaven to earth in order to die.  Then, did Jesus commit suicide?  Isn’t a voluntary death suicide?  No.  Voluntary death is suicide unless it is for the life of another or to save the lives of others.  When the Father was satisfied that His Son paid the penalty for our sins, Jesus Christ cried out with a loud voice saying, “It is finished!”  He then put His head in a position of rest and voluntarily yielded His spirit to the Father (John 19:30).  His death was neither a murder nor a suicide, but it was a sacrifice.  Since all of us are sinners, all of us are the cause of the sacrificial death of Christ on the cross (Isaiah 53:6-7; 1 Peter 2:24).

But the story doesn’t end there.  Jesus said, “I lay down My life that I may take it up again . . . I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it up again.”  The word “authority” is used in this verse, not only in the sense of absolute power but also in the sense that it was His right and His freedom to accomplish the work for which He was sent.  Included in that work was not only His atoning death but also His victorious resurrection from the dead.  By repeating these words several times, Jesus is saying, “I’m supreme over life and death.”  The Lord Jesus and His Father are one.  There is no division between them in this matter of salvation.  They worked together in perfect harmony.

V.  THE RESPONSE (verses 19-21)

These statements made by Jesus were bound to cause a response from the Jewish leaders.  There was an immediate difference of opinion about His words.  Verse 19 says, “There arose a division among the Jews because of these words.”  The leaders of the Jews were no longer in complete agreement concerning Jesus.  The healing of the blind man and the words of Jesus caused a few of them to reconsider His claims.  Verse 20 says, “And many of them were saying, ‘He has a demon and is insane.  Why do you listen to Him?”  They have made that statement before and have no basis for it.  I think they are saying those words loudly as a rebuke to those who were listening intently to Jesus’ words.  In verse 21, we get the response of the minority.  They said, “These are not the sayings of one demon-possessed.  A demon cannot open the eyes of a man born blind.”  They were looking at the evidence of Jesus’ words and Jesus’ miracles and they could not refute it.

CONCLUSION:

It’s impossible to be neutral about Jesus Christ.  His claims, His character, His miracles, His fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies, His death, resurrection, and appearances, and the changed lives of those who follow Him leave people with no excuse.  There are some people who will do almost anything, and say almost anything in order to avoid facing the truth.  What we believe about Jesus Christ is a matter of eternal life and death.

In this passage of scripture, John 10:11-21, we have learned how well the Lord Jesus fits His description of the good shepherd.  He is present with them (Matthew 28:20), knows them by name, loves and cares for them, and is prepared to lay down His life for them so that they might be with Him for eternity.  We also learn, from this passage of scripture, that we are a lot like sheep.  Are you a lost sheep, or has Jesus brought you into His fold?

Jesus calls people sheep for good reasons.  Like sheep, we are also followers.  We are all following something or someone, looking for happiness, contentment, and peace of mind.  King Solomon, in the book of Ecclesiastes, tells us about his pursuits of wisdom, pleasure, and work.  In each case, he found that it was “meaningless, emptiness, striving after wind” (Ecclesiastes 1:14).  There was no lasting meaning, purpose, or joy in the pursuit of those things.  In Ecclesiastes 12:13 Solomon comes to a conclusion.  I like the way the New Living Translation puts it:  “That’s the whole story.  Here now is my final conclusion:  fear God and obey His commandments for this is everyone’s duty.”  In other words, “follow God.”  No one and nothing else is worth following.

The Lord Jesus has described Himself as the Good Shepherd, possessing immeasurable goodness and perfect love.  He’s the Shepherd who chose to be the sacrificial lamb to pay the price that our sins deserve.  I’m closing with the words of Isaiah 53:5-6, and invite you to consider whether this is the person you want to follow with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, for the rest of your life.

“But He was pierced through for our transgressions.
He was bruised for our iniquities.
The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him
and by His scourging, we are healed.
All of us like sheep have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
but God has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.” 

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THE DOOR OF THE SHEEPFOLD — John 10:6-10

Jesus the door, the door to the sheepfold

INTRODUCTION:

A fifteenth-century Italian artist by the name of Lorenzo Ghiberti spent 21 years of his life skillfully crafting images of Jesus’ life into the bronze doors of Italy’s Florence Baptistery.  There were twenty-eight panels on those doors and twenty-one of them depicted scenes from the life of Christ.  Those bronze doors were so moving that Michelangelo called them “the Gates of Paradise”.  Visitors from around the world have come to Florence over the years and have admired the gospel message depicted so beautifully on those doors.  In the passage of Scripture we are about to study, John 10:6-10, Jesus will be using the image of a door to convey physical and spiritual truths to His listeners and to us as well.

In John 10, verses 1-5, Jesus used the language of a shepherd to tell the Pharisees that He was the true Shepherd of the sheep.  He explained to them that His own sheep know His voice and follow Him.  He also pointed out to the Pharisees that they were thieves and robbers.  You would expect the Pharisees to become enraged at those words and try to arrest Him or stone Him.  That’s what they tried to do before, in a previous confrontation.  However, in this case, nothing happened.  Why not?

I.  THE BEWILDERMENT OF THE PHARISEES (verse 6)

It’s clear in verse 6 that Jesus’ listeners did not understand what Jesus said or why He said it.  Here’s what the apostle John writes in verse six:  “This figure of speech Jesus spoke to them, but they did not understand what those things were which He had been saying to them.”  They must have been standing there quietly with puzzled looks on their faces.  As they pondered Jesus’ words, they may have been thinking to themselves, “What in the world did He mean by that description?”

John describes Jesus’ words as a “figure of speech”.  The Pharisees may have considered Jesus’ words to have been some sort of proverb or metaphor.  We don’t know for sure.  However, I can think of two reasons why these Pharisees didn’t understand what Jesus was saying.  First, these Pharisees weren’t shepherds by occupation and may have known very little about a shepherd’s relationship to his sheep.  Secondly, in a spiritual sense, they weren’t His sheep, nor did they want to be His sheep.  So Jesus’ words may have sounded like gibberish or nonsense to them.  Since these Pharisees didn’t understand His symbolic language, Jesus follows up on His illustration by applying it to Himself.

II.   JESUS THE DOOR (verse 7)

Verse 7 reads, “Jesus therefore said to them again, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep’.”  Once again, Jesus begins by saying, “What I am about to say to you is very important and true.”  Notice that Jesus does not say, “I am a door”, but “I am the door’.  What He means is:  “I, and I alone, am the door.”  There is no other door.

