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Unlocking the New Testament Part 5 - John 1

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it's the story of how God was seeking a

bride for his son each book is different

from every other book I'm trying to give

you the keys for you to unlock it for [Music]

[Music]

yourself well now we've been talking

about the Bible is a library made up of

many different kinds of books and there

are two facets of the Bible that we need

to hold in Balance first of all there's

a variety and secondly there's a unity

and the variety is due to the fact that

there are 40 different authors in the

Bible spread over a period of about

1,400 years and writing in three

languages and not one of them realized

that were writing the Bible not one but

there's a great variety because the Holy

Spirit did not use people as if they

were word processors do you understand

what I'm saying he used their

personality and their different styles

so there's a great Variety in scripture

and yet through it all there runs a

Unity that's because it had one Divine

editor so it had 40 human authors and

one Divine editor and that means we've

got variety and unity now different

groups of Christians are afraid of one

or the other

liberal Christians as we call them are

afraid of the unity of scripture they

want to be able to pick and choose and

set one part against another and tear it

to pieces and read the Bible with a pair

of scissors in their hand and cut out

what doesn't fit in but Evangelical

Christians are afraid of the

variety they're afraid of finding

contradictions or of

inconsistencies and there are apparent

differences that you need to study very

closely to resolve and we are studying

together the variety of

scripture and we're finding that each

book is different from every other book

I find that enriches the Bible for me

when you just pick texts out of the

Bible you're treating it as a Unity

almost a

uniformity as if it's all just one book

with one message in one style with one

content but it isn't it's a library of

different books and so we come to John's gospel

gospel

of course the Bible being the word of

God reflects God himself and in God

himself there is variety and

unity the father and the son are

different from each other and the spirit

is different from father and son and yet

we believe in one God there's an

incredible Unity there even with the

variety and that's reflected in God's

word there are different personalities

writing scripture each with their own

insight and their own style and yet

somehow the Holy Spirit the Divine

editor has brought a beautiful Unity to

this whole library and if you read the

first three chapters of the Bible and

the last two chapters of the Bible as

Genesis 1:3 and Revelation 21 and 22

you'll be astonished how they hang

together you'd think the same person

wrote both and was just tying all up all

the loose ends up right at the end well

now the first thing that hits you with

John is what a contrast there is to what

we call the synoptics the synoptic The

View together the first three gospels

all look at Jesus from one side as it

were Matthew Mark and Luke all look at

Jesus from one side whereas John seems

to be looking from quite a different

point of view so they are synoptic

they're all looking together but John is

looking from Another Side I'll take it a

little further these are looking at the

outside of Jesus whereas John is looking

at the inside of Jesus remember what I

said in the last talk on Matthew that

there are three phases of interest in a

great man who's lived the phase number

one their interest is in what he did

phase number two in what he said but

phase number three is in what he was and

John belongs to phase three he's looking

at Jesus from the

inside what was he like what was his

real real

person now the contrast can be drawn out

specifically in five ways first of all

John omits a lot of material that there

is in the first three gospels now is he

omitting it because it's already been

said so well and so frequently or is he

omitting it for a special reason we

shall find it's a special reason but

here is what he's omitted there's no

mention of the conception or birth of

Jesus in John there's no mention of his

baptism there's no mention of his

Temptations there's no mention of any

casting out of demons there's no mention

of the

Transfiguration when he took Peter James

and John up the mountain there's no

mention of the Last Supper of the bread

and the wine there's no mention of

Gethsemane and the struggle that Jesus

had in Gethsemane there's no mention of the

the

Ascension now perhaps you never noticed

that because when you read the Bible you

don't notice what's not there but it's

rather important to notice what's not

there why should he leave all those out

because they were irrelevant to what he

wanted to say he's said telling us

something quite different from the other

gospels and there was no point in

including all