There were two different kinds of sheepfolds in the land of Palestine during that period of time.  One was a public sheepfold in the town and it had room for many flocks of sheep.  That’s the one that Jesus was referring to in verses 1-5.  The other sheepfolds were out in the countryside.  They were much smaller, usually circular, and were used by an individual shepherd and his own flock of sheep.  Beginning here in verse 7, Jesus is referring to a sheepfold in the country and to Himself as the door.  How can a person be a door?  He doesn’t have hinges or a latch.  Jesus is using the word “door” in this case to refer to a barrier.  A door provides security, protection, and safety within an enclosure by limiting access.  Out in the countryside, after the shepherd led his sheep through the opening and into the sheepfold for the night, he would sit in that opening with his staff in hand, resting his back and head against one side of the opening and bent legs against the other side.  He then sleeps with his body across the opening.  Nothing and no one could enter or leave the sheepfold without climbing over him.  You may have heard someone use the phrase, “Over my dead body!”.  It’s a more emphatic response than just saying, “no”.  The person may be saying, “You’ll have to kill me first before you can get away with that!”.  I wonder whether that phrase, “Over my dead body!”, was originally said by a shepherd.  That would make sense, wouldn’t it?

II.  THE THIEVES AND ROBBERS (verse 8)

In verse 8, Jesus continues by saying, “All who came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them.”  When Jesus used the words “before Me”, He wasn’t talking about people in the Old Testament because He uses the present tense, saying that they “are” thieves and robbers.  He’s repeating what He said in verse one, referring to those who were the leaders of the Jews when Jesus began His public ministry.  Those leaders were taking advantage of the people of Israel for their own personal gain.  They were not part of God’s sheepfold because they were not led into the sheepfold by the shepherd who is also the door.  His own sheep pay no attention to them because His sheep only respond to the voice of their own shepherd.

III.  THE DOOR TO ABUNDANT LIVING (verses 9-10)

In verse 9, Jesus begins to develop the spiritual meaning and application of His words while continuing the physical analogy of the shepherd and his sheep.  It’s important that we keep that analogy in mind as we study verses 9 and 10 so that we don’t misinterpret the words of the Lord Jesus or draw any wrong conclusions.

In verse 9, Jesus said, “I am the door; if anyone enters through Me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture.”  Jesus repeats the statement He made about Himself in verse 7, leaving out the words, “of the sheep”.  He then ties His words to the words of Moses in the Old Testament.  Notice the similarity of Moses’ words as he speaks to God in Numbers 27:16 -18.  “May the Lord, the God of the spirits of all flesh, appoint a man over the congregation, who will go out and come in before them, and who will lead them out and bring them in, that the congregation of the Lord may not be like sheep which have no shepherd.”  Do you see the similarities?  Moses referred to the people of Israel as sheep, and these sheep need a shepherd.  Moses had been a shepherd himself for many years, tending his father-in-law’s sheep.  He knew what sheep were like, and he knew that the people of Israel were like a flock of sheep.

On July 8, 2005, a group of shepherds in Istanbul, Turkey, watched in horror as their sheep, all 1500 of them, jumped off a cliff.  First, one sheep jumped or slipped off the edge of the cliff, and then all the rest of them followed him.  The shepherds were away from the sheep having breakfast together when they saw it happen.  450 of the sheep died from the fall of 15 meters (49 feet).  Those who were farther back in line were saved because the pile got higher and the fall was more cushioned.  Moses was right!  Sheep need a shepherd!  As one commentator put it:  “Sheep are dumb, directionless, and defenseless.”

Jesus continues His metaphor in verse 10 when He says, “The thief comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy; I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly.”   Who is the “thief” Jesus is referring to in this verse?  It is not Satan.  Jesus has not abandoned His metaphor.  The symbolism stays the same.  The word “thief” is not used anywhere in the Old Testament to refer to Satan, nor is that a term that is used within the Jewish culture to refer to Satan.  What we find in the Old Testament is that the term “shepherd” is often used to refer to the Messiah, and ‘thieves” and “robbers” are used as a metaphor for the leaders of Israel (Isaiah 1:21; Jeremiah 2:26; 7:11; 23:30).  Jesus was intentionally using the shepherd parable from Ezekiel 34, which is a prophecy directed against the shepherds or leaders of the nation of Israel, His flock.

He now ends this portion of his conversation with some good news when He says, “I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly.”  What does it mean to have an abundant life?  Jesus used the word “they” instead of “you”.  He is still using the analogy of the Shepherd and His sheep.  What’s an abundant life to a sheep?  Try to picture yourself as a sheep in Palestine in the first century A.D.  What would you consider to be an abundant life for yourself as a sheep?  The meaning of the word “abundantly” might be helpful.  The Greek word is “perrison”, which means “surplus”.

Personally, if I were a sheep, I would be more than content if I knew that my shepherd loved me so much that he called me by name and led me out to green pastures where I could eat and drink all I wanted.  Then He would bring me back to a safe place at night and make sure I was OK.  Thanks to my shepherd, I would be a well-nourished and healthy sheep.  If I walked up to greet him, he would pat my back and scratch my head.  What more could a sheep ask for?  I’d be skipping and jumping like a spring lamb, without a care in the world.  How about you?

Now let’s apply Jesus’ illustration to our own lives.  What does an abundant life consist of?  Let me ask you a few questions.  Have you observed positive changes in your attitude, your actions, and your view of your future?  Are your burdens lighter?  Are your struggles easier and is your future brighter?  Do you have more purpose for living and less fear of dying?  Do you enjoy spending time daily with your Shepherd in His Word and in prayer?  If your answer to those questions is “yes”, you’re not a candidate for the abundant life – you’re a recipient of it!  This abundant life that God gives to His followers, His sheep, gets better every day until it reaches its peak in heaven where it continues forever.

If this has not been your experience, you’re still a candidate.  Jesus is the door to the sheepfold of believers.  If you will acknowledge that Jesus is the Son of God – God become Man; if you will repent of your sins, and transfer the ownership of your life completely over to Him as your Shepherd, and follow Him, you will become His child and the abundant life will begin and last forever.  In these troublesome times, please don’t put it off for another moment if you sense that the Shepherd is calling you by name.     

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THE TRUE SHEPHERD — John 10:1-5

John 10:1-5, shepherd, shepherding the sheep, True Shepherd, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

To properly understand the message of Christ in John 10, one must first understand the circumstances that lead up to it.  In John 9, Jesus healed the man born blind, but the Pharisees would not accept it.  Instead, they insulted the man, threatened him, and finally excommunicated him from the religious life of Israel.  They cast away one of the sheep of the nation of Israel.  But Jesus, the true Shepherd, found him and lovingly brought him into the fold of God.

I.  THE PRETENSE OF FALSE SHEPHERDS (verse 1)

The Lord sets the stage by describing the false shepherds who showed that they did not care about the welfare of the sheep when they cast out the blind man.  The sheepfold that Jesus referred to in verse 1 was a sheepfold in a town or village, not one in the countryside.  Each village in Palestine had a common sheepfold where each shepherd, returning from the field with his sheep, would lead his flock at night.  The sheepfold was made of rough stones and the walls were ten to twelve feet high.  It had no roof.  This was a place to protect the sheep from wild animals, thieves and robbers that might try to harm them.  After the shepherd led his sheep through the door of the sheepfold, he would entrust his flock to the doorkeeper.  Each sheepfold had a doorkeeper whose job was to protect and care for the sheep while the shepherd went home to sleep.  Once the sheep were led through the door into the sheepfold, the door was locked and guarded by the doorkeeper.  No one but the doorkeeper had the key to unlock the door.

The first thing the Lord Jesus wanted these Pharisees to understand was that they were the false shepherds.  He said in verse 1, “He who does not enter by the door but climbs up some other way, he is a thief and a robber.”  The Greek word translated as “thief” refers to a petty thief who steals from people around him, whereas the word “robber” refers to a band of robbers.  Both individually and collectively, His listeners fit His description of them.  Jesus is reminding them of the words of the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel who prophesied against the shepherds of His people Israel.  God had not appointed the Pharisees as shepherds over Israel.  They appointed themselves and they only pretended to care about the people.  In Ezekiel 24:2, God said to the shepherds of Israel, “Woe, shepherds of Israel who have been feeding themselves!  Should not the shepherds feed the flock?”  Time hasn’t changed a thing.  Today, there are still false prophets trying to lead people astray.  False shepherds have only one goal:  to glorify themselves by having others follow them.

II.  THE PROOF OF THE TRUE SHEPHERD (verses 2-5)

In contrast to these Pharisees, Jesus told them in verse 2, “But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.”  What does the door refer to?  It refers to God’s appointed way of entrance to the nation of Israel, the way in which the Old Testament prophets said that the true Messiah would come.  Jesus came in the exact fulfillment of those Old Testament prophecies.  They foretold where He would be born, who He would be born to, the unusual events surrounding His birth, how He would be introduced to the nation of Israel, where He would live, why He came, and how He would die and then rise from the dead.  Also, Jesus’ life, His miracles, the words spoken by God the Father at His baptism, and many witnesses verified His claim to be the Messiah, Israel’s true Shepherd.

Verse 3 tells us, “To Him, the doorkeeper opens.”  In Israel, after the sheep spent the night in the sheepfold under the care of the doorkeeper, the shepherd would return in the morning to lead his sheep out.  When the doorkeeper heard the shepherd’s voice, he would open the door of the sheepfold for him.  Who is this doorkeeper that Jesus is talking about?  He is John the Baptist, the one who prepared the way for the Messiah and introduced Him to Israel.  He publicly proclaimed that Jesus was “the Lamb of God” and “the Son of God” (John 1:23-36).  After John introduced Jesus to Israel, some Jewish people began to follow the true Shepherd.

When a shepherd came to get his sheep in the morning, he would come to the sheepfold filled with the sheep of many shepherds.  In order to lead out the sheep that belonged to him, he would call his own sheep by name and they would come to him and follow him.  This is what Jesus is saying in verses 3 and 4.  Sheep know the voice of their shepherd and will follow him only.  There was a small minority of the Jewish people who followed the Lord Jesus.  You can’t fool these sheep when it comes to recognizing their Shepherd’s voice.  They will not respond to the voice of strangers.  That’s why Jesus said in verse 5, “And a stranger they simply will not follow, but will flee from him.”

One day a man in Australia was arrested for stealing a sheep.  However, he claimed that it was his own which had been missing from his flock for many days.  At first, the judge was puzzled, not knowing how to decide the matter.  At last, he asked that the sheep be brought before him.  Then he took one of the men, the man who made the accusation, into the courtyard and told him to call the animal.  The sheep made no response except to raise its head and look frightened as if it dreaded being in that unfamiliar place with strangers.  The officer took the man back to the courtroom.  Then he instructed the officer to bring down the defendant.  The accused man did not wait until he entered the yard, but as he drew near the gate, before the sheep could see him, he began to make his peculiar call.  Overjoyed, the sheep bounded toward the gate and by his actions showed that he recognized the familiar voice of his master.  “His sheep knows him”, said the judge, and so the case was quickly decided.

The point of our Lord’s message to the Pharisees was to explain why a man born blind would follow Him.  It was because He was Israel’s True Shepherd and a true shepherd has sheep.  Why does anyone leave a religious system or a philosophy today?  It’s because we have heard the voice of the True Shepherd calling us through the Bible, and we have chosen to trust Christ and follow Him.

A missionary was once asked to pass through some very unfamiliar territory in the middle of the night.  As we went through the darkness with his guide going on ahead, he looked down at his feet and could see no road.  The guide turned so frequently that the missionary feared the way had been missed.  In his anxiety, he finally cried out, “Where is the way?”  The native turned around and said, “I am the way.  There is no beaten path here; just follow me step by step and you will reach the end of the journey safely.  The missionary did as he was told and soon arrived at his destination.

III.  OBSERVATIONS:

What can we learn from Jesus’ words in this passage of Scripture?  First of all, we learn that Jesus is the true Shepherd of God because He came through the door – the proper entryway to the sheep of Israel in fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies.  The doorkeeper, John the Baptist, recognized that Jesus was the Messiah and opened the door for Him, proclaiming Him to be the “Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

Secondly, we learn that Jesus knows His own sheep.  “He calls them each by name” and they come to Him because they recognize His voice.  Every encounter with Jesus in the Gospel of John is on a personal basis.  We’ve already studied His encounter with Nicodemus, the woman at the well in Samaria, the impotent man at the pool of Bethesda, the man born blind, as well as several others.  Every person comes to Jesus individually and personally.

Thirdly, “He leads them out”.  Jesus is telling these Pharisees that, even though they cast the man who had been born blind out of the synagogue, it wasn’t just their own doing.  Jesus was leading the man out of that place of spiritual blindness.   He was the one behind it.  The once blind man was now His sheep and he came to his true Shepherd.

Fourthly, in verse 4, Jesus said: “He goes before them”. Unlike the Pharisees who were self-centered, the true shepherd of the sheep stays with his sheep and goes in front of them.  He is the first to experience what lies ahead, facing the dangers and obstacles that may be in store for them.  He chooses the best pastures and the safest areas for them to graze.