that there are only seven miracles in

John whereas in the other gospels there

are dozens

There is almost no mention of the

Kingdom in John that is a surprise

because it's everywhere in the other

three in fact the word only occurs twice

once when Jesus is talking to Nicodemus

and says unless you're born again you

can't see the kingdom of God and the

other was to pilate where he said my

kingdom is not of this world but apart

from that never mentions the

kingdom well that's the first contrast

now look at the

second just as there are omissions there

are some very important additions of the

seven miracles that John mentions five

are completely

new only two are repetitions five are

new they start with water into wine and

they finish with the raising of Lazarus

now why has John made a totally

different selection of the

Miracles and one clue is that he doesn't

call The Miracles he calls calls them

signs and a sign always points to

something Beyond

itself and he sees the Miracles as very

significant now you see the ordinary

person is only interested in seeing the

miracle John is interested in saying

what does that Miracle point

to and he looks through the miracle

Beyond it to try and understand what

it's saying and so he calls the miracles

signs and he chooses the miracle

that are the clearest signs to what he

wants to point his readers

to so there are additions Peter and the

foot washing only occurs in the fourth

gospel that's very important story to

him uh as far as the people go most of

the stories about people in John are about

about

individuals Jesus talking one to one the

woman at the well of Samaria or

Nicodemus or whoever whereas in the

other gospels he's talking to

crowds great crowds follow him and

listen to him but in John he's talking

one to one all the time

furthermore there are these seven big

statements in John about Jesus himself I

am I am the bread of Heaven I am the

light of the world I am the Good

Shepherd I am the door I am the

resurrection and the life I am the way

the truth and the life I am

the True Vine now how come the other

writers missed those that to me is

almost incredible such important

statements and yet the other three

somehow forgot them it they just didn't

but with John those are among the most

important things Jesus ever said because

they are signs pointers to who he was

which is John's interest

then there is a change of

emphasis the other gospels based as they

are on the outline of Mark tend to use

his framework of 30 months in the North

in Galilee followed by 6 months in the

South but John is quite different almost

all of John is in the

South and interestingly enough earlier

rather than later now again there

appears to be a contradiction Matthew

Mark and Luke say Jesus spent the first

30 months of his life in the north of

his ministry in the north yet John is

saying he was in the south at that time

and again liberal Scholars love to point

to the fact here's a contradiction so

they can't both be historically

accurate but actually if you read John

carefully you'll find that Jesus did go

south from the beginning but for the

feasts like a good Jew he went up to

Jerusalem three times a year and John

concentrates on his visit South rather

than what he did in the North during

that earlier period so there's no

contradiction John is highlighting those

three visits a year to the Feast of

Tabernacles for example which none of

the others even mentions but Jesus went

up for that feast and said some pretty

important things at

it so you getting the feel of the

difference let's go to a a fourth thing the

the

style there are no short

Parables instead Jesus seems to be

involved in Endless arguments in Long

discourses instead of the simple short

stories and it does seem that when Jesus

went South he changed his style of teaching

teaching

altogether largely because in the South

he was involved in arguments all the

time with the Jews about who he

was uh John chapter 8 is a very uh good

example of this where the Jews say very

nastily to Jesus they say we know who

our father

is and then they say again and we are

not illegitimate children we're not

bastards now that was nasty wasn't it

but Jesus answered it by saying I know

who my father is you don't know him but

I know him

and the whole thing is a discussion a

dialogue a very hot argument between

Jesus and the Jews which brings me to a

very important point when we read in

John's gospel that the Jews hated Jesus

that Jesus was always arguing with the

Jews that the Jews crucified him we make

the very big mistake of applying that

phrase to the whole

nation and alas it's caused

anti-Semitism for 2,000

years and it's very sad the history of

Christian attitude to Jews you killed

Jesus but listen when John says the Jews he

means the

southerners the

judeans he does not mean the

galileans now do you understand what

I've just said that's very very

important John who was himself a Jew as

was Jesus as were all the apostles was

not saying we're all involved in this

what he was saying it was the judeans

were the ones that Jesus couldn't get on

with whenever he went South he bumped

into the Jews and that simply means

Judean do you follow me very very

important that you realize that John's

gospel is not

anti-semitic but Jewish people do not

like John's gospel because so many

Christians have used it to say you Jews

kill Jesus but no many Jews loved Jesus

and followed him and started the church

for us so let's be objective in our

judgments the Jews are the people in the

South so there's a difference in style

long discourses discussion of theology

rather than ethics or discussion of what

we believe rather than how to behave

there's very little in John about how

we're to behave whereas in Matthew there

was a whole lot but it's about what we believe

believe

and finally there's a big difference in

Outlook and this is a little more

difficult to

explain Hebrew and Greek thinking are

very different from each other and I'm

going to be mentioning this again and

again as we look at different books of

the Bible trouble is our Western

education is so Greek that we read the

Bible with Greek spectacles and Hebrews

are so different now as far as John's

gospel goes it's a bit of a mixture of

the two and John was writing this in a

very Greek world he was writing it in a

town called Ephesus in Western turkey as

it now is it was Asia Minor then and it

was a mixture of Greek and Hebrew there

and John mixes them a bit from this

point of view the Hebrews worked with a

horizontal line of

time in their thinking past present and

future The God Who was and is and is to

come and all that thinking is on this

timeline and time has purpose and

progress Greeks didn't think like that

they thought on a vertical line of

space above and below Heaven and

Earth now when you think in Hebrew terms

you're into a line of history and time

is important and it's traveling in One

Direction and it's going somewhere and

God has decided where it's going he

started off he'll finish it off of but

you're thinking all the time in terms of

past present and future and the first

three gospels Matthew Mark and Luke are

on that sort of

timeline but John while he doesn't leave

it behind because he's Jewish

nevertheless he thinks primarily in his

Gospel of the vertical line between

Heaven and Earth above and below no man

came can go up into heaven except he who

came down from heaven he even the son of

man who is in heaven but you see the

kind of vertical

thinking Jesus is from above and he's

come to the below he's come down that's

that's the thinking it's an up and down

gospel whereas the others are a now and

then gospel do you see the difference

now John is both but there's a big

emphasis on I came from above this other

world and that's very Greek thinking the

other world and this world that kind of

thinking and so there's a difference in

Outlook as well now let's uh go a bit

further that's that difference there the

time the horizontal line is very much

Hebrew present and future and the key

word in that horizontal thinking is age

the present evil age the age to come

which we looked at in Matthew the key

World here is heaven and The World God

so loved the world that he gave his only

begotten son to come down from Heaven to

Earth to save us vertical thinking the

major emphasis of the Bible is on

this but as we shall see in a number of

books particularly Hebrews when we get

to that there's a great emphasis on the

vertical line the up and down and a

combination of the two

really well that's the differences now

let's look at the person who wrote it to

get his angle on it and it's someone

very very special a fisherman who ran

his own retail business selling it as

well as far as we know he fished in

Galilee but he clearly had connections

in Jerusalem and it's almost certain

that that he had a retail business for

selling the fish in Jerusalem once he'd

caught them in Galilee he certainly was

a man of Two Worlds he was a man of the

North and the South whereas most of the

apostles were northerners in fact the

only real Southerner in the 12 was Judas

of Kio or Judas is scariot and he was a

misfit anyway as we know Jesus found his

real support in the north but John was a

bridge between north and south and he

clearly had influential connections down

in the South now of the 12 disciples I

don't know if you ever realized that at

least five and probably seven were

jesus' own physical

relatives and that's really quite a

tribute to Jesus isn't it that he

managed to get so many of his family but

not of his immediate family until after

his resurrection none of his immediate

family believed in him none of his four

brothers or his

sisters after the resurrection they

became some of his best missionaries and

two of them wrote part of the New

Testament James and Jude but before his

immediate brothers and sisters didn't

believe but his cousins did and it was

from his cousins that he got at least