Lastly, at the end of verse 4 and continuing through verse 5, Jesus said, “the sheep follow him because they know his voice.  And a stranger they simply will not follow, but will flee from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.”  As he leads his sheep, the shepherd talks to them, showing his constant care for them.  Sometimes the shepherd would talk louder and more sharply to get the sheep’s attention and remind them of his presence. The sheep trust in him only and flee from strangers.  I have watched videos on YouTube demonstrating the validity of this passage of Scripture and it was amazing to observe the sheep’s reaction to the stranger’s voice and afterward to the shepherd’s voice.

IV.  APPLICATIONS:

Do you hear Him calling you?  If you will sincerely study the Scriptures as they describe the Person and work of Jesus Christ in His own words and through the testimony of eyewitnesses, you will come to the conclusion that He is the True Shepherd of the sheep.  Spiritually, we are all like sheep – defenseless against the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil, directionless in our journey through life, easily led astray, and ignorant of the dangers that lie ahead in this life and the next.  We need a shepherd, and there is only one True Shepherd that you can trust because He loves you and proved it by giving His life for you.  If you’re ready to make that commitment to Christ or want to review what it means to become a child of God and follower of Jesus Christ, please read my sermon entitled “WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO RECEIVE CHRIST – John 1:12.  Choose to follow Him and experience the peace and joy that comes from being close to the One who leads the way for you and calls you by name because you have become a member of His flock forever.

If you are already a follower of Jesus Christ, are you walking close to the Shepherd even when it’s hard to understand where He is leading you?   Remember that He sees your tomorrow more clearly than you see your yesterday.  Keep trusting in His guidance and praying for His leading in your life.  He is with you, leading you every step of the way and providing for your needs along the way.

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SPIRITUAL LIGHT AND DARKNESS – John 9:35-41

John 9:35-41 sermon, spiritual darkness, spiritual light, spiritual sight, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

There are certain living phenomena that can be seen almost anywhere in the world.  They are called lichens and they can be found on rocks, tree trunks, and a variety of other places where they cling and grow in size.  There are many varieties of lichens, having different shapes and colors.  Lichens are not technically plants.  They are composed of a fungus and algae that live together in harmony.  This is not meant to be a biology lesson, but there is something about lichens and their use that relates to the passage of Scripture we are now studying:  John 9:35-41.  From the 16th century to the present day, lichens have been used in scientific experiments to test the pH levels in liquids.  The test is called a litmus test.  A blue dye and a pink dye were extracted from certain lichens.  A particular variety of paper called “litmus paper” was infused with this pink dye or blue dye.  The paper now had the ability to change color under certain conditions, demonstrating whether the solution into which it was dipped was acidic, alkaline, or neutral.

Over a period of time, the term “Litmus test” began to take on a new meaning.  People started using that term to make a judgment about whether or not someone or something was acceptable.  The “litmus test” came to mean the single, most important, and deciding factor that provided the right answer or led to the right decision.  That’s where we are as we study John 9:35-41.  Jesus is about to give a “litmus test” that will clearly define the difference between spiritual blindness and spiritual sight.

I.  THE QUESTIONS (verse 35-36)

Verse 35 contains these words:  “Jesus heard that they had put him out; and finding him, He said, ‘Do you believe in the Son of Man?’ ”  When Jesus learned that the man whom He healed of his blindness had been escorted out of the temple, He went looking for him.  This healed man had been publicly interrogated and then publicly thrown out of the temple area.  The news of those events must have spread quickly throughout the city of Jerusalem.  People everywhere in the city were talking about the healing of the blind man, and the inability of the Pharisees to refute his arguments or deny his testimony.

Jesus kept searching for this man until He found him.  He took the initiative to seek and find this man.  The blind man didn’t ask Jesus for this miracle of sight, and I’m sure he wasn’t expecting Jesus to make a search for him and find him.  Now comes the “litmus test”.  Jesus asked the man, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”  He’s asking him to make a choice – a commitment.  There’s no doubt that this man recognized the voice of Jesus.  How could he forget the voice of the One who put mud on his eyes and said, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam.”?  When Jesus used the title “Son of Man”, this healed man knew who Jesus was talking about.  The words of the prophet Daniel came to his mind.  In Daniel 7:13, the prophet Daniel was having dreams and visions from God and he said, “I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven One like the Son of Man was coming.”  and Daniel describes Him as a King who has everlasting dominion and authority.  As he looked at Jesus, this man knew that He was referring to the Messiah, the Son of God, and he responds, in John 9:36, by saying, “Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?”  He wants to believe, and he is ready to believe, but he’s not yet sure who Jesus is referring to.  The word, “Lord” can also be translated as “sir” and, in this case, that would be the proper translation since this man does not yet know who Jesus is.

II.  THE MAN’S RESPONSE (verses 37-38)

In verse 37, when he hears, from Jesus’ lips, the words, “You have both seen Him, and He is the one who is talking with you”, his response is immediate and appropriate.  Verse 38 reads, “And he said, ‘Lord, I believe.’  And he worshiped Him.”  At that moment, this formerly blind man passed the test.  His spiritual eyes were opened and he immediately acknowledged that Jesus Christ was the Messiah by believing in Him and worshiping Him.  This time when he calls Jesus “Lord”, he’s addressing Jesus as his Messiah, the King of kings and Lord of lords.  As he said those words, he assumed a position of worship,  prostrating himself at the feet of Jesus and Jesus accepted his worship.  Jesus did not forbid people to worship Him while He was on this earth.  He always accepted worship as an appropriate response to Himself.

President Franklin Roosevelt was a regular church-goer.  It is said that on one gloomy Sunday morning during World War 2, he walked three miles in order to attend worship.  One of his neighbors, noticing this, said to him:  “I can worship in the fields or anywhere else.”  “Yes”, replied Mr. Roosevelt, “but no one will ever suspect you of it.”

This man whom Jesus healed wasn’t concerned about what others thought of him or said about him.  Without hesitation, he fell to his knees in the presence of all of them and worshiped his Lord.  What a contrast to the Scribes and Pharisees!  When Jesus revealed His deity to them, they picked up stones to stone Him!

III.  JUDGMENT (verses 39-41)

While this man is prostrate at his feet, Jesus looks at those standing around Him and says these words in verse 39:  “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see; and that those who see may become blind.”  The word “judgment” is not used here in the sense of condemnation.  Jesus came for judgment in the sense that He was the dividing line.  He was the one who would separate one group from the other.  He was the “litmus test”, defining and separating spiritual light from spiritual darkness.  Those who admitted their spiritual blindness would be given spiritual insight from Jesus, and those who were convinced that they already had spiritual understanding would continue in their spiritual blindness, pronouncing judgment upon themselves.  Someone has said, “There is no one so blind as he who refuses to see!”  Jesus was encouraging the first group of people and warning the second group.

Some of the Pharisees who were close enough to hear those words spoken by Jesus, decide to ask Him a question.  They phrase their question in such a way as to let Jesus know what answer they expect Him to give them.  Here is their question in verse 40:  “We are not blind too, are we?”  They were expecting Jesus to give them the answer “No”.  After all, they were very religious people.  No one would dare to accuse them of errors concerning spiritual matters!  I think they are trying to “twist His arm”, so to speak — to make Jesus say something that He really doesn’t want to say.  Have you ever tried to do that to someone else?  Were you successful?

These Pharisees are living in a state of denial.  They have chosen to forget all the other times when Jesus made them face the facts about their sinful actions and exposed them to the truth of God’s Word.  They preferred to close their eyes and pretend that it didn’t happen.  That form of denial in the face of the obvious still takes place in our world today.

A race-car driver by the name of Scott Goodyear had these words to say about race-car drivers who have been killed in crashes at the Indianapolis 500.  “You don’t go look at where it happened.  You don’t watch films of it on television.  You don’t deal with it.  You pretend it never happened.”  Through the years, a driver has never been pronounced dead at the racetrack.  If you were to visit the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Racing Museum, located inside the 2.5-mile oval, you would find that it has no memorial to the 40 drivers who have lost their lives here.  Nowhere is there even a mention.”  [The total number is now 42]

The Pharisees, in verse 40, are waiting for Jesus to exonerate them so that the discussion can be closed, covered up, and not mentioned again.  However, the response they receive from Jesus is not what they expected to hear and not what they wanted to hear.  In verse 41, Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see,’ your sin remains.”  What does He mean by that statement?  Jesus is saying, here in verse 41, that if the Pharisees would admit to their ignorance of the truth and were willing to confess that ignorance and seek instruction from Him, they would be forgiven and set free from their sin.  People are not condemned for what they cannot do or cannot understand.  However, if these Pharisees are so proud and confident in their own wisdom that they shut their eyes to the truth, their sin will remain unpardoned, and they will be to blame.  In a spiritual sense, there is a big difference between the one who is blind and knows it and the one who simply shuts his eyes.  Only the person who realizes his own blindness can learn to see.  Only the one who realizes his own sin can be forgiven.

CONCLUSION:

There are times when an illustration doesn’t completely fit the topic of conversation or the passage of scripture that is being studied.  In this case, there is a sense in which the “litmus test”, used in my opening illustration, doesn’t fit the topic of spiritual sight, and doesn’t completely align with the words of Jesus in verse 35, where He said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”   A litmus test shows one of three results after being dipped into a liquid:  “alkaline”, “acidic”, or “neutral”.  However, when it comes to belief in Jesus Christ, there is no neutral ground.  You are either making a decision for Christ or you’re making a decision against Christ.  Evangelist Billy Graham said, “If you make no decision for Christ, you’re making a decision against Christ.”  There’s no sitting on the fence, and God doesn’t honor good intentions.

Which side of the fence are you on at this moment?  If you’re unsure, wouldn’t this be a good time to make sure?  How you respond to Jesus Christ is the greatest decision in your life.  It will determine the quality of your life on this earth as well as your eternal destiny.  The Bible says that there are only two eternal destinations – heaven and hell, and each of us is going to one or the other.  Please make the right decision and see what a difference it makes to be a true child of God through faith in Jesus Christ.

Fellow Christians, it is our privilege and responsibility to lead others out of the darkness of sin and into His marvelous light.  I hope we are ready, willing, and able to be Christ’s ambassadors to the world around us.  That is what He has called us to be.  2 Corinthians 5:20 says, “We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us.  We implore you, on Christ’s behalf:  Be reconciled to God.”

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

PHARISEES VS. BLIND MAN (Round 3) – John 9:24-34

fear, fear of consequences, Messianic miracles, Proverbs 1:7, spiritual blindness, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

Quantum Physicist Arthur Zajonc wrote a book entitled, “Catching the Light”.  He describes various studies that investigated recovery from congenital blindness.  Thanks to cornea transplants, people who had been blind from birth would suddenly have functional use of their eyes.  However, in most cases, the patient could see light but could make out no colors or shapes after the surgery.  Light and eyes were not enough to give the person sight.  One surgeon concluded, “To give sight to a congenitally blind person is more the work of an educator than a surgeon.”

From both the animal and human studies, they found that there are critical developmental “windows” in the first years of life.  Sensory and motor skills are formed, and if this early opportunity is lost, trying to play catch up is very frustrating and usually unsuccessful.  Professor Sajonc adds, “The sober truth remains that vision requires far more than a functioning physical organ.  Without an inner light, without a formative visual imagination, we are blind.”

The blind man that we have been studying in John’s gospel, chapter 9, is no doctor and he is no physicist, but he will be making a statement that goes along with these statements and adds to them.  Let’s find out what he has to say.

I.  FURTHER INTERROGATION (verse 24)

The verbal battle between the Pharisees and the blind man that Jesus healed isn’t over yet.  It’s now round three, the final and deciding round of this verbal boxing match.  The blind man outscored his opponents in round one, his parents out-maneuvered them in round two, and now, after a change of strategy, the Pharisees have come back for more.

Verse 24 begins with a command:  “Give God the glory”.  What’s the purpose of that statement?  Shouldn’t that be understood?  Isn’t that part of the rules?  I think they are trying to be the referees in this match.  That expression was used in the Old Testament scriptures as an oath.  Joshua used those words when speaking to Achan after he was chosen by lot as the one guilty of the defeat at Ai (Joshua 7:19).  Joshua was saying, “Give the glory to God by telling us the truth about your guilty actions.”  The Pharisees are saying, “Give glory to God, not Jesus.”  They are no longer denying the miracle, but are urging him to deny that Jesus was the miracle worker.  When they say, “We know that this man is a sinner” they are implying, “sinners can’t perform miracles.”  They are hoping this man might share more information that might prove that Jesus is an impostor.

II.  BACK TO THE FACTS (verse 25)

I admire the tenacity of this healed man.  He sticks to the facts and dodges their theories when he says “Whether He is a sinner or not, I do not know; but one thing I know, that though I was blind now I see.”  In one sense, this man was still in the dark. He didn’t know very much about Jesus, but he knew that Jesus had changed his life in a miraculous way.  There was no doubt about that!  His testimony is undeniable!  Based upon the illustration in my introduction, this man was not only given light, but also sight.  The Lord Jesus performed a miracle, not only on this man’s eyes but also in his brain.  The sensory and motor skills, and the visual imagination which took years to develop, were programmed into this man’s brain by Jesus before he opened his eyes.  A man who had been blind from birth now had perfect vision!  Those critics standing around him were no match for that testimony!  Their world was enveloped in a spiritual blindness of their own making.