five and seven p seven of his 12

Apostles now out of those he had three

very close ones Peter and James and

John and out of those three he had one

special now Jesus didn't have favorites

but he did have these inner circles and

this one special and whenever they sat

at a meal of course they didn't sit at

chairs with their feet out of sight

under the table as we do they lay

sideways and their feet were right next

the face of the next person that's why

you had to have your feet wash before a

meal since we stick our feet under the

table we just wash our hands but they

had to wash feet but it meant that you

were leaning on someone's

chest and literally the person who

leaned on the host chest was the bosom

pal the bosom friend the closest and

whenever the disciples sat at a table

John was in that

position and in a very modest way he

doesn't name this but throughout the

gospel he says the disciple whom Jesus

loved this is the one I was the closest

furthermore he was not only the closest

to Jesus but he was the last surviving

Apostle the last one to know Jesus

personally all the others had been

assassinated by the time he wrote this

book so he had to get it down quickly

since he was the CEST and he'd known

Jesus better than any of the others he'd

been in a position to whisper to him

time and again he' had a private

conversation even when they were

together with the others so he had this

unique Insight he's now an old man and

at the end of his gospel he he retells

the story of how

Peter with typical

curiosity putting his nose into other

people's business asked what was going

to happen to John after Jesus had told

Peter you are going to be crucified

Peter and Peter lived with that

knowledge for 30

years and then dear o Peter says and

what's going to happen to John and Jesus

reply was mind your own business

Peter he said if I decide that he will

still be around when I return that's

none of your business Peter you follow

me and from that day a rumor went round

that Jesus would come back before John

died but that was not what Jesus said

and John says so at the end of his

gospel that's not what Jesus meant he

was just telling Peter to mind his own

business but John did survive and maybe

that was why Jesus put his mother in

John's charge always wondered why the

brothers and sisters didn't take Mary

over but they were killed for

Jesus and

Jesus kept John not just to look after

his mother I Think Jesus kept John from

assassination because he wanted

someone to keep the knowledge alive that

personal knowledge of

himself and ultimately obviously led him

to write it down and that's how the

gospel came to us so he doesn't hesitate

to expend jesus' words that's a bit of a

problem to some readers he paraphrases

what Jesus said to bring out the full

meaning of it

really believes he knows jesus' mind so

well that he can expand what he said for

example John 316 for God so loved the

world that he gave his only begotten son

you know the verse who said

that it's it's a strange thing for Jesus

to say it's kind of a third person

talking about Jesus in a rather indirect

way for Jesus to say for God so loved

the world that he gave his only begotten

son it's something that someone would

say about about Jesus and yet in chapter

3 it's on jesus' lips apparently that's

the kind of thing you'll find all the

way through John John is expanding what

Jesus said because he really understood

what it meant and he draws out the

implications almost putting it into the

mouth of Jesus but he's paraphrasing

he's interpreting for us what Jesus said

and the Holy Spirit is guiding him to do

so so I don't have a problem with that

but it does mean that sometimes you're

wondering is this Jesus talking or is it

John expanding what he said it could be

either but it's still the true word of

God and inspired for

us now we come to the purpose for which

he wrote and that's the real key and

just as Matthew gave us the purpose at

the end of his gospel about discipling

the Nations and teaching them to observe

all that I've commanded so at the end of

John's gospel as we had read earlier

this morning we have the reason the

whole world isn't big enough for the

books if everything Jesus said and did

were written down but these have been

written in other words I've selected

what I've written out of all the

material I've carefully selected these

things for this purpose that you might

believe that Jesus is the Christ the son

of the Living God and that believing you

might have life in his name now I'm

going to retranslate that for you I'm

sure you know the New Testament was

written in Greek and Greek is not the

same as English and there are peculiar

tenses of the verb in Greek it's such a

tragedy that they don't always come out

in English there is one tense of the

verb which to me is crucial and it is

called the present continuous

tense and it means to go on doing

something and to translate into English

you've got to add the tool little words go

on for example Jesus didn't say ask and