His response to them must have also surprised them.  Normally when the leaders of the Jews made a statement, it wasn’t questioned.  Most people kept quiet and accepted what they had to say.  This was an exception to the rule.  I can imagine that a thought entered the minds of these Pharisees:  “Who are you to question us?”  They are so dumbfounded by his response that they don’t know what to say.  They know they have to say something.  They can’t let him have the last word, and there are people around them watching and waiting to see how they are going to respond.

III.  A SECOND INTERACTION (verses 26-29)

In desperation, the Pharisees go back to the “tried and failed”, asking the man once again, “What did He do to you?  How did he open your eyes?”  If you or I had been that blind man and heard the rerun, we would probably have been short on patience if we had any patience left at all.  This healed man is no exception and he gives these Pharisees a piece of his mind.  They may outnumber him but he’s not at a loss for words.  In verse 27, he relieves some of his tension by scolding them and following that up with a sarcastic remark.  He sounds like a school teacher responding to a dumb question asked by one of his pupils.  Here are his words:  “I told you already and you didn’t listen; why do you want to hear it again?”  He’s treating these Pharisees like delinquent children who aren’t paying attention.  As scathing as that remark is, it gets even worse.  Now he adds a bit of sarcastic humor when he says, “You don’t want to become His disciples too, do you?”  By using the little word “too”, he’s proclaiming himself to be a follower of Jesus Christ, even though he had yet to see Him.  I envision a smile on his face as he said those words.  He knew those words were going to come back and hit him in the face but he said them anyway.  I also think that some of the people who are standing around the “ringside” and watching this confrontation take place are silently rooting for him.  He’s saying things to these Pharisees that they would like to say, but would never consider saying because of their fear of the consequences.

The Pharisees give him the response that he was expecting to receive.  Verse 28 says, “And they reviled Him, and said, ‘You are His disciple, but we are disciples of Moses.’ ”  These Pharisees don’t realize it, but they have just paid this man a compliment.  He has already identified himself as a follower of Jesus and they have confirmed it!  Now they are really angry, and their pride takes over when they say “we are disciples of Moses.”  They lingered on the words “We” and “Moses” for the sake of emphasis because this is their prideful boasting.  At the same time, they put Jesus down by referring to Him as “that man” – that “nobody”.  That’s “hitting below the belt!”  Their actions are described by the wisest person in the Old Testament.  King Solomon said, in Proverbs 1:7, “Fools despise wisdom and instruction.”  An unknown person said these words:  “A wise man learns by the experience of others.  An ordinary man learns by his own experience.  A fool learns by nobody’s experience.”  The once-blind man learned by his own experience.  He was an ordinary man.  Where do the Pharisees fit into that illustration?  They certainly didn’t learn from the experience of others, in this case, the healed man.  They also didn’t learn from their own experiences in their conversations with the healed man and his parents.  That puts the Pharisees in the remaining category – “the fool who learns by nobody’s experience” because they have “despised wisdom and instruction”.

IV.  THE FINAL AND DECISIVE BLOW (verses 30-33)

It’s the end of the final round and God continues to give this healed man wisdom as he makes sarcastic remarks about their conclusions and expresses amazement at their lack of faith.  In verse 30, he begins his response by saying these words:  “Well, here is an amazing thing”.  He’s not referring to the miracle performed on his eyes but to their lack of faith.  He’s implying that their lack of faith is even more amazing than the miracle itself.  “You don’t know where He came from, and yet He opened my eyes.”  How can they refuse to believe in spite of all the evidence?  He knows why they are refusing to believe, but he decides to give them a basic course in logic to show them just how foolish they are.  In verse 31, the healed man presents the Pharisees with a concise summary of their own argument when he says, “We know that God does not hear sinners, but if anyone is God-fearing, and does His will, He hears him.”  I imagine that many of these Pharisees were nodding their heads in agreement thinking, “This man has finally come to his senses and is agreeing with us!”  However, he has set them up for the final and deciding blow.  This time it’s in the form of a history lesson – the history of medical treatments for the blind.  He says, in verse 32, “Since the beginning of time it has never been heard that anyone opened the eyes of a person born blind.”  It makes me shudder to think of all the experimental treatments and surgeries that were done throughout the centuries in an attempt to restore sight.  I don’t even want to think about the drastic consequences to those patients.  The success rate was zero in every case.  We also find no cases in the Old Testament scriptures where a blind person was healed.  That’s because the miracle of restoring sight to the blind was a miracle that was reserved for the coming Messiah.  Only He could perform such a miracle.  The Pharisees knew that information.  They were familiar with the prophecy in Isaiah 35 which says, “Behold, your God will come with vengeance; the recompense of God will come, but He will save you.  Then the eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.”  In Matthew 11, John the Baptist sent some of his disciples to ask Jesus this question:  “Are You the Expected One, or shall we look for someone else?  Jesus immediately replies to them saying, “Go and report to John what you hear and see; the blind receive sight and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them.  And blessed is he who keeps from stumbling over Me.”  That was sufficient information to convince John the Baptist that Jesus was the Messiah because He fulfilled the prophecies that were written about Him in the Scriptures.  These were prophecies that no one else had fulfilled nor could fulfill.

In verse 33, the healed man brings this controversy to its only logical conclusion when he says, “If this man were not from God, He could do nothing”. That was the decisive blow!  How do you respond to an argument that is so sound and logical?  How do you react to a statement that is so firmly rooted in the history and prophecies of the Old Testament scriptures?  The bout is over!  The winner hasn’t been announced, but everyone there knows who the winner is, especially the Pharisees who are still reeling from this TKO [Technical Knock-Out].

V.  THE PHARISEES’ RESPONSE (verse 34)

In their agony and shame, these Pharisees want this healed man out of their sight immediately and permanently.  Verse 34 says, “They answered and said to him, ‘You were born entirely in sins, and are you teaching us?’  And they put him out.”  He taught them alright!  He taught them a lesson they will never forget, even though they refused to believe it.  His battered opponents decided to make themselves the referees of this match.  However, they couldn’t declare themselves the winners because their viewing audience knew they were the losers.  They couldn’t ask for a rematch because everyone there knew he beat them “fair and square”.  They didn’t want to take the “walk of shame” again, as they and the scribes did in John 8:1-11, quietly leaving the synagogue with their heads bowed after losing the match with Jesus.  Their only other choice, in their minds, was to remove the evidence as quickly as possible  They couldn’t refute his arguments so they degraded him with their words and whisked him out of the synagogue.  Their last words to him may have been:  “Get out of here and don’t ever come back!”

CONCLUSION:

It’s easy to miss or overlook the greatest miracle in this passage of Scripture.  The most amazing miracle was not the unbelief of the Pharisees in spite of the obvious gift of sight to this congenitally blind man, nor was it the physical healing of this man’s eyes, nor the reprogramming of his brain so that he could see clearly.  The greatest miracle was the gift of spiritual sight or insight that caused this man to believe that Jesus was the Messiah and to commit his life to follow Jesus.  The rest of the passage of Scripture bears witness to the fact that this miracle of the new birth was real in his life.  He was ready and willing to testify on behalf of Christ in spite of the opposition and the potential consequences of his words.  It was obvious that he was a changed man and God gave him wisdom and empowered his testimony.

Do you have a personal testimony of a point in time when you responded to the truths in God’s Word, repented of your sins, asked Jesus Christ to come into your life and reign as King in your life, and began to follow Him?  Did you experience a new joy and peace in your life as a new child of God and a desire to share the source of that joy and peace with others?  Is God changing your life as you walk in obedience to His Word?  If your answer is “yes”, then you have experienced a miracle that never ends.  You will enjoy its effects during the rest of your life on this earth and throughout eternity.  I hope you are following the example of this man who received his sight and is delighted and unashamed to share his testimony of what Jesus Christ did in his life.

If this has not yet been your personal experience, please reconsider the claims of Christ written here in John’s gospel, and the miracles that substantiate those claims.  Ask God to open the spiritual eyes of your soul and give you a willing mind to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior and Lord and follow Him with all your heart.  He will give you a new life and will direct your steps as you yield to His control and His abiding presence in your life (John 10:27-30; 2 Corinthians 5:17)

CONSTRUCTION SITE:  COMPLETED

Thanks for stopping by this site.  There are over 150 completed sermons on my blog site and you are welcome to visit them all and use them for His glory.

 

 

 

TRADITION MEETS CONVICTION — John 9:13-23

John 9:13-23, Uncategorized

INTRODUCTION:

As you think of people in the Bible who were bullies, what names come to your mind?  I immediately thought of Goliath, the Philistine giant who defied the army of Israel, challenging them to send a man out to fight against him.  As he shouted at them and taunted them day after day, I Samuel 17:11 says, “Saul and all the Israelites were dismayed and terrified.”  Verse 24 says, “they ran from him in fear.”  Have you ever been bullied by a person or by a group of people?  Maybe you acted like a bully yourself at some point in your life.

In the previous sermon on John 9:1-12, we studied the healing of the man who was born blind and the negative reaction he received from his neighbors.  They refused to believe what had happened to him but they couldn’t deny or refute his testimony.  One of the major sources of frustration in people is limited resources.  The man’s neighbors didn’t have the theological training or experience to enable them to handle this situation.  In their pride, they were unwilling to give up the fight so they decided to take it to the next level.  This court case isn’t over yet!  They are taking it to the “Court of Appeals”.

I.  ADVANCE TO A HIGHER COURT (verse 13)

Verse 13 says, “They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind.”  By doing so, these Jews disobeyed the Law that God gave to Moses.  Deuteronomy 17:9-11 and Deuteronomy 19:17 states that it is the responsibility of the priests to interpret the law and settle disputes.  Instead, they went to the Pharisees, a sect of “separatists” that wasn’t even in existence when the Law of Moses was written.   The power structure in Jerusalem had changed over the years and the Scriptures were no longer the standard by which people were judged and instructed.

From a human standpoint, this healed man’s escort service was taking him to the ones who might fight for their cause and eliminate their frustrations.  The Pharisees were the “theological bullies” of that day, and when push comes to shove, they had the arguments, the interrogation tactics and the public status to get the job done.  Let’s see what happens next.

II.  THE SESSION BEGINS (verse 14-15)

Before the questioning begins, the apostle John reminds his readers of an important fact that is going to be the major focus of their questions.  He says in verse 14, “Now the day on which Jesus made the mud and opened the man’s eyes was the Sabbath.”  Jesus had broken “their Sabbath laws”, not God’s when He performed that miracle.

The “court” is now in session and the healed man has been placed on the witness stand.  The first question the Pharisees ask this man is the same question his neighbors asked him.  Verse 15 says, “Therefore, the Pharisees also asked him how he received his sight.”  How?  They are asking him for an explanation?  This was a miracle!  You can’t explain a miracle!  It’s an impossible event — something that only God could do!  By using the word “how”, the neighbors and the Pharisees were saying, We don’t believe you.  There’s got to be a logical explanation for this, so tell us what really happened.”

I have a personal, true story of a physical healing miracle that God performed in my life and there was an appropriate response to it.  Many years ago an echocardiogram showed that I had a leaking heart valve [mitral valve prolapse] and a regurgitating aortic valve.  The cardiologist put me on a medication to help relieve the symptoms and said that I would probably need a valve replacement within 10 years.  Fifteen years had passed and the leak did not become worse.  He told me that this happens in less than one-in-a-thousand cases.  One day, while driving home from work, I fainted with no warning other than the sound of a car horn.  When I opened my eyes, there were two paramedics looking through the windshield at me.  My blood pressure was 70/40.  No wonder I fainted!  Another echocardiogram was taken, and at the consult afterward, my cardiologist said the following words to me:  “I am not a believer in miracles but I can’t explain this in any other way.  Your heart valve is no longer leaking.  It’s completely healed.  The medication you take also lowers blood pressure.  When your heart valve suddenly stopped leaking, the medicine caused your blood pressure to drop quickly.  I know of no case where this has ever happened before.  There will be an article written about your case for a medical journal.”  That’s a doctor who now believes in miracles!  It’s been almost 25 years since that day and I have had no issues with my heart.  A miracle doesn’t require an explanation!  It just needs confirmation and a celebration!

The man who was healed gave the Pharisees a description of what happened, not an explanation, saying, “He put mud on my eyes and I washed, and now I see.”  It’s basically the same answer he gave to his neighbors, presented clearly and simply.  That should have been the end of the discussion; but as it turns out, it’s only the beginning.

III.  A DISAGREEMENT TAKES PLACE (verses 16-17a)

What follows is a completely new experience for this formerly blind man.  During all those years of sitting and begging at the gate to the temple, he must have listened to many discussions and disagreements among the priests, scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees.  Now, for the first time in his life, he gets to watch and listen to a disagreement among the Pharisees.  He gazes intently at the expressions on their faces and the gestures they make.  Even the slightest movement of their bodies is noticeable to him.