you'll receive seek and you'll find

knock and it will be open to you he

actually said go on asking and you'll

receive go on seeking and you'll find go

on knocking and it will be open to you

and somebody says to me you know I once

asked for the Holy Spirit and nothing

happened I say but Jesus said go on

asking how much more will your heavenly

father give the Holy Spirit to those who

go go on asking him and if you really

want something you go on asking don't

you when our children wanted bicycles

Daddy can we have

bicycles then not yet week later

everybody else has a bicycle week later

save bus feds if we had bicycle they

they go on asking and in the context of

Luke 11 where Jesus said go on asking

for the Holy Spirit he talked about a

neighbor knocking at someone's door and

going on knocking until he got them out

of bed and got what he wanted so go on

now then listen to the verse I've just

quoted properly translated these are

written that you may go on believing

that Jesus is the son of God and going

on believing you will go on having

life listen to John 3:16 it'll change it

it may wreck it for you but listen for

God so loved the world that he gave his

only begotten son that whoever goes on

believing will never perish but go on

having eternal

life that changed it for you it should

have done it's not whoever once believes

it's whoever goes on believing I'm sure

you've heard this of Ephesians 5:18 go

on being filled with the spirit that's

the same tense the faith that saves you

is the faith that goes on

believing the faith you had yesterday

won't save you today

Faith you had 20 years ago won't save you

you

tomorrow faith is to go on

believing and that's the purpose and so

John was not written so that you may

come to believe that Jesus is the son of

God but so that you will may go on it's

written for mature Christians to hold

them to their faith so that they never

depart from their understanding of who

Jesus is and Will Go On Believing and

therefore go on having life

and eternal life is both a quantity and

a quality of

life it's both Everlasting and

abundant and it's a quantitative and

qualitative adjective is eternal it's

not just to go on living it's to go on

living really living the Irish have a

greeting I love the greeting may you

live all the days of your

life now that's what Jesus came to do he

came precisely so that we could live all

our lives

and really live and have life more

abundantly but you only do that as you

go on

believing doesn't happen if you just

believed once 20 years ago you will

enjoy eternal life today if you are

believing in Jesus

today and you'll enjoy eternal life

tomorrow if you go on believing and if

you go on believing you will never

perish but go on having eternal life

this is so important because this sort

of one saved always saved thing is such

a neat cliche

and it's not to be found in the New

Testament incidentally but people are

resting on years ago when they give

their testony they can only talk about

years ago you know and they're they're

resting in a false security it's my

faith today that saves me today my faith

tomorrow that saves me tomorrow go on

believing and you go on having life

that's why John wrote his gospel so

let's look at this thing called

believing there are three aspects to

Faith in John's gospel and in his

letters incidentally but we're just

looking at John's gospel now now the

three aspects by the way this verb

believing occurs 98 times in this gospel

that is far far more than the other

three put together even Matthew though I

told you Faith was a characteristic of

Matthew nearly 100 times John talks

about believing and it's the verb he

uses not the noun he rarely talks about

faith he always talks about believing

because believing is something you do

believing is something active it's a

verb not a noun it's not something you

have it's something you do and so he's

always using the verb but there are

three dimensions to believing in John

and unfortunately many people don't

always get the three dimensions I've

given them uh rather complicated names

just for a bit of alliteration but don't

worry about that alliteration is the

province of fools poets and Plymouth

Brethren I've been told well I don't

know but let's let's look at these three

words first of all

Credence that means to believe that

something is true the key word there is

that to believe that Jesus died to

believe that he rose again it's it's

believing in certain historical

facts it is accepting the credit ability

of the Gospel accepting the

truth but of course that's not saving

Faith because uh anybody could say that

they believe that's something I know a

budar who sings

hymns belongs to an old lady in Cardiff

and can sing a whole verse of what a

friend we have in

Jesus and when visitors come to this old

folks home they hear a little voice

saying what a friend we have in Jesus

and they look around they look around

and here's this budg in a cage and they

push money through the bars of the cage

for some reason and the lady who owns it

sends the money to a missionary in

Africa now that budgie is doing more

than most church

members because it is actually praising

God every day and it's supporting a

missionary in Africa see and the old

lady has sent £175

£175

already you see it's just a budar it's

not a

Believer and the an awful lot of

budgerigars in church saying

the saying the Creed saying the Creed

and yes I believe

that and the Creed is I believe that but

see that's only the beginning of Faith

to accept the truth the devil believes

the truth too he accepts it and he

trembles at least he does that about it

he's not a Believer so believing that

something is the beginning of faith and

accepting the truth the words and works

of Jesus but then it must move into

confidence to believe in someone how

me not very great

response how many of you believe that I

exist there now you see word the appeal

properly you get a bigger

response but you see believing that I

exist is one thing that's Credence you

find that credible but believing in me I

don't even know if those who

hesitatingly put up their hands actually

do if you give me all your money to look

after I'll believe it to believe in

someone you've got to do something to

show them you trust them you follow me

that you have confidence in

them and that's to believe in Jesus

accepting the truth is the first step

doing it by trusting and obeying shows

Jesus you trust him if you do what he

tells you you've got confidence in him

but even that is not enough there is

this third dimension which I've already

mentioned which is to go on believing

and invariably this verb in John is in

this present continuous tense which

means to continue believing in both the

Greek and the Hebrew languages faith and

faithfulness are the same

word and you sometimes you don't know

which it means in other words if you

really trust someone you will go on trus

trusting them whatever happens do you

follow me if you are really full of

Faith then you will be

faithful you'll go on believing in

someone whatever

happens and whatever it costs now that's

faith in the fourth Testament it's not

just accepting the truth and doing the

truth it's holding the

truth and he says you will really be my

disciples if you hold on to what I say

and you will know the truth and the

truth will set you

free and holding is a vital dimension of

Faith because you can make shipwreck of your

your

faith many do they don't hang on there

hold in so accepting the truth is

Credence doing the truth confidence

holding the truth continuance going on

being faithful as well as full of faith

and those two words as I said are

exactly the same so we come to this

matter of

Truth and pilate in this gospel says to

Jesus what is

truth that's the question that is being

asked in our relativistic age today

people are saying what is truth who

knows you've got your opinion I've got

mine what is truth the amazing thing is

that the answer was standing six feet in

front of pilot

because truth is not a proposition truth

is a

person that's the great revelation of

John's gospel people think truth is

something it isn't it's

someone and if you want to know the

truth then you need to have personal

knowledge of this

person and therefore the most important

question you can ever ask is what do you

think of

Jesus or as the Jews said to him in

chapter 8 here in Jerusalem they said

who do you think you

are that's the most important question

you can ever ask of

Jesus well now inevitably as people died

who knew him personally rumors and

legends began to creep

in and speculation came in about Jesus

especially in the city of Ephesus where

John the elderly man was writing this very

very

gospel I don't know if you are aware

that there are many other gospels that

you don't have in your

Bible the Gospel of Thomas is one a

whole lot of them there are weird

stories in those gospels there's one

gospel that says Jesus as a little boy

was playing in the street in Nazareth

and somebody pushed him over into the

mud and he pulled himself up and he

cursed the boy with Leprosy who had

pushed him into the

mud then there's another story about him

fashioning little birds out of clay and

then blessing them and they flew away

way all of this in his childhood

actually Jesus didn't do a single

Miracle until he was 30 because he

couldn't do them without the power of

the Holy Spirit Jesus didn't do Miracles

as the Son of God but as the son of man

filled with the spirit that's why he

said what I'm doing you can do too so we

know these are false and all these

Legends and rumors that gather around

great people were starting together but

in particular there were two things that

were beginning to be said which were

false about Jesus and John had to write

his gospel to correct them and I'm not

going to tell you what they are we're

going to finish there and next talk

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