The apostle John describes this event in verse 16.  “Some of the Pharisees said, ‘This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.’  But others asked, ‘How can a sinner do such miraculous signs?’  So they were divided.”  As he watches and listens, this formerly blind man realizes which group holds the majority view and which has the minority view.  The first group is committed to their own traditions and laws.  They speak of Jesus as “this man” [this carpenter from Nazareth, this uneducated “nobody”].  It’s an expression of contempt and rejection.  Jesus’ miracles can’t be denied so they decide to ignore and reject them.  The second group of Pharisees responds by asking a question.  They are looking at the evidence of Jesus’ miracles and questioning whether their own beliefs and traditions about the Sabbath day are correct.  The evidence is obviously on the side of the second group, but experts say that the best way to win an argument is to shout louder than your opponent or opponents.   The Pharisees who raised that question are trying to be realistic and look at the situation objectively.  The other group must have been yelling as loudly as they could in order to defend their own interpretation of the law in spite of the evidence.  These Pharisees were demonstrating a second major cause of frustration:  not being able to have their own way.  As the saying goes, “If you want to be in the game, you have to play by our rules.”  They must have won the argument because we don’t read anything more about that argument in the verses that follow.  The minority must have joined the majority.

After having won that argument, the strict traditionalists among the Pharisees do something uncharacteristic of them:  they ask this beggar for his opinion about the matter.  Verse 17 says, “Finally, they turned again to the blind man, ‘What have you to say about him?  It was your eyes he opened’.”  These Pharisees wouldn’t ask advice from a beggar concerning religious issues.  If we had been there, standing next to that beggar, and had heard those words being spoken and watched the expressions on the faces of those Pharisees, I think we would have immediately realized that this was not a question but a challenge.  With an air of victory in their tone of voice, they said to him, “Are you going to give in as the others did, or do you want to try to take us on?”  They’re acting like bullies again!

IV.  A COURAGEOUS RESPONSE (verse 17b)

The man who received his sight is up to the challenge.  Based upon his limited understanding and his personal experience, he gives them a clear and immediate answer by saying, “He is a prophet”.  Notice what this man did not say.  He didn’t say, “I think he’s a prophet”, nor did he say, “He might be a prophet”.  There was no doubt in his mind and there’s no argument about his words.  Moses, Elijah, and Elisha were prophets, and they performed miracles as proof that they were sent by God.  This man is growing in his understanding of who Jesus is, and he’s not afraid to proclaim it out loud to these Pharisees, in spite of what they might do to him.

The man’s claim leaves them speechless.  They can’t deny that Jesus’ miracles are proof that He has the qualifications of a prophet sent from God.  There was also a popular saying and belief among the Jews in those days that a prophet could break the law of the sabbath, and be guiltless.  The Pharisees have traveled down another dead-end street.  Are they ready to give in and accept reality?  Not in your life! They are still struggling to maintain outward control of this situation.  They continue to give the impression that they know what they are doing.  In reality, however, they are at their wit’s end.  I can hear them saying to themselves, “What do we do now?”

V.  INTERROGATION OF THE PARENTS (verses 18-23)

Verse 18 begins with the words:  “The Jews still did not believe that he had been born blind and had received his sight until they sent for the man’s parents.”  They refuse to believe the evidence and the testimony of the blind man, so they seek some other way to discredit the man and the miracle. A thought comes to their minds:  “Why don’t we bring his parents in for questioning.  Maybe we can exert enough pressure on them and instill enough fear in them to cause them to deny that he is their son, or to state that he was not born blind.  Maybe we can compel them to say that his sight improved in some other way than a miracle by Jesus.  If we succeed, we might turn the people against Jesus by declaring this miracle to be a hoax and Jesus to be a false prophet.  It’s worth a try.”  The little word “until”, in verse 18, informs us that this idea is also doomed for failure. 

The parents are asked three questions:  “Is this your son?”, “Was he born blind?”, and “How does he now see?”.  The parents answered the first two questions without hesitation.  They knew that he was their son and they knew that he was born blind.  The parents of the blind man didn’t answer the third question for two reasons.  First, they were not eye-witnesses.  Therefore they could not give legal evidence.  The second reason is given in verse 22.  The man’s parents “were afraid of the Jews, for already the Jews had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ would be put out of the synagogue.”  That’s a terrible thought and a dreadful experience.  The phrase, “put out of the synagogue”  is similar to that of excommunication but the consequences are even worse.  The person was excluded from the synagogue worship services and treated like a leper.  He was excluded from all contact with other Jews and had to keep a distance of at least 4 cubits (6 feet) from one’s spouse and friends.  When such people died, they were given no funeral.  It was a social, economic and religious disgrace.  Depending upon the degree of the offense, this punishment could be temporary (30 days) or permanent over a person’s lifetime.  In this case, it appears that the Jewish leaders were threatening the followers of Jesus Christ with a permanent excommunication.

So the man’s parents responded by saying, “But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don’t know.  Ask him.  He is of age; he will speak for himself.”  End of discussion.  By reminding these Pharisees of the laws of testimony and evidence, his parents just closed the door of opportunity.  “Plan B” failed.  In the next message, we are going to discover that the Jews follow the parents’ advice and set up another interview with the blind man.  It’s the end of round two but the fight isn’t over yet.  There’s one more round to go.  “Plan C” is on the drawing board.  We’ll see how the fight ends and determine the winner as we study John 9:24-41.

CONCLUSION: 

In Exodus 34:8, Moses is speaking to God and he calls the people of Israel a “stiff-necked people”.  The Hebrew word literally means “hard-necked”.  It was used in the Old Testament and the New Testament to refer to an ox which stubbornly refused to respond to its owner’s prodding with the ox-goad that was in his hand.  An ox-goad is a long, light-weight pole with an iron spike at the end of it.  The farmer would hit the ox on one side of the neck or the other to get the ox to turn in that direction.  Some oxen would stubbornly refuse to do so.  You’ve probably heard the phrase, “As stubborn as an ox”.  Like the stiff-necked ox, these Pharisees were determined to go in their own direction in spite of the evidence and the prodding of Jesus to follow the way of the Father who sent Him. 

I hope that’s not a description of you at this moment.  If so, please ask God to open your eyes to the truths in His Word and respond in faith and obedience to His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.  He will turn your stubbornness into enthusiasm and wholehearted obedience to Him.   

CONSTRUCTION SITE: COMPLETED

May God open your eyes to new truths in His Word and new applications to your own life